1 Corinthians 3:16
Bible text: King James Version (1769 Blayney text) · Public domain
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible · Public domain
Bible text: American Standard Version (1901) · Public domain
Bible text: World English Bible, Messianic edition · Public domain
Bible text: Geneva Bible (1599) · Public domain
Bible text: Young's Literal Translation · Public domain
- ΟὐκOukSurelyG3756PRT-NNegative Particle Negative
- οἴδατεoidateyou knowG1492V-RAI-2PVerb Perfect Active Indicative 2nd Plural
- ὅτιhotithatG3754CONJConjunction
- ναὸςnaostempleG3485N-NSMNoun Nominative Singular Masculine
- θεοῦtheouof GodG2316N-GSM-TNoun Genitive Singular Masculine Title
- ἐστεesteyou yourselves areG1510V-PAI-2PVerb Present Active Indicative 2nd Plural
- καὶkaiandG2532CONJConjunction
- τὸtotheG3588T-NSNDefinite article Nominative Singular Neuter
- πνεῦμαpneumaSpiritG4151N-NSNNoun Nominative Singular Neuter
- τοῦtou[the]G3588T-GSMDefinite article Genitive Singular Masculine
- θεοῦtheouof GodG2316N-GSM-TNoun Genitive Singular Masculine Title
- οἰκεῖoikeidwellsG3611V-PAI-3SVerb Present Active Indicative 3rd Singular
- ἐνeninG1722PREPPreposition
- ὑμῖν;huminyouG4771P-2DPPersonal pronoun Dative 2nd Plural
English is a literal word-by-word gloss of the Greek, not the KJV's wording. Why?
This is the original text the KJV's translators worked from — each Greek word with its own literal English meaning in this verse, prepared by scholars at Tyndale House, Cambridge. The KJV translates whole sentences, not word by word, so its wording differs: one Greek word can become several English words, and the KJV may choose “charity” where the gloss reads “love”. Both are faithful — they answer different questions. For the KJV's own rendering, switch to the KJV text.
Words in [ ] are added by the English.
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Public-domain commentary
Matthew Henry
From his Commentary on the Whole Bible. Henry wrote on whole passages, and this entry covers 1 Corinthians 3:16–17.
Here the apostle resumes his argument and exhortation, founding it on his former allusion, You are God's building, 1 Corinthians 3:9, and here, Know you not that you are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile (corrupt and destroy) the temple of God, him shall God destroy (the same word is in the original in both clauses); for the temple of God is holy, which temple you are. It looks from other parts of the epistle, where the apostle argues to the very same purport (see 1 Corinthians 6:13-20), as if the false teachers among the Corinthians were not only loose livers, but taught licentious doctrines, and what was particularly fitted to the taste of this lewd city, on the head of fornication. Such doctrine was not to be reckoned among hay and stubble, which would be consumed while the person who laid them on the foundation escaped the burning; for it tended to corrupt, to pollute, and destroy the church, which was a building erected for God, and consecrated to him, and therefore should be kept pure and holy. Those who spread principles of this sort would provoke God to destroy them. Note, Those who spread loose principles, that have a direct tendency to pollute the church of God, and render it unholy and unclean, are likely to bring destruction on themselves. It may be understood also as an argument against their discord and factious strifes, division being the way to destruction. But what I have been mentioning seems to be the proper meaning of the passage: Know you not that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? It may be understood of the church of Corinth collectively, or of every single believer among them; Christian churches are temples of God. He dwells among them by his Holy Spirit. They are built together for a habitation of God through the Spirit, Ephesians 2:22. Every Christian is a living temple of the living God. God dwelt in the Jewish temple, took possession of it, and resided in it, by that glorious cloud that was the token of his presence with that people. So Christ by his Spirit dwells in all true believers. The temple was devoted and consecrated to God, and set apart from every common to a holy use, to the immediate service of God. So all Christians are separated from common uses, and set apart for God and his service. They are sacred to him - a very good argument this against all fleshly lusts, and all doctrines that give countenance to them. If we are the temples of God, we must do nothing that shall alienate ourselves from him, or corrupt and pollute ourselves, and thereby unfit ourselves for his use; and we must hearken to no doctrine nor doctor that would seduce us to any such practices. Note, Christians are holy by profession, and should be pure and clean both in heart and conversation. We should heartily abhor, and carefully avoid, what will defile God's temple, and prostitute what ought to be sacred to him.
Historical interpretation
Four Centuries of Reception
17 surviving comments on this verse. Each one is dated, so this reads as a timeline rather than a list.
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If you defile your flesh, you will also defile the Holy Spirit; and if you defile your flesh and spirit, you will not live.
For thus, according to the holy apostle, the sin of fornication is perpetrated against the body, as involving also sin against the temple of God.
Whence also he says, that this handiwork is "the temple of God "thus declaring: "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man, therefore, will defile the temple of God, him will God destroy: for the temple of God is holy, which
What, then, shall we say of the Gnostic himself? "Know ye not "says the apostle, "that ye are the temple of God? "
In Platonic phrase, indeed, the body is a prison, but in the apostle's it is "the temple of God," because it is in Christ.
"Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? " Now, since man is the property, and the work, and the image and likeness of the Creator, having his flesh, formed by Him of the ground, and his soul of His afflatus, it follows that Marcion's god wholly dwells in a temple which belongs to another, if so be we are not the Creator's temple.
However, let me meanwhile add that in the same passage Paul "carries about in his body the marks of the Lord Jesus; " he also forbids our body to be profaned, as being "the temple of God; " he makes our bodies "the members of Christ; " and he exhorts us to exalt and "glorify God in our body.
For since, by the introduction into an appropriation (in) us of the Holy Spirit, we are all" the temple of God," Modesty is the sacristan and priestess of that temple, who is to suffer nothing unclean or profane to be introduced (into it), for fear that the God who inhabits it should be offended, and quite forsake the polluted abode.
Or shall we "in that day" produce (our) marriage certificates before the Lord's tribunal, and allege that a marriage such as He Himself has forbidden has been duly contracted? What is prohibited (in the passage just referred to) is not "adultery; "It is not "fornication." The admission of a strange man (to your couch) less violates "the temple of God," less commingles "the members of Christ" with the members of an adulteress.
And, accordingly, why excuse it on the ground of pristine precedent? It did not bear the names of "body of Christ," of "members of Christ," of "temple of God," at the time When it used to obtain pardon for adultery.
(He it is) who even in the first (Epistle) was the first of all (the apostles) to dedicate the temple of God: "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that in you the Lord dwells? " -who likewise, for the consecrating and purifying (of) that temple, wrote the law pertaining to the temple-keepers: "If any shall have marred the temple of God, him shall God mar; for the temple of God is holy, which (temple) are ye.
For inasmuch as the Apostle Paul says again, "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? " -even although love urged us less to bring help to the brethren, yet in this place we must have considered that it was the temples of God which were taken captive, and that we ought not by long inactivity and neglect of their suffering to allow the temples of God to be long captive, but to strive with what powers we can, and to act quickly by our obedience, to deserve well of Christ our Judge and Lord and God. For as the Apostle Paul says, "As many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ," Christ is to be contemplated in our captive brethren, and He is to be redeemed from the peril of captivity who redeemed us from the peril of death; so that He who took us out of the jaws of the devil, who abides and dwells in us, may now Himself be rescued and redeemed from the hands of barbarians by a sum of money-who redeemed us by His cross and blood-who suffers these things to happen for this reason, that our faith may be tried, whether each one of us will do for another what he would wish to be done for himself, if he himself were held captive among barbarians. For who that is mindful of humanity, and reminded of mutual love, if he be a father, will not now consider that his sons are there; if he be a husband, will not think that his wife is there kept captive, with as much grief as shame for the marriage tie? But how great is the general grief among all of us, and suffering concerning the peril of virgins who are kept there, on whose behalf we must bewail not only the loss of liberty, but of modesty; and must lament the bonds of barbarians less than the violence of seducers and abominable places, lest the members dedicated to Christ, and devoted for ever in honour of continence by modest. virtue, should be sullied by the Just and contagion of the insulter.
That even a baptized person loses the grace that he has attained, unless he keep innocency. In the Gospel according to John: "Lo, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing happen unto thee." Also in the first Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians: "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God abideth in you? If any one violate the temple of God, him will God destroy." Of this same thing in the Chronicles: "God is with you, while ye are with Him: if ye forsake Him, He will forsake you."
It is necessarily the case that God lives in his own temple. Note that because he says that the Spirit of God lives in us, the word God must be taken to refer to the Holy Spirit [in this verse].
"Know ye not that ye are the Temple of God?" For since he had discoursed in the section before, concerning those who were dividing the Church, he thenceforward attacks him also who had been guilty of uncleanness; not indeed as yet in plain terms but in a general way; hinting at his corrupt mode of life and enhancing the sin, by the Gift which had been already given to him. Then also he puts all the rest to shame, arguing from these very blessings which they had already: for this is what he is ever doing, either from the future or from the past, whether grievous or encouraging. First, from things future; "For the day shall declare it, because it is revealed by fire." Again, from things already come to pass; "Know ye not that ye are the Temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?"
The one who believes in Christ receives the Holy Spirit, who dwells in him by the washing of rebirth, and thus he is spiritual. But if such people then turn around and serve worldly passions, in that respect they are carnal. Paul says that those who have become spiritual according to their confession of faith may nevertheless still live as though they were carnal so as to become an insult to the Holy Spirit who dwells in them.
And again he says: "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy."
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This verse
Paul reminds the Corinthians of what they already know, that as a church they are God’s temple because the Spirit of God dwells among them.
“Know ye not”
A question that expects the answer yes, with eídō, “know”. The Corinthians had been taught this already, and Paul’s question rebukes them for living as if they had forgotten it.
“that ye are the temple of God,”
The “ye are” (esté) is plural and addresses the church at Corinth together. The word for temple, naós, is the sanctuary itself, the house where God dwells, as distinct from the whole temple enclosure.
“and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?”
This is what makes the church a temple. The verb oikéō means to live in a house as one’s home, and the Spirit lives among his people.
The Church Is God’s Holy Temple
1 Corinthians 3:16–17
Summary
Paul reminds a church torn by rivalries of something they should already know. Together they are the temple of God, because the Spirit of God lives among them. Then he warns that God will destroy anyone who ruins that temple, since it is holy, and he says plainly who the temple is: “which temple ye are.” In two verses we learn where God dwells now, how highly he values his people, and how seriously he takes any harm done to them.
Ye are the temple of God
Paul writes these words to believers who have lined up behind different leaders. In 1 Corinthians 1–3 some say they follow Paul, some Apollos and some Cephas, and Paul answers that every minister is only a servant through whom God works, and that the wisdom of this world stands against the wisdom of God shown in the cross. He calls their quarrelling a sign that they are still carnal, babes who can take only milk (1 Corinthians 3:1–4). Then he pictures the church as a building. He laid the foundation, which is Jesus Christ, others build on it with gold, silver and precious stones or with wood, hay and stubble, and fire will test each one’s work (1 Corinthians 3:10–15). In verse 16 Paul turns from the builders to the building itself, and the building is a temple.
The word for temple is naós. It means a temple or shrine, and at Jerusalem it was the word for the temple building proper, the sanctuary, as distinct from the whole enclosure with its courts, for which Greek uses hieron. Paul chooses the word for the house where God dwells. The church at Corinth is God’s sanctuary.
That would have struck everyone in the church. For Jewish believers the temple at Jerusalem, the house Solomon first built for the LORD (1 Kings 6), was the place of God’s presence among his people. Gentile believers lived in a wealthy trading city full of temples built to house gods such as Aphrodite, Apollo and Poseidon. To both Paul says, “ye are the temple of God.” The place where God dwells is now the community of his people, and that raises both their standing and their responsibility. It also reaches into ordinary days, because the people themselves are holy to God wherever they are.
How the Spirit makes them a temple
The second half of the verse explains how the church is God’s temple: “the Spirit of God dwelleth in you.” The verb oikéō comes from oikos, a house, and means to occupy a house, to reside or inhabit. God’s Spirit has made his home among his people, and his presence is what makes them holy ground.
Paul tells this church the same thing in his next letter: “ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them” (2 Corinthians 6:16). Ephesians speaks of believers as fellow citizens with the saints, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, and growing together into a holy temple in the Lord (Ephesians 2:19–22). Peter calls them lively stones, built up into a spiritual house (1 Peter 2:5).
Why does Paul ask, “Know ye not”?
Paul is reminding the Corinthians of something they had been taught and should already have seen. “Know” is eídō, a verb whose root sense is to see, with the eyes or with the mind, and so to know. A question in this form, common in Paul’s letters, expects the answer yes, and it carries a rebuke. People who know that God lives among them have no excuse for tearing his house apart in factions.
Is the temple the church or each believer?
In these verses the temple is the church at Corinth taken together. The “ye” of “ye are”, esté, is plural, and so is hymeîs, the “ye” in “which temple ye are” in verse 17. A plural “you” can address any group, so the weight falls on the setting. Paul is answering a church split into parties, and what their quarrels threaten is the one temple they make up together.
Later in the letter Paul applies the same truth to each believer: “your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20). So the Spirit dwells in the whole church and in each of its members, and in this chapter the emphasis falls on the church as a whole.
God will destroy whoever ruins his temple
Verse 17 turns the truth of verse 16 into a warning. “If any man” is eí tis, a plain “if any”, and it takes in everyone in the church, whether a leader, a teacher or an ordinary member. Whoever he is, if he defiles God’s temple, God will destroy him.
In the KJV “defile” and “destroy” are two English words, but Paul uses one Greek verb twice, phtheírō. It means to shrivel or wither, to spoil or ruin, and figuratively to corrupt or deprave by moral influences. The repetition makes the judgment match the deed: the man who ruins God’s temple, God will ruin. The word “God” in “him shall God destroy” is theós, and the judgment comes from God himself.
The setting shows what ruins the temple. First of all it is the factions Paul has been rebuking since he urged the Corinthians to be “perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:10). It also includes false teaching, immoral practices that bring scandal on the church, and whatever undermines its spiritual health and its witness. Every builder in 1 Corinthians 3:10–15 whose work is poor will suffer loss, and verse 17 goes further, to the one whose work tears the building down.
Why the temple is holy
Paul gives the reason for the warning with gár, “for”: “for the temple of God is holy.” The word hágios means sacred, pure, morally blameless, consecrated to God. The church is holy because God dwells in it, and its holiness is God’s gift to it. To ruin it is to strike at what belongs to God himself, and God guards his dwelling. “For our God is a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12:29).
The Corinthians knew how temples were regarded around them. Greeks and Romans revered a temple as the dwelling of a god, and to defile one was a grave offence, often punished by death or other severe penalties. Paul takes that reverence and applies it to the gathered people of God, the holiest place on earth.
The verse closes with “which temple ye are”, using hóstis, “which”, and the emphatic hymeîs, “ye”, with esté, “are”. Paul names the temple once more so that the warning lands on the people reading it.
What does “him shall God destroy” mean?
It means a severe judgment from God himself on the one who corrupts or ruins his church, a ruin that answers the ruin he caused. Paul leaves the form of that ruin unstated, and it need not mean eternal damnation. It may be judgment in this life, such as the loss of a ministry or of influence, or heavier consequences that reach even to sickness and death. The New Testament shows God’s discipline within the church taking that form. Ananias and Sapphira died for their lie (Acts 5:1–11), and Paul tells this same church that because some ate and drank the Lord’s Supper unworthily, “many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep” (1 Corinthians 11:29–30). Whatever form it takes, the judgment is God’s, and it is as serious as the holiness of the house it protects.
Christ, the true temple
Jesus said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up,” and he spoke of the temple of his body (John 2:19–21). Through his death and resurrection he became the true temple, the place where God and man meet. Because of his finished work the Holy Spirit was poured out at Pentecost (Acts 2:1–4), and God now dwells in his people rather than in buildings made with hands. The church is Christ’s body (Ephesians 1:22–23), and so it shares in his own temple-body.
Paul has just said, “other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 3:11). The temple of verse 16 stands on him, with Jesus Christ himself as the chief corner stone (Ephesians 2:20), and in him believers are “builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:22). Its holiness comes from Christ, who sanctifies and cleanses the church “with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish” (Ephesians 5:26–27).
That gives the warning of verse 17 its full weight. Christ is the head of the body, the church (Colossians 1:18), which God purchased with his own blood (Acts 20:28). Whoever ruins the church dishonours Christ, and the judgment Paul promises shows how jealously Christ protects his bride. The temple waits for its completion in the new Jerusalem, of which John says, “I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it” (Revelation 21:22).
God’s house among his people
These two verses tell a quarrelling church what it truly is. The God who once filled Solomon’s house now lives by his Spirit among ordinary believers in Corinth, and his presence makes their gathering holy. Their leaders are servants, their divisions are an offence against God’s own house, and their unity matters because God lives there.
The warning shows how dearly God holds his people. Those who corrupt or divide his church answer to God, and the same holiness that makes the warning so solemn is the protection of every believer in it. God guards his house. In the end the whole of it will be filled with him, when the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.
1 Corinthians 3:16 This verse
“Know ye not”
A question that expects the answer yes, with eídō, “know”. The Corinthians had been taught this already, and Paul’s question rebukes them for living as if they had forgotten it.
“that ye are the temple of God,”
The “ye are” (esté) is plural and addresses the church at Corinth together. The word for temple, naós, is the sanctuary itself, the house where God dwells, as distinct from the whole temple enclosure.
“and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?”
This is what makes the church a temple. The verb oikéō means to live in a house as one’s home, and the Spirit lives among his people.
1 Corinthians 3:17
“If any man defile the temple of God,”
eí tis, “if any”, takes in anyone in the church, leader or member. “Defile” is phtheírō, to spoil, ruin or corrupt, and the context points first to the factions tearing the church apart.
“him shall God destroy;”
The same verb, phtheírō, comes back, so the punishment matches the offence. God (theós) himself acts against the one who ruins his house.
“for the temple of God is holy,”
gár, “for”, gives the reason for the warning. hágios, “holy”, means sacred and set apart, and the temple is holy because God dwells in it.
“which temple ye are.”
hóstis, “which”, and the emphatic hymeîs, “ye”, with esté, “are”, name the Corinthian church as that temple, so the warning is addressed to them.
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