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Ambrosiaster

Nicene & Post-Nicene · AD 325–500 · 1,043 passages across 16 books

Commentary

401–420 of 1,043
2 Corinthians 10:15

Not boasting of things without our measure, that is, of other men's labours; but having hope, when your faith is increased, that we shall be enlarged by you according to our rule abundantly,

Someone who takes pride in his own work is not being excessively proud of himself. A prudent man does not rely on the labors of others. This is why Paul does not claim any credit for those who have come to faith by the preaching of other evangelists.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 10:16

To preach the gospel in the regions beyond you, and not to boast in another man's line of things made ready to our hand.

What Paul wants is to preach the gospel to those to whom the message has not yet been given, so that God will be glorified by his labor.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 10:17

But he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.

By saying this Paul intimates that even his assurance and pride are to be given to the Lord, because it is by his favor that he has them. Someone who has confidence in the power of the gospel has confidence in the God who enables it. Thus God is glorified by all godly work. A person who has not received power from God cannot glory in the Lord, because he is seeking his own glory.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 10:18

For not he that commendeth himself is approved, but whom the Lord commendeth.

God does not commend someone whom he does not send.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:1

Would to God ye could bear with me a little in my folly: and indeed bear with me.

Paul says that he is being foolish when he starts to talk about himself but that he is forced to do so because these people were harboring unworthy thoughts, when they of all people ought to be thinking well of him.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:2

For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.

Paul is making it clear that what he is about to say he will say out of love for them, so that it may be conducive to their progress as much as to his praise and that they may learn from it how to do a favor to their father in the gospel. For to speak ill of a father harms the sons, and the praise of sons is a father’s glory.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:3

But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.

Paul is saying that glory has been given to him not so that he might praise himself but so that he might cast blame on those who, in the name of Christ, were preaching against Christ and by whom the Corinthians were being seduced.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:5

For I suppose I was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles.

Paul does not think that he is inferior to the other apostles because he has taught the same things and done the same miracles.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:6

But though I be rude in speech, yet not in knowledge; but we have been throughly made manifest among you in all things.

This does not refer to the apostles, who were unlettered men of no eloquence, but to the false teachers whose rhetorical skill the Corinthians preferred. Paul did not mean by this that he did not know how to speak but that commendation did not depend on mere eloquence. A person of little eloquence is not guilty before God, but someone who does not know God is liable to be charged with ignorance, because it was a sin to be ignorant of what is conducive to salvation. It was not eloquence which would commend Paul’s message but the power to save which accompanied it.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:7

Have I committed an offence in abasing myself that ye might be exalted, because I have preached to you the gospel of God freely?

Paul refused payment for two reasons. He would not resemble the false apostles who were preaching for their own advantage and not for the glory of God, nor would he allow the vigor of his message to become sluggish. For the person who accepts payment from sinners loses the authority to censor them.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:8

I robbed other churches, taking wages of them, to do you service.

Paul makes it clear that not only did other churches encourage him in his ministry to the Corinthians but also that they gave him significant financial support.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:9

And when I was present with you, and wanted, I was chargeable to no man: for that which was lacking to me the brethren which came from Macedonia supplied: and in all things I have kept myself from being burdensome unto you, and so will I keep myself.

Paul accepted contributions from the Macedonians because they corrected their faults. But he refused anything from the Corinthians because they were less ready to correct theirs.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:10

As the truth of Christ is in me, no man shall stop me of this boasting in the regions of Achaia.

Paul urges the whole of Achaia to give aid to the saints, but at the same time he refuses to take anything for himself from any of them.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:11

Wherefore? because I love you not? God knoweth.

Paul wanted the Corinthians to understand that his love for them was beneficial, not harmful.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:15

Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.

The servants of righteousness are the apostles, whose associates these people falsely pretended to be, so as to deceive their hearers.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:16

I say again, Let no man think me a fool; if otherwise, yet as a fool receive me, that I may boast myself a little.

Paul returns here to what he said at the beginning of the chapter. What he is about to say is true, though it may make him appear to be foolish, because these truths redound to his praise. Paul is not really boasting but merely wants to show that others who boast have nothing more to show for themselves than he has, so that if they are worthy of praise so is he.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:17

That which I speak, I speak it not after the Lord, but as it were foolishly, in this confidence of boasting.

God does not approve of boasting, so this mode of speaking does not come from him. But the content of what he is saying is still true.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:18

Seeing that many glory after the flesh, I will glory also.

Paul is saying this because some Jewish believers were claiming superiority as children of Israel. To glorify oneself according to the flesh is to claim nobility of the flesh. The Jews claimed this because they are the children of Abraham, who believed in God. Commentary on Paul’s Epistles.

2 Corinthians 11:19

For ye suffer fools gladly, seeing ye yourselves are wise.

Paul gives the name of fools to those who prided themselves in the circumcision of the flesh. It was because these people were accepted by the Corinthians that Paul wants them to recognize that he too can boast of this. But he does not glorify himself as a result. On the contrary, he points out that such boasting is foolish and worldly.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

2 Corinthians 11:20

For ye suffer, if a man bring you into bondage, if a man devour you, if a man take of you, if a man exalt himself, if a man smite you on the face.

Paul is referring to certain Jews who were maltreating them because they were uncircumcised. They were claiming high rank for themselves and humiliating everyone else.

COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES

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