Foods for the belly, and the belly for foods: but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.
All Commentaries on 1 Corinthians 6:13 Go To 1 Corinthians 6
George Leo Haydock
AD 1849
Meat for the belly. That is, meat is necessary for the support of nature, though this or that kind of meat be indifferent: and we ought to reflect, that God in a short time will destroy both the meats, and the appetite of eating, and the body shall shortly die, but it shall rise again.
Know you not that your bodies are the members of Christ. And the temple of the Holy Spirit. Man consists of soul and body; by baptism he is made a member of that same mystical body, the Church, of which Christ is the head: In baptism both the soul and body are consecrated to God: they are made the temple of the Holy Spirit, inasmuch as the spirit and grace of God inhabits in men, who are sanctified. Christ redeemed both our souls and bodies, both which he designs to sanctify, and to glorify hereafter in heaven; so that we must look upon both body and soul as belonging to Christ, and not as our own.
Shall I, then, taking the members of Christ, make them the members of an harlot, by a shameful and unlawful commerce?
Fly fornication. Such sins are chiefly to be avoided by flight, and by avoiding the occasions and temptations. Other sins are not committed by such an injury done to the body, but by an abuse of something else, that is different from the body, but by fornication and sins of uncleanness, the body itself is defiled and dishonoured, whereas the body ought to be considered as if it were not our own, being redeemed by our Saviour Christ, consecrated to him, with an expectation of a happy resurrection, and of being glorified in heaven. Endeavour, therefore, to glorify God in your body, by employing it in his service, and bear him in your body by being obedient to his will. (Witham)
We know and we believe that we carry about Jesus Christ in our bodies, but it is the shame and condemnation of a Christian to live as if he neither knew or believed it. If fornication is a great crime in a pagan, in a Christian it is a species of sacrilege, accompanied with injustice and ingratitude. Whoever yields to impurity, converts his body into the temple of Satan, glorifies and carries him about, tearing away the members of Jesus Christ, to make them the members of a harlot.
