Neither let us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand.
All Commentaries on 1 Corinthians 10:8 Go To 1 Corinthians 10
Cornelius a Lapide
AD 1637
As some of them committed. When they worshipped Baal-peor. i.e, Priapus, and in his honour committed fornication with the daughters of Moab ( Numbers 25.).
And fell in one day three and twenty thousand. Chrysostom, Anselm, Cajetan, refer this to the plague which was sent because of the fornication with the daughters of Moab, and which is related in Num. xxv. But in ver9 of that chapter the number slain is given as24 ,000 , not23 ,000. (1.) Some account for this by saying that on one day only23 ,000 were slain, and1000 on the day before. But this is pure conjecture, for Scripture says nothing of this. (2.) Cajetan explains it by an error of some scribe, who wrote23 ,000 for24 ,000. (3) Å’cumenius says that some read23 ,000 in Numbers 25:9 as well as here. (4.) Others say that the Apostle is not wrong, because the greater number includes the less. But it is simpler and more natural to say that the Apostle is referring to Exod. xxxii28 , where, according to the Roman Bible, 23 ,00 fell for worshipping the golden calf. S. Paul, if this be Song of Solomon , is not referring to the punishment inflicted on the fornicators of Num. xxv, but by a Hebrew custom he looks back to the idolaters of ver7. We must suppose that, having forgotten to mention the punishment inflicted on them, he now gives it as an after-thought: certainly in the sins he goes on to name he in each case adds the punishment. He does this to warn the Corinthians against such sins, and especially because the worship of the calf and the lust accompanying it were exactly parallel, both in punishment and guilt, to the worship and fornication in the matter of Baal-peor. S. Paul"s number agrees with the older rendering of the Greek in Exodus 32:28. The LXX. now has3000.
