1 Corinthians 7:6-7

τοῦτο δὲ λέγω points to the leading direction given in 1 Corinthians 7:2, from which 1 Corinthians 7:3-5 digressed: “I advise you to be married (though I think celibacy good, 1), κατὰ συνγνώμην,” secundum indulgentiam (Vg [1021]) i.e., συγκαταβαίνων τ. ἀσθενείᾳ ὑμῶν (Thp [1022]); οὐ κατʼ ἐπιταγήν, ex concessione, non ex imperio (Bz [1023]). The rendering “permission” is somewhat misleading; συνγνώμη is quite distinct from the γνώμη opposed to ἐπιταγὴ in 1 Corinthians 7:25; it signifies either pardon (venia, excuse for a fault), or, as here, allowance, regard for circumstances and temperament. In θέλω δὲ κ. τ. λ. the Ap. states his personal bent, which he had set aside in the recommendation just given: “But I would have all men to be as indeed myself,” sc. cœlibem and contentedly so (cf. Acts 26:29). ὡς καὶ ἐμαυτόν, paratactic acc [1024] (attracted to πάντας ἀν θρώπους) = ὡς καὶ αὐτός εἰμι; καὶ emphasises the assertion that the writer is what he would like others to be. It is manifest (see also 1 Corinthians 9:5) that the Ap. was unmarried, although Clem. Alex. and some moderns have inferred otherwise from Philippians 4:3. That he had never been married is by no means certain. Two things, however, are clear: that if P. had known the married state, it was before his apostleship “wife and children are never hinted at, he goes about entirely free from such ties” (Lt [1025]); further, that if in early life he had entered this state, it was not διʼ ἀκρασίαν; he possessed the “grace-gift” (χάρισμα) of undisquieted continence (opposed to πυροῦσθαι, 1 Corinthians 7:9; cf. Matthew 19:12), which was in his case an adjunct of his χάρις ἀποστολῆς. “However (= I cannot have every one like myself, but) each has a charism of his own from God, the one in this shape and the other in that.” ὁ δὲ οὕτως does not refer to the married Christian, as though his state were in itself a charism, but to any special endowment for service in Christ's kingdom other than that stated. On χάρισμα see 1 Corinthians 1:7; and cf. 1 Corinthians 12:4-11.

[1021] Latin Vulgate Translation.

[1022] Theophylact, Greek Commentator.

[1023] Beza's Nov. Testamentum: Interpretatio et Annotationes (Cantab., 1642).

[1024] accusative case.

[1025] J. B. Lightfoot's (posthumous) Notes on Epp. of St. Paul (1895).