1 Corinthians 10:11

“Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the end of the world is come.”

This verse is the summary of all the foregoing examples; a fact which leads us to prefer the reading of the Sinaït. and of the Greco-Lats., which preserves and even places foremost the word πάντα, all.

The two readings τύποι, “as types,” and τυπικῶς, typically, have the same meaning; but the second is to be preferred, first, because it is read in MSS. of the three families; and next because the word τυπικῶς occurs nowhere else. The substantive τύποι has probably come from 1 Corinthians 10:6.

Of the two readings συνέβαινον and συνέβαινεν, the first goes better with τύποι, the second with τυπικῶς.

The apostle does not mean that these facts did not really happen, as has been insinuated, but that they had a bearing beyond their immediate signification. The Scripture compilation of the facts of sacred history has the same end as the history itself. The same God who directed the latter willed that it should be committed to writing with a view to those who should live in the final epoch of the world, and for whom those facts, without Scripture, would be as though they were not.

The word νουθεσία signifies: rebuke, correction, 2 Timothy 3:16-17. This is what the Corinthians needed at that time.

Τὰ τέλη τῶν αἰώνων, literally the ends of the ages, is a term corresponding to the acharith hajjamim, the end of the days, in the prophets; comp. the expressions the last times (1Pe 1:20), and the last hour (1Jn 2:18). It is the dispensation of the Messiah which for us falls into two periods, confounded in one in the view of the prophets, that of His purely spiritual kingdom and that of His kingdom of glory. Paul is here speaking of the former. The ages, αἰῶνες, denote the whole series of historical periods, and the term “ the ends of the ages,” shows that the Messianic period itself will contain a series of phases.

The verb καταντᾷν, to meet, represents the ages which follow one another in the final dispensation, as coming to meet the living. We must prefer the perfect κατήντηκεν of the Alex. reading to the aorist of the T. R.; Paul does not mean to speak of the meeting itself, but of the whole state of things constituted by this constant approach of the end. This final period is the most solemn of all, for it is during its course that the laws of the Divine kingdom, imperfectly manifested in former periods, display their conclusive effects. Formerly blessings and judgments, all have only a provisional and figurative character. With the final period of history, everything, whether for weal or woe, takes a decisive, eternal value. This is why everything which happened in former times took place with a view to us to whose lot it has fallen to live at this last hour (ἡμῶν εἰς οὕς).

The apostle did not himself know the duration of this final period, which in his mind coincided with the development of the Church; but the phrase: the ends of the ages, shows that he did not regard it as so short as is commonly alleged; see on 1 Corinthians 7:29.