1 Corinthians 2:14

Vv. 14. “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” It seems at first sight that γάρ, for, would have been more suitable than δέ : “We appropriate spiritual things to spiritual men; for others would not understand them.” But the thought is different. The δέ signifies: “ But, as to the nonspiritual, we give them nothing of the kind, for we should thereby be doing them more ill than good.” Paul here designates the non - spiritual man by the term ψυχικός, psychical. This word denotes a being animated with that breath of natural or earthly life (ψυχή) which man possesses in common with all the living beings of creation. It implies here the absence of that breath of higher life which puts moral beings in communication with God, and which Scripture calls τὸ πνεῦμα, the spirit. Thus 1 Corinthians 15:44, the terrestrial body is called a psychical body, inasmuch as it is organized to serve as the dwelling-place and organ of a simple ψυχή, while the future body is called pneumatical, spiritual, inasmuch as it is destined to be the organ of a spirit. Holsten concludes from this expression of Paul that he denied all possession of the πνεῦμα, the spirit, to the natural man. It seems to me that 1Th 5:23 proves the contrary. By putting body, soul, and spirit, parallel to one another, as the three constant objects of Christian sanctification, he shows that in his view these are the three essential elements of the whole human person. Only, before the coming of the Divine Spirit, the spirit in man is rather an aspiration, or, as de Wette says, a receptivity, than a power and life. It is simply the organ with which the human soul is endowed for the Divine, the sense destined to perceive and receive it; it is a capacity which the Divine Spirit will change into a real power and a new principle of life when He comes to take possession of it. No doubt soul, which is the principle of life common to man and the animals, is in the former endowed with faculties superior to that of all other animated beings. But spirit alone puts man into relation with God, and thus forms his really distinctive character among all the animals. The term psychical man, which we render by natural man, does not therefore exclude the presence of spirit in such a man; it only implies the latent and inactive state of this element, so long as the Divine Spirit has not awakened it to enter into union with Himself and to become through it master of the soul and thereby of the body. In this state man possesses only the natural intelligence with which his soul is endowed, and by means of which he judges things of the present life and is guided in this sphere; it is in this sense that Paul calls him psychical. Meyer thinks that the epithet has not an essentially different sense from the word carnal, 1 Corinthians 3:1. But in this last passage it is Christians who are spoken of, though weak Christians, babes in Christ. Paul would not apply to true believers such strong expressions as those of our verse: “The things of the Spirit are foolishness unto them.” Meyer's mistake arises from his not understanding that between 1 Corinthians 2:14 and 1 Corinthians 3:1 there is by no means a relation of equality. “This wisdom cannot be explained to the psychical man, who has only his natural reason to apprehend it; and as for myself when I was with you, carnal as you still were, though believing, I could not enter on this domain.” See also on 1 Corinthians 3:16.

The term οὐ δέχεται, he does not receive, indicates that in his inner man there is nothing corresponding to this light; it does not penetrate into him. What ravishes advanced believers with joy and admiration leaves him cold, and even produces in him, with all his intelligence in other domains, the impression of something foolish. Why so? Are there two logics: one for the converted, the other for the unconverted? Certainly not. The laws of the syllogism are valid for every sane mind. The difference arises from the fact that the experience of salvation establishes in the believer new premisses, foreign to the natural man's experience. As the egoist cannot believe in the heroism of devotion, and treats it as an impossibility, not because he has another logic than the man of heart, but because a necessary moral premiss is wanting to him to appreciate the moral fact, so the purely psychical man, not having made experience of the Divine love, does not possess the premiss necessary for understanding the Divine plan, and with the same understanding as the believer, he calls that foolishness which is heaven to the latter.

The apostle adds, neither can he know them, as if to say: “If he does not understand them, it is not so much his fault as that of the ill-advised teacher who expounds a Christian philosophy to the man who needs first to have salvation declared to him; who expatiates in the high regions of knowledge, when he should have laboured at the renewing of the heart.” Here we see clearly how Paul distinguishes between the simple preaching of salvation and the wisdom of which he speaks throughout this whole passage. For certainly he never thought that to the unregenerate there is no need of preaching salvation by the cross, and that it is not their own fault if they do not understand, and so reject it. The use of the adverb πνευματικῶς, spiritually, has nothing in common with the Alexandrine system of interpretation, according to which those were called spiritual who could distinguish in Scripture the profound (allegorical) sense from the grammatical. The word simply means here, “in virtue of spiritual premisses.” And the verb ἀνακρίνειν, to make an examination, analyze, discern, denotes the analysis made by the νοῦς (the understanding) of things transmitted to it, and the judgment resulting from it.

From this Paul could pass directly to the application which he has in view (1 Corinthians 3:1-4). But, as Rückert has well observed, he here interposes a short episode, 1 Corinthians 2:15-16, fitted to pave the way for this application, and to give it its full gravity.