1 See article ‘‘ Chronology of the N.T.” in Hastings’ Bib. Dict. ; and for the latter date, article ‘ Paul,’ i., 5. It is now generally recognised that the dates assigned to Pauline events by Wieseler and Lightfoot are, from 49 onwards, at least a couple of years too late.
(v. 1). More agreeable tidings have come with Stephanas and his companions (xvi. 17 f.), who bear a dutiful letter of inquiry addressed to Paul, which he answers in chap. vii. ff. Through their lips, as well as from the Church letter, he receives the assurances of the general loyalty and goodwill of the Corinthian believers. Prom all these sources occasion is drawn and material furnished for the writing before us.
This Epistle is not the first which Paul had addressed to Corinth. In chap. v. 9 the writer refers to an earlier letter forbidding inter- course with immoral persons. The terms of this admonition had raised debate. Some read it as though all dealings with vicious men were inhibited—a restriction that was as good as to tell Corinthian Christians to “go out of the world”! They could not imagine Paul to mean this; but his words allowed of this construction, and thus opened the door for discussion and for temporising. The tenor of the lost Epistle probably resembled that of 2 Cor. vi. 14-vii. 1 (see this Comm., ad loc.). This letter had arrived some months previously to our Epistle; for the Church had had time to consider and reply to it, and the condition of things to which it relates has undergone some changes. It may be referred as far back as the previous autumn (55 4.p.). Inasmuch as the Church-letter touched on “the collection for the saints” (xvi. 1: see note), it seems likely that the Apostle had made some appeal in the lost Epistle on this subject, eliciting a favourable reply (cf. 2 Cor. viii. 10, ix. 2), but with a r=j1est for directions as to the mode of gathering the money.
There is reason to believe that Paul had himself visitea Corinth not very long before writing the aforesaid letter. The allusions of 2 Cor. ii. 1, xii. 14, 20—xiii. 2 (see notes), imply that he had been twice in Corinth before the Second Epistle. If with Clemen (Chronol. d. Paulin. Briefe), Schmiedel(Handcomm., 1 and 2 Kor., Einleitung),and Krenkel (Bettrage z. Aufhellung d. Paul. Briefe, vi.) we could spread the composition of 1 ‘and 2 Cor. over two years, space would be found for interposing such a visit between them, but at the cost of creating fresh and insuperable chronological difficulties. In 2 Cor. i. 15 ff. the Apostle defends himself for having failed to come recently to Corinth ; he had sent Titus, and with him a letter (2 Cor. ii. 4, vii. 8)— distinct, as the present writer holds, from 1 Cor. (a second lost letter of Paul to Corinth: see Hastings’ Bib. Dict., article ‘‘ Paul,” i. d.), and occasioned by an emergency that arose subsequently to its despatch —which gave a new turn to the Apostle’s relations with the Church. Meanwhile he has himself left Ephesus (as contemplated in 1 Cor. xvi.), has pushed forward to Macedonia (2 Cor. ii. 12 f.), where at