‘A Little Yeast Leavens the Whole Batch of Dough’: Incest and Pollution in 1 Corinthians 5

Abstract

Paul commands the Corinthians to give an incestuous man to Satan in 1 Cor. 5.5. Scholars often see this as a punishment for sin, but why does incest require this particular response? This article offers an answer by reading 1 Cor. 5 in light of other discussions of incest and pollution in Greco-Roman literature. It highlights connections between incest, pollution, and communal danger and explores means of resolving pollution. It then examines Paul’s discussion of incest in 1 Cor. 5.5 and concludes that his instructions concerning the incestuous man follow a logic common in ancient discussions of incest and pollution.

Introduction

Paul’s instructions in 1 Cor. 5.5 to hand a man over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh continue to invite investigation. Scholars frequently understand the man’s practice of incest as sin and suppose that Paul’s directives punish or discipline him. ¹ This disciplinary action, many scholars suggest, addresses the issue of sin by encouraging the incestuous man to repent and turn from his sinful behavior (Murphy-O’Connor 1982: 170; Moses 2013: 190; Waters 2015: 249). But Paul does not say that the man sins or mention repentance as part of the solution, nor is it clear why incest, uniquely in 1 Corinthians, should require both expulsion and destruction from Satan. In this paper, I consider whether part of the difficulty in understanding Paul’s instructions concerning the incestuous man relates to the framework in which scholars intuitively place incestuous acts—namely, a framework of sin. Perhaps Paul understands the nature of, the danger caused by, and the solution to incest primarily in terms of pollution. In this paper, I analyse 1 Cor. 5 in conversation with other ancient discussions of incest and pollution. I look at ways in which incest, pollution, and danger can connect and argue that attention to how ancient writers connect them can clarify the logic of Paul’s command in 1 Cor. 5.5 and help us see why he would urge both expulsion and destruction from Satan in response to this issue.

In the first section, I discuss purity and pollution in ancient literature, broadly speaking. Because I am studying a first-century Jew writing in Greek, I consider especially how the material the we may label as ‘Greco-Roman’ or ‘Jewish’ relates to each other and to Paul and how the disciplines of classics and biblical studies can inform one another. In the second section, I examine descriptions of incest as a source of pollution in extrabiblical Greco-Roman literature, the dangerous effects that incest can have on a community, and the means by which one resolves or removes the pollution of incest. I ask whether there are any patterns we can discern related to incest and one’s response to it. Finally, I provide an exegesis of 1 Cor. 5 in light of the material surveyed in the first two sections. I ask if Paul follows a pattern seen in other Greco-Roman literature, and if so, how and to what extent. I conclude that Paul’s instructions in 1 Cor. 5.5 need not indicate an effort to punish a sinner or to make him repent. Instead, like many other ancient writers, Paul urges separation from pollution with the expectation that a divinity will resolve it.

Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature

If we want to understand the relationship between incest, pollution, and danger, we must first look briefly at pollution in the ancient world more generally. The study of purity and pollution took a leap forward with the appearance of Mary Douglas’s Purity and Danger, first published in 1966. Douglas challenges the notion that concerns about purity—that is, for cleanness as opposed to uncleanness—are ‘primitive’. She instead approaches purity/pollution beliefs as systems for the ordering and classification of the universe. She says, ‘Where there is dirt there is system. Dirt is the by-product of a systematic ordering and classification of matter, in so far as ordering involves rejecting inappropriate elements’ (Douglas 2002: 44). Douglas’s work remains influential, not least among scholars of ancient literature who work to delineate the logic by which systems of purity and pollution function in ancient cultures. Texts from the Greco-Roman world speak frequently of the pure and the polluted, and these purity/pollution discussions fit into broader systems of ordering, boundary creation, access to the divine, and social and religious convention (Bremmer 1994: 4–6; Bendlin 2007: 178; Robertson 2013: 195; A. Petrovic and I. Petrovic 2016: 11–15), the contours of which deserve elucidation.

Not all pollution that appears in Greco-Roman literature is the same in cause, effect, or means of resolution. On the one hand, we find pollution that results from physical contamination. Texts label this kind of pollution primarily with the word μίασμα, which indicates a stain or defilement. Μίασμα results from contact with sex and related bodily flows, blood, childbirth, or corpses, and it has the effect of rendering a person or object unfit to approach the gods and sacred spaces. While μίασμα is the key term for this pollution, in some instances, other words that communicate dirtiness or contamination can likewise indicate a pollution with these characteristics. ² This kind of pollution restricts access to the divine, but it can be otherwise relatively innocuous as long as the polluted person avoids the sacred while in a polluted state. So, for example, Herodotus says, ‘It was the Egyptians who first made it a matter of religious observance not to have intercourse with women in temples, nor enter a temple after such intercourse without washing. Nearly all other men are less careful in this matter than are the Egyptians and Greeks’ (Persian Wars 2.64 [Godley]). For Herodotus, sex as such is not a problem, but it becomes so if one copulates in a temple or proceeds immediately from the act to a temple without cleansing. One can often resolve physical pollution, as in this passage, through washing or some other ritual cleansing.

On the other hand, pollution sometimes results from transgressions against a ritual, against the divine, or against ‘divinely sanctioned social norms’ (A. Petrovic and I. Petrovic 2016: 30). Texts written in Greek sometimes still indicate this kind of pollution using language of physical contamination—namely, μίασμα—or they may use the words ἄγος and ἐναγής, which refer particularly to this kind of pollution. In either case, scholars categorize this sort of pollution separately because the causes, effects, and means of resolution for this pollution differ from those associated with physical contamination. If one murders suppliants in a temple (Thucydides, Hist. 1.126; Plutarch, Sol. 12.1–6), desecrates a temple and its votive offerings (Aeschines, Ctes. 107–9), breaks an oath (Plutarch, Cat. Min. 51.1–2), or fails to bury a corpse (Sophocles, Antigone 256), he or she can incur pollution that endangers both the polluted person and those around him or her. This pollution is resolved through divine intervention, often in the form of physical affliction (with illness, for example) or destruction of the polluted person rather than through washing or some other ritual purification. While this latter kind of pollution may include physical contamination in some sense (e.g., killing a suppliant could expose one to blood), the defiance of divine authority and the violation of the sacred render this pollution particularly problematic.

Classicists describe pollution that does not result merely from touching something dirty as ‘metaphysical’ pollution, ³ and recently, Andrej Petrovic and Ivana Petrovic use the phrase ‘major metaphysical pollution’ to refer to the pollution that results from transgressions against the divine (2016: 30). ⁴ It is ‘major’ because of the gravity of transgressing against the gods and ‘metaphysical’ because it does not result from contact with a corporeal object. The use of the phrase ‘major metaphysical pollution’ can create confusion in New Testament scholarship because scholars in this field frequently interact with quite different theological discussions of ontology and cosmology, which may be referred to as ‘metaphysics’. Rather than multiply terminology, however, I retain the use of the phrase ‘major metaphysical pollution’ here because this paper seeks to bring research from classics into conversation with biblical studies. I add the caveat that when I say ‘major metaphysical pollution’ I use it only in the restricted sense of that kind of pollution caused by serious transgression against the divine and/or violation of the sacred.

Biblical scholars are often more familiar with discussions of purity and pollution in the Hebrew Bible. This corpus deserves examination in a paper about Paul since Paul draws so frequently from its contents. The texts of the Hebrew Bible, like many texts from the ancient Mediterranean world, differentiate between distinctive kinds of pollution. Physical contamination resulting from natural sources such as childbirth (Lev. 12.1–8), genital discharge (Lev. 15.1–33), and corpses (Num. 19.11–22) creates one kind of pollution that is called טמא. While the person polluted in this way must avoid the sacred (Lev. 7.20–21, 20.3–7), the pollution is temporary. The polluted person can remove this pollution through appropriate acts of purification and/or through allowing the contagion to diminish over time (e.g., Lev. 15.1–18).

The sins of forbidden sexual relationships (Lev. 18.6–30), idolatry (Lev. 20.1–3), or bloodshed (Num. 35.33–34) create pollution of a different kind. The Hebrew Bible sometimes still uses טמא in relation to this pollution, but it also uses תועבה and חנף, which are used restrictively in the context of this more serious pollution. Pollution that results from these three sins differs from physical contamination not only in cause but also in effect and means of resolution. It has the effect of defiling the sinner as well as the land (Lev. 18.24–25; Ezek. 36.17) and the sanctuary itself (Lev. 20.3). Resolution does not occur through rituals of purification but through punishment, atonement, or, ultimately, exile (Lev. 18.26–28; Ezek. 36.16–19). ⁵

I follow Jonathan Klawans (2000: 22–31) in labeling these distinctive kinds of pollution in the Hebrew Bible as ‘ritual’ and ‘moral’ impurity, respectively. ⁶ I use this language because the word ‘ritual’ rightly highlights that physical contamination excludes one from participation in certain ritual acts and bars one from sacred precincts (Klawans 2000: 22), while ‘moral’ acknowledges that some impurity results from what the Bible depicts as immoral acts (Klawans 2000: 26). This is not to say that the terminology is perfect. Klawans himself notes that neither adjective finds attestation in biblical literature and that drawing a distinction between the ritual and the moral can invite us to evaluate the moral more highly than the ritual (Klawans 2000: 22). Nonetheless, this terminology proves valuable because it underlines a distinction between kinds of pollution that does appear in the primary sources. Sometimes, the primary sources mark this distinction linguistically (by using the words תועבה and חנף to mark moral impurity), but at other times, the explanation of what causes pollution, its effects, and its means of resolution indicate the difference.

The texts of the Hebrew Bible and the texts written in Greek that classicists analyse provide fascinating material for comparison. The fact that both groups of texts address issues of purity and pollution speaks to a widespread concern for purity among the cultures of the ancient Mediterranean basin. What is more, both groups of texts distinguish between physical dirtiness and another, less tangible form of pollution caused by acts the god(s) find particularly offensive. This latter pollution proves dangerous not only to the individual but also to the wider community. It can be difficult, even impossible, to resolve this pollution via ritual acts of purification.

Despite conceptual similarities, these groups of texts differ in the details. The sources of the latter, intangible pollution; the nature of its communally dangerous effects; and the means of resolving it vary between the Hebrew Bible and the texts written in Greek. Idolatry pollutes in the Hebrew Bible, but idols feature noncontroversially in the pagan cultic practices that appear ubiquitously in nonbiblical literature. The kinds of communal danger caused by ‘metaphysical’ or ‘moral’ pollution and the means of resolving it also diverge. In the Hebrew Bible, moral impurity caused by transgression against the divine impacts the land and the people of Israel, culminating in exile. The fear of losing the land through exile connects to the unique covenant between the Lord and Israel. This covenant and the desire to maintain it shapes much of the Hebrew Bible but is absent from non-Jewish texts.

What do we do with these distinct but conceptually similar ways of understanding pollution in relation to Paul, a first-century, Greek-speaking Jew who reads and attempts to apply the texts of the Jewish scriptures to his churches? It is here that one of Valero Valeri’s critiques of Douglas helps us. Valeri argues that Douglas’s early work on purity/pollution casts purity systems as overly monolithic. We cannot speak of ‘the system’, ‘form’, or ‘order’ because ‘there are many coexisting orders of classification’, he says (Valeri 2000: 71). Similarly, and in a discussion of ancient Greek literature more specifically, Robin Osborne argues that we cannot assume the circumstances that create pollution are consistent ‘across all who share the same categorical division—and so presumably normally all who share the same language’ (2011: 164). As we move from one ancient writer to another, we can identify points of distinction in terms of how they identify, discuss, and react to pollution, even if they share a belief in pollution generally and in the idea that transgressions against the divine create a more serious kind of pollution than contact with ‘dirty’ objects.

The realization that many different, and even competing, systems for understanding pollution can coexist proves vital for discussions of first-century Jews of the Greco-Roman world. In one sense, the Jews constitute an identifiable group in the ancient world whose writings we can collect together for study. Jewish writings of the Second Temple period reflect an indebtedness to particularly Jewish traditions and scripture, as well as, in many cases, a self-conscious attempt to differentiate the Jewish people from other ancient people groups. In another sense, Second Temple Jewish texts from the Roman period, including those of the New Testament, are themselves products of the Greco-Roman world and reveal overlapping patterns of thinking with other ancient, non-Jewish literature.

In Second Temple Jewish writers, we can see language and forms of conceptualization that seem to derive from discussions of pollution in the Hebrew Bible, as well as language and forms of conceptualization that are more common in nonbiblical Greco-Roman discussions of purity and pollution. To take just one example, Josephus refers to idols as a source of pollution (Ant. 9.273) and links the Babylonian exile to the pollution of temple and land (Ant. 10.37) in a manner that recalls the Hebrew Bible and the discussions of pollution in that corpus. At the same time, Josephus refers to the pollution of the Jerusalem temple with the word ἄγος (J.W. 4.163), a word that never appears in the Septuagint but appears frequently in non-Jewish literature to indicate what classicists call major metaphysical pollution.

In light of the complex relationship between material that scholars may dichotomize as ‘Jewish’ or ‘Greco-Roman’, we should not assume at the outset that since Paul is Jewish, only texts found in the Hebrew Bible or written by Jews can help explain his approach to incest and pollution. This paper positions Paul within broader discussions of incest and pollution in the ancient world by looking at non-Jewish Greco-Roman texts as well as biblical and related texts written by Jews. My analysis includes texts from many eras and from many genres. This does not suggest that Paul knows any particular text I examine. Neither do I imply that these texts reveal ‘what ancient Greek speakers believed’ about incest and pollution. Ancient people believed many things about incest and did not necessarily agree with one another about what counted as incest or how incest related to pollution. Surveying a range of literature does not, therefore, reflect an attempt to construct a monolithic representation of ancient views of incest but serves rather to help us identify patterns of thinking about incest and pollution that appear frequently throughout ancient literature. Identifying a pattern allows us to delineate with some clarity one way that a first-century member of the Greco-Roman world might react to incest. It then remains for us to exegete 1 Cor. 5 to determine how and to what extent Paul’s argument matches the outlined pattern. The next section focuses on extrabiblical Greco-Roman literature and explores depictions of incest as pollution, dangers associated with incest, and the means by which one resolves pollution from incest. Patterns uncovered here provide a context within which to read 1 Corinthians in the final section.

Incest, Pollution, and Danger

Incest as Pollution in Greco-Roman Literature

Disdain for incest—that is, a sexual relationship between people deemed too closely related to have such a relationship—finds attestation across cultures and eras. ⁷ Greco-Roman texts frequently criticize sexual relationships between people who share family bonds. Here, I consider texts that depict sexual relationships as unacceptable on account of a family relationship between the sexual partners and that present this sexual violation of the family relationship as a source of pollution.

Robert Parker claims, ‘It is difficult to prove incest is a “pollution”’ because it is ‘nowhere spoken of as a miasma, and it does not seem that it was even formally illegal at Athens, much less that the offender was publicly expelled to purify the state’ (1983: 97). Whether Greeks and Romans outlawed incest does not, however, determine whether writers described it as pollution. ⁸ In regards to the use of the word μίασμα for incest, Parker seems to have made an oversight. Several passages (many of which Parker cites) connect incest with the language of dirtiness, including μίασμα. Parker mentions that in Euripides’ Phoenician Women, the chorus says Oedipus ‘made a marriage that was no marriage, poor man, glorious in victory over the riddle, and brought pollution upon the city’ (μιαίνει δὲ πτόλιν) (Phoen. 1047–50 [Kovacs]). Here, Oedipus’s incestuous union with his mother pollutes the whole city of Thebes. Fabian Meinel notes that, in this play, incest also sires pollution (2015: 172). Oedipus and Jocasta create children who are μίασμα πατρός, a pollution of their father (Euripides, Phoen. 1995: 816). ⁹ In Euripides’ Hippolytus, Theseus falsely believes his son (Hippolytus) had sex with his wife (Phaedra). Theseus says, ‘He [Hippolytus] was born from my loins, and yet he disgraced my bed’ and then claims the affair creates μίασμα (Euripides, Hipp. 943–7 [Kovacs]). ¹⁰ In other plays, Creon labels Oedipus as ἄγος, a word used restrictively of major metaphysical pollution, immediately after Oedipus describes both his patricide and his incestuous marriage to his mother (Sophocles, Oed. tyr. 1994b: 1426).

Outside the tragedies, Aelian uses the word μίασμα and a more specific word for major metaphysical pollution, ἐναγής, to describe mother-son incest (On Animals 6.39). Philo, a Jewish contemporary of Paul, does not label mother-son incest as a μίασμα, but he does use language of dirtiness when he says the law views it with disgust (μυσάττομαι) (On the Special Laws 3.3.13). For him, sex with one’s mother constitutes an impious act (ἀνοσιούργημα) that threatens the sanctity of the father’s bed (On the Special Laws 3.3.13–14). Latin texts, as well, can use the words incestus and incestare, words that indicate pollution, in connection to sex between a stepmother and stepson (Apuleius Metam. 10.6; Virgil Aen. 10.389).

While other texts discuss sex between close relatives in negative terms without labeling the relationship as a source of pollution, ¹¹ the texts chosen here illustrate that several texts do connect incest and pollution. As noted previously, pollution that derives from serious transgressions can create a kind of danger more serious than that created by mere contact with a dirty object. The ways in which ancient writers connect the pollution of incest to danger require further elaboration.

Effects of Pollution Caused by Incest

Readers of ancient literature will recall the frequent connection between pollution and communal danger. As noted previously, pollution caused by contact contagion proves mostly benign so long as the polluted person avoids the sacred until he or she completes the necessary procedures for purification. Pollution caused by crimes such as putting suppliants to death or killing someone who is offering a sacrifice, however, can lead to natural disasters like earthquakes (Thucydides, Hist. 1.128) or crop failure (Plutarch, Rom. 24.1–2) that affect entire cities or regions. Persons polluted by crimes against the divine, which pollution classicists call ‘major metaphysical pollution’, can also affect the cultic and ritual observances of the communities they inhabit simply by their presence. People polluted by killing suppliants cause sacrifices to produce abnormal results until the guilty are expelled, and the pollution is expiated (Plutarch, Sol. 12.1–6). In other cases, the presence of a polluted person at a sacrifice can render the sacrifice unsuccessful. ¹² These various effects of major metaphysical pollution, distinct as they are, share in their potential to affect whole communities, including people in those communities who are not guilty of the polluting crime.

In texts that identify incest as a source of pollution, incest can create the same grave, communal danger as other sacrilegious crimes against the gods mentioned in the previous paragraph. This suggests that the pollution created by incest proves more serious than the pollution caused by physical contamination, such as permissible sex or childbirth. The idea that pollution can threaten the safety even of an entire kingdom drives the Oedipus tragedies. Oedipus’s presence causes problems for Thebes, including plagues, blights, storms, and troubled cultic observances. In some versions of the Oedipus story, characters in the narrative identify the murder of King Laius as the specific cause of these effects. ¹³ This leads Edward Harris, in a discussion of Sophocles’ Oedipus Tyranus, to say that murder and not incest causes the plagues and other afflictions facing Thebes (2013: 137). In other passages, however, incest more clearly creates danger. I already noted that, for Euripides, incest pollutes the city (Euripides, Phoen. 1047–50). For Seneca, both patricide and incest create danger. In his version of the Oedipus tragedy, Laius’s ghost says to expel the king in order to end the plague, blight, etc., caused by his presence. He says, ‘It is not the unwholesome breath of the scourging south wind that harms you, nor the dry exhalations of a land too little watered by heaven’s rains, but a bloodstained king’ (Seneca, Oedipus 631–34 [Fitch]). Here, he links bloodshed causally to communal danger. He also says, however, ‘In Thebes the greatest crime [scelus] is the love of a mother. O fatherland, you are not ravaged by the gods’ anger, but by a crime [scelus]’ (Seneca, Oedipus 629–31 [Fitch]). These lines indicate a connection between incest and communal danger as well. Oedipus has ‘doubly unclean hands’ (Naiden 2013: 154) that can bring about, depending on the writer, communal pollution, plague, blight, death, and troubled cultic observances.

Philo believes that sex between a mother and son, even when the act occurs without knowledge of the relationship, produces evil that radiates out into the wider community (On the Special Laws 3.3.15). He considers constant war, the loss of a city’s inhabitants, and even fratricide within a royal family to result from the ‘ill-matched mating of sons with mothers’ (On the Special Laws 3.3.19 [Colson]). Philo appeals to the Oedipus stories as support for his views, noting that Oedipus’s union with his mother produced ‘such a harvest of ills that nothing was wanting that could lead to the utmost misery’ (On the Special Laws 3.3.15–16 [Colson]). This reveals not only that Greek tragedy could influence a Jewish writer but also that the logic of pollution and danger by which the Oedipus stories operate is more than a mere plot device. Ancient people writing in other genres can build a case against incest by appealing to the communal danger created by it.

Purging Pollution Caused by Incest

While people can remove physical contamination through ritual cleansings, the gods resolve major metaphysical pollution caused by transgressions against the divine. Some texts even state that only divine intervention can resolve major metaphysical pollution. Pausanias (the geographer) says Pausanias (the general) incurs ἄγος through bloodshed that he cannot expiate through any cleansing ritual (Pausanias 1918–35). He ultimately pays ‘a fitting penalty to Cleonice and to the god’ (Descr. 3.17.9 [Jones]). Divine intervention can vary in form, but it frequently involves removing pollution by destroying the polluted person(s). Depending on how this occurs, the process of destruction can endanger both the polluted person and those who are close to the polluted person, either proximally or socially. One passage in Euripides suggests the gods can resolve major metaphysical pollution by causing shipwrecks. These shipwrecks destroy the guilty but endanger everyone else on the ship as well (Euripides, El. 1349–56).

Divine intervention, whatever that looks like, has the potential not only to resolve pollution but also to stop whatever dangerous, communal effects accompany it. In Pseudo-Plutarch, a man who has intercourse with his daughter is sacrificed to the averting deities (τροπαίοις θεοῖς), which stops a plague that is ravaging the city (Pseudo-Plutarch, Greek and Roman Parallel Stories 310 C). Divine intervention does not always remove all dangerous effects of pollution by itself, however. Sometimes, people must perform other expiations to ensure the restoration of their relationship with the gods. ¹⁴ Nonetheless, the gods’ intervention provides one critical piece of the resolution process.

The gods ultimately resolve cases of major metaphysical pollution, but this does not mean humans who find out about such pollution are powerless to protect themselves from its dangerous effects. In many texts, communities that discover serious pollution in their midst expel the guilty person or otherwise avoid him or her. The logic behind expulsion is easy to understand. Major metaphysical pollution endangers those near the polluted person. Divine intervention resolves the pollution, but divine intervention can destroy both the guilty and those near the guilty. So, it follows naturally that a community aware of pollution in its midst would want to drive that pollution out. As A. Petrovic and I. Petrovic suggest, a polluted person ‘is shunned by the society for fear of divine retribution collaterally affecting those in his or her company’ (2016: 30; cf. Parker 1983: 9). Importantly, expulsion does not purify the offending person (Thucydides, Hist. 1.126). Divine intervention, even divinely mediated destruction, can still strike a polluted person later. ¹⁵ Expulsion works instead to keep the community safe. In a sense, the community stands back to avoid the lightning bolts.

Ancient writers connect incest both to divine action and to expulsion. Scholarship on 1 Cor. 5 often cites Cicero, who assumes that incest will invite the gods’ wrathful judgment. He discusses a woman who engages in relations with her son-in-law and asks how she could possibly do such a thing when she should be aware of the gods’ power. He laments, ‘To think that she did not quail, if not before the vengeance of Heaven, or the scandal among men, at least before the night itself with its wedding torches’ (Cicero, Pro Cluentio 6.15 [Hodge]). In the text from Pseudo-Plutarch cited previously, sacrificing an impious, incestuous person to the gods proves the only solution to the danger created by his presence (Pseudo-Plutarch, Greek and Roman Parallel Stories 310 C). Philo, in his discussion of scriptural prohibitions against incest, says, ‘justice [δίκη] who watches over human affairs avenges the unholy deeds on the impious, and the impiety extends beyond the perpetrators of the deed to those who voluntarily range themselves with the perpetrators’ (Philo, On the Special Laws 3.3.19–20 [Colson]).

In other texts, particularly the tragedies, incest leads to expulsion, although some earlier scholarship overlooks these passages. ¹⁶ In Euripides’ play, Creon tells Oedipus to leave the city in order to protect the land from avenging spirits that afflict Oedipus (Euripides, Phoen. 1584–94). For Seneca, also, Oedipus’s departure marks the removal of communal danger. As Oedipus says, ‘a kindlier condition of the skies follows my going’ (Seneca, Oedipus 1054–55 [Fitch]). Importantly, Oedipus’s expulsion does not purify Oedipus. In Seneca, the plagues follow him. ‘I am drawing with me the deadly maladies of the land’, he says, ‘Savage Fates, the shuddering tremor of Disease, Wasting and black Plague and ravening Pain, come with me: I rejoice to have such guides as these’ (Seneca, Oedipus 1058–61 [Fitch]). In Sophocles’ sequel to Oedipus Tyranus, Oedipus describes himself as one still affected by some stain. ‘How could I, who was born to misery’, he asks Theseus, ‘wish you to touch a man in whom every taint of evil dwells?’ (Sophocles, Oed. col. 1132–35 [Lloyd-Jones]). Oedipus’s expulsion from Thebes protects Thebes, not Oedipus. The final resolution of Oedipus’s crime occurs later and through the intervention of the gods. By ‘some escort come from the gods or the unlighted foundation of the earth that belongs to those below’, Oedipus is ‘taken away with no lamentations’ (Sophocles, Oed. col. 1994a: 1661–66 [Lloyd-Jones]).

Patterns Related to Incest and Pollution

In this section, I analysed depictions of incest as pollution in extrabiblical Greco-Roman literature. I asked how writers understand the danger of incest pollution and how they envision its resolution. Despite differences in the specific words used to denote pollution, there is a shared pattern of thinking whereby writers associate incest with pollution that creates communal danger. The gods resolve this pollution through an intervention that afflicts or destroys the polluted person and potentially releases the wider community from the effects of pollution. Noting this pattern reveals for us one way in which ancient writers (including Jewish ones, i.e., Philo) can approach incest. It now remains to ask if Paul’s discussion of incest in 1 Cor. 5 follows this pattern, and if so, how and to what extent?

Incest, Pollution, and Danger in 1 Cor. 5

Incest as Pollution in 1 Cor. 5

Paul expresses shock at a case of πορνεία among the Corinthians, ‘of a kind that is not found even among pagans’ (1 Cor. 5.1). ¹⁷ A man in the community has his father’s wife. Paul’s description of the situation (γυναῖκά τινα τοῦ πατρὸς ἔχειν) in 1 Cor. 5.1 implies a union between a man and his stepmother. ¹⁸ Joshua Reno, in contrast to the majority of Pauline scholarship, suggests that Paul does not view this relationship as incest at all but rather as adultery, which threatens the social body of the Corinthian assembly (2016: 828). He claims the ancient sources ‘consistently categorize relationships between stepmother and son as simply adulterous’ (Reno 2016: 838). Reno nuances the discussion of 1 Cor. 5 by highlighting the fact that ancient sources need not categorize sexual behaviors in a way that matches modern, Western views (Reno 2016: 838). A scholar today may instinctively call something ‘incest’ that an ancient writer may call ‘adultery’. Nonetheless, while not all ancient writers describe stepmother/stepson relations as incest, some do, which Reno himself notes. ¹⁹

There are other reasons to suppose that Paul views a stepmother/stepson relationship as incest and not merely as adultery. Each Pentateuchal text that prohibits sex with one’s father’s wife suggests that such acts violate the father’s sexual rights (Lev. 18.8, 20.11; Deut. 22.30, 27.20; cf. Jub. 33.10). At the same time, Lev. 18.8 casts stepmother/stepson relationships as incestuous by grouping them with other relationships that are forbidden because of the close kinship between the involved parties. These relationships, discussed in Lev. 18.6–18, share in their potential to pollute the land and invite exile (Lev. 18.25, cf. Lev. 20.10–26). Jews in the first century read their scriptures variously, and they reach different conclusions about why the law forbids stepmother/stepson relations, ²⁰ but Josephus places stepmother/stepson relations within the same category as relations between a biological mother and son (Ant. 3.274–5) as Lev. 18 does. It seems likely, then, that Paul also views stepmother/stepson relationships as incestuous.

Many scholars call incest in 1 Cor. 5 a ‘sin’ or call the incestuous man a ‘sinner’ (Kempthorne 1968: 570 n. 1; Collins 1980: 337; Campbell 1993: 341; Deming 1996: 304; Engberg-Pedersen 2010: 206; Waters 2015: 239), but sin language does not appear in this letter until 1 Cor. 6.18 in the discussion of πορνεία related to a πόρνη. ²¹ In 1 Cor. 5, Paul is concerned with pollution, not sin per se. Language of pollution and purity permeates this section. In 1 Cor. 5.6, Paul refers to the man as leaven (ζύμη). This word frequently indicates something that is incompatible with cultic celebrations or that pollutes sacrifices (i.e., renders them improper for cultic use) in the Septuagint, ²² but ζύμη pollutes in other Greco-Roman texts as well. ²³ Paul’s response to the pollution caused by incest involves purification. Paul commands the Corinthians to clean out (ἐκκαθαίρω) the leaven in 1 Cor. 5.7. The word used for ‘sincerity’ (εἰλικρίνεια) in 1 Cor. 5.8 also denotes purity in the sense of being unmixed with other materials—namely, in this case, ζύμη. Paul treats a man who engages in incestuous sex with his stepmother as a source of pollution, along with writers in section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature)—such as Euripides, Sophocles, Aelian, and others, all of whom describe incest as a source of pollution.

Effects of Pollution Caused by Incest in 1 Cor. 5

Paul not only connects incest with pollution but also links incest with communal danger. Scholars who discuss incest in terms of sin often emphasize the danger of tolerating sin among God’s people and suggest that such laxity invites condemnation. Roy Ciampa and Brian Rosner say, ‘Failure to deal with a seriously sinning member invites the possibility of judgment from God on the whole group’ (2010: 201). Paul, however, highlights two other dangers that emanate from the man himself.

First, the man’s pollution contaminates the rest of the community. Paul warns: ‘a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough’ (1 Cor. 5.6). ²⁴ Left unchecked, this pollution can prevent the community from being a new lump of dough (1 Cor. 5.6–7). Second, the man’s presence impacts cultic and ritual observances. In 1 Cor. 5.6–8, Paul draws on traditions in which the presence of ζύμη endangers the Passover ritual and sacrifices (Exod. 12.14–19; Num. 28.16–17; Deut. 16.2–4). Christ, the πάσχα, has been sacrificed, and Paul urges the Corinthians to drive out the old leaven (τὴν παλαιὰν ζύμην) so that they can celebrate the festival ‘with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth’ (1 Cor. 5.8). Scholars often take the exhortation to celebrate the festival in 5.8 as a general instruction for living a Christian life (Garland 2003: 180; Ho 2015: 108), but it could indicate the actual ritual practices of the Corinthian community. All three synoptics link Passover and the Lord’s Supper (Mt. 26.17–29; Mk. 14.12–25; Lk. 22.7–23), and the words of institution Paul ‘received from the Lord’ (1 Cor. 11.23) closely resemble the synoptics, especially Luke. Moreover, Paul particularizes his command not to associate with a brother who is a πόρνος (1 Cor. 5.9) by forbidding the Corinthians to eat with such a person (1 Cor. 5.11). The Corinthians do not gather together to eat mundane meals but rather to eat the Lord’s Supper. Paul’s concerns about the Corinthians’ meals in 1 Cor. 5 foreshadow the discussion of the Lord’s Supper in 1 Cor. 11.17–34. The polluted man proves as incompatible with the Corinthians’ communal, cultic meals as ζύμη at the Passover or ζύμη in the hands of Jupiter’s priests.

These two communal dangers prove important because they are attested in other Greco-Roman literature where incest creates pollution. The incestuous man pollutes the Corinthian community, and Oedipus’s pollution pollutes Thebes (Euripides, Phoen. 1047–50). The incestuous man impacts cultic and ritual observances, and Oedipus’s pollution impacts haruspicy and sacrifice (Seneca, Oedipus 314–83). To the extent that Paul describes incest as a source of pollution that endangers the Corinthian community, he follows the pattern explored in section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature). The fact that Paul discusses uniquely Jewish and early Christian rituals (Passover and Lord’s Supper) does not take away from the fact that the underlying logic of pollution that causes danger appears even in nonbiblical texts.

Purging Pollution Caused by Incest in 1 Cor. 5

Paul’s reaction to the case of incest is twofold. Paul begins by urging the Corinthians to expel the guilty man. They should have mourned, he says, ‘so that he who has done this would have been removed from among you’ (1 Cor. 5.2). Importantly, Paul does not suggest that the Corinthians must purify the man. Instead, they expel him to purify themselves. ²⁵ The word ἐκκαθαίρω, used in 1 Cor. 5.7, indicates cleansing from something as opposed to the cleansing of something. ²⁶ The ἵνα clause in 1 Cor. 5.7 further establishes that cleansing occurs so the community can be a new lump of dough. Again, Paul emphasizes the need to purify the community rather than any communal responsibility to purify the man. This makes sense as a reaction to pollution caused by incest, as we have seen attested in other ancient texts. For example, Oedipus leaves Thebes so that Thebes can prosper; however, this does not purify Oedipus (Seneca, Oedipus 1058–61; Sophocles, Oed. col. 1132–35).

Paul also says to give the man to Satan ‘for the destruction of the flesh’ (1 Cor. 5.5). This command presents a significant obstacle to interpreters of this passage. As noted previously, texts from Leviticus that forbid incest link incest with pollution and suggest that incest can pollute the land and invite exile, but none of these texts suggest that the Israelites must give the person engaging in incest to Satan. ²⁷ Three features of this command deserve note because they parallel ancient discussions of incest, pollution, and danger in section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature).

First, handing the man to Satan leads to destruction (ὄλεθρος). Although many scholars maintain that ὄλεθρον τῆς σαρκός refers to destruction of some aspect of the man such as his weakness or his fleshly orientation (Thiselton 2000: 396; Basta 2019: 441), σάρξ can refer to the physical body in Pauline writings (Phil. 1.22, 24; Gal. 2.20; 2 Cor. 4.11), including in contexts where both flesh and spirit represent components of the person (2 Cor. 7.1; cf. Martin 1995: 172). Destruction of the flesh can therefore indicate a physical affliction that the incestuous man faces. Even Gordon Fee, who resists reading ‘destruction of the flesh’ as physical suffering or death, nonetheless admits: ‘This is the most natural understanding of the word “destruction” ’ (1987: 210).

Leviticus 20.11 prescribes the death penalty for sex between a man and his father’s wife, but while Paul does anticipate destruction in 1 Cor. 5, he does not ask the Corinthian community to carry out that destruction. This brings me to the second noteworthy feature. Paul expects Satan to mediate the destruction of the flesh. This is clear because of the relationship (indicated by εἰς ὄλεθρον τῆς σαρκός) between handing the man over to Satan and the man’s destruction. Whether εἰς followed by the accusative expresses purpose (Campbell 1993: 332) or result (Fee 1987: 209; Ciampa and Rosner 2010: 209) is irrelevant for my point. Satan plays a role in the man’s destruction in either reading. The appeal to Satan as the source of physical affliction coheres with Paul’s Jewish heritage. ²⁸ Yet, even as Paul daws from Jewish traditions in his identification of Satan as the divinity that intervenes to destroy the offender, the underlying pattern of incest pollution, danger, and destruction from a divinity appears not only in the Jewish writer Philo but also in several non-Jewish texts in section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature). ²⁹ Destruction mandated by the gods (Pseudo-Plutarch, Greek and Roman Parallel Stories 310 C) or affected by the gods (Sophocles, Oed. col. 1661–66; cf. Cicero, Pro Cluentio 6.15) can resolve pollution caused by incest and end the danger associated with it.

Third, it is this destruction of the flesh that enables the spirit’s salvation in the day of the Lord. The use of ἵνα in 1 Cor. 5.5 indicates that saving the spirit is the ultimate purpose of handing the man to Satan. Σῴζω connotes purification, suggesting that destruction can resolve the problem of pollution highlighted throughout 1 Cor. 5. ³⁰ As noted in the introduction, many scholars position incest within a framework of sin and thereby conclude that repentance or cessation of sin makes salvation possible (Murphy-O’Connor 1982: 170; Moses 2013: 190; Waters 2015: 249). Repentance does represent an appropriate response to sin in the New Testament (e.g., Mk 1.4; Lk. 3.3, 17.3–4), but I have argued that Paul does not discuss incest in terms of sin in this passage. Further, nothing in this text indicates that Paul expects repentance, as even some advocates of this reading acknowledge (Murphy-O’Connor 1982: 170). Paul only links the possibility of salvation to handing the man to Satan for destruction.

Which πνεῦμα is saved? Some scholars hold that destruction saves the man’s πνεῦμα (Fee 1987: 212) while others claim that destruction protects the πνεῦμα of God in the community, which incest threatens (Collins 1980: 260; Suh 2020: 76–7). Several factors suggest that destruction from Satan purifies the man from his pollution. Paul uses πνεῦμα to refer to a human spirit three times in 1 Corinthians (2.11, 7.34, 14.14–16), which sets a precedent for the use of πνεῦμα in reference to a human person. Paul uses no possessive pronoun to identify the spirit as the man’s in 1 Cor. 5.5, ³¹ but neither does he use a possessive pronoun in 1 Cor. 7.34 when he uses σῶμα and πνεῦμα to refer to a virgin’s body and spirit. Moreover, the spirit’s salvation in 1 Cor. 5.5 occurs ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τοῦ κυρίου. This adds an eschatological dimension to the discussion that echoes 1 Cor. 3.13–15, where salvation in ἡ ἡμέρα refers to the salvation of a person. ³² The idea that a man’s πνεῦμα will persist despite the destruction of the σάρξ also corresponds to Paul’s affirmation that σάρξ does not inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 15.50), but that the resurrection body is πνευματικός (Martin 1995: 171).

And yet, Paul’s discussion of the man’s purification remains connected to his concern for the broader health of the ‘pneuma of Christ’s body’ (Martin 1995: 169). For Paul, the Corinthians are joined together into one body with each other and with Christ through πνεῦμα. What happens to one member of this body impacts the others and even affects Christ (1 Cor. 6.15–20). Within this connection, sharp distinctions between the individual and the communal break down. ³³ One man’s pollution can pollute the entire Corinthian assembly like ζύμη in a lump of dough. So also, destroying the polluting element completes the extraction of that pollution from the community and purifies its πνεῦμα. The resolution of pollution through the action of a divinity on the guilty person differs from the ultimate resolution of incest pollution in Lev. 18.24–30 and Lev. 20.11. Paul does not envision a communal exile as a result of the incestuous man’s crime, nor does he expect the Corinthians to kill the incestuous man in their midst. Instead, along with texts considered in section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature), Paul urges expulsion and then expects that a divinity’s activity will lead to final resolution both for the man and for the community.

Patterns Related to Incest and Pollution in 1 Cor. 5

I began this section by asking if Paul’s approach to incest in 1 Cor. 5 follows a pattern seen in other Greco-Roman literature from section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature), and if so, how and to what extent. Paul follows the pattern I highlighted by associating the incestuous man with pollution. He sees that pollution as a source of communal danger, of a kind seen in texts examined in section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature). He urges the Corinthians to expel the incestuous man to protect the community from danger, which is a common response to serious pollution in Greco-Roman literature. And yet expulsion does not, in itself, resolve pollution. Satan destroys the σάρξ, which leads to the ultimate cleansing of the πνεῦμα. Again, numerous Greco-Roman texts end with the resolution of pollution by means of divine intervention, which often includes destruction of the polluted person.

But does Paul follow the pattern outlined in section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature) to such an extent that his ideas are indistinguishable from other non-Jewish writers in the ancient world? Paul does not think so. Indeed, he begins the chapter by criticizing the Corinthians for their behavior ‘not found even among pagans’, suggesting a distinction between those ‘sanctified in Christ Jesus’ (1 Cor. 1.2) and the rest of the world (cf. 1 Cor. 12.2) and implying that the Corinthians must hold to a standard distinct from pagans. As he develops his argument in this chapter, he adopts a uniquely Jewish tradition—namely, Passover—and incorporates the Corinthians into it (cf. 1 Cor. 10.1–13) while simultaneously reimagining the festival with Christ as the πάσχα. Neither Zeus nor Dike nor the Erinyes destroy the incestuous man, but a figure drawn from Jewish tradition, Satan. Paul positions this destruction and salvation in the context of the ‘Day of the Lord’. In all of these ways, Paul’s approach is thoroughly Jewish and in self-conscious distinction from the nations. My aim here is not, therefore, to suggest that Paul’s approach to incest is ‘Greco-Roman’ as opposed to ‘Jewish’. Instead, I want to highlight how even though Paul’s approach to incest shows clear indebtedness to Jewish tradition, at a conceptual level, it also follows a pattern of pollution, danger, and resolution that is familiar within the broader Greco-Roman world.

Conclusion

At the outset, I asked why the response to the incestuous man in 1 Cor. 5 requires both expulsion and destruction from Satan. I noted that many scholars see the command in 1 Cor. 5.5 as an injunction to punish a sinner, but without clarifying why only incest requires this punishment. I considered one pattern that appears in Greco-Roman literature where incest is associated with pollution that creates communal danger and that is resolved by divine intervention. This establishes one way that ancient people might understand incest. My exegesis of 1 Cor. 5 revealed that Paul’s response to incest adheres to this pattern in that he sees incest as polluting and dangerous, and he commands the Corinthians to hand the man to a divine force for resolution.

In light of the similarity between the pattern identified in section (Purity and Pollution in Ancient Literature) and Paul’s approach in 1 Cor. 5, Paul may not give his instructions because he wants to punish the man for his sin. He may not view incest as more morally abhorrent than other sins. He may not intend to make the man repent. Instead, perhaps Paul encounters a case of incest in his community and, like some of his contemporaries, sees incest as a real danger. His reaction represents one of the ways that ancient people could respond to this danger. He urges the Corinthians to separate from the polluted man in order to stay safe and allow Satan to resolve the pollution.