1 Cor 1, 1-3: los ministros en la comunidad de Corinto. Análisis filológico y traducción del protocolo de la Primera Carta a los Corintios

Abstract

In contrast to the epistolary formula of our time, the protocol of the first letter of St. Paul to the Christians at Corinth, and likewise of more than a third of the 13.500 letters of Graeco-Roman antiquity studied by O. Roller, consists of three sections: a) the sender, b) the address or addressee, c) the greeting. This study is a philological analysis of some words, the meanings of which not sufficiently appreciated until now, that could facilitate a more precise translation. 1. ADEYQOC is a designation applied to Sosthenes; it means a Christian associated with the Apostle through ties of ecclesiastical authority, although evidently subject to the apostolic authority of St. Paul. 2. 'EmKaYOu[lEVOlC appoints members to a governing body which directs the Christian community at Corinth as much as they carry out, a permanent manner, the cult and the priestily mission, by invoking, as St. Paul states, the divinity during the sacrificial rite. It is probable that this word was a technical one as opposed to the word ETI[oK0;1OL for example, which we find Phil. 1,2, because St. Paul speaks of the eucharistic celebrations only once throughout his epistles, (1 Cor. 10,16-22; 11,17-34). The preposition ouv which means in organic community with... connects the totality of the saints at Corinth mentioned immediately before, with the ETIlKUA,OO[lEVOl referring to the visible local head of the ecclesiastical body, under the direction, supra-local and absolute of the Apostle. This interpretation of the protocol is confirmed by the letter to the Christians at Philippi, which, though simpler, has a similar structure. 3. The word -rOTIoc cannot mean here a place, but rather a function, an authority. It refers to a post or a position, as well as to the principle addressees : CXltrwv like the senders (nuwv : Paul and Sosthenes) . The term locus -as the Vulgate translation- might have this meaning also the Latin Christian and non-Christian literature. 4. The traditional punctuation has to be modified by placing a colon instead of a comma after Koptvecp. This is the only way of avoiding tautology, absent the rest of the New Testament epistles as well as non-Christian letters. At the same time, the comma between tottw and autwv is superfluous. It has been placed there by some authors who constder the genitives autwv as coming not from the substantive tottw, which is the regular construction, but from Kupiou, so introducing an eparnotosis, a rhetorical figure non- existent here. 5. The Christian community at Corinth is not a model of a charismatic community as commonly held, neither is the Sacred Eucharist celebrated there without the intervention of the ministerial priests. 6. The Xapic, wished by St. Paul for the Christians at Corinth, besides the protocol usage of the Greek greeting, signifies grace, a supernatural gift.