1 CORINTHIANS CHAPTER 6 - 10

1 Do any of you dare, when you
Have a case against others due,
Go to law before the unjust,
And not before the saints in trust?
2 Do you not know the saints will judge
The world? And if the world like fudge
Shall be judged by you, are you yet
Not worth to judge smallest set?
3 Do you not know that we shall judge
Angels? How much more then the smudge
Of things in this life? 4 If you then
Have cases of judgement for men
In this life, set them to judge who
Are least esteemed by the church crew.
5 I speak to your shame. Is it so
That there’s not a wise man to go
Among you? No, not one to be
Able to judge his brothers’ fee?

My practice, my Beloved, has always been
To bring complaint before the one in sin
Against my pride and store, and if he fail
To do me justice, then I haste to sail
To his friends and present the turgid case
To see if they can save his hopeful face.
Never yet have I gone to law to get
My rights, instead I simply strive to set
My belt a bit tighter and stay to taste
What kale and turnips remain without waste.
Remainder that You leave to me in store
So far has met my needs and far, far more.
I only wonder that I do so well
In this world where the wicked rule the spell.

To judge the cases of the quarrelsome
It seems the ones esteemed least by the rum
Are to be chosen. What the man admits
Is that the ones called out where St. Paul sits
Hold some in great esteem and others small.
What can one then expect when good St. Paul
Has gone to rest and emperors require
The seating of the bishops on the wire
Of councils ecumenical and bright?
We can expect an even darker night.
The least may judge indeed as may the great,
But judgement’s likely to fall on the pate
Of the least guilty not to say the true
And righteous ones, if such are in Your view.

6 But brother goes to law with his
Own brother and that before quiz
Of unbelievers. 7 Now therefore
There’s utterly a fault at core
Among you, because you make suit
One with another. Why refute,
Instead of taking the wrong? Why
Do you not rather suffer lie?
8 Instead you do wrong and defraud
You own brothers like any clod.

There may be somewhere Baptist church where all
Have always been loving under the pall,
But I’ve got doubts. I know a plenty where
Lawsuits have risen to set out a snare.
But now I see I’ve done right on my own
To appear only before Your own throne
And not the bench where lawyers beat the bush
The find a fee over, beyond the push.
My virtue is forgotten as I putter
About the garden and the lazy gutter.
I rather look at the vine and the flower
While I am living in this world an hour,
Or better yet, the beetle that was last
To face the autumn torrents failing fast.

9 Don’t you know the unrighteous will
Not inherit God’s holy hill?
Don’t be deceived, nor fornicators,
Idolaters nor wedlock breakers,
The spineless, nor the male priests who
Serve in fertility cult’s pew,
10 Thieves, nor the covetous, nor yet
Abusers of alcohol’s bet,
Revilers nor extortioners,
Shall inherit God’s harbingers.

There is an inconsistency I trow
In those who take this text to preach somehow
To those adults consenting in their way
Of privacy and out of light of day,
And yet themselves participate to praise
The resurrecting god in raucous lays
Just like the ones heard in the awful days
Of Baal and Ashtoreth. Beloved, keep me
Away from the temples where Trinity
Is served with sensual rhythm and the share
Of sex no matter whether it is there
Between men or between the opposite.
I scorn the sacred prostitute that sings
And sways his hips while counterpart takes wings.

11 And such were some of you, but you
Are cleansed and sanctified now too
In Lord Jesus’ name and by our
God’s spirit. 12 All things in their hour
Are lawful to me, but not all
Things are expedient in their call,
All things are lawful for me, but
I’ll not be brought to them and shut.

It seems that justification and more,
Both cleaning and the greater treasure store
Of sanctification comes in fell swoop:
It’s not a work of lifetime in the coop.
It’s not gained by the human sacrifice,
Nor by the sex trade in the temple slice,
But by the Lord Jesus’ name and by our
God’s spirit. My Beloved, I thank the hour
When I saw You within the self with power,
Not to be overthrown by any deed,
But intimately wedded to the need
Of human breath and life, the sovereign Lord
Who orders my obedience to Adored,
Whose word is like a burning fire and sword.

13 Food for the stomach and the belly
For food, but God destroys the jelly
Of both of them together. Now
The body’s not for fornication,
But for the Lord, the Lord somehow
Is for the body. 14 In his station
God’s raised up the Lord, and will raise
Us also by His own power’s praise.
15 Don’t you know that your bodies are
The members of Christ? Shall I mar
The members of Christ and make them
The members of a harlot’s hem?
May God forbid such stratagem.
16 What? Don’t you know the one who’s joined
To a prostitute is purloined
In one body? For two, says He,
Will be joined in one flesh to be.
17 But one that joined unto the Lord
Is one spirit with the adored.

O my Beloved, if anything I know,
It is that there are not two in the show,
There’s only One, You in all things and over
All things the Sovereign and no longer rover
As I might in my blindness and illusion
Think to my detriment and my confusion.
The self and Self are joined in One to be
One now and ever to eternity.
There is no I of me, but only I
That is the truth of Your reality.
Beloved, I turn from others and join me
To You in one and see from earth to sky
The rising flame of sacrifice, the spark
Of light that rises on surrounding dark.

18 Flee fornication. Every sin
That a man does is without din
Of body, but the fornicator
Sins against his own body later.
19 What? Don’t you know your body’s room
Of the holy spirit abloom
Among you, which you have from God,
And you’re not your own on the sod?
20 For you’re bought with a price, that’s why
To glorify God in the ply
Of your body, in spirit too,
Both of which are God’s to be true.

Let me, Beloved, flee fornication and
The spirit of unfaithfulness to stand
In prayer in temples of the sun and rain,
In temples of Baal where the lights remain
In fables caught in art beneath the strain
Of splintered rainbows crowned with stone and glass.
Beloved, let me see those temples and pass
Into the greater temple made of light
And air and love and sovereign bidding bright.
My worship is obedience to Your word
Like every soul that’s feathered and that’s furred.
As though without will and in innocence
Let me sweep out the refuse from Your tents
And do Your will until my breath relents.


1 As for the things of which you wrote
To me, it’s good for a man smote
Not to touch a woman at all.
2 But because fornication's call
Let every man have his own wife,
And let every woman save strife
From her own husband. 3 Let the man
Give his wife due kindness in span,
Likewise also the wife unto
Husband let her always be true.
4 The wife does not have power upon
Her own body, but husband drawn,
And likewise also the man’s not
Got power over his body’s plot,
But that belongs to wife alone.
5 Do not defraud each of his own,
Except with consent for a time,
That you may give yourselves to climb
Fasting with prayer, then come again
Together, that Satan in den
Not tempt you to weak acts of slime.

The true fast includes more that food and drink,
It also means to pray and not to think
Of pleasures of the flesh in those brief hours
Of daylight were the body leans and cowers
While spirit rises to the skies to set
The soul alight with blessing there well met.
Beloved, St Paul reveals he knows the air
At least if not the time when fasting’s fair.
Your revelation’s always everywhere
The same no matter which book men may share.
I fast from flesh these days not so much for
The sanctity I have behind the door,
But simply because with the passing years
The body does not know the former fears.

6 But I speak this by leave and not
Commanded by the Lord as taught.
7 For I wish all men were like me.
But every man has his own fee
In gift of God, one set one way,
Another for a different ray.

The good St. Paul is not alone in wishing
All other men were just like him in fishing.
Few and far between love the difference
Of others on the other side of fence.
Irrational desire to be secure
Makes foolish people think the only sure
Would be if all shared thought and action to
Accommodate everything all men do.
But vive la différence is still a word
To be more general for whey and curd,
The more the difference the more exciting
I find the other, and especially biting
Is difference in thought. I do not care
For colour of the skin and length of hair.

8 I say therefore to those who are
Unmarried and widows, it’s far
Better for them if they abide
As I do then they will not slide.
9 But if they can’t control themselves,
Let them marry, humans or elves,
For it’s a better thing that they
Marry than burn in hellish way.
10 And to the married I command,
Not I, but the Lord, let not manned
Wife leave her husband in the land.
11 But and if she does leave, then let
Her stay unmarried or then get
Reconciled to her husband, let
Not husband put away his wife.
12 But as for the rest of the strife,
It’s I who speaks and not the Lord.
If any brother’s wife adored
Does not believe, and she’s content
To live with him resilient,
Then let him not divorce or vent.
13 And the woman who’s got a man
That does not believe, if he can
Be pleased to live with her, then let
Her not leave him to place a bet.
14 The unbelieving man is set
Apart as holy by the wife,
The unbelieving wife gets life
Of holiness by husband’s fife,
If not, your children were unclean,
But now they’re holy, it is seen.

St. Paul is ready to make fatwa here,
Despite the fact that nothing in his ear
Speaks from Your Word for him to know and fear.
The proposition that he makes is this:
That children of one faithful do not miss
But are clean in the pasture that they kiss.
If they are clean, then so must be the spouse
That is an unbeliever in the house.
Result is that since faith in one makes two
Clean, then the faithful one must not give shoe,
Divorcing the unfaithful man or shrew.
The logic is a convolution true,
And Paul does well not to attribute that
To You, Beloved, but to his own mind's fat.

15 But if the unbelieving leave,
Let him leave and not have reprieve.
A brother or a sister’s not
In bondage in such cases’ plot,
But God’s called us to Islam’s lot.

Or then to Peace, Beloved. What do You want?
Religious in identity is gaunt,
And hardly anything for You to grumble,
Although it's one where humans always stumble.
Peace or Islam, I care not any whit,
As long as from the bondage of the fit
In Roman yoke I come away to sit.
But like the pincers that set squeeze on nut,
The other half of Rome, that makes it shut,
Is doubtless the great caliphate that claimed
Jerusalem between the crusades blamed.
The one allows no divorce and eschews
The marriage bed at least for priestly cues.
The other binds four wives under its screws.

16 Who knows, O wife, if you will save
Your husband from the sinful grave?
Who knows, O man, if you will get
Inheritance for your wife yet?
17 But as God’s given to every man,
As the Lord’s called, let all who can
So walk. And so I order all
The called out ones to keep the call.
18 Is any man once circumcised
Called? Let him not become as guised
Uncircumcised. Is any called
Uncircumcised? Leave him unthralled.
19 The circumcision’s naught at all,
Nor is uncircumcision’s call,
But keeping the commandments of
God under His eternal love.

But fact is Abraham was called before
He caught his circumcision and the gore.
But fact is whether called or not, the rate
Of Your commandment is out there to state
That every male should go under the knife
Upon the eighth day or then meet the strife.
Uncircumcision is not consonant
With keeping of commandments on the slant.
What Paul says makes no sense at all to me,
But is in conflict with itself to see.
The walls You make in artificial spree,
Given men's rue, are not necessary.
At least there is no doubt a child must be
Cut open with the best of sorcery.

20 Let every man stay in the same
Calling where he’s called without blame.
21 Are you called as a servant come?
Care nothing for it, but stay rum,
Yet if you may become free, then
Take advantage of that again.
22 Because the one called in the Lord,
Though he’s a servant, in the Lord
He is the Lord’s freeman, likewise
Also the one that’s free to rise
By calling, is Christ’s servant wise.
23 You’re bought with a price, do not be
The servants of men, but be free.
24 Brothers, let every man in calling
Stay in it with God, without brawling.

The death of Christ and payment made in blood
Makes sense at least before the awful flood
Of those who would make me servant of men
To follow every custom and each yen.
I'm bought and paid for from the surfeit of
Political correctness in the glove,
Of neighbour's expectations at the shove,
And from the right thing to do in earth's den.
I'm bought and paid for, so I need not search
A place in any henhouse for a perch.
I am the property of one who paid
For me with his own life when once waylaid.
I praise You I am free from all that those
Who claim the priestcraft would on me impose.

25 Concerning virgins, I receive
No command of the Lord to grieve,
Yet I give my own judgement being
One who’s obtained mercy and seeing
To be faithful to Lord’s decreeing.
26 So this is a good thing, I guess,
To answer in present distress,
That it’s good for a man to be.
27 Are you bound to a wife? Then see
You don’t try to get a divorce.
Are you divorced from a wife? Then
Don’t look for a wife among men.
28 But and if you marry again,
You do not commit any sin,
And if a virgin marries, she
Has not sinned, because she was free.
But such people will in the flesh
Have trouble, I would not enmesh.
29 But this I say, brothers, the time
Is short, and there will come the chime
When those who have wives will be like
Those who had no car nor a bike.

The Advent sort of spirit that I knew
When I was young and sitting in the pew
Suggested time was short and there were few
Who should live to marry or study too.
Now I have a grandchild after the fact,
The time was short, but I had time to act.
What shall we say of those in Paul's day who
Did not marry at all because they thought
There was not time for such things in the plot?
Two thousand years suffices in my mind
For householder to marry someone kind.
And yet the time is shorter now than then,
And nearer to the coming once again
Of Christ than when Paul wrote and when I pined.

30 And those who weep as though they’d not,
And those rejoicing as though shot,
And those that buy as those who had
Nothing in wealth of good or bad.
31 And those that use this world, as not
Abusing it, for fashion taught
Of this world passes from the plot.
32 But I would have you be without
Care. He that’s unmarried is stout
To care for what belongs to Christ (the Lord),
How he may please the Lord sufficed.
33 The married one, the other way,
Cares for the things of the world’s sway,
And how he may please his own wife.
34 A difference lies between the rife
Virgin and wife. Unmarried girl
Cares for the things of the Lord’s curl,
So she may be holy both in
Body and spirit without sin,
But she that’s married has a care
For the things of the world in share,
How she may pleaser her husband there.

When celibate in Ephrata looked out
Upon the wilderness with mug and stout,
He saw the rigours of the married life
Too great for where he had to live in strife.
The celibate may take the easy way,
The time to read and work and fast and pray,
But virtue to be true in hermitage
Needs writing on the bustle of the page,
Needs exercise to muscle in the wage.
Beloved, the immature in mind in me
May long for peace and some security,
But faith in arm and surer poetry
Is carved out of the living at the boot,
The wear and care of loving at the root.

35 And this I speak for your own gain,
Not to cast a snare on your mane,
For the seemly thing, and so that
You may attend where the Lord sat
Without distractions lean or fat.
36 But if anyone thinks he is
Behaving uncoothly towards his
Virgin, if she’s passed flower of youth,
And there seems to be need in truth,
Let him do what he will and not
Sin, let them marry as they ought.
37 But he who stands steadfast in heart,
Without necessity to start,
But has control over his will,
And has decided not to spill
Virginity, he does well still.
38 So he who gives away the bride
Is doing well, but he beside
Who does not give such ones away
Is doing better in his way.
39 The wife is bound by law as long
As her husband lives in the throng
But if her husband dies, then she
Is left with her full liberty
To be married to whom she will,
But only in the Lord’s way still.
40 But she’s happier if she abides
According as my judgement rides,
And I think also that in me
There’s working God’s spirit to see.

Methinks St. Paul speaks over much about
A thing he has not practiced up to doubt.
His wordiness is typical of those
Who try to show and try to make a pose
Of knowledge, but know nothing of the shows.
He does well to admit he speaks his mind
And not the revelation that You signed.
According as his judgement rides indeed,
Let ancient wisdom ripen, go to seed,
But long as male and female feel the need,
His words will fall on deaf ears of the steed.
But You, Beloved, are wiser in Your bill,
And more human than humans at the till,
For humans love to climb celestial hill.


1 Now as for offerings made to idols,
We know we all have knowledge bridles.
Knowledge makes proud, but charity
Builds up the soul in unity.
2 If any one thinks that he knows
He knows nothing yet to dispose
As he should. 3 But if any man
Love God, the same is within scan.
4 So as for eating of those things
That are set in idols’ offerings,
We know an idol’s naught at all,
And there’s no God but One in hall.
5 For though many are called gods in
The sky or in the earth for sin,
As there are gods and lords galore,
6 But there is but one God in store,
The Father of whom are all things,
And we in him. And star of kings
Is one Lord Jesus Christ by whom
Are all things till the day of doom
And we have in him too our room.

Beloved, there is no God but You I know.
All idols are vain emptiness and show.
One God alone You send in every age
Divine guides who apply the sacred page
Of revelation. This I know and yet
None in this world and life have knowledge set,
But only glimmerings and peekings at
The glories of Your throne where You have sat
Eternities beyond imagination.
For Your sent one You hold a coronation
Beyond the water dippings and the meals
Where the elite in scorn says what he feels,
Beyond the crosses and the resurrections.
In Your name and in his I eat confections.

7 But such knowledge there is not found
In every man upon the ground,
For some up to this time aware
Of the idol therefore forebear
To eat a thing offered in air
To an idol, and for that care
Their conscience being weak finds snare.
8 But food does not recommend us
To God, for neither if we fuss
To eat we are the better then
If we don’t eat, then we’re worse men.
9 But take care not to abuse this
Liberty of yours and not miss
Being a stumblingblock to those
Who are weak by the thing you chose.
10 For if anyone see you which
Have knowledge sit eating in ditch
Of idol’s temple, will he not
Be stricken in his conscience caught
In weakness and be bold to eat
Those things that are the idol’s treat,
11 And through your knowledge shall the weak
Brother be destroyed by your cheek,
For whom Christ died, or so they speak?
12 When you sin so against the brothers,
And wound their weak conscience with smothers,
You sin against Christ. 13 So if food
Makes my brother offend as prude,
I’ll eat no meat while the world stands,
So’s not to break my brother’s bands.

Three things are uppermost in slaughter site:
The species must be clean there to be right,
The blood must not fail to gush into might,
And the name of the true God must prevail.
The later is a conceit of the pale.
St. Paul is like his Saviour in the way
He slices off traditions from his prey
And sticks tenaciously to letter of
The law that You once sent down here in love.
But think how many have the wit to read
The words with care to make them out with speed.
Most people use the words and an excuse
For eating pork and drinking blood's refuse.
Think before You inspire a whammed recluse.


1 Am I not an apostle too?
Am I not free? Have I not seen
Jesus Christ our Lord in his due?
Are you not my work in the Lord?
2 Though I’m not apostle adored
To others, yet doubtless I mean
To be one to you, for the sheen
And seal of my apostleship
Is you yourselves set in the Lord.

It all depends on how a man defines
Apostle in view of some false combines.
Apostles are those sent to testify
Of Your Son's resurrection on the sly.
But Paul just saw a vision in the light,
And those around him could witness no fight,
And gave no recognition to his call.
The doubts are valid when applied to Paul.
Just anyone at all may claim that he
Met Your Son on the road on one Friday,
But if there is no witness of the spree,
He only speaks of it to cause to be
Division in his hearers' company.
Beloved, keep You invisible in stall.

3 I answer those who question me
By this unanswerable decree,
4 Have we not power to eat and drink?
5 Are we not able at the brink
To lead about a sister, wife
As well as others in the life
Of apostolate, and as those
Brothers of the Lord, whom he chose
Also to call Cephas, suppose?
6 Or I only and Barnabas,
Can we not then turn off the gas?
7 Who goes to battle any time
At his own charges for the grime?
Who plants a vineyard not to eat
The fruit it bears him for a treat?
Who feeds a flock not to consume
The milk of the flock in his room?
8 Am I speaking as a man speaks?
Does not the law too make such creaks?
9 For it’s in law of Moses written,
You must not muzzle the mouth smitten
Of the ox that treads out the corn.
Does God leave even ox forlorn?
10 Or does He say it for our sakes?
For our sakes, no doubt, are these stakes
Written, that he that ploughs should plough
In hope, and he that threshes now
In hope to be partaker of
His hope to eat all of above.
11 If we’ve sown for you spiritual things,
Is it great if we reap such things
As carnal and material things?
12 Of others have this power on you,
Do not we have much more in view?
Yet we have never used this right,
But suffer everything for spite,
So’s not to hinder Christ’s word’s light.

Contention lasts a winter night and goes.
Now Paul takes Barnabas again and shows
Abiding love to one near and like kin.
They share the spirit and the bread within
As well as grain to fill the paunch withal.
The two of them obey the single call.
To justify their lack of sale and trade
Paul takes the Torah law that once was made
For grain and oxen and the right to tasting
A bit in hunger while at work not wasting
The kernals that fall by the trough though fat.
In this I hope that Paul’s not guilty at
Attempting to compare for his own gain.
With You, Beloved, comparing is in vain.

13 Do you not know that those who serve
With holy things live in the curve
Of the temple? And those who wait
At the altar from it take plate?
14 So has the Lord ordained that they
Who preach the gospel have their way
Of living from the gospel pay.
15 But I have used none of these things,
Neither have I written these things,
That it should be so done to me,
For I would rather die than see
That some should set my boasting free.
16 For though I preach the gospel, I
Have nothing to take glory by,
For need is laid upon me, and
Woe is to me if I don’t stand
To preach the gospel to this band.
17 For I do this thing willingly,
I have reward you do not see,
But if it is against my will
A dispensation’s to my bill.
18 What is my reward then? That when
I preach the gospel unto men,
I may make the gospel of Christ
Without charge, that I not abuse,
My right in the gospel confuse.

I see the truth of what Paul has to say
About the yoke placed in the Gospel pay.
I too made the mistake to be ordained
By such as had no plan but leave me pained,
Without support of any kind to preach,
Without encouragement that I should teach.
Long has the burden been upon my heart
As one responsible, ordained in cart,
But without horse and without house to pray.
I was ordained and then sent out to hay.
Beloved, the meadow where I wander free
Is sweet with presence of Your trinity
Of love and faith and at last charity.
I look over the fences where I pray.

19 For though I’m free of every man,
Still I’ve made myself under ban
To serve all, that I may gain more.
20 Unto the Jews I am a Jew,
That I might gain the Jews a few,
To them under the law as one
Under the law, shall I have won
Them who are under the law spun.
21 To them who are without the law,
As without law, not without awe
Of law to God, but under law
To Christ, that I might gain them that
Are without the law where they sat.
22 To the weak I became as weak,
That I might at last with the weak,
I’m made all things to all, that I
Might by all means save some that cry.
23 And this I do for gospel’s sake
That I might of you too partake.
24 Don’t you know that those who run in
A race all run, but one to win?
So run, so you may win the bin.
25 And everyone that strives to take
Control of self sets temperate stake
In everything. Now they do so
To get a fading crown in show,
But we an eternal prize know.
26 That’s why I run like this and not
Uncertainly, and so I’ve fought
Not as one that just beats the air.
27 But keep under my body’s care,
And bring into subjection there,
So that by any means when I
Have preached to others, then should I
Myself not be cast out to die.

If anyone, I understand what Paul
Says when he says he's backed against the wall
To be a Jew to Jew and Greek to Greek.
I too am anthropologist to seek
The temporary suspension of peek.
I too conform to cultures in the wake
Of every place I go to take a stake.
But I have never been a Jew to Jew,
Even when travelling in that holy view,
And never have I been a Greek to share
The tongue of Homer and of Hesiod's ware.
Beloved, let me be godly when with You,
And when I find myself in cosmic pew,
Godly with God who never speaks but true.


1 Moreover, brothers, I would not
Have you be ignorant and sot,
Since all our fathers passed beneath
The cloud and crossed the sea’s bequeath,
2 All baptised by Moses in cloud
And in the sea to sing aloud,
3 They ate the same blessed food in crowd,
4 And all drank the same blessèd drink,
For they drank from the sacred brink
Of the Rock that followed them there,
That Rock was Christ and of his share.
5 But with many of them was God
Not well pleased, but threw on the sod
In the desert. 6 Now these things were
Our examples by which infer
That we should not lust after things
Evil as they lusted in rings.
7 Be not idolaters as some
Of them were as was written rum,
“The folk sat down to eat and drink
And rose up to dance in the rink.”

The dance itself is not a pagan thing,
For David danced before You and to sing.
But dancing for a golden calf is such
A sin that I should never hope to touch.
The passing of the waters in the flood
Was baptism indeed but in the bud.
It made no Christian of the throng until
They fed upon the Rock from Sinai's hill.
Beloved, I sing and dance and so I make
A pilgrimage to waters for Your sake,
Across the Red Sea waves in pile on pile
While seagulls turn and shout and dip the while,
And flee from Egypt and the Pharaoh's crew
To find my solace is alone in You.

8 Let’s not commit uncleanness then
As committed some of those men,
And feel in one day twenty-three
Thousand of them unfaithfully.
9 Let’s not tempt Christ, as some of them
Also tempted, and to condemn
Were struck by serpents’ requiem.

The Christ or the Messiah in that day
They tempted before serpents got their pay
Was not the Jesus of first century,
But Moses bringing from Egyptian spree.
The Christ is the one sent, adorned, appointed
Divine guide by the head and heart anointed.
The many Christs that You have sent reveal
The character of Jesus at the meal.
Beloved, I lay my hand on every one
And vow my vows to You when I have done.
There is an image bought by time and place,
And though that image may shadow Your face,
The glory of eternal wonders stand
Above temptations in the desert land.

10 And don’t complain as some complained,
And were destroyed by the disdained.
11Now all these things happened to them
For examples written on hem
For warning to us on whom come
The ends the the world and its sum.
12 Whoever thinks he stands take heed
Not to fall down upon the mead.
13 No tempting’s taken you but such
As is a common, human touch.
But God is faithful who will not
Let you be tempted above what
You can bear, but will with the trial
Also make an escape a mile,
So you can bear and not be caught.
14 So flee, my dearly loved, from that
Idolatry where you have sat.
15 I’m talking as though to wise men,
So consider what I say then.

If Paul is really one to bring the news
Of Gospel abrogating law from views,
Then why does he pretend that You provide
The grace to keep the law from side to side?
And if the law is kept in any way,
The flight from the unclean, the idol's sway,
Then it is kept at least at the big ten
That sound resounding from Sinai again.
And if the ten are couth and sure then I
Must stop upon the Sabbath day and vie
With every priest upon the crutch and sill
Of church who denies Sabbath with a will.
Beloved, I know Sabbath cannot be kept,
Since priests say so, but grace alone has swept.

16 The cup of blessing that we bless,
Is it the communion, I guess,
Of the blood of Christ? The bread we
Break, is it not communion free
Of the body of Christ? 17 For we
Though many are one bread and one
Body, eaters of one bread done.
18 Look at Israel after the flesh,
Are they not who eat what is fresh
From the sacrifices also
Partakers of the altar’s glow?
19 What do I say then? Is the stone
Idol any thing or what’s shown
In sacrifice to idols flown
Any thing at all of what’s grown?
20 But I know what the Gentiles bring
In sacrifice offered to sing
Is done to devils and not God,
And I don’t want you by the prod
To have fellowship with such things
As devils hanging on their strings.
21 You can’t drink the cup of the Lord,
And the cup of devils abhorred,
You can’t partake of the Lord’s gift
And of the devils’ table’s shrift.
22 Do we provoke the Lord to be
Jealous, are we stronger than He?
23 All things are legal in my way,
But not all of expedient sway.
All things are legal as I fly,
But not all things here edify.
24 Let no man further his own part
But every man the other’s cart.

Occasional conformity is meant
No doubt in what St Paul here wrote and sent.
One cannot taste the wondered flesh of Christ
In bread and wine as validly sufficed
And then return to pagan table set
With crucifix and bell where flesh is met
With Jesus cookie complete with the sign
Of Osiris and Horus to resign.
Dionysos in Greece remains to pine
When the lance at the altar comes to pierce
The loaf intact that centuries make fierce.
Beloved, I sit me down beside the board
Of heavenly sanctuary with the horde
Of shewbread for the Sabbath in accord.

25 What’s sold in the butcher’s shop eat,
And ask no questions of the meat.
26 Because the earth is the Lord’s and
Everything in it’s by His hand.
27 If someone who does not believe
Invites you to a feast, don’t grieve
But go, and what is offered you
Eat without question of its due.
28 But if someone says to you, “This
Was offered in sacrifice’ bliss
To idols,” don’t eat it because
Of him who showed you it by laws,
Because the earth is the Lord’s and
Everything in it’s by His hand.

No doubt the Jewish butcher shop is meant,
Since mouse and pork are of the other bent,
And clearly take the pagan idol's rent.
It's only the ambiguous in view,
The mutton and the goat-meat to say true
That may be eaten without question of
The sacrifice to idols hand in glove.
The matter's of no consequence today,
And so there is no lesson had for pay.
It's an abuse to take this word that meets
The situation of idolic treats
And make of it excuse to drink the blood
Of pig and eat abominations' flood.
But such sweet Christians do when come in heats.

29 Take conscience, I say, not your own
But that of your brother alone,
For why is my freedom judged by
Another man’s conscience to buy?
30 For if I live by gift of God,
Why am I slandered by the prod
For what I take in gratitude?
31 Whether it be you eat your food
Or drink your drink, or what you do,
Do all to God’s glory in view.

There are some who proclaim that they are here
To partake of the idol's form and gear
With motivation of both joy and tear
To worship You alone in all they steer.
The pagan dance, the din of music's sound,
Gyrations of Baal's hips upon the ground,
Are all in evidence the Spirit's found,
And You are named with idol's perfect round.
Beloved, keep me from every temple's woe,
The whirling dance, the bowing deep and slow,
That shouts Allah, Jehovah in the row,
But in truth has no master but the glow
Of idol standing in the temple square,
Idolatry of great and good and fair.

32 Don’t give offence, not to the Jews,
Nor to the Gentiles, don’t abuse
The called out ones of God accuse.
33 I try to please all in all things,
Not seeking my own profitings,
But that of many, so they may
Be saved and brought in the right way.

Paul visits temenos and temple gate,
The court of pagans where the doomed await,
The synagogue and place in nature's room
Where wait the curious to pray in gloom.
He stands among them all in hope that he
May bring them gospel light eternally.
But what he writes is taken in a spree,
Excuse to worship falsehood's trinity,
Excuse to eat the unclean and excuse
To neglect circumcision for abuse.
Beloved, have mercy on poor Paul and me
Who battle with the faithful under tree
Where lust creates a new world running free.
Have pity on poor St. Paul and turn loose.

AUTHOR: THOMAS G. MCELWAIN

Copyright © 2007 Adams & McElwain Publishers and Thomas McElwain First Published in two volumes, The Beloved and I 2005, and Led of the Beloved, 2006. Second Edition, 2010 Third and revised edition, 2012 All rights reserved. No part of this verse commentary on the sacred Scriptures may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from publisher.

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