The Epistle today switches to S. Paul’s first letter to the Christians at Corinth. As we did with S. Paul’s letter to the Romans, we will be reading from his epistles to the Corinthians over the next several weeks.
We might recall that S. Paul founded the church in Corinth about five years before writing the first epistle, then stayed long enough to get things organized, about one and one half years (Acts 18.11). Because of on-going persecution from the Jewish religious authorities, he left Corinth and sailed to Syria on his way to Jerusalem.
In this section of the Epistle (chapters 7-14), S. Paul attempts to answer a series of questions put to him by the Corinthians. And in our Epistle for this Sunday, he specifically addresses the question of Christian liberty. Here, he applies the use of allegory to the Hebrew Scriptures, something he does in several of his epistles.
Briefly, two schools of Biblical interpretation arose amongst the early Church Fathers. The so-called School of Antioch (located in modern-day Turkey) used a more literal interpretation and concerned themselves with the context of a given text. The School of Alexandria used allegory extensively, claiming it to be found in the writings of S. Paul and others. While the Hebrew Scriptures were written in the context of the Hebrew faith, these texts could be given a deeper meaning in the Christian context. Behind this practice was the conviction that the texts were inspired by God: All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. (II Timothy 3:16)
S. Paul applies this principle to the exodus experience of the Hebrew people as they traveled from Egypt to the Promised Land. The various events recorded in the Book of Exodus are seen as “types” (Gr. typos) or metaphors for the Christian in his journey from the slavery of sin to the freedom of the Kingdom of God.
Specifically, S. Paul wants the Corinthians to learn from the errors of the Israelites. Even though blessed by God having passed through the waters of the Red Sea (a “type” of the sacrament of Baptism) and given manna and water in the wilderness (a “type” of the sacrament of the Eucharist), they still turned their backs on the Sinai covenant and returned to their former idolatrous practices in Egypt. God took the Hebrew people out of Egypt but it seemed He could not take Egypt out of the Hebrew people.
Having received even greater blessings, the Corinthian church, like the Hebrew people, were presumptuous and over-confident in their relationship with God. S. Paul reminds them that even though all the Hebrews were rescued from slavery, not all of them made it to the Promised Land. Those who returned to idolatry came under God’s judgement.
In a similar way, we who have been baptized into Christ and receive His Body and Blood are to take this as a warning. While we might not worship a golden calf as the Hebrews did at Mt Sinai, there are other gods that tempt us away from the one true God. Wealth, power, security, adulation or those things that appeal to our lower passions all have a way of attracting us away from our true end. We must not be presumptuous and assume that we will find ourselves in the Kingdom of God, no matter what we do. The lambs will be separated from the goats. (Matthew 25:31-46)
No, the Christian journey is arduous and demanding. It requires a willing spirit and discipline. But when we find ourselves in the midst of temptation or heading towards despair, we would do well to remember these encouraging words from the epistle: There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.
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Rabbi Wolpe’s evolving Bible leaves faith with no anchor
When society defines God’s message, religion becomes little more than opinion
BY: Everett Piper, The Washington Times (July 26, 2026).
Recently, Shabbors Kestenbaum, a Harvard Divinity School graduate and host of the PragerU podcast “Theological,” interviewed Rabbi David Wolpe, a former visiting scholar at Harvard Divinity School. Rabbi Wolpe is also the Max Webb emeritus rabbi of Sinai Temple in Los Angeles and a scholar-in-residence at the Maimonides Fund.
On the show, Rabbi Wolpe denied the Old Testament’s historicity. For example, when asked about the story of Israel’s exodus from Egypt, he responded: “I don’t take these stories literally.” He then added, “Faith is not determined by empirical truth. We cannot turn to the Torah for scientific advice [or] for accurate historical accounts.”
Rabbi Wolpe also contended that the Bible is not static, but is rather an evolving document. He then argued that “as society changes, so does the way that God instructs us change.”
Finally, he defended same-sex marriage by indignantly asking, “Do you mean that the Torah says that someone’s deepest impulses are just evil? I just don’t believe that’s true.”
Whether you are Jewish or Christian (or neither), this should cause you to raise an eyebrow or two. A former visiting scholar from one of the world’s foremost theological schools just said he does not believe in original sin or that the Exodus was real. I mean, what Bible is the man reading?
Let us first consider Rabbi Wolpe’s assumption of human goodness. Everyone with a Sunday-school-level understanding of the Bible should know that, if anything is clear in both the Old and New Testaments, it is that our desires are evil, not good. Here are just a few examples.
“Every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” (Genesis 6:5)
“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9)
“Indeed, there is no one on earth who is righteous, no one who does what is right and never sins.” (Ecclesiastes 7:20)
“The same destiny overtakes all. The hearts of people … are full of evil and there is madness in their hearts while they live.” (Ecclesiastes 9:3)
“They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good. … All have turned away, all have become corrupt; no one does good.” (Psalm 14:1-3)
“There is none righteous, no, not one … their feet are swift to shed blood.” (Romans 3:10-18)
“For out of the heart of man come evil thoughts, fornication, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness.” (Mark 7:21, 22)
Now, lest I be accused of just thumping my Bible, theists and atheists alike have acknowledged the same.
For example, in “The Rape of Nanking,” Iris Chang writes, “Almost all people have this potential for evil, which would be unleashed … under certain … social circumstances.”
Paulo Coelho echoes the same in his book, “The Devil and Miss Prym.” “About the nature of human beings,” he writes, “I discovered that confronted by temptation, we will always fall. Given the right circumstances, every human being on this earth would be willing to commit evil.”
Then there is the seminal quote of G.K. Chesterton, who wrote in “Orthodoxy” that certain new theologians “dispute original sin, which is the only part of Christian theology which can really be proved.” He went on to bemoan that some followers of the Reverend R.J. Campbell “admit divine sinlessness, which they cannot see even in their dreams. But they essentially deny human sin, which they can see in the street.”
Finally, we have Malcolm Muggeridge, who succinctly added: “The depravity of man is at once the most empirically verifiable reality but at the same time the most intellectually resisted fact.”
Rabbi Wolpe’s argument for this metaphorical view of Scripture reminds me of my doctoral research at Michigan State University some 30 years ago. I attempted to define how contemporary evangelicals view Scripture. I will never forget how one of Michigan State University’s most iconic professors told me that the “death, resurrection, virgin birth and miracles of Jesus could be ’message statements,’” not “reality statements.”
This low view of Scripture, whether from Christians or Jews, makes faith pallid and inconsequential. There is no question that the Bible features several genres of literature, such as poetry, prose, prophecy and parables. No one disputes that. Still, dismissing its historicity and reducing it all to feel-good allegories and metaphors ultimately makes it all meaningless to anyone but you.
When culture rather than God defines your faith, its impact is of little consequence. If your religion is indistinct from the history-denying existentialism of the alphabet soup world around you, your influence is reduced to nothing and you will be ignored.
“When the salt has lost its savor … it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.” — Jesus (Matthew 5:13)
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Do Democrats hate Israel because they hate God?
On wrong side of heaven
BY: Don Feder, The Washington Times (July 26, 2026).
Is there a connection between Democrats’ growing animosity toward Israel and their rejection of God?
Back in the day, Democrats were the party of pious immigrants, including Irish and Italian Catholics and blue-collar workers who filled the pews on Sunday mornings when Republicans were off playing golf.
Democrats were once the backbone of U.S. support for Israel. President Truman was the first to recognize the modern state of Israel in 1948. President Kennedy had nothing but praise for the Jewish state.
However, this is no longer your father’s Democratic Party.
On July 16, a slim majority of Democrats in the House voted to cut off all aid to Israel, humanitarian and military. These included former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, and the second-ranking Democrat in House leadership, Rep. Katherine Clark of Massachusetts.
Anti-Zionism has come to define the Democratic Party even more than support for abortion and hysteria over U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Democrats are competing to see who can take the most deranged position on Israel. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani ran on arresting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the next time the Jewish leader visited the Big Apple — only to discover that he lacked the authority.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York Democrat, accuses Israel of genocide. Abdul El-Sayed, a candidate for the Michigan Democratic nomination for Senate, says he does not know whether Israel has a right to exist.
Darializa Avila Chevalier, who recently won the Democratic nomination for Congress in a New York district by defeating the head of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, attended a pro-Palestinian rally the day after Hamas’ 2023 massacre of 1,200 Israelis. Ms. Chevalier is a convert to Islam.
What about the God of Israel?
At the 2012 Democratic National Convention, delegates booed putting God back into their party’s platform.
The platform of the 2008 convention acknowledged Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and made an innocuous reference to God in the form of a call to help individuals “reach their God-given potential” — not exactly the stuff of the Rev. Franklin Graham.
Initially, both positions were removed from the 2012 platform. They were put back in at the insistence of President Obama, who thought it might hurt his chances of reelection.
Today, Democrats have nothing but contempt for traditional religion.
James Talarico, the Texas Democratic nominee for Senate, slams public school displays of the Ten Commandments, says God is nonbinary and calls himself a Christian who “hates Christianity.”
President Biden, who claims to be a Catholic, designated Easter Sunday 2024 as “Transgender Day of Visibility.” Was this a calculated insult to Christians, or did cognitive-decline Joe just forget the date of Christianity’s most important holiday?
In 2025, every Democrat in the House of Representatives save one voted against the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, which would have required physicians to render life-giving care to babies who survived abortion. Let us be clear: They did not vote for abortion. They voted for infanticide.
In 2023, the FBI’s Virginia office put out a memo, since withdrawn, warning of the danger posed by those it designated “radical traditional Catholics” — a group that, according to the memo, includes White supremacists.
If something is not done soon, they may force us to attend Latin Masses at gunpoint.
The latest obscene Democratic gesture to people of faith is the Equality Act, the so-called transgender bill of rights. It would force people of faith to violate their deeply held beliefs on gender by allowing the mutilation of minors and accepting men in women’s sports and spaces.
Democrats are offended by the idea of a God whose commandments disallow their ideology, including abortion on demand, the notion that one can choose a gender and taxpayer-funded depravity.
Democrats believe that rights come from the omnipotent state, not what they consider a mythical supreme being. Forget that “endowed by their Creator” stuff in the Declaration of Independence.
By eliminating Israel, Democrats hope to kill the idea of the God of Israel.
Israel is a sign of God’s presence in the world. How else can you explain the reemergence of a nation after its people spent almost 2,000 years in exile — in a region that could not be more hostile to them? How else to explain a nation that transformed a wasteland, survived eight wars and ended up with one of the strongest armies in the world?
It cannot all be a coincidence.
Being on the wrong side of history is one thing, but being on the wrong side of heaven is something else entirely.
GFK
Observations From The Fifth Estate 