What Does 1 Corinthians 7:12 Mean?

(12) **But to the rest.**—Up to this point the writer has alluded only to Christians; he has spoken of the duties of unmarried persons, of widows, and of those already married. There still remains one class of marriages concerning which differences of opinion existed—viz., mixed marriages. In a church like Corinth there would have been, no doubt, many cases where one of the partners was a heathen and the other a Christian, arising from the subsequent conversion of only one of the married couple. This subject is treated of in 1Corinthians 7:12-16. The words are emphatically, “If any man *have already* a wife,” &c. The case of a Christian marrying a heathen is not alluded to. In 2Corinthians 6:14, the marriage of a Christian to a heathen is forbidden. **Speak I, not the Lord.**—The Apostle has no word of Christ’s to quote on this point, it being one which did not arise during our Lord’s life. (See Note on 1Corinthians 7:10.) It is to be noticed that the Apostle, in giving his own apostolic instruction on this point, does not use the word “command,” which he applied to our Lord’s teaching, but the less authoritative “speak.” **A wife that believeth not.**—That is, a heathen. In some modern religious circles this whole passage has been used (as also 2Corinthians 6:14) as if by “unbeliever” St. Paul meant a careless Christian, or one who, in modern phraseology, was not “converted.” The Apostle is referring under this designation to heathens, and the only case to which his teaching could now or ever apply would be when two heathens had been married, and subsequently only one had embraced the Christian faith. It is *to* be noticed that both here and in 1Corinthians 7:13 the being “pleased to dwell” is put only in reference to the partner who is a heathen, for the Apostle takes for granted that after the instructions he here gives to the Christian partner, no such desire for separation will arise on the part of a Christian.