1:2 — To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be his holy people, together with all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ—their Lord and ours:
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Following conventions Paul now identifies the recipients of his letter; it is addressed to "the church of God in Corinth." This seems straight forward enough. Gordon Fee, however, points out how this address differs from the letter Paul had just written to another city in the region which he addressed to "the church of the Thessalonians in God" (1 Thess 1:1; also 2 Thess 1:1). Fee thinks that this is a subtle reminder to the divisive parties (who are not named) that the church does not belong to them or to him or Apollos, and "by this slight change in the address Paul disallows at the outset one of their tendencies—to think too highly of themselves." "This shift," Fee is careful to add, "would have escaped the Corinthians, of course, but it probably says something about Paul and his relationship to this church."1 What Paul has to say both to and about the church afterwards is firmly rooted in this understanding of the church, and explains why Paul is so passionate about what he says. It is not about him, Apollos, Cephas, or any of the leaders of the various factions in the church; it is about God and what pleases Him.

Immediately Paul addresses the church in Corinth also as "those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be his holy people." The two clauses are, of course, synonymous—both the participle 'sanctified' and the adjective 'holy' share the same root, hagios—the repetition serving to emphasize the point. Here the point could not have escaped the Corinthians as the previous phrase may have, for, as the rest of the letter would clearly indicate, the lifestyles of those in the church were far from anything that smelled of holiness.

The next clause—"together with all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ—their Lord and ours:"—has generated not a little debate among commentators. What does Paul have in mind? The natural first impression on reading it is that Paul also intends for this letter to be read by the wider churches apart from just that in Corinth. But why would Paul do that, especially when the problems to which he responds are so specific to Corinth?2 These questions have puzzled commentators and led them to propose other suggestions about this sentence and its place and purpose here. Here are the four main ones (Click here to open Sentence Diagram to help you follow the arguments):

1. It is as our first impression suggests: this letter was intended by Paul for the wider church (brown box in Sentence Diagram). "Christians in Corinth are called to holiness, and in this they share a common vocation with all Christians." This reading, however, is grammatically the most difficult.3

2. The clause is to be read with "Paul and Sosthenes," as senders of the letter (green box). This suggestion can be reject straightway. First, it is in the wrong place to serve such a purpose and, second, it is extremely difficult to see how "all those everywhere" may be said to be instrumental in the writing and sending of the letter.

3. This clause was not original to Paul's letter but was added later, possibly by a scribe when the various letters of Paul were recognized as canonical and the scribe was concerned that the wider churches should also recognize its apostolic authority. There is no evidence for this and by its very nature such a thing cannot be proved or disproved. This suggestion is good only as an exercise in historical and creative imagination.

4. A fourth possibility is that Paul intended for the wider church to be included neither as 'senders' nor 'recipients' of the letter as a whole but for them either a) to be understood as also "sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be his holy people (blue box), or b) to be embraced in the "grace and peace" that he wished for the Corinthians in the next verse.

Whichever of the two likely proposals—the first or the last—we take, the early church certainly saw the importance of the letter for them. Leon Morris notes how it was:

. . . cited in 1 Clement, a first-century letter, being the first example of a New Testament document to be cited with the name of its author. It is freely quoted by Ignatius and Polycarp. From then on it is often referred to . . . None of Paul's other letters appears to have been quoted as widely and as early as this. In the Muratorian Fragment . . . and some other lists it is the first of Paul's letters. No satisfactory reason has been given for this, but clearly it indicated something of the importance attached to 1 Corinthians.4

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