1 Corinthians 6:1 - Lawsuits among Believers (2024)

Verse (Click for Chapter)

New International Version
If any of you has a dispute with another, do you dare to take it before the ungodly for judgment instead of before the Lord’s people?New Living Translation
When one of you has a dispute with another believer, how dare you file a lawsuit and ask a secular court to decide the matter instead of taking it to other believers!English Standard Version
When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints?Berean Standard Bible
If any of you has a grievance against another, how dare he go to law before the unrighteous instead of before the saints!Berean Literal Bible
Anyone of you having a matter against the other, dare he go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?King James Bible
Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unjust, and not before the saints?New King James Version
Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?New American Standard Bible
Does any one of you, when he has a case against his neighbor, dare to go to law before the unrighteous and not before the saints?NASB 1995
Does any one of you, when he has a case against his neighbor, dare to go to law before the unrighteous and not before the saints?NASB 1977
Does any one of you, when he has a case against his neighbor, dare to go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?Legacy Standard Bible
Does any one of you, when he has a case against another, dare to be tried before the unrighteous and not before the saints?Amplified Bible
Does any one of you, when he has a complaint (civil dispute) with another [believer], dare to go to law before unrighteous men (non-believers) instead of [placing the issue] before the saints (God’s people)?Christian Standard Bible
If any of you has a dispute against another, how dare you take it to court before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?Holman Christian Standard Bible
If any of you has a legal dispute against another, do you dare go to court before the unrighteous, and not before the saints? American Standard Version
Dare any of you, having a matter against his neighbor, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?Aramaic Bible in Plain English
Dare any of you, when he has a dispute with his brother, to judge before the evil and not before the holy?Contemporary English Version
When one of you has a complaint against another, do you take your complaint to a court of sinners? Or do you take it to God's people? Douay-Rheims Bible
DARE any of you, having a matter against another, go to be judged before the unjust, and not before the saints ? English Revised Version
Dare any of you, having a matter against his neighbour, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?GOD'S WORD® Translation
When one of you has a complaint against another, how dare you go to court to settle the matter in front of wicked people. Why don't you settle it in front of God's holy people?Good News Translation
If any of you have a dispute with another Christian, how dare you go before heathen judges instead of letting God's people settle the matter? International Standard Version
When one of you has a complaint against another, does he dare to take the matter before those who are unrighteous and not before the saints? Literal Standard Version
Dare anyone of you, having a matter with the other, go to be judged before the unrighteous, and not before the holy ones?Majority Standard Bible
If any of you has a grievance against another, how dare he go to law before the unrighteous instead of before the saints!New American Bible
How can any one of you with a case against another dare to bring it to the unjust for judgment instead of to the holy ones?NET Bible
When any of you has a legal dispute with another, does he dare go to court before the unrighteous rather than before the saints?New Revised Standard Version
When any of you has a grievance against another, do you dare to take it to court before the unrighteous, instead of taking it before the saints?New Heart English Bible
If any of you has a dispute against another, does he dare go to court before the unrighteous, instead of the saints?Webster's Bible Translation
Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unjust, and not before the saints?Weymouth New Testament
If one of you has a grievance against an opponent, does he dare to go to law before irreligious men and not before God's people?World English Bible
Dare any of you, having a matter against his neighbor, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints? Young's Literal Translation
Dare any one of you, having a matter with the other, go to be judged before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?Additional Translations ...

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

VI.

(1) Dare any of you.--Having rebuked the Corinthian Christians for any attempt to judge those who are outside the Church--i.e., the heathen--St. Paul now insists, on the other hand, on the importance of their not submitting their affairs for decision to the heathen tribunals. Jewish converts would have more easily understood that they should settle disputes among themselves, as the Roman power had, as we learn from Gallio's remarks (Acts 18:14-15), given this liberty to the Jews. The Gentile converts, however, would have been naturally inclined to continue to bring disputes before the tribunals with which they had been so familiar in a proverbially litigious condition of society before their conversion. We can well imagine how detrimental to the best interests of Christianity it would be for the Christian communion, founded as it was on principles of unity and love, to be perpetually, through the hasty temper and weakness of individual members, held up to the scorn of the heathen, as a scene of intestine strife. Repeated lawsuits before heathen judges would have had the further evil effect of practically obliterating the broad line of demarcation which then really existed between the principles of Roman jurisprudence, and the loftier Christian conceptions of self-sacrifice and charity by which the followers of Jesus Christ should, in accordance with His teaching, control their life. These considerations rendered necessary the warnings which the Apostle here commences with the emphatic word "Dare," of which it has been well said (Bengel), "Treason against Christians is denoted by this high-sounding word."

Unjust . . . . saints.--These words convey here no essentially moral ideas. They merely signify respectively "heathen" and "members of the Christian Church." These phrases remind us that the state of things when St. Paul wrote this was entirely different from what exists in any Christian country now. The teaching has nothing whatever to do with the adjudication of the courts of a Christian country. The cases to which St. Paul's injunctions would be applicable in the present day would be possible only in a heathen country. If, for example, in India there existed heathen tribunals, it would certainly be wrong, and a source of grave scandal, for native Christians to submit questions between themselves for decision to such courts, instead of bringing them before the legal tribunals established by Christian England. It is not probable that at so early a period there were any regular and recognised tribunals amongst the Christians, and certainly their decisions could scarcely have had any legal force. There is, however, historical evidence of the existence of such in the middle of the second century. The principles here laid down would naturally have led to their establishment. (See 1Corinthians 5:4.)

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 1-11. - Litigation before heathen courts forbidden. Verse 1. - Dare any of you? rather, Dare any one of you? It is in St. Paul's view an audacious defiance of Christian duties to seek from the heathen the justice due from brother to brother. A matter; some ground of civil dispute. Against another; i.e. against another Christian. When one of the litigants was a heathen, Christians were allowed to go before heathen law courts, because no other remedy was possible. Go to law before the unjust. The "unjust" is here used for "Gentiles," because it at once suggests a reason against the dereliction of Christian duty involved in such a step. How "unjust" the pagans were in the special sense of the word, the Christians of that day had daily opportunities of seeing; and in a more general sense, the Gentiles were "sinners" (Matthew 26:45). Even the Jews were bound to settle their civil disputes before their own tribunals. The ideal Jew was jashar, or "the upright man," and Jews could not consistently seek integrity from those who were not upright. A fortiori, Christians ought not to do so. Before the saints. All Christians were ideally "saints," just as the heathen were normally "unjust." If Christians went to law with one another before the heathen, they belied their profession of mutual love, caused scandal, and were almost necessarily tempted into compliance with heathen customs, even to the extent of recognizing idols. Our Lord had already laid down the rule that "brothers" ought to settle their quarrels among themselves (Matthew 18:15-17). Parallel Commentaries ...

Greek

[If] any
τις (tis)
Interrogative / Indefinite Pronoun - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 5100: Any one, some one, a certain one or thing. An encl*tic indefinite pronoun; some or any person or object.

1 Corinthians 6:1 - Lawsuits among Believers (2024)

References