The following is my translation of the notes and useful applications of the Epistle Reading for the Feast of the Holy Cross, 1 Corinthians 1:18–25, as they are found in Das Weimarische Bibelwerk (1877). Square brackets indicate my own notes and additions. For the useful applications, I recommend the reader see this very helpful article by Dr. Benjamin T. G. Mayes.
III. A report against two vices, which have been found over the Preaching Office: one, where the people, who are otherwise completely union in religion, nevertheless become divided for the sake of the teachers; second, where people, because of human wisdom and vain eloquence, marvel highly at the false teachers. (v. 10–31)
[v. 10–17 omitted due to the appointed reading]
18. For the Word of the cross (the doctrine of the Gospel concerning Christ, the crucified) is (according to their erring thoughts, v. 25) foolishness to those, * who (in their unbelief) are perishing; but to us, we who are (through faith in Christ) being saved, it is ** a power of God (through which He strengthens us and keeps us to eternal life).
* 2 Corinthians 4:3.
** Romans 1:16.
(Cf. 1:24; 4:10)
19. For it stands * written: “I will make as nothing the wisdom of the wise, and the understanding of the understanding (those who in divine matters follow their human reason) I will destroy.
* Isaiah 19:14.
(Job 12:17)
20. Where * are the wise men (among the Gentiles)? Where are the scribes (among the Jews)? Where are the philosophers? (those who can make from human skill many disputations? Among all these, is there anyone who knows how to declare the counsel of God for our salvation?) Has not God the ** wisdom of this world made as foolishness? (And what they put forward as the way to salvation, is it not shown to be foolishness? Because they regulate the doctrine of the Gospel according to reason and do not receive it in simplicity of faith, they thereby become fools before God.)
* Job 12:17; Isaiah 33:18.
** Baruch 3:28.
(Matthew 11:25; Romans 1:22)
21. For because the world (the philosophers) through their (imagined) wisdom * did not know (but rather much more became futile in their reasoning, Romans 1:21) God in their wisdom, it well-pleased God, through the foolish preaching to save those, who believe in it. (That is, because body Jews and Gentiles much more value their earthly and natural wisdom rather than the heavenly wisdom, which God reveals through His Word and in His works, and therefore they neither know nor honor Him, much less can they be saved; so it has pleased His eternal wisdom through the preaching of the Gospel, which appears entirely strange, absurd, and silly to the philosophers, to save all those who believe in it, whereby the highly-praised wisdom of the world is made to shame and pure foolishness.)
* Matthew 11:25; Luke 10:21.
(Isaiah 55:8ff.)
22. Since * the Jews demand signs (they do not allow themselves to be content with the evident and powerful miracle-signs of Christ and the Apostles, but rather continually, of their own mind, want to have new and greater miracle-signs) and ** the Greeks (the Gentiles) ask according to wisdom (they judge the doctrine of the Gospel according to their reason, and want to have it proved from philosophy).
* Matthew 12:38; 1 Corinthians 16:1; John 4:48
** Baruch 3:23.
(John 6:30)
23. But we preach the crucified Christ, (who) * to the Jews is a stumbling block (who was from the beginning and still is; who seemed to them much to lowly and powerless that He should be the promised Messiah who was to deliver them from their bondage. And it was no small scandal for them that He was condemned to death by the great council in Jerusalem as a blasphemer), and to the ** Greeks is foolishness (it seemed to be, as those thought it was great foolishness if one should believe that through the death of one man the sin of the entire world has been atoned for and [eternal] life has been won).
* Matthew 11:6; John 6:61; Romans 9:32
** 1 Corinthians 2:14
(Acts of the Apostles 26:24)
24. But to those who are called (through the Gospel to knowledge of Christ, and do not despise such call willingly), both Jews and Greeks, we preach Christ (who indeed is [the Christ] in fact, whether or not they recognize Him as such), * divine power and divine wisdom. (The holy Apostle calls Christ divine power and divine wisdom, not only because He is true God, of one essence of the Father, and divine power and wisdom is essential to Him, but also because God proved His power and wisdom through Him, in that Christ through His suffering and death has blotted out the sin of the entire world, has powerfully overcome death and the devil, and has thereby fulfilled the most wise counsel of God concerning our salvation; that He also has revealed this same divine wisdom in the preaching of the Gospel, and thereby has gathered a Church for Himself from the human race, which He powerfully sustains and protects against all the the raging of the gates of hell; and finally, because He has made us wisdom from God, v. 1 Corinthians 1:30, and we are preserved by His power through faith unto salvation, 1 Peter 1:5.)
* Romans 1:16; Colossians 2:3.
25. For the divine foolishness (what the Gentiles who demand wisdom, v. 22, according to their corrupted reason judge as foolishness) is wiser than men are (not only than human wisdom, but rather also than men themselves); and the divine weakness (what the Jews, who demand signs, v. 22, consider as weakness) is stronger than men are. (Luther: “Divine foolishness and weakness is the Gospel, which is foolish in the eyes of the wise, but is powerful and wise in the eyes of Christians.”)
[v. 26–31 omitted due to the appointed reading]
Useful Applications
III. DOCTRINE: That generally, those who are foolish, weak, ignoble, despised, and nothing before the people of this world are chosen and called by God by faith to eternal life; but on the other hand, many among the wise, powerful, and noble (for the sake of their unbelief) are rejected to condemnation, v. 26–28. DOCTRINE: The grace of God is still to be recognized and praised in a congregation, wherein the chief work, His pure Word, goes rightly, even though many deficiencies are otherwise found therein, v. 4–30.
PATTERN OF SOUND WORDS 