He says this as a reproach to them. Are we really to test and provoke God, whether He can punish us when we go over to the side of His enemies? Then, in order to show the full absurdity of their behavior, he says: "Are we stronger than He?" – recalling thereby the very sharp saying: "They have provoked Me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have moved Me to anger with their vanities" (Deut. 32:21).
1 Cor. 10:23. All things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable.
Lest someone object: "I eat with a clear conscience and therefore have the right to do so," he says: no, all things are permissible for you, since God created you free; but to eat food sacrificed to idols is not entirely beneficial for you. For by constantly participating in idol feasts, you will gradually develop an attachment to the idols themselves.
1 Cor. 10:23. All things are lawful for me, but not all things edify.
Your behavior, as I have said before, is beneficial neither for you nor for your brother. For it does not edify him, but rather upsets him and perverts his faith. If there is no benefit either for you or for your brother, then why should you do this?
1 Cor. 10:24. Let no one seek his own, but each the good of the other.
Do not only keep in mind whether you eat with a clean conscience, but also whether your action edifies your brother. In many places in his epistles he sets this forth as a matter of the utmost necessity. He does not forbid seeking one's own benefit in general, but only when it is harmful to a brother. For in such a case we must place his benefit above our own and choose it.
1 Cor. 10:25. Eat whatever is sold in the market without any inquiry, for the sake of a peaceful conscience.
He confirmed with many arguments that they must abstain from food sacrificed to idols. But lest they again become overly scrupulous beyond what is necessary and begin refusing what is sold in the marketplace out of fear that it might be food sacrificed to idols, he says: eat everything that is sold, without investigating the sellers, without inquiring whether what is sold is food sacrificed to idols, as though your conscience is gnawing at you and you wish to clear it. Or thus: lest your conscience gnaw at you, do not ask, for upon inquiry you may learn that what you intend to buy is food sacrificed to idols, and your conscience will be troubled.
1 Cor. 10:26. Lord's is the earth, and all that fills it.
The earth is the Lord's, and not of demons. And if the earth is the Lord's, then the fruits, and the trees, and the animals are also the Lord's; and if all things are the Lord's, then by nature nothing is unclean, but everything depends on the mind of each person.
1 Cor. 10:27. If one of the unbelievers invites you, and you wish to go, eat everything set before you without any inquiry, for the sake of a peaceful conscience.
He said well: "you wish"; for he himself did not want either to advise or to disadvise. Do not investigate at all, so that in excessive scrupulousness you do not show fear before idols, and so that you keep your conscience clean and undisturbed.
1 Cor. 10:28. But if anyone says to you: this is offered to idols, – then do not eat for the sake of the one who told you, and for the sake of conscience. For the earth is the Lord's, and all that fills it.
I command you to abstain not because food offered to idols is harmful, but for the sake of the one who declared that it was offered to idols, lest he suffer harm and think that Christians need not turn away from things pertaining to idols. And I do not teach abstaining from food offered to idols as though it were unclean and utterly foreign to our Lord: this is evident from the fact that "the earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof," that is, everything contained in it. Or thus: abstain from this food, for the whole earth is the Lord's, and you can be satisfied with something else, for everything is open to you.
1 Cor. 10:29. And by conscience I mean not your own, but that of the other.
That is, a pagan. For he will perhaps, as I said, be scandalized, or consider you a glutton, or think that you too, like him, accept idols. And lest anyone say: "Why should you care about the one who announced it? For you yourself previously (1 Cor. 5:12) said: 'What have I to do with judging outsiders?'" – it is said: I care not about him, but about you, lest you be subjected to condemnation. Therefore he also added the following.
1 Cor. 10:29. For why is my freedom judged by another's conscience?
Freedom he calls indiscriminateness and lack of restraint by prohibition. I, he says, will eat freely and without discrimination, but the pagan will condemn me and say: the faith of Christians is vain; they say that they abhor idols, yet they eagerly eat what is sacrificed to them.
1 Cor. 10:30. If I partake of food with thanksgiving, then why am I denounced for that for which I give thanks?
I, he says, for my part freely make use of God's creatures, by the grace of God, which has so established and strengthened me that I observe nothing. But the pagan will speak evil of me, as though I avoid idols out of hypocrisy, yet eat what is offered to them in sacrifice out of gluttony. The words "for which I give thanks" mean: I for my part thank God that He has placed me so high, even above Jewish humility, that I find harm in nothing; but, as I said, the pagan is offended and speaks evil.
1 Cor. 10:31. Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.
All things, he says, do to the glory of God: for by your present conduct God is not glorified, but rather blasphemed. And someone eats and drinks to the glory of God when he does not cause anyone to stumble by it, and does it not out of gluttony or love of pleasure, but in order to prepare his body for the practice of virtue; and in general, someone does every deed to the glory of God when he neither harms another through causing stumbling, nor himself, as, for example, one who acts out of people-pleasing, or out of some passionate thought.
1 Cor. 10:32. Give no offense, neither to the Jews, nor to the Greeks, nor to the church of God.
That is, do not give anyone any occasion for reproach. And this will be the case when we do not cause offense to either Jew or Greek, and still less to the brethren, for they are the "church of God." Take note. He stated the most important thing at the end: Christians ought to attract others to the faith as well, rather than persecuting even the brethren; and by them he means all those who were scandalized by their eating of food offered to idols.