In our general comment on verses 20-22 we stated that the first part of verse 22 is close in meaning to verse 21. Paul has already spoken of himself in 2.3 and 4.10 as being weak. Then in 8.7-13 he speaks of weak Christians who had come out of a pagan background. If the weak in this chapter are the group discussed in 8.7-13, it is correct to refer to them as “weak in faith” as Good News Bible does. Good News Bible also adds “like one of them,” to avoid the suggestion that Paul himself was “weak in faith.” In most languages the word weak will need to be modified in some way to show the kind of weakness about which Paul is speaking. If possible, the same word for weak should be used in both halves of the first sentence, even if this makes the translation more literal than Good News Bible.

Also in the first part of the verse, the word To will need to be expanded in translation; for example, “When I am among….” The phrase weak or “weak in faith” can be rendered more meaningfully as “people who do not believe in Jesus strongly” or “people whose faith in Jesus is weak.”

The second part of the verse sums up the thought of verses 20-22a.

Became and have become translate different tenses of the same verb, the first normally referring to a point in past time, and the second to a state continuing from the past into the present. The context, however, strongly suggests that the two tenses are used purely for variety, and no distinction between them is made in Good News Bible or New Jerusalem Bible.

The phrase by all means may be rendered as “by using every way that I possibly can.”

It should be noted that Paul does not use the word “as” (Good News Bible‘s “like”) in this verse as he did in verses 20 and 21. In this verse Paul means that he really has “become weak” (Good News Bible).

Quoted with permission from Ellingworth, Paul and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, 2nd edition. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1985/1994. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .