This verse contains several problems. One has to do with the text itself, while the others are concerned with punctuation. Most Greek manuscripts make the first question an open one: “Is Christ divided?” This is a rhetorical question that equals a strong statement. So Good News Bible has translated it this way (see below for a detailed statement on rhetorical questions). The second question, on the other hand, expects the answer “No”: “Surely it was not Paul who was crucified for you?” A few manuscripts make the first question correspond to the second: “Surely Christ is not divided?” This, though, is less likely to be what Paul wrote. The difference between the two questions is one of emphasis rather than meaning. Thus Good News Bible translates the first one as a statement: “Christ has been divided into groups!” The second is translated as a question: “Was it Paul who died on the cross for you?”

Good News Bible makes it clear that Paul is not thinking of an individual being cut up into pieces. He is thinking of the church, the Christian community in Corinth, as the body of Christ. He means that since there is only one Christ, it is unthinkable that those who believe in him should be divided into rival parties. In some languages it may be necessary to make the implicit information explicit by translating “Christ has only one body, the church, and it cannot be divided.”

The oldest Greek manuscripts had no punctuation. It is therefore possible to read the first part of this verse as either a question, an exclamation, or a statement. There is little difference between what is called a rhetorical question and a statement. A rhetorical question is one that is asked, not to obtain information, but to give more emphasis or impact. For example, Revised English Bible‘s “Surely Christ has not been divided!” would have almost the same meaning if a question mark were put in place of the exclamation mark. Paul uses many of these questions in 1 Corinthians. There is a whole series of them in a section such as 4.7-8, and especially 9.1-12. When translators deal with rhetorical questions, they have to decide, first of all, whether for Paul himself the question is a real one or a rhetorical one. Secondly, translators must decide whether their own languages use rhetorical questions. If these are not natural in a translator’s language, they should be rendered as emphatic statements. If the rhetorical question is positive, then the corresponding emphatic statement must be negative: “Who cares?” means “Nobody cares!” Whereas, if the rhetorical question is a negative one, the corresponding emphatic statement will be positive: “Aren’t you ashamed?” means “You should be ashamed!”

Another punctuation problem occurs between the second and last parts of this verse. Should they be punctuated as one (double) question, or as two separate questions? Translators need to decide how the three sentences are related to each other. For many languages it will be helpful to follow Good News Bible. One should then make the first part of the verse a statement, and render the second part as two separate questions. The translator should then omit Revised Standard Version‘s or.

Crucified for you: Good News Bible uses the simpler expression “died on the cross….” It does this in order to make the meaning of crucified clear, especially near the beginning of this letter. Paul was writing to people who knew about the Roman method of execution called “crucifixion.” But in some parts of the world today, readers of Bible translations may know nothing about this method of executing people. They may even think of the cross as mainly an object found in churches. In such cases it will be important to use some expression that means “died” (Good News Bible) or “was killed.” Since this is the first time that Paul refers to crucifixion in this letter, one can say something like “died on a cross.” It is also important not to talk about some other kind of execution here, since Paul is, of course, referring to an actual historical form of execution.

Were you baptized…?: the meaning of this question is quite general: “Did someone baptize you in the name of Paul?”

Baptized in the name of Paul: in verse 10 Good News Bible translated in the name of as “by the authority of.” Here, where the meaning is different, Good News Bible renders this phrase “as Paul’s disciples.” Some of the meaning, though, is lost in Good News Bible. Baptism, from the earliest times, involved literally naming the name of Christ (see Matt 28.19 for a command from Christ that uses the formula “in the name” in both Revised Standard Version and Good News Bible). Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch has a note on the word “name” in its glossary. It says “with this naming of the name, the person baptized is given over to belong to Jesus, his Lord, and is placed under Christ’s protection.” One can rephrase were you baptized in the name of Paul as “When they baptized you, did they use Paul’s name?” or “Did they baptize you as if you belonged to Paul?” or “… so that you would belong to Paul?”

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 .