Don’t you realize that all of you together are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God lives in you? God will destroy anyone who destroys this temple. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.
1 Corinthians 3:16-17
Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honour God with your body.
1 Corinthians 6:19-20
You are sinning against your own body when you practise immorality. But hang on a minute you don’t own this body. You don’t belong to yourself, God has bought you with a price. So honour God by honouring the Holy Spirit’s dwelling place, His temple. You are the temple of the Holy Spirit. Yes collectively even more so. So I am the building set apart for the spirit to dwell in. This is an extension of the building Paul was talking about in 1 Cor 3:9, a general concept of building a building with the right materials but very soon he moves deeper.
There are two words for temple: ἱερόν [hieron] and ναός [naos]. Naos occurs 46 times in the New Testament. It is used of an idolatrous shrine; in Luke 1:9, 21-22, it is used of the temple sanctuary, the inner court, the Holy of Holies. Hieron is used 70 times in the New Testament; however, it is never used figuratively. It signified the “entire building with its precincts”. Christ was teaching in the temple. Not in the holy of holies but in the outer courts of the temple area. Hieron is the word used to denote that. Naos refers to the ancient temple but more the enclosed part. Hieron refers more to the general temple buildings and the structure per se. it is more a reference to the outer court.
Naos is the word used to refer the inner sanctum: The Holy of Holies. That is what you are. The word naos is in the emphatic position in the sentence, the final position in the clause. Greek word order was relatively free being tagged with a case system which makes it clear what the word was referring to. So Greeks could use the first and the last position in the sentence to put the word they most wanted to emphasize. You (pl) are that TEMPLE.
Paul’s question demands the answer Yes. Didn’t you know? Yes we didn’t know. Or we would say “no, I didn’t know.” He is expecting them to answer the proposition in question. Do you know or don’t you know about the indwelling Holy Spirit. The question is a rebuke to their ignorance and their malpractice of Holy Spirit. The Corinthians have never grasped, or have failed to live out the fundamental doctrine of the indwelling of the Spirit”.
“Temple” is a word without the definite article. This normally would mean “a temple” instead of the specific temple. But that is not the case here. There are times when an anarthrous construction (without a definite article) is used to heavily emphasize something even more. Like the big debate over Hebrew 1:2 “And now in these final days, He has spoken to us through a Son.” “son is anarthrous meaning literally “a son”. But the strength of the use is not “a son, any son will do”. The strength is more spoken to us “in son” – is in the form of a son, in sonness if I can say that. (which I can’t). That is what is happening here. You are temple of Holy Spirit. It heightens the notion. God is in you dwelling in His fullness.
Think of the “Holy of Holies”, that inner sanctum where the priest ventured once a year with a cord tied to his foot. If he entered and God was not pleased with him and struck him dead his body could be retrieved without any else being endangered. You are that place! You are the inner sanctum of the Holy Spirit. Wow. Get a hold of that! Suck that one like a sweetie.
Much, much more could be said but I have to stop somewhere. Now is the time for you to go ponder these verses.
Seeing yourself in the right light – When you follow the light your shadow has to stay behind you or beneath you.
S.Whyte
Grace is inviting to the unrighteous and threatening to the self-righteous.
Sandra Stanley
When we have been given something by GRACE, to be ungrateful [or treat it with contempt – Ian’s addition] is insulting.
Sidney Mohede