Bible Strands
1 Corinthians 10:6
These things took place as examples to keep us from craving evil things as they did.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Paul addresses the Corinthian church, positioning this warning immediately after noting that God was not pleased with most of the Exodus generation who were struck down in the wilderness. He writes to a community facing idolatrous pressure, using Israel’s past failures as the immediate backdrop.
The words — τύποι (typoi) = types, denoting historical patterns or concrete examples. μὴ (mē) = not, establishing the negative command that forms the core of the warning.
The thread — The pattern of past judgments serving as recorded warnings recurs in 1 Corinthians 10:11, Jude 1:7, and 2 Peter 2:6. Each reference treats historical divine actions as documented examples meant to shape future behavior.
Why it lands — The text commands readers to treat Israel’s wilderness judgments as concrete patterns to actively restrain personal idolatry and sinful craving. It requires immediate behavioral correction, framing historical events as direct safeguards against present temptation.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Greek words
King James Version
Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted.
Cross-references
- Jude 1:7 In like manner, Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, who indulged in sexual immorality and pursued strange flesh, are on display as an example of those who sustain the punishment of eternal fire.
- 1 Corinthians 10:11 Now these things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the fulfillment of the ages has come.
- 2 Peter 2:6 if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes as an example of what is coming on the ungodly;
- Hebrews 4:11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following the same pattern of disobedience.
- Numbers 11:4 Meanwhile, the rabble among them had a strong craving for other food, and again the Israelites wept and said, “Who will feed us meat?
- Zephaniah 3:6 “I have cut off the nations; their corner towers are destroyed. I have made their streets deserted with no one to pass through. Their cities are laid waste, with no man, no inhabitant.
- Numbers 11:31 Now a wind sent by the LORD came up, drove in quail from the sea, and brought them near the camp, about two cubits above the surface of the ground, for a day’s journey in every direction around the camp.
- Psalms 106:14 They craved intensely in the wilderness and tested God in the desert.
- 1 Peter 3:21 And this water symbolizes the baptism that now saves you also—not the removal of dirt from the body, but the pledge of a clear conscience toward God—through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
- Psalms 78:27 He rained meat on them like dust, and winged birds like the sand of the sea.