Brothers in dispute: A socio-economic and legal analysis of the litigants in the church of Corinth

This dissertation explores the possibility that the lawsuit described in 1 Cor 6:1-11 was fought between two non-elite believers. This question engages the discussion concerning the socio-economic status of the early urban Christians. The lawsuit has been used as evidence for the presence of social elites in the church of Corinth, which often leads to unqualified use of elite sources to reconstruct the situation behind the lawsuit and to interpret the passage in question.;This dissertation argues that the litigation could have been afforded by nearly half of the adult male believers in Corinth. To support this thesis, the present study undertakes a socio-economic analysis and an examination of Roman civil procedures.;The study begins with an investigation of the economy of Roman Corinth around the time of Paul in the context of the ancient economy and the Roman Empire, to show that the city can indeed be classified as a large and wealthy city in the empire. It next evaluates four significant economic scales that have been published in the last decade and argues that they all under-represent Corinth's prosperity. A hypothetical economic scale for Corinth is then constructed by adjusting Walter Scheidel and Steven Friesen's income scale to account for Corinth's prosperity.;Following the economic analysis, the present study explores the Roman civil procedures and demonstrates that the cost of lawsuit was not necessarily beyond the ability of people with modest economic means. This legal analysis provides helpful insights into the interpretation of 1 Cor 6:1-11 and suggests a few possibilities to reconstruct the dispute(s) in Corinth. Combined with lexical and grammatical studies, the present study supports the imperatival interpretation of the passage's crux interpretum and explains Paul's rationale for demanding that the church resolve its internal disputes.