1 Corinthians

lights to find their place in the atrium.”1 In 1 Corinthians, Paul reacts against the unequal food distribution, and the fact that there might be no food left when the workers arrived (11.21).

The architecture of the houses in which the Lord’s supper was celebrated may also have relevance for the situation that is depicted and addressed in 1 Corinthians. The Christ-believers probably gathered in a large house (cf. Rom. 16:10, 14, 15; see Rom. 16.23). No specific buildings were devoted solely for this purpose. In an average well-to-do house, the dining room accommodated about nine people. The open-air atrium outside would accommodate about thirty to forty persons. In any large gathering, a small group would eat in the dining room, and rest

According to Marilou Ma. Ibita, these two occurrences of πεινᾷ refer to the same group of people, i.e., those who were actually and literally hungry.5 The suggestion is both economic and coherent with the rhetorics of the rest of letter. Paul returns to the issue that the Corinthians must avoid splitting up in fractions throughout the letter (see esp. 1.10–31; 12.1–31), and also the present passage begins with a similar address (11.18–19).6 Ibita’s interpretation entails that Paul’s direct exhortation to the one who is hungry (πεινᾷ) to go into the house implies that he or she is encouraged to go into the house where the Lord’s supper is celebrated, and eat (ἐσθιέτω). Her interpretation reflects the simplicity of the text (εἴ τις πεινᾷ, ἐν οἴκῳ ἐσθιέτω). On the other hand, previous suggestions have been both complicated and incoherent with Paul’s rhetoric elsewhere in the letter. For instance, Hans Conzelmann suggests that Paul’s exhortation implies that the hungry [rendered as those who want to eat excessively] must eat [in their own] house(s) [prior to the celebration of the Lord’s supper].7 Also Conzelmann himself notes that his suggestion contradicts Paul’s call to unity, which is uttered even within the same passage.8 Furthermore, Conzelmann’s interpretation ignores Paul’s call for the assembly to wait for one