Albert Barnes Commentary 1 Corinthians 10:9

"Neither let us make trial of the Lord, as some of them made trial, and perished by the serpents." — 1 Corinthians 10:9 (ASV)

Neither let us tempt Christ, and so on. The word tempt, when applied to humans, means to present motives or inducements to sin.

When used with reference to God, it means to test his patience, to provoke his anger, or to act in such a way as to see how much he will bear, and how long he will endure human wickedness and perverseness.

The Israelites tempted him, or tried his patience and forbearance, by rebellion, murmuring, impatience, and dissatisfaction with his dealings.

In what way the Corinthians were in danger of tempting Christ is not known and can only be conjectured. It may be that the apostle cautions them against exposing themselves to temptation in the idol temples—placing themselves, as it were, under the unhappy influence of idolatry.

This would be needlessly trying the strength of their religion and making an experiment on the grace of Christ, as if he were bound to keep them even in the midst of dangers into which they needlessly ran.

They would have the promise of grace to keep them only when they were in the way of their duty and using all other precautions. To go beyond this, to place themselves in needless danger, to presume on the grace of Christ to keep them in all circumstances, would be to tempt him and provoke him to leave them (See Barnes on Matthew 4:7).

As some of them also tempted. Evidently, a word is to be understood here, and it may be either "Christ" or "God." The construction would naturally require the former, but it is not certain that the apostle meant to say that the Israelites tempted Christ.

The main idea is that of temptation, whether of Christ or of God. The apostle's purpose is to caution them against the danger of tempting Christ, based on the fact that the Israelites were guilty of the sin of tempting their leader and protector, thus exposing themselves to his anger.

It cannot be denied, however, that the more natural construction of this passage is that which supposes that the word "Christ" is understood here rather than "God." To relieve this interpretation from the difficulty that the Israelites could not properly be said to have tempted "Christ," since he had not then come in the flesh, two remarks may be made:

1. Firstly, concerning the "angel of the covenant" and the "angel of his presence" (Exodus 23:20, 23; 32:34; Exodus 33:2; Numbers 20:16; Isaiah 63:9; Hebrews 11:26) who went with them and delivered them from Egypt, there is reason to think the sacred writers understood the Messiah to be intended, and that he who subsequently became incarnate was he whom they tempted.
2. Secondly, we are to bear in mind that the term Christ has acquired with us a signification somewhat different from that which it originally had in the New Testament.

   We use it as a proper name, applied to Jesus of Nazareth. But it is to be remembered that it is merely the Greek word for the Hebrew "Anointed," or the "Messiah." By retaining this signification of the word here, a significant part of the difficulty will be avoided.

   The expression then will mean simply that the Israelites "tempted the Messiah." The idea will be that he who conducted them, against whom they sinned, and whom they tempted, was the Messiah who afterwards became incarnate—an idea that is in accordance with the ancient ideas of the Jews respecting this personage, and which is certainly not forbidden in any part of the Bible.

And were destroyed of serpents. These were fiery serpents (Numbers 21:6).