First Letter to the Corinthians 8

¹ Now about food sacrificed to idols. ‘We all have knowledge’; yes, that is so, but knowledge gives self-importance – it is love that makes the building grow.

² A man may imagine he understands something, but still not understand anything in the way that he ought to.

³ But any man who loves God is known by him.

⁴ Well then, about eating food sacrificed to idols:[*a] we know that idols do not really exist in the world and that there is no god but the One.

⁵ And even if there were things called gods, either in the sky or on earth – where there certainly seem to be ‘gods’ and ‘lords’ in plenty –

⁶ still for us there is one God, the Father, from whom all things come and for whom we exist; and there is one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things come and through whom we exist.

⁷ Some people, however, do not have this knowledge. There are some who have been so long used to idols that they eat this food as though it really had been sacrificed to the idol, and their conscience, being weak, is defiled by it.

⁸ Food, of course, cannot bring us in touch with God: we lose nothing if we refuse to eat, we gain nothing if we eat.

⁹ Only be careful that you do not make use of this freedom in a way that proves a pitfall for the weak.

¹⁰ Suppose someone sees you, a man who understands, eating in some temple of an idol; his own conscience, even if it is weak, may encourage him to eat food which has been offered to idols.

¹¹ In this way your knowledge could become the ruin of someone weak, of a brother for whom Christ died.

¹² By sinning in this way against your brothers, and injuring their weak consciences, it would be Christ against whom you sinned.

¹³ That is why, since food can be the occasion of my brother’s downfall, I shall never eat meat again in case I am the cause of a brother’s downfall.