Concerning Food Sacrificed to Idols

8 Now concerning food sacrificed to idols, we know that “we all have knowledge.”[fn] Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. 2 If anyone thinks he knows anything, he has not yet known as it is necessary to know. 3 But if anyone loves God, this one is known by him.

4 Therefore, concerning the eating of food sacrificed to idols, we know that “an idol is nothing in the world” and that “there is no God except one.”[fn] 5 For even if after all there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, just as there are many gods and many lords,

• 6 there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things, and we are for him,
• and there is one Lord, Jesus Christ,
  • through whom are all things, and we are through him.

7 But this knowledge is not in everyone. But some, being accustomed until now to the idol, eat this food as food sacrificed to idols, and their conscience, because it[fn] is weak, is defiled. 8 But food does not bring us close to God. For neither if we eat do we have more, nor if we do not eat do we lack.[fn] 9 But watch out lest somehow this right of yours becomes a cause for stumbling to the weak. 10 For if someone should see you who has knowledge reclining for a meal in an idol’s temple, will not his conscience, because it[fn] is weak, be strengthened so that he eats the food sacrificed to idols? 11 For the one who is weak—the brother for whom Christ died—is destroyed by your knowledge. 12 Now if you[fn] sin in this way against the brothers and wound their conscience, which is weak, you sin against Christ. 13 Therefore, if food causes my brother to sin, I will never eat meat forever[fn], in order that I may not cause my brother to sin.