Matthew Poole and continuators on 1 Corinthians 9:5

5 Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife , as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas? .

Those that by those terms, [non-Latin text not transcribed], understand, not (as we translate it) a sister, a wife, but a woman, that should out of her estate have contributed to the Apostles maintenance (as Ioanna the wife of Chuza, Herods Steward, and Susanna, and many others followed Christ, ministring to him of their substance, Luke 8.3.) seem not to consider: 1. That such women would have been no burden, but an help to the Church (which is quite contrary to the Apostles sense.) 2. That the term leading about, imports a conjugal relation to the woman. 3. That if this had been the sense, it had been enough to have said, to lead about a woman, he should not need have said, a sister, a woman. 4. That such leading about a woman, not their wife, had been scandalous. 5. That the very phrase, a sister, a wife, answers the phrase, Acts 23.1. Men, brethren, which signifies no more than, O ye Christian men, as a sister, a wife signifies here a Christian wife. 6. That we no where read, that Peter, Iames, Iohn, Iudas (here called the Brethren of our Lord, or any of the other Apostles, ever in their travels carried about with them any such rich matrons, not their wives, who (as those, Luke 8.3.) ministred to them of their substance. Our Interpreters have therefore justly translated it, a sister, a wife; and the sense is, Have I not power to marry? Yet the phrase teaches us two things: 1. That Christians have no power, that is, no lawful power to marry such as are no Christians, their wives must be their sisters also in Christ. 2. That husbands and wives ought to be undivided companions one to another.

He instanceth in several Apostles that were married, Peter (called Cephas,) Iames, Iohn, and Iudas the Son of Alpheus, Christs kinsmen. Whence we may observe, That Ministers may lawfully marry, no Law of God hath restrained them more than others: The Popish Doctrine forbidding to marry, is by the Apostle determined to be a Doctrine of Devils.

Marginal references: Or, [illegible: 1 span].; Mark 6.3. Luke 6.16. Gal. 1.19.; Matt. 8.1[illegible: 1 letter]