Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.
7. Purge out therefore Having borrowed a similitude from leaven, he pursues it farther, though he makes a transition from a particular point to a general doctrine. For he is no longer speaking of the case of incest, but exhorts them generally to purity of life, on the ground that we cannot remain in Christ if we are not cleansed. He is accustomed to do this not infrequently.
Here the apostle exhorts them to purity, by purging out the old leaven. In this observe, I. The advice itself, addressed either, 1. To the church in general; and so purging out the old leaven, that they might be a new lump, refers to the putting away from themselves that wicked person, Co1 5:13. Note, Christian churches should be pure and holy, and not bear such corrupt and scandalous members.
Commenting on 1 Corinthians 5:7-8
Purge out therefore the old leaven,.... Meaning either the incestuous person, whose crime might well be compared to sour "leaven", and be called old because of his long continuance in it; whom the apostle would have removed from them; this is properly the act of excommunication, which that church was to perform, as a quite distinct thing from what the apostle himself determined to do.