---
title: 1 Corinthians 10:14
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/1-corinthians-10-14/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/1-corinthians-10-14.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: 1 Corinthians 10:14
testament: NT
section: Letters
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# 1 Corinthians 10:14

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.

## JW Usage

The Watchtower reads 10:14 ("flee from idolatry") as broadly supporting the JW position that representational art tied to worship, including the cross, is idolatrous. Combined with Exodus 20:4, this verse forms part of the cluster rs uses (pp. 89-93) to argue that cherishing a cross-shaped representation of Christ's death is cultic idolatry that Christians must flee. The verse thus becomes a general-purpose prohibition on religious imagery rather than the specific warning Paul issues.

## Protestant Usage

10:14 is Paul warning the Corinthian church against the actual idolatry around them — participation in pagan sacrificial meals in the temples of Greek and Roman gods. The immediate context (10:14-22) is about eating food offered to idols in idol temples, not about religious art in the abstract. Paul is not banning representational art. The proof is inside his own canon: the God who inspired this verse also commanded Moses to make golden cherubim on the ark (Exodus 25:18-22), cherubim woven into the tabernacle curtains (Exodus 26:1), and the bronze serpent on a pole that Jesus later used as the pattern for his own crucifixion (Numbers 21:8, John 3:14). At the door: "Flee from idolatry is flee from worshipping created things as gods — not flee from representing God's saving acts. The Watchtower has conflated the two."

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [The Cross Is Not Pagan — And Paul Boasted In It](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/cross-pagan-symbol-rebuttal.md) — Galatians 6:14 / 1 Corinthians 1:18 / Colossians 2:14 [Practice]