<p>10:9- see on 1 Cor. 10:4.</p><p><em>Neither let us put the Lord to the test, as some of them did and perished by the serpents- </em>The usual assumption is that this refers to Israel's complaining about their &quot;light bread&quot; in Num. 21:5, as this is the only recorded incident where they were punished by serpents. But their complaint at that point hardly sounds like putting the Lord to the test. The more obvious reference is to the incident at the place subsequently named Massah, 'testing', when they put the Lord to the test by asking &quot;Is the Lord among us or not?&quot; (Ex. 17:7). The Bible doesn't record that they were then punished by serpents, but this was so in Jewish tradition; and we saw on :4 that Paul is unafraid to allude to such traditions and take lessons from them. Suffering from &quot;fiery serpents&quot; was Israel's common experience in the wilderness (Dt. 8:15). This incident is more pertinent to the Corinthian situation. For in chapter 1, Paul has assured them that the Lord was indeed amongst them by His Spirit; but they were not spiritual (3:1), they refused to perceive His activity amongst them through the Spirit. The miraculous signs of the Spirit had been worked amongst them (2 Cor. 12:12). Christ crucified had been revealed amongst Paul's converts by the ministry of the Spirit (Gal. 3:1,5). And yet the Corinthians were effectively saying, along with the Galatians: 'Where is the promise of the Spirit amongst us which Paul keeps claiming?'.</p>