2 Corinthians 5

2 Corinthians 5 is the fifth chapter of the Second Epistle to the Corinthians in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It was written by Paul the Apostle and Timothy in Macedonia in 55–56 CE.
The 18th-century theologian John Gill summarises the contents of this chapter:

Text

The original text was written in Koine Greek. This chapter is divided into 21 verses.

Textual witnesses

Some early manuscripts containing the text of this chapter are:

"Our earthly house" refers to the body; similarly, Plato also calls the body,, "an earthly tabernacle", just as the Jews call the body a house or a "tabernacle". Abarbinel paraphrases "my dwelling place, which is the body, for that is "the tabernacle of the soul"."
The "house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens" can be interpreted as the "glorified body", or "the holy house" in the world to come, which might be intended in or .

Verse 6

Otto Paul (O. P.) Kretzmann notes that in the life of a Christian believer, "there is a yearning for home, a homesickness for heaven". Harold H. Buls comments that "this verse touches on the great paradox in the life of the Christian": although believers are homesick, they are cheerful; they long for heaven, but they are content.

Verses 18-19

MacDonald suggests that the passage from 2 [Corinthians 2#Verse 14|2 Corinthians 2:14] onwards, in which Paul defends his authority as an apostle, ends here at 2 Corinthians 5:19. She notes that the next section is "closely related" to the foregoing text, while also initiating "a new type of exhortation".