Doctrine Analysis
11 Doctrine Analysis — Full Chapter Matrix
1 Corinthians 1–16 | Language Package Extension
Status: This matrix is fully consistent with assets/doctrine_risk_registry.json (v1, 2026-07-10). Doctrine keys, names, risk tiers, and review routing below are identical to the registry; this document adds chapter-by-chapter passage mapping and translation-risk rationale for Phase 1 Step 4/5 sign-off. Where a chapter contributes no new doctrine or terminology beyond doctrines already tabled, it is explicitly marked “Reviewed — no new doctrine” per the FULL-BOOK COVERAGE mandate.
Core passage anchor: 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 (Apostolic Gospel Tradition / Resurrection of Christ) sits within the larger ch. 15 unit and is never treated as the boundary of analysis; the matrix below spans the entire book.
Chapter 1
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Christian Unity versus Factionalism (christian_unity_versus_factionalism) | 1:10-17 | High | ”Sự chia rẽ” must retain full weight as a wound in Christ’s one body; Vietnamese congregational life is especially prone to factional loyalty around individual pastors or founding-missionary lineage, which could soften this into ordinary disagreement if under-translated. | Human theologian |
The Cross as Wisdom and Power (wisdom_and_power_of_the_cross) | 1:17-25, 1:30 | High | ”Thập tự giá” risks flattening into a decorative religious symbol; “sự khôn ngoan” risks collapsing into Buddhist trí tuệ (self-attained insight) unless anchored to the historical crucifixion/resurrection. | Human theologian |
| Baseline reuse: Saints, Sanctification, Grace, Church, Called | 1:1-9, 1:30 | Medium-High (per baseline) | Standard baseline terms (các thánh đồ, sự nên thánh, ân điển, Hội Thánh, được kêu gọi) recur with no new risk; enforce translation memory exactly. | Native speaker review |
Chapter 2
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
The Cross as Wisdom and Power (wisdom_and_power_of_the_cross) | 2:1-5 | High | Paul’s preaching “not with wisdom of words” must not be read as anti-intellectualism generally; power of God contrast must stay tied to the cross event. | Human theologian |
The Mystery of God Revealed (mystery_of_god_revealed) | 2:1, 2:7-10 | Medium | ”Sự mầu nhiệm” must be distinguished from Mật tông (esoteric Buddhist) progressive initiate-only transmission; God’s plan is openly proclaimed. | Native speaker review |
Spiritual versus Natural Discernment (spiritual_versus_natural_discernment) | 2:14-16 | High | ψυχικός (“natural person”) has no isolating Vietnamese lexeme distinct from σαρκικός (“carnal”); risk of conflating a neutral pre-conversion incapacity with post-conversion sin. | Human theologian |
Chapter 3
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Spiritual versus Natural Discernment (spiritual_versus_natural_discernment) | 3:1-4 | High | ”Tánh xác thịt” (carnal) applied to believers still behaving in factional/childish ways; must not read as denying genuine conversion. | Human theologian |
Christian Unity versus Factionalism (christian_unity_versus_factionalism) | 3:3-9 | High | Paul/Apollos rivalry parallel to denominational-lineage loyalty in Vietnamese church planting history; must be named as sin rooted in worldly rivalry. | Human theologian |
The Church as the Temple of God (church_as_temple_of_god) | 3:16-17 | High | ”Đền thờ của Đức Chúa Trời” (full phrase) required; bare “đền” collides with folk-hero/spirit shrines. Corporate church in view here (singular “you” = the congregation). | Human theologian |
Chapter 4
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Christian Unity versus Factionalism (christian_unity_versus_factionalism) | 4:6-21 | High | Continues ch.1/3 argument against exalting one leader over another (“that none of you may be puffed up in favor of one against another”); “người quản gia” (steward) and “đầy tớ” (servant) language (see Core Glossary §2) reinforce this but introduce no new risk tier beyond the doctrine already tabled. | Human theologian |
Reviewed — no new doctrine. Verses 4:1-5 (stewards of God’s mysteries, final judgment by the Lord) and 4:14-21 (Paul as spiritual father) use only established baseline/glossary vocabulary (judgment, calling, fatherhood-in-ministry sense distinct from father = God) with no elevation in risk tier. | 4:1-5, 4:14-21 | — | Confirmed full coverage; no action required beyond standard glossary enforcement. | Automated review |
Chapter 5
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Church Discipline and Holiness (church_discipline_and_holiness) | 5:1-13 | High | ”Giao (kẻ đó) cho Sa-tan” must never be taught as functioning like a folk curse-formula (trù ẻo); this is redemptive discipline under Christ’s authority. “Men/không men” (leaven) requires OT Passover background teaching. | Human theologian |
Sexual Holiness and the Body (sexual_holiness_and_the_body) | 5:1 | High | ”Sự gian dâm” must retain full moral gravity before a holy God, not merely social shame/loss-of-face. | Human theologian |
Chapter 6
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Sexual Holiness and the Body (sexual_holiness_and_the_body) | 6:12-20 | High | Body as temple of the Holy Spirit; sexual sin is sin against God and one’s own Spirit-indwelt body, not a private lifestyle matter. | Human theologian |
The Church as the Temple of God (church_as_temple_of_god) | 6:19 | High | Individual-believer application of the temple metaphor (paired with 3:16-17’s corporate application); “đền thờ của Đức Thánh Linh” full phrase required. | Human theologian |
Redemption and Belonging to God (redemption_and_belonging_to_god) | 6:20 | High | ”Được mua chuộc bằng giá cao” must not imply an ongoing repayment debt (guard against ơn nghĩa framing, per baseline grace note). | Human theologian |
| Reviewed — no new doctrine. 6:1-8 (lawsuits among believers before unbelievers) and 6:9-11 (vice list, then “such were some of you… but you were washed, sanctified, justified”) reuse baseline sanctification/justification vocabulary exactly; no new risk tier. | 6:1-11 | Medium (baseline) | Standard reuse of sự xưng công bình / được nên thánh; enforce translation memory exactly. | Native speaker review |
Chapter 7
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Marriage and Singleness (marriage_and_singleness) | 7:1-40 | High | Marriage framed as gifting/calling before God; singleness devoted to the Lord dignified as equally valid — this directly counters the strong Confucian expectation that marriage is filial duty (continuing the family line, thờ cúng tổ tiên continuity) and that an unmarried adult’s life is incomplete or shameful to the family. Extended sense of “được kêu gọi” (calling) to one’s state in life must not dilute the term’s soteriological sense elsewhere. | Human theologian |
Chapter 8
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Christian Liberty and Conscience (christian_liberty_of_conscience) | 8:1-13 | High | Knowledge that idols are nothing is insufficient without love; must not be presented as an unqualified right to eat regardless of a weaker believer’s conscience — sensitive given real Vietnamese family pressure around đồ cúng (ancestor/spirit-offering food) at shared meals. | Human theologian |
Idolatry and Idol Food (idolatry_and_idol_food) | 8:1, 8:4, 8:7, 8:10 | Critical | ”Của cúng các hình tượng” uses the same verb (cúng) as near-universal Vietnamese ancestor and tutelary-spirit food-offering practice; every occurrence requires explicit teaching distinguishing the idol’s lack of real competing power from the real danger of participation implying idol worship or causing a weaker believer to stumble. | Human theologian |
Chapter 9
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Apostolic Ministry and Reward (apostolic_ministry_and_reward) | 9:1-27 | Medium | ”Phần thưởng” (reward) and “giải thưởng” (prize) must be distinguished from karmic merit-accumulation (công đức); this is a gracious reward for freely rendered service after salvation is already secured, not a payment earning salvation. | Native speaker review |
Chapter 10
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Warning from Israel’s History (warning_from_israels_history) | 10:1-13 | Medium | Requires OT narrative background (wilderness generation) largely unfamiliar to Vietnamese readers without prior OT literacy; must be taught as historically grounded, not a moralizing fable. | Native speaker review |
Idolatry and Idol Food (idolatry_and_idol_food) | 10:14-22 | Critical | Same critical collision as ch.8; “chén của Chúa / bàn của Chúa” sets up sharp exclusivity against cups/food at ancestor and spirit altars. | Human theologian |
Demons and Spiritual Realities (demons_and_spiritual_realities) | 10:19-22 | High | All spirits invoked through idol worship are treated as morally opposed to God, however locally categorized in Vietnamese folk cosmology as benign, ancestral, or protective (ma, thần); this must not be softened. | Human theologian |
Christian Liberty and Conscience (christian_liberty_of_conscience) | 10:23-33 | High | ”Do all to the glory of God” liberty principle continues ch.8’s conscience concern; freedom exercised in love, not unlimited personal license. | Human theologian |
Chapter 11
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Headship and Order in Worship (headship_and_order_in_worship) | 11:2-16 | High | ”Đầu” (head) risks collapsing into Confucian patriarchal household-authority alone (obscuring Paul’s own mutual-honor qualifications in 11:11-12) or being evacuated of theological meaning altogether. Head-covering practice must be taught by function (honor/propriety signal), not as a disconnected universal rule. | Human theologian |
The Lord’s Supper (the_lords_supper) | 11:17-34 | Critical | ”Tiệc Thánh” must be sharply distinguished from Vietnamese ancestral memorial meals (giỗ, cúng cơm) — ritual meals believed to honor and sustain a departed spirit on a death anniversary, a fundamentally different transaction between the living and the dead than commemorating Christ’s finished atoning death. | Human theologian |
Chapter 12
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Spiritual Gifts and Unity of the Body (spiritual_gifts_and_unity_of_the_body) | 12:1-11 | Medium | Well-established terminology (ân tứ thuộc linh) with comparatively low syncretism risk; the same Spirit distributes varied gifts for the common good. | Native speaker review |
Discernment of Spirits (discernment_of_spirits) | 12:3, 12:10 | High | Must not be taught as paralleling folk spirit-mediums/diviners (thầy cúng, đồng cốt, thầy bói); this gift operates under scriptural authority, testing against “Đức Chúa Giê-xu là Chúa.” | Human theologian |
The Body of Christ: Unity in Diversity (body_of_christ_unity_in_diversity) | 12:12-31 | High | The church’s organic, Spirit-constituted identity must be distinguished from clan/lineage solidarity (đại gia đình, dòng họ), which also strongly and competingly shapes Vietnamese social identity. | Human theologian |
Chapter 13
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Love as the Greater Way (love_as_the_greater_way) | 13:1-13 | High | Biblical ἀγάπη is willed, self-giving, covenantal love modeled on God’s character — distinct from Vietnamese romantic love (tình yêu, the most readily evoked general vocabulary), Confucian hierarchical filial-duty love (hiếu, đạo nghĩa), and Buddhist detached compassion (từ bi) oriented toward relieving suffering through non-attachment. | Human theologian |
Chapter 14
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Tongues and Prophecy (tongues_and_prophecy) | 14:1-40 | High | ”Tiếng lạ” must be sharply distinguished from hầu đồng (spirit-mediumship/possession trance practice) — biblical tongues are a self-controlled, Spirit-given, church-edifying gift, not involuntary trance speech under an invoked spirit. | Human theologian |
Order in Public Worship (order_in_public_worship) | 14:26-40 | Medium | All exercise of gifts must build up the church, conducted decently and in order; 14:34-35 introduces significant interpretive/pastoral complexity flagged for careful review, though no new load-bearing vocabulary beyond terms already covered. | Native speaker review |
Chapter 15 (Core Passage Chapter)
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Apostolic Gospel Tradition (apostolic_gospel_tradition) | 15:1-3 | High | The gospel is a fixed, unrepeatable historical deposit “delivered/received” unchanged from eyewitnesses, not an evolving family/ancestral tradition (truyền thống gia đình/dòng họ) that Vietnamese culture expects to adapt across generations. | Human theologian |
The Resurrection of Christ (resurrection_of_christ) | 15:3-8, 15:20 (core passage 15:1-11) | Critical | Bodily, historical, once-for-all resurrection witnessed by named eyewitnesses; “sự sống lại” must never be rendered with đầu thai/luân hồi. The eyewitness-appearance list (15:5-8, “đã hiện ra”) must be taught as objective, bodily encounters, not ancestor-spirit “hiện về” phenomena. | Human theologian |
The Resurrection of Believers (resurrection_of_believers) | 15:12-58 | Critical | Christ’s resurrection guarantees the future bodily resurrection of every believer as the same transformed body, not a new incarnation in a different body; must guard against luân hồi/đầu thai/biến hóa supplying the reader’s default framework for “changed” and “imperishable.” | Human theologian |
Chapter 16
| Doctrine (registry key) | Supporting Passages | Risk | Translation Risk Rationale | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Giving and Fellowship among Churches (giving_and_fellowship_among_churches) | 16:1-4, 16:15 | Low | Practical outworking of Christian fellowship and generosity across congregations; standard vocabulary, minimal doctrinal risk. | Automated review |
Closing Exhortations: Maranatha and Anathema (closing_exhortations_maranatha_and_anathema) | 16:20-24 | High | ”Ma-ra-na-tha” (liturgical invocation for Christ’s return) and “A-na-them” (solemn apostolic exclusion declaration) must be distinguished from folk curse/hex practices (bùa, ngải, lời nguyền/trù ẻo) invoked through occult ritual means; these are not magical formulas causing harm through ritual power. | Human theologian |
Full-Book Coverage Confirmation
All sixteen chapters of 1 Corinthians are represented above. Chapters 4 and 6 include sections explicitly marked “Reviewed — no new doctrine,” confirming they were checked against the doctrine registry and found to reuse only already-tabled doctrines/vocabulary at their established risk tiers, per the FULL-BOOK COVERAGE mandate. No chapter was silently omitted.
Risk Tier Totals (Cross-Check Against Registry)
| Tier | Count | Review Routing |
|---|---|---|
| Critical | 4 | Human theologian (100%) |
| High | 17 | Human theologian (100%) |
| Medium | 5 | Native speaker review |
| Low | 1 | Automated review |
| Total doctrines | 27 | Matches doctrine_risk_registry.json risk_summary exactly |
This matrix must be loaded alongside assets/doctrine_risk_registry.json and assets/bible_term_registry.json-equivalent term data in Phase 2. Any discrepancy between this document and the registry is an error; the registry’s risk field is authoritative and this document must be corrected to match, never the reverse.
Critical Risk Doctrines
The Resurrection of Christ
Vietnamese name: Sự Sống Lại của Đấng Christ
Key terms: resurrection, raised, appeared, buried, third day, gospel_tradition
Review routing: Human theologian
CRITICAL: bodily, historical, once-for-all resurrection witnessed by named eyewitnesses; sự sống lại must never be rendered with đầu thai/luân hồi (reincarnation into the cycle of samsara). The eyewitness-appearance list (15:5-8) must be taught as objective, bodily encounters, not the ancestor-spirit ‘hiện về’ phenomena reported in Vietnamese folk practice.
The Resurrection of Believers
Vietnamese name: Sự Sống Lại của Các Tín Đồ
Key terms: resurrection_of_the_dead, firstfruits, resurrection_body, perishable_imperishable, immortality, changed_transformed
Review routing: Human theologian
CRITICAL: Christ’s resurrection guarantees the future bodily resurrection of every believer as the same transformed body, not a new incarnation in a different body. Must guard against Vietnamese Buddhist rebirth-cosmology vocabulary (luân hồi, đầu thai, biến hóa) supplying the reader’s default framework for ‘changed’ and ‘imperishable.‘
Idolatry and Idol Food
Vietnamese name: Sự Thờ Hình Tượng và Của Cúng
Key terms: idol_meat, idol, demons
Review routing: Human theologian
CRITICAL: ‘của cúng các hình tượng’ directly names food ritually offered to idols/ancestors/spirits — the verb cúng is the same one used for offering food to ancestors (thờ cúng tổ tiên) and local tutelary spirits in near-universal Vietnamese family practice. Every occurrence requires explicit teaching distinguishing the idol’s lack of real competing power from the real spiritual danger of participation implying idol worship or causing a weaker believer to stumble.
The Lord’s Supper
Vietnamese name: Tiệc Thánh của Chúa
Key terms: lords_supper, new_covenant, remembrance, discern_the_body, unworthily
Review routing: Human theologian
CRITICAL: Tiệc Thánh commemorates Christ’s finished, once-for-all atoning death and proclaims his resurrection and return, received by faith; it must be sharply distinguished from Vietnamese ancestral memorial meals (giỗ, cúng cơm), which are ritual meals believed to honor and sustain a departed spirit on a death anniversary — a fundamentally different transaction between the living and the dead.
High Risk Doctrines
Apostolic Gospel Tradition
Vietnamese name: Truyền Thống Tin Lành của Các Sứ Đồ
Key terms: gospel_tradition, gospel, first importance
Review routing: Human theologian
The gospel is a fixed, unrepeatable historical deposit handed down unchanged from eyewitnesses, not an evolving family or ancestral tradition (truyền thống gia đình/dòng họ), which Vietnamese culture expects to adapt across generations.
Christian Unity versus Factionalism
Vietnamese name: Sự Hiệp Một của Cơ Đốc Nhân Đối Nghịch với Sự Chia Rẽ theo Phe Nhóm
Key terms: division_schism, strife_quarreling, carnal_fleshly
Review routing: Human theologian
Loyalty to a human leader, denominational lineage, or regional/ethnic congregational identity fracturing the one body must be named as sin, not softened to ordinary disagreement; Vietnamese church life is especially vulnerable to factional loyalty around individual pastors or the lineage of founding missionaries.
The Cross as Wisdom and Power
Vietnamese name: Sự Khôn Ngoan và Quyền Năng của Cây Thập Tự
Key terms: cross, wisdom, foolishness, power_of_god
Review routing: Human theologian
God’s revealed wisdom is centered in a historical, shameful crucifixion, not self-attained enlightenment; sự khôn ngoan must be distinguished from Buddhist trí tuệ (insight attained through meditative/ascetic practice), and thập tự giá must be kept as a historical instrument of atoning death, not reduced to a decorative religious symbol or amulet.
Spiritual versus Natural Discernment
Vietnamese name: Sự Phân Biệt giữa Người Thuộc Linh và Người Tự Nhiên
Key terms: spiritual_person, natural_person, carnal_fleshly
Review routing: Human theologian
Vietnamese lacks a lexical item isolating ψυχικός (natural incapacity apart from the Spirit) from σαρκικός (sinful, Spirit-quenching conduct); both default to xác-thịt-family vocabulary, risking conflation of a neutral pre-conversion state with post-conversion sin, which must be supplied contextually in teaching.
The Church as the Temple of God
Vietnamese name: Hội Thánh là Đền Thờ của Đức Chúa Trời
Key terms: temple_of_god, holy_spirit
Review routing: Human theologian
The corporate church, and the individual believer’s body, is God’s Spirit-indwelt dwelling; must be sharply distinguished from đền (a folk-temple honoring a deified hero or local spirit), even though the compound đền thờ của Đức Chúa Trời avoids the bare-đền collision.
Church Discipline and Holiness
Vietnamese name: Sự Sửa Trị và Sự Nên Thánh trong Hội Thánh
Key terms: hand_over_to_satan, leaven, unleavened, satan
Review routing: Human theologian
Formal church discipline is a redemptive act under Christ’s authority aimed at restoration, not a vindictive curse or an appeal to occult power (bùa, ngải, trù ẻo); ‘giao cho Sa-tan’ must never be taught as functioning like a folk curse-formula.
Sexual Holiness and the Body
Vietnamese name: Sự Thánh Sạch về Tình Dục và Thân Thể
Key terms: sexual_immorality, temple_of_god, bought_purchased
Review routing: Human theologian
Sexual sin is retained as sin against a holy God and against the believer’s Spirit-indwelt body, not merely a private lifestyle choice or a matter of social shame/loss-of-face, though loss-of-face is a real and distinct concern in Vietnamese honor culture that must not replace the primary theological ground.
Redemption and Belonging to God
Vietnamese name: Sự Cứu Chuộc và Quyền Thuộc về Đức Chúa Trời
Key terms: redemption, bought_purchased
Review routing: Human theologian
Christ’s costly purchase establishes loving ownership and freedom, not an ongoing debt the believer must repay; must be guarded against collapsing toward ơn nghĩa (a Confucian-style reciprocal-debt favor), the same risk the baseline flags for grace.
Marriage and Singleness
Vietnamese name: Hôn Nhân và Đời Sống Độc Thân
Key terms: marriage, virgin, unmarried, called
Review routing: Human theologian
Marriage is treated as a matter of gifting and calling before God, and singleness devoted to the Lord is dignified as equally valid, directly countering the strong Vietnamese Confucian expectation that marriage is filial duty (continuing the family line) and that an unmarried adult’s life is incomplete or dishonorable to the family.
Christian Liberty and Conscience
Vietnamese name: Sự Tự Do của Cơ Đốc Nhân và Lương Tâm
Key terms: freedom_liberty, conscience, weak_brother, knowledge, stumbling_block
Review routing: Human theologian
Genuine freedom from idols must be voluntarily limited out of love for weaker believers still navigating family meals involving ancestor-offering food (đồ cúng); knowledge that idols are nothing is insufficient without love and must not be presented as guaranteeing an unqualified right to eat any food regardless of a weaker believer’s conscience.
Demons and Spiritual Realities
Vietnamese name: Các Quỷ và Thực Tại Thuộc Linh
Key terms: demons, cup_table_of_the_lord
Review routing: Human theologian
Scripture treats all spirits invoked through idol worship as morally opposed to God, however locally categorized in Vietnamese folk cosmology as benign, ancestral, or protective (ma, thần); sharing ‘chén của Chúa/bàn của Chúa’ is exclusive covenant loyalty incompatible with also honoring ancestor-altar or spirit-shrine offerings.
Headship and Order in Worship
Vietnamese name: Địa Vị Đứng Đầu và Trật Tự trong Sự Thờ Phượng
Key terms: head, head_covering, glory
Review routing: Human theologian
Vietnamese Confucian family and social structure already carries strong hierarchical-headship assumptions (patriarchal household authority); teaching on κεφαλή must avoid both collapsing the term into mere Confucian patriarchal authority (obscuring Paul’s own mutual-honor qualifications in 11:11-12) and evacuating it of theological meaning altogether.
The Body of Christ: Unity in Diversity
Vietnamese name: Thân Thể của Đấng Christ: Hiệp Một trong Sự Đa Dạng
Key terms: body_of_christ, member_body
Review routing: Human theologian
The church’s organic, Spirit-constituted unity must be taught clearly as a new identity transcending blood lineage, distinguished from the clan/lineage solidarity (đại gia đình, dòng họ) that also strongly and competingly shapes Vietnamese social identity.
Discernment of Spirits
Vietnamese name: Sự Phân Biệt Các Thần
Key terms: discernment_of_spirits, jesus_is_lord
Review routing: Human theologian
This Spirit-given gift operates within the church, under apostolic/scriptural authority, testing whether a manifestation aligns with the confession ‘Jesus is Lord’; must not be taught as paralleling the practice of folk spirit-mediums/diviners (thầy cúng, đồng cốt, thầy bói) who claim to identify or communicate with spirits.
Tongues and Prophecy
Vietnamese name: Tiếng Lạ và Lời Tiên Tri
Key terms: tongues, interpretation, prophecy, order
Review routing: Human theologian
Biblical ‘tiếng lạ’ is a Spirit-given gift exercised by a self-controlled believer for the church’s edification, subject to order and interpretation; must be sharply distinguished from hầu đồng (spirit-mediumship/possession trance practice), in which a medium speaks or acts under an invoked spirit’s influence in an involuntary altered state.
Love as the Greater Way
Vietnamese name: Tình Yêu Thương: Con Đường Trổi Hơn
Key terms: love, hope, faith
Review routing: Human theologian
Biblical ἀγάπη is a willed, self-giving, covenantal love modeled on God’s own character, distinct from Vietnamese romantic love (tình yêu, most readily evoked by the general vocabulary), Confucian hierarchical filial-duty love (hiếu, đạo nghĩa), and Buddhist detached compassion (từ bi, lòng thương xót) oriented toward relieving suffering through non-attachment.
Closing Exhortations: Maranatha and Anathema
Vietnamese name: Lời Khuyên Kết: Ma-ra-na-tha và A-na-them
Key terms: maranatha, anathema, holy_kiss, grace
Review routing: Human theologian
Maranatha (an early liturgical invocation for Christ’s return) and anathema (a solemn, authoritative apostolic declaration of exclusion from God’s covenant blessing) must be distinguished from folk curse/hex practices (bùa, ngải, lời nguyền/trù ẻo) invoked through occult ritual means; these are not magical formulas causing harm through ritual power.
Medium Risk Doctrines
The Mystery of God Revealed
Vietnamese name: Sự Mầu Nhiệm của Đức Chúa Trời được Bày Tỏ
Key terms: mystery
Review routing: Native speaker review
God’s redemptive plan, once hidden, is now openly proclaimed to all who believe; must be distinguished from Mật tông (esoteric Buddhist) transmission progressively revealed only to advanced initiates.
Apostolic Ministry and Reward
Vietnamese name: Sự Hầu Việc của Sứ Đồ và Phần Thưởng
Key terms: right_authority, reward, prize, self_control
Review routing: Native speaker review
Paul’s voluntary forgoing of a legitimate right, and the reward held out for faithful gospel labor, must be distinguished from karmic merit-accumulation (công đức); this is a gracious reward for freely rendered service after salvation is already secured, not a payment earning salvation itself.
Warning from Israel’s History
Vietnamese name: Lời Cảnh Báo từ Lịch Sử Y-sơ-ra-ên
Key terms: israel, idolatry
Review routing: Native speaker review
Requires OT narrative background largely unfamiliar to Vietnamese readers without prior Old Testament literacy; the warning against presumption and idolatry must be taught as historically grounded, not a moralizing fable.
Spiritual Gifts and Unity of the Body
Vietnamese name: Ân Tứ Thuộc Linh và Sự Hiệp Một của Thân Thể
Key terms: spiritual_gifts, manifestation_of_the_spirit, baptism_spirit
Review routing: Native speaker review
The same Spirit distributes varied gifts for the common good; well-established terminology with comparatively low syncretism risk, consistent with the baseline’s spiritual_gifts doctrine.
Order in Public Worship
Vietnamese name: Trật Tự trong Sự Thờ Phượng Công Cộng
Key terms: order, edification
Review routing: Native speaker review
All exercise of spiritual gifts in public worship must build up the church, conducted decently and in order; 14:34-35’s instruction regarding women’s speech introduces significant interpretive and pastoral complexity flagged for careful review, though it introduces no new load-bearing vocabulary beyond terms already covered.
Low Risk Doctrines
Giving and Fellowship among Churches
Vietnamese name: Sự Góp Tiền và Sự Thông Công giữa Các Hội Thánh
Key terms: collection, saints, fellowship
Review routing: Automated review
The practical outworking of Christian fellowship and generosity across congregations; standard vocabulary, minimal doctrinal risk.
Referenced passages