4. The Assurance of Triumph (15:50–58)
Although what comes next constitutes an abrupt change of subject matter, it is nonetheless significantly related both to the immediately preceding concern (chaps. 12–14) and to many other matters in the letter as a whole. The issue itself is clear: “How can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?” (v. 12). In other words, “Given that you believed in the resurrection of Christ (vv. 1–2, 11), how is it that some of you are denying the future bodily resurrection of believers?” Furthermore, even though he mentions “some of you” (v. 12), nothing in Paul’s response suggests that the Corinthians are divided among themselves on this matter. As before, the issue seems to be between some of them—who have influenced the many—and the apostle Paul. What is less certain is whether Paul has learned of this problem from their letter, which seems less likely, or from a report.
Paul’s response is in three parts. He begins (vv. 1–11) by reestablishing their commonly held ground, that Christ was raised from the dead. This is presented in such a way as to emphasize the objective reality of both Christ’s death and bodily resurrection. At the same time he repeats two themes from the immediately preceding argument (14:33–38): (a) that this is the common ground of all who believe in and preach Christ, and (b) that his own apostolic ministry is the source of the Corinthian believers’ life in Christ.
In part 2 (vv. 12–34) Paul takes up what for him are two contradictory positions on their part (belief in Christ’s resurrection and denial of their own) and sets out to demonstrate the logical—and therefore absurd—consequences of such contradictions. This section is also in three parts, which revolve around a hypothetical allowance of their position: what if the dead are not raised. First (vv. 12–19), that would mean that Christ was not raised (vis-à-vis vv. 1–11); and if Christ was not raised, then everything is false. They cease to exist altogether as Christians, since both their past and future are predicated on what they now deny. Next (vv. 20–28) he takes up the reverse position. Since Christ has been raised from the dead, the inevitable corollary is the resurrection of believers. Christ’s resurrection is the firstfruits of the full harvest, having set in motion the defeat of death itself, a defeat that the very nature of God demands be brought to consummation. Finally (vv. 29–34), Paul once more picks up their position and shows the absurdity of their and his present activities if they are right. All of this together argues for the inevitability of a resurrection of believers from the dead.
Part 3 then takes up a new issue, namely how the dead are raised (v. 35), meaning not by what power but in what form. The answer? Bodily, but in a body adapted to the new conditions of the future. There is both continuity and discontinuity. The present body is earthly, “natural,” subject to decay; the raised body is heavenly, “spiritual,” and incorruptible. The final result, therefore, is a glorious resurrection-transformation of both the dead and the living wherein the final enemy, death, is swallowed up in victory.
Both the way the argument is structured and its language indicate that the Corinthians’ problem had to do with the resurrection of the dead, meaning, in light of the second half of the argument (vv. 35–58), that they had especially objected to the corporeal features of such an idea. But how did believers in Christ come by such a denial? Although several answers have been given to this question, the most likely is related to what has been argued right along, that it reflects the conflict between them and Paul over what it means to be pneumatikos (“a Spirit person”). In their view, by the reception of the Spirit, and especially the gift of tongues, they had already entered the true “spirituality” that is to be (4:8); already they had begun a form of angelic existence (13:1; cf. 4:9; 7:1–7) in which the body was unnecessary and unwanted, and would finally be discarded altogether. Thus for them life in the Spirit meant a final ridding oneself of the body, not because it was evil but because it was inferior and beneath them; the idea that the body would be raised would have been anathema. It is also possible that they saw the sacraments as the magical way of securing this new existence, which may further explain why some of them were being baptized for the dead—not because they expected the dead to be raised but because they saw in it a way of offering similar spiritual existence to the departed (15:29). Although one cannot be certain of this reconstruction, it is in keeping with what we have seen throughout to be their position vis-à-vis Paul.
Two historical realities probably merged to bring about their actual denial of a bodily resurrection. First, it seems unlikely that an articulated doctrine of resurrection belonged to the earliest Christian preaching, especially among Gentiles. Christ’s resurrection was central, but that said something primarily about him (cf. Rom. 1:3–4). For believers it secured salvation and gave hope for the future, but that hope would not necessarily have been thought of in terms of a resurrection. After all, few of them would have died—and in any case their hope was in an imminent Parousia. The evidence from Paul’s earliest preserved letter (1 Thess. 4:13–18) suggests that even as late as A.D. 48–49 Paul had not yet addressed this question—at least not in that church. When he does so, apparently because some have died, it is in terms similar to our present chapter. Since that earliest preserved letter was written from Corinth, is it at this time that he there began to teach the resurrection of believers as well?
Second, apparently soon after Paul’s departure from Corinth things took a turn for the worse in this church. A false theology began to gain ground, rooted in a radical pneumatism that denied the value/significance of the body that was expressed by way of a somewhat “overrealized,” or “spiritualized,” eschatology. Along with this there arose a decided movement against Paul. These two concerns come to a climax as the concluding matters in this letter, first, in their pneumatic behavior (chaps. 12–14) and, second, in their denial of a resurrection of the dead (chap. 15), which included their questioning of his status as pneumatikos (14:36–38) and perhaps their calling him an “abortion” or a “freak” (15:8). Thus, as elsewhere, Paul sets out not only to correct some bad theology but at the same time to remind them of his right to do so.
Furthermore, all of this is integrally tied to the matters of behavior that have preceded. It is of more than merely passing interest that both major sections of this argument conclude with exhortation to proper behavior. Part 2 concludes (vv. 33–34) with an especially strong appeal that belief in the resurrection should serve to mend their aberrant ways, while part 3 concludes (v. 58) on a more positive note, exhorting them to continue the work of the gospel in which they already stand (v. 1).
At all events, the net result of their errors is one of the great theological treasures of the Christian church. If for Paul, and therefore for us, there is an element of mystery to the concept of a “spiritual body” (v. 44), there can be little question that for him Christ’s resurrection is central to everything. It is the ultimate eschatological event. By raising Christ from the dead God set in motion the final overthrow of death itself. Hence the inevitable fact (vv. 12–28) and nature (vv. 35–49) of our own resurrection.
1Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. 2By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.
3For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. 6After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. 7Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, 8and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
9For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. 11Whether, then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.
Or you at the first
That is, Peter
Although the enumeration of appearances might suggest otherwise, Paul is not here setting out to prove the resurrection of Jesus. Rather, he is reasserting the commonly held ground from which he will argue against their assertion that there is no resurrection of the dead. To do so he appeals to “the tradition” of the whole church, which he preached and they believed, namely that Christ died, was buried, and was raised on the third day. The emphasis is threefold: First, he reiterates both at the beginning (vv. 1–2) and the end (v. 11) that this tradition is something they have indeed believed. Two points are made here: (a) In keeping with the emphasis at the end of the preceding argument (14:33, 36), what Paul preached and they believed is the common ground of the whole church (cf. vv. 3–5, 11). (b) Alongside that emphasis is the reminder that their very existence as believers is at stake on this matter. That is, any deviation from this gospel which “saved them” and “in which they stand” puts them in danger of “believing in vain.”
That is followed, second, with Paul’s reiterating the commonly held tradition itself. For several reasons it is generally agreed that Paul is here (vv. 3–4 at least) reciting a very early creedal formulation that was common to the entire church, to which he adds other traditions about several resurrection appearances. Paul’s use of this material seems to have a twofold concern: (a) The combination in the creed of “buried” and “raised on the third day” emphasizes the resurrection of a dead corpse, not the “spiritual” renewal of life after death. Whatever the precise nature of the Corinthian view, this citation of the creed is a reminder that the nature of Christ’s resurrection is genuine and corporeal. (b) So also with the catalogue of resurrection appearances that follows (vv. 5–7), the likes of which there is nothing else in the early literature. Since this catalogue seems quite unlikely to be part of the creed itself, its inclusion is therefore quite emphatic. Paul’s language, “he appeared to,” means that the risen Christ was seen by all these people, that is, he was corporeally visible this side of the grave.
Third, the catalogue of appearances concludes with his own experience (v. 8), which leads him to a brief word about his apostleship (vv. 9–10). Since these words are otherwise unnecessary to the argument, one is led to ask what caused them to appear here. The best answer seems to be that they reflect the conflict between him and them last addressed in what has immediately preceded (14:36–38). In relating his own experience of the risen Christ he describes himself as “one who is ektrōma,” a word that means “miscarriage” or “abortion” and is probably intended to refer to his “lowly” status as “least” among the apostles, which may perhaps have been hurled at him as an epithet by some of the Corinthians. In any case, as earlier in the letter (4:8–13) where he also set forth his own view of apostleship over against theirs, he capitalizes on his own “lowliness” in order to exalt the grace of God in his life—not the least of which is evidenced in their coming to faith through such an ektrōma as he (v. 11)!
Thus this introductory section functions both to ground the argument that follows in Christ himself and to ground Paul’s authority in his having seen the risen Lord and in the Corinthians’ coming to be believers themselves as the result of his ministry (cf. 9:1–2). At the same time it serves to illustrate once more his own understanding of apostleship as modeled after the Crucified One (cf. 2:1–5; 4:8–13; 9:15–23).
1–2 This opening sentence serves to introduce most of the concerns that will be spelled out in the argument that follows (at least through v. 28). At the same time it ties what follows to what has immediately preceded. The verb “I make known,” although finally meaning “I want to remind” (as the NIV), is probably a nice piece of irony that picks up the verb that has immediately preceded (14:38, “if anyone does not know [lit. ‘is ignorant’!]).” To those who think of themselves as pneumatikos (people of the Spirit) over against Paul, he pronounces the judgment that their “ignorance” of his word as the commandment of the Lord (14:37) meant they would be “ignored” by God. Now he “makes known” to them what they already know, but seem to have forgotten. All of this is the apostle at his finest!
Even though the sentence itself is somewhat convoluted, so that some have despaired of making grammatical sense of it, the flow of Paul’s thought can be discerned easily enough. The argument has an A-B-A-B structure:
By this analysis A′ repeats the basic statement of A, while B expresses their response to the gospel and B′ serves as its negative counterpoint, indicating the net result of their present stance with regard to a future bodily resurrection. Thus Paul begins, “Now I make known to you, brothers and sisters, the gospel I preached to you.” In terms of the argument proper, these words anticipate what comes next (vv. 3–5), which gives the content of the gospel Paul preached, and could easily have followed. Instead, he digresses momentarily (B) to remind them that the gospel he preached is also the one on which their past (“you received”), present (“you stand”), and future (“you are being saved”) are predicated. Having thus stressed that the gospel he preached is also the one to which they owe their very existence, he resumes the opening clause, but now by means of an indirect question. Leaving out the “digression,” the A-A′ sentences read: “I make known to you the gospel I preached to you, that is, with what word [namely, the tradition that will follow in vv. 3–5] I preached to you.” But this repetition of the opening statement leads to a second “digression” (B′), the counterpoint to B: “Provided you hold firmly, unless you have believed in vain.” Grammatically this last clause goes with A′; conceptually it modifies B.
Despite their qualification of the clauses in B, the final clauses (B′) are not to be understood as doubt on the apostle’s part. Rather, the whole sentence nicely introduces the three concerns addressed at the outset (vv. 3–28). First, as already noted the opening sentence both serves as a transition (from 14:36–38) and anticipates the somewhat interruptive apologetic note to come (vv. 8–11). Second, the repeated phrase “word [= gospel] which I preached to you” introduces the rest of the present paragraph (vv. 3–7), the “tradition” that has the death and resurrection of Christ as its heart and soul and in turn becomes the predicate of the entire first part of the argument (vv. 12–28). Third, the two “asides” (B-B′) anticipate the logic of its first half (vv. 12–19), that the Corinthians’ own existence as believers argues for the truth of the resurrection of the dead. On the one hand, the clauses in part B reassert that the Corinthians owe their entire existence as believers to the gospel Paul preaches, with its central affirmation of Christ’s bodily resurrection. On the other hand, the final clause in B′ is surely irony and is intended to anticipate what he will say in the next phase of the argument (vv. 14–19). If they do not hold fast to the gospel, that is, if their current position as to “no resurrection” is correct, then Christ did not rise, which in turn means that they did indeed believe in vain. If they are right, everything is a lie, and they cease to exist as believers altogether.
3a With an explanatory “for” Paul proceeds to introduce the “word” (v. 2) of the “gospel I preached.” The language is nearly identical to that used earlier regarding the Lord’s Supper (11:23). These two texts together make it clear that this is technical vocabulary from Paul’s Jewish heritage for the transmission of religious instruction. As with the tradition of the Lord’s Supper, this language indicates that the essential matters go back to the very beginnings of things. Of crucial importance here is the clear implication that the two basic tenets of the Christian faith, atonement through the death of Christ and a high Christology based on his resurrection, were well formed before Paul came on the scene. For all the shaping that Christian theology underwent in his hands, the basic elements were there before and after him. This is what he “received” and what he “passed on.”
What is less certain is the meaning of the prepositional phrase translated “as of first importance.” As the marginal reading indicates, this could also mean priority in time. Although a case can be made for the latter (he would be stressing that this is what he preached and they believed from the very beginning of their coming to Christ), both the form and language suggest that the translated text is Paul’s concern. Among all the things he proclaimed and taught while he was with them, these are the matters of “first importance.” Here is the “bare bones” content of the gospel that saves.
3b–5 Even though the material that follows immediately (vv. 6–7) is by its very nature “traditional,” and therefore probably belongs to “what Paul received and passed on” to them, it seems unlikely that it also belonged to the “gospel I preached to you.” For this reason, plus the balanced structure of the present sentences, most scholars consider this to be an expression of a very early Christian creed, while the following affirmations (vv. 6–7) represent further traditions that Paul has added at the end to fill out his personal concerns.
As to the creed itself, there has been considerable discussion over several issues: its unity; the extent of its content; and its original language. On these matters one is referred to the literature. In its present form it has four lines, each introduced with a kai hoti (“and that”), thus emphasizing the content of each line. The four lines are in two nearly perfect sets of Semitic parallels. Lines 1 and 3, which describe the death and resurrection of Jesus, correspond formally, including the phrase “according to the Scriptures”; lines 2 and 4 respond respectively to lines 1 and 3, warranting their content. Thus:
1.
that
Christ died for our sins
according to the Scriptures;
2.
and
that
he was buried;
3.
and
that
he was raised on the third day,
according to the Scriptures;
4.
and
that
he was seen
by Cephas [and] the Twelve.
Line 1. That “Christ died for our sins” is the primary tenet of Christian faith. Several items need to be noted: (a) In his earliest letter Paul simply said, “We believe that Jesus died and rose” (1 Thess. 4:14). But the creed uses the divine title as a name, “Christ died.” Although by now this had become Jesus’ divine name, it undoubtedly still carried messianic overtones. In Christian understanding, the Messiah is characterized first of all by this reality: “He died to take away our sins” (cf. 1:23; 2:2).
(b) The language “for our sins” is a direct reflection of the LXX of Isaiah’s Suffering Servant (Isa. 53). Since Judaism did not interpret this passage messianically, at least not in terms of a personal Messiah, and since there is no immediate connection between the death of Jesus and the idea that his death was “for our sins,” it is fair to say that whoever made that connection is the “founder of Christianity.” All the evidence points to Jesus himself, especially at the Last Supper with his interpretation of his death in the language of Isa. 53 as “for you” (see on 11:23–25).
(c) This is the language of atonement. In saying “Christ died for our sins,” the creed presupposes alienation between God and human beings because of human rebellion and sinfulness, for which the just penalty is death. Death “for our sins” means that one died on behalf of others to satisfy the penalty and to overcome the alienation. Thus, even though there is no “theory” of atonement here, simply the affirmation, the concept of substitution is woven into the very earliest of the Christian creeds. In Pauline theology this includes not only forgiveness of past sins, but in a very real sense deliverance from the bondage of one’s sinfulness as well.
(d) Finally, the added phrase, “according to the Scriptures,” probably is not intended to point to a single passage or set of passages but to the larger reality of the OT, where “Scripture is seen as a whole.” According to “the Scriptures” God had provided that the death of a spotless lamb should be part of Israel’s rescue from the bondage of Egypt. This in turn became part of the sacrificial system in which animals “bore the sins” of the people on the Day of Atonement. And this language is picked up once more in Isaiah to describe the one who “like a lamb led to the slaughter” (53:7) took away the sins of the people.
Although this first line is almost certainly to be understood as part of the creed, hence the reason for its inclusion, at the same time it serves to emphasize the reality of Christ’s death and perhaps one more time to press the concern with which the letter began (chaps. 1–4), that the gospel is not “wisdom” humanly conceived but the story of a crucified Messiah who died on behalf of sinners.
Line 2. This addition to line 1, “and that he was buried,” functions to verify the reality of the death. In the present context it emphasizes the fact that a dead corpse was laid in the grave, so that the resurrection that follows will be recognized as an objective reality, not merely a “spiritual” phenomenon, a phantasm of some kind. Therefore, even though the point is incidental to Paul’s own concern, this very early expression of Christian faith also verifies the reality of the empty tomb stories. It is common in some quarters of NT scholarship to deny this latter; but that seems to be a case of special pleading. The combined emphasis on death, burial, and third-day resurrection would have had an empty tomb as its natural concomitant, even if not expressed in that way. Given this language, embedded in the heart of the earliest tradition, the early Christians and Paul would find it unthinkable that some would deny that they believed that the tomb was also empty, or that those stories were the creation of a later generation that needed “objective verification” of the resurrection. One may not believe that Jesus rose and that the tomb was therefore empty; but one may scarcely on good historical grounds deny that they so believed.
Line 3. With this line Paul comes to his present concern. Nonetheless he keeps to the language of the creed, “that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.” In distinction from the two previous lines, the verb in this instance is a perfect passive (“he has been raised”), implying that he was both raised and still lives. The difficulty for us is to determine precisely what was meant by “on the third day according to the Scriptures.”
The problem with the initial phrase, “on the third day,” has to do both with its origin and its significance for the creed. Although several solutions have been offered, the most likely is that “on the third day” came into the creed primarily because this was in fact the day of the discovery of the empty tomb and of the first resurrection appearances. One may surmise that the event had such an impact on those who saw Jesus alive after his crucifixion that it was simply carried over into the creed, in somewhat the same manner that the Lord’s Supper tradition carried with it “on the night that he was betrayed” (see on 11:23). Added to that would be the disciples’ after-the-fact understanding, as referring to his resurrection, of the otherwise enigmatic saying that Jesus “would destroy the temple and in three days build it again” (John 2:19–22; cf. Mark 14:58//Matt. 26:61; Mark 15:29//Matt. 27:40). That is, their own experience of the risen Lord “on the third day,” plus their later remembrance that he himself had so predicted such an occurrence, combined to fix the phrase in the creed.
The phrase “according to the Scriptures” has posed even greater difficulties. Since neither the tradition of the third day nor the resurrection is well attested in the OT, several theories have been offered: (a) that it modifies “on the third day” and refers to some specific OT texts; (b) that it refers either to early Christian attempts to write passion and resurrection narratives or to Testimony Books containing OT citations that were interpreted prophetically as referring to the third day; (c) that it reflects a popular Jewish belief that corruption set in only after the third day, so that Jesus was raised on the third day to fulfill a passage in the Psalter (16:9–11 [LXX]) that his body would not suffer “corruption”; (d) that it modifies only the verb “he was raised” and does not include “on the third day”; and (e) that it has the same force here that it did in line 1, asserting that the OT as a whole bears witness to the resurrection on the third day. This latter seems the most likely option. If so, then an early tradition saw the combined evidence from two Psalms (16:8–11 and 110:1) as bearing witness to the Messiah’s resurrection (cf. Acts 2:25–36); and that it happened “on the third day” was probably seen in terms of the variety of OT texts in which salvation or vindication took place on the third day.
Line 4. Not only was Jesus raised, but “he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve.” Just as line 2 functions to warrant line 1, so this line warrants line 3 and thereby also emphasizes the objective reality of the resurrection. He “was raised” and he “was seen.” This is so crucial for the present argument that Paul will append four more appearances to these first two (vv. 6–8). Paul’s point seems emphatic. The resurrection of Jesus from the dead was not a form of “spiritual” existence. Just as he was truly dead and buried, so he was truly raised from the dead bodily and seen by a large number of witnesses on a variety of occasions.
In the gospel narratives, the first appearances are to women; in the tradition Paul is citing these appearances are skipped over in favor of those to Peter and the Twelve, which are also recorded in the Gospels. Since Peter is here called “Cephas,” which is Paul’s usual appellation for him (see on 1:12), one must be cautious as to whether this name was actually in the “tradition” that Paul cites. It may mean, as some have argued, that the tradition ends with the verb “was seen.” Very likely it means simply that Paul has substituted his own preference for whatever was in the tradition.
One cannot tell whether the addition “then to the Twelve” belonged to the creed itself or whether it is the beginning of Paul’s expansion on the final line. In either case, the reference is to an appearance such as that found in John’s gospel (21:14). The use of the term “the Twelve” is a clear indication that in the early going this was a title given to the special group of twelve whom Jesus called to “be with him” (Mark 3:14). Thus this is their collective designation; it does not imply that all twelve were on hand, since the available evidence indicates otherwise. This designation for Jesus’ disciples, plus the fact that Paul will later refer to another appearance to “all the apostles” (v. 7), suggests most strongly that the joining of these two terms into the title “the twelve apostles” had not yet taken place in the church. That is, in Paul’s view “the Twelve” were a distinct entity, no doubt considered apostles, but the latter designation covered a much larger group of people. The idea that there were only twelve apostles belongs to a later—or different—stratum of Christian tradition.
6 The language of the three additional appearances (vv. 6–7) is so thoroughly Pauline that it seems probable that these items have been added by Paul himself, probably from a different “tradition.” By “tradition” one does not here mean another creed, but simply information available to him from whatever source. After all, the clear implication of this affirmation is that there were still eyewitnesses around who could be consulted, and one would scarcely need some special source for such information. These additional items seem to function in two ways: first, further to emphasize the veracity of the tradition that in Jesus’ case a real resurrection was involved; second, to form a bridge of tradition between the Twelve and himself, since when he gets to his own experience the concern shifts for a moment from the resurrection of Jesus to Paul’s own place in the tradition. The fact that none of these next three enumerations is otherwise known from our available sources is but a reminder that the literature we have from the early church, including the NT documents, is a small collection that at best gives us a slice of the early history, but scarcely anything bordering on the whole picture.
Of the appearance to “more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time,” nothing more is known. Although the words “and sisters” are not in Paul’s text, his designation “brothers” usually included women as well, and especially so in this case, since it is the unanimous witness of the various gospel traditions that Jesus had women as well as men among his disciples, in the sense of those who often accompanied him as he traveled about. The adverb “at the same time” here can hardly be explained except as an attempt to emphasize the reality and objectivity of this appearance. But beyond that, in terms of time and place, all is speculation.
Everyone agrees that the words “most of whom are still living, although some have fallen asleep,” are a Pauline addition. But not all agree as to their significance. The usual understanding is that it functions as a kind of open-ended invitation for the Corinthians to inquire for themselves, as it were, thus putting the emphasis on “most of whom are still living,” with a slight note of regret that some have indeed already fallen asleep. Others put the emphasis on “although some have fallen asleep” as a kind of anticipation of the argument that comes next (vv. 12–34), implying that the Corinthians who say there is no resurrection of the dead are also asserting that they themselves do not expect to die. But since the latter is not specifically brought out in the argument that follows, and since Paul seems to exhibit considerable concern to demonstrate the objective reality of Christ’s resurrection, the traditional interpretation is probably the correct understanding.
7 Finally, he adds an appearance “to James” and “then to all the apostles,” both of which are also unknown elsewhere in the canonical tradition, although an appearance to James is recorded in the apocryphal Gospel of the Hebrews, and the introduction to Acts (1:6–11) reflects a tradition of several appearances to those who would come to be known as apostles. This James is the Lord’s brother, who, along with his other brothers, “did not believe in him” during Jesus’ earthly ministry (John 7:2–9) but who appear with the disciples after the resurrection. At some early stage he became a leader in the church in Jerusalem. Paul’s first contact with him occurred on his first brief visit to Jerusalem as a Christian (Gal. 1:19), in which passage he also refers to James as an “apostle.”
The final item in the catalogue, “then to all the apostles,” is the most puzzling of all, both in terms of who is intended by this designation and of the “event” itself, whether Paul intended a single appearance to all or appearances to each of them. On the second matter, even though there is no “at the same time” as in the preceding sentence, the enumerating conjunction “then” and the fact that the appearance to the Twelve was collective, not individual, combine to suggest that a collective appearance (probably with a commissioning) is in view here. Moreover, one would expect the apostle to have written “and then to each of the apostles,” had he intended such.
But whom does Paul understand “all the apostles” to include? There have been three ways of taking this: (a) That it means “then to all the apostles,” implying that besides the individual appearances to Peter, the Twelve, and James, Jesus appeared again to the entire group who came to be known as apostles, including Peter, etc.; or (b) that it is simply another way of speaking of “the Twelve” and refers to a second commissioning appearance to them; or (c) that it means “then to all the apostles,” implying that this is yet another group not heretofore mentioned. Although the scheme of enumeration itself tends to favor (c), Paul’s usage of the term “apostle” elsewhere, especially in his later letter to the Galatians (1:17–19), implies that both Peter and James were “apostles before him.” The further inclusion of John in the following argument in Galatians (2:1–10) implies that Paul considered him an apostle as well. Therefore, even though there are some difficulties with (a), this probably refers to a tradition similar to that recorded at the beginning of Acts (1:6–11). Such an appearance would have included Peter, the Twelve, and James, plus a larger group who came to be known as apostles. Most likely this designation, as elsewhere in Paul, is a functional term rather than an official one. Or to put that in another way, “the Twelve” were a definite group who had a special relationship to Jesus and in the early church probably served in some kind of authoritative capacity. But the “apostles,” a term that included the Twelve, were a larger group who in Paul’s understanding had seen the risen Lord and were commissioned by him to proclaim the gospel and found churches (cf. 9:1–2). They, too, had authority in the churches, especially those they founded, but they scarcely formed a “body” or served as a “council.” Their authority was that of ministry rather than jurisdiction.
8 The mention of the appearance to “all the apostles” leads Paul directly to his own experience: “and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.” As noted earlier (9:1), Paul is here referring to his having seen the risen Lord on the Damascus Road, which he did not consider a visionary experience but an actual resurrection appearance of a kind with the others in this series. The sure evidence of that is (a) his actually including his experience in this enumeration, (b) the repetition of the verb “appeared,” and (c) the language he uses to describe his inclusion, that it is “last of all” and “as to one abnormally born.”
But it is not at all clear what Paul intended by the term ektrōma (“abnormally born”). Traditionally, it has been understood to mean that Paul recognized his own experience to lie outside the “normal” process. His was a unique and gracious gift that occurred after the time when such appearances were understood to have ceased. This lends credence to the suggestion that the preceding appearance “to all the apostles” refers to the tradition of Christ’s appearing to them at the time of the Ascension, which “event” occurred not for his sake, to get him to heaven, as it were, but for their sakes, both to enable them to see his ascending to the place of authority at the Father’s right hand and to bring to a conclusion the time of resurrection appearances. From that point on, the divine visitation was in their experience of the Spirit. Hence the risen Lord’s appearance to Paul was “as to one abnormally born.”
The problem with that view is twofold. First, Paul includes the article with the noun, hence “as to the ektrōma”; second, the word literally refers to any kind of premature birth (abortion, stillbirth, or miscarriage). Thus the word comes to be used figuratively to refer to something horrible or freakish. Since this is such an unusual term of deprecation, and since it occurs with the article, the “miscarriage,” it has often been suggested that the Corinthians themselves have used the term to describe Paul, as one who because of his personal weaknesses is something of a “freak” in comparison with other apostles, especially Apollos and Peter. Others have suggested that the term is a play on Paul’s name—Paulus, “the little one.” Hence they dismissed him as a “dwarf.” This has the advantage of helping to explain the unusual “digression” that follows (vv. 9–10), where he in fact allows that he is “least” of all the apostles; nonetheless God’s grace worked the more abundantly in his behalf.
In any case, whether it originated with them, which seems altogether likely, or with Paul himself in a sudden outburst of self-disparagement, it seems hardly possible to understand this usage except as a term that describes him vis-à-vis the Corinthians’ own view of apostleship. That is made more certain by the explanatory digression that follows. As has been noted throughout, this tension between him and them over their activities—and theological justification for them—has also brought about the anti-Pauline sentiment that is in part responsible for their divisions as well as their attitude toward him as an apostle. As in an earlier moment (4:9–13), Paul once more goes on the “attack” in this matter by asserting as a value what they would disparage, namely his “untimely birth” or his “dwarf” status as a real “paulus” of an apostle. What they see as weakness and therefore as evidence of a lesser standing, he sees as the true evidence that his apostleship is from the Lord. Thus, later in his next (preserved) letter to them, where all this comes to a head (2 Cor. 10–13), he will defend himself once again by glorying in his weaknesses (cf. 1 Cor. 2:1–5 and 9:1–27).
9 With this sentence and the next Paul offers an explanation of the preceding self-deprecating words (v. 8), which serve at the same time as an apologetic of his apostleship and especially of his ministry among them. The opening words, “I am the least of the apostles,” affirm both that he is an apostle and that, as they probably view him, he is the least ranking of them all. As noted above, this is very likely a play on his own name in light of their view of him as something of a “freak.” Indeed he will take them a step further. He does “not even deserve to be called an apostle”—a view many of them probably also held. But his reasons for it would be different from theirs. They have difficulty with his weaknesses and lack of “spirituality,” as judged by their own criteria. In the earlier passages where he defended his ministry among them he gloried in his weaknesses, through which the power of the Spirit could be manifested (2:1–5; 9:15–18). But his reason here has to do with his former way of life: “because I persecuted the church of God.”
Frequently when Paul mentions God’s grace in his behalf, he refers to himself in this way (Gal. 1:13–15; Phil. 3:6–8; 1 Tim. 1:13–16). While a persecutor, of course, he thought he was doing God a favor; for him this was “zeal” for the Lord and “advancement” in Judaism. But on this side of his encounter with the risen Christ he saw himself for what he really was, the chief of sinners (1 Tim. 1:15) and persecutor of the church of God, thus standing over against the eternal God and what God was doing in the world through Christ. Out of this encounter comes the basis of his theology of grace. Since God was gracious to him, God’s enemy, in this way, Paul came eventually to realize that this is the way God is toward all, Jew and Gentile alike, making no distinctions. Since all alike are sinful (thus broken and fallen), all alike are potential recipients of God’s grace. In like manner he views his apostleship. It is a matter of grace, and grace alone. Since the Corinthians themselves have not given him his authority, they can neither take it from him nor deny it to him. It has been given him by a gracious act of God, which point he will make in the next two sentences (v. 10).
10 Paul proceeds to give the reason why he is indeed an apostle: “by the grace of God I am what I am.” Although this is true of his being a believer as well, the concern here has to do with his undeserved apostleship. Even though he is admittedly something of an “abortion” and the least of the apostles, Paul is nonetheless an apostle—“by the grace of God.” Thus, “grace” in this sentence does not so much refer to God’s gracious favor on behalf of sinners, although that is not very far behind; but in a way similar to its appearance in the opening thanksgiving (1:4), it refers to the concrete expression of that grace in his apostleship. Thus he speaks in the succeeding clauses of God’s “grace to me” and finally of “the grace of God that was with me.” In these sentences he makes two points: First, God’s grace in his case “was not without effect.” That is, it did not become something given “in vain.” Most likely this sentence points in two directions. On the one hand, it points both backward (v. 2) and especially forward (v. 14), where there is considerable danger that if they persist in their present folly, God’s grace to them will have turned out to be “useless.” On the other hand, it points directly to their own existence in Christ; they themselves are the sure evidence that God’s grace in terms of Paul’s apostleship was not without effect.
Second, although God’s gracious gift of apostleship was the result of divine initiative, hence all of grace, nonetheless it required Paul’s response. Thus he can also say, “No, I worked harder than all of them,” referring to “the apostles” mentioned earlier (v. 9). In Paul’s view this is the sentence that balances his being “the least.” He is so because he deserved least to be one at all; not only was his birth “untimely,” but it turned out that in his former zeal he had been God’s avowed enemy. Although least in this sense, however, he does not consider his work itself to be one whit less than anyone else’s. Paul is sometimes given to expansive statements, and “I worked harder than all of them” is one of these. His point, however, is not that of comparison, as if to say “I am better than they because I worked harder.” Rather, his concern is to say something about his own ministry as such, including his having come to Corinth with the gospel. To make sure that he is not misunderstood, he quickly qualifies with “yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.” That is, even my intense labors in the gospel are ultimately not the result of a personal need to compensate God for his grace, but are themselves the reflection of that very grace at work in my life. Thus, in Pauline theology, even though his labor is a response to grace, it is more properly seen as the effect of grace. All is of grace; nothing is deserved. Neither therefore can he lay claim to his own ministry nor can they reject it; it is God’s activity in him in their behalf.
11 By concluding the considerable enumeration of resurrection appearances with his own, which in turn led to a short digression about his apostleship, Paul’s argument has gotten away from him a bit. Not that these things are unimportant—or irrelevant. To the contrary, the enumeration of witnesses is crucial to the argument that will follow and the defense of his apostleship integral to the whole reason for the argument, namely some strong differences between him and them on this matter. But the argument itself has to do with their denial of the resurrection of the dead. To that matter he is about to turn. He does so by coming back to the point of the present paragraph, namely that belief in the resurrection of the dead is predicated first of all on the reality of the resurrection of Christ. His point has been that this is something that they have believed (even if in an unsatisfactory way); it is the foundation of their existence in Christ.
Thus he concludes all these matters (lit.): “Therefore, whether I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.” The original NIV missed some subtleties here by putting the opening phrase (“whether I or they”) in the past tense. Had this conclusion followed directly from the preceding paragraph, as it logically could have, Paul would have said, “Thus we (or I) preached, and thus you believed.” In the meantime, however, he has made the preceding short excursion (vv. 9–10), so he concludes, “Whether I or they, thus we preach.” With these words, therefore, he is not simply identifying the gospel they believed with the creed cited at the beginning (vv. 3–5), but he is also tying it both to his own apostleship and to the common preaching of all the apostles—and therefore by implication suggesting that this is the gospel held in common by all who believe in Christ. Once more, therefore, he is pressing on them that their current behavior and theology are out of step with those of the other churches (cf. 1:2; 4:17; 7:17; 11:16; 14:33), and thus with believers in general. “What they believed,” therefore, resulting in part from his preaching when he was among them, is the same gospel preached presently by him and by all the apostles. On the matter of their denial of the resurrection, therefore, they are following neither Apollos, nor Cephas, nor Christ; they are simply going off on their own, and in effect abandoning truly Christian faith and discipleship.
On the basis of this common faith, Paul will next turn to a direct confrontation with the Corinthians over their denial of the resurrection of the dead. The nature of that argument makes it plain that the purpose of this opening paragraph is not to prove Christ’s resurrection but to reestablish this fundamental premise as the common denominator between him and them, and from this to argue with them as he will in the next step of the present argument (vv. 12–34). The reason for the catalogue of witnesses is therefore not to prove that Jesus rose but to emphasize that the resurrection of Christ, which they believed, had objective reality and was held universally by all true believers and thus to emphasize that it is they who were desperately out of line.
Unfortunately, in today’s church many claim to be believers who deny what for Paul was the same as denying the faith itself. Such a denial meant to believe “for naught.” It was the resurrection after all that made it possible for them to say, “Christ died for our sins.” And it was the resurrection, as he will go on to argue (vv. 20–28), that guarantees our own future as the people of God. To deny the objective reality of Christ’s resurrection is to have a faith considerably different from Paul’s. One wonders whether such faith is still the Christian faith.
On the other hand, there are those who use this passage to try to prove the resurrection to unbelievers. What they fail to recognize is that such “proofs” are valid only to those who believe. Either one believes the witnesses or one does not. But the resurrection of Christ itself finally lies outside the ordinary categories of historical proof. What one may prove is that they believed in the bodily resurrection of Christ, and that such belief took an extraordinary (i.e., miraculous) event in order for it to have come into being. Nonetheless, our calling is to proclaim the resurrection as those who, with Paul, are absolutely convinced of its reality and significance. Such conviction leads also to the proclamation of the gospel itself, the good news that God loves fallen, broken human beings and has made provision through Christ’s death and resurrection to overcome their alienation, so that they too may know divine forgiveness and have a sure hope for the future. This, it would seem, is the lasting significance of this argument and its content for today.
Having reasserted the resurrection of Christ as the common ground of all Christian preaching and faith, Paul now moves from that base to refute those who deny the resurrection of believers who have died. The argument proceeds along two lines, an appeal to logic (vv. 12–28) and an appeal ad hominem (vv. 29–34). In each case Paul indicates the logical consequences, and therefore illogical nature, of their position. On the one hand, he argues at the beginning (vv. 12–19), if they are right that there is no resurrection of the dead, that can only mean that Christ was not raised, which not only contradicts the common faith just appealed to (vv. 1–11) but logically means that he and they cease to exist as believers altogether. On the other hand, as he continues in the next step in the argument (vv. 20–28), since Christ was raised from the dead, that means that God has set in motion two irreversibles: the resurrection of all who are “in Christ” (vv. 20–22), and thus the final destruction of death itself (vv. 23–28). Likewise, Paul goes on at the end (vv. 29–34), if there is no resurrection of the dead, then both they and he are playing the role of fools. Significantly, and somewhat characteristically of this letter, he concludes the present argument with a strong appeal to them to stop their sinning as well (vv. 33–34).
Thus Paul’s concern is to demonstrate from the commonly held position of both himself and them—the resurrection of Christ—first the absurdity of their present position (vv. 12–19) and then the splendor of his (vv. 20–28). And in case that is not fully heard, there are always the practical absurdities of both his and their daily lives if there is no resurrection of the dead (vv. 29–34).
12But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. 15More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. 16For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. 17And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. 18Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. 19If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.
With this paragraph the reason for the present argument is stated for the first time: Some of them are saying that there is no resurrection of the dead. With a piece of compelling logic, Paul takes up first the awful consequences of that position by showing how it affects the argument that has just preceded. The logical force of their position is that Christ himself was not raised from the dead if the dead are not raised (v. 13). The rest of the argument takes up that hypothetical position and spells out its net results: both his preaching and their believing are to no avail. Paul’s point is a simple one: If their present position prevails, they have neither a past nor a future.
The structure of the argument is as follows:
I.
The opening sentences (vv. 12–13) represent in chiastic fashion the gospel (A) and their current position (B), followed by the hypothetical allowance of their position (B′) and its logical consequence as to Christ himself (A′):
A
We
preach: Christ has been raised from the dead,
B
Some of you say: there is no resurrection of the dead.
but
B′
If there is no resurrection of the dead,
A′
neither has Christ been raised.
II.
The middle sentences (vv. 14–16) pick up the hypothetical consequence of A′, indicating its net results (R1 and R2); the point here is that the faith itself is otherwise false:
A′
If
Christ has not been raised,
R1
then both our preaching
and your believing are to no avail.
More than that
R2
we are found to be false witnesses of God,
because
A
We bore witness about God, that he raised Christ,
A′
Whom he did not raise,
B′
If indeed
the dead are not raised
for
B′
If
the dead are not raised,
A′
not even
Christ has been raised.
The final sentences (vv. 17–19) repeat the hypothetical consequence of A′ and then elaborate R1, with emphasis on the futility of the effects of their believing:
A′
If
Christ has not been raised,
R1
your faith is futile:
R1 (a)
You (the living) are still in your sins,
and furthermore
R1 (b)
Believers who have died have perished.
Conclusion (resulting from R1[b]):
If we have hoped in Christ in this life alone, then we are to be pitied above all others. [That is, if we have believed in Christ’s resurrection as giving us hope for the future when there is no hope for the future, then we are truly to be pitied.]
By this form of logic, called modus tollens, the Corinthians are being forced to agree that there is a future resurrection of believers on the basis of their common faith in the resurrection of Christ. The argument is irrefutable, given their acceptance of Christ’s resurrection and its effects in their lives. Hence the significance of how all this began (vv. 1–11).
12 An adversative “but” contrasts the preceding argument, “it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead” (vv. 1–11), with their present position, “Some of you say there is no resurrection of the dead.” The present contrast takes the form of a question: How is it in light of what has just been said that some of you now say . . . ? Although this is the position of only “some among you,” most likely the “some” are the same as those early on (4:18) and elsewhere (e.g., 9:3) who have had a significant influence within the community and are almost certainly responsible for its apparently prevailing anti-Pauline sentiment.
Even though in the opening sentences (vv. 1–11) Paul did not use the language that Christ was “raised from the dead,” this is in fact what he intended and is his regular way of speaking of Christ’s resurrection. Thus, as the creed says, Christ died and was buried, and as Paul regularly says, he was also raised from the dead, referring not to his being raised from death itself but from among those who have died. The Corinthians’ position, “There is no resurrection of the dead,” means that the dead do not rise, implying both that those who are currently dead and those who shall yet die will not have a future existence that involves their present bodily form. Thus they are not denying that they shall die, nor arguing that they have no future, nor is Paul saying that people must die in order to be raised, as some have suggested. The problem for the Corinthians is with the dead and their rising, that the dead have a future existence in some somatic form—probably from their point of view taken literally to mean the reanimation of a corpse to continue bodily existence in its present bodily form. Paul himself will go on to reject that view (vv. 42–50); but before he does so he must affirm the reality of resurrection itself, including the implicit fact that it is “bodily.”
13 Paul now sets out to show how their premise would affect the preaching and its results he has just reiterated. “For the sake of argument,” he is suggesting, “let’s allow that your position is correct, that there is no resurrection of the dead.” That logically means, he continues, that no one either has risen or ever will rise from the dead, which must further imply that “not even Christ has been raised.” Although this could possibly mean that a general repudiation of the resurrection would thereby render a single instance to be impossible, more likely Paul already has in mind the causal connection to come between Christ’s resurrection and that of believers. That is, to deny the resurrection of the dead is to deny the resurrection of the one who makes any and all resurrections possible. At this point, however, Paul chooses not to refute their position on the basis of what he has just reiterated (vv. 1–11)—that is, since Christ has been raised, as he preached and they believed, there must be a resurrection of the dead. That will come in the next step in the argument (vv. 20–28). Rather, he chooses first to show the further logical consequences of their position, which he takes up in the rest of the paragraph.
14 The preceding hypothetical allowance of their position concluded that if they are right, then he and all the apostles are wrong: Neither has Christ been raised. That apodosis now becomes the hypothetical premise for the rest of the argument. “But if Christ has not been raised, then,” he argues, what was hinted at in the opening sentence (vv. 1–2) has come to pass: literally, “empty [= without basis] [is] our preaching; empty [without basis] also is your believing.” Both his preaching that led to their faith and their faith itself are to no avail. Paul will elaborate the second item, the futility of their faith in terms of its effects, a bit later (vv. 17–19); for now the emphasis lies on the futility or baselessness of his preaching.
It is not certain what Paul intends by “our preaching,” whether he is pointing to the content of the preaching given above (vv. 3–7) and suggesting that it has no foundation whatever if Christ is not raised, or whether he is pointing to the futility of their own preaching as well, since it has no basis in truth. Perhaps here it is a case of both-and, since both are equally true. In either case it comes out at the same point, having the net effect that “their believing is therefore also to no avail” since it is based on preaching that has been divested of its content—if they are right.
15–16 Paul now goes on to elaborate. The logical conclusion of their position (v. 12), with its consequence that Christ is not raised (v. 13), is not only that Paul’s and the other apostles’ preaching (v. 11) is to no avail (v. 14), but that it turns out to be a lie. If the fact itself is untrue, then the testimony to the fact is equally untrue. Even worse, it is a lie carried out in God’s name, so that by implication their denial of the resurrection of the dead finally implicates the very God in whom they have put their trust: “More than that [i.e., what was just said above (v. 14)],” Paul says, “we are also found to be false witnesses about God,” meaning “we have borne witness against God by saying that he raised Christ from the dead, whom God did not raise, if indeed the dead are not raised.” Although it is possible that the genitive “of God” is objective (= we are false witnesses about what God did or did not do), it is also possible that it is possessive (= we are bearing false witness in God’s name, as those sent from God). The causal clause that follows tends to support the former: “because we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead” (= we have accused God falsely of doing something God did not in fact do, if the Corinthians are right). Since for Paul Christ’s resurrection is not his (Christ’s) own doing, but God’s vindication of the work of the Son, that means that a denial of the resurrection of the dead leads ultimately to a denial of the gospel altogether and levels an accusation against the living God, that God did what in fact God did not do—if they are correct.
But more significantly, the final two clauses, “but God did not raise him, if in fact the dead are not raised,” repeat the argument, if not the precise language, of the first concluding sentence (v. 13). This is then further reinforced in the next sentence (v. 16) by yet another, this time almost verbatim, repetition of the earlier proviso (v. 13). By thus bringing the argument back to their position with regard to the resurrection of the dead, Paul seems to be implying that ultimately the false witness against God is to be laid not at the apostles’ feet but at the feet of those who deny the resurrection, thus themselves.
17–18 Just as the preceding sentence (v. 16) repeated the opening sentence (v. 13), so the opening clause in this sentence repeats the hypothetical protasis that followed (“If Christ has not been raised”). The apodosis in this case picks up the last clause from before (“empty is your believing”) in order to elaborate on it. By the change of adjectives with which the clause now begins, Paul emphasizes the utter futility of their own situation if their basic premise is correct. The futility of their “faith” has to do with both the living and the dead.
First, as to themselves (the living), “you are still in your sins.” If Christ has not been raised, there is no longer any possibility of saying, “Such were some of you, but now you are washed, etc.” (6:11). The reason for quoting the creed in full at the outset now comes into sharper focus. The denial of their future, that they are destined for resurrection on the basis of Christ’s resurrection, has the net effect of a denial of their past, that they have received forgiveness of sins on the basis of Christ’s death. As in his later letter to the church in Rome (4:25 and 5:10), the death of Jesus as “for us,” including both justification and sanctification, is inextricably bound together with his resurrection. To deny the one is to deny the other. Thus, as hinted at, at the beginning (v. 2), Paul is urging that their present position with regard to the resurrection means that they cease to be believers altogether. This, of course, is a reductio ad absurdum; since their experience is otherwise, he expects them to read the logic in reverse and admit therefore that there must be a resurrection of the dead.
Second, “Then, also those who have fallen asleep in Christ [i.e., those who were believers when they died (cf. 11:30)] are lost [= perish].” It is crucial to note that this clause is a continuation of the preceding hypothetical alternative to what both he and they believe about Christ’s resurrection (v. 17). The net result of the Corinthian position is that “those who have fallen asleep in Christ,” meaning those who at the time of their death had previously put their hope in Christ have in fact “perished” because, as with the living, they were still in their sins when they died. In saying that they “have perished” Paul means that there is for them no future of any kind; hence the NIV’s “are lost.” Because they would thus have died in their sins, they perish along with the rest of fallen humanity.
Such a conclusion probably stands directly over against that of the Corinthians. Although they have denied that there is a resurrection of the dead, it is unlikely, in light of their baptizing for “the dead” (v. 29), that they also thought there was no future for people who have died. Most likely in their view the believing dead have simply shed their bodies (cf. 6:13) so as to have entered into the final spiritual (heavenly) existence. Not so, says Paul, they have perished; they have no future at all. For if Christ did not rise, which he did not if they are correct, then there is no provision for sins, and believers who have “fallen asleep” have died in their sins. Thus Paul’s point is that to deny the resurrection of the dead is not only to deny one’s past but finally to deny any real future as well. Thus the whole of the Corinthians’ existence, past, present, and future, has come to nothing, if they are correct.
19 This sentence adds a final addendum to the point just made and flows especially from the preceding concluding word. But the precise nuance of the protasis is not easy to determine. Literally it reads, “If for this life in Christ we are those who hoped only.” Does the “only” modify the phrase “for this life” (NIV), or more specifically the verb itself, emphasizing that in this life we have only hoped in Christ but with no real future? More likely it is the former, since “hope” is always a positive term in Paul’s extant letters and the second option makes it somewhat negative. This way of stating it, however, has given some later generations difficulty, since it is often understood to imply that Christian faith is interested only in life in the future, or that somehow the Christian life is a mean existence at best, so there had better be a future reward; otherwise it was terribly unkind of God to exact such payment, promise reward, and then have none to offer.
Paul’s point, however, is considerably different from this and embraces the reality of both preceding sentences (vv. 17 and 18). It is still based on the opening hypothetical protasis (v. 17). By believing in Christ’s death and resurrection, we (meaning both he and they) have placed our trust in Christ to forgive us our sins. But if Christ has not been raised from the dead, that means we not only do not have present forgiveness but have lost our hope for the future as well. And if we have believed in the future when there is no future, then of all human beings we are the most to be pitied—not because Christian existence is interested only in the future, but because the loss of the future means the loss of the past and present as well.
Both this final sentence and the whole argument of this paragraph are especially troublesome to those within the Christian faith who have done what is here only hypothetical for the Corinthians—denied Christ’s resurrection and thus ours as well. There seems to be little hope of getting around Paul’s argument, that to deny Christ’s resurrection is tantamount to a denial of Christian existence altogether. Yet many do so—to make the faith more palatable to “modern man,” we are told. But that will scarcely do. What modernity accepts in its place is no longer the Christian faith, which predicates divine forgiveness through Christ’s death on his resurrection. Nothing else is the Christian faith, and those who reject the actuality of the resurrection of Christ need to face the consequences of such rejection, that they are bearing false witness against the very God they claim to believe in. Like the Corinthians, they will have believed in vain, since the faith is finally predicated on whether or not Paul is right, especially on this issue. It is arrogance of the highest order to think one exists in some continuity with the historic Christian faith when this absolute center core of that faith is brushed aside in the guise of modernity. That, rather, is an abdication of the Christian faith as it has been preserved for us in the NT.
On the other hand, the word for those who accept Christ’s resurrection as reality is a blessed one indeed. It includes not only the forgiveness of sins, and therefore fullness of life in the present, but it also means a glorious future, including a resurrection like Christ’s. Since Christ is indeed raised from the dead, neither our faith nor our preaching is in vain—which is the point Paul will proceed to make next.
20But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. 22For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. 23But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. 24Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. 25For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. 26The last enemy to be destroyed is death. 27For he “has put everything under his feet.” Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. 28When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.
Psalm 8:6
In the preceding paragraph Paul attempted to show the irresponsibility of the Corinthian believers’ arguing that there is no resurrection of the dead by pointing out how this would play out, if they are right, in terms of their own existence. But since all of that was hypothetical, Paul now turns to demonstrate that Christ’s resurrection, which both he and they believe to have happened (vv. 1–11), has made the resurrection of the dead both necessary and inevitable.
In order to understand how this is so, and therefore also the logic of the present argument, one must keep in mind two realities about Paul’s theological outlook: (1) Whatever else, Paul’s thinking is thoroughly eschatological. He understood both the death and resurrection of Christ and the subsequent gift of the Spirit as eschatological realities. That is, he recognized that in those events God had set in motion the events of the End in such a way that they must of divine necessity be brought to consummation. The absolutely crucial matter as the beginning point for this view is the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. In Paul’s Jewish eschatological heritage resurrection belonged to the final events of the End. The fact that the resurrection had already taken place within history meant that the End had been set inexorably in motion; thus for Paul the resurrection of Christ absolutely guaranteed the resurrection of all who are “in Christ.” This is the point he makes in the opening sentences (vv. 20–22), using the metaphor of firstfruits and the Adam-Christ analogy.
(2) As noted above (vv. 4, 15), it is basic to Paul’s view of things that Christ did not on his own rise from the dead, but that God raised him. Therefore, the inevitable chain of events set in motion by Christ’s resurrection has ultimately to do with God’s own absolute authority over all things, especially death. For Paul, Christ’s resurrection and ascension mean that Christ now rules (v. 25); but it is also clear that despite his rule the enemy is still at work, since people still die. Thus for Paul there is a divine necessity to the resurrection of the dead, since that alone is the evidence of the final overthrow of the last enemy, death itself. Christ’s resurrection, therefore, also set in motion the defeat of death, the final form of which is the overpowering—in the form of resurrection—of its stranglehold on humanity. When that occurs, that is, when the final enemy is thus defeated through resurrection, then God’s being “all in all” will have been actualized within the framework of our human history.
This is the point of the rest of the section (vv. 23–28), which is not a digression, as some have suggested, nor an apocalyptic working out of the chronology of resurrection. Rather, these sentences are crucial to the whole argument: Christ’s resurrection demands our resurrection; otherwise death is never defeated and God cannot be “all in all.” Thus the concern is ultimately theological; not just the death of individuals concerns Paul here, but death itself as the final enemy of God and God’s sovereign purposes in the universe. The work of Christ is therefore the key to everything, both the resurrection of believers, set in motion by his own resurrection, and at the same time through that resurrection the consummation of the “saving acts of God,” including the utter defeat of all of God’s enemies.
Thus, in a passage of “epic grandeur,” Paul responds to the Corinthians’ denial of the resurrection of the dead. Their form of “spirituality,” which allows such a denial, stems not only from a false view of the nature of humanity but also from a less than adequate view of God as the sovereign Lord of history.
20 This opening sentence of affirmation picks up the theme of part I of the argument (vv. 1–11), in the language that began part II (v. 12, “Christ has been/is raised from the dead”); at the same time both the content (“the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep”) and the introductory “but, as a matter of fact” make it clear that it stands in contrast to the preceding twice-repeated hypothetical clauses (vv. 14 and 17), especially the latter, to which this sentence stands as the logical response: “If Christ is not raised, as the logical consequence of your present position requires, then the further consequence is disaster for both the living and the dead. Believers are still in their sins and the dead in Christ have perished.” In contrast to that Paul asserts, “But as it is, Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those (mentioned in v. 18) who have fallen asleep.” The point of course is that those who have fallen asleep in Christ (v. 18) will not perish, but are destined for resurrection.
This is the final mention of Christ’s resurrection in the argument, but everything that follows is predicated on it. Paul’s present concern is to demonstrate not only that the resurrection of Christ stands logically against their view that there is no resurrection of the dead (vv. 12–19), but that his resurrection has inherent in it that which makes the resurrection of the believing dead inevitable. He does this first by calling Christ the “firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.” Although this term has a rich OT history, Paul’s interest is not in its biblical overtones, which have to do with consecrating the firstfruits of the harvest to God (cf. Lev. 23:9–14), but in its function as a metaphor for the first of the harvest serving as a kind of guarantee for the full harvest. In his usage, therefore, the metaphor functions similarly to that of the “down payment” or “earnest money” of the Spirit in his next (preserved) letter to them (2 Cor. 1:22 and 5:5; cf. Eph. 1:14); both serve as a present pledge on the part of God for the final eschatological harvest or payment. Thus the Thessalonians (2 Thess. 2:13) and the household of Stephanas (1 Cor. 16:15) are the “firstfruits” in a given geographical area, which means not only that they are the first converts but the first of the larger harvest that was yet to be realized. So too with Christ. He is God’s “firstfruits,” God’s own pledge that there will be a full harvest of those who will be raised from the dead. By calling Christ the “firstfruits,” Paul is asserting by way of metaphor that the resurrection of the believing dead is absolutely inevitable; it has been guaranteed by the eternal God, the living God, who in Christ’s life, death, and resurrection has set that future in motion.
21–22 With these two sentences Paul proceeds to explain further the preceding metaphor and its inherent implication of the inevitability of the resurrection of the believing dead. The two sentences are set forth in perfect double parallelism, the first (v. 21) explaining by way of analogy how God’s raising Christ as “firstfruits” makes the resurrection of the believing dead an inevitable concomitant, the second (v. 22) further elaborating the former (v. 21) so that its point cannot be missed. Thus:
for
(explaining how Christ’s being firstfruits leads inevitably to
the resurrection from
the
dead)
Since
through a man,
death,
also
through a man,
the resurrection of
the
dead;
for
(explaining how so)
Just as in Adam
all die
so also in Christ
all will be made alive.
It must be noted at the outset that the general resurrection of the dead is not Paul’s concern, neither here nor elsewhere in the argument. Both the context and Paul’s theology as a whole make it clear that in saying “in Christ all will be made alive,” he means “in Christ all who are in Christ will be made alive.” The lack of such a qualifier in the sentence itself is the result of both the balanced style and the fact that he expected it to be read in the context of his argument with them, not as a piece of abstract theology. In the present context these two sentences are still part of his response (to vv. 17–19), begun in the preceding sentence. Paul previously referred to “those who have fallen asleep in Christ” (v. 18), making it certain that even that paragraph was concerned only with the resurrection of believers. He begins his next step in the argument (v. 20) by asserting the inevitability of the Corinthians’ own resurrection, based on that of Christ, whom he now calls the “firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (= those mentioned above [v. 18]). The present Adam-Christ analogy is thus a further attempt to show how Christ’s resurrection makes inevitable the resurrection of those who have fallen asleep in Christ.
This is the first use of the Adam-Christ analogy in Paul’s extant letters. He will pick it up again, but in a different way, a bit later (vv. 45–49), as well as in his letter to the believers in Rome (5:12–21). His varied use of this theme suggests that it is a commonplace with Paul, for whom Christ stands at the beginning of the new humanity in a way analogous to, but not identical with, the way Adam stood at the beginning of the old order, both temporally and causally. Paul’s interest here is twofold: (a) in death and the overthrow of death through resurrection—the motif that will dominate the rest of the argument, and (b) in the human mediation of both death and life, and therefore in the genuine humanity of Christ. Whatever the Corinthians may have believed about Christ’s resurrection, it cannot be argued to be of a different order because he was divine. Rather, just as death, so resurrection is through a man. Thus the analogy begins by stating that “death came through a man.” Paul’s point is that death is inevitable because of our sharing in the humanity and sinfulness of the first man, Adam. But believers’ sharing in the resurrection from the dead through the second Man, Christ, who in his resurrection effected the reversal of the process begun in Adam, is equally inevitable. That this is Paul’s intent is made clear by the second set of clauses, which explain how the first set works out in fact. In saying that “all die in Adam,” Paul means that this common lot of our humanity is the result of our being “in Adam,” that is, being born of his race and thereby involved in the sin and death that proceeded from him (cf. Rom. 5:12–14, 18–19). In saying that “in Christ all will be made alive,” Paul means that those who are “in Christ,” those who have entered the new humanity through grace by means of Christ’s death and resurrection, will just as certainly “be made alive”; they will be raised from the dead into the shared life of the risen One. Thus Christ is the firstfruits; he is God’s pledge that all who belong to God will be raised from the dead. The inevitable process of death begun in Adam will be reversed by the equally inevitable process of “bringing to life” that was begun in Christ. Therefore, it is not possible (= permissible) for the Corinthians to say there is no resurrection of the dead. Such a resurrection is necessitated by Christ’s.
23–24 Although the preceding analogy was expressed in terms of Adam and Christ, Paul is less concerned with the outworking of this analogy per se (which he will pick up again in vv. 45–49) than he is with the fact that Christ’s resurrection makes absolutely necessary the resurrection of believers from the dead. What lies behind Paul’s reasoning here is the ongoing reality of death. Through the fall Adam began the process of death (note that emphasis in both of the preceding sentences); that process has now been overturned through the resurrection, which means that by raising Christ from the dead God has in fact triumphed over death for the human race, at least for those who believe. The problem is that despite Christ’s resurrection (= triumph over death), believers still die. Hence they must be raised, (a) because they are “in Christ,” who is already raised, and (b) only so will death, the last enemy, finally be subdued, so that through the work of Christ God will finally be “all in all.” The argument in the rest of this paragraph makes it clear that this is Paul’s real and only concern.
In these two clauses (a single sentence in Greek) he begins by setting forth the “order” of events that lead to “the End.” At that time Christ will do two things: (1) “he [will] hand over the kingdom (reign) to God the Father”; and (2) “he [will] bring to an end all dominion and all authority and power.” As the rest of the argument indicates, these two items logically occur in reverse order (hence the NIV’s “after he has destroyed”). In Paul’s sentence, however, they are coordinate and without a conjunction; most likely he intended them to be in double apposition to “the end.” In this understanding of things the whole sentence, laid out in terms of its related parts, looks like this:
1.
the firstfruits, Christ;
2.
Then
at the Parousia
those who belong to him;
3.
Then the end (= the goal):
A. When he hands over the kingdom to God
B. When he brings to an end all other dominions.
Some have seen this as slightly discursive from the argument in the interest of spelling out a Jewish (now Christian) apocalyptic scheme about the end times; but in fact it is both relevant and crucial to the argument, and has nothing to do with apocalypticism. Paul’s concern is singular: to demonstrate on the basis of Christ’s resurrection the necessity of the resurrection of the dead by tying that event to the final events of the End, particularly the defeat of death (cf. vv. 54–55).
Having asserted that “in Christ all will be made alive,” Paul sets out to explain “but each (event) in his (its) own order.” The first “order” is the one already mentioned (v. 20), that on which the entire argument is predicated—Christ’s resurrection as “firstfruits.” God the Father has thereby set in motion a series of events that have to do with resurrection and the defeat of death. Thus the next event in this scheme happens at the coming of Christ, when God raises from the dead those who are God’s own.
Although the third item is prefaced with another “then,” it is unlikely that Paul intends by this yet another event in the sequence begun by Christ’s resurrection. The “order” of resurrections is only two: Christ the firstfruits; the full harvest of those who are his at his Parousia. Paul shows no interest here in anything beyond these. The “then” in this third instance is sequential to be sure, but in a more logical sense, meaning that following the resurrection of believers at the Parousia the final two “events” transpire. With the resurrection of the dead, the end, or goal, has been reached; an “end” that has two sides to it. On the one hand, the resurrection of the dead will mean that Christ has subjugated, and thereby destroyed, the final enemy death, expressed in this case in the terminology “every dominion” and “every authority and power.” That this destruction of the “powers” refers to the defeat of death is made certain by the supporting argument from Scripture that follows. On the other hand, with the final defeat of the last enemy the subjugation of all things has taken place, so that Christ might turn over the “rule” to God the Father. The rest of the argument spells out how this is so.
25 The argument that begins with this sentence and carries through to the end of the paragraph (v. 28) is Paul’s explanation of the how and why of the two “events” of the End, mentioned at the end of the preceding sentence. The explanation is based on his use (interpretation?) of two passages from the Psalms (110:1 and 8:6 [LXX 8:7]), which have the similar theme of “placing his enemies (subjecting all things) under his feet.” Although the argument gets somewhat complex, primarily because the reader is not always sure of the antecedent of all the pronouns, whether Christ or God, the point of the whole seems plain enough. The one and only God stands as both the source and goal of all that is; and since God has set in motion the final destruction of death, when that occurs, God will be “all in all.” Christ’s role is to bring about this destruction through the resurrection of believers, which is inherently tied to his own. When that occurs, all of God’s enemies will be subjected to Christ, so that in turn he may be made subject to God, who, it turns out, has been the one who subjected all things to Christ in any case.
Paul thus begins by picking up the theme of “Christ’s rule” assumed in the preceding sentence (v. 24). This rule is currently in effect; but at “the end,” when Christ has himself destroyed all the powers, he will “hand over the kingdom to God the Father.” Paul now puts that into biblical perspective. Christ’s rule, which by implication began with his resurrection (or subsequent ascension), must continue until the word of the Psalmist is fulfilled, “until he has put all his enemies under his feet” (Ps. 110:1).
What is not certain is the intended subject of the verb “until he has put.” In favor of “Christ” is (a) the grammar itself, since the natural antecedent is the subject of the preceding “he must reign,” referring to Christ; and (b) the fact that this serves as an explanation of the preceding sentence (v. 24), where Christ is the subject of the clause “when he destroys all dominion, etc.” In favor of “God” is (a) the fact that in the psalm itself God places all things under the Messiah’s feet, and (b) that in the concluding sentence (v. 28) God is finally designated as the subject of the citation from the Psalter (8:6), that is, as the one who has subjected all things to Christ. Almost certainly we must go with the grammar here and see Christ as the subject. Thus, he must reign (as he is now doing by virtue of his being Lord) until he places all his enemies (esp. death, as v. 26 makes clear) under his feet. By subjecting death to himself through the resurrection of the dead, which is causally related to his being the firstfruits, Christ will thus have brought Satan’s tyranny to its conclusion.
As noted elsewhere, Paul’s concern is therefore not with “two reigns,” but with the Messiah’s bringing to completion his work of redemption. The further explanation to follow (vv. 27–28) makes it clear that God ultimately lies behind this final action of the Messiah. The reason for this is that the destruction of death takes place in the raising of the dead itself, an event that occurs because those who are in Christ are in solidarity with him, so that his resurrection becomes the foundation of theirs; and God is the ultimate “cause” of the resurrection, which takes place in two “orders.”
26 The grammar of this sentence is somewhat puzzling; nonetheless, its point is certain. This is Paul’s own interpretation of the “last enemy” that must be put under the reigning Messiah’s feet, death itself, and thus is the reason for this entire explanation in the first place. The sentence literally reads, “The last enemy is being destroyed, namely death.” The difficulty lies with the present tense and passive voice of the verb, plus the fact that no conjunction or particle joins it to what has preceded. It has been suggested that it serves as the apodosis of the preceding two “when” clauses (v. 24), with “the end” being understood adverbially (= “at the end”) and with the explanatory clause that follows (v. 25) as a parenthesis explaining the two preceding clauses. Thus: “Then at the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, when he has destroyed all dominion, authority, and power (for he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet), the last enemy is being destroyed, death itself.” Attractive as this suggestion is as a way out of the grammatical difficulty, the reading of the preceding sentence as a parenthesis, when the content of the present one is dependent on it, seems to nullify it as a truly viable option.
Nonetheless, this view is probably on the right track in terms of understanding Paul’s intent. The asyndeton (lack of conjunction) gives the sentence a “strong and decisive prominence” between the two scriptural adaptations. The present passive is best understood as referring to what takes place at the time when “the end will come” (v. 24); that is, it refers to Christ’s destroying “every dominion, authority and power.” In a sense death, the final enemy to be subdued, is already being destroyed through the resurrection of Christ; but Paul’s concern here is with its final destruction, which takes place when Christ’s own resurrection as firstfruits culminates in the full harvest of the resurrection of those who are his. Death is the final enemy. At its destruction true meaningfulness is given to life itself. As long as people die, God’s own sovereign purposes are not yet fully realized. Hence the necessity of the resurrection—so as to destroy death by “robbing” it of its store of those who do not belong to it because they belong to Christ! This is precisely the point made again at the end of the argument (vv. 53–57).
27 With these sentences and the next (v. 28) Paul proceeds, on the basis of Psalm 8, to show how it is that God is ultimately responsible for this whole chain that began with Christ’s resurrection and culminates in the destruction of death through the resurrection of believers. The first sentence begins with an explanatory “for,” referring to what has preceded (vv. 25–26), and an adaptation of the psalm: “He has subjected all things under his feet” (8:6). But it is again not at all certain either who is the intended subject (Christ or God) or how this past tense further explains the preceding sentences. There are two options.
First, it is possible that this is simply a further reiteration of the point of those sentences, with Christ as the subject and the past tense retained from the psalm but explained in the following clause to refer only to the Eschaton. This would ordinarily be the natural reading of the subject of the verb. The case for this view is especially strengthened by the introduction of the next clause with the same conjunction used above (vv. 24 and 28). Thus Christ is also the subject of the next verb, which should then be translated, “Whenever he shall have said, ‘All things have been subjected.’ ” The two sets of clauses then look like this:
27
(a)
For “he (Christ) has subjected all things under his feet.”
but
(b)
Whenever he (Christ) shall have said:
“All things have been subjected” [referring to v. 25]
(c)
(of course excepting Him who subjected to him all things),
28
but
(a)
Whenever all things shall have been subjected to him,
(b)
then even the Son himself shall be subjected
to Him who subjected to him all things,
(c)
so that God might be all in all.
The difficulty for this view lies with the third clause (v. 27c), which must be understood as something of an awkward parenthesis that anticipates the “then” clause that follows (v. 28b), while the preceding “whenever” clause (v. 28a) functions as the resumption of the preceding one (v. 27b).
Second, it is possible that this “citation” of the psalm, including the retaining of its past tense, is now moving on to the point that will be made explicit at the end, that ultimately it is God the Father who has subjected all things to Christ. In this view the two sets of explanatory clauses (vv. 25–26 and 27–28), the first actually beginning with a “for,” respectively serve as the scriptural explanation for the two “whenever” clauses that have preceded (v. 24): the first set (vv. 25–26) thus explains “when he destroys all dominion, authority and power” (v. 24c) in terms of Ps. 110:1; and the second set (vv. 27–28) explains “when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father” (v. 24b) in terms of Ps. 8:6. Thus, when death is finally destroyed (vv. 25–26), the way is paved for the final “handing over of the kingdom to God the Father” (vv. 27–28). In this view God is the subject of the verb in the scriptural citation with which it begins (v. 27), which is then explained in the succeeding clause (= “when it [Scripture] says”), to which the final clause then serves as the apodosis. Thus:
27
(a)
For “he (God) has subjected all things under his (Christ’s) feet.”
Now
(b)
When it (Scripture) says:
“All things have been subjected”
(c)
it is clear that “all things” excludes the One who did the
subjecting to him.
28
But
(a)
Whenever it shall be that all things are subjected to him,
(b)
then even the Son will be
subjected to the One who
subjects all things to him,
(c)
so that God might be all in all.
It is difficult to choose between these two options. The first is especially attractive, since (1) it keeps the flow of thought with what has preceded (vv. 25–26), and (2) it gives the conjunction “for” (v. 27b) its natural meaning in this context. Nonetheless, the difficulty in finding an adequate reason for the last clause (v. 27c) in this sentence (one is naturally suspicious of solutions that require parentheses), and the fact that the rest of these two sentences after the quotation seems to be an interpretation of Ps. 8:6, tend to make one lean in the direction of the second option.
If so, then the explanation begins by commenting on the text of the psalm itself. The key for Paul lies in the fact that an external subject is responsible for the act of subjecting all things to Christ. Thus, “When it says that ‘everything has been subjected,’ it is clear that ‘everything’ excludes the one (i.e., God) who did the subjecting to him (i.e., Christ).” As the next verse makes clear, this has to be explained because in Paul’s view a twofold act of subjecting is going on in the raising of the dead. On the one hand, death itself will thereby finally have been subjected to Christ (v. 24c); on the other hand, with that final subduing of death the time of Christ’s reign comes to its end, so that he may hand over the “rule” to the Father (v. 24b), who thus becomes “all in all” (v. 28).
28 This final sentence in the argument ties together all that has preceded. First, it serves as a further elaboration of Paul’s interpretation of the psalm; second, it further explicates the earlier twin clauses (v. 24), which state that at the end Christ will hand the kingdom over to God the Father, having subdued all the “powers.” Although it is not specifically so stated here, these concluding clauses therefore also serve as the culminating word on the necessity of the resurrection of the dead. Paul’s point is that in raising Christ from the dead God has set in motion a chain of events that must culminate in the final destruction of death and thus in God’s being once again, as in eternity past, “all in all.”
The first clause thus repeats the point regarding Christ’s role at the Eschaton made above (in the final clause of v. 24), but now in the language of the psalm. “When all things have been subjected (by God, is implied) to him” is thus the new way of saying, “when he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power.” By means of the psalm Paul is pointing out that God is responsible for that subjection through Christ. As what has preceded (vv. 20–22 and 26) makes certain, “all things” here refers especially to death.
The second clause likewise repeats the first clause of the preceding passage (v. 24), also through the language of the psalm. “Then the Son himself is subjected to the One (= God) who subjected all things (death) to him (= the Son)” is the new way of saying, “when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father.” This is made clear by the final purpose clause, “so that God may be all in all.” The last words “all in all” are a Pauline idiosyncrasy and must be understood in light of what he affirms at the end (vv. 54–57) or a later passage in Romans (11:36). In any case, as Barrett noted, they are to be understood soteriologically, not metaphysically. Most likely Paul here intends that at the time of the resurrection of the dead, when through Christ the final enemy of the redeemed has been subdued, the will of the one and only God will be supreme in every quarter and in every way. In Paul’s view this consummation of redemption includes the whole sphere of creation as well (cf. Rom. 8:19–22; Col. 1:15–20). Nothing lies outside God’s redemptive purposes in Christ, in whom all things finally will be “united” (Eph. 1:9–10). Therefore, at the death of death the final rupture in the universe will be healed and God alone will rule over all beings, banishing those who have rejected the divine offer of life and lovingly governing all those who by grace have entered into God’s “rest.”
As in two earlier passages (3:22–23 and 11:3), the language of the subordination of the Son to the Father is functional, referring to the Son’s “work” of redemption, not ontological, referring to Christ’s being as such. The unity of the one and only God lies behind all such language.
This is one of the great passages in the NT, not only in terms of Paul’s own argumentation, but especially in terms of the true significance of Easter. It is therefore unfortunate that at times this powerful demonstration of the certainty of our own resurrection is overlooked in favor of an apologetic of trying to prove the resurrection to unbelievers. First of all, that is not what Paul is trying to do. What he has going for him is the common ground of his and the Corinthian believers’ belief in the resurrection of Christ. There is a place for apologetics, that is, the defense of Christianity to the unconverted; but Easter is not that place. Easter, which should be celebrated more frequently in the church and not just at the Easter season, calls for our reaffirming the faith to the converted. The resurrection of Christ has determined our existence for all time and eternity. We do not merely live out our length of days and then have the hope of resurrection as an addendum; rather, as Paul makes plain in this passage, Christ’s resurrection has set in motion a chain of inexorable events that absolutely determines our present and our future. Christ is the firstfruits of those who are his, who will be raised at his coming. That ought both to reform the way we currently live and to reshape our worship into seasons of unbridled rejoicing—and that serves as apologetic enough!
29Now if there is no resurrection, what will those do who are baptized for the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized for them? 30And as for us, why do we endanger ourselves every hour? 31I face death every day—yes, just as surely as I boast about you in Christ Jesus our Lord. 32If I fought wild beasts in Ephesus with no more than human hopes, what have I gained? If the dead are not raised,
“Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”
33Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.” 34Come back to your senses as you ought, and stop sinning; for there are some who are ignorant of God—I say this to your shame.
Isaiah 22:13
From the Greek poet Menander
This paragraph makes it clear that the issue of the Corinthians’ denying the future resurrection of believers is no small matter. Paul has just rung the changes on a powerful and (given their common faith in Christ’s resurrection) conclusive theological argument for both the inevitability and the necessity of the resurrection of believers who have died. Nonetheless, with this paragraph he comes at the issue yet again, this time with very little in the way of theology. It is altogether ad hominem. As usual in such arguments (cf. 14:36–38), Paul proceeds by way of rhetorical questions, to which he appends his own rhetorical responses before turning to exhortation. The actions of some of them (v. 29), not to mention of himself (vv. 30–32), border on absurdity if the dead are not raised. But even more important, he concludes with an exhortation to righteous living (vv. 33–34), which strongly implies that there are some close ties between this particular issue and the aberrant behavior he has been attacking throughout the letter.
Thus the paragraph is in three parts, signaled by three (or four) changes in personal pronouns (isolated in bold). The first two parts are rhetoric and conclude on the identical note from before (vv. 12–19), “if the dead are not raised” (isolated in italics), while the third is a series of three imperatives, each part flowing out of the former. Thus (somewhat literally):
I.
Otherwise (if vv. 20–28 are not true),
What will they do, those who are being baptized for the dead?
If the dead are not raised at all,
why indeed
are they being baptized for them?
II.
Why indeed do we ourselves
face danger every hour?
I die every day
—indeed by my
“boasting” in you,
which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord—
If I fought “wild beasts” in Ephesus,
for no more than human hopes,
What have I gained?
If the dead are not raised,
Let us
eat and drink,
for we die tomorrow.
III.
[You]
stop being misled:
“Bad company corrupts good character.”
[You]
come back to your senses as you ought;
[You]
stop sinning; for there are some who are ignorant of God—
I say this to your shame.
By reason of their personal nature, ad hominem arguments are usually ad hoc to a very high degree. The result is that Paul mentions activities in both cases (I and II) that are especially difficult to decipher in terms of specifics. So much is this so that at least forty different solutions have been suggested for the first item (baptism for the dead). One may consider it as axiomatic that when there is such a wide divergence of opinion, no one knows what in fact was going on. The best one can do in terms of particulars is point out what appear to be the more viable options, but finally admit to ignorance. What is certain is how the text functions in the argument. Whatever it was that some of them were doing, those actions are a contradiction to the position that there is no resurrection of the dead (v. 12).
29 This rhetoric follows naturally, although not necessarily logically, from the preceding argument in which Paul pressed for the necessity of the resurrection, given the fact of Christ’s resurrection and its having set in motion the final defeat of death. “Otherwise,” he now urges, implying that if what has been argued is not true, then (lit.) “what will they do, those who are being baptized (or are having themselves baptized) for the dead?” In typical fashion, and to make certain that his point is clear, he repeats the question, once again using the language of their assertion: “If the dead are not actually raised, why at all are they being baptized for them?”
The normal reading of what Paul wrote is that some Corinthians were being baptized, apparently vicariously, in behalf of some people who have already died. It would be fair to add that this reading is such a plain understanding of the Greek text that no one would ever have imagined the various alternatives were it not for the difficulties involved, both historical and theological. The problem is twofold: (1) There is no historical or biblical precedent for such baptism. The NT is otherwise completely silent about it; there is no known practice in any of the other churches nor in any orthodox Christian community in the centuries that immediately follow; nor are there parallels or precedents in pagan religion. This is a genuinely idiosyncratic historical phenomenon. For that reason, if in fact some were actually practicing such a baptism, we are left quite in the dark on all the essential questions: (a) Who was being baptized? (b) For whom? (c) Why were they doing it? and (d) What effects did they think it had for those for whom it was being done? It is quite impossible to give a definitive answer to any of these.
(2) The second problem is theological and has to do with how Paul can appeal, without apparent disapproval, to a practice that stands in such contradiction to his own understanding both of justification by grace through faith, which always implies response on the part of the believer, and of baptism as personal response to grace received. This smacks of a “magical” view of sacramentalism of the worst kind, where a religious rite, performed for someone else, can have saving efficacy. That lies quite outside the entire NT view of things.
This combination of difficulties has led to a variety of alternative solutions, which at best are difficult to categorize, but which for the most part have in common the attempt to find an alternative meaning to the plain sense of one or more of the words (either “baptized,” “for,” or “the dead”).
(1) One option is to understand “baptize” metaphorically in light of a Jesus logion preserved in two gospels (Mark 10:38; Luke 12:50). Either (a) some were “being baptized into the ranks of the dead” by martyrdom, or (b) the apostles “were being destroyed by their labors on behalf of the dead (i.e., those who are lost).”
(2) Others take “baptized” as referring to Christian baptism but give the preposition “for” different shades of meaning; sometimes these views suggest special meanings for “the dead” as well. These run the gamut: (a) that they are being baptized “over” the graves of the dead; (b) that they are being baptized “with death before their eyes” as it were; (c) that it means “with a view toward,” suggesting that the departed are Christians and those being baptized are new converts who are being baptized with a view toward their being reunited with their departed loved ones; (d) that it means “concerning,” or “with reference to,” having to do with the symbolic meaning of baptism, that it is in reference to death, burial, and resurrection; (e) that the prepositional phrase goes with the verb “do,” not “baptized,” and should read, “What will the baptized do in behalf of the dead (in the future, given that they do not believe in resurrection)?”
(3) Another set of solutions attempts to find a meaning for “the dead” that will be more compatible with Pauline theology. These include: (a) that “the dead” refers to the “(soon to be) dead bodies” of the Christians themselves, and that they were being baptized for the sake of that part of them that was dying and about to become a corpse; and (b) that “the dead” refers to those among whom Christ was named, hence “What shall they do who have sworn allegiance to one who on their showing must be numbered among the dead?”
(4) Finally, some have offered alternative punctuation: either (a) “In that case, what are the baptized to do? (It is) for the dead (= merely in death), if there is no resurrection of the dead at all. Why then are they baptized for them (= and whatever is the use of that?)”; or (b) “Otherwise what shall they do who are baptized for the dead? (i.e., are they baptized to belong to, to be numbered among the dead, who are never to rise again)? Indeed, if the dead do not rise again, why are people baptized? For them? that is, are they baptized to be numbered among the dead who are never to rise again?”
Partly because of this very plethora of options, none of which is compelling as a natural reading of the text, the majority of scholars think that Paul is referring to some form of vicarious baptism. But again, there is no unanimity as to what “form” this may have taken. Some things, however, seem to be necessary prerequisites. First, as already noted (), this unusual use of the third person plural, when elsewhere Paul always turns such references into a word to the community as a whole (e.g., vv. 12–13, 35–36), suggests that it is not the action of the whole community. On the other hand, there is no reason to deny that it was happening with the full knowledge of the community and probably with their approval. Second, Paul’s apparently noncommittal attitude toward it, while not implying approval, would seem to suggest that he did not consider it to be as serious a fault as most interpreters do. On the other hand, it is difficult to imagine any circumstances under which Paul would think it permissible for living Christians to be baptized for the sake of unbelievers in general. Such a view, adopted in part by the Mormons, lies totally outside the NT understanding both of salvation and of baptism. Therefore, the most likely options are (a) that it reflects some believers’ being baptized for others who either were or were on their way to becoming believers when they died (e.g., as in 11:30), but had never been baptized; or (b) that it reflects the concern of members of households for some of their own number who had died before becoming believers.
What they may have expected to gain from it is not quite clear, but one may guess that at least they believed baptism to be necessary for entering the final eschatological kingdom. In any case, and everything must be understood as tentative, this probably reflects the Corinthian attitude toward baptism in general, since earlier passages (1:13–17; 10:1–22) imply a rather strongly sacramental stance toward baptism on their part, with some apparently magical implications. Perhaps they believed that along with the gift of the Spirit baptism was their “magical” point of entrance into the new pneumatism that seems to have characterized them at every turn. If so, then perhaps some of them were being baptized for others because they saw it as a way of offering similar spirituality to the departed. But finally we must admit that we simply do not know.
In any case, whatever they were doing and for whatever reason, Paul saw it as a clear contradiction to the present stance of the community at large that “there is no resurrection of the dead.” If so, Paul argues, then this other action by some of their number is the highest expression of absurdity. From his point of view, Christ’s resurrection makes any other form of spiritual existence beyond the grave a non sequitur.
30 While on this kind of tack, Paul reverts to another question that lies behind so much of this letter—their view of his apostleship vis-à-vis his own—which he will now defend in a most circuitous way. As noted throughout, the Corinthians oppose Paul’s point of view in so many things because they stand in opposition to him. Their opposition is based in part on conflicting views of what it means to be pneumatikos, which had inherent in it their taking a less than enthusiatic view of his weaknesses and sufferings as an apostle. What Paul seems to do in this concluding set of sentences is to capitalize on his weaknesses once more (cf. 2:1–5; 4:10–13; 15:9–10), this final time, however, agreeing that if they are right on the one count (there is no resurrection), then they are surely also right on the other (his apostleship is of no profit whatsoever). But of course they are not right on the former (vv. 20–28), and his apostleship has to do with their being his “boast” in Christ Jesus.
The new train of thought thus proceeds in the style of the final sentence in the preceding verse: “Why indeed do we ourselves face mortal danger every hour?” This question serves as a significant comment on Paul’s view of his own life. As he will detail on more than one occasion, his apostolic ministry was a constant round of hardship and danger of all kinds. The emphasis here is on its continual (= “every hour”) dangers (cf. 2 Cor. 11:26), for which the next two verses serve as commentary. His point, of course, is that he is indeed crazy to put his life in constant jeopardy for the sake of others, if neither he nor they have hope in the resurrection. But even more, he now also indicates the absolutely central and crucial place that Christ’s resurrection played in his life. One must remember throughout that to deny the resurrection of the dead meant to deny the resurrection of Christ (vv. 12–19), which meant for Paul the denial of Christian life altogether. Thus everything Christians do as Christians—and especially the labors of an apostle—are an absurdity if there is no resurrection.
31 Paul’s concern could have been established by his simply adding his final sentence (v. 32b) at this point. Instead, for their sake he elaborates on the continual dangers mentioned in the opening sentence: “Daily I die.” Taken as an elaboration of the preceding question (v. 30), this means something like “On a daily basis I face the reality of death.” Although one cannot be sure as to what this refers specifically, there are several hints in this letter and in his next preserved letter to this church that his stay in Ephesus was anything but an Aegean holiday. In the next sentence he refers to “fighting wild beasts in Ephesus”; toward the end (16:9) he notes that even though a great door was open for ministry, many stood in opposition to him. Then, sometime later when writing his next (preserved) letter to them (our 2 Corinthians) shortly after leaving Ephesus, he thanks God for having been delivered from a deadly peril in which he had actually despaired of his life (2 Cor. 1:8–11), while the rest of the letter is a litany of hardships and sufferings that seem too fresh in mind to be simply general catalogues. One wonders at moments like these what a different picture of both the apostle and the early church we might have received if Paul had kept a journal of his stay in Ephesus!
What follows comes as something of a surprise. It is a kind of oath, the first word serving as the affirming particle (= “I swear by”), and the next words serving as that by which one swears. Literally it reads “I swear by your boasting,” which he quickly qualifies as “(boasting) which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The NIV’s “I glory over you” translates the possessive adjective “your” plus the noun for the act of “boasting.” Although grammatically this could refer to their boasting in him, that fits neither the immediate context (esp. the following qualifying phrase) nor the context of the letter as a whole. Rather, the possessive is here objective and refers to Paul’s “boast” in the Corinthians as believers, a “boast” that probably does not so much refer to his telling others about the Corinthians as to their very existence as the result of his apostolic labors (cf. 9:2, 15–16).
What a telling oath this is. To make sure that they understand the truth of his constant facing of death, he swears by that which is dearest to him, their own existence in Christ, which also came about by labors that had exposed him to such dangers. That seems also to be the point of the qualifying addition, “which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The boast is his, but it is not self-serving nor self-exalting. It rests completely on what Christ had done among them through his labors (cf. vv. 9–10). Thus they are his boast; but for Paul that ultimately means boasting in Christ.
32 Paul’s opening sentence further elaborates the preceding rhetoric (vv. 30–31) by way of a specific instance; the second sentence ties it all back into the argument with the same form of conditional clause with which the present paragraphs began (v. 29). The fighting “with wild beasts in Ephesus” must be understood metaphorically, not only because Paul otherwise lived to tell about it, but because (a) such a metaphor was a common phenomenon in the moralistic literature of Hellenism, and (b) his Roman citizenship should have excluded him from what would have meant certain death if it were a literal fight in the arena. But the metaphor is not a word about his struggle with opponents in general; rather, he specifies that it was with “wild beasts” in Ephesus. Since he is in Ephesus at the time of writing, and since a few paragraphs later (16:9) he refers to many who oppose him there, this is probably a reference to that struggle. The language of the preceding sentence (v. 31) would suggest that it was not simply an ideological struggle but, as often in his life, one that had exposed him to severe physical dangers as well. Beyond that, one would only be speculating.
With this understanding of the metaphor, the much-debated prepositional phrase “according to man” is also easily decided. Its meaning is not “for merely human reasons” (original NIV), but exactly as early on (3:3), where Paul, in contrast to their boasting of being truly “in Spirit,” accuses the Corinthians of acting “according to man,” that is, as “mere human beings” who do not have the Spirit of God. Here he means that if there is no hope in the resurrection, then his life-or-death struggle against the opponents of his gospel is carried on at the merely human level—he is nothing more than a “mere man” among other “mere humans,” with nothing better than merely “human hopes.” His point of course is: What sense does it make to live like this if we live only at the merely human level as others who have no hope for the future?
The concluding apodosis, “what have I gained?” is often seen as Paul’s reflecting on his own personal life. While there is a degree of truth to that, more likely he is once again putting his ministry, and in that sense his personal life, into perspective. No resurrection means he has played the fool with his life; all of his labor has been in vain after all. This comes very close to the point made twice earlier (vv. 9–10 and 14–15), that their existence as believers is predicated on his ministry, which had the resurrection of Christ as its heart and soul. Thus, without the resurrection his earthly struggle is without meaning; he has gained nothing, not only now but in the life to come, and not only for himself but for all those who have come to Christ as a result of that struggle.
To cap the argument Paul once more repeats the protasis against which this entire argument struggles, namely the Corinthian position, literally “if the dead are not raised,” meaning as the NIV has it, “if there is no resurrection,” i.e., “of believers.” The apodosis in this case offers the logical conclusion as to the direction in which one’s life ought to go, in contrast to the daily struggles, even to the point of facing death, that characterize his own life. If there is no resurrection, then instead of “fighting wild beasts in Ephesus,” one may as well go the route of despair—and dissolution—and “eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” This word is one of those happy ambivalences in Paul that point simultaneously in two directions. On the one hand, this is a verbatim citation of a passage in Isaiah (22:13) and is surely intended as the logical alternative to his own kind of “daily dying.” If there is no resurrection, he has argued, such a “death-facing” life is without gain. One may as well go the way of despair and eat and drink, for “tomorrow” we die anyway. To be without hope in the resurrection makes life in the present a constant round of nothing.
On the other hand, this citation from Isaiah (22:13) also reflects contemporary anti-Epicurean sentiments, which (not altogether fairly) believed the Epicureans taught this very philosophy. In Plutarch’s anti-Epicurean writings, for example, the language of “eating and drinking” was a formula for the dissolute life. Since Paul immediately follows this quotation with a series of imperatives that call the Corinthians from the errors of their ways to a “sober” life in Christ in which they “stop sinning,” these words of despair also serve as transition to what follows. The Corinthians, aware of his own apostolic struggles on the one hand, and their own less-than-disciplined lifestyle on the other, would have to be in a true stupor (cf. v. 34) not to catch his point and see the application.
33 In typical diatribe style, the argumentum ad absurdum turns truly ad hominem, and becomes a word of exhortation for the Corinthians to mend their ways. When one considers that the point of the whole argument is to get them to change their views as to the resurrection of the dead, it is difficult not to see in these words a direct connection between much of the behavior being corrected by this letter and this denial of theirs. Paul’s concern is a simple one: They are to adopt the kind of behavior that should be expected of those for whom the future is both “already” and “not yet,” who have been “washed from their sins” through Christ Jesus (cf. 6:11; 15:3) and who yet await the final destruction of death (vv. 24–28). They are to live as people who not only have a past in Christ, but a future as well.
This opening exhortation, therefore, repeats the imperative used much earlier (6:9; cf. 3:18): “Stop deceiving yourselves” (or “allowing yourselves to be misled”). Their present path is one of delusion, both in terms of their theology and its consequent behavior. In this case the delusion is spelled out in the language of an epigram from Menander’s Thais, “Bad company corrupts good character,” which comes into the argument as something of a jolt. On the one hand, as countless generations in every culture and clime have experienced, this epigram is independently true and carries much the same effect as the more Jewish proverb Paul cited earlier (5:6). Keeping company with evil companions can have a corrosive influence on one’s own attitudes and behavior. But why that word here, in the middle of an argument against their denial of the resurrection of the dead?
It may be that this is simply a matter of style, that in keeping with the diatribe Paul is merely generalizing about their own behavioral patterns. But more likely this is a very direct word to their present situation. Since the word translated “company” can mean either “companionship” or “conversation,” one wonders whether the emphasis here is more on the “company” of “evil conversation” that denies the resurrection, than on simply associating with people who so deny. In that case, it would mean here something like, “Evil conversations such as those that deny the resurrection of the dead can only have a corrupting effect on your good character.” Otherwise, he would seem to be pointing to the “some” who are denying the resurrection (v. 12). By implication, they should thus dissociate from them.
34 The concluding two imperatives suggest that the “evil company” is in fact their denial of the resurrection, which undoubtedly had a role in the corrosion of their Christian behavior. Thus he exhorts them to “Sober up as you ought and stop sinning.” The verb “sober up” may be a metaphor either for to awake from sleep or to be aroused from a drunken stupor. One cannot be sure which Paul has in mind here, although both the context (“let us eat and drink”) and the compounded form of the verb suggest that it is the latter. In any case, it is a telling metaphor, which the NIV’s contemporary English idiom “come back to your senses” nicely captures regarding their present state of delusion, in which they both deny the resurrection of believers and thus behave as if there were no future to the kingdom of God. Therefore, coming to their senses means they must “stop sinning.” This prohibition expressed in the Greek present tense implies the cessation of action already going on; and apparently it is not the action of one or a few. The letter is replete with examples of sinning to which this could refer.
What is less clear is the final reason of this double-sided exhortation, “for (lit.) ignorance of God some have.” It is possible that this is a word that points outward, to those outside their community who do not know God and, given the present theological delusion and behavioral aberrations of this Christian community, are not likely to. Nonetheless, in the present context this is almost certainly a word of irony, the ultimate “put-down” of those responsible for taking this church down its present disastrous course. Those who are leading others into a new understanding of pneuma, sophia, and gnōsis (Spirit, wisdom, and knowledge) are here said to be as the pagan world that surrounds them, people who are altogether “ignorant of God.” Most likely this is to be understood in light of the preceding paragraph (vv. 20–28), that those who deny the resurrection ultimately live in ignorance of the one and only God, who through Christ’s resurrection has set in motion that chain of events which leads to his finally being all in all. It is also possible, however, since the clause functions as the explanation of “stop sinning,” that Paul intends a much broader perspective (e.g., as in 8:2–3, where their lack of love also exhibits failure to know God). In any case, he now says this “to their shame,” probably in much the same way as in the first occurrence of this clause in the letter (6:5), where his argument itself is an attempt to “shame” them into a change of thinking and behavior.
Thus the present long argument that began way back (v. 12) comes to a conclusion on this very strong hortatory word. The inevitable conclusion of the Corinthians’ position means both the end of their existence as believers (vv. 14, 17) and hopelessness for the dead (v. 18); it also means that the activities of some of them and especially of his own apostolic labors are living contradictions. Thus they need to come to their senses, as he will urge again at the conclusion of the letter (16:13). But before that conclusion he must bring the present matter to its full conclusion, by addressing the issue of what the resurrection means in relationship to our present bodily existence.
Probably because most people have had such a difficult time knowing what to do with the question with which this paragraph began (v. 29), there has been a strange silence in the church with regard to this paragraph. Yet it stands as one of the more significant texts pointing to a genuine relationship between what one believes about the future and how one behaves in the present (cf. 2 Pet. 2–3). This is not to say that the future is the only motivation for correct behavior, but it is to plead that it is a proper one because it ultimately has to do with the nature and character of God. Those who have put their trust in Christ should be living in this world as people whose confidence in the final vindication of Christ through our own resurrection determines the present. On this matter see also on an earlier passage (7:29–31). It is a matter of sober historical record that slippage at this key point of Christian theology is very often accompanied by a relaxed attitude toward the Christian ethic. It is no wonder that the world fails so often to “hear” our gospel, which must look at times like anything but the good news it really is—that Christ delivers people from the bondage of sin and guarantees their future with him in a life where neither sin nor death will have a foothold.
Paul’s concern to this point has been to refute those in the believing community in Corinth who were denying the resurrection of the dead; he has done so by urging its absolute necessity if there is to be any Christian faith at all. Otherwise, everything is up for grabs—Christ’s death as a saving event, forgiveness of sins, hope for the future, Christian ethics, the integrity of the one and only God—if there is no resurrection. But almost certainly lurking behind that denial is a view of the material order that found the resurrection of material bodies (or dead corpses) to be a doctrine most foul. Thus Paul next proceeds to address that issue.
The turn in the argument is signaled both by the two questions that begin this section (v. 35) and by the decided shift in language. The word nekros (“dead”) has appeared eleven times up to this point in the argument (vv. 1–34), six in the phrase “if the dead are not raised.” That word occurs only three times in the present section (vv. 35, 42, 52)—at key points where the two sections are tied together. The word that now dominates is sōma (“body”), which occurs ten times here but not once in the preceding section. Nonetheless, these are related ideas. “The dead” refers not simply to people who have died, but also to their dead bodies that have been laid in the grave. This is made clear by three pieces of evidence: (a) In the opening set of questions, the second is best understood as specifying the first; thus: “How are the dead raised?” that is, “With what kind of body will they come?” (b) The significant verb “is raised” occurs in both sections, earlier to speak of the raising of the dead, now to speak of the raising of bodies. (c) The final occurrence of “the dead will be raised” (v. 52) is now qualified by the word “imperishable,” the key word in what immediately preceded (vv. 42–49), which responds to the opening questions of how and with what kind of body.
All of this suggests that the real concern behind their denial of the resurrection of the dead was an implicit understanding that this meant the reanimation of dead bodies, the resuscitation of corpses. Paul’s response in turn is driven by two concerns. First, for him denial of a resurrection of the dead meant the denial of any genuine continuity between the present and the future. The point of continuity lay with the body; therefore there must be a resurrection of the body. Second, and even more importantly, the reality of the resurrection of Christ absolutely dominated his thinking at every turn. Since Christ was raised bodily—he was buried, raised, and seen— there must of necessity be a bodily resurrection of believers. Nonetheless, Paul was equally convinced that Christ’s resurrection was not the resuscitation of a corpse, but the transformation of his physical body into a “glorified body” (Phil. 3:21) adapted to his present heavenly existence. It is this reality that ultimately controls the present argument. Thus, the long debate over whether the stress lies on continuity or discontinuity seems a bit misguided. Paul’s concern obviously lies with both; however, it is far better to speak of continuity and transformation. Thus his way of framing the present question is, “With what kind of body will they [appear]?” The answer: as with Christ, it will be the same yet not the same; this body, but adapted to the new conditions of heavenly existence; sown one way, it is raised another, but the same body is what is sown and raised.
The argument, which shows continuous development in its line of thought, is in three parts, enclosed by the presenting question (v. 35) and the final exhortation (v. 58). In part I (vv. 36–44) Paul prepares the way for the idea of a “spiritual” (= heavenly, or glorified) body through two sets of analogies: seeds and kinds of bodies. The analogies are intended to take them from the known to the unknown. That of the seeds (vv. 36–38) illustrates both the genuine continuity of the future body with the present one and the reality of its transformation, in which a “body” for each mode of existence is given by God; that of the differing kinds of “bodies” (vv. 39–41) further illustrates the latter point, that bodies differ and have a different “glory.” The two analogies are then applied to the resurrection of the dead (vv. 42–44), the key word for the new body being “imperishable.”
Part II (vv. 45–49) further illustrates the two themes of “bodies sown one way but raised another” and “the transformed body adapted to its new conditions” by picking up the earlier Adam-Christ analogy (vv. 21–22). Just as believers have shared the earthly body of the first man, so also will they bear the heavenly body of the second man. This of course is the key to everything. The ultimate reason for Paul’s faith lies with the resurrection of Christ and the fact that he was thus raised in incorruption, glory, and power. The continuity existed because the One who had been crucified was also seen, visibly and corporeally, after his resurrection; but Christ’s current heavenly existence also meant for Paul that there was obvious transformation. So with ourselves, he argues. We do and shall bear the likeness of both Adam and Christ.
The argument is brought to a resounding climax in part III (vv. 50–57), where Paul argues for the absolute necessity of transformation in order for believers to enter their heavenly existence. Quite in contrast to those who think Paul’s major point in the argument is that believers must die in order to be raised, his concern in fact is that transformation must take place in order for believers, whether dead or alive, to enter into heavenly existence: “This corruptible must be clothed with incorruptibility.” Thus, whatever the Corinthians may think about their present spirituality, it is not the heavenly existence that is to be. Moreover, when the transformation does take place, then the point of the argument made earlier on (vv. 24–28) is realized—death is not only defeated, it is swallowed up in victory!
This section, therefore, is absolutely crucial to the argument of this entire passage (from 15:1), since it responds to the real issue that led to their denial of the resurrection. At the same time, it is crucial to the entire letter. The key issue has to do with being pneumatikos (“people of the Spirit”). The Corinthians were apparently convinced that, by the gift of the Spirit, and especially the manifestation of tongues, they had already entered into the spiritual, “heavenly” existence that is to be. Only the body, to be sloughed off at death, lies between them and their ultimate spirituality. Thus they have tended to deny the body in the present, and have no use for it in the future. Not so, says Paul. As with Christ, so with us. This corruptible must put on incorruption; only then does the End come. At stake is the biblical doctrine of creation. According to Scripture, God created the material order and pronounced it good. But in the fall it also came under the curse. In Paul’s view, therefore, the material order must also experience the effects of redemption in Christ, and that involves the physical body as well. Since in its present expression it is under the curse, it must be transformed; and that happens at the Eschaton, so that beginning and end meet in Christ Jesus.
35But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come?” 36How foolish! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. 37When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be, but just a seed, perhaps of wheat or of something else. 38But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body. 39Not all flesh is the same: People have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. 40There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendor of the heavenly bodies is one kind, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another. 41The sun has one kind of splendor, the moon another and the stars another; and star differs from star in splendor.
42So will it be with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable; 43it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; 44it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body.
This initial response to the opening set of questions (v. 35) is in two parts. Paul begins (vv. 36–41) by offering two sets of related analogies that are then applied to the resurrection of the dead (vv. 42–44). The analogy of the seed (vv. 36–38) illustrates from their everyday experience that one living thing, through death, can have two modes of existence. As the concluding application (vv. 42–44) indicates, the stress lies on its being sown one way (in death) and being raised another (in resurrection). Inherent in that analogy is the other, that “bodies” exist in a great variety of forms, some adapted for one existence, others for another. As the later Adam-Christ illustration makes plain, this too is of great significance for the argument. It will explain how the same body can move from one form of existence to another. God has already so arranged the universe that “bodies” are adapted to a variety of kinds of existence. Thus the first analogy, that of the seeds, stresses both continuity and transformation; the second analogy, that of the kinds of bodies, is intended to illustrate the phenomenon of bodies’ being adapted to their existence. At the end both analogies are applied to the resurrection (vv. 42–44).
35 The strong adversative with which these questions begin indicates that Paul knows his task to here is but partly done; there still remains the philosophical objection that must have lain behind their denial of the resurrection in the first place. Even though these questions continue the form of the preceding diatribe (vv. 29–34), in which an author uses an interlocutor (“but someone will ask”) to raise the question that they wish to take up next, in this case it seems most highly probable that Paul knew by firsthand information that here in fact is the real issue. Inherent in their denial of the resurrection was the assumption that it had to do with reanimating corpses. Therefore, because they could not handle the how, they had given up the that— the resurrection itself. Having spoken at length with all of his rhetorical and theological skills to the latter question, he now turns to the former.
As noted above, the two questions are probably to be understood as corresponding to one another. The first, “How are the dead raised?” is made specific in the second, “With what kind of body do they come?” Inherent in the first is the skepticism of the interlocutor, “How is it possible that the dead are raised at all?” skepticism that is further elaborated by the incredulity of the second question, “With what kind of body?” As noted above, it is this connection of “body” with “the dead” that makes the concept of resurrection so difficult for those Corinthians who are leading the church down these paths.
36–37 Paul now responds to his interlocutor in the strongest of terms, beginning with the vocative, “Foolish man!” an appellation so harsh to Christian ears that it tends to get modified in translation (NIV, “How foolish!”). The implication is not simply that such questions suggest one to have taken leave of their senses, but that such a person stands in the role of the “fool” in the OT sense—as the person who has failed to take God into account. Thus the contrast is being set up for the sentence that follows (v. 38), where the dead seed is given a new body as God wills.
This vocative is followed immediately in the Greek text by the personal pronoun, which ordinarily is not expressed, and is usually emphatic when it is, especially in the first position. Thus Paul says, “Foolish man, you, what you sow. . . .” In other words, “You hold the answer in your own hands. Simply look at the way God has arranged the natural order of plant life. In the everyday occurrence of the seed you have the evidence to answer your question.”
The two clauses that follow are especially awkward, but thereby reveal Paul’s own emphases: “You, what you sow does not come to life unless it dies; and what you sow, not the body that shall be you sow, but a naked seed, perhaps of wheat or something else.” The two sentences are coordinate, each beginning with the relative clause “what you sow,” and joined by an unusual (for Paul) paratactic “and.” Together they pick up the twin themes of “the dead” and “body” from the two presenting questions (v. 35).
The first clause is reminiscent of the Jesus logion in John’s gospel, but Paul’s point in fact is quite different. In the Johannine narrative the emphasis is on the necessity of death before there can be fruit. Despite some contemporary scholars who would see the necessity of death as the point here as well, that concern is not in fact picked up anywhere in the succeeding argument, and what Paul says a bit later (vv. 50–53) stands quite against it. Paul’s concern is with death as the precondition of the life to come, not in the sense that all must die but in the sense that the seed itself demonstrates that out of death a new expression of life springs forth. God’s purposes are not thwarted by death; as with the seed, what is sown in death is brought forth into life. His point, therefore, in response to their skepticism as to the resurrection is that it is possible for the dead to rise again, as their own experience of sowing grain gives evidence.
But as he says by way of follow-up (v. 37), and this is Paul’s concern, the life that comes forth does so in a transformed body. The use of “body” at this point in the analogy, and especially “the body that will be,” indicates that this is where everything has been leading. It matters not whether one speaks of “wheat” or any other grain, Paul says, one plants a “naked seed,” bare grain. Although Paul will later speak of the body as weak and, in Dryden’s famous words, “subject to decay” (cf. 2 Cor. 4:7–12), there is no hint of that in this imagery. The emphasis is not on its weakness but on its being simply a seed, with no vestige of its “afterlife” visible in the seed itself. Thus the emphasis is on the transformed nature of the “body” of the seed after its “resurrection.” Nonetheless, inherent in the imagery, and crucial to it, is the fact of continuity. The one “life” is in two modes, one before and one after death and resurrection.
38 As is his custom, Paul proceeds to take the “natural” phenomenon he has just described and attributes it to God. In saying that “God gives it [the naked seed] a body as he has determined” (cf. 12:11), he means of course “the body that shall be,” hence the “resurrection body.” Even though he is still in the middle of the analogy, Paul’s point is clear: The answer to the question “With what kind of body will the dead come?” is ultimately to be understood as an activity of God. That is why the interlocutor has been called a fool (v. 36); such a question has left God out of account. God does as God pleases; and what pleases God is to “transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his [Christ’s] glorious body” (Phil. 3:21).
But Paul is not yet ready to make that application; that will come a bit later (vv. 42–49). For now he keeps to the analogy of the seeds. However, the mention of God’s giving to the “naked seed” a “resurrected” body as God pleases reminds Paul of the great variety of “bodies” there are in the plant world. Thus, “and to each kind of seed God gives its own body,” meaning that each of the kinds of grain is different, not only from its naked seed, but from others as well. It is this last point that he feels compelled to explain further in the next series of analogies.
39–41 With these sentences Paul elaborates on the last clause of the preceding sentence, that God has given to each seed its own kind of body. His present concern is to point out the great variety and kinds of “bodies” there are in the world, all of which is God’s doing in creation. Although it is not clearly specified, the applications that follow suggest that Paul’s concern is to emphasize that each is adapted to its own peculiar existence, i.e., that “body” does not necessarily mean just one thing (= flesh and blood), since there are many kinds of bodies. At the same time, even though he means something different here with the language “heavenly and earthly bodies” than in the argument that follows (vv. 45–49), he seems to be anticipating the language of that argument. In the preceding sentences (vv. 36–38) the use of the word “body” was limited to that which was “raised,” a usage that had been determined by the opening set of questions (v. 35). In the present series, even though Paul uses the word “flesh” for the first group, he uses the word “body” to describe both the heavenly and earthly “bodies.” The series seem to begin with “earthly bodies” (v. 39), followed by “heavenly bodies” (v. 41), with a twofold affirmation (v. 40) standing as the middle term that expressly ties the two together. All together they form a nearly perfect chiasm.
A
Not all “flesh” is the same; [earthly bodies]
B
People have one kind;
Animals
another;
Birds
another;
Fish
another
C
There are heavenly bodies [B′]
There are earthly bodies [B]
C′
The splendor of the heavenly bodies is of one kind;
The splendor of the earthly bodies is of another.
B′
The sun
has one kind of splendor;
The moon
another kind of splendor;
The stars
another kind of splendor;
A′
And star differs from star in splendor. [heavenly bodies]
Thus the first and final sentences (A-A′) emphasize differences within kinds; the two B sentences emphasize the differences within “genus” (the earthly expressed in terms of “flesh”; the heavenly in terms of “splendor”); while the two middle sentences (C-C′) simply state the realities of earthly and heavenly “bodies.”
The first series (v. 39) calls attention to the phenomenon of animal life. Here Paul uses the term “flesh” because his concern is not with the form of their bodies but with the different substance of each, thus also anticipating the difference between the earthly and heavenly existence of believers. These are the “earthly bodies” of the two middle sentences (v. 40). The four “kinds” are standard expressions of “animal” life (human beings, beasts, birds, fish).
Even though the central affirmations (C-C′) seem clearly to refer to the sets spoken of on either side (vv. 39 and 41), by their very expression they also anticipate the argument to come (vv. 45–49). What is important to note is that each has its own kind of “glory,” so that in this argument, even though the earthly body must die, it is not without its own glory. Nonetheless, it is scarcely accidental that the present description of the “heavenly bodies” (v. 41) is carried through, not with the word “flesh,” which would make no sense at all, nor with the word “body,” which might. Rather, the heavenly triad of sun, moon, and stars is described in terms of the “glory” (here = radiance) of each. In the application that follows (v. 43), it is the resurrected (heavenly) body that has “glory.” The fact that each star differs from others in radiance illustrates the well-known observations of the heavens that fascinated the ancients.
42–43 Paul now proceeds to apply both of the preceding analogies to the present concern, which is expressed again in the language of the Corinthians’ denial: “So also is the resurrection of the dead.” Paul again resorts to rhetoric. With a series of four staccato clauses, each repeating the verbs “it is sown, it is raised,” he applies first the analogy of the seed (the first three clauses, vv. 42b–43) and then the analogy of the differing kinds of bodies (v. 44a). In so doing, he keeps alive the metaphor of the seed through the first verb (“it is sown”), but expresses the language of resurrection with the second (“it is raised”). The clauses have no expressed subject; “body” is most likely intended as the subject for both verbs in each set, thus implying genuine continuity between the present body and its future expression.
The first three sets of contrasts are intended to describe the essential differences between the “naked seed” and “the body that is to be” (v. 37); that is, despite the verb “sown,” they are not intended to describe the “dead body” that is buried, but to contrast the present body with its future expression. The first set is primary, describing the essential difference between the present, earthly body and the future, heavenly one. As the Corinthians well know, the present body is subject to decay; indeed, in death it “is sown in a perishable state,” which is precisely why they are disenchanted with it (cf. 6:13). But what they have failed to reckon with is the transformation that God will effect: “it is raised imperishable.” So important is this basic set of contrasts to Paul’s argument that this is the only language picked up in the description of the final transformation (vv. 50–54), where it is repeated three times (vv. 50/52, 53, 54).
The second set picks up the immediately preceding theme of “glory” in order to describe the resurrected body. But now it does not mean “radiance.” Rather, this reflects Jewish eschatological language for the future state of the righteous. Paul has already used it of Christ’s personal reign (1 Thess. 2:12). In a much later letter it is the word used to describe Christ’s resurrection body (Phil. 3:21). This usage is what here controls Paul’s thinking. Its opposite is “dishonor” (better, “humiliation”). This, too, is something with which the Corinthians would readily agree. For Paul, it is not so much a pejorative term to describe the body as shameful, as it is a description of its present “lowly” state in comparison with its glorified one.
Likewise with the third set, “weakness and power.” In this case the language has been determined by its present state of “weakness,” a word that recurs particularly in his next (preserved) letter to describe not only the body but Paul’s whole present existence (2 Cor. 10–13). Its opposite, “power,” in the current sentence less describes its permanent heavenly state than the nature of its being raised.
44 With this fourth set of contrasts Paul now applies the preceding analogy of the differing kinds of “bodies” (vv. 39–41). Thus, instead of describing how the body is sown, the two adjectives “natural” (psychikos) and “spiritual” (pneumatikos) are used with the noun “body” (sōma) to describe its present earthly and future heavenly expressions respectively. At the same time, however, this use of language must have had special shock value in Corinth, where the word pneumatikos is most likely what from their view set them apart from Paul, and most likely was a catchword for their antisomatic understanding of Christian existence. They would probably have had little trouble with the description of the present body as psychikos. But the use of pneumatikos to describe sōma would almost certainly have been troublesome indeed.
These two adjectives are the same Paul used much earlier (2:14) to describe the basic differences between believer and nonbeliever. In the present case, however, as the next analogy (vv. 45–49) will make clear, they do not describe the “stuff” or composition of the body; nor are they value words as before, describing the essential difference between those who belong to God and those who do not. Rather, they describe the present body in terms of its essential characteristics as earthly, on the one hand, and therefore belonging to the life of the present age, and as heavenly, on the other, and therefore belonging to the life of the Spirit in the age to come. It is “spiritual,” not in the sense of “immaterial” but of “supernatural,” as he will explain with the help of Scripture at the outset, because it will have been re-created by Christ, who himself through his resurrection came to be “a life-giving Spirit.”
The transformed body, therefore, is not composed of “spirit”; it is a body adapted to the eschatological existence that is under the ultimate domination of, and animated by, the Spirit. Thus for Paul, to be truly pneumatikos is to bear the likeness of Christ (v. 49) in a transformed body, fitted for the new age. The problem that the Corinthians would have had with this idea seems to be the best explanation for the unusual final sentence in this argument: “If there is a psychikos body [a matter on which there would be no quibble], there is also a pneumatikos body.” But that would be precisely the problem for the Corinthians, so Paul turns next to explain how so, and does so on the basis of the Adam-Christ analogy, which has Christ’s supernatural, that is, “spiritual,” body as its presupposition.
Thus, with this set of analogies and applications Paul has argued first with illustrations from everyday life that God has already so arranged the universe that there are bodies of all kinds adapted to their various existences. And in one case, the analogy of the seed, the same “life” itself finds expression in two different “bodies.” But that analogy must not be pressed because the seed and the full stalk with grain have only their life in common. In the case of the resurrection body, there is genuine continuity, a point made by using the same noun “body” to describe its twofold expression. Thus the way is prepared for the next analogy, that of Adam and Christ, since the entire argument is predicated on the resurrection of Christ.
These affirmations, which should be the standard for all later believers, have not always fared well in the church. Because so many crucial transgressions have the human body as their common denominator (e.g., gluttony, sexual immorality, body beautiful/ugly), the beat has gone on for centuries, well demonstrated by Francis of Assisi’s calling it “brother ass.” But the combination of Christ’s own resurrection and Paul’s present affirmations go in a different direction. In our present earthly existence the body simply is, neither to be admired (or lavishly adorned) nor denigrated (as less than truly “spiritual”). Since it serves as the present vehicle of our life on this planet, one should properly care for it as the gift that it is; but “care” should not also lead to adoration, just as it should not lead to contempt.
45So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam, a life-giving spirit. 46The spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and after that the spiritual. 47The first man was of the dust of the earth, the second man is of heaven. 48As was the earthly man, so are those who are of the earth; and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are of heaven. 49And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man.
Gen. 2:7
Some early manuscripts so let us
This paragraph break is quite arbitrary. The first sentence continues the immediately preceding argument, serving as an elaboration of its final clause (v. 44b). Nonetheless, since the content of this paragraph is so different from what has preceded, it is fitting to isolate this introductory material so as to see its place in the overall argument, which unfortunately is a bit less easy to see in English because of the inherent difficulty in translating some of the key words and concepts.
To understand what Paul has done here, one must keep in mind two crucial contextual matters: First, the concern is not christological; rather, its function in the argument is to demonstrate from Scripture the reality of the preceding sentence (v. 44), that just as there is a psychikos body, so there is a pneumatikos body. As noted above, this must have come as something of a shock to the Corinthian pneumatics. Second, the Adam-Christ analogy presupposes its prior use a bit earlier (vv. 21–22), and therefore deals with the effects of the resurrection of Christ, now in terms of the resurrection body. All of that is to say, therefore, that Paul’s concern throughout has to do with the question, “With what kind of body?” (v. 35). His reasoning is that, just as the resurrection of Christ is the ground of our resurrection (vv. 1–11, 20–28), so it is the ground of the resurrection body.
The argument is basically in two parts, both of which are based on a kind of midrashic interpretation of a key passage from Genesis (2:7) in light of the resurrection of Christ. Thus Paul begins by citing the passage itself, in which the key word (psychē) is used of Adam and the implied word (pneuma = “God-breathed”) is applied to Christ, and Paul insists that what is pneumatikos comes after what is psychikos. This is then followed (vv. 47–49), again in the language of Genesis, with a contrast between Adam and Christ that is made in terms of the nature of their humanity: One by virtue of creation is “of earth,” the other by virtue of resurrection is “of heaven” (v. 47), which point is then applied to the Corinthian believers (v. 48). Finally (v. 49), they are urged to bear the likeness of the One who is now “heavenly.” Since believers have all shared the existence of the first Adam, they are being called to bear the image of the last Adam, which in its eschatological expression will be a “heavenly” body such as Christ now has.
45 Paul had earlier argued that “as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive” (vv. 21–22). He now returns to that analogy by way of Scripture to support his preceding contention that believers will be raised with a “spiritual body,” that is, a “supernatural” body acquired through resurrection and adapted to the life of the Spirit in the coming age. He begins by citing the LXX of the Genesis passage in a kind of midrash pesher (= a quotation that is at once citation and interpretation; cf. 14:21). Thus:
The first man,
Adam,
became
a living
(zōsan)
psychē;
The last
Adam,
a life-giving
(zōiopoioun)
pneuma.
Several observations need to be made about this citation: (1) The modifications in the first line, namely the additions of the adjective “first” and of the name “Adam,” are designed to lead to the second line, where Paul’s concern lies. (2) The two words that describe Adam and Christ respectively are the cognate nouns for the adjectives psychikos and pneumatikos he has just used (v. 44). This clear linguistic connection implies that the original bearers of the two kinds of bodies mentioned there are Adam and Christ. (3) Even though the second line is neither present nor inferred in the Genesis text, it nonetheless reflects the language of the prior clause in the LXX, “and he breathed into his face the breath of life [pnoēn zōēs].” (4) At the same time, the language “life-giving” repeats the verb used of Christ in the Adam-Christ analogy (v. 22), indicating decisively, it would seem, that the interest here is neither in our Lord’s incarnation nor in his creational activity, but as before in his resurrection as the ground of ours (“in Christ all will be made alive”).
Although some subtleties are at work here, from these observations one may draw the following conclusions about Paul’s intent. First, the reason for the citation lies with his desire to demonstrate the reality of the resurrection body on the basis of the prior Adam-Christ analogy. The use of psychē to describe Adam gives Paul a biblical base for the distinctions he wants to make between the two kinds of sōma and at the same time allows him to connect that with what he had said previously (vv. 21–22).
Second, as the further explanation (vv. 47–48) makes clear, the overriding urgency in this passage is to show in an analogical way that the two kinds of bodies “sown” and “raised” (v. 44) are already represented in the two archetyphal “Adams.” The first Adam, who became a “living psychē,” was thereby given a psychikos body at creation, a body subject to decay and death. This Adam, who brought death into the world (vv. 21–22), thus became the representative man for all who bear his psychikos likeness. The last Adam, on the other hand, whose “spiritual (glorified) body” was given at his resurrection, not only became the representative Man for all who will bear his pneumatikos likeness, but he is himself the source of the pneumatikos life as well as the pneumatikos body.
Therefore, third, the shift from “living” with regard to Adam (he is merely life-receiving) to “life-giving” seems to have a double entendre with regard to Christ. In his resurrection whereby he assumed his “supernatural body,” Christ also became the giver of life to all who will ever follow after. Paul’s point seems to be that one can assume full pneumatikos existence only as Christ did, by resurrection, which includes a pneumatikos body. The concern of line 2, therefore, is not christological, as though Christ and the Spirit were somehow now interchangeable terms for Paul. The concern is soteriological-eschatological; the language has been dictated both by the Genesis text and the concern to demonstrate that Christ is the foundation of believers’ receiving a “spiritual body.” To make any further theological deductions from such analogies is to do the apostle a grave injustice.
Part of Paul’s point in all of this seems to be to deny, on the basis of Christ’s resurrection, that they are completed people of the Spirit now. They, too, must await the resurrection (or transformation, v. 52) before their “spirituality” is complete, since, as with Christ, it must include a somatic expression. This is the point he will pick up with the second use of this text and the Adam-Christ analogy to follow (vv. 47–49); but before that he takes a final swipe at their misguided, overspiritualized eschatology.
46 Since the sentence to follow (v. 47) evolves so naturally from what was just said, the present sentence is a truly puzzling moment in the argument, both as to what “spiritual” and “natural” here refer to (Christ and Adam, or the two kinds of bodies) and why it is said at all, especially with the adversative “but” and the “not/but” contrast that emphatically declare that the “spiritual” comes second. Of several suggestions the best solution seems to lie in the preceding citation of the passage from Genesis, and almost certainly is to be understood over against the Corinthians themselves. On the one hand, in asserting that the last Adam became “a life-giving spirit,” Paul was alluding to the prior act of God in breathing life into the first Adam. Now Paul appears to be correcting any misimpressions that allusion may have created. The “last Adam” refers to the eschatological reality of Christ’s resurrection and of his subsequently giving life to his own at their resurrection. Thus the pneumatikon comes after the psychikon, in terms both of Adam and Christ and of the two forms of somatic existence Christ’s own people will bear. The scholarly debate over Adam/Christ or the two bodies, therefore, is probably too narrowly conceived. The words most likely refer to the two orders of existence connoted by this language, of which Adam and Christ are the representatives and the two bodies the concrete expressions.
At the same time, however, the emphatic “not/but” suggests that Paul is asserting this order of things over against the Corinthians themselves. This does not mean, as some have suggested, that the Corinthians were asserting some kind of Philonic or gnostic understanding of the priority of the spiritual to the physical. After all, in neither of those systems is there a concern for the chronology of the one in relation to the other. The order here is that set out earlier (v. 23), which insists that each comes in its own order, Christ first, then those who are his. Against the Corinthians, who assumed that they had already entered into the totality of pneumatic existence while they were still in their psychikos body, Paul insists that the latter comes “first,” that is, that they must reckon with the physical side of their present life in the Spirit. “Then,” meaning at the Eschaton, comes the pneumatikos; and they must reckon with the reality that, since the psychikos comes first and has a body, so too the pneumatikos that comes after will have a body, a transformed body appropriate to eschatological spiritual life.
47 But Paul is not done with the Adam-Christ analogy, nor with his use of the sentence in Genesis as the biblical text from which to make his point. He has just used the passage (v. 45) to demonstrate that, just as Adam was the representative “man [= human]” for all who bear a psychikon body, so Christ in his resurrection became the representative “Man” for all who will bear the pneumatikon body. Paul has just insisted that the one prevails until the eschatological arrival of the other. Now he takes up the language “dust of the earth” from the account of Adam’s creation and offers an appropriate opposite for Christ, “of heaven.” Thus Paul is once again using the Genesis text to refer to something characteristic of Adam, for which he will say something about Christ that is its eschatological counterpart. In so doing he reverts to the language “man” for each, as earlier (v. 21), but picks up, by implication, the preceding language of “first” and “second.”
Unfortunately, this use of language has led to a considerable amount of misunderstanding. Paul’s sentence reads, literally:
The first
man of earth
made of dust;
The second
man of heaven.
There is a history of interpretation that sees these clauses as referring to the origin of Adam and Christ. That is, the first man’s origin is “from the earth,” therefore he is “earthly,” while the second man “comes from heaven” and is therefore “heavenly.” More likely, however, these prepositions, which have come about by way of Gen. 2, are intended to be synonyms of psychikos and pneumatikos and are thus intended to be qualitative, having to do with human life that is characterized by being either “of earth” or “of heaven.” Several considerations support this view of things:
(1) The context nearly demands such an understanding. Paul’s concern here, as before (v. 45), is not with Christ’s origins but with his present (heavenly) somatic existence as the ground of believers’ similar heavenly existence at their resurrection. Thus Christ’s body is “of heaven” in the same way that Adam’s—and ours now—is “of earth.” (2) The grammar also supports this contextual understanding. The adjective “made of earth” is nominative and follows “of the earth” as its duplicate, so that together they modify “man” as predicate adjectives; the adjective seems to have been added to show that it is in fact with regard to the body that Paul thus speaks. That means, therefore, that the verb “to be” must be supplied, and that it must be supplied after anthrōpos. Thus what characterizes the first anthrōpos is that his life is of the present earth, earthly, whereas what characterizes the second anthrōpos is that his life is “of heaven,” that is, heavenly. (3) The following sentences, which elaborate this one, indicate most clearly that Paul did not intend to identify Christ as having come from heaven. The same adjective, “made of earth,” is repeated in Adam’s case; the counterpart used of Christ is now “heavenly”—which qualitatively describes his resurrected existence—not “from heaven.” The reason for this is simple: Believers are said to share both kinds of existence, that of Adam through their humanity, that of Christ through their resurrection. They do not share Christ’s heavenly existence because, as he, they are from heaven, but because at the resurrection they will receive a heavenly body that is just like his. (4) Finally, for Paul now to refer to Christ’s preexistence and incarnation would be to contradict the very point just made (vv. 45–46), that the pneumatikos comes second.
Thus in both passages the concern is the same. At the resurrection the “last Adam,” whose resurrection marks the beginning of the End and whose somatic existence as the “second man” is now “of heaven,” will change our “humble bodies into the likeness of his glorified body” (Phil. 3:21). That point is precisely what is elaborated in the final two sets of clauses in the paragraph.
This also means that an enormous amount of discussion that has surrounded this verse is nearly irrelevant, since it has been concerned with the background (or origin) of the idea of “the man from heaven” in Pauline thinking, as though he were influenced by myths of a Primal Man or a “redeemed Redeemer.” Since he is not thinking in those terms at all, the true question has to do with the origin of his seeing Christ’s present humanity as “of heaven.” In this case those are surely right who have seen the background as lying in his own encounter with the “heavenly Christ” on the Damascus Road, coupled with the theme of the restoration of Adam to heavenly existence found in Jewish apocalyptic literature.
48–49 With this set of perfectly balanced sentences Paul now applies the preceding Adam-Christ analogy to their situation. They also make plain that the point of what has immediately preceded (vv. 45–47) is to explicate the prior assertion (v. 44), that the body “sown” in death is psychikon, while the one raised at the resurrection is pneumatikon. Picking up the language he has just used, slightly modified in the case of Christ, Paul argues that Adam and Christ are representative of those who belong to them: first to an earthly order of existence, and then through Christ to a heavenly one. Thus:
Such as
the man
of earth,
such also
the people
of earth;
such as
the man
of heaven,
such also
the people
of heaven.
and
even as we
have borne
the
likeness
of the man of earth,
let us also
bear
the
likeness
of the man of heaven.
The first pair in particular indicate that the preceding description of Christ did not have to do with his incarnation, but with his resurrection. The first man’s progeny are as he is; they “bear his likeness.” He is of earth, earthly; so also are they. As Adam died, so like him they sow at death a corruptible body that is “of earth.” This is the psychikon body, which belongs only to the present existence. As noted above, that would scarcely have disturbed the Corinthians; they would be glad to have it sown in the earth so as to get on with the truly “spiritual,” that is, nonsomatic, existence that their present experience of the Spirit has already made available for them. But not so, says Paul. For those who are “in Christ” (v. 22) also share the likeness of the man of heaven, whose resurrection has guaranteed that they shall share a body adapted to heavenly existence as well.
But in this case the question remains as to whether their sharing of the “heavenly” existence has not already begun, that is, whether their corresponding to the man of heaven refers only to the resurrection body that they are to assume at the Eschaton, or whether Paul is here intending also a broader sense, including behavioral implications, involved in their sharing in his likeness now. Under ordinary circumstances, one would see the latter as a secondary idea at best, brought in circuitously by way of the earlier passage (vv. 21–22) through the later discussion in his letter to the believers in Rome (Rom. 5). But in this case the question arises on the basis of the final verb in the final sentence. If Paul had written the future, “we will bear,” the case would be closed; the whole discussion would then involve the heavenly body and have to do only with the Eschaton. One can well understand, therefore, why the majority of those who have written on this passage opt for this reading. Nonetheless, the future is found in only a few disparate MSS and is easily accounted for on the very same grounds that it is now adopted by so many, while it is nearly impossible to account for anyone’s having changed a clearly understandable future to the hortatory subjunctive so early and so often that it made its way into every textual history as the predominant reading. At this point good textual criticism must prevail (the reading that best accounts for all the others is most likely the original); thus the admonition “let us” must be the original (since it is nearly inconceivable that a scribe would have created this), and if original, it must be intentional on Paul’s part as a way of calling them to prepare now for the future that is to be.
If so, then the exhortation is not that the Corinthians try to assume their “heavenly body” now; both the earlier argument (vv. 23–28) and that to come (vv. 50–57) insist that such happens only at the Eschaton. Rather, they are being urged to conform to the life of the “man of heaven” as those who now share his character and behavior. As before (vv. 33–34) and later (v. 58), the concerns over their denial of the resurrection with its heavenly body and over their unchristian behavior merge. The implication is that not only are they not fully pneumatikos now, but they will not be fully pneumatikos at all if they do not presently also “bear the likeness of the man of heaven.” Thus we have another expression of Paul’s “already/not yet” eschatological framework. They are being urged to become what they are by grace; but as the rest of the argument makes plain, what they presently are by grace will not be fully realized until this mortal puts on immortality and the final defeat of death is realized.
The problem is that the Corinthians apparently believed that they had already assumed the heavenly existence that is yet to be, which for them was an existence in the Spirit that discounted earthly existence both in its physical and in its behavioral expressions. What Paul is most likely doing once again is refuting both notions. They have indeed borne—and still bear—the likeness of the “man of earth.” Because of that they are destined to die. But in Christ’s resurrection and their being “in him” they have also begun to bear the likeness of the “man of heaven.” The urgency is that they truly bear that likeness now, by the way they live, as they await the consummation when they will bear that likeness fully. And as happens so often in this letter, the later church is the beneficiary of a great deal of important Christian theology because of their misunderstanding or aberrant ways.
50I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. 54When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
55“Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?”
56The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
58Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
Isaiah 25:8
Hosea 13:14
With this magnificent crescendo Paul brings to a conclusion part III of the argument for the future bodily resurrection of believers (that began in v. 35). Having argued both for the reasonableness of a resurrection body (through the analogies of vv. 36–44) and for its certainty (on the basis of Christ’s heavenly body, vv. 45–49), he now emphasizes: (1) the absolute necessity of transformation in order to enter the heavenly mode of existence (vv. 50, 53); (2) the fact that both the living and the dead must be so transformed (vv. 51–52); and (3) that the resurrection/transformation, which will take place at the Parousia (v. 52), will signal the final defeat of death (vv. 54–55). Never one to let a theological moment pass without an exhortation, Paul concludes on the high note of Christ’s present victory over sin and the law as well (vv. 56–57), which leads to a concluding exhortation to “labor” for Christ in the context of hope (v. 58).
This is Paul’s final, triumphant response to the questions raised at the beginning (v. 35), “How are the dead raised?” (meaning, How is it possible for such a thing to happen?) and “With what kind of body will they come?” The answer: a transformed body, in which the perishable and mortal are clothed with imperishability and immortality. At the same time, however, since the emphasis is not now on resurrection per se, but on the necessity of transformation, Paul adds—and emphasizes—the revelation of a mystery: Transformation will happen to the living as well as to the dead. It is difficult to assess the impact this revelation may have had on them; but surely it was not without purpose for Paul. In a community where being pneumatikos (“spiritual”) appears to have been understood as a present full realization of what is to be, for whom the thought of any kind of somatic existence, either present or future, was apparently repugnant, the revelation of this “mystery” must have come as no small jolt.
Two further notes: (1) Although Paul does not say so here, the preceding argument makes it certain that this revelation is predicated on the resurrection of Christ, who in his present heavenly existence has assumed a transformed, glorified body. (2) Since for Paul correct theology must always lead to commensurate behavior, one is not surprised to have this eschatological argument conclude with affirmation and exhortation about the present. The One who will swallow up death at his Parousia (vv. 54–55) has already through his death and resurrection prevailed victoriously in our behalf over sin and the law (vv. 56–57). Hence the concluding exhortation (v. 58). The framework is thus the same throughout: Eschatology that is both already and not yet. Through Christ the End has begun; but they are not there yet, as many of them seem to think. So they must live in hope, not in a false triumphalism that leads to aberrant behavior.
50 Although some have seen this sentence to be the conclusion of what has preceded (vv. 45–49), there can be little question that it serves rather to introduce this final paragraph. This is confirmed by (a) the conjunction de (= “now”); (b) the vocative, “brothers and sisters”; (c) the opening assertion, “This I say. . . that,” which is identical to an earlier similar instance (7:29), in which a new thought is also begun; and (d) its clear linguistic ties to what follows. On the other hand, of course, it picks up the argument to this point and begins to carry it to its final conclusion. Paul’s point is the same that he has been making from the beginning (v. 37), that “the body that will be” is a transformed expression of the one that was “sown.” He now spells that out in terms of its present incompatibility with the future. What is said negatively here will very soon be reasserted positively (v. 53).
The two lines are most likely to be understood as synonymous parallelism, so that the second makes the same point as the first. Together they declare most decisively that the body in its present physical expression cannot inherit the heavenly existence just argued for (vv. 47–49). Of the two terms that describe present physical existence, the second, “the perishable,” was already used earlier in the present argument (v. 42) and will be repeated three times in this paragraph. Contrary to some ( above), it does not refer to what is already dead, but to that which in its present form is subject to decay, which in itself rules out its possibility for eternal longevity.
This is probably also how we are to understand the more ambiguous “flesh and blood.” On the one hand, this could refer to the composition of the present body; a body so composed cannot enter the Eschaton. Very likely a dimension of this understanding must be included. On the other hand, Jeremias (see ) popularized the view that it means “the living” in contrast to “the dead”; the living cannot enter the kingdom as they are. Although this seems to move in the right direction, both of these proposals are probably too narrowly conceived. Most likely the term refers simply to the body in its present form, composed of flesh and blood, to be sure, but subject to weakness, decay, and death, and as such ill-suited for the life of the future.
The description of the future in terms of “inheriting the kingdom of God” indicates how varied was the language Paul used to describe the future. This language had already occurred much earlier in the letter (6:9–10, q.v.); its appearance here echoes an earlier moment in the present passage (vv. 24–28), where the future is described in terms of the Son’s handing over the kingdom to God the Father (v. 24) so that God may be “all in all” (v. 28). Thus those who are currently in Christ’s kingdom (v. 25) are thereby also destined for God’s final eschatological kingdom. There can be little question that in Paul’s view this refers to our final heavenly existence, in which believers “inherit” the “heavenly” likeness of Christ himself (vv. 48–49).
51–52a The concern of Paul’s argument is with the nature of the body that believers will assume at the resurrection. The contrasts that have been set up, however, are not between the corpses of the dead and their reanimated bodies, but between bodies in their present earthly expression vis-à-vis their transformation into the likeness of Christ’s glorified body. Thus he has just asserted (v. 50) that the body in its present form cannot “inherit the kingdom.” Even though this may still refer to the body “that is sown,” the logical consequence is that what is true of the dead is equally true of the living. The perishable body, either dead or alive, cannot inherit the imperishable life of the future. Paul, therefore, now turns to emphasize that point with regard to the living. They, too, must be changed before they are fitted for immortality. The Corinthians, of course, would have been plumping for a nonsomatic immortality; but for Paul the resurrection of Christ and his present somatic heavenly existence exclude their option. Hence the solemn asseveration: “Listen, I tell you a mystery.”
As elsewhere in the Pauline corpus, “mystery” does not refer to what is currently hidden, but to what was once hidden but has now been revealed through Christ. The heavenly existence of Christ in a pneumatikon sōma (“super-natural body”) means that yet another “mystery” is now revealed to God’s people. The content of that mystery is found in the pair of clauses that follow, the first of which probably sustains a concessive relationship to the second: “Even though we will not all sleep, nevertheless we will all be changed.” Two further observations need to be made.
First, Paul has already expressed himself similarly in his earliest preserved letter (1 Thess. 4:13–18). There in particular it is difficult to avoid the plain sense of the language, that he expected to be among the living at the Parousia. That does not mean that he lived in intense, eager anticipation of it, as is sometimes maintained, but that he simply expected it to happen within his lifetime. Similar language prevails here, but on an even lower key in terms of expectation. He uses “we” chiefly because nothing else would make sense, especially in the first clause. In a letter where he easily falls in and out of this usage, especially when he wants to include himself with them in the benefits of salvation, it is hardly possible that this clause could have been expressed in either the second or third person. Thus it says very little about Paul’s expectations with regard to the Parousia; what it says is that he is currently among the living!
Second, Paul’s emphasis is on the necessary “change” that will happen to all, both the living and the dead. Not all will die, since by the nature of things some will be alive at the return of Christ; but all, including those alive at the time of the Parousia, must be transformed so as to bear the likeness of the man of heaven. It is probably this latter reality that is the content of the “mystery.” It may be that Paul is pressing this point as a direct word against the Corinthian point of view; however, it is just as possible that it flows naturally as the logical concomitant of the argument to this point. In either case, such a word is unlikely to have been received enthusiastically in Corinth.
With the three prepositional phrases that begin this sentence Paul indicates the nature and time of the transformation. It is clear from his similar earlier usage (1 Thess. 4:16) that he intends the time of the Parousia. However, since the emphasis here is on the transformation that all experience, there is no mention of the coming of the Lord himself or of believers’ rising to be with him. Thus, in place of language referring to the shout of victory, the emphasis here is on the instantaneous nature of the transformation: “We will all be changed in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye.”
What will mark the Parousia is the blowing of “the last trumpet,” imagery that had been taken up into Jewish prophetic-apocalyptic in a variety of senses to herald the Eschaton: to sound the last battle cry (e.g., Jer. 51:27), to warn of the approaching day of judgment (Joel 2:1), to announce the coming of the Lord (Zech. 9:14), to summon the people of God from the four corners (Isa. 27:13). Since it is such common imagery for the heralding of the End, it may carry no metaphorical freight whatever in this instance. On the basis of the next clause, however, it is arguable that the imagery is that of summoning the dead from their graves. It is the “last” trumpet not because it is the final in a series, but because it signals the End.
52b With an explanatory “for,” this next clause basically repeats the immediately preceding concerns (vv. 51–52a) by spelling out what they entail. First, “the trumpet will sound,” repeating what has immediately preceded. With that, second, “the dead will be raised imperishable.” Although this language has not been frequent in this section of the argument (vv. 35–58), its appearance here, as earlier (v. 42), indicates that this has been the concern right along. People die partly because they live in perishable bodies. But with the coming of Christ, all of that changes. They are raised, still with bodies, but bodies that have been made over into their “imperishable” form. Third, along with the resurrected dead, “we [= the living] will be changed.” These last two clauses, which in their own way repeat what was said at the start, have no interest in chronology, although they are expressed in the same order as in Paul’s earlier letter (1 Thess. 4:16–17). For all practical purposes the events transpire basically at the same time—at the sound of the eschatological trumpet.
53 With yet another explanatory “for,” Paul with these words brings closure to the present argument, that both the living and the dead must assume transformed bodies in order to enter their final, heavenly existence. In Christ Jesus, God has already decreed such; and therefore it must be so. Again, as before (v. 50), the two clauses are synonymous parallels, in this case made certain by the repeated demonstrative “this” and the neuter adjectives used as substantives (= “this perishable [body]”). Both lines emphasize the same reality, the first word in each case referring to our present existence in bodies that are subject to decay and death. Their opposites are bodies that are “clothed” in the likeness of Christ, with what is “imperishable” and “with immortality.” The long chain of decay and death inaugurated by the first Adam will finally be broken irrevocably by the last Adam.
54 With the rhetorically powerful full repetition of the two clauses from the preceding sentence, Paul advances the argument by indicating the net results of the Parousia-resurrection-transformation process—the abolition of death itself. Earlier (vv. 23–28) he had argued that resurrection is a divine necessity, inaugurated through the resurrection of Christ, as God’s way of destroying the last enemy, death. Now he returns to that theme, not so much in terms of its necessity as in personal exultation and triumph. “Take that, death,” he exults, “for when mortality is clothed with immortality, you have lost both your victory and your sting!” No more can death tyrannize, because it has been “swallowed up” by resurrection.
Paul makes this point in significant fashion by citing two OT texts (Isa. 25:8; Hos. 13:14) that he understands as yet to be fulfilled: “Then the saying that is written will come true.” This is the only instance of his citing yet unfulfilled prophecy; but as always he cites the OT in light of the death and resurrection of Jesus. So these two passages are in fact fulfilled in Christ; they simply have yet to be realized.
The citations themselves, both of which vary from the LXX, are brought into collocation by the key words “death” and “victory.” It is of interest, therefore, that the word “victory” is not found in either OT passage. At this distance we can only surmise how all of this came about. The citation from Isaiah is the key and is most likely the “saying” (singular) to which Paul is referring. In this case the citation is precisely in keeping with its OT context, where the prophet proclaims that on the great day of salvation “God will swallow up death forever,” which Paul now reads as: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.” In so doing he is reflecting a common LXX idiom for the translation of the Hebrew “forever”; but as the next citation makes clear, he means it finally in terms of “victory,” not just “forever.” At the resurrection-transformation God will abolish death forever, just as God promised in the words of the prophet.
55 In light of the swallowing up of death in the victory of the resurrection-transformation, Paul proceeds to taunt death in the language of Hosea (13:14, somewhat modified). Whether Paul intended to “cite” this passage as such, as part of the preceding “fulfilled” word, is moot. By a series of modifications, Paul seems to be taking over the text of Hosea so as to make it his own derision of death in light of the preceding affirmation (vv. 51–53) and the citation from Isaiah (v. 54). He does this in three ways: (1) by changing the LXX word dikē (“penalty”) to nikos (“victory”), thus bringing it into verbal agreement with the previous quotation from Isaiah; (2) by substituting in the second line the vocative “O Death!” for the “O Grave!” of the LXX, thus making both lines a derision of death itself; and (3) by bringing forward the possessive pronoun “your” to first position (after “where”), followed immediately by the vocative, thus emphasizing the personification (lit., “where your, O Death, Victory?” which replaces the LXX’s “where the penalty of you, O Death?”).
The net result is a powerful taunt of death that looks in two directions at once. First, it completes the argument of the paragraph as a whole as well as the citation from Isaiah. Even though Paul still lives in the “already,” and in his own body experiences both the perishability and mortality of the present age that is passing away, the apostle has also seen the risen Lord. Thus with a clear vision of what is to be he mocks the enemy, whose doom has been sealed through Christ’s own death and resurrection; and it is precisely because of Christ’s victory that the mockery obtains, even if in the meantime believers “fall asleep.” Thus this taunt is Paul’s way of looking forward to the triumph of the ages. Death’s victory has been overcome by Christ’s victory; and death’s deadly sting has been detoxicated—indeed, the stinger itself has been plucked—through Christ’s resurrection. Death, therefore, is “powerless over the dead”; God’s people will be raised and changed into the likeness of the risen and ever-living Christ himself.
Second, even though the taunt has to do with the future resurrection of believers, it is expressed in the present tense, precisely because the beginning of the End has “already” set in motion the final victory that for us is still “not yet.” The mention of the word “sting,” therefore, leads Paul from the future to the present; what is to be has in effect already begun. Thus, he concludes this exalted description of the “not yet” with an appropriate reminder of the victory that is “already” theirs in Christ (vv. 56–57). It has been well said, “Death is also powerless over the living.”
56 Anyone who has heard this paragraph read at a Christian funeral senses the dissonance these follow-up words seem to bring to the argument. For our present purposes the preceding taunt is climactic; but Paul is not quite finished. Granted that the argument per se is now over, much as in an earlier moment (vv. 33–34), however, the final word is one of application to the Corinthian believers’ present situation. That word will come partly by way of the exhortation (v. 58). Before that, however, the preceding words of taunt (v. 55) apparently touch off a theological chord that must be given a moment’s hearing. With a piece of step-parallelism, Paul moves from the final line of the Hosea “quotation” to a brief compendium of his own theology as to the relationship of sin and the law to death. Not only has death been overcome by resurrection; but mutatis mutandis so have the enemies that have brought death to all—sin and the law. Thus:
“Where, O
death,
is your sting?”
Now
(1)
the sting
of death
is sin;
and
(2)
the power
of sin
is the law.
The first line requires little comment. In Pauline theology sin is the deadly poison that has led to death. Although this word group has not occurred frequently in the present letter to describe the Corinthian behavioral aberrations, there can be no question that Paul considered their actions sinful and in need of divine forgiveness. The word occurs with greater frequency in this chapter than anywhere else. The reason Christ died is “for our sins” (v. 3); and if he did not rise, the Corinthians are still in their sins (v. 17). In the exhortation that concludes the first section of the argument, they are urged to “stop sinning” (v. 34). For later readers the full explication of this sentence will emerge in the Epistle to the Romans; its appearance here in this fashion is the sure indication that this essential dictum of Pauline theology had long been in place. Although something of an aside, it is not difficult to see its relevance. Sin is the deadly sting that has led to death. Thus, Christ’s victory over the latter is evidence that he has overcome the former as well.
The second line is the puzzler, especially since in this Gentile community the relationship of sin to the law has not seemed to emerge as a problem. Nowhere do the issues that have arisen, either between him and them or between them internally, reflect concern over the law. This almost certainly means that the statement belongs to the first line as a theological construct, not as an issue in this church. If so, this also means that the essential matters that surface in a thoroughgoing way in Galatians and are spelled out at length in Romans had been essential to Paul’s theology long before the Judaizing controversy erupted—at least in the tangible form in which we know it from Galatians. Its point is simple, and will later be spelled out in detail in a later letter (Rom. 7: the relationship of law to sin is that the former is what gives the latter its power). In that same letter Paul will explain that “sin is not charged against anyone’s account where there is no law” (5:13). That is, the law not only makes sin observable as sin, but also, and more significantly, demonstrates that one’s actions are finally over against God, and thus leads to condemnation (cf. 2 Cor. 3:6). The law, which is good, functions as the agent of sin because it either leads to pride of achievement, on the one hand, or reveals the depth of one’s depravity and rebellion against God, on the other. In either case, it becomes death-dealing instead of life-giving.
Paul’s point in this theological aside is that death is not simply the result of decay through normal human processes. Rather, it is the result of the deadly poison, sin itself, which became all the more energized in our lives through acquaintance with the law. Hence, in exulting in Christ’s victory over death, Paul is reminded that that victory is the final triumph over the sin that brought death into the world, and over the law that has so frequently emboldened sin. But since both sin and the law have already been overcome in the cross, this compendium prefaces a final doxology that thanks God for present “victory” as well.
57 As just noted, this final doxology first of all expresses gratitude that God through “our Lord Jesus Christ” presently gives the people of God victory over sin and the law, which lead to death. At the same time, however, it embraces the entire argument, especially as it climaxes in this paragraph. Thus, Paul exults in God’s victory over death through resurrection (v. 55) and now in the conquest of the sin that leads to that death (v. 57). As at the beginning (vv. 3–5), so at the conclusion, Christ is the one through whom God has wrought this triumph.
58 In light of the sure hope of resurrection, and now especially in light of Christ’s triumph over sin and the law as well, Paul concludes, as is his wont, on a strong word of exhortation. The opening “so then” (NIV, “therefore”) is the last of the long series of these inferential conjunctions in this letter. For its use with this vocative see two earlier moments (11:33 and 14:39). The vocative in this case is accompanied by the term of endearment, “my dear [= beloved] brothers and sisters.” Despite Paul’s misgivings over their theology and behavior, and despite their generally anti-Paul stance on so many issues, from his own point of view they are ever his “dear brothers and sisters,” and that because, even though in one sense they are his dear children in the Lord (4:15), in the much greater sense predicated on the theology of the preceding doxology he and they are brothers and sisters, because they have the same divine parent.
The surprising feature of this exhortation is that, unlike before (vv. 33–34), it is not directed toward ethical behavior as such, but toward the work of the gospel. Probably, therefore, it is to be understood as a word to the congregation as a whole vis-à-vis those who are leading them astray by denying the “resurrection of the dead” (v. 12). On the contrary, Paul urges, not only must they not go that route because of what Christ has effected (vv. 20–28, 45–49, 54–57), but they must in general remain loyal to the gospel as he preached it among them. He makes this point in two ways.
First, on the negative side, “Let nothing move you.” This translation combines two Greek words, “steadfast” and “immovable,” which together urge that they not “move from the hope held out in the gospel . . . that you heard” (Col. 1:23). This urgency is almost certainly in direct response to the denial of the resurrection by some. It urges by way of exhortation what was affirmed at the beginning of the present issue (vv. 1–2), that the gospel of Christ is that on which they have in fact taken their stand.
Second, on the positive side, “Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord.” It is not absolutely certain what kind of activity Paul had in mind by the phrase “the work of the Lord.” Minimally, it may refer more broadly to whatever one does as a believer, both toward outsiders and fellow believers. But along with the next word, “labor,” Paul frequently uses “work” to refer to the actual ministry of the gospel. Probably in their case it covers the range but leans more toward the former. That is, there are those kinds of activities in which believers engage that are specifically Christian, or specifically in the interest of the gospel. This seems to be what Paul has in mind here.
Finally, with a marvelous stroke of genius, whether intentional or not, Paul concludes on the same note with which he began this whole “reminder” (vv. 1–2). There he was concerned, because of the denial of the resurrection by some, whether his own “labor”—namely their own existence in Christ—was in vain. Now, after the strong evidence for the resurrection presented throughout, he concludes with such faith as the ground for their continued labor: “because you know that your (own) labor in the Lord is not in vain.” Thus with this language the entire chapter is tied together. The implication in all this, of course, is that if they continue their present route, they have good grounds for lacking any confidence that what they do as believers has any meaning (vv. 14–19). But Christ has been raised from the dead, and they too shall be raised to share his likeness; therefore they may not only abound in his service, but know assuredly that what they do is not in vain.
It is of some interest that Paul’s own moment of hesitation at the very beginning (vv. 1–2) is answered for him by his own arguments, so that this concluding paragraph exudes with confidence and triumph. There is little doubt as to why it is read regularly at Christian funerals. Read without comment, it has its own power. Here the Word has its own regenerative power because it expresses the truth of Christ himself. But here, too, it is a word for all seasons. Our present existence in Christ, and our present labors, are not in vain. Standing beneath them is the sure word of Christ’s own triumph over death, which guarantees that we shall likewise conquer. Victory in the present begins when one can, with Paul, sing the taunt of death even now, in light of Christ’s resurrection, knowing that death’s doom is “already/not yet.” Because “death could not hold its prey, Jesus our Savior,” neither will it be able to hold its further prey when the final eschatological trumpet is blown that summons the Christian dead unto the resurrection and immortality. What a hope is this. No wonder Paul concluded on a note of exhortation that we may confidently continue on our way in the Lord.