§46 Controversy in Corinth (1 Cor. 15:12–19)

These verses move from the foundational issues to a controversy in the Corinthian church, and the verses articulate a tough-minded logic that proves the error of the position taken by some of the Corinthians. The problem was that some of the Corinthians said there is no resurrection of the dead. The statement as Paul reports it could mean that they said there is no resurrection at all, or they advocated “immortality” (survival of the spirit) rather than “resurrection” (new creation), or they denied a future resurrection and claimed a fully realized this-worldly resurrection (as in 2 Thess. 2:1–2; 2 Tim. 2:17–18). Option one makes the plainest sense of the words, but there is no indication in general that the Corinthians denied life after death. In fact, 15:29 speaks clearly against the idea that the Corinthians were unconcerned with life after death. Option three makes sense given the Corinthians’ penchant for ecstasy and sacramentalism, but Paul’s statements do not explicitly refute the claim that the resurrection had already passed. Thus, option two seems most likely given the full discussion by Paul: the Corinthians denied that the dead would be raised. Life went on after death, but through the survival of the person’s spirit. Note the tone of Paul’s argument. He is correcting a misunderstanding and a misappropriation, not a major distortion or denial of the truth. Paul argues at length and in a gentle but firm and thorough fashion to redirect the understanding and the actions of the Corinthians.

Nevertheless, whatever understanding of the Corinthians’ beliefs one adopts for making sense of this part of the letter, this section resists viewing Christ’s resurrection in isolation as a mythic theme or an eternal timeless truth. Christ’s death and resurrection have a definite, determinative role in both the beliefs and the actions of members of the church (see 15:58). Paul’s argument exposes the errors of the Corinthians’ denial of a resurrection of the dead. In so doing, Paul argues a tight logical loop: Christ is raised → the gospel is preached → the Corinthians have faith → the dead in Christ are raised → Christ is raised. As Paul presents the connections, to falsify one element of this loop is to invalidate the whole, and to invalidate the loop exposes the testimony of the apostles as false testimony about God. If, moreover, the testimony about God’s gracious saving work is false, then the dead are lost and Christians have no hope but are to be pitied as deluded.

15:12 / Paul launches his discussion with a conditional sentence (But if … how can …?) in the form of a question that creates a logical connection between the resurrection of Christ from the dead and the resurrection of the dead per se. Christ has been preached as having been raised from the dead, and the Corinthians believed this proclamation. Therefore, for them to believe that Christ is raised is for them to believe that there is a resurrection of the dead.

15:13–14 / Paul shifts points of view to the position that the Corinthians have taken, which he wants to refute and correct. Again, he writes in conditional sentences to force the readers to draw particular conclusions. Paul stands the faith of the Corinthians on its head: If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ cannot have been raised, because he was dead. Paul’s rhetoric indicates an assumption that such a thought is possible and true, although he does so only to force a further undesirable conclusion. If Christ is not raised, then the apostolic proclamation is false and the Corinthians’ faith is without foundation.

Someone could agree, although Paul does not assume this as he makes and continues this line of argumentation. To agree at this point would mean that the entire life of the Corinthian church was a foolish mistake or a bogus operation. As Paul’s letter has indicated, the Corinthians have an experience with the presence and the power of God’s Spirit that informs them of the real, even divine, substance to the life of their congregation. Thus, while some could agree with Paul’s present logic as he pursues an absurd end, Paul does not seem to think that they will argue with his true line of reasoning.

15:15 / The statement in this verse complements and particularizes the logic of verses 13–14. If what the Corinthians are saying is true (that there is no resurrection of the dead), then, Paul argues, the preachers lied about God; God did not raise Christ, because dead persons are not raised by God. Again, Paul does not mean for the Corinthians to agree with this argument that he intends to be patently absurd. The form of the argument is a grand reductio ad absurdum.

15:16–18 / Paul draws tight the links of his logical chain: the dead in general, Christ in particular, the Corinthians, dead Christians. One may see how these elements are related in the argument, although at the outset one should recognize that Paul’s statements assume some knowledge about the relationship of sin and death, which he does not offer at this point (see Rom. 3–7). According to Paul, the general denial of the resurrection of the dead means the particular impossibility of Christ’s having been raised. In turn, that Christ was not raised means that the faith of the Corinthians was unfounded and that the death of Christ (which was not overturned by God in resurrection from the dead) did not deal with the sins of the Corinthians. Thus, anyone in Christ who died simply perished. Paul’s argument has led the Corinthians to an undesirable conclusion, quite deliberately.

15:19 / One can read this verse as Paul’s response to or rejection of a statement that the Corinthians made (only for this life we have hope in Christ), but in the wake of the argument generated in verses 16–18, it is more likely that Paul is driving home the unacceptable nature of the conclusions that he reached through his foregoing (false) reflections. Thus, from the discouraging imaginary scenario of the previous verses, Paul makes a conditional statement that, in its first part, summarizes the whole matter as the readers should see it from the position at which they arrived by following Paul’s argument (“we have hoped in Christ in this life only”). Then, the second part of the verse states Paul’s verdict on this obvious but fully unacceptable conclusion. If the dead are not raised, Christ is not raised, faith is nothing, and the dead perish, then those in the church who might try to find some hope in Christ for this life are a truly pitiful, misguided, deluded group. Paul reduces to nothing the hope of those who would deny the resurrection of the dead as an act of divine transformation and creation. To deny the resurrection of the dead is to misunderstand the grace of God, and for Paul, God’s transforming grace is the basis of all valid Christian hope. The Christians do not have an essential existence that is their guarantee of passage to a life after death. All rests with God. If there is no resurrection of the dead, if God’s gracious power did not raise Christ from the dead, if there is no gracious divine dealing with sin, and if the dead have perished, then there is no point to Christian existence in the context of the present world. In other words, if the form of this world is not passing away (because it is being superseded by God’s new creation that is already revealed in the resurrection of Christ from the dead), then so what? Or, if “this is as good as life gets”—even if it goes on forever—so what?

Additional Notes §46

In general this section of the letter is a grand conditional discussion. Paul makes a series of seven conditional statements, real and unreal, that then generate a series of results of the stated conditions, again real and unreal. The argumentation can be tricky, but fortunately English grammar and idiom function similarly to the norms of koine Gk., and so the English reader can follow the discussion by instinct without having to analyze and classify the forms of the various conditional statements—protases and apodoses. Fee offers an elaborate outline that may prove helpful, although the analysis presses for a degree of precision that Paul may not have intended (Epistle, pp. 739–40).

In general, Paul’s seven conditional statements may be viewed and understood as follows:

	IF (condition):	THEN (coordinate):
v. 12	if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead		real
		some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead	real
v. 13	if there is no resurrection of the dead		unreal
		not even Christ has been raised	unreal
v. 14	if Christ has not been raised		unreal
		our preaching is useless and so is your faith	unreal
v. 15	if in fact the dead are not raised.		unreal
		we are … false witnesses … God did not raise [Christ]	unreal
v. 16	if the dead are not raised		unreal
		Christ has not been raised either	unreal
v. 17	if Christ has not been raised		unreal
		your faith is futile; you are still in your sins	unreal
v. 19	if only for this life we have hope in Christ		unreal
		we are to be pitied more than all [others]	unreal

Paul effectively stands theological reality as he knows it on its head and proceeds to declare the consequences. Coupled with the unreal conditions of the six unreal conditional statements are sets of most undesirable circumstances. Having flipped from reality to irreality after v. 12 because of the illogical and undesirable denial of the resurrection of the dead, Paul proceeds to demonstrate how pointless Christian faith and life are without the real foundation of Christ’s resurrection, itself an indication and a promise of the resurrection of the dead. Paul winds on into absurdity from v. 13 through v. 19. Then, remarkably, in v. 20, after having taken the readers on this trek through the land of undesirable irreality, he returns directly to a discussion of reality, declaring, “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead”—exactly as he was proclaimed according to v. 12!

15:12 / Talbert (Reading, p. 97) identifies an assertion by the Corinthians embedded within this verse that Paul quotes in order to discuss and refute: there is no resurrection of the dead. Talbert is suggesting, not merely that this is Paul’s summary, but that this is a kind of motto that some in Corinth have articulated. The attitude behind such a statement, whether a quotation or not, is analyzed and termed “spiritual elitism” by R. A. Horsley (“ ‘How can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?’ Spiritual Elitism in Corinth,” NovT 20 [1978], pp. 203–31), who examines the dualism of immortal soul and mortal body that was common in the first-century Greco-Roman world, a dualism that produced spiritual elitism wherein the elite denied the resurrection of the dead body.

15:19 / Talbert (Reading, p. 98) also argues that in this verse there is another citation by Paul of a Corinthian declaration, “If in this life in Christ, we are hoping only, we are of all men most pitiful.” Whether or not one perceives a Corinthian motto in this material, the phraseology of Paul’s statement is ambiguous. The adverb only may be read with the words this life or the words we have hope. Thus, Paul could have made two possible and quite different statements: “in this life we have only hope,” i.e., in life the believers have nothing but hope; or “in this life only we have hope”—i.e., only in this life is there hope. The NIV translation, “If only for this life we have hope …,” agrees with most contemporary renditions in understanding Paul to refer to Christian hope that is limited to earthy life. Whatever Paul said, he said it to demonstrate that the position was wrong.