RSV ~ 1 Corinthians 15 Notes

1 Cor 15:1-58 | ISB Notes

Paul defends the doctrine of the resurrection against attack and misunderstanding (15:12). Working forward from the Resurrection of Christ, he insists that our bodies will be raised immortal (15:20-23) and glorified for life in heaven (15:35-50). This belief is so important that to deny the resurrection is to destroy the essence of the gospel (15:17-19).

1 Cor 15:3-5 | ISB Notes

A symbol or creed of the Christian faith that is founded on apostolic testimony (CCC 186, 638). Should Paul’s readers reject any of these basic tenets of the gospel, their faith will prove “vain” (1 Cor 15:1-2).

1 Cor 15:3 | ISB Notes

I delivered . . . I also received: Refers to the transmission of oral and liturgical tradition. A similar formula was used in rabbinical schools for the transfer of Jewish tradition from teacher to student from generation to generation. See note on 1 Cor 11:2.

1 Cor 15:4 | ISB Notes

he was buried: This important detail sets the Resurrection of Jesus over against his burial, indicating that his tomb was empty on Easter morning (Jn 20:1-10). The rising of Jesus from the grave is thus proclaimed as a physical and bodily event; it involved much more than the resuscitation of his corpse, but certainly nothing less than this. The Resurrection is a miracle of history that cannot be reduced to a metaphor for new life (CCC 639-40).

the Scriptures: Belief in a bodily resurrection can be traced back to the OT (CCC 652). • Several passages affirm that the Lord will raise the dead to live again (Is 26:19; Ezek 37:1-14; Dan 12:2; 2 Mac 7:9). Jesus was the first to benefit from these promises in advance of the messianic people united to him. For biblical background on the third day motif, See note on Lk 24:46.

1 Cor 15:5 | ISB Notes

appeared to Cephas: Jesus appeared alive to Peter (Lk 24:34) and the rest of the apostles on Easter Sunday (Jn 20:1923). Paul catalogues a total of six appearances (1 Cor 15:5-8), most of which took place within the 40-day interval between the Resurrection and the Ascension (Acts 1:3; CCC 641-42). No mention is made of Christ’s appearances to the holy women (Mk 16:1-8), possibly because a woman could not give admissible legal testimony in Jewish tradition.

1 Cor 15:6 | ISB Notes

more than five hundred: A public appearance mentioned only here in the NT. For Paul, such a large group of eyewitnesses adds to the credibility of the Resurrection, especially since some were still living and could verify the facts.

1 Cor 15:7 | ISB Notes

James: Known as “James the Lord’s brother” (Gal 1:19), a kinsman of Jesus (Mt 13:55) and the first appointed bishop of Jerusalem (Acts 12:17; 15:13). Only here is it stated in Scripture that Christ appeared to him personally.

the apostles: Probably refers to a wider circle of disciples than the “Twelve” (15:5), as is sometimes the case in the NT (Acts 14:14; 2 Cor 8:23).

1 Cor 15:8 | ISB Notes

appeared also to me: Paul both saw the risen Christ and received a missionary mandate from him (Acts 9:1-15). His encounter with the resurrected Jesus in visible glory was unique compared with the other apostles, who saw Jesus alive before his Ascension into heaven (CCC 659). Paul felt undeserving of an apostolic mission in light of his former hostility to the Church (1 Cor 15:9; Eph 3:8; 1 Tim 1:15-16).

1 Cor 15:12 | ISB Notes

no resurrection of the dead?: Such a denial might stem from either a Jewish or a Greek background. (1)The Sadducees held a minority view within Judaism that emphatically denied the resurrection of the dead (Acts 23:8). (2)Among the Greeks it was commonly held that the body was a prison or tomb that was destined to decay once the soul was liberated from it at death (Acts 17:32). Whatever the influence, Corinthian skepticism concerning the future of the body led to a denial of Christian doctrine and a sharp decline in morality (1 Cor 6:12-20; 15:34; CCC 996).

1 Cor 15:13 | ISB Notes

then Christ has not been raised: Paul exposes the inconsistency of the Corinthians’ position: they affirm that Christ is risen (past), yet they deny that Christians will rise again as he did (future). To deny the possibility of the latter is to deny the historicity of the former.

1 Cor 15:14 | ISB Notes

your faith is in vain: The Resurrection of Jesus is a historical foundation so essential to Christianity that, without it, the entire structure of the faith collapses in ruins (CCC 651).

1 Cor 15:15 | ISB Notes

he raised Christ: I.e., God the Father (CCC 648). Technically, the Resurrection is the work of all three Persons of the Trinity—Father (Rom 6:4), Son (Jn 10:17-18), and Spirit (Rom 1:4).

1 Cor 15:17 | ISB Notes

still in your sins: If Jesus did not overcome death, then he could not have destroyed sin, for death is the consequence of sin (Gen 3:17-19). It is precisely Christ’s victory over death that demonstrates his triumph over the cause of death (1 Cor 15:56-57).

1 Cor 15:20 | ISB Notes

the first fruits: In the liturgy of ancient Israel the first portion of a crop was offered to God in the Temple as a means of consecrating the whole of the expected harvest (Ex 23:19; Lev 23:10-14). So, too, Christ is not only the first to be raised in glory, but his resurrected humanity is an offering that ensures an entire harvest of believers will be raised as he was (Acts 26:23; Rom 11:15-16).

fallen asleep: A euphemism for biological death (15:6; 1 Thess 4:15).

1 Cor 15:21-22 | ISB Notes

Paul compares and contrasts Adam and Christ as the two individuals whose lives have had the greatest impact on the entire human race. Sin had its beginning with Adam, and because of him the human family enters the world estranged from God and destined to die. Salvation comes to us through Christ, whose triumph over sin reverses the damage done by Adam and gives us the hope that even our mortal bodies will be resurrected to new life. This contrast continues in 15:45-49.

1 Cor 15:23 | ISB Notes

at his coming: Only when Christ returns in glory (Acts 1:11) will the bodies of the saints be raised in glory (Phil 3:2021).

See word study: Coming at Mt 24.

1 Cor 15:24 | ISB Notes

rule . . . authority . . . power: Demonic spirits hostile to God and the advance of his kingdom (Col 2:15; 1 Pet 3:22). .

1 Cor 15:25-27 | ISB Notes

Paul summarizes the drama of the last days, when Christ will triumph over his enemies and transfer his kingdom over to the Father (CCC 1042-50). He makes use of imagery from Ps 110:1 and Ps 8:6, passages linked by the expression under his feet (1 Cor 15:25, 27). • Psalm 110 portrays the Messiah enthroned at Yahweh’s right hand and awaiting the subjection of his enemies. Psalm 8 reflects on the original vocation of man to stand above all of creation as its ruler and steward. Christ assumes both of these roles at his Ascension, from which time his reign continues until all creation bows in homage and his final adversary, death, falls in defeat (CCC 668, 1008).

1 Cor 15:25 | ISB Notes

until: This expression fixes a limit to the conflict between Christ and his enemies, not to his kingship. His rule will be perfected, not terminated, when death is finally destroyed.

1 Cor 15:28 | ISB Notes

everything to every one: Or, “all things in all”. In the end, creation and even the incarnate Son will honor the Father as the Lord of all and the absolute Origin of all life.

1 Cor 15:29 | ISB Notes

baptized on their [the deads’] behalf: This passage continues to baffle interpreters, since neither the form nor the meaning of this practice is familiar to us today. Perhaps living believers were receiving baptism for the sake of deceased persons, hoping its benefits would accrue to them in the afterlife (cf. 2 Mac 12:39-45). Another possibility, suggested by the verses that follow (1 Cor 15:30-34), is that Paul is talking about people who endure a baptism of suffering for the sake of others who are physically or spiritually dead (Mk 10:38; Lk 12:50). Either way, Paul reasons that such baptisms are pointless apart from belief in

a future resurrection.

1 Cor 15:32 | ISB Notes

What do I gain: Suffering would be meaningless without the prospect of a heavenly reward (4:9-13; 2 Cor 4:11). Let us eat and drink: A quotation from Is 22:13. • Isaiah echoes the words of the wicked inhabitants of Jerusalem, who despised the Law of God in their pursuit of selfish enjoyments. Such a carefree philosophy of life makes sense only if there is no hope of life beyond death.

1 Cor 15:33 | ISB Notes

Bad company ruins good morals: An excerpt from Thais, a comedy written by the Greek poet Menander. Paul cites it to warn that doctrinal error about the resurrection breeds immorality that is both destructive and contagious (6:13-14; Prov 13:20).

1 Cor 15:35-58 | ISB Notes

Paul moves from defending the resurrection to explaining the constitution of resurrected bodies. For those Corinthians who believed a resurrection was impossible—given the frailty of our bodies at present—Paul insists that risen bodies will be clothed in power, glory, and immortality (15:42-44, 51-53).

1 Cor 15:36 | ISB Notes

unless it dies: As seeds must decay in order to germinate and bring forth life, so death is merely a prelude to resurrection and new life (Jn 12:24). Paul may be continuing the illustration of 15:23, where the risen body of Christ is the first offering of a crop that consecrates a whole harvest of resurrected saints.

1 Cor 15:38-41 | ISB Notes

Variations in nature between the dignity of living beings (men, animals, birds, fish) and heavenly bodies (sun, moon, stars) enable Paul to illustrate the different gradations of glory that will characterize the bodies of risen believers. •Daniel 12:2-3 likewise compares the righteous who rise again with the lights and stars shining in heaven.

1 Cor 15:42-44 | ISB Notes

Our risen bodies will be the same bodies that we possessed during earthly life, only transformed by new and spiritual qualities. The Resurrection of Christ’s crucified body is a demonstration of this (Jn 20:26-28; CCC 999, 1017). • Catholic theology enumerates four qualities that will endow the risen bodies of the saints: impassibility (immunity to suffering), agility (freedom from weakness), subtility (complete subjection of the body to the soul), and brightness (outward radiance in proportion to the degree of inward holiness).

1 Cor 15:44 | ISB Notes

spiritual body: The body in its risen and glorified state. More than a resuscitated corpse, the resurrected body will be supernaturally transformed by the divine power of Christ (Phil 3:21). • It is not called a “spiritual” body because the body will become a spirit but because the body will remain immortal and incorruptible through the spirit that enlivens it (St. Fulgentius, On the Faith 70).

1 Cor 15:45 | ISB Notes

The first man: The contrast between Adam and Christ shows that by nature we get a body from Adam that is physical, earthly, and mortal; and by grace we expect a body from Christ that is spiritual, heavenly, and immortal (15:21-22). • Paul draws on Gen 2:7 to hint that Adam’s creation bears a certain likeness to Christ’s Resurrection. Just as Adam’s body was raised from the earth by the breath of natural life, so Christ’s body was raised from the earth by the Spirit of supernatural life. It is this life-giving Spirit, now channeled to the world through the sacrament of Christ’s risen humanity, that will raise our bodies also (Rom 8:11).

1 Cor 15:50 | ISB Notes

flesh and blood: A Semitic idiom for human beings, weak and subject to corruption (Sir 14:18; Mt 16:17). Paul is not denying that resurrected bodies will have flesh and blood; his point is that our physical bodies cannot enter God’s kingdom in their present state of weakness; they must be radically “changed” (1 Cor 15:51).

1 Cor 15:51 | ISB Notes

We shall not all sleep: The last generation that lives to see Christ return may be spared the experience of bodily death. Some scholars interpret this verse to mean that Paul expected Christ to come again during his own lifetime, since he seems to number himself (“we”) among this final generation of Christians. Two considerations, however, suggest these words are rhetorical and should not be taken literally. (1) Elsewhere Paul counts himself among those who would be raised (“us”) from the dead (1 Cor 6:14; 2 Cor 4:14). (2) Paul sees death, through either hardship or martyrdom, as a real possibility for himself in several letters (2 Cor 1:8-9; Phil 3:10-11; 2 Tim 4:6).

1 Cor 15:52 | ISB Notes

the last trumpet: The final blast that will inaugurate the general resurrection (1 Thess 4:16). • Several uses of the trumpet in ancient Israel fill out the background to this image. The trumpet was a liturgical instrument that summoned Israel to meet the Lord (Ex 19:16-17), to worship him on the Feast of Trumpets (Lev 23:23-25), and to enjoy his rest every jubilee year (Lev 25:9). The trumpet was also a military instrument that called soldiers into battle (Judg 7:19-23; Jer 4:19). These uses overlapped in the conquest of Jericho, where the military operation against the city was itself a liturgical action of processing and blowing trumpets (Josh 6:1-21). Trumpet imagery is also used in the Prophets to signal Israel’s restoration from the covenant death of exile (Is 27:13) and to commence the judgment of the wicked on the “day of the Lord” (Joel 2:1; Zeph 1:15-16).

1 Cor 15:53 | ISB Notes

put on immortality: Our risen bodies will be robed with undying life, not stripped away like worthless garments. See note on 2 Cor 5:4.

1 Cor 15:54-55 | ISB Notes

Paul appeals to Is 25:8 and Hos 13:14 to announce the final demise of death. • Isaiah describes a banquet of rich foods where all nations come to celebrate the end of suffering as the Lord swallows up death for ever. Hosea likewise forecasts that death will one day be robbed of its power and taunted like a defeated enemy. In Paul’s mind, this day will dawn with the general resurrection.

1 Cor 15:58 | ISB Notes

your labor is not in vain: The assurance that God will reward our faithfulness in the resurrection puts the struggles of daily life in perspective. Practically speaking, Paul is summoning us to glorify God in our bodies (6:20; CCC 364).