918
bh Rom. xiii. ¢
4; Gal. ili.
4) iv. 11 yh σα
Col. 11. 18;
Prov. : ed ; XXViil. 25. i See iii. 5. k See xi. 2.
ii.10; 2 Th. i. 11; 1 Pet. ii. 8, iii. 21. 22. Cf. περι αµαρτ., Rom. viii. 3, etc
flesh and the world of matter.—Paul’s argument is in two parts: (A) vv. 1-34, concerning the certainty; (B) vv. 35-57, concerning the nature of the Resurrection. To establish its certainty (A), P. begins by (a) rehearsing the historical evidence of Christ’s bodily resurrection, which had been preached by himself ἐν πρώτοις and so received by the readers (1-11); (5) he shows that to deny the resurrection of the dead is to deny Christ’s resurrection, and so to declare the Gospel witness false and its salvation illusive (12-19); and further, (c) that the risen Christ is the first-fruit of a great harvest, whose in- gathering is essential to the fulfilment of the kingdom of God (20-28); (d) he closes this part of the case by pointing to the practical results of faith or unoelief in a future resurrection (29-34). (B) The nature of the resurrection body is (a) illustrated by the difference between the seed and the perfect plant; also by the endless variety of material forms, in- stanced in animal organisms and in the heavenly bodies, which helps us to un- derstand how there may be a future body of a higher order than the present human frame (35-43). (6) This differ- ence between the σῶμα πνευματικὸν and the σῶμα ψυχικὸν being premised, it is argued that our investiture with the former is as necessary a conse- quence of our relation to Christ as our investiture with the latter is a con- sequence of our relation to Adam (44-49). (c) Only by this transformation, by the victory over death and sin thus achieved, can the promise of God in Scripture be fulfilled, His redeeming purpose effected, and the work of His servants made secure (51-58).—This is the earliest Chris- tian doctrinal essay; in method and argumentative character it is akin to the Ep. to the Romans. Hn. ably de- fends its integrity against the attempts of Clemen and the Dutch School to make out interpolations and contradictions. §50. THE Facts CONCERNING CHRIST’S RESURRECTION, xv. I-11. The doubt which the Ap. combats strikes at the fundamental, probative fact of his Gospel. fle must therefore go back to the be- ginning, and reassert the “first things” he had taught at Cor. (1-4); to establish
ΠΡΟΣ KOPINOIOYS A e
> πο πα oe > , ει µη εικη επιστευσατε; 3.
1N.T. 41.; Gen. xxxiii. 2. n See viii. 11,