I Cor 15:1-11 and Paul's Apostleship

The first section (1-2, 11) may be entitled "The Fact of our Common Faith." In an age where Christians are divided not simply into liberal and conservative but into all other kinds of divisions, it is good to reaffirm the basis of faith. The structure of vv. 1-2 is striking. Three interior affirmations are sandwiched by statements about the Gospel which Paul preached to the Corinthians. It was the Gospel "I preached" (vv. 1-2), but in between those two statements are "which you received, in which you stand, through which you are saved." The Gospel not only had a source; it had to be received and cultivated by the hearers. The idea of "standing" in faith is elaborated richly in Ephesians 6. Note the stress on that verb:

"Therefore take up the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to withstand on that evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. Stand therefore..." (Eph. 6:13-14).

We receive the Gospel. We stand in it. Then, we should note the tense of the verb "to save." It is a present tense in Greek. We "are being saved." Salvation is here conceived as a process, something that happens over time. And, rushing head to v. 11, this faith that Paul seems uniquely to preach in vv. 1-2 is said to be a faith "we" preach--a common faith. Paul certainly put his won "stamp" or "twist" on the Gospel, but he recognizes also that it is a common faith shared throughout the nascent Christian world.

II. The Nature of the Common Faith (vv. 3-7)

The common faith has a common content. Striking in these verses is not simply the expected statements about Christ's death and resurrection but the extended list of "appearances" made by Christ to various people. Paul's own experience of the risen Christ (v. 8) is the link between all the other appearances and his unusual narrative of himself in vv. 9-10. So, vv. 3-7 may be further divided into vv. 3-4, which we might call the real death and burial of Christ, and vv. 5-7, various appearances of Christ. As said in the previous essay, the stress on Christ's death and burial was meant to counterract emphasis by the spiritual people solely on spiritual truths. The death on behalf of sins as well as Christ's rising from the dead were said to be "according to the Scripturses," which meant that already by the 50s of the first century, the Christians had developed an OT collection of texts which "proved" these points.

With respect to the appearances, we have something very interesting. If you read the Gospel stories, especially the Gospel of John, you note that the first people to whom the risen Christ appeared were women. Here, in I Cor 15, where Paul was probably reciting an early Christian confession (the presence of tradition-based language in v. 3--"I handed over what I received" suggests this), the emphasis is on appearance to men. Had the voice of women already been ignored? Or, had the tradition of Mary's first witnessing the risen Christ only grown up in John's circle, possibly in Asia Minor? We don't know, but both possibilities are enchanting. The most interesting appearance, in my judgment, was the one that Paul claimed.

III. The Appearance to Paul--the "Freak" (vv. 8-10)

In the midst of this seemingly traditional narration of the faith common to all Christians are three verses that relate only to Paul. This is one of the engaging ironies of Paul. He wants so badly to be a representative of THE TRADITION while, at the same time, he wants HIS NAME all over the tradition. Thus, he will narrate the appearance of Christ to the others but then he spends as much time telling about Christ's special appearance to HIM. But, rather than simply vaunting himself or his experience, he calls himself "one untimely born" (v. 8), who is "the least of the apostles" (v. 9). Some interesting psychological things are happening in these verses. Let's just focus on two of them: his name for himself and his former persecution of the church.

Let's be clear. The word translated "untimely birth" by the "stained-glass" translators of v. 8, is really an "abortion" or "miscarriage" (Greek is ektroma, literally "abnormally born"). The word doesn't appear frequently in Greek literature, but does appear in the Greek translation of Job 3:16, where Job says, "why was I not buried like a stillborn child?" (ektroma). What is interesting in the Greek construction of 15:8 is that Paul says, "last of all, as to the ektroma, he appeared even to me." The words of Paul's seeming lesser importance than the other apostles pile up one after another. The word "even to me" (kamoi) appears as the last word of the sentence, to emphasize the graciousness of Christ. Gordon Fee (The First Epistle to the Corinthians, 732-33) argues that "the word comes to be used figuratively to refer to something horrible or 'freakish.'" Since it appears with the definite article "the one abnormally born," Fee suggests that this was perhaps an epithet thrown at Paul by some of the Corinithians who might not have appreciated his ministry. Paul might have said he received a "late" vision of Christ, and this may have led to the allegation that Paul was a rather "freakish" person. Paul, then, would pick up on this negative characterization and agree with it. "I am a freakish person. So what? That is precisely what God uses to communicate the Gospel."

Paul's use of this terminology is then supplemented by reference to his being the "least" of apostles (v. 9) because he persecuted the early church. This is his reason for suggesting why he worked "harder than the rest," possibly as a way to try to atone for his own foolish and dangerous behavior towards the earliest Christians. Paul, then, is a complex individual, who appears to be motivated so strongly to control the debate in Corinth because he ultimately is driven by a sense of guilt, which he tries to characterize as gratitude, over the havoc he wrought before he came to faith. He so much wants to be "equal to" (and even superior to) the other Apostles, and he knows that he really doesn't have the "credentials" for this. Yet, he has the appearance in time out of time of the risen Christ to him, and that will be his passport for Apostleship. Everything else is raw energy and competitive fury, possibly driven, as I suggested above, by residual guilt for his effort in attacking the earliest Christians.

Conclusion

But there you have it--a fascinating combination of the common faith and the psychological needs of a most uncommon individual, Paul. Both of them make up the Gospel and its proclamation. And so, even today, when you communicate that word, you combine both the tradition and your personality. The tradition comes through you, too. Think on that as you prepare your words.

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