[This is
an ongoing project that is analyzing N.T. Wright’s 5 volume series, Christian
Origins and the Question of God. This series is widely read and bridges the gap
between the academic and devotional world. It is therefore worthy to be
carefully analyzed so that all readers can understand his key points while at
the same time gaining a critical eye to some of his rather bold claims. This
series of posts are concerning volume 3 –
The Resurrection of the Son of God.]
N.T. Wright’s discussion of Resurrection in Paul continues
in this chapter which is his first concerning first and second Corinthians.
Here, Wright presents a remarkably convincing depiction of resurrection in the
books. The only real problem with his work is that is that he overstates his
case to make resurrection the “magic bullet” by which the rest of the books are
understood. This is a natural danger to all of us in the academy who are
studying a particular topic and is somewhat understandable; however, it still
does need to be addressed.
First, Wright correctly asserts that resurrection is a
rather important topic in the Corinthian correspondence. Indeed, with 1
Thessalonians 4, it is the standard place wherein readers have found Paul’s
message of resurrection. The problem, of course, is trying to untangle what
Paul says about resurrection from the sundry items he address in 1 and 2
Corinthians. Wright explains this problem well:
The resurrection – that of Jesus,
and that of Jesus’ people – dominates the Corinthian correspondence. Discussion
of such a central topic inevitably becomes entangled in all kinds of other
issues, some of which are as complex and unresolved today as they were when
critical scholarship first began to investigate them.[1]
The key question, that Wright never addresses, is whether
one should untangle resurrection from
these other issues. His topic is to understand “what Paul thought of
Resurrection” though this is a fundamentally difficult task. Wright here seems
to fall into the common trap of recognizing that Paul is not a systematic
theologian, but then going farther to create a systematic theology for him! If
Paul is truly not a systematic theologian, but instead his arguments are
occasional, then why are we trying to create a systematic theology for him? Why
are we not simply keeping his views in their own situations? Wright should not
be castigated too highly for this – he mostly does keep the conversation about
the resurrection in the context of the books; however, it is unavoidable that
when one asks what did Paul think about (insert topic here), it will result in
trying to mash together his various books and take them out of their
situations.
Wright’s focus
on resurrection in the Corinthian correspondence shows this focus. He argues
that resurrection was the key issue in
the Corinthian correspondence. This is a problem. Whenever one says that there
was a key issue, then it suggests all
the other issues from which one has “untangled” resurrection are somehow less
dynamic, or less important. To show the situation, Wright presents a classic
view of resurrection and then the critique of it in 1 Corinthians. Note in his
presentation how he argues resurrection – one way or another – is the key issue
at hand:
A major proposal was made some
years ago to address this: that the Corinthians held some form of over-realized
eschatology, and were inclined to believe that they were already ‘raised’ in
all the senses they ever needed to be. This was then advanced to explain such
passages as 4.8 (“Already you’re filled! Already your rich! Without us, you are
kings!”), and several other parts of the text. Chapter 15 was written,
according to this theory, to put the record straight, and to argue at length
for a future resurrection which would
show up the present posturing of super-spiritual Corinthians as such ‘puffed
up’ boasting.[2]
Many scholars have come round to
the view argued by Richard Hays that the problem at Corinth was not too much eschatology
but not nearly enough. The Corinthians were attempting to produce a mixture of
Christianity and paganism; their ‘puffed up’ posturing came not from believing
that a Jewish-style eschatology had already brought them to God’s final future,
but from putting together their beliefs about themselves as Christians with
ideas from pagan philosophy, not least the kind of popular-level Stoicism which
taught that all who truly understand the world and themselves are kings. Paul
urgently wanted to teach them to think of themselves, corporately, individually
and cosmically, in a more thoroughly Jewish fashion, in terms of the great
Jewish stories of God, Israel and the world.[3]
Note that in both cases, arguing for or against this
position, he presents resurrection as the key issue which is dividing the
community. He argues that the Bultmannian hypothesis that some felt the
resurrection was a present rather than future reality is out of date and
instead, it is instead the view that many were not taking resurrection
seriously enough. In both cases, he sees the major controversy surrounding
resurrection.
The problem, of course, with this view is that if there is
any particular issue that dominates 1 Corinthians, it is clearly the divided
community as the introduction to the letter proclaims “For it has been reported
to me by Chloe’s people that there are quarrels among you, my brothers and
sisters. What I mean is that each of you says “I belong to Paul,” or “I belong
to Apollos,” or “I belong to Cephas,” or “I belong to Christ.”[4] Margaret Mitchell has convincingly
shown that the primary issue of the letter was a lack of unity and Paul uses
Greek deliberative rhetoric to address that problem.[5]
I do not believe Wright disagrees with this, but he certainly does not emphasize
it. Instead, he seems to want to argue that the primary reason for the lack of unity is resurrection. Here, he stretches
the evidence too far. A cursory reading will show that there were a variety of
reasons for the lack of unity within the group.
He argues that in 2 Corinthians he has the same point, but
with a different emphasis. He suggests that rather than pushing the group to
take seriously the world of the resurrection, instead, he wants to challenge
them to see the issue of apostleship as related to the issue of resurrection.
Wright explains:
But in much of 2 Corinthians his
point, though closely related, is significantly different. Paul has not stopped
looking to the future. Far from it. But now, instead of looking to the future
and seeing the present as the appropriate preparation for it, he is looking to
the future and discovering that it works its way back into the present in ways
he had not previously explored, giving hope and strength when neither seemed
available by any other means. In both letters, what mattes is the continuity
between future Christian hope and present Christian experience. But whereas in
1 Corinthians the movement is primarily toward the future, straining towards
the resurrection and discovering what needs to be done in the present to
anticipate it, in 2 Corinthians the movement is primarily towards the present,
discovering in the powerful resurrection of Jesus and the promised resurrection
for all his people the secret of facing suffering and pain here and now.[6]
His issue of suffering and apostleship, are of course
united, in that we participate now in the suffering and death of Christ and
only in the future will we participate in his resurrection. He maps this out
well as he says is a use of eschatology for a pastoral need:
It is important to spell out the
logic of what he is saying, because in 2 Corinthians all this is controversial.
(a) He believes, as a good Pharisaic Jew, that the creator God raises the dead,
in the normal sense. (b) He believes this all the more strongly because he
believes that God has already done it in the case of Jesus. (c) He believes
that he is living between Jesus’ resurrection and his own future resurrection.
(d) He therefore claims, and discovers in practice, that God’s power to raise the
dead is at work in the present time, one of its results being that God can and
sometimes does rescue his people from what had seemed imminent and certain
death. This is inaugurated eschatology in the service of urgent pastoral need.[7]
He therefore suggests that the present is in a unique place.
He therefore fits his apostleship within this framework – an
apostleship in which one can expect suffering as we are merely acting within the
new creation now and not in the future:
Verse 10 [chapter 9] sums up not
only all of 11.21-12.9, but, in a measure the entire epistle: the weakness of
the apostle, seen to good effect in all the extraordinary things he has to
suffer, is the very point at which he is being identified with the Messiah, and
hence the very point also at which the Messiah’s resurrection power comes in
the present apostolic life and work, anticipating, by the Spirit, the
resurrection which still awaits him.[8]
Here, I agree with Wright in his general view – Paul does
discuss the challenge of suffering as keyed to the drama of future resurrection
versus present reality of the meaning of being in the new creation as opposed
to the view of the superapostles who he believes have completely misunderstood
this point.
In all, Wright’s discussion of Paul’s view of resurrection
is generally strong. The problem is how it can be construed and strained to
create monothetic thinking about Paul that is decidedly unhelpful. Further, a
discussion of the “new creation” without discussing the Platonic language of
participating “in Christ” seems to be a mistake. Wright nowhere discusses this
important point in this chapter and it leaves the reader guessing not as to
what the resurrection is, but how anyone can be part of this new creation.
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