1 Corinthians 15 versus the Gospels

 

 

Paul devoted 1 Corinthians 15 to showing that Jesus really rose from the dead to refute the Christian heretics who were saying that resurrections don’t happen.  

 

Paul was unable to say anything like that Jesus was a good honest man and there were people who could vouch for that so God could have raised him from the dead and it wasn’t a trick.  He was unable to say that Jesus would have been too decent to fake his death or resurrection.  He was unable to say that Jesus did miracles when he was alive and that there are witnesses to these miracles therefore Jesus had the power to rise from the dead.  Paul dished out the best arguments for the resurrection he had and they were terrible meaning that there is no doubt that Paul and the apostles were dependant on visions of Jesus to find out stuff about him.  None of them knew Jesus before his death.

 

Paul wrote that the dead are lost forever if Jesus never rose from the dead - which is an illogical argument.   It is like saying, “My wife will come back to me because I don’t want to be old and alone”.  What you want or need isn’t going to make any difference.  It is trying to blackmail his hearers to believe.  You only use fear as a weapon in this way when you suspect your visions are hallucinations or when you are lying.  The apostles in Jerusalem must have been as bad as him.  They all palled together when it came to defending the alleged resurrection.

 

What makes the argument worse is the fact that the saviour could have been unknown or there could have been another way to save or perhaps God accepts the sincere who think they are saved.   

 

At the start of the chapter, Paul’s detailing about the times that Jesus was seen after the resurrection is only a recap and not an attempt to counter the heretics of Corinth who denied the resurrection because it is no good repeating a testimony to people who deny that testimony and indicate thereby that they should agree with it and Paul knew that.  So his illogical arguments were his real reply to them.  Notice how the arguments attempt to make them feel that it is a terrible thing if Jesus is still dead and the apostles are liars and that nothing worse can be imagined.  If the Christian faith is stupid and worthless as he says if the Lord has not returned from the dead this implies that sincerity alone does not please God which he wants us to think for he wants to bring us to the conviction that non-believers will be lost forever. This is emotional manipulation and emotional blackmail.  He’s trying to scare them into believing and make them feel guilty and feel despair if they do not.  This is a sure sign that neither Paul or the apostles were honest for when Paul the busiest evangelist and therefore the one who had to be on top as regards theology and evidence had to resort to such low and primitive tactics what else could they do either?  Being the earliest and therefore the most authentic attempt to verify the resurrection the credulity and dishonesty it is riddled with, shows that the witnesses to the resurrection were anything but believable and there is no way the alleged resurrection appearances can be indications that Jesus was a real person.  The visions of unreliable men are themselves unreliable. 

 

Paul said that

 Jesus must have risen for Paul himself and the apostles could not be liars and would not misrepresent God – a sure indication that he thought they were lying and he should have known for he was one of them.  If a salesman came to your door telling you that an amulet would solve all your problems for he says so you would see through him for saying that.  And the honest give the best evidence they can to support their statements and don’t want you to just take their word for it.  Then he said that if Jesus is dead then we are still in our sins another illogical argument for nobody can prove that God has forgiven them when millions think they are forgiven and are not according to the Christian gospel.  Amusingly, he even went as far as to indicate that the resurrection must have happened for it is too much to think of poor Jesus being dead!  I mean if Jesus being dead means our dead are lost and this is terrible then it means Jesus is lost too!  Paul was desperate to silence the heretical Christians of Corinth who denied the resurrection which was such a serious rejection of the Pauline gospel.   The way Paul handles his predicament gives us a vital insight into what he really knew about Jesus and what the generation that spawned the gospel knew.

 

Liars like the apostles and Paul cannot be trusted when they say that Jesus lived.  If you would lie about Jesus living after his death then why not lie about Jesus living as an ordinary man as well?

     

Paul argued that if the dead will not rise then Christ could not have been raised (v 16).  This is obviously wrong for God could have a reason to raise Jesus physically without needing or intending to raise the whole human race.  Or God could give Jesus the right to be raised and not raise him but raise people instead.  Paul here denies the doctrine that God has mysterious ways which is a foundation stone of Christianity.  Paul knew fine well he was talking nonsense but was trying to take his readers for fools for then as now you get loads of Christians who say they think Jesus rose from the dead but who do not expect anybody else to rise from the dead.

 

The actual act of resurrection shouldn’t affect our salvation.  What should matter is the right of Jesus to be raised.  Even the act of resurrection cannot save us unless Jesus first had the right from God to be raised. If Jesus had the right to be raised but wasn’t that should be enough to save us.  It takes care of the legalities.  The contract was that Jesus pay for our sins in our place and deserve the right to be raised from the dead so that we could deserve to be raised too through his grace.  Jesus was meant to take the right and give it to us so that we could be raised.  Paul would exaggeratedly stress the act of resurrection only if resurrection appearances were the only way to know of Jesus.

 

Reason says that if Jesus saved us by his death we do not need his resurrection to save us but Paul says we do and that is a mystery.  Why did he not say that Jesus himself said that his own resurrection would be a foreshadowing of ours?  Because contrary to the gospels Jesus never said that.  He does not argue that Jesus did miracles when alive so it would be natural and possible for him to come back from the dead which would have been a big boost to his arguments if it had been true.  His Jesus was no wonder-worker.  He does not use the argument that Jesus’ body disappeared and appeared risen though it was crucial to his argument against the heretics suggesting that they all believed that Jesus lived long long ago when nobody could remember what happened to the body or that the body was not used or only a few cells used in the creation of the new body with its spiritual powers.  When a man needs to argue that Jesus is risen for it is too terrible to think of him being dead and not use the vanishing body if that is what happened to Jesus’ body then it tells us a great deal.

 

In verse 30 he argues that Jesus rose from the dead because he and his friends continually risk their lives for spreading the good news of the resurrection.  This was very dishonest for Paul knew many people who risked their lives for lies or for what they suspected was fraud.  Ad hominum arguments like this are worthless and are based on a fallacy.  Scripture is not without error.  It shows he couldn’t focus on less dubious evidence for Jesus for there was none.

 

Paul wrote that Christ was the first fruit of the dead in that he rose from the dead before everybody else would and that this was the proper order.  Christians see that in the gospels it is said that Jesus raised people from the dead long before he rose.  They say that these resurrections were only reviving dead bodies while Jesus' was just rising in a transformed supernatural state.  For that reason he can be described as the first to rise in that way.  But Paul simply speaks of rising and is not distinguishing between different types of resurrection.  He meant that Jesus rose as the first fruits before anybody else did.  He rose before the resurrection miracles reported in the Old Testament.  You will never be able to tell if anything is a contradiction or not if you start pretending that words mean different things from what they appear to mean.  Paul believed that if anybody said Jesus did resurrection miracles before Jesus rose then the miracles were a hoax or a lie and that Jesus didn't do them at all.  The anonymous gospels then challenge the writings of an apostle!  They challenge the only eyewitness who wrote in the New Testament.  They have other resurrections to contend against the truth about Jesus'.

 

The blunders in this most important chapter of the New Testament show that Paul’s testimony about Christ was not protected against error by the power of God and to depend on it is not to depend on God but on a man we know little about.  Yet it is the first attempt to prove the resurrection and shows how the apostles dealt with apologetics which was terribly.  The gospels never try to prove the resurrection but just give their interpretation of supposed events which is no good when one needs concrete and reinforced evidence for such an outrageous claim.  It is blasphemous to depend on what Paul said for the word of God has to be sure.  When the Church was able to trick people into believing in a resurrection that never happened there is no reason why Jesus could not have been a lie himself too.  He was probably made up for the resurrection was made up and it was as important as him – no it was more important for he was nothing without it.  Remember, if Jesus died and did not rise then the Jesus that supposedly appeared to the apostles was made up for Jesus doesn’t exist anymore.  So when they could do that and get away with it why could the pre-crucifixion life of Jesus not be a myth as well?

 

 

Top of the Document

 

IF CHRIST HAS NOT BEEN RAISED

 

“If Christ hasn’t been raised from the dead then your faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins.  Then those who have died in Christ are lost.  If we only have hope in Christ for this life then we are to be pitied above all men” (1 Corinthians 15:17-19).

 

Some think that he is saying that if Jesus hasn’t risen that he implies that Christianity must make things harder for people and have a standard of goodness that is dependant not on commonsense but on revelation and which must be very painful to follow.  Otherwise they would not be the stupidest people alive.  

 

The context is about sin and being lost from God forever and that we are to be pitied if we only enjoy our faith in this life.  That interpretation is wrong.

 

In Paul’s thought, if the faith is wrong you are better off without the standard of morality revealed by Christ in spite of the joy of being a Christian.  Paul rejects the heretical view of the modern Church that if Christianity is wrong we are still better off having followed it for it made us good and happy.  This shows that the pleasure-loving Jesus of the gospels who offered all humanity a light burden that would be good for them is rejected as inauthentic.  He is a fiction.

 

He said that if Jesus is not alive now then Christians are to be pitied above all people (v19).  But if Jesus is dead and Christians are inspired to be caring and are happy thinking he is alive then how could Paul say that?  How could Paul say that if Jesus is not the risen Son of God then all is lost and we are still in our sins and should despair? 

 

1 One answer is that the Christians had all been staking everything on expecting the risen Jesus to soon come back for them so if this is wrong their suffering and sacrifice would be proven fruitless.  In 1 Corinthians 7 Paul certainly made it clear that lives must be turned upside down in preparation for his coming.  Paul must have claimed that he had a revelation that Jesus was on his way for he could not have them go that far over speculation.  When that revelation was wrong what about the one when he saw Jesus on the way to Damascus in a flash of light from Heaven? 

 

2 Another answer that could be added to this one or taken alone is that Paul believed that human beings were worthless and their works futile unless God had cleansed them from their sins and saved them so if Jesus has not risen there is no forgiveness.  We know Paul did teach that humans were totally useless without the work of God’s grace to make them good and forgive them.  In this case it would be a hint that the doctrine of human uselessness and the need for a saviour and for one who comes back from the dead were not revealed by Jesus himself for they are true even if Jesus was a fraud.  This would mean that Paul’s Jesus did not teach these things though the gospels say he did. 

 

3 Another answer in the same category is that Paul was just being silly.  When Paul could not handle a serious heresy adequately despite his heavy work as an evangelist it shows that his converts were gullible and that he had no concern for the purity of the truth and was not an apostle and was too unsuitable so Jesus did not choose him on the way to Damascus which was a hallucination.

 

If Jesus died for sinners as he said then sin is dealt with and Jesus doesn’t have to rise until the end of the world if he wants to.  Why is it so vital that Jesus must have risen before Paul’s ministry?  The timing is interesting.  It implies that there can be no salvation for anybody until Jesus rises first.  Paul believed that some by special revelation in the Old Testament were saved.  The resurrection must have happened in ancient times!

 

The Christians despite their sacrifices were happy so answer one can be dismissed.  Answer two just means that you are totally sinful and need a saviour to take away your sins and pay the price to God for them.  But if the saviour wasn’t Jesus why can’t one hope it was somebody else?  God would provide a saviour if necessary. 

 

The correct answer is probably that Paul was saying that he couldn’t be wrong about the resurrection and was so sure that if Jesus wasn’t the saviour nobody was because Paul cannot be wrong!  It was then not faith in the resurrection at all that Paul wanted.  It was really faith in Paul.  This shows that Paul had to base the religion on his own personality and not on Jesus either because Jesus wasn’t interesting when he was a man or nobody knew anything about him as a man for he lived centuries before.

 

One wonders how Paul could teach that if Jesus was not the saviour then nobody could be the saviour. Christians say that he meant there was nobody as holy and powerful with miracle working as Jesus so nobody could be his match or do better.  And so if Jesus was a fraud there will be no saviour. Paul gave no indication of reasoning this way at all. 

 

The reasoning is absurd.  Somebody more powerful could come along.  The reasoning is stupid and arrogant.

 

There could have been a saviour who saved the world and who rose but who never appeared to anybody or who is perhaps appearing in India.

 

If Jesus did miracles and proved he was the Son of God before his crucifixion and was still dead there would still be hope of a return.  Christians say there wouldn’t be if Jesus had promised to rise on the third day and failed to.  Even if he did rise later the failed promise would prove he was not the saviour or Son of God after all.  They say Paul knew that and had that at the back of his mind.  But had Paul meant that he would have said so.  But if Jesus promised to rise in three days and didn’t there is the possibility that the apostles who would have heard of this promise had they lived with him were mistaken or tricked by Satan.  He will actually rise later in the future.   We can reject what the Christians would say.

 

However, if Jesus had done miracles when alive even that would prove that there is a supernatural power and make it possible that somebody else could die for us and save us by the miracle of rising again.  All would not be lost and we could hope for somebody else.  The way Paul makes it a total catastrophe if Jesus hasn’t risen suggests that this thinking is wrong.  Therefore the resurrection was the first known miracle of Jesus.  The gospels lied when they said Jesus did miracles before his crucifixion.

 

When he had to remind the heretics that Adam was made from clay and so raising the dead from dust was possible they were not experts in theology or exceptionally well-instructed in religion.  He meant something simple – something they could understand.  He meant therefore that to say that all was lost if Jesus is dead at face value.  It was a dogma.

 

Paul said that even if you sincerely but wrongly believe Jesus rose you are to be pitied and you are still in your sins.  In saying that, Paul eliminates sincerity as sufficient for salvation so even the resurrection is useless without appearances in which Jesus will convey the gospel.  You need to know the gospel to be saved.  Orthodoxy is necessary.  When Paul says that all is lost if Jesus has not been raised he means that the resurrection is necessary for the appearances and appearances for the gospel to be taught and the gospel is the only way to salvation so if there is no resurrection there is no salvation.

 

He meant that the resurrection alone would have been a claim to fame for Jesus.  This would implying Jesus lived an ordinary life or that nobody knows what kind of life he had.  According to Paul, if Jesus has not risen and appeared there is no saviour and we are lost.  He never actually says that it is because the end of the world is coming soon according to the Old Testament prophets and the signs of the times.   Some say that to Paul, if Jesus were not the saviour nobody was for no one would come now to save us for time was running out. 

 

For Paul, if Jesus is still dead there is no reason to hope that he will rise and be the saviour meaning Paul saw nothing unusual or interesting, or perhaps that could be known, about Jesus’ historical life.