Then is Christ not risen. If the possibility of a resurrection be generically denied, it cannot in any instance be true. Yet you admit as Christians that Christ rose! and his resurrection "has begotten us again to a lively hope" ( 1 Peter 1:3 ; see 2 Corinthians 4:14 ; 1 Thessalonians 4:14 ; John 14:19 ). read more
Vain . You accepted our proclamation ( kerugma ) , yet it would be utterly void if its central testimony was false. The word translated "then" has a sort of ironic force—"after all," or "it seems." The whole argument is at once an argumentum ad hominem and a reductio ad absurdum. Your faith is also vain. For it would be faith in a crucified man, not in the risen Christ. read more
We are found. The word means, "we are proved to be," convicted of being false witnesses. False witnesses of God; i.e. concerning God. St. Paul does not shrink from the issue. It is not one—it could not be one—between truth and mistake, but between truth and falsehood. We have testified of God that he raised up Christ; rather, the Christ. "This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses" ( Acts 2:32 ; Acts 4:33 ; Acts 13:30 ). read more
This verse is a repetition of 1 Corinthians 15:13 , to emphasize the argument that the Christian faith in the Resurrection rests not on philosophic theory, but on an historic fact. read more
Now if Christ ... - Paul, having 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 stated the direct evidence for the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, proceeds here to demonstrate that the dead would rise, by showing how it followed from the fact that the Lord Jesus had risen, and by showing what consequences would follow from denying it. The whole argument is based on the fact that the Lord Jesus had risen. If that was admitted, he shows that it must follow that his people would also rise.Be preached - The word “preached”... read more
But if there be no resurrection of the dead - If the whole subject is held to be impossible and absurd, then it must follow that Christ is not “risen,” since there were the same difficulties in the way of raising him up which will exist in any case. He was dead and was buried. He had lain in the grave three days. His human soul had left the body. His frame had become cold and stiff. The blood had ceased to circulate, and the lungs to heave. In his case there was the same difficulty in raising... read more
And if Christ is not risen, then is our preaching vain - Another consequence which must follow if it be held that there was no resurrection, and consequently that Christ was not risen. it would be vain and useless to preach. The substance of their preaching was that Christ was raised up; and all their preaching was based on that. If that were not true, the whole system was false, and Christianity was an imposition. The word vain here seems to include the idea of useless, idle, false. It would... read more
Yea, and we are found - We are; or we shall be proved to be. It will follow, if the Lord Jesus was not raised up, that we have been false witnesses.Of God - Respecting God. It will be found that we have affirmed that which is not true of God; or have said that he has done that which he has not done. Nothing could be regarded as a greater crime than this, whatever might be the immediate subject under consideration. To bear false witness of a man, or to say that a man has done what he has not... read more
For if the dead rise not ... - This is a repetition of what is said in 1 Corinthians 15:13. It is repeated here, evidently, because of its importance. It was a great and momentous truth which would “bear” repetition, that if there was no resurrection, as some held, then it would follow that the Lord Jesus was not raised up. read more
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The Pulpit Commentary - 1 Corinthians 15:12-34
Denying the resurrection from the dead, and what the denial involves. Some of these Corinthian Christians denied that there would be a literal resurrection. They understood little or nothing of the idea of the body, of its uses intellectually and morally regarded, and of its partnership with the soul in all that concerned present probation and future reward. What had Grecian philosophy taught them? That the body was the seat of evil. What had Grecian art taught them? To admire the body for... read more