2 Corinthians 5:16

16. Henceforth After the full, constraining effect of Christ’s death upon us.

After the flesh In contrast with after the spirit. Romans 8:1. After the unregenerate nature. Under the power of the Spirit resultant from Christ’s death, the renovated man (see next verse) sees things in a new aspect. In his renewal all things else appear renewed. As consecrated to Christ he is a devoted being; in the full assurance of faith things eternal are the sole realities, and things of time become transient and subordinate; and in the full assurance of hope he sees that the priceless benefits, the eternal results of Christ’s death and resurrection, are his. He, therefore, henceforth knows no thing and no man after the flesh. And St. Paul means to say, that his own living in the full realization of this renewed state is the cause why he is held by fleshly men as beside himself, 2 Corinthians 5:13.

Christ after the flesh Supremely does the eye of the renewed man behold Christ in a new light. Rationalism may pronounce him only “a great religious genius;”

Judeo-Christianism may hold him a mere prophet-reformer; but the man who has truly felt the power of his death beholds Christ as the divine though human, the dying yet ever-living, source of our transcendent life. The phrase known Christ after the flesh, does not in itself necessarily signify to have seen Christ while he lived on earth. There is no valid reason for supposing that Paul ever so saw the living Jesus. And yet it is difficult to avoid supposing that he here does allude to some boast of his opposers, that they had seen and heard the personal Jesus.