(avg. read time: 3–6 mins.)
As hinted in the previous part, in order to understand Paul’s theology of resurrection, particularly the connection of resurrection with the salvific union with Christ, one must consider the involvement of the Holy Spirit. After all, believers are able to be “in Christ” because it is the Spirit who incorporates them, conforms them to him, and enables them to participate in him. In the case of resurrection, as in the original creation, God gives life by the Spirit, with whom Christ is also linked, so that the Spirit is the Spirit of Christ and Christ is described as the life-giving Spirit in 1 Cor 15:44–45. There is much that can be said about this link, and I have explored it in some detail in my dissertation, but I will wait until later to give but a brief summary of it here.
But this notion of the Spirit being linked with Christ in such an intimate sense, and the further connection of the Spirit with resurrection, appears elsewhere beyond 1 Cor 15 (where the Spirit’s role is not as explicit). The Spirit is linked to Jesus’s resurrection in Rom 1:4 and 1 Tim 3:16 (where Paul focuses more on the vindication aspect of Jesus’s resurrection). The description of the Spirit as the “Spirit of Christ” in Rom 8:9 is linked to the larger point of describing the Spirit as the Spirit of life and of linking the Spirit with the God who raised Jesus from the dead, since the presence of this same Spirit serves as a guarantee of our own resurrection (8:1–11). Later in this same chapter, Paul links having the firstfruits of the Spirit with the redemption of our bodies in resurrection (8:23). He makes the same point in 2 Cor 5:1–5 in referring to the Spirit as the down-payment for our transformation in resurrection (cf. 3:18; Titus 3:4–7).
In 1 Corinthians itself, Paul makes a point of how the Spirit unites the members of the Church with one another in one body and unites them with Christ, who is their head (12). In describing them as a body, he also describes them as the temple of the Holy Spirit (3:16). When describing the concrete body in 6:19, he makes the same point of how the body is meant to be a temple for the Holy Spirit. Indeed, Paul’s argument in 6:12–20 about glorifying God with the body is dependent, inter alia, on the logical link between resurrection (v. 14), union with Christ (v. 15), and the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit (vv. 17, 19).
As for 1 Cor 15 itself, our attention is drawn to vv. 44–45 with its curious descriptions of the σῶμα πνευματικόν and of Christ as the life-giving Spirit. The most basic meaning of the -ικος suffix is to signify a relationship of “belonging to” or “pertaining to” the root. This suffix generally indicates an ethical, functional, or dynamic relationship of characteristic. Many scholars thus understand the term as referring to what governs or animates the σῶμα, which also fits with the contrasting adjective of ψυχικόν. In summary, one can define the range of meaning for πνευματικός that is relevant to the NT as, “pertaining or belonging to wind, air, breath, or spirit/Spirit in character/nature, particularly by motivation or dynamic action, often ethically or functionally.” As noted already, the context indicates more specifically that the body pertains to the Spirit, rather than the other possibilities. Conversely, ψυχικός could be defined as, “pertaining or belonging to the present and mortal animating life-force” (often translated as “soul”).
The pregnant meaning of σῶμα πνευματικόν has at least three levels. One, it signifies the Spirit’s animation and governance of the resurrection body in the contrast to how ψυχή animates and governs the present body. Most scholars have noted this, but I think it is ultimately too restrictive an understanding in this context, not least because Paul’s other uses of the adjective confirm that the suffix has a more general sense of “belonging to.” Two, that broader sense of the suffixed term is helpful for signifying union with Christ the life-giver, who communicates resurrection life with the Spirit (vv. 44b–45). Three, considering the many observations made about the cosmic context of resurrection belief in this chapter, and considering the combined somatic and cosmic resonances of the previous contrasts, one should similarly see here that the phrase signifies the suitability of the resurrection body for the new creation, which will still feature bodies, but of a different kind according to God’s purposes. It will be a body more appropriate for a world in which there is a closer union with God than is possible in the present world, as the new creation is where sin, death, and their effects on mortality have been completely removed, and where the body and everything it interacts with will know the everlasting life of God, which is part and parcel of the kingdom reality of God being “all in all” mentioned in the rhetorically parallel segment.
As for the description of Christ as the “life-giving Spirit” here, it has some link with the fact that Spirit is sometimes called the “Spirit of Christ” or some related name (cf. Rom 8:9; Gal 4:6; Phil 1:19), since it is through the Spirit that Christ communicates his resurrection life and all that pertains thereto (cf. Rom 8). Paul’s close identification of Christ and the Spirit in the same text as he describes Christ as the Last Adam thus presents Christ on both sides of the God-human relationship. He is on the human side by virtue of being the Last Adam, the new progenitor of humanity, and the prototype of the new creation. He is on the side of God by virtue of communicating divine qualities and life to those in union with him, being Lord, being worthy of worship with God, and being identified with the life-giving Spirit (or as the source of life, as in Rom 5:17; 8:1–11; 2 Cor 4:8–10). Notably, vv. 22 and 45 use the same verb to indicate that Christ’s own resurrection is the basis of the believers’ (cf. vv. 13–16, 20). Each kind of progeny also receives a body apposite to the progenitor, meaning that believers will wear the image of the resurrected one when they receive bodies of a πνευματικός nature like the Last Adam’s. When they are raised as bodies belonging to the Spirit, the Spirit of Christ will animate their bodies by virtue of their spiritual generative union with Christ (cf. 1 Cor 6:12–20). Indeed, Paul’s use of the term πνευματικός as a modifier of the body signifies its nature as being somehow derived from the Spirit.
The bonds and identifications laid out here demonstrate the roots of Trinitarian theology. In particular, it shows a principle that was crucial to Trinitarian monotheism from early on: opera trinitatis ad extra sunt indivisa (the external operations of the Trinity are indivisible). Distinct roles may be discerned in the various actions of God, but all of God’s actions are triune in that every member of the Godhead, by virtue of being one God, is involved in the action. This is signified in several of Paul’s teachings linking the three persons of the Trinity, such as 1 Cor 12:4–6; 2 Cor 1:21–22; 13:13; Gal 4:6; Eph 4:4–6; 2 Thess 2:13. The principle is most explicitly connected to resurrection in the case of Rom 8:9–11, as Paul mentions all three persons in reference to resurrection.