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Dying and Rising with Christ

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

Eduard Schweizer
Affiliation:
Zürich, Switzerland

Extract

The relation of the so-called ‘mystical’ to the so-called ‘juridical’ aspect of Paul's theology has been frequently discussed. While Albert Schweitzer thought that the doctrine of justification by faith was no more than a ‘side-crater’ in the Pauline theology, Rudolf Bultmann considered the idea of a participation in the destiny of Christ a Gnostic influence not really fitting into the Pauline pattern of thought. This disagreement is not of merely historical interest; behind it lies the central theological problem of the significance of Jesus' life, death and resurrection for us today. Is this significance to be expressed in the categories of an example to be followed or a forerunner, who opens the way ahead for us, or are the categories of sacrificial or vicarious death more adequate? At first sight, the two patterns seem to contradict each other. According to the first, the believer dies with Christ; Christ's death becomes the believer's death; according to the second, Christ dies under the curse of divine judgement, lest the believer undergo this judgement. However, the first observation that we make in the Pauline texts is the coincidence of both lines in the same sentence: II Cor. v. 14: ‘One has died for all; therefore all have died’; I Thess. v. 10: ‘Christ died for us so that whether we wake or sleep we might live with him.’

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1967

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References

page 1 note 1 Schweitzer, A., Die Mystik des Apostel Paulus (Tübingen, 1930), p. 220Google Scholar. Cf. Bultmann, R., Theologie des N.T. ch. 33, 35Google Scholar. The most recent and very helpful discussion of this problem is to be found in Tannehill, R. C., ‘Dying and Rising with Christ’, Beiheft ZNW, xxxiii (1966). CfGoogle Scholar. also Thüsing, W., ‘Per Christum in Deum’, Neutestamentliche Abhandlungen, N.F. 1 (1965)Google Scholar, and Güttgemanns, E., Der leidende Apostel und sein Herr (1966)Google Scholar, also Schweizer, E., Ev. Theol. 26 (1966), pp. 239–57.Google Scholar

page 1 note 2 Cf. Tannehill, (op. cit. note 1), pp. 69, 133f., who also refers to Phil. iii. 2–11 (p. 115).Google Scholar

page 1 note 3 Cf. note 5, p. 2.

page 2 note 1 Pace Dupont, J., , L'union avec le Christ suivant St Paul, 1 (1952), pp. 172–81.Google Scholar

page 2 note 2 Considered as a fragment of a pre-Pauline hymn by Güttgemanns (cf. note 1, p. 1), pp. 240f.

page 2 note 3 The same idea is probably expressed as early as I Thess. v. 10, cf. below.

page 2 note 4 Cf. Dupont (cf. note 1), p. 42; the New English Bible against RSV; and Thüsing (cf. note 1, p. 1), p. 202.

page 2 note 5 Some manuscripts read ‘with Christ’, some also ‘in him’; but the rendering given above represents probably the correct reading. Cf. Tannehill (cf. note 1, p. 1), 99, n. 1.

page 3 note 1 To be sure, the verb is in the aorist (Tannehill [cf. note 1, p. 1], pp. 133f., who interprets therefore in the former sense); however, exactly the same is true for Rom. vi. 4c.

page 3 note 2 Schnackenburg, R., Das Heilsgeschehen bei der Taufe nach dem Apostel Paulus (Münchener Theol. Studien, hist. Abt. 1 [1950]), pp. 5760.Google Scholar

page 4 note 1 The idea of man becoming, through Christ, the image of God is for Thüsing (cf. note 1, p. 1), pp. 122–4, etc. the key to understanding man's participation in the life of the Risen Lord. Cf. also note 2, p. 11 below.

page 4 note 2 I agree with Tannehill (cf. note 1, p. 1), pp. 7–14, 41–3, etc. that the baptismal context in Rom. vi belongs to a pre-Pauline tradition and that, on the whole, Paul himself does not emphasize baptism in most of the passages quoted above. Cf. note 1, p. 1.

page 4 note 3 Marsh, H. G., The Origin and Significance of New Testament Baptism (1941), p. 28Google Scholar; Kraeling, C. H., John the Baptist (1951), pp. 117fGoogle Scholar. Cf also Gnilka, T., Revue de Qumrân, iii (1961), pp. 204f.Google Scholar

page 4 note 4 Kraeling, , pp. 171–5.Google Scholar

page 4 note 5 Cullmann, O., Vorträge und Aufsätze (1966), pp. 529f.Google Scholar

page 4 note 6 In a mimeographed paper: Die Kindertaufe im ältesten Christentum (1965), pp. 4f.Google Scholar

page 5 note 1 I should not say that he expects nothing from the future, but certainly not the kingdom of God in the old sense which this connotation has in the Synoptists. I think that v. 28f.; vi. 51–8; xii. 48d are traditional sentences or phrases taken up by the evangelist, but cf., in his own language, xi. 25f.; xii. 25; xiv. 3; xvii. 24.

page 5 note 2 For a modern variant of this thesis, cf. Güttgemanns (cf. note 1, p. 1), pp. 67–93; his pre-supposition that a fully developed myth of the Saviour's identity with the saved people was known in Corinth still seems to me a hypothesis without evidence.

page 5 note 3 It might be that this expression was borrowed from a first line of the hymn quoted in i. 15–20; for Wildberger, H. has shown in Theologische Zeitschrift, xxi (1965), 500 that it occurs rather frequently in Egyptian texts (up to the time of the New Testament) together with the concept of the image of God (v. 15). For the meaning of baptism cf. n. 5, p. 7; n. 1, p. 14.Google Scholar

page 6 note 1 Armin, V.. 11, 191; III, 265.Google Scholar

page 6 note 2 Ant, M.. 11, 1; Terentius Varro (Augustinus, Civ. Dei 22, 28).Google Scholar

page 6 note 3 Kittel, Theol. Wörterbuch, 1, 686, 8ff. (F. Büchsel); Corp. Hem. xiii, where it occurs ten times, is of a very late date.

page 6 note 4 Philon, , Post. Cain. 124Google Scholar; Cicero, , Att. 6Google Scholar; Josephus, , Ant. 11, 66; cf., in the second century A.D., Lucianus, Enc. Mus. 7 (the Platonic rebirth of the soul).Google Scholar

page 6 note 5 Cf. Sjöberg, E. in Studio Theol. iv (1951), 60 ff.Google Scholar, also Strecker, G., Der Weg der Gerechtigkeit (1962), p. 238, n. 3Google Scholar. For a Hebrew parallel cf. 1QS 4, 25 (Dupont, J., Biblica 45, p. 365).Google Scholar

page 6 note 6 The middle voice means ‘to let oneself be washed’ (Schnackenburg [cf. note 2, p. 3], pp. 1 f.; E. Lohse, Taufe und Rechtfertigung bei Paulus, Kerygma und Dogma, xi [1965], 322).

page 7 note 1 Although ‘sealing’ is not yet a technical term for baptism (Schnackenburg, pp. 81–3), the passage deals probably with it and not only with the apostolic vocation (against Schnackenburg, pp. 84f.).

page 7 note 2 Cf. II Cor. v. 5; Eph. i. 13f.

page 7 note 3 Cf. Stuhlmacher, P., Gerechtigkeit Gottes bei Paulus (1965), pp. 186f.Google Scholar

page 7 note 4 Cf. the baptismal phrase ‘to put on the Lord’ (Gal. iii. 27) in v. 14, and Lohse (cf. n. 6, p. 6), p. 323.

page 7 note 5 Cf. the mention of baptism in v. 2 and Jeremias, J. in Kittel, Theol. Wörterbuch iv p. 874. Again, the reference to baptism belongs, of course, to the tradition rather than to Paul himself (cf. note 2, p. 4 above). For Paul, baptism marks mainly the beginning of the new way of faith.Google Scholar

page 8 note 1 Again, I agree with Tannehill's (cf. note 1, p. i) statement that the idea of dying with Christ is different from that of living with Christ in or after the parousia (p. 88, n. 14), and that the former is rooted in pre-Pauline tradition (cf. note 2, p. 4 above). However, I am suggesting that the phrase ‘with Christ’ (with which Tannehill is not dealing, p. 6) originates in an apocalyptic view of the future life and was, before and independently of Paul, transferred to the area of ideas about a new life gained by baptism. On the other hand, baptism was traditionally connected with the death of Jesus (Mark x. 38; Luke xii. 50), although not with the phrase ‘with Christ’. Thus, it would be Paul, who in contrast to an understanding of baptism as a mere rising with Christ to a divine life, finally defined it as ‘dying with Christ’.

page 9 note 1 That Gal. iv. 4f. simply takes up the idea of iii. 13 is proved by the mention of the law and the term , which, within Paul's undisputed letters, is restricted to these two passages. In Rom. viii. 3, the phrase άμαρτίας, going back to Lev. ix. 2f.; xii. 6, 8; xiv. 22, 31; xv. 15, 30; xvi. 3, 5; xxiii. 19; also v. 6, 11; vii. 37, is certainly not a later addition, but Paul's reinterpretation of the pattern in the light of Christ's sacrificial death. Cf. Schweizer, E., ‘Zum religionsgeschichtlichen Hintergrund der “Sendungsformel” Gal. iv. 4f., Röm. viii. 3f., Joh. iii. 16f., I Joh. iv. 9’, ZNW, LVII (1966), 199210.Google Scholar

page 9 note 2 Cf., however, Fitter, G., ‘Der Ort der Versöhnung nach Paulus’, Theologische Zeitschrift, xxii (1866), 161–83.Google Scholar

page 10 note 1 Cf. II Macc. vii. 38; IV Macc. i. ii; vi. 29; xvii. 21f.

page 10 note 2 Cf. note 1, p. 14.

page 11 note 1 Cf. Schweizer, E., in Kittel, Theol. Wörterbuch, vii, 131, 20 ff.Google Scholar

page 11 note 2 ‘Gottesgerechtigkeit bei Paulus’, in Exegetische Versuche und Besinnungen, 11 (1964), 181–93. I should think that this category, used also extensively in Tannehill (cf. note 1, p. 1), e.g. pp. 14–20, 123–9, is more adequate to Paul's thinking than either Thüsing's or Güttgemann's stimulating new formulations (cf. note 1, p. 1). The former emphasizes the corporate body of the exalted Lord, to be conceived of in ontological terms, into which the believer is transferred in the sacrament (for Rom. vi especially pp. 67–93, 134–43). However, his understanding of the life of the exalted Christ as directed towards God so that sharing it means sharing a life of obedience in which God becomes the only goal (262 f.), comes rather near to Käsemann's concept, and is a real progress in Pauline interpretation. The latter's emphasis on the Christological aspect of Paul's theology (203–6, for Rom. vi cf. 212f.) is certainly helpful. He also rightly opposes a merely mythological concept of the body of the risen Lord (e.g. 330–44). But I doubt whether his stress on the ‘eschatological’ character of the time of Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection which bridges the gap between A.D. 30 and today, is sufficient for explaining Paul's view (cf. e.g. 118–21, 195–8, 222f.). His strict denial of a concept of an individual body of the risen Lord (247–70) or of the apostle's membership in the body of Christ (323) does not seem to do justice to the texts.Google Scholar

page 12 note 1 I understand άνοχή as it is understood in ii. 4, and interpret πάρεσις as a provisional allowing to pass, not identical with άφεσις. Hence the formerly committed sins are those which had been committed before Christ's death.

page 13 note 1 I Cor. xii. 8f. δά το⋯ πνεύματος is totally synonymous with κατά τό πνε⋯μα. Very similar is it in Rom. viii. 4–9 (cf. 13f.), and in Rom. i. 4 κατά τό πνε⋯μα designates the sphere which determines the new, heavenly existence of Christ. Cf. also Thüsing (cf. note 1, p. 1), pp. 39–45.

page 13 note 2 Cf. note 2, p. 9.

page 14 note 1 We cannot deal here with the difficult problem of the relation of the ‘once for all’ of Christ's crucifixion and resurrection to the ‘once for him’ of the individual baptism. For Paul, the establishment of the Lordship of Christ clearly took place around the year A.D. 30 in Palestine, although it becomes valid for us in our baptism as the beginning of our faith.

page 14 note 2 A last image may illustrate Paul's emphasis. If I want to know about a performance of Shakespeare's Macbeth, I must ask somebody who was present. A totally ‘objective’ observer might tell me that 250 electric bulbs were burning, etc. Thus, I must ask somebody who really got engaged. If, however, this one told me merely about his subjective experiences (‘I tell you, I had tears in my eyes during the second act, and my heart was beating wildly during the third…’) he would not help me at all, since I want to know what happened on the stage and not in the hearts of the audience. Therefore, the witnesses of the New Testament, just because they are totally engaged, do not tell us about their own engagement, but about God's deeds.