145 - The Spirit and the Congregation: Studies in I Corinthians 12-15

The Spirit and the Congregation:
Studies in I Corinthians 12-15
By Ralph P. Martin
Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 1984. 168 pp. $10.95.

Professor Martin of Fuller Theological Seminary offers a fresh and penetrating analysis of I Corinthians 12-15. He interacts with a wide spectrum of recent research, but focuses clearly on showing how Paul's struggle with a fairly recalcitrant congregation with its excesses of "spirituality" can be a

146 - The Spirit and the Congregation: Studies in I Corinthians 12-15

probing guide to the contemporary church, large segments of which are marked by an opposite tendency to a lack of focus and devotion.

Martin sees the main opposition to Paul in a gnosticizing tendency which devalued the body and held that the great transformation had already taken place in baptism. Against this, Paul strongly emphasized the bodily and corporate nature of the life of faith, and its anticipatory nature, since the great transformation lies in the future. Hence, chapter 15 is far more integrally related to chapters 12-14 than most students have seen.

William A. Beardslee
School of Theology at Claremont
Claremont, Calif.