109 - The Defeat of Death: Apocalyptic Eschatology in I Corinthians 15 and Romans 5

The Defeat of Death: Apocalyptic Eschatology in I Corinthians 15 and Romans 5
By Martinus C. De Boer
Sheffield, Academic Press, 1988. 278 pp. $37.50.

This revised Union Theological Seminary (N.Y.) doctoral dissertation

110 - The Defeat of Death: Apocalyptic Eschatology in I Corinthians 15 and Romans 5

attempts to argue against Käsemann and Beker, in particular, that death has already been defeated through the resurrection of Christ and that such victory is not a future hope but a present reality. In order to substantiate this thesis, de Boer argues that death, in all its dimensions (as bodily demise, as spiritual or moral death and as eternal death), is interpreted in two different ways by apocalyptic Judaism. On the one hand, cosmological apocalyptic eschatology, also referred to as track 1, understands death as a sign of the hegemony of evil angelic powers. Only God, by reestablishing rightful claim on creation, can rectify this situation. On the other hand, in forensic Jewish apocalyptic eschatology, also referred to as track 2, the principle of human choice operates. Here the law is given as the solution and it is fidelity to that Law that will determine one's ultimate destiny.

Crucial for this thesis about the defeat of death is the exegesis not only of I Cor. 15 but also of Rom. 5:12-21. With regard to the former, it is unconvincing. To conclude that "the thrust of Paul's argument seems to be directed to establishing not the futurity of the resurrection but the reality and the certainty of such a resurrection" runs counter to Paul's entire line of thought in that chapter. With regard to the crucial text from Romans 5, it is argued that we find here a shift from the predominantly forensic terminology found in other parts of Romans, characteristic of Paul's conversation partners in Rome, to a predominantly cosmological terminology introduced by Paul. Much of this section contains rich insight, but it compartmentalizes what is far more fluid and dialectical in Paul's thought (as, for example, in Phil. 3:10-14, a text virtually ignored). Commenting on these two different types of eschatological patterns present in Paul, de Boer concludes that "in Romans, the vectors are pointed in the opposite direction, away from linearity and futurity to the paradoxical presence of eternal life now…". This heavy emphasis on the term "eternal life , which appears in Paul only four times (Rom. 2:7; 5:21; 6:22-23; Gal 6:8), not only does not support the thesis, but also overlooks the significant use by Paul of exclusively future oriented "salvation" language. Thus, this reviewer would sharply disagree with such assertions as "the 'first-fruits' contains within it and mediates the fulness of salvation…" or. that I Thess. 5:10 "obliterates the difference between the dead and the living…." Certainly Paul asserts that through Christ's death and resurrection the power of death has been overcome, but that proleptic reality is only to be actualized on the last day, on the day of resurrection. That is why the Apostle must insist: "But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ" (I Cor. 15:21). de Boer's alternative interpretation, keen and creative as it is, misses the mark.

Karl P. Donfried
Smith College
Northampton, Mass.