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GENERAL AUDIENCE OF WEDNESDAY, 10 FEBRUARY
During the general audience of Wednesday, 10 February, John Paul II
continued his catechesis on the resurrection of the body.
1. From Christ's words on the future resurrection of the body, recorded
by all three synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark and Luke), our reflections
have brought us to what St. Paul wrote on the subject in the First Letter
to the Corinthians (ch. 15). Our analysis is centered above all on what
might be called the anthropology of the resurrection according to St.
Paul. He contrasts the state of the "earthly" man (i.e., historical) with
the state of the risen man, characterizing in a lapidary and at the same
time penetrating manner, the interior system of forces specific to each of
these states.
Radical transformation
2. That this interior system of forces should undergo a radical
transformation would seem to be indicated, first of all, by the contrast
between the weak body and the body full of power. Paul writes: "What is
sown is perishable; what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in
dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in
power" (1 Cor 15:42-45). "Weak," therefore, is the description of the body
whichin metaphysical termsrises from the temporal soil of humanity.
The Pauline metaphor corresponds likewise to the scientific terminology
which defines man's beginning as a body by the use of the same term (semen,
seed).
If, in the Apostle's view, the human body which arises from earthly
seed is weak, this means not only that it is perishable, subject to death,
and to all that leads to it, but also that it is an animal body.(1) The
body full of power, however, which man will inherit from the second Adam,
Christ, in virtue of the future resurrection, will be a spiritual body. It
will be imperishable, no longer subject to the threat of death. Thus the
antinomy, weakfull of power, refers explicitly not only to the body
considered separately, but also to the whole constitution of man
considered in his corporeal nature. Only within the framework of such a
constitution can the body become spiritual: and this spiritualization
of the body will be the source of its power and incorruptibility (or
immortality).
3. This theme has its origin already in the first chapter of Genesis.
It can be said that St. Paul sees the reality of the future resurrection
as a certain restitutio in integrum, that is, as the reintegration
and at the same time as the attaining of the fullness of humanity. It is
not truly a restitution, because in that case the resurrection would be,
in a certain sense, a return to the state which the soul enjoyed before
sin, apart from the knowledge of good and evil (cf. Gn 1-2). But such a
return does not correspond to the internal logic of the whole economy of
salvation, to the most profound meaning of the mystery of the
redemption. Restitutio in integrum, linked with the resurrection
and the reality of the other world, can only be an introduction to a new
fullness. This will be a fullness that presupposes the whole of
human history, formed by the drama of the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil (cf. Gn 3) and at the same time permeated by the text of the First
Letter to the
Corinthians.
Perfect harmonization
4. According to the text of First Corinthians, man, in whom
concupiscence prevails over the spiritual, that is, the "animal body" (1
Cor 15:44), is condemned to death. He should rise, however, as a spiritual
body, man in whom the Spirit will achieve a just supremacy over the body,
spirituality over sensuality. It is easy to understand that Paul is here
thinking of sensuality as the sum total of the factors limiting human
spirituality, that is, as a force that "ties down" the spirit (not
necessarily in the Platonic sense) by restricting its own faculty of
knowing (seeing) the truth and also the faculty to will freely and to love
in truth. However, here it cannot be a question of that fundamental
function of the senses which serves to liberate spirituality, that is to
say, of the simple faculty of knowing and willing proper to the
psychosomatic compositum of the human subject.
Just as one speaks of the resurrection of the body, that is, of man in
his true corporeal nature, consequently the spiritual body should mean
precisely the perfect sensitivity of the senses, their perfect
harmonization with the activity of the human spirit in truth and
liberty. The animal body, which is the earthly antithesis of the spiritual
body, indicates sensuality as a force prejudicial to man, precisely
because while living"in
the knowledge of good and evil"he
is often attracted and impelled toward evil.
Influence of the Holy Spirit on man
5. It cannot be forgotten that here it is not so much a question of
anthropological dualism, but of a basic antinomy. Constituting it is not
only the body (as the Aristotelian hyle), but also the soul, or man
as a "living being" (cf. Gn 2:7). Its constituents areon
the one hand, the whole man, the sum total of his psychosomatic
subjectivity, inasmuch as he remains under the influence of the vivifying
Spirit of Christ,on
the other hand, the same man inasmuch as he resists and opposes this
Spirit. In the second case man is an animal body (and his works are works
of the flesh). If, however, he remains under the influence of the Holy
Spirit, man is spiritual (and produces the "fruit of the Spirit") (Gal
5:22).
6. Consequently, it can be said that we are dealing with the
anthropology of the resurrection not only in First Corinthians 15, but
that the whole of St. Paul's anthropology (and ethics) are permeated with
the mystery of the resurrection through which we have definitively
received the Holy Spirit. Chapter 15 of First Corinthians constitutes the
Pauline interpretation of the other world and of man's state in that
world. In it each one, together with the resurrection of the body, will
fully participate in the gift of the vivifying Spirit, that is, in the
fruit of Christ's resurrection.
Christ's reply
7. Concluding the analysis of the anthropology of the resurrection
according to First Corinthians, it is fitting to turn our minds again to
Christ's words on the resurrection and on the other world which the
evangelists Matthew, Mark and Luke quote. We recall that in his reply to
the Sadducees, Christ linked faith in the resurrection with the entire
revelation of the God of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob and of Moses (Mt
22:32). At the same time, while rejecting the objection proposed by those
who questioned him, he uttered these significant words: "When they rise
from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage" (Mk 12:25).
We devoted our previous reflections to these words in their immediate
context, passing on then to the analysis of St. Paul's First Letter to the
Corinthians (1 Cor 15).
These reflections have a fundamental significance for the whole
theology of the body, for an understanding both of marriage and of
celibacy for the kingdom of heaven. Our further analyses will be devoted
to this latter subject.
NOTE
1. The original Greek uses the term psychikon. In St. Paul it is
found only in First Corinthians (2:14; 15:44; 15:46) and not elsewhere,
probably because of the pre-gnostic tendencies of the Corinthians, and it
has a pejorative connotation. As regards its meaning, it corresponds to
the term "carnal" (cf. 2 Cor 1:12; 10:4).
However, in the other Pauline letters, "psyche" and its derivatives
signify man in his manifestations, the individual's way of living, and
even the human person in a positive sense (e.g., to indicate the ideal of
life of the ecclesial community: miโ-i
psych๊-i
= "in one spiritPhil
1:27; sympsychoi = "by being of the same mind"Phil
2:2; is๓psychon
"like him"Phil
2:20; cf. R. Jewett, Paul's Anthropological Terms. A Study of Their Use
in Conflict Settings [Leiden: Brill, 1971], pp. 2, 448-449).
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