Bible. New Testament -- Criticism, interpretation, etc.; Jesus Christ -- Historicity
[300] An attempt is now being made to prove the contrary, citing 2
Cor. v. 16, which runs: "Wherefore we henceforth know no man after
the flesh: even though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet
now we know him so no more." The passage has been most differently
explained. According to Baur the "Christ after the flesh" refers to
the Jewish Messiah, the expected king and earthly Saviour of the Jews
from political and social distress, in whom even Paul believed at
an earlier date; and the meaning of the passage quoted is that this
sensuous and earthly conception of the Messiah had given place in him
to the spiritual conception ("Die Christuspartei in der kor. Gemeinde
Tüb. Ztschr.," 1831, 4 Heft, 90). According to Heinrici the "even
though we have known" is not a positive assertion of a point of view
which had once determined his judgment of Christ, but a hypothetical
instance, which excludes a false point of view without asserting
anything as to its actuality ("Komment," 289). According to Beyschlag
the passage is to be understood as asserting that Paul had seen Jesus
at Jerusalem during his life on earth. But with Paul there is no
talk of a mere seeing, but rather of a knowing. Lütgert disproves
all these different hypotheses with the argument that the words
"after the flesh" refer not to Christ but to the verb. "The apostle
no longer knows any one 'after the flesh,' and so he no longer knows
Jesus thus. At an earlier stage his knowledge of Christ was 'after
the flesh.' At that time he did not have the spirit of God which made
him able to see in Jesus the Son of God. Paul then is not protecting
himself from the Jews, who denied him a personal knowledge of Jesus,
but from the Pneumatics, who denied him a pneumatic knowledge of Jesus"
("Freiheitspredigt und Schwarmgeister in Korinth," 1908, 55-58).
[301] Gal. i. 11, 12; 1 Cor. ii. 10; 2 Cor. iv. 6.
[302] Gal. i. 17-19.
[303] Gal. ii. 1 sqq.
[304] Id. i. 19.
[305] Matt. xxviii. 10; Mark xiii. 33 sqq.; John xx. 17.
[306] In the opinion of the Dutch school of theologians, whom Schläger
follows in his essay, "Das Wort kürios (Herr) in Seiner Bezichung auf
Gott oder Jesus Christus" ("Theol. Tijdschrift," 33, 1899, Part I.),
this mention of the "Brother of the Lord" does not come from Paul;
as according to Schläger, all the passages in 1 Cor., which speak of
Jesus under the title "Kurios," are interpolated. "Missionary travels
of Brothers of Jesus are unknown to us from any other quarter, and
are also in themselves improbable" (op. cit., 46; cf. also Steck,
op. cit., 272 sq.).
[307] Similarly Origen, "Contra Celsum," i. 35; cf. Smith, op. cit.,
18 sq.
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