Post
by Candlepower » Sun Jan 23, 2011 11:33 am
TK,
You come up with such good points of discussion.
It could have been a slip of Paul's pen, but perhaps there is another solution to the problem you presented. First, I think Paul deserves the benefit of the doubt. Probably he was too astute to have forgotten that Judas had died and had not witnessed the resurrected Christ. Matthias, however, though he was not an Apostle until after the ascension, had witnessed the resurrected Jesus, as Paul knew. When Paul wrote I Cor. 15:4-5, I think "The twelve" referred to the twelve Apostles at the time of Paul's writing, even though one of them was not an Apostle (only a witness) at the time of the resurrection. I think Paul was saying that all of the twelve current Apostles actually witnessed the resurrected Christ.
Here's what I think might be an illustration. If I said, "The United states defeated Germany in WWII," would that be true? Well, it would, and it wouldn't. It would depend on what I meant by the U.S. If I meant the U.S. as constituted in 1945, then my statement would be true. But if I meant the U.S. as presently constituted, it would technically be inaccurate because in 1945 Hawaii and Alaska were not member States in the United States. But by saying that the U.S. won WWII, it is commonly understood that I'm not implying that Hawaii and Alaska were member States in the U.S. in 1945. We understand that when I say U.S., I'm speaking of an entity consisting of a changeable membership. The U.S. was the U.S. with 13 members; it is the U.S. with 50 members. If the South had won the war, the U.S. would have remained, but with a different membership.
In speaking of "The Twelve" in this instance,I think Paul meant the group entity regardless of its membership past or present. All of the Apostles contemporaneous with Paul had see the resurrected Christ, including Matthias. I think that's the essential point Paul was making, as I understand it, even though the way he worded it may have led to some head scratching.
CP
