1Cor 15:36-37 | RWP | e4.org | Thou foolish one ( αφρων ). Old word ( α privative, φρην ), lack of sense. It is a severe term and justified by the implication "that the objector plumes himself on his acuteness" (Robertson and Plummer). Proleptic position of συ (thou) sharpens the point. Sceptics (agnostics) pose as unusually intellectual (the intelligentsia), but the pose does not make one intelligent. Except it die ( εαν μη αποθανη ). Condition of third class, possibility assumed. This is the answer to the "how" question. In plant life death precedes life, death of the seed and then the new plant.

‏ 1 Corinthians 15:36-37

Thou foolish one ( αφρων ). Old word ( α privative, φρην ), lack of sense. It is a severe term and justified by the implication "that the objector plumes himself on his acuteness" (Robertson and Plummer). Proleptic position of συ (thou) sharpens the point. Sceptics (agnostics) pose as unusually intellectual (the intelligentsia), but the pose does not make one intelligent.

Except it die ( εαν μη αποθανη ). Condition of third class, possibility assumed. This is the answer to the "how" question. In plant life death precedes life, death of the seed and then the new plant.

Not the body which shall be ( ου το σωμα το γενησομενον ). Articular future participle of γινομα, literally, "not the body that will become." The new

body ( σωμα ) is not yet in existence, but only the seed ( κοκκος, grain, old word, as in Mt 13:31).

It may chance ( ε τυχο ). Fourth class condition as in 14:10 which see. Paul is rich in metaphors here, though usually not so (Howson, Metaphors of St. Paul). Paul was a city man. We sow seeds, not plants (bodies). The butterfly comes out of the dying worm.