Teks -- 1 Corinthians 15:15 (NET)

15:15 Also, we are found to be false witnesses about God, because we have testified against God that he raised Christ from the dead, when in reality he did not raise him, if indeed the dead are not raised.

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per frasa)

Robertson: 1Co 15:15 - False witnesses of God

False witnesses of God ( pseudomartures tou theou ).

Late word, but pseudomartureō , to bear false witness, old and common. The genitive (tou theou ) can be either subjective (in God’ s service) or objective (concerning God). Either makes good sense.

Robertson: 1Co 15:15 - Because we witnessed of God

Because we witnessed of God ( hoti emarturēsamen kata tou theou ).

Vulgate has adversus Deum . This is the more natural way to take kata and genitive, against God not as equal to peri (concerning). He would indeed make God play false in that case, if so be that the dead are not raised (eiper ara nekroi ouk egeirontai ). Condition of first class, assumed as true. Note both per intensive particle indeed and ara inferential particle therefore .

Wesley: 1Co 15:15 - If the dead rise not

If the very notion of a resurrection be, as they say, absurd and impossible.

JFB: 1Co 15:15 - testified of God

That is, concerning God. The rendering of others is, "against God" [Vulgate, ESTIUS, GROTIUS]: the Greek preposition with the genitive implies, not direct antagonism (as the accusative would mean), but indirect to the dishonor of God. English Version is probably better.

JFB: 1Co 15:15 - if so be

As they assert. It is not right to tell untrue stories, though they are told and seem for the glory of God (Job 13:7).

Calvin: 1Co 15:15 - We are also found to be false witnesses

15.We are also found to be false witnesses The other disadvantages, it is true, which he has just now recounted, were more serious, as regards us — that faith was made vain — that the whole doctrine of the gospel was useless and worthless, and that we were bereft of all hope of salvation. Yet this also was no trivial absurdity — that the Apostles, who were ordained by God to be the heralds of his eternal truth, were detected as persons who had deceived the world with falsehoods; for this tends to God’s highest dishonor.

The expression, false witnesses of God, we may understand in two ways — either that by lying they used the name of God under a false pretext, or that they were detected as liars, in testifying what they had received from God. The second of these I rather prefer, because it involves a crime that is much more heinous, and he had spoken previously as to men. ³⁶ Now, therefore, he teaches that, if the resurrection of Christ is denied, God is made guilty of falsehood in the witnesses that have been brought forward and hired by him. ³⁷ The reason, too, that is added, corresponds well — because they had declared what was false, not as from themselves, but from God.

I am at the same time well aware that there are some that give another rendering to the particle κατα The old interpreter renders it against. ³⁸ Erasmus, on the other hand — concerning. ³⁹ But, as it has also among the Greeks the force of ἀπό, (from,) this signification appeared to me to be more in accordance with the Apostle’s design. For he is not speaking here of the reputation of men, (as I have already stated, ⁴⁰) but he declares that God will be exposed to the charge of falsehood, inasmuch as what they publish has come forth from him.

TSK: 1Co 15:15 - we have // whom

faults, Exo 23:3; Job 13:7-10; Rom 3:7, Rom 3:8

we have : Act 2:24, Act 2:32, Act 4:10,Act 4:33, Act 10:39-42, Act 13:30-33, Act 20:21

whom : 1Co 15:13, 1Co 15:20

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per Ayat)

Poole: 1Co 15:15-16 - We are // if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised

Ver. 15,16. There is nothing in these two verses but what the apostle had before said, viz. That if Christ were not risen, the apostles’ preaching and the Corinthians’ believing were both of them vain and false. Only what the apostle, in the former verse, called preaching, he here calleth witnessing:

We are (saith he) false witnesses of God To be false witnesses for men, or in the name of men, is against the ninth commandment, and a sin of no ordinary magnitude; but to be a false witness of God, is a much higher sin. This title of witnesses was at first given to the apostles by Christ, Act 1:8 ; afterwards often (especially in the Acts) applied to them, Act 1:22 2:32 4:33 5:32 10:39,41 : particularly Paul applieth it to himself, Act 22:15 26:16 . It is true, the apostles, who either saw Christ while he was on earth after his resurrection, or in heaven, as Paul did, Act 9:1-43 , were in the strictest sense eye witnesses; but yet in a larger sense this notion agreeth to all ministers, who testify, upon the hearing of the ears, and upon reading the Scriptures, the same thing which the apostles testified, though not upon the same evidence. Now to aifirm a thing, as from God, for truth, which is in itself false, is a very high transgression; which (saith the apostle) we must be guilty of, if Christ be not raised; and

if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised

Haydock: 1Co 15:13-23

He brings many reasons to convince them of the resurrection. 1. If there be no resurrection for others, Christ is not risen again: but his resurrection (as he tells them ver. 4) was foretold in the Scriptures. 2. And if Christ be not risen again,...your faith is also in vain, this being one of the chief articles of your belief. 3. We should be found guilty of lies and impostures; and yet we have confirmed this doctrine by many miracles. 4. It would follow that you are not freed from your sins; i.e. unless Christ, by his resurrection, has triumphed over sin and death. 5. Without a resurrection we Christians, who live under self-denials and persecutions, would be the most miserable of all men, neither happy in this world nor in the next, for the happiness of the soul requires also a happy resurrection of the body. 6. Christ is the first-fruits, and the first begotten of the dead, of those who have slept: and by his being the first-fruits, it must be supposed that others also will rise after him. 7. As death came by the first man, ( Adam ) so the second man (Christ) came to repair the death of men, both as to body and soul; and without Christ's resurrection, both the souls of men have remained dead in their original sins, and their bodies shall not rise again. (Witham)

Gill: 1Co 15:15 - Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God // because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he raised not up, if so be the dead rise not

Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God,.... The apostles were chosen to be witnesses of the resurrection of Christ; he appeared to them, and was seen by them for this purpose; and they were sent into all the world, to bear their testimony to this truth, which they accordingly did: now if Christ is not risen, they have bore a false testimony; and what greater scandal, or a more odious character can be fixed upon a man, than to be a false witness? but God forbid that such an imputation should be fastened upon the holy apostles of Christ, who cannot be thought to have any sinister end in publishing such a falsehood; who were sure on account of declaring it, and abiding by it, to meet with nothing but hatred, reproach, persecution, poverty, and death; but this is not all, nor the worst; for if they are false witnesses, they are false witnesses of God; they are of his suborning; he selected them as witnesses; he must put this lie into their mouths, and send them into the world under his authority to publish it; than which to say nothing can be thought of more blasphemous and execrable; and yet this must follow, upon a denial of the resurrection of Christ:

because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he raised not up, if so be the dead rise not; it may be read, "we have testified against God", as the Vulgate Latin does; for as it must be bringing a false testimony from God, so it must be bearing a false testimony against him, to say that he raised Christ from the dead, when he is not risen; which must be the case, if there is no resurrection of the dead.