Center of Pauline theology?

In my book, Christ's Body in Corinth, I am not rejecting the power of unity or its need for a strong community in a Corinthian context. But the real issue or question is, what kind of unity are we talking about? Unity in 1 Corinthians, as I read, is centered upon Christ's cross -- Christ crucified. This unity criticizes any abusive, oppressive, destructive powers of the community and in society. So members of the community are asked to live through this image of Christ's life and death -- what I would call "Christic embodiment." As Christ sacrificed for "others" in a real world, so members of the community are exhorted to live like that. Because of this reading in a historical situation, I view "soma christou" (body of Christ) as an attributive genitive -- which we can see in Romans 6: "body of sin" as sinful body (sin-ruling body). In the same manner, "body of Christ" is Christ-ruling body or Christ-like body. So you are Christ-ruling body; you are Christ-like body (1 Cor 12:27). This reading of genitive is very different from the traditional objective genitive, in which "body of Christ" is understood as a community belonging to Christ (an organism metaphor). In this view, 1 Cor 12:27 can be understood as "you are members of Christ, members of a community). Grammatically, we can go with either of these genitive cases.

So we have to choose in our reading, between an objective genitive (so organism metaphor) and a subjective or attributive genitive (a metaphor for a way of life). I argue that Paul uses in the sense of attributive genitive for the following reasons. First, Paul never put "soma christou" in conjunction with "ekklesia" in his own letters (seven letters such as 1-2 Corinthians and Romans). This side-by-side appearance of both "soma christou and ekklesia" appears only in the so-called Deutero-Pauline letters written by students of Paul after his death (ekklesia is his body, whose head is Christ; see for example, Col 1:18, 24; 2:19; Eph 4:12; 5:23), but not in Paul's own letters. It is plausible that in Paul's time he does not have so much concerns over administrative matters of the church partly because end-time is near and mainly because his radical theology of Christic embodiment in a daily basis hardly afford to spend time on church organization. Only in much later time students of Paul (and church leaders in later time) co-opt for social hierarchy and church management with the use of metaphorical organism (so now "body of Christ" is a church, an institution, just like a social body, functionally). Second, in 1 Corinthians when Paul needs to refer to an institution, he clearly uses "ekklesia" which is being built, like the church is being built (in the sense of organism). In other words, what is being built is not "body of Christ" in 1 Corinthians. Rather, if "body of Christ" is lived out, there is an ekklesia. These two are not the same in 1 Corinthians. Third, in view of conflicting issues in Corinthians (ranging from sexual immorality to resurrection), Paul's main mode of exhortation is to use the image of Christ crucified (1 Cor 1-4, in particular) to shame those who are wise, powerful to bring in God's love and justice to all people in a community and elsewhere. Paul criticizes the Corinthians who do not live Christ-like and exhorts them to live like Christ. So you are to live like Christ (1 Cor 12:27: the case of Christic embodiment). Fourth, looking at 1 Cor 12:27, "you" are a subjective, which is Christ's body. There is no hierarchical concept, however we relate "you" to Christ's body. In contrast, in Ephesians or Colossians, the subject is the ekklesia, which is Christ's body, whose head is Christ. In the Deutero-Pauline letters, what is being built is also Christ's body, which is not seen in Paul's own letters. In these later letters, there is an equal relation between church and Christ's body (making Christ's body as an institutionalized or ecclesiological body metaphor) at the sacrifice of "embodiment" metaphor of Christ's body.

In conclusion, Paul's metaphor of "soma christou" (Christ's body) in 1 Corinthians is reserved for his radical theology of Christic embodiment. It is only in later time that this metaphor is being used for an organism. If we read his metaphor of the body of Christ through the lens of the Deutero-Pauline letters, we do not do justice to him. If we understand his metaphor as a way of life, and think that it is Paul's utmost issue and theology, then there will be an ongoing Christ-like community with the sense of unity (with same mind of Christ who sacrificed for others) and of diversity that demands our respectful engagement with "others" -- especially when "others" are considered non-bodies of the church or Christ. So what is important in my book is not to choose between unity and diversity or choose both but to examine our human conditions to bring in God's kingdom for which Jesus and Paul strove in their ministry. How? It is through Christ's body (as a way of life) [attributive genitive: Christic body]. --Yung Suk Kim (home page)