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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
1Th_4:13 to 1Th_5:11
Instruction and Exhortation in regard to the Coming of the Lord
1Th_4:13-18
1. They who have fallen asleep will rise again, and so at the Lord’s Advent will suffer no loss
2. That ye sorrow not, even as the rest (of men, those not Christians) also (in comparisons, see 1Th_4:5) &c., ëõðïῦíôáé ; who have no hope. Here he speaks not exclusively of the heathen, as in 1Th_4:5 who know not God. In Eph_2:12, indeed, it is specially the heathen whom he describes as strangers to Israel’s promises, having no hope (in the widest sense, with reference to all Messianic promises), and without God in the world. Israel, on the contrary, had promises and therefore also hopes, and if the Sadducees rejected these, there is yet in that place no thought of them. There is indeed, however, still a difference between having the promises and the actual living holding fast of the hope, and it is not merely among the heathen that the latter is wanting. Even supposing that he has them especially in his eye, it is yet not without reason that the expression is kept general. But the Apostle does not require that Christians shall not sorrow at all (Lünemann: because the phrase is not, ìἠ ôïóïῦôïí ὡò , but simply: their sorrow should not be of the same sort as, etc. ( êáèþò , as in Eph_4:17. Hofmann [Wordsworth, after Augustine; and so most.—J. L.]).
3. (1Th_4:14.) For if we believe, &c.—He thus gives the reason why they should not sorrow in a heathenish way; åἰ is not used in the sense of siquidem, but the hypothetical turn just so much the more challenges their assent: if, as we at least have no difficulty in believing (1Th_1:3; 1Th_1:10; 1Th_2:13); if we not merely hold it to be true, but build thereon with confidence (the meaning of ðéóôåýåéí ), making it the foundation of our life;—from this he then draws the conclusion, from which we in our ready despondency hang back.—That Jesus (he uses the human name) died (here not, fell asleep, but without any disguise he speaks of death). And did not every one believe that? Certainly we are not to assume here (with some Greek interpreters) a caution against a Docetic denial of the bodily death. Christ’s death and resurrection are really to him the two inseparable pillars of the faith: He died (for us, 1Th_5:10), and what more? did he remain in death? no! died and arose; as the Firstfruit (1Co_15:20), He brought to light a victorious life. But he arose out of death, was not glorified without passing through death; not even Christ.—So also those who, &c. Ïὕôùò is not simply a sign of the apodosis (Olshausen), any more than it is so at 1Th_4:17, but: so, as the Crucified arose (Rev_11:5); or: so, as the consequence of that (Rom_5:12); still better: so, as made like Him in death and resurrection;—God will bring them with Jesus; it is not said: He will awake them. The turn which the apodosis takes is concise and forcible, the clause, if we believe, being followed, not by another of the subjective kind: so we believe also, but objectively, by a matter of fact: so God will do thus and thus. If this faith of ours is the truth, if on this truth of God we firmly rely, then it follows, &c. Otherwise Koch and Hofmann; if we believe expresses, they think, a condition: then, in that case, so will God—that is, bring with Jesus those who in this faith have fallen asleep. But this is a harsher incongruity than what Hofmann censures in the other explanation; it must then have been said: So will He, when we fall asleep, awaken us.—It is still disputed, to what äéὰ ôïῦ Ἰçóïῦ belongs. Almost all the moderns (De Wette, Lünemann, Hofmann, and others) refer it to ἄîåé , as being unsuited to êïéìçèÝíôáò , which would require ἐí ôῷ Ἰçóïῦ , as at 1Th_4:16 ἐí ×ñéóôῷ , and so 1Co_15:18; and because to say that ἐí stands for äéÜ [ äéÜ for ἐí . So Jowett still.; also Webster and Wilkinson.—J. L.], and both for áְּ , is obsolete. But ἄîåé has already its more precise specification in óὺí áὐôῷ , and with êïéìçèÝíôáò it is desirable to find their Christian character, not merely indicated by the context, but expressly declared (opposed to the view of Koch and Hofmann). The meaning, moreover, may well be this: those who fell asleep through Jesus, whose falling asleep is through the mediation of Jesus [Webster and Wilkinson: ôïῦ Ἰçóïῦ —the article referring emphatically to Jesus as presented in the first member, Jesus who died and rose again.—J. L.]; so Chrysostom, Luther, Calvin, Grotius, Bengel, Hilgenfeld, and others. He will bring them with Him (Jesus)—this many take as pregnant for (awaken and) bring. (Through Jesus as Mediator God effects the work of quickening, John 5, 6) But it is still simpler, if we understand ïὕôùò as above explained: so He will bring them, when conformed to Jesus in death and resurrection, along with Him (as the Shepherd, whither He goes)”; Luther: thither, where Jesus abides; Roos: to glory, to rest, to the goal of their hope; Starke; with Him, when He shall come to judgment; Hofmann: when He brings Jesus into the world again (Heb_1:6), He will bring them, cause them to come, along with Jesus, will let them share in His heavenly manifestation. How he comes at this ἄãåéí , is shown 1Th_4:16-17.
4. (1Th_4:15.) For (to explain) this we say unto you, etc.—He thus illustrates what was said in 1Th_4:14, first negatively (1Th_4:15), then positively (1Th_4:16-17). This (what follows) we say unto you in a word of the Lord; ἐí , as in 1Co_2:7, marks the medium in which the discourse moves; not in my words do I speak; my statement confines itself within the sphere of a word of the Lord; comp. for the matter 1Co_7:10; 1Co_7:12; 1Co_7:25, and for the expression 1Ki_20:35, áִּãְáַø éְäåָֹä , 70. Pelt supposes him to refer to Mat_24:31; to which Ewald adds Luk_14:14; Hofmann, Mat_16:27 sq.; Zwingli and others, Mat_25:1 sqq., Joh_5:28 sq. Theophylact and Calvin think of a word orally utered by Christ, and so probably a ëüãïò ἄãñáöïò , like Act_20:35. But such a one is in that place introduced differently; and not one of the texts cited makes the special disclosure that here follows, respecting the relation between the dead and those still living. It is therefore more correct to think (with Chrysostom and other Greeks, Bengel, Olshausen, De Wette, Lünemann) of a revelation from the exalted Lord, an ἀðïêÜëõøéò ôïῦ ìõóôçñßïõ (Chrysostom, it is true, adduces not only 2Co_13:3 on one side, but also Act_20:35 on the other). At 1Co_15:51 also Paul says something similar on a similar occasion; comp. Gal_1:12; Rom_11:25.—That we who are living (here: in the earthly body), according to the more precise explanation: who remain over (are left over by God) unto the coming (return) of the Lord (that is: who live to see that coming), shall in no wise precede those who fell asleep: ïὐ ìÞ in the New Testament indifferently with the aorist subjunctive or the future indicative; Winer, § 56, 3. This coming (1Co_15:23) is coincident with Mat_24:31; Rev_19:11 sqq.; Rev_20:5 (not Rev_20:11 sqq.). Here we learn to understand the trouble of the Thessalonians. They sorrowed on the supposition that whoever does not live to see the Advent suffers loss (in the Fourth [in the English Apocrypha, the Second] Book of Esdras, Ezr_6:13, we meet with such ideas; see Wieseler, Chronol. des apost. Zeitalters, p. 250). But how did they conceive of this loss? Evidently Lünemann goes too far, when from the words: Ye are not to sorrow as they who have no hope, he (as Calvin and others before him) draws the inference that they believed in no life at all after death, and supposed that the dying were absolutely excluded from the kingdom. That does not lie in the comparison, any more than 1Th_4:5 : “Indulge not in lust, even as the Gentiles who know not God” charges them with not knowing God; rather, Because ye know Him, be not like those who know Him not.” And so here: “Sorrow not as those who have no hope; ye do have a hope.” He then reasons, as in 1 Corinthians 15, from the connection between Christ and believers, the Head and His members, as an indissoluble unity: “The Head cannot forsake His members.” He does not in this imply the existence of any deniers of the resurrection, as at Corinth; what we allow is simply that they suffered from dimness of apprehension. To the Greeks generally the resurrection was a difficult topic (Acts 17). The Thessalonians, indeed, expected with firm faith the coming of the Lord (1Th_1:10; and in 1 Thessalonians 4 also it is presupposed). But the significance and operation of that event they did not duly perceive. They seem with Grecian fancy to have taken up the idea of the outward splendor of the appearance, without considering with sufficient earnestness that the Crucified One, who arose from the dead, will come again; the Conqueror of sin and death. Paul therefore reminds them of this fundamental truth, and thence infers that we shall not precede those fallen asleep, shall not be admitted to the Lord earlier than they. It is only by ingenuity that Lünemann can here hold fast to his idea: Paul, he thinks, is engaged with the figure of a race, where those who are outstripped, and have to lay behind in mid course, do not reach the goal at all. But Paul does not intimate that he has here any thought of this figure; and besides, such a preoccupying of salvation, as would deprive others of it, is not within the compass of truth. This were a one-sided pressing of the figure of a race, that would turn it into an untruth. Rather, in saying: We shall not anticipate the dead, he lets us see that the Thessalonians cherished such an idea; but that this leaves open all the while an undefined prospect at least for the later comers. But what prospect? On this point their view is not clear to us, perhaps was not so even to themselves. Olshausen, De Wette, Hofmann and others suppose that they had no doubt about the resurrection at the final consummation, only they did not distinguish between the first and the second resurrections; that, in fact, they knew nothing of the first resurrection (of the just), of the hailing of the returning Lord by His risen ones, and of their fellowship with Him during the glorious period preceding the general judgment; that their idea was, that in the kingdom just at hand the dead would have no part; that, however, they really believed in the remote, final resurrection after the kingdom of glory, but found in that no living consolation. Still it is by no means clear how they should have mastered and believed in such a precise arrangement of all the stages of the last things (Advent, Kingdom of glory, Last Resurrection) with only the single exception of the First Resurrection at the Advent; nor yet how the Last Resurrection should have been of so little consequence in their estimation. Are we, then, to be driven back on Lünemann? Not that either; but we suppose that Paul had powerfully preached in Thessalonica the coming of Christ to set up His kingdom, but had not had time to enter into all questions of detail. Now the Thessalonians, with a lively impression of this message, had yet a rather dim, worldly understanding of it, from their conceiving of every miraculous occurrence as rather simply an exhibition of power, and not duly considering that the path lies through death to resurrection, through decease to the new life. To be gathered unto the Lord (as even in Mat_24:31 the resurrection is not expressly named)—for them this desire absorbed everything. Whoever lives not to see that, he suffers loss—such was their thought. They did not, like the Corinthians, deny the resurrection of the dead, for the Apostle certainly does not reprove them as he does those; and quite as little perhaps can it be asserted so positively as Olshausen assumes, that they believed only in the last resurrection; but whether there was anything, and what, still to be expected for the dead, this was to them an obscure matter; their whole hope and aspiration was bent or the one point, to remain exempt from death;—the thing that Paul likewise desired (2Co_5:4), but not so partially. This anxiety was such as could be felt only in the first period of instruction still imperfectly apprehended. (See the Introduction, p. 12. On we who are living, see Exeg. Note 7.)
5. (1Th_4:16.) For He Himself, the Lord [Because the Lord Himself], &c. For, not that (Koch); he shows how there is no such thing as öèÜíåéí . De Wette and Hofmann would here, as at 1Th_3:11, understand merely: He, the Lord; but here, as there, the Apostle makes an emphatic antithesis both of subjects and predicates; not: “We shall first come to Him,” but: “He Himself will descend,” otherwise no one at all would come to Him. Ἐí signifies in, with, attended by, as 1Co_4:21; Rom_15:29. ÊÝëåõóìá (another form, êÝëåõìá ) Luther translates Feldgeschrei [war-cry], and understands by it the joyful exclamation of the angelic host, “the Van and guards; “English Bible: with a shout; but more correctly the Vulgate: in jussu; for the word signifies a shout of command, proceeding from the leading huntsman, or from the pilot of a ship, requiring the rowers to keep time, or from a charioteer, or a general; Pro_30:27, Sept.; also Thucydides ii. 1Th 92: ἀðὸ ἑíὸò êåëåýóìáôïò ἐìâïÞóáíôåò , where êåë . does not denote the battle-cry of the combatants, but the meaning is that at a word of command they shouted. Christ is, therefore, described as a victorious Captain, whose order summons to battle, for the destruction of His enemies and the extermination of the antichristian power (2 Thessalonians 2; Rev_19:11 sqq.). To this is added: with the voice of an archangel, summoning the other angels, the great hosts of heavenly spirits, who sympathize in man’s salvation, cooperating at the giving of the law (Act_7:53; Gal_3:19) and afterwards at the judgment (Mat_13:41; Mat_24:31; Mat_25:31); which last event brings a consummation also for themselves (Eph_1:10). In canonical Scripture the archangel Michael appears again only at Judges 9; Gabriel is not so called, nor the seven angels before God (Rev_8:2=Tob_12:15). Yet to the name archangel, prince of angels, corresponds the designation ùָׂøִéí , ἄñ÷ïíôåò Dan_10:13; Dan_10:20; and already Jos_5:14, ùָׂøÎöְáָàÎéְçåָֹä , Sept. ἀñ÷éóôñÜôçãïò äõíÜìåùò êõñßïõ . By the archangel Ambrosiaster [Jeremy Taylor] and Olshausen would understand Christ, the Lord of angels; others still more unsuitably, the Holy Spirit; but he must be an angel, the highest amongst the angels, answering to the high priest as compared with the priests. Lastly, with a trumpet of God (the last, 1Co_15:52); this is not merely a nota superlativi, the very great, though it is indeed the Divine, and not a human, majesty that is antithetically described; but, besides that, we are to understand it thus: which is used by God’s command, in God’s service, which belongs to Him; De Wette compares êéèÜñáò ôïῦ èåïῦ , Rev_15:2. What should it be? How will it sound? is not to be searched out. The future reality is depicted in images of present reality. It will be heard, as the sign will be seen, Mat_24:27; Mat_24:30. As to its import, it is the conclusive echo of Sinai, the highest form of all the signals, whereby the people are called together before the Lord, that by which the enemy’s stronghold, mightier than Jericho, falls (Numbers 10; Isa_27:13; Zec_9:14; Rev_4:8. Seven trumpets). This is not a mere notion of Jewish Rabbis, but the prophetic word receives apostolic sanction. Lünemann and Hofmann would understand the archangel’s voice and the trumpet as in apposition to êÝëåõóõá , but without reason. [Witsius, after Grotius, identifies the archangel’s voice with the trumpet as blown by him.—J. L.] We have rather to recognize three particulars, following each other in rapid succession: the Commander’s call of the King Himself; the voice of the archangel summoning the other angels; the trumpet, which awakes the dead, and collects the believers. [Dr. John Dick: “Three sounds are distinctly mentioned, but I do not pretend to know what they are.”—J. L.]
The descent from heaven presupposes the ascension thither (Act_1:11). And the dead in Christ shall arise first; ἐí ×ñéóôῷ , though without the article, belongs to ïἱ íåêñïß (Winer;, §20, 2). He speaks here only of the resurrection of the just (Luk_14:14), ôῶí ôïῦ ×ñéóôïῦ at His coming (1Co_15:23), who have died in the Lord (Rev_14:13), qui in Christi corpore continentur (Calvin); not of all without distinction arising in Christ. The correction in Codd. F. G., ïἱ íåêñïὶ is not at all necessary. The same Codd. together with D.1 road (instead of ðñῶôïí ) ðñῶôïé ; Itala and Vulgate, primi, which is altogether unsuitable, for the contrast here is not (as Theophylact and others suppose) between such as rise first and others who do not rise till afterwards; but between what will take place first (the resurrection of those who fell asleep in faith), and what next ( ἔðåéôá ) occurs in the case of the living.
6. (1Th_4:17.) Then we &c. shall together with them be snatched away, caught away; hastily, swiftly, irresistibly, by the overpowering might of God; this lies in the expression (also 2Co_12:2, though in a different application); in (on) clouds, as one received the Lord (Acts 1); not into the clouds ( åἰò ), but in the clouds (inwrapped), or on them (throned, as on chariots of God; Chrysostom); comp. Mat_24:30; Mat_26:64; Rev_11:12; Rev_14:14; unto meeting of the Lord, ìִ÷ְøַàú ; instead of ἀðÜíô . ôïῦ êõñßïõ others (weaker authorities) give ὑðÜíô . ôῷ ×ñéóôῷ . Both words, ἀðÜíôçóéò or ὑðÜíôçóéò , govern the genitive (Mat_25:1) or (like the verb) the dative (Act_28:15). Chrysostom and other Greeks: “to meet Christ, as persons of distinction meet a king to salute him, while others must wait for him, as criminals for the judge.” For the matter, 2Th_2:1 is to be compared. It is a description, so to speak, of the Church’s Ascension, in which the Head brings His members to Himself. Possibly the clouds here, as in Acts 1, indicate a veiling of the transaction. But at any rate this rapture necessarily presupposes the previous sudden change (1Co_15:52; 2Co_5:2 sqq.), which is here only not expressly mentioned, but without which a soaring away into the air were not conceivable. Only by means of the glorified corporeity (Php_3:21) can such an event take place. Luther (appealing to Heb_9:27) insists that all men must once die, that is, leave this life and enter another. For those left over, therefore [die “Ueberlinge,” as if we should say, the overlings.—J. L.], the change would be their death. These shall not sleep, but in a twinkling will die and live again.—And, so (as those who have been caught away into the air, the risen and changed ones, or, still better: as those who have thus met Him) shall we ever be with the Lord; Hofmann: continually, not meeting with Him merely in transient or occasionally repeated salutation; óýí expresses the intimate union, ìåôÜ simply outward companionship. This is the main point of comfort which he had in view: to be with the Lord, inseparably united to Him. Thus we reach the ἄãåéí óὺí áὐô ͅ ῷ (1Th_4:14), the marriage supper of the Lamb (Rev_19:7-9). But it is not in the air that this being over with Christ takes place (as Pelt, Usteri, Weitzel think, with a quite mistaken appeal to Eph_2:2 : the air as the region of spirits, but of evil spirits!). Only the meeting takes place in the air, not the abiding. Already Augustine (De Civ. Dei, xx. 20, 2) saw the truth: Venienti ibitur obviam, non manenti. The Lord is come from heaven, but not quite to the earth, so that a rapture into the air leads to His presence. He comes to fetch them (Joh_14:2-3) into the heavenly kingdom (2Ti_4:18), which is so called, not merely because it is of a heavenly quality, and even the earth receives a heavenly glory, but because at the coming it really transports the glorified into heaven; they shall be with Him, as Bengel says, non modo in aëre, sed in cælo unde venit. Others think of a coming with Him to the earth to judgment. Hilgenfeld thinks that the meeting is followed by the coming with Him to the glorified earth. But that may even be reserved for a later date. In fact, the description is not one that exhausts all particulars; it is carried only so far as is necessary to make it clear, that the dead shall be in no way inferior to those who survive. (See the Doctrinal and Ethical Notes, 5.)
7. (1Th_4:15; 1Th_4:17.) We who are living, who are being left over.—Here Paul evidently reckons himself among those of whom he considers it possible, and a thing to be desired and hoped for, that they may live to witness the Advent; just so 1Co_15:51 sqq. (according to the correct reading of the text. rec., and also of the Cod. Vat.). The strange evasions, by means of which the Fathers and others sought to make out, that Paul nevertheless is not speaking of himself, are justly set aside by Lünemann. (To this class belongs the explanation of Œcumenius, that the dead are the bodies, the living are the souls; &c.) Nor ought it to be imput to him, that he uses ἡìåῖò merely in the way of communicatio (Theophylact: representing in his own person all who shall then be living), though knowing that he will not be present; of this knowledge we see nothing, rather a hope inconsistent with it. But it were just as inconsiderate to say bluntly, that the Apostle’s expectation has been plainly convicted by the event as erroneous; as if thus the whole eschatological prediction collapsed. In that case, indeed, Paul would be a false prophet (Deu_18:20 sqq.), and his appeal to the Lord’s word an untruth. This word of the Lord, as even Lünemann allows, told him only generally in what relation the dead would stand to those surviving, not who belongs to each of the two classes; it was, therefore, not: “Thou, Paul, shalt be of the number;” otherwise he could not again have spoken doubtfully on the point at Php_1:21 sqq.; 1Th_2:17; 2Co_5:9, and in still a different tone at 2Ti_4:6. Altogether, just as here, in speaking of those who live to the Advent, he says ἡìåῖò by communicatio in the sense of hope (Grotius: putavit fieri posse), he elsewhere says as freely by communicatio on the opposite side: “God will raise us up,” 1Co_6:14 (this alongside of 1Co_15:51); 2Co_4:14; comp. 1Th_5:10; Act_20:29. He expressly reminds us at 1Th_5:1 sqq., that we know not the times and the seasons, and were not to know them; as the Lord declares even of Himself in his condition of self-denial (Mar_13:32), and as He represents to his Apostles (Act_1:7). Had he meant to set it down as certain: I shall not die, that would really have been at least a knowledge of the ÷ñüíïé ; and not less so, had he asserted: I shall die before that, it will not happen in my time. Moreover, if ἡìåῖò expressed the definite expectation: I shall yet be there, it must equally follow that to all his readers of that age included with himself in ἡìåῖò he makes the promise, that they shall live till the Advent; which were indeed utterly absurd. Rather, he opposes the two classes to each other; here those asleep, and on the other side the living, those remaining over; he himself, of course, is among the living; but both classes are in a state of constant flux. What did not come to pass in the case of Paul and his cotemporaries, then holds good for those who follow after, and shall actually live till the Advent. Certainly the Apostles do all of them ex press often enough the expectation of the Coming as near; e.g., 1Pe_4:1; 1Jn_2:18; Jam_5:8; and Paul, 1Co_7:29 sqq.; Rom_13:11-12; Php_4:5; this, however, not as a dogma whereby the ignorance of the ÷ñüíïé would be removed, but merely as a living hope and longing expectation. See Hölemann, Die Stellung St. Pauli zu der Frage um die Zeit der Wiederkunft Christi, Leipzig, 1858; and the Doctrinal and Ethical Notes, 6.
8. (1Th_4:18.) Wherefore comfort one another with these words; ὥóôå with a following imperative also at Php_4:1; and so äéü , 1Th_5:11. The comfort should check the sorrowing (1Th_4:13); with these words, which rest on the word of the Lord, not rationibus, argumentis, but simply the words of the evangelical message.
2. The rest, who have no hope, are in the widest sense all who stand not in Christ, the only Source and Guarantee of true life. In the Old Testament is the sound of many lamentations over the life in the shadowy realm, as being no life, but as gloomy as in the Homeric songs (Isa_38:18 sq.; Psa_6:6 [Psa_6:5]; Psa_88:11-13 [Psa_88:10-12]; Psa_115:17; Job_10:21 [and Job_10:22]; &c.); not because the right conception is still wanting, but because the actual curse of death is not yet broken. The gleams of prophetic hope (Psa_16:9 sqq.; Psa_49:16 [Psa_49:15]; Pro_14:32; Pro_15:24; Pro_23:14; Isa_26:19; Hos_13:14; Dan_12:2) are first realized through Christ. But it is especially the heathen, of whom the Apostle’s judgment holds good. It might, indeed, be a question here, as at 1Th_4:5, whether he does not assert too much. For do we not find among all nations some hope of immortality? and among the philosophers, as Socrates, Plato, &c, elevated thoughts on that topic, and arguments in its favor? True; but, measured by the full resurrection-life, what a state of death is that which the heathen call the other life! And how isolated is the more cheerful hope, how slender its thread, how feeble its knowledge, for the very reason that it is founded, not on the actings of God, but on disputable, more or less problematical arguments, accessible only to the refined thinker. How weak are the Consolationes of a Cicero, Seneca, Plutarch! nothing but probabilities. Even now observation shows how those who do not rely on the written word, and, inquiring merely about the immortality of the soul, would thus simply recognize a permanent separation of soul and body (though this would be a permanent reign of death),—how these persons with all their arguments never get the better of their doubts; nay, how more and more the most decided amongst them no longer have or allow any hope. It were easy to bring together a number of disconsolate sayings from the classics; for example, Æschylus, Eumen. 638 (648): ἅðáî èáíüíôïò ïὔôéò ἔóô ’ ἀíÜóôáóéò . Theocritus, Idyll. 4, 1Th 42: ἐëðßäåò ἐí æùïῖóéí , ἀíÝëðéóôïé äὲ èáíüíôåò . Catullus, 5, 1 Thessalonians 4 : Soles occidere et redire possunt: Nobis, cum semel occidit brevis lux, Nox est perpetua una dormienda. Starke: In Plutarch’s time people mocked at the ἐëðéóôéêïýò . It was an affected witticism of the dying Vespasian: væ, puto deus fio. And this is as it should be; it is proper that we should not get to be certain of our personality, until we are sure of our God and Saviour. On this true basis, however, Scripture regards as normal the undivided life, when the spirit and the body are together; being equally remote from materialism, which seeks in matter for the root and strength of all spiritual life, and from idealism, which sees the most perfect spirituality in being released from the body. The glorified body as the perfect organ of the ruling spirit—this is the reëstablishment and consummation of the condition originally designed by God (Php_3:21). Luther: We shall again receive enriched and improved that which we lost in Adam; for we should have had it in Paradise (Works, ed. Walch, xii. 2628).
3. Death a sleep; Starke: (1) Because in both the body rests, the soul remains alive; (2) because from both the body also awakes; (3) because both are a desirable release from trouble and toil; (4) because after both we again joyously salute and wish one another good morning.—Still the likeness exists only for faith, not for sight. According to what is visible, the word of triumph: “O death, where is thy sting?” sounds frequently like a scoff. Diedrich: The death of those dear to us still confronts us often as a frightful mystery.—Not only does the Old Testament call him the king of terrors [Job_18:14], his name in the New Testament also is still the last enemy. A natural horror in the presence of death is expressed by the Apostle himself in 2 Corinthians 5, and is seen in Gethsemane. Corruption wears a different aspect from sleep. So much the greater must the Awakener appear to us.
4. (1Th_4:15.) Paul appeals to a word of the Lord, like the old prophets (1Sa_3:21; Isa_1:10; Jer_1:2); not as one who steals and deceitfully gives out the Lord’s word (Jer_14:14; Jer_23:30); not as one who has merely adopted rabbinical opinions. (Whence, indeed, have the Rabbins the substance of their doctrine?) Nor does he speak in heaped-up images of a transcendental vision (when he really had such a one, with what modest reserve does he speak of it! 2 Corinthians 12); but his words have a clear and sober import. From the most intimate converse with the Lord he gives forth his explanations respecting the course of the kingdom of God, the crises of Divine providence, and its final issues: Eph_3:3; Eph_3:5 sqq.; Rom_11:25; 1Co_15:51 sqq.; and here. It is a weighty problem, and, God be praised! it is also a privilege vouchsafed in ever larger measure to our times, to bring one’s self into living communion with the prophetic word. Our very reverence for it should, indeed, restrain us from precipitate conclusions.
5. (1Th_4:15-17.) Our passage furnishes no complete doctrine of the last things. In Scripture generally there remains over for curiosity a multitude of unanswered questions; and even the legitimate desire of knowledge must acquiesce. Whatever is necessary to salvation, and serves to further the process of sanctification, is nowhere wanting. In this spirit should the doctrine of the Christian hope be dealt with (Luthardt, die Lehre von den letzten Dingen, Leipzig, 1861). Our passage says nothing beforehand of the condition that immediately follows death; nothing beyond calling it a sleep. A preliminary judgment, an introductory stage of blessedness, is indicated by the passages cited in Exeg. Note 1. A being with Christ is there promised to such as die in Christ; yet must it be inferior in fulness and power to the life of the resurrection (comp. Rev_6:9-11), without our being able to define precisely the difference. Paul takes the less notice here of this topic, from his having to correct the anxiety of the Thessalonians in regard to the disadvantage which the dead might be under at the Advent. What is of use to this end he holds up to their view. Nor does he in our passage go further. But it easily admits of being combined with other passages into a general representation. Now what Paul says of the Coming was understood by the Reformers altogether of His Coming at the Last Judgment; as by Calvin, in express opposition to the Chiliasts, though under the supposition, to be sure, that they teach the wild doctrine of a resurrection for only a thousand years. But even in the Apocalypse there is no mention of any such thing. If we take into view the passage in the Rev_20:1-6, the question is, whether and in what way it may be reconciled with the doctrine of the Apostle Paul. An obvious expedient apparently is to identify the Advent here, 1Th_4:15, and 1Co_15:23, with the return at the setting up of the (millennial) kingdom, and in like manner the first resurrection of the Apocalypse with the resurrection of the just (Luk_14:14) or the gathering together of the elect (Mat_24:31), but positively to distinguish this from the final judgment on the whole world (Mat_25:31; Rev_20:11 sqq.); this last judgment, including the general resurrection, would then be comprehended in the end of which Paul, after making mention of the resurrection ôῶí ôïῦ ×ñéóôïῦ , says: åἶôá ôὸ ôÝëïò (1Co_15:24). More closely examined, however, the passages do not quite so readily admit of mutual adjustment. In the first place, at the text last mentioned no one without the Apocalypse would think, that this åἶôá embraces a thousand years. And for this reason, accordingly, the Reformers, disregarding the Apocalypse, conceived of the raising of the dead as occurring at one and the same time, and supposed that such passages as Joh_5:28-29; Act_24:15; 2Co_5:10 speak of a simultaneous resurrection of the just and the unjust, and that Matthew 24 likewise refers to no other coming of Christ than Matthew 25. In like manner, and this is the second point, Matthew 25 shows us the saved alongside of the lost, and says nothing of a first resurrection which had already, a thousand years before, brought the elect to glory. In our passage, indeed, and just so in 1 Corinthians 15, Paul is entirely silent about those who are lost Calvin: The object here is, not to alarm the ungodly, but to heal the immoderate grief of the pious. The resurrection to judgment, therefore, might be thought of as contemporaneous with that of the pious, or on the other hand as following at a later date. Only it is to be noticed that 1 Corinthians 15 represents the raising of those who belong to Christ as something done once for all; then follows the end, when He shall deliver up the kingdom to the Father, after He has abolished all hostile rule. This does not sound as if still another host of those belonging to Christ would not share in the salvation till a later and final judgment, as must yet be the case, if Matthew 25 speaks of this final judgment. On the whole, as it is important to fulfil the condition on which alone we can be sure of salvation, so it is difficult, if not impossible, to set up unexceptionable tests, according to which some are made partakers of the first resurrection, others only of the second, who are nevertheless saved. After all, the relation might rather be this, that the Pauline statements, as well as the passages which speak briefly of the last day, the last hour (Joh_6:39-40; 1Jn_2:18; comp. 2Pe_3:10; 2Pe_3:12), comprehend the coming of the Lord in one view, which the Apocalypse then distributes into various stages. But as the day of the Lord divides itself in the later revelation into a series of steps, so also the resurrection of those belonging to Christ, since the first resurrection by no means merely passes by the raising of the lost to judgment, but shows likewise a later resurrection to life as still possible. To the end belongs the glorification also of the terrestrial world (Romans 8; Rev_21:22); and after that the saved have reigned together with Christ in the kingdom (2Ti_2:12), and have co-operated with Him in the judgment (1Co_6:2-3). That is to say, from their heavenly thrones (Rev_20:4) the kingdom will pass into its stage of highest fulfilment, when God shall be all in all (1Co_15:28). In many places, however, these stages are viewed together indiscriminately. Such a comprehension of details, which are only kept apart by later prediction, meets us also elsewhere in all prophecy.
6. The last remark affords us light also in regard to the hope of the nearness of the Advent (see Exeg. Note 7). From the patriarchs down through the entire line of the prophets every one contemplates the future salvation as one whole, with all its details, without any one being able to say: There is here a want of perspective, an optical illusion. Rather, the living fulness of the future is conjoined with the varying standpoint of the present in one bud. The certainty, that the Lord is coming with His salvation, is so stirring, bright, overpowering, that the man who is full of it says: Quickly! The Assyrian period is Isaiah’s horizon, into which he sees Immanuel enter, bringing salvation (Isaiah 7; Isa_29:17). And again there was a delay of four hundred years, before the promise in Malachi (1 Thessalonians 3) began to be fulfilled. Prophecy is not the knowledge of the history of the future, but a contemplation of the essential steps of development. Instructive is such a passage as Eze_12:22 sqq.; especially even because it is there shown to us, how long-suffering delayed the judgment, and how contempt of the long-suffering accelerates it. Thus there came to pass finally what for so long a time the prophets had promised and threatened, and the scoffers had scoffed at; it came, according to human reckoning, later than had been supposed, yet not too late for any one, rather too soon for many. And as the New Testament time came, so will come the final term promised by Christ and the Apostles. Yea, they declared with truth that it had already arrived. With Christ began the world’s last hour, and there comes none later, to establish another and higher relation between God and humanity. If the period of waiting for the revelation of the Lord has reached much further than the Apostles supposed, and even than the words of Christ gave them reason to expect (Mat_10:23; Mat_16:28; Mat_24:29), it is to be considered, first, that in this very way scope was afforded for the development of the series of stages in His coming; and, secondly, that it behoves us to recognize long-suffering in the fact that, after the first step of the judgment (on Jerusalem), the second was deferred (2Pe_3:8-9; 2Pe_3:15). But, while acknowledging His sparing long-suffering, we acknowledge also that His government is so arranged as to admit of modification according to the faithfulness or unfaithfulness of men; that we are wrong, therefore, in taking, much more than we are aware of necessitarian views of prophecy. So much the more short sighted were it to say, that a disappointment respecting the date is proof that such last things are not to be expected at all. A denial of the world’s end would require us also to assert that humanity has never had a beginning; and this would imply that the life of humanity has no aim, and that the establishment of a perfect, holy reign of God is not to be looked for. But he alone is a Christian, who directs his life toward this mark. Of the time and the hour he knows nothing. “The Lord delayeth His coming!”—that he leaves the wicked servant to say; that the Bridegroom may tarry, he is well aware. There are also things that must still precede; not the conversion of the nations, but the preaching of the gospel among all nations (Mat_24:14); along with this, the universal security of those who believe in no Advent, and by means of their unbelief are witnesses for the truth (1Th_5:3; Mat_24:37 sqq.; Luk_18:8); the apostasy of Christendom from the faith (2 Thessalonians 2). All these signs are perceptibly growing. The life of humanity, including the individual life, goes forward on the brink of eternity and to eternity. It is readily conceivable that the experience of a longer duration of the world, according to man’s measurement, has modified in some degree our views of the last things, and turned the eye chiefly toward the death of individuals. But only too frequently does this way of thinking assume such a form, that the longing for the coming of the Lord and the glory of His holy kingdom, as well as sympathy in the fortunes of the Church at large, is too much impaired. At times, on the other hand, and amongst the pious, when the life of faith rules in due force, we again meet likewise with the apostolic hope and aspiration in living freshness. That watching and hoping are so unfamiliar to us, is a defect. The more we become heavenly in our character and thoughts, the more also does the stream of human history appear to us as a hasting towards the coming of the Lord.
7. (1Th_4:17.) The being caught away to meet the Lord is in the Irvingite interpretation erroneously explained in a manner that seems to bear the dignity of an inviolable dogma. Comp. the work, which otherwise contains many good practical exhortations, by E. L. Geering, Mahnung und Trost der Schrift in Betreff der Wiederkunft Christi, Basel, 1859. It is there taught (p. 55) that, previous to the coming tribulation, the company of disciples, who are witnessing for Jesus and waiting for Him, is brought into a condition of safety. Indeed, the saints will with Him judge the world (1Co_6:2); their deliverance, therefore, through being taken away, precedes the Lord’s return; and on p. 60 mention is made of servants of Christ who are not, it is true, recklessly profane nor yet hypocrites, but still are not looking out for the coming of the Lord, nor striving towards it, and, as their punishment for this, have no part in the rapture of the faithful servants, but must undergo the rule of Antichrist’s reign. They have forfeited their title to be kept from the hour of temptation, of the great tribulation, which comes on all (Rev_3:10). They might have been preserved and taken away from it.—This whole interpretation has at least no sort of foundation in our text. The German word entrücken (to snatch from) might give the impression that it refers to the taking away from a threatening danger. But Paul speaks of a swift-coming to meet the Lord, without regard to the question whether this is before or after the endurance of tribulation. To the view of Christendom in general he holds up, as prior to the coming of the Lord, the coming of the apostasy, and the tyranny of the Man of Sin (2 Thessalonians 2). The keeping which the disciples need is not necessarily a being kept from the experience of this persecution, as if to be kept in the midst of it, to be kept while in the world from the evil—the thing which the Lord seeks in prayer for His disciples (Joh_17:15)—were a penal condition. There are various ways in which the keeping may rather take place: 1. by a previous death (Isa_57:1-2; Rev_14:13); 2. by endurance of martyrdom without renouncing the faith (Mat_10:28 sqq.; Matthew 10 :2 Thessalonians 2; Rev_11:7; Rev_13:15; Rev_20:4); perhaps also, 3. by remaining hidden, in the case especially of the humble class, like the seven thousand in the time of Elias (Rom_11:4). There may be a participation in the judgment by those caught away to the Lord (as assessores judicii, Bengel), without the interpretation which we oppose. Altogether it is possible to love the coming of the Lord Jesus, without adopting the peculiar Irvingite exegesis. To represent the two things as inseparable, and to determine accordingly the reward of being caught away or the penalty of being left—this Isaiah , 1. in itself a wrong, as in every case where a human dogma is set up, and salvation connected with the acceptance of it; 2. it misleads to a groundless confidence, and is a sort of illusory promise, that is not free from an effeminate fear of suffering. Comp. Luthardt, l. c. p. 37 sqq.
Death a sleep, but only through Christ; and only for faith, which knows the Awakener.—Roos: Death has an entrance, and also an outlet. We must and we desire to go the way that Christ went.
Scripture does not forbid us to mourn, but only to mourn as those without hope.—Rieger: By the examples of others, that nearly concern us, the thoughts of our hearts are revealed to us—our own dying agony.—Luther: Holy Scripture not merely indulges, but commends and praises those who are sorrowful, and lament for the dead (Abraham, Joseph, the people at the death of Aaron and Moses). The Apostle simply distinguishes between the mourning of the heathen and that of Christians.—The same: It is an artificial virtue and fictitious fortitude of heathens and schismatics, when they pretend that we must entirely extract what is creaturely in us, and hold no terms with nature. Such a hard heart has never truly loved, and would fain dissemble before people. He is a Christian, who, while experiencing sorrow, yet so restrains himself therein that the spirit rules over the flesh.—We are allowed to weep for death. It is one thing, when Christ, who wept Himself, dries our tears, and another thing, when men would forbid them to flow. But we have no occasion to weep for the lot of those who have fallen asleep in the Lord. Whoever laments without measure or restraint, acts as a heathen acts.—Bengel: The effect of the Christian faith is neither to abolish nor yet to aggravate grief for the dead, but gently to moderate it.—Diedrich: We need not be in a state of fearful uncertainty about any Christian, whether living or dead.—Heubner: Christianity teaches men to rise superior to natural sorrow, yea, to rejoice therein.—The ancient Christians called the day of the believer’s death his birthday.
[Ignorance of the truth and purposes of God, so far as these have been revealed, injurious to our spiritual comfort and edification. “I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren”—a common scriptural formula.—Doddridge: Let us charge it upon our hearts, that we do honor to our holy profession in every circumstance, and particularly in our sorrows as well as our joys.—M. Henry: All grief for the death of friends is far from being unlawful; we may weep at least for ourselves, if we do not weep for them; weep for our own loss, though that may be their gain. Yet we must not be immoderate or excessive in our sorrows.—J. L.]
1Th_4:14. Luther: Our death Paul calls not a death, but a sleep; Christ’s death he calls a real death, which has swallowed up all other deaths. [So Burkitt: Jesus died, the saints sleep. ... I do not find that Christ’s death is called a sleep; no, His death was death indeed, death with a curse in it.—J. L.]—Luther: If Christ is risen, that must surely not be in vain and without fruit.—[The text of Archbishop Tillotson’s Sermon on “The certainty and the blessedness of the resurrection of true Christians.”—J. L.]
1Th_4:13-14. Rieger: The two main sources of all comfort, and of all resignation in dying, lie in the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus (Rev_1:18) Whatever is trying and severe in death comes either from attachment to the visible from which we are separated, or from the uncertainty in which we stand in regard to the invisible. The former trouble is relieved by the death of Jesus, the second by his life.—Stähelin: If thou thyself wouldest not, or if thy friends are not to sorrow, see that thou fall asleep through the Lord Jesus.—Hast thou hope? 1. On what is it founded? on the belief th