The Judgment Seat of Christ Revisited (2 Corinthians 5.10) – Full Exegetical Article

ABSTRACT: This paper argues that the subordinate clause in 2 Corinthians 5:10 should be translated “so that each of us may receive through the body what is due us for what we have done,” instead of the traditional translation: “so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body” (NIV and similar texts). This note rejects various efforts to defend the conventional translation, including by classifying the Greek phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος as elliptical.

1.The Judgment Seat of Christ Revisited:

Does 2 Corinthians 5:10 Really Say What Translators and Church Authorities Have Long Believed?[1]

This note proposes an alternative reading of 2 Corinthians 5:10 (Judgment Seat of Christ), specifically the subordinate clause, and identifies a small number of translations that have adopted a similar approach.[2] The note begins by addressing grammatical and conceptual issues in the Greek text. It then discusses whether the leading commentaries and other pertinent literature shed any light on this question, and whether additional scholarship is needed. Also addressed are potential objections that might be raised to dispute the views advocated here. Apart from the revised translation itself, which in its own right raises notable theological and eschatological issues, this note argues that the overall significance of the discussion for Biblical exegesis is that in addressing complicated New Testament syntactic structures, the conceptual interplay between and among the various linguistic units does not merely constitute a semantic adjunct to the underlying formal treatment of the text (that is, the formal grammar and syntax), but that it represents an essential, and sometimes determinative, component of that analysis. Stated differently, the careful weighing of formal and conceptual elements should proceed hand in hand in any well-conceived “grammatical” treatment of complex passages.[3]

2. Translating the Subordinate Clause

The full verse of 2 Corinthians 5:10 reads as follows, UBS Greek text (UBS5):[4]

τοὺς γὰρ πάντας ἡμᾶς φανερωθῆναι δεῖ ἔμπροσθεν τοῦ βήματος τοῦ Χριστοῦ, ἵνα κομίσηται ἕκαστος τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν, εἴτε ἀγαθὸν εἴτε φαῦλον.

The subordinate clause (ἵνα κομίσηται ἕκαστος τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν) contains an unusual construction. There appear to be few, if any, direct parallels in the Greek New Testament or in other early Christian literature, and certainly none where two prepositional phrases appear back-to-back while bracketed between two transitive verbs, with an article closely preceding the first phrase and a relative pronoun directly preceding the second verb.[5] The complicated, some might say “awkward”[6] nature of the construction suggests that there might be more here than meets the eye.[7]

The traditional translation of the verse, with particular attention to the subordinate clause, is well-established, with just a few minor variations. Some well-known examples include the following, with the subordinate clause in italics:

New International Version (NIV)

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.

English Standard Version (ESV)

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.

NET Bible

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be paid back according to what he has done while in the body, whether good or evil.

NASB

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.

New Living Translation (NLT)

For we must all stand before Christ to be judged. We will each receive whatever we deserve for the good or evil we have done in this earthly body.

King James Bible

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.

Lutherbibel [8]

Denn wir müssen alle offenbar werden vor dem Richterstuhl Christi, auf daß ein jeglicher empfange, wie er gehandelt hat bei Leibesleben, es sei gut oder böse.

This note advances the view that these translations fail properly to account for the relationship between the article τὰand the following relative pronounἃ.[9] The traditional approach to this passage effectively treats the two as linked, when instead they should be viewed independently of each other. Stated differently, the traditional texts connect the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματοςwith the following clauseπρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν (Compare Furnish, II Corinthians, 276: “The present tr. in effect ignores the article (ta) and includes the phrase [διὰ τοῦ σώματος] in the relative clause, what each has done“),when in fact they should be decoupled and treated separately. A more accurate rendering of the passage would thus read something along these lines: “We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive in or through the body what is due us, or recompense, for what we have done, or for our deeds, whether good or bad.”[10]A small number of translations, both ancient and modern, have adopted a more-or-less similar reading, demonstrating that others arguably have noticed this issue as well.[11]

With a few notable exceptions, there is surprisingly scant detailed grammatical analysis of this passage in the literature.[12] While a variety of approaches supporting the conventional translation can be postulated (some of the more notable ones are discussed below, including the use of ellipsis to color the meaning of the text), perhaps the most direct method is to start with the idea that the article τὰ governs the following prepositional phrase, thereby making the entire phrase (τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος, that is, “the things through or in the body”) a substantive, rather than adverbial.[13]In other words, the article in τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματοςnominalizes or substantivizes the prepositional phraseδιὰ τοῦσώματος, thus turning the phrase into a noun. In his grammar, Moule, An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, 110. 3, the author referred to an entire clause being “treated as a single entity―as a kind of composite noun.”

The ability of prepositional phrases in Greek to function as substantives is well settled. Matthewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 95: “Occasionally the entire propositional phrase can function as a substantive. In this way it fills the noun slot in a clause (e.g., as subject or direct object). This usage most often occurs with an article that acts as a nominalizer, turning the propositional phrase into a substantive.” Compare Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 403: “Greek authors turned almost any grammatical unit into a substantive by placing an article in front of it. The prepositional phrase is no exception. Prepositional phrases are sometimes substantized (nominalized) and function as nouns.” Köstenberger, 403, listed as an example 1 John 2:15 (τὰ ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ), explaining that “[b]ecause the prepositional phrase is substantized by a neuter accusative plural article, the translators have added ‘the things…’ in English. This use of the prepositional phrase is akin to the substantive use of the adjective.”[14]

Once it is established that the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος functions here as a substantive, the next question is how it relates, if at all, to the subsequent phrase πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν. According to Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 244, “the most common function of the relative clause [in this case, πρὸς ἃ] is as a modifier (secondary clause): [I]t modifies another clause to which it is connected by its antecedent. Sometimes the modifying relative pronoun is the object of a preposition in its own clause.” Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 398, stated this same idea in a slightly different way: “A relative pronoun … is a pronoun that (usually) ‘relates back’ to an antecedent noun and allows the writer to make an additional explanatory comment about that noun. The entire clause introduced by the relative pronoun is called a relative clause.” Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 711, underscored the strong relational aspect of the relative pronoun: “The relative becomes the chief bond of connection between clauses….The agreement of the relative with antecedent in person, number, gender, and sometimes, case, is just the natural effort to relate more exactly the two clauses with each other.”[15]

Following this line of analysis to support the conventional rendering of the passage, the relative clause πρὸς ἃ would “relate back” to its antecedent, which in this case would be the article τὰthat nominalizes the prepositional phrase, διὰ τοῦ σώματος. Note that the relative pronoun ἃ and the article τὰ not only fall near one other in the text, separated only by the nominalized prepositional phrase and the preposition of which the relative pronoun ἃ is its object, but moreover share both a neuter plural and the accusative case. Thus, the argument would proceed, the two are grammatically linked in what is essentially an inseparable bond (Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 711). The subordinate clause would then arguably begin with the relative clause πρὸς ἅ that in turn elaborates, defines, and modifies its antecedent, “the things (τὰ) through or in the body,” and thus connects the prepositional phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος[16] with the following verb, ἔπραξεν. This construction would account for the NIV translation “for the things done while in the body,” and similar texts.[17]

Under the alternative translation proposed here, the analysis proceeds quite differently. The second prepositional phrase (πρὸς ἃ) is read solely with reference to the second verb, ἔπραξεν; in other words, the phrase πρὸς ἃ, by denoting reference, relates to the following verb ἔπραξεν by “delimiting the extent of that verb’s action.” Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 71. Accordingly, the substantivized phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος, instead of being transported into the following clause (Furnish, II Corinthians, 276), is treated as the direct object of κομίσηται. The phrase is thus likened to an accusative noun. “The accusative case is the case of limitation or extension, delimiting the action of a verb. The accusative ‘measures an idea as to its content, scope, [or] direction’.” Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 64. See also Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 28: “verbs in general take accusative direct objects … [s]ome grammars call it the case of limitation or extent.”[18]

Thus, under this line of reasoning, the prepositional phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος would measure the idea of receiving (from the verb κομίσηται) “as to its content, scope, direction.” Chamberlain, An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 37. It would do so by signifying the means through which recompenseis to be received, in this case through the instrumentality of the body.[19] Compare Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 582, where in explaining the agency role of the preposition διὰ, the author wrote: “Here, of course, the agent is conceived as coming in between the non-attainment and the attainment of the object in view.” Thus, under Robertson’s reading of agency as applied to the revised translation proposed here, it would be the body (σώματος) that would serve as the vehicle by which and through which Christ’s judgment of believers is attained.[20]

In deciding between these two translational approaches, the key question is whether the relative pronoun ἃ and the preceding article τὰ, and thus their respective prepositional phrases διὰ τοῦ σώματος and πρὸς ἃ, should be linked in translation or not. On the surface they would appear to be closely connected. This is because the relative pronoun and the preceding article share a neuter plural accusative, fall in close proximity to one another, and can both be translated generally as “the things,” thus forging what would appear to be an unbreakable grammatical bond between the two. Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 711. However, that is not the whole story. Formal (that is, purely grammatically based) counterarguments exist.

Supporting a decoupling of the two clauses is the general rule that a relative pronoun in a prepositional phrase such as πρὸς ἃ often has no precise grammatical antecedent, although in certain instances the antecedent may be “conceptual.” Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 342-343: “The RP is often used after a preposition. Frequently, such prepositional phrases have an adverbial or conjunctive force. In such instances, the RP either has no antecedent, or else its antecedent is conceptual, not grammatical.” Here, the phrase πρὸς ἃ has an adverbial force in relation to the verb ἔπραξεν, suggesting the absence of an antecedent. Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 71, fn 74. See also Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 51: “In some instances, the relative pronoun is not connected to an antecedent, or head, in another clause.” In referring to Hebrews 5:8 (ἔμαθεν ἀφ’ ὧν ἔπαθεν, which the authors translated as: “He learned obedience from what he suffered“), Mathewson, 245, in concluding that the relative clause has no antecedent, reasoned that “[t]he relative ὧν is the object of the preposition ἀπὸ and the entire prepositional phrase modifies ἔμαθεν…”[21]

This note acknowledges that the purely formal arguments in favor of linking the two clauses seem to outweigh those supporting their decoupling. In most of the passages involving a preposition and a relative pronoun that are not connected to an antecedent (see fn 21 herein), there is either no obvious antecedent, or the relative pronoun has only conjunctive force, and thus functions more like a “vague resumptive phrase.” Moule, An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, 131. Simply because the relative clause πρὸς ἃ, by denoting reference, relates adverbially to ἔπραξεν by “delimiting the extent of that verb’s action,” Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 71, does not preclude the relative pronoun in that clause from fulfilling its normal role of relating back to an antecedent noun, in this case, the prepositional phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος. Compare Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 244, “the most common function of the relative clause [is that] it modifies another clause to which it is connected by its antecedent. Sometimes the modifying relative pronoun is the object of a preposition in its own clause.” Indeed, the formal grammatical connection in 2 Corinthians 5:10 between the relative pronoun ἃ and the prior articular composite noun (τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος) seems as sturdy as one could hope for, since they share not only gender and number, but also case, and they fall very near each other in the text. That does not end the analysis, however. The conceptual component must now be considered.

A rendering of the subordinate clause along the lines suggested in this note, as opposed to its more conventional treatment in translation, need not rely on fine categorical distinctions.[22] Here, the conceptual relationship between the two clauses, or more accurately the lack thereof, should far outweigh any grammatical affinity.[23] Simply put, the relative pronoun ἃ (“the things”) in the phrase πρὸς ἃ refers generally to “works” or “deeds,” or “what we did.” The New Linguistic and Exegetical Key to the Greek New Testament, Rogers Jr., Cleon L., and Rogers III, Cleon L., Zondervan (1998 ed.) (hereafter “Rogers”), 402, where the authors noted that “[W]ith the prep. the phrase means ‘w. reference to what he did'”; the NASB text (“according to what he has done”); the ESV text (“for what he has done”); the NIV text (“for the things done”); and Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407: “the things which (= what) he has done,’ or in proportion to his deeds’.” In stark contrast, the preceding article τὰ (alsoin a general sense, “the things”)refers to “deserts” or “recompense” or “what is due.” Zerwick, A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament, 544, the NASB text, and the ESV and NIV texts.[24]

In other words, we have here a case of the proverbial apples and oranges asbetween the two adjacent clauses:τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματοςand πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν. How then can the relative pronoun “relate back” (Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 398) to the article so as “to modify” or elaborate (Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 244) the preceding nominalized prepositional phrase (διὰ τοῦ σώματος) when the relative pronoun and article refer to (that is, conceptualize) entirely different “things?” The relative pronoun here denoting “works” or “what each has done” cannot therefore fulfill its usual relational function with respect to the prior phrase, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος (Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 711). This is because to do so would distort the meaning of the text by imputing to the prior article and nominalized phrase the notion that “what is ‘received (back)’ is one’s earthly activity,” which would at best make only “obscure sense.” Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 395, fn 1443, discussed in detail below under the heading THE LITERATURE. Indeed, Thrall did not even seek to link the two phrases, but instead chose to advance an entirely different translational approach.

The relative pronoun and prior article, along with their respective phrases, should thus be treated independently in translation. Such a construction between a relative pronoun and a prior articular substantive where form does not align with meaning is rare, but not unheard of.[25] The connection, or the “chief bond” as Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 711, put it, between the two prepositional phrases thus broken, and nothing else linking the two, each prepositional phrase falls back on its natural function in the sentence, διὰ τοῦ σώματοςas the substantivized object of κομίσηται, andπρὸς ἃdenoting reference.[26] Furnish, II Corinthians, 276, translating πρὸς as “according to”; and BAGD, 710, n 5, πρὸς indicating “reference.”See also Luke 12:47: πρὸς τὸ θέλημα αὐτοῦ, denoting “in accordance with”, BDF, ¶ 239 (8); and Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers, The Shepherd of Hermas, Mandates, 11.3, 540: πρὸς τὸ κένωμα τοῦ ἀνθρώπου ἀποκρίνεται (translated therein: “according to the emptiness of the one asking.”)[27] 

The nominalized phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος therefore delimits the verb κομίσηται in its role as an accusative direct object, while the relative clause πρὸς ἃ is read solely in relation to the second verb, ἔπραξεν. To comingle the two phrases, as the traditional translations would seem to do, essentially equates definitionally what Christ dispenses at his judgment seat with what believers do on the earth, a nonsensical equivalence.[28]

3. The Literature

With some exceptions discussed below, most of the relatively recent literature on 2 Corinthians is of little help in describing in detail the grammatical underpinnings of this difficult passage.For example, Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, 290, only mentioned the phrase definitionally: “[W]e understand the phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος … to be temporal, ‘while in the body’… that is, during one’s time on earth, not actions ‘done by means of the body’ ….” Guthrie went on to discuss the subsequent verb and relative clause as an isolated unit, 290: “Further, πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν … communicates the idea of ‘accordance,’ suggesting that Christ’s recompense will be according to what a person has accomplished during earthly life.”Nowhere, however, did the author address why this earthly time in the body (σώματος) should not instead be read in conjunction with the immediately preceding verb, κομίσηται.[29]

Those hoping to find deep grammatical exegesis of this passage in another leading commentary, 2 Corinthians, An Exegetical and Theological Exposition of Holy Scripture, The New American Commentary, Garland, David E., B&H Publishing Group (1999) (hereafter “Garland”), will be quickly disappointed. Here, once again, assumptions about the timing and venue of judgment seemed to drive what scant grammatical analysis there is, as Garland spent little ink on the grammar of verse 10, but instead stressed the importance of the “body” for Christians as they appear before Christ’s judgment seat (266): “What humans do in the body has moral significance and eternal consequence. Everyone who is mindful of their mortality must therefore be mindful of their mortality.” Under the revised reading proposed here, Garland’s focus on the body would take on even more significance, since the body would not only serve as the obvious vehicle by which believers accomplish the acts being judged, but would also represent the instrument through which judgment for such behavior is executed.[30]

With reference to chapter 5 verses 6-8, Garland, 264, noted that “Paul’s whole life is suffused with confidence because of the hope of the resurrection…” Likewise, from this standpoint of hopeful assurance, it “would have been a matter of relative insignificance to Paul” when Christ’s judgment of his followers takes place. Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 409 (quoted more fully below). Compare Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament 2 Corinthians, Kruse, Colin G., Köstenberger, Andreas J., Yarbrough, Robert W., B&H Academic, (2020) (hereafter “Kruse”), 107, where the authors cited Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 385-386, in defending “the view that in v. 3 Paul is expressing, not fear of temporary physical disembodiment or permanent spiritual disembodiment, but assurance of spiritual embodiment and rejection of any idealization of disembodiment that may have been advocated by certain gnosticizing Corinthians.” Kruse, 109, noted that the reason for this confident assurance is “the presence of the Spirit as God’s pledge to him of bodily resurrection.” Compare Martin, World Biblical Commentary, Volume 49, 2 Corinthians, Martin, Ralph P., Word Books Publisher, Waco Texas (1986) (hereafter “Martin”), 108: “The use of ἀρραβῶνα…refers to a down payment, something to assure that the ‘final installment will come’ (1:22). What the Christian has now is a present possession, which promises more to come….”  

Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 406, likewise assumed without comment that διὰ τοῦ σώματοςis to be read in conjunction with the second verb ἔπραξεν and not the first: “So that each may be duly recompensed for actions … performed through the body.” Compare Kruse, Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament 2 Corinthians, 111, where the authors assumed that the key phrase (τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος) simply confirmed the standard reading (“the things (done) through the body”), without explaining the grammatical basis for associating the reference to the body with ἔπραξεν, rather than with the site or vehicle through which judgment is received (κομίσηται).  Likewise, Martin, 2 Corinthians, 115, glossed over this difficult passage with no grammatical or conceptual comment other than an unstated reliance on standard assumptions: “The basis of this recompense for the Christian is τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν, ‘what he has done in the body’.”

Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, went on to observe: “ἕκαστος, ‘each person,’ indicates that τοὺς πάντας ἡμᾶς does not imply a judgment en masse. Accountability and assessment are individual,” an observation which is fully in keeping with an evaluation during each believer’s individual life, rather than at some corporate, post-death venue. See also Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, 289: “ἕκαστος … indicates that scrutiny will apply to each individual rather than consisting of a summary judgment on that (πάντας ἡμᾶς) group of people”; Furnish, II Corinthians, 275: “Although we must all appear before the judicial bench of Christ, we are individually accountable”; and Martin, 2 Corinthians, 115: “judgment is not rendered en masse, but in each case, one by one.”

Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, mentioned the article τὰto denote that it is not “simply metonymy for ‘the consequences of,’ as though the κομίσασθαι were merely the outcome of some immanental process by which the reaping of consequences followed inexorably on the sowing of actions, for in this case the reference to an appearance and examination before the βήμα would be rendered superfluous.” Under the translation proposed here, believers appear and are judged before Christ’s βήμα throughout the course of their lives. This evaluation is by its very nature a highly individualized examination unique to each believer and thus consistent with Harris’s rejection of “some immanental process.” Harris colored the sense of the phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματοςby implying after the article τὰ the participle of the verb “to do” or “to accomplish,”[31] presumably as the means to link the phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος with the action of doing.[32]

Furnish’s main contribution here is to emphasize repeatedly the problematic nature of the text (II Corinthians, 276): “The best-attested text reads, literally, ‘(may receive back) the things through the body in accordance with what each has done’,” which Furnish, agreeing with Synofzik (Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus,75), characterized as an “awkward pleonasm.”[33] Again, Furnish, 305, the author wrote: “[T]he syntax of this verse is extremely unclear. The troublesome phrase is the one that mentions the body. In addition to the syntactical problem, one should note that it is quite unique to have bodily existence mentioned at all when the topic is the last judgment, as it is here. Thus, the phrase [τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος] calls attention to itself both grammatically and conceptually.” Once more, the author, 276, pointed to the troublesome nature of the phrase: “The Greek phrase involved here (ta dia tou sōmatos) is textually, syntactically…and also grammatically problematic.” Furnish reasoned that this lack of clarity suggested that perhaps “Paul intrudes it in order to make a point of some importance to him.” Furnish, 305.

Furnish, 305, cited E. Synofzik in Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus for a possible explanation of this “point of some importance” Paul was attempting to make by his “troublesome” reference to the body. For his part, Synofzik, 74, argued that Paul employed much-discussed terms and concepts from 2 Corinthians 5:1-5 “(ἐκδυσάμενοι ― ἐνδυσάμενοι ― οὐ γυμνοὶ εὑρεθησόμεθα)” and from verses 6-8 “(ἐκδημῆσαι ἐκ τοῦ σώματος ― ἐνδημῆσαι ἐν τῷ σώματι)” to dispute opposing eschatological views (mit anders-artigen Eschatologie-Vorstellungen) of his Corinthian rivals (Gegner in Korinth). Thus, according to Synofzik, Paul’s main goal here was not so much to advance his confidence in the hope of the resurrection as is generally believed, but to admonish his opponents in Corinth over their mistaken notion that the physical body, and what one did while in the body, was unimportant to their eternal destiny. Compare, for example, Garland, 2 Corinthians 250: “Paul did not write this passage [2 Corinthians 5] to answer questions we might have about the when, what, or how; he only intends to affirm his confidence in the Christian’s transformation in the life after death.”[34]

Synofzik, Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus, 74-77, contended rather that Paul was admonishing his Corinthian readers of the ethical consequences of their bodily existence, the importance of which Paul feared that they had disregarded. Compare Synofzik, 76, where he stated that in the foreground for Paul was not the threat (Drohung) of judgment, but rather one’s earthly existence in the face of what he felt was the Corinthians’ enthusiastic degrading or devaluation of the body (“sondern die Begründung der Verantwortlichkeit für das eigene somatische Leben angesichts der korinthischen entusiastischen Abwertung des Soma,” and “Gegenüber der korinthischen Abwertung des Leibes.”)

According to Synofzik, 76, Paul countered his opponents by instead placing the greatest possible weight on the body: “legt Paulus gerade das größte Gewicht auf den Leib.” Synofzik, 76, further claimed that Paul was arguing here that the body was not irrelevant before God, as Greek thought at the time might have suggested: “Unser Leben in Soma ist nicht irrelevant vor Gott.” Synofzik, 76, thus imputed to Paul the suggestion that the body represented the basis of Christian hope: “Schon hier bringt Paulus polemisch zum Ausdruck, daß für ihn die in Korinth propagierte entusiastische Loslösung vom eigenen, negativen verstandenden Soma nicht die Grundlage christlicher Hoffnung and christlicher Existenz verständnissen sein kann.” Again, 77, Synofzik hammered home this point of the eschatological significance of the body: “Die Gegner des Paulus in Korinth dürfen ihre somatische Existenz nicht irrelevant oder gar als aufgehoben betrachten; denn auf ihr ruht die ganze eschatologisch begründete Verantwortung des Christen in seinem Bemühen, dem Herrn wohlgefällig zu sein.”  

Synofzik, 76, argued that Paul lived and preached so that his bodily life was transparent to God: “Paulus lebt und verkündigt so, daß er schon jetzt Gott offenbar ist. Diese Gott offenbare Existenzweise ist das Unterpfand [meaning Beweis (proof) or Gültigkeit (validity), Duden.de] des Paulus für seine Hoffnung, daß er auch den Opponenten in Korinth in gleicher Weise offenbar werde.” Indeed, Synofzik, 77, went so far as to maintain that the body was the “object” of judgment: “Der Ton der traditionellen Gerichtsaussage liegt also entsprechend der gesamten ab 4,7 ff geführten Auseinandersetzung nicht in der Art und Weise des vergeltenden Gerichtes, sondern in der Markierung des Gegenstandes des Gerichts, des σῶμα.”

Paul accused the Corinthians, according to Synofzik, 74, of failing to understand the ethical consequences of bodily life for the Christian: “Diese z. T. spekulativen Eröterungen über den Zustand des Leibes nach dem Sterben bzw. nach der Parusie lässt Paulus mit V. 9 hinter sich da für ihn besonders die etische Konsequenz für das Leben der Christen in der Gegenwart zu Relevanz ist. Gerade diese Konsequenz, die sich in dem somatischen Leben in der Kreuzesnachfolge (vgl. 2 Kor. 4,7 ff) abbildet, scheint von den Gegnern des Paulus in Korinth missachtet oder gar übersprungen werden zu sein.” Synofzik, 76, contended that Paul’s principal message here was that the believer’s responsibility before God is lived out through the physical body: “In pointiertem Gegensatz zu dem Überspringen und Verachten des eigenen Soma bei seinen Gegnern behauptet Paulus in 2 Kor. 5,10 gerade seine Verantwortlichkeit vor Gott διὰ τοῦ σώματος.”

Thus, Paul’s point of emphasis, according to Synofzik, 77, was the eschatologically grounded responsibility with respect to the Christian’s bodily existence: “der Hinweis auf die eschatologisch begründete Verantwortung der geschichtlich-somatischen Existenz des Christen.” Synofzik, 77, reasoned that for Paul: “hier [on the earth] ist der Ort des περιπατεȋν διὰ πίστεως, οὐ διὰ εἴδους (V.7).”[35]

Indeed, Synofzik, 76, stressed the significance of the body to the degree that he made what might easily be taken in isolation as a rather astonishing observation: “Denn die Christen werden nach ihren Werken διὰ τοῦ σώματος gerichtet.” Here, again, we encounter a question of interpretation with respect to the grammatical force of the phrase, διὰ τοῦ σώματος. Does this phrase function as an adjective modifying Werken (works); or does it instead serve as an adverb modifying the verb gerichtet (judged)?  In other words, should we interpret what Synofzik was attempting to communicate here as: Will Christians be judged according to their works (done) through the body; or will Christians be judged through the body according to their works? Viewing the entire discussion in context, it is likely the former meaning that Synofzik intended, although he followed this surprising statement with another rather intriguing observation, 76: “Wir alle werden unser Leben in der gegenwärtigen, somatischen Existenz vor Christus verantworten müssen” (roughly translated: “We will all have to answer for our life in the present bodily existence before Christ,” though the text does not specify precisely when that evaluation would take place). Synofzik, 76, clearly asserted, however, that Paul’s focus here was not on some apocalyptic future, but on the believer’s present bodily life: “Paulus den Gedanken der Verantwortlichkeit vor dem eschatologischen Richter nicht zu einem apokalyptischen Gerichtsgemälde, sondern zur Begründung für gegenwärtigen Existenz verwendet.”

Still, despite Synofzik’s probable intent here, the ambivalence of some of his observations, combined with his repeated stress on the importance of the body to Paul (des Gegenstandes des Gerichts, des σῶμα), offers “tantalizing” (Roetzel, Book Review, 452-454)possibilities for further exploration of what exactly Paul meant when he composed the enigmatic phrase, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος. Compare Synofzik, 76: “So zeigt auch die Vearbeitung der traditionellen Gerichtsaussage in 2 Kor. 5,10 durch den folgenden Kontext, daß Paulus allein auf die Verantwortlichkeit und Einschätzung seiner somatischen Existenz abhebt, und sie bestätigt so die Annahme, daß Paulus in 2 Kor. 5,10 die traditionelle Gerichtsaussage durch τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματοςinterpretiert habe” (this last phrase meaning that Paul interpreted the traditional Biblical statement of judgment [die traditionelle Gerichtsaussage] through [durch] the body, that is, “τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος”).[36]    

Following Synofzik’s lead, Furnish, noting that in his view “the present translation in effect ignores the article (ta) and includes the phrase [referencing σώματος] in the relative clause, what each has done,” went on to suggest (276) that the phrase “was polemically motivated in view of the devaluation of the body by certain persons in Corinth.”[37] No consideration was given simply to link the “troublesome” phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος with the preceding verb in its natural role as the nominalized object of κομίσηται, rather than Furnish’s dubious approach of ignoring the article altogether.[38]

Margaret Thrall in her well-respected and exhaustive commentary directly addressed the grammar of this difficult passage with a creative but ultimately flawed effort to defend the conventional translations. In fn 1443 and fn 1444, Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 395, supported the traditional translation by relying on an “extended” definition of κομιζω, and by implying through ellipsis the addition of the participle πεπράγμενα (things done, actions, deeds) immediately after the article τὰ. She made no explicit effort to link the two clauses (τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος and πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν) either grammatically or conceptually.[39] Thus, the only issue here concerns the treatment of the first verbκομίσηταιand its relationship to the subsequent phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος.

In fn 1443, after noting that κομιζω in the middle voice means “get for oneself” or “receive,” Thrall, 395, wrote that “[h]ere, what is ‘received (back)’ is one’s earthly activity.” Concluding, however (395), that since this only makes “obscure sense, the meaning must be extended somewhat.”[40] Without telling us precisely why it must be extended (that is, the conceptual basis for doing so) other than to relieve the obscurity of the text, Thrall defined the term as to “‘receive (something) in return for’ (earthly activity), ‘receive recompense’.” Thrall, 395, fn 1443. Compare Kruse, Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament 2 Corinthians, 111: “κομίσηται expresses purpose: so that each may be repaid”; and Martin, 2 Corinthians, 115: “The Christian will receive (note how the use of the middle voice for κομίσηται stresses the action of the agent; this fits in well with the remainder of this verse) or ‘receive back’ or ‘receive what is one’s own (‘reap’ or ‘get back for one’s self’….”

While the broad definition of receiving recompense is possible,[41] there is no precedent for including within the definition per se the precise terms and nature of the exchange. See, for example, Windisch, Der zweite Korintherbrief, 171: “κομίσηται heißt im gewöhnlichen Sprachgebrauch eine Gebühr, ein Recht, einen Besitz, Lohn, Gehalt, eine Strafe rechtmäßig in Empfang nehmen”; and Baumert, Täglich Sterben und Auferstehen: Der Literalsinn von 2 Kor 4, 12-5,10 SANT 34, München, 1973, 250, 410-429, cited by Thrall, 395, fn 1443: “[T]he meaning is ‘receive a verdict,’ an evaluation of one’s deeds.” Thrall, 395, fn 1444, attempted to remedy this oversight by classifying the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος as “elliptical,” thereby “requiring, e.g., πεπράγμενα [things done] after τὰ.” In this way, the author sought to make clear what the plain language of the text does not; namely, that the body (σώματος) should be read solely with reference to one’s earthly activity, and not to the site of judgment.

Ellipsis or an elliptical expression refers to “words or phrases normally omitted in a discourse when the sense is perfectly clear without them.”[42] In Nida, Style and Discourse, 34 and 36, the authors in describing the rhetorical feature of “omissions” observed that the “most common kind of omissions are syntactic ellipses, and these more often than not involve the omission of so-called function words, that is to say, words which serve to relate textual elements to one another. … There appears to be no instance of an omission in the New Testament which cannot be supplied from the immediate context or from one’s knowledge of patterns of cultural avoidance.” See also BDF, ¶ 479: “Ellipsis (brachylogy) in the broad sense applies to any idea which is not fully expressed grammatically and leaves it to the hearer or reader to supply the omission because it is self-evident.” BDF, ¶ 480, listed various ellipses of verbs in formulaic constructions, none of which would apply here.[43]

As detailed above (Furnish, II Corinthians, 276), the sense of the subordinate clause “textually, syntactically…and also grammatically” is far from perfectly clear, either in general, or from the immediate context. Indeed, it is perfectly unclear. Furnish, 305: “[T]he syntax of this verse is extremely unclear.”This lack of clarity extends beyond the grammar and syntax and goes to the very meaning of the passage. It is worth repeating here that, despite Furnish’s citation of Synofzik’s arguments as a possible rationale for Paul’s “troublesome” reference to the body, Furnish continued to harbor misgivings as to the true meaning of the passage: “The troublesome phrase is the one that mentions the body. In addition to the syntactical problem, one should note that it is quite unique to have bodily existence mentioned at all when the topic is the last judgment, as it is here. Thus, the phrase [τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος] calls attention to itself both grammatically and conceptually.” Furnish, II Corinthians, 305.[44]

Thrall sought to craft a complicated grammatical analysis that conformed the text with longstanding assumptions as to its meaning. Her construction required three elements: extending the definition of κομιζωbeyond its general meaning; implying a participle (πεπράγμενα) after the definite article τὰ; and finally implying an additional prepositional phrase (in return for, or in exchange for) without which the subordinate clause would make little sense.Why engage in such grammatical gymnastics when there exists a straightforward rendering of the text, unless the aim is a disguised effort to defend long held theological and eschatological assumptions?[45]While Greek is a flexible language (Compare BDG, ¶ 473: “Because of the flexibility of the Greek language, vivid, impassioned speech easily gives rise to…dislocations” in normal word order), such flexibility should not be taken as a license to rework conceptually and syntactically problematic texts in order to achieve some predetermined result. 

In short, the purported omissions in the text which Thrall attempted to fill or remedy by implication, namely by adding a participle and an associated prepositional phrase, “cannot be supplied from the immediate context” (Nida, Style and Discourse, 36) because that context is fundamentally unclear, largely because of the very phrase the meaning of which Thrall was attempting to clarify, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος. Furnish, II Corinthians, 276 and 305. Thus, in translation the Greek text should be allowed to speak for itself without the addition of semantically dubious rhetorical structures. In other words, what Thrall sought to impose upon the text was “beyond the bounds of translation.” Newman, A Translator’s Handbook, 356.[46]

Thrall relied for much of her interpretation of this passage and her definition of κομιζω on Plummer, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary. Note her prominent citation of Plummer in fn 1443, 395. However, there are contradictions in the definitional treatment of the passage between the two commentaries. Plummer, 157, described the recompense that believers are to receive, quoting from F. W. Robertson’s Lectures on the Epistles to the Corinthians (quoted more fully below), in this way: “St. Paul does not say merely that he shall receive according to what he had done in the body, but that he shall receive the things done―the very selfsame things he did, they are to be his punishments.” 

Citing Ephesians 6:8 (εἰδότες ὅτι ἕκαστος, ἐάν τι ποιήσῃ ἀγαθόν, τοῦτο κομίσεται παρὰ κυρίου) and Colossians 3:25 (ὁ γὰρ ἀδικῶν κομίσεται ὃ ἠδίκησεν), Plummer, 157, elaborated that the verb κομίσηται “always in N. T. means not simply to receive but to receive back, to get what has belonged to oneself but has been lost, or promised but kept back, or what has come to be one’s own by earning,” thereby signifying that the term connotes “to get as an equivalent, to get requited.” Plummer, 157, went on to cite various passages from the Greek Old Testament, which he argued supported his reading of the term, including Genesis 38:20 (κομίσασθαι τὸν ἀρραβῶνα) and Leviticus 20:17 (ἁμαρτίαν κομιοῦνται). Plummer, 157, expanded on this notion of automatic requital for one’s deeds by noting that “the metonymy by which we are said to receive back what we have done is not a mere idiom, but ‘lies deeper in the identity of the deed and its requital’.”[47]

Such a mechanical version of judgment conflicts with Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, who wrote that the presence of the article τὰdoes not denote”simply metonymy for ‘the consequences of,’ as though the κομίσασθαι were merely the outcome of some immanental process by which the reaping of consequences followed inexorably on the sowing of actions, for in this case the reference to an appearance and examination before the βήμα would be rendered superfluous.” Moreover, this “identity of the deed and its requital”; that is, receiving “back what we have done” (Plummer 157), conflicts somewhat with Thrall’s own appraisal of the nature of the recompense (2 Corinthians 1-7, 395, fn 1443): “Here, what is ‘received (back)’ is one’s earthly activity. But since this makes only obscure sense, the meaning must be extended somewhat: ‘receive (something) in return for’ (earthly activity), ‘receive recompense’.”

The underlying rationale for Thrall’s reading of the passage, namely, “the identity of the deed and its requital,” was thus ultimately drawn (through her reliance on Plummer, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary, 157) from one of the lectures delivered by F.W. Robertson at Trinity Chapel. The relevant portion of this lecture (delivered in 1852) is quoted here at length, with the briefer portion quoted by Plummer shown in italics:[48]

The second motive [behind Paul’s labors for the Gospel] was the feeling of accountability (v. 10).  ‘We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.’ Now this feeling of accountability may assume either of two forms. In a free and generous spirit, it may be simply a sense of duty; in a slavish and cowardly spirit, it will be a sense of compulsion; and the moment the sense of duty ends, the sense of compulsion begins….This is the difference between the two feelings; I ought, or I must; The Gospel, or the Law….Consider then the terrors of the Judgment. Remember, St. Paul does not say merely that he shall receive according to what he hath done in the body, but that he shall receive the things done―the self-same things he did―they are to be his punishment. To illustrate the Apostle’s meaning by analogy, future retribution is the same as here on earth. God’s punishments are not arbitrary, but natural. For example, a man commits a murder. It would be an arbitrary punishment if lightning struck him, or an earthquake swallowed him up….But God’s punishment for hatred and murder is hardening of the heart. He that shuts Love out, shuts out God…. God has hidden in the man’s own heart the avenging law: he becomes a degraded man: the serpent-tempter’s curse is his―’to go on his belly, and eat dust all the days of his life.’…He receives the things done in his body. Now, such is that is the law of future retribution. ‘Whatsoever a man soweth’―not something else, but that shall he also reap.’ ‘He which is filthy, let him be filthy still….Brethren, there is no perhaps. These are things ‘which will be hereafter.’ You cannot alter the Eternal Laws. You cannot put your hand in the flame, and not be burnt. You cannot sin in the body, and escape the sin; first it goes inwards, becomes part of you, and is itself the penalty which cleaves for ever and ever to your spirit. Sow in the flesh, and you will reap corruption. Yield to passion, and it becomes your tyrant and your torment. Be sensual, self-indulgent, indolent, worldly, hard―oh! they all have their corresponding penalties…. 

 Robertson certainly delivered a lively and powerful message to his listeners, and there is much in it to be admired, even by today’s standards, perhaps especially by today’s standards. The problem, however, is that Robertson’s notions of divine judgment leave little room for Christ. The process is automatic, almost mechanical, as each sin that the believer commits inexorably begins to take over part of his heart, soul and being. But, again, as Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, noted, what of Christ? Is there no room for mercy in his judgments? Compare Psalm 102: 9-10, LXX: “οὐκ εἰς τέλος ὀργισθήσεται, οὐδὲ εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα μηνιεῖ· οὐ κατὰ τὰς ἀνομίας ἡμῶν ἐποίησεν ἡμῖν, οὐδὲ κατὰ τὰς ἁμαρτίας ἡμῶν ἀνταπέδωκεν ἡμῖν.” See also Ezra 9:13 (NIV): “What has happened to us is a result of our evil deeds and our great guilt, and yet, our God, you have punished us less than our sins deserved and have given us a remnant like this.”

Does our Lord not have any independent say in what sort of dispensation proceeds from his own judgment seat (τοῦ βήματος τοῦ Χριστοῦ)? Harris The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, correctly referred to this as an “immanental process by which the reaping of consequences followed inexorably on the sowing of actions, for in this case the reference to an appearance and examination before the βήμα would be rendered superfluous.” Here, therefore, in this faulty immanental and rather mechanical expression of divine judgment lies the fifth possible meaning (see fn 46 above) culled from an examination of the relevant literature of Paul’s use of the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος; that is, to identify works with recompense in some sort of automatic retributive process of cause and effect. Indeed, on this questionable line of reasoning, Plummer A Critical and Exegetical Commentary, 157, equated “the identity of the deed and its requital,” which in turn became the basis for his reading (Plummer, 158) that τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος should be rendered: “Done by means of the body.”[49]

Plummer implied the Greek participle for “done” in his translation of this passage without expressly mentioning it, an omission which Thrall, 395, fn 1444, later corrected by classifying the entire phrase as “elliptical,” thereby allowing her to impute the participle πεπράγμενα after the article τὰ.[50] Compounding the problematic nature of his reading, Plummer, 160, almost as an afterthought, noted that “κομίσηται has τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος as its object,” without bothering to address whether this nominalized prepositional phrase as the direct object of κομίσηται exerts any delimiting force with respect to its verb. Instead, he cited it as evidence for the rather obvious proposition that there “is no doubt that ἔπραξεν, not κομίσηται, is to be understood with εἴτε ἀγαθὸν εἴτε φαῦλον.”[51]

The weak analytical foundation of Thrall’s reasoning behind the elliptical insertion of the Greek participle for “deeds done” is again demonstrated by her further reliance on the German theologian Hans Windisch (Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 395, fn 1444): “The phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος is elliptical, requiring, e.g., πεπράγμενα after τὰ (Windisch, p. 172).” Windisch’s exegesis of this passage, however, leaves much to be desired.

Windisch, Der zweite Korintherbrief, 172, began his treatment of the text with the observation that the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος is difficult (schwierig): “Nicht ganz leicht sind die letzten Worte zu lesen und zu fassen: für das schwierige τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος.” Windisch, 172, then pointed as further evidence of the difficult nature of this passage to the two corrupted variants mentioned in fn 17 above (D* F G, fifth century and onward, ἃ διὰ τοῦ σώματος ἔπραξεν; and the earlier Papyrus 46, τὰ ἴδια τοῦ σώματος ἃ ἔπραξεν). He next concluded, 172, like Thrall, that a Greek participle for “done” must be inserted into the phrase: “In der Tat ist zu τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος etwa πεπράγμενα oder είργασμένα zu ergänzen,” reasoning that “ein jeder trägt davon, was er durch sein körperliches Handeln erwirbt hat; πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν entsprechend dem, was er getan hat.” This would be true, he argued, 172, whether διὰ should be viewed instrumentally (“was durch den Leib, durch die Glieder des Leibes getan ist”) or temporally (“was in der leiblichen Existenz, bei Leibesleben getan ist”). According to Windisch, 172, both point to individual responsibility for one’s bodily behavior: “Beide Fassungen sind darin eins, da sie nur für eine Verantwortung für das irdische Dasein annehmen.” Why his reading of this text (essentially, one gets what one deserves) required an elliptical insertion of a participle denoting earthly activity when that semantic function (“sein körperliches Handeln,” 172) is fully satisfied by the presence of the following relative clause, πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν, remained unexplained.[52]

Apparently not entirely comfortable with this solution to the text’s difficult language (τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν), which he conceded (thus agreeing with both Furnish and Synofzik) that in his view formed “eine Dublette” (meaning “ein doppelt vorhandenes Stück unmittelbar nacheinander,” Duden.de; that is, a repeated linguistic unit or phrase following directly one after the other; in other words, a pleonasm), Windisch, 172, admitted that he was tempted to strike one of the two phrases, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος or πρὸς ἃ: “man ist versucht, eine der Wendungen als Glosse zu streichen.” He finally concluded, however, that the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος was simply too difficult (schwierig) not to be the original: “aber τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος ist für eine Glosse zu originell und zu schwierig, und πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν wäre auch nicht gerade die nächstliegende Glosse für τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος.”

Windisch, 172, completed his analysis by proposing another solution to this troublesome reference to the body: “Eine andere Lösung wäre die Einbeziehung von τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος in den Relativsatz…je nachdem er gehandelt hat im Leibe.” In other words, without any discussion of why the underlying grammar would support such a reading, Windisch posited an alternative rationale that would simply transport the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος into the following relative clause πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν, yielding in German, “je nachdem er gehandelt hat im Leibe.” Compare Furnish, II Corinthians, 276: “The present tr. in effect ignores the article (ta) and includes the phrase [διὰ τοῦ σώματος] in the relative clause, what each has done.” This note has already addressed the conceptual disconnect between the two phrases which prevents such a coupling in translation.[53]

Thus, Thrall’s effort to impose on the text an unwarranted elliptical construction once again runs aground on faulty assumptions and a weak interpretive and grammatical foundation. Whether that faulty translation is based on relating the relative pronoun ἃ back to the article τὰ and thereby improperly cominglingtheir associated clauses in much the way Windisch, Der zweite Korintherbrief, 172; and Furnish, II Corinthians, 276, attempted to do: or whether it is founded on an elliptical insertion of a participle, πεπράγμενα, after the article as Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 395, fn 1444; Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, fn 231; and Windisch, Der zweite Korintherbrief, 172, all suggested, both approaches seem theologically motivated rather than grammatically and conceptually driven. In other words, all these efforts are aimed at reaching an unstated but nevertheless predetermined theological understanding of the passage.

Any such conventional rendering of the text not only disregards the conceptual disconnect between the two prepositional phrases, διὰ τοῦ σώματος and πρὸς ἃ, but it also missachtet (ignores) and überspringt (jumps over) (taken from Synofzik, Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus, 76, in another context) the fundamentally problematic nature of the passage, specifically the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος that renders an elliptical insertion inappropriate. In contrast, the translation proposed by this note represents a straightforward reading of the Greek text in which there is no hint of the pleonasm or redundancy surrounding the “troublesome” phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος that plagues the conventional renderings, and in which the problematic linkage of the physical body with judgment identified by Furnish is fully addressed.[54] 

4. Other Potential Objections

This note acknowledges that additional objections might be raised on a variety of grounds to the alternative translation proposed here. For instance, it could be argued that Paul’s reference to βήμαindicates a traditional eschatological viewpoint. The term βήμαlikely referredto a Roman seat of judgment at which the “deeds, both good and bad, performed through the earthly body” (Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 406) would be examined. For the significance of the βήμα, see also Hodge, Commentary on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 125; Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, 288; and Windisch, Der zweite Korintherbrief, 171: “βήμα ist auch im N.T. der gewöhnliche Ausdruck für den Amststuhl des Richters oder des Statthalters.” The term could also be treated, in keeping with a military triumphal parade (2 Corinthians 2:14), as referring to a tribunal before which soldiers would appear at the conclusion of their military service.[55]

Nothing in this passage, however, suggests that Paul was thinking of anything other than a “judicial appearance” (Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 406). Such an appearance need not take place in “a court of heaven” (Harris, 405) after one’s physical death. Indeed, Paul stood before Gallio’s tribunal in Corinth “some four years previously (in A.D. 52) when the proconsul dismissed the charge that Paul had contravened Roman law (Acts 18:12-17).” Harris, 406. Jesus faced Pilate’s βήμα before going to his death on the cross and completing his earthly ministry, and the martyred Stephen saw the risen Lord immediately prior to his death (Acts 7:55).[56] All the ink spilled by commentators on this common Greek term and its cultural context and significance does little other than suggest a metaphor for Christ’s evaluation of believers occurring at some point, a judgment that under the alternative translation proposed here would take place “through the body.”[57]

Another common objection might be that the judgment spoken of in 2 Corinthians 5:10 has a revelatory aspect to it that will be “revealed” or “made manifest” (φανερωθῆναι) in some future apocalyptic scenario or event. But see Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, 288, where the author instead denoted this term as “communicating a strong note of accountability.” See also Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 409: “But in comparison with the supreme and sobering fact of his accountability to Christ, the precise time of the φανερωθῆναι would have been a matter of relative insignificance to Paul.” To be fair, Harris was referring to various points at or after one’s physical death when this judgment might occur. Nevertheless, the reading proposed here, though novel, seems perfectly consistent with Paul’s overriding concern that believers must give account to Christ for their behavior.[58]

To the charge that this revised reading is overly literal (Compare Furnish, II Corinthians, 276, denoting a literal reading of the text as a “pleonasm”), there seems no conflict here between a so-called “‘word-for-word’ (i.e. ‘literal’) and ‘sense-for-sense’ (i.e. ‘free’) translation” (Wei Lu, Literal Translation, 742).[59] The theological mainstays of Paul’s underlying concerns in the overall passage, assurance of salvation for believers (Garland, 2 Corinthians, 264) and the need for accountability for their actions (Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, 288-289), not only do not undercut this alternative reading, but are both preserved and supported by it.[60]

The principal objection to this proposed rendering, however, would likely not be grammatical, but rather contextual; that is, the verse’s proximity to Paul’s discussion in verses 1–9 that seems to point to a post-death future. See, for example, Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, 279, where the author described how Paul in verses 2-5 “explains specifically his groaning in the earthly body and longing for the heavenly body;” Hodge, Commentary on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 118-119, where the author referenced Paul’s “longing after a better world” in a “heavenly” home; Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 371, describing how “Paul longs for the new spiritual form of somatic existence;  Kruse, Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament 2 Corinthians, 106: “Paul talks about groaning and longing to put on the heavenly body”; and Martin, 2 Corinthians, 99: “In short, Christians are groaning (στενάζομεν, 5:2,4) and are burdened (βαρούμενοι, 5:4) as they wait for the new building of God.” Plummer, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary, 145, explained this Christian longing succinctly: “we groan because we yearn.” Thus, the γάρ that introduces verse 10 arguably indicates that the motive behind Paul’s attitude and striving is his recognition that there will one day be a comprehensive accounting of his actions. Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 367. Compare Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, 288: “The combination of the passive infinitive φανερωθῆναι…and δεῖ (dei, must, it is necessary) communicates a strong sense of accountability.”

As outlined above, such accountability can be achieved whether one is “in the body” or not. Indeed, the verse immediately preceding 2 Corinthians 5:10 provides (NIV): “So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it.” See also Furnish, II Corinthians, 304, (discussion of verse 9): “The effect of his [Paul’s] formulation here, whether we are at home or away from home, is to relativize the matter of ‘residency’ so thoroughly as to dismiss it as an irrelevant issue. For him, what is alone important is whether one’s service as an apostle (or as any ordinary believer) is finally adjudged acceptable to the Lord. Paul is constantly reminding himself and his congregations that whatever one says or does comes under God’s surveillanceand ultimate judgment.” Compare Kruse, Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament 2 Corinthians, 111, who in citing Thrall’s commentary observed that the need for believers to strive to please Christ is only while they are in the body: “To overcome the problem of thinking that even after death, when believers are in the presence of Christ, they will still need to strive to please Christ, Thrall, 393 says, ‘During his present life Paul aims to act that both now and hereafter he will be pleasing to the Lord.'”[61]

An ultimate evaluation, together with the obvious reality of Christ’s constant surveillance of one’s deeds, words, thoughts, and emotions during one’s life, all accomplishedδιὰ τοῦ σώματος,would seem to be more than enough motivation for one’s present conduct (5:9) “to strive to please Christ” (φιλοτιμούμεθα εὐάρεστοι αὐτῷ εἶναι), and thereby overcome any contextual misgivings.[62]

5. Conclusion

Translators and commentators have been too quick to decouple the prepositional phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος from the first verb κομίσηται in the subordinate clause of 2 Corinthians 5:10, and instead to link it through various means to the second verb, ἔπραξεν.[63] A straightforward analysis of the plain language of the text arguably demonstrates that the phraseshould be associated with the first verb, not the second, and that such a reading does not in any way conflict with Paul’s message to believers regarding the assurance of salvation and the need for accountability. Moreover, the use of ellipsis to color the meaning of the text is inappropriate here because it assumes and then imposes the desired interpretative outcome onto a grammatically and conceptually problematic passage.[64]

The many theological and eschatological implications of this alternative rendering are beyond the scope of this note, though it is hoped that the discussion here will spur such inquiries, including a long overdue exhaustive and comprehensive examination of the significance of Paul’s seemingly cumbersome reference to the body (τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος).[65] Indeed, this overall passage is so obviously critical to a thorough understanding of Christ’s relationship to his followers in this life and the next that a wider, “ongoing conversation” is needed. Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, xii. As Harris observed, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407: “The recompense received comes from Christ, for it is his tribunal.”[66]

The End

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Baumert

Baumert, Täglich Sterben und Auferstehen: Der Literalsinn von 2 Kor 4, 12-5,10 SANT 34, München, 1973

Blass

A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, Blass, F., Debrunner, A., and Funk, Robert W, The University of Chicago Press (1961)

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Theology of the New Testament, Bultmann R., vol 1, New York: Scribner (1951)

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Martin M. Culy, I, II, III John: A Handbook on the Greek Text (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2004)

Chamberlain

An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, Chamberlain, William Douglas, The Macmillan Company (1961)

Conybeare

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Rodney J. Decker, Mark 1-8, A Handbook of the Greek Text, Decker, Rodney J.,Waco: Baylor University Press (2014)

De Lang, Marijke

Five Hundred Years of Martin Luther’s September Testament, The Bible Translator, 2022, Vol. 73(3)

Historical Criticism Reformulated in the “Age of Imagination,” BT Vol. 63, No. 3: 109-118

The Reformation Canon and the Development of Biblical Scholarship, The Bible Translator, 2016, Vol. 67(2) 184 –201

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Garland

2 Corinthians, An Exegetical and Theological Exposition of Holy Scripture, The New American Commentary, Garland, David E., B&H Publishing Group (1999)

Gundry

Soma in Biblical Theology, with emphasis on Pauline Anthropology, Gundry, Robert H., Cambridge University Press (1976)

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The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, Harris, Murray J., NIGTC, Eerdmans (2005)

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Heilig, Christoph. Paul’s Triumph: Reassessing 2 Corinthians 2:14 in Its Literary and Historical Context. BTS 27. Leuven: Peeters, 2017

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Commentary on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, Hodge, Charles,Eerdmans, (reprinted May, 1973)

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The Apostolic Fathers, Greek Texts and English Translations, edited and translated by Holmes, Michael W., Baker Academic (3^rd ed) 2007

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Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, Revised Edition: An Intermediate Study of the Grammar and Syntax of the New Testament, Köstenberger, Andreas J., Merkle, Benjamin L., and Plummer, Robert L., B&H Academic (2020)

Kruse

Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament 2 Corinthians, Kruse, Colin G., Köstenberger, Andreas J., Yarbrough, Robert W., B&H Academic, (2020)

Long

Long, Fredrick J. “‘The god of This Age’ (2 Cor 4:4) and Paul’s Empire-Resisting Gospel.” Pages 219–69 in The First Urban Churches: Volume 2: Roman Corinth. Edited by James R. Harrison and Laurence L. Welborn. Writings from the Greco-Roman World Supplement Series 7. Atlanta: SBL Press, 2016

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Martin

World Biblical Commentary, Volume 49, 2 Corinthians, Martin, Ralph P., Word Books Publisher, Waco Texas (1986)

Mathewson

Intermediate Greek Grammar: Syntax for Students of the New Testament, Mathewson, David L., Emig, Elodie Ballantine, Baker Academic (2019)

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A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, Metzger, Bruce M., United Bible Societies (Corrected Edition, 1975)

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Critical and Exegetical Commentary on The New Testament, Parts V. and VI, The Epistle to the Corinthians, Vol. II, Meyer, H. A. W., Translated from the German with the Sanction of the Author, Translation Revised and Edited by Dickson, W. P., and Stewart, W., Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark (1870)

Moule

An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, Moule, C.F.D., Cambridge University Press, 2^nd ed., (1959)

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A Grammar of New Testament Greek, Moulton, James Hope, and Turner, Nigel, Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark Ltd (1976)

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Newman and Nida, A Translator’s Handbook on The Gospel of John, United Bible Societies (1980)

Nida

Style and Discourse with special reference to the text of the Greek New Testament, Nida, E A, Louw, J P, Snyman, A H, Cronje, J v W, Bible Society of South Africa, First edition 1983, Second impression (1991)

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Partridge, A.C. (1973), English Biblical Translation, London: André Deutsch Limited)

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A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Second Epistle of St Paul to the Corinthians, The International Critical Commentary, Plummer, Alfred, Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark (1956)

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Sermons Preached at Trinity Chapel, Brighton, by Rev. Frederick W. Robertson, M.A., Vol. 1 and 2, Boston: James R. Osgood and Company, Late Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood, & Co. (1874), Source: https://archive.org/details/sermonspreacheda02robe

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Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament with Scripture, Wallace, Daniel B., Zondervan(1996 ed.)

The Semantics and Exegetical Significance of the Object-Complement Construction in the New Testament, Grace Theological Journal 6.1 (1985)

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Zerwick

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[1] “[I]n spite of the wealth of scholarly resources we now have at our disposal, 2 Corinthians needs and rewards continued study.… [A]ll that could be said has not been said: a fresh look at certain interpretive issues in 2 Corinthians can contribute to a needed, ongoing conversation.” 2 Corinthians, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament, Guthrie, George H., Baker Academic (2015) (hereafter “Guthrie”), xii.

“Scripture cannot be understood theologically unless it has first been understood grammatically,” Publisher Book Cover Note to The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, Harris, Murray J., NIGTC, Eerdmans (2005) (hereafter “Harris”). Compare Intermediate Greek Grammar: Syntax for Students of the New Testament, Mathewson, David L., Emig, Elodie Ballantine, Baker Academic (2019) (hereafter “Mathewson”), xix: “[W]e are committed to a minimalistic view of grammar, where maximal meaning is not attributed to the individual linguistic units but is found in their broader context… There is danger in reading far more from the grammar than is justified.”

[2]This note does not presume that the translational approach shared here is the exclusive, or even the only persuasive, way to analyze this difficult passage. The note does suggest, however, that, despite its novel character, the proposed alternative translation is well-supported and worthy of serious consideration. “We know how hard it was to understand Paul’s letters (2 Pt 3: 15,16), and in what manifold and sometimes contradictory fashion they have been interpreted.” A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature. By W. Bauer. Trans. and rev. by W.F. Arndt, F.W. Gingrich, and F.W Danker. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, (1979) (hereafter “BAGD”), xxiv.

[3] As will be illustrated more fully below, “conceptual” here does not refer to broadly theological concerns, or even to some “broader” conceptual context (Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, xix), but rather to the precise meaning of the various Greek terms and units in relation to each other within the context of the specific text being examined. While it is unlikely that this type of narrowly defined conceptual analysis in most instances will have the dramatic translational impact as it does here, this note contends that it should nonetheless be incorporated as an essential component of the “grammatical” treatment of complex New Testament passages. This approach would be especially useful, as shown below, in examining and categorizing formal relationships between various clauses, terms and phrases within discrete linguistic units.   

[4] Greek quotations are from the shared text of NA28 and UBS5. A subordinate clause, also known as a dependent clause, “is a portion of a sentence that contains (or implies) a subject or predicate and is subordinated to another portion of the sentence. It cannot stand alone as a complete thought.” Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, Revised Edition: An Intermediate Study of the Grammar and Syntax of the New Testament, Köstenberger, Andreas J., Merkle, Benjamin L., and Plummer, Robert L., B&H Academic (2020) (hereafter “Köstenberger“), 446. A phrase refers to “[t]wo or more words functioning together as a discrete grammatical unit, though lacking the sufficient components to be called a clause or sentence.” Köstenberger, 467. Syntax refers to “the arrangement and interrelationships of words in phrases, clauses, and sentences.” Newman and Nida, A Translator’s Handbook on The Gospel of John, United Bible Societies (1980) (hereafter “Newman, A Translator’s Handbook“), 677.

[5] Roberton in his stalwart grammar, A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research, Robertson, A.T., Broadman Press, 4^th ed. (1934) (hereafter “Robertson”), provided here by http://bibletranslations.ws, 471, wrote that the term transitive simply “means a verb whose action passes over to a noun.” The author noted (806) that verbs in the middle voice can be transitive depending on the nature of the verb.     

[6] II Corinthians, The Anchor Bible, Furnish, Victor Paul, Doubleday (1984) (hereafter “Furnish”), 276. Apart from the grammatical difficulties of this passage, there is a conceptual problem as well arising from the “troublesome” reference (Furnish, 305) to the body (διὰ τοῦ σώματος). Both must be kept in mind as the analysis proceeds. In An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, Chamberlain, William Douglas, The Macmillan Company (1961) (hereafter “Chamberlain”), 5, the author wrote: “The interpreter should ask first, what does the author say; second, what does he mean by this statement.” Compare Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus, eine traditionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung, E. Synofzik (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1977), 75, where the author opined that the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος represented a pleonasm: “Die Wendung [τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος] bereitet in jetzigem Kontext einige sprachliche Schwierigkeiten [verbal difficulties]. Der Ausdruck bildet im jetzigem Text einen Pleonasmus zu dem folgendem Relativsatsz πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν. Dies gilt vor allem dann, wenn man τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος instrumental versteht.” “A pleonasm consists in the repetition of an idea which has already been expressed in the sentence, not for any rhetorical purpose…, nor because of mere carelessness, but as a consequence of certain habits of speech.” A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, Blass, F., Debrunner, A., and Funk, Robert W, The University of Chicago Press (1961) (hereafter “BDF”), ¶ 484. Thus, Synofzik, as did other prominent Biblical exegetes discussed below, seemed to be making the rather startling observation that the phrases τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος and πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν express much the same idea, that is, earthly activity, and are essentially redundant. This note, as explained more fully below, takes a far different view.   

[7] Perhaps not surprisingly, empirical data in the relevant literature relating to the various grammatical units in this difficult text are hard to come by, though not non-existent. The only other passage in the New Testament where the article τὰ is followed immediately by διὰ is Romans 7:5 (ὅτε γὰρ ἦμεν ἐν τῇ σαρκί, τὰ παθήματα τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν τὰ διὰ τοῦ νόμου ἐνηργεῖτο ἐν τοῖς μέλεσιν ἡμῶν εἰς τὸ καρποφορῆσαι τῷ θανάτῳ). This verse is not on point here since in 2 Cor. 5:10 the relevant prepositional phrase is bracketed by two verbs along with a relative clause directly preceding the second verb, the unusual nature of which presents the very issue addressed in this note. Also, in Romans 7:5 the definite article τὰ preceding the prepositional phrase διὰ τοῦ νόμου clearly relates back both grammatically and conceptually to the prior article and related noun, τὰ παθήματα. While there are arguments either way regarding the grammatical link between the relative pronoun ἃ in 2 Cor. 5:10 and the preceding article τὰ (which are explored below), the conceptual link between them is not only lacking, but there is a marked divergence in meaning. All of this is discussed in detail below.

There are three noteworthy New Testament passages where a participle intervenes between the article and the preposition διὰ: (Luke 18:31) καὶ τελεσθήσεται πάντα τὰ γεγραμμένα διὰ τῶν προφητῶν; (2 Cor. 5:8) τὰ δὲ πάντα ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ καταλλάξαντος ἡμᾶς ἑαυτῷ διὰ Χριστοῦ; and (2 Pe. 1:3) τὰ πρὸς ζωὴν καὶ εὐσέβειαν δεδωρημένης διὰ τῆς ἐπιγνώσεως τοῦ καλέσαντος ἡμᾶς. The phrase τὰ διὰ does not appear in the Greek Old Testament, Septuaginta, Verkleinerta Ausgabe in einem Band, Rahlfs, Alfred, Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft Stuttgart (1979) (hereafter “LXX”). However, there are four noteworthy passages where a participle is likewise explicitly stated after the article and preceding διὰ: (Jer. 17:16 LXX) τὰ ἐκπορευόμενα διὰ τῶν χειλέων μου; (Deut. 23:24 LXX) τὰ ἐκπορευόμενα διὰ τῶν χειλέων σου; (Ps. 88:35 LXX) τὰ ἐκπορευόμενα διὰ τῶν χειλέων μου; and (Esther 1:15) οὐκ ἐποίησεν τὰ ὑπὸ τοῦ βασιλέως προσταχθέντα διὰ τῶν εὐνούχων. For the relevance of the Greek Old Testament to New Testament research, see generally Marijke de Lang, The Reformation Canon and the Development of Biblical Scholarship, The Bible Translator, 2016, Vol. 67(2) 184 –201, 197-198: “The emphasis on the importance of translating the Old Testament from Hebrew diverted attention from the fact that the Bible of the authors and earliest readers of the New Testament writings was a Greek Bible, not a Hebrew one, and that for a better understanding of the New Testament, a translation of the Old Testament from the LXX would perhaps make more sense.” All these participial-related phrases, both New Testament and Old Testament, are either discussed or alluded to below under the heading, THE LITERATURE.The phrase τὰ διὰ likewisedoes not appear in The Apostolic Fathers, Greek Texts and English Translations, edited and translated by Holmes, Michael W., Baker Academic (3^rd ed.) 2007 (hereafter “Holmes”), although these ancient texts do provide some interesting parallels to the passage at issue here, which are discussed below.

The phrase πρὸς ἃ is also exceedingly rare and appears only here in the Greek New Testament, and in only two verses in the Greek Old Testament, both from Jeremiah: (Jer. 32:17 LXX) ἐπότισα τὰ ἔθνη, πρὸς ἃ ἀπέστειλέν με κύριος ἐπ᾽ αὐτά; and (Jer. 32:15 LXX) ποτιεῖς πάντα τὰ ἔθνη, πρὸς ἃ ἐγὼ ἀποστέλλω σε πρὸς αὐτούς. An arguably analogous phrase appears in 3 Kings 21:6, LXX: ἔσται τὰ ἐπιθυμήματα ὀφθαλμῶν αὐτῶν, ἐφ᾽ ἃ ἂν ἐπιβάλωσι τὰς χεῖρας αὐτῶν. These verses are not on point because each of the relative pronouns clearly relate back to the antecedent article both grammatically and conceptually.

The unusual syntactical construction in 2 Cor. 5:10 of two consecutive prepositional phrases, the first preceded by an article and the second with a relative pronoun as the object of the preposition, both agreeing in number and gender, all flanked by two transitive verbs, may well be sui generis in all early Christian literature. Some may question how far one should profitably search beyond early Christian writings for grammatical parallels as an aid to Biblical exegesis. For example, Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 41, wrote that “[i]t is possible and essential then to correlate the N. T. Greek with all the other Greek to throw light on the stage of the language under review.” More recent grammars, however, disagree: “The ‘correct’ grammar is that upon which language users agree. A corollary of this approach to grammar is that the study of language should be primarily synchronic (describing the use of language at a given point in time) …. [O]ur study of Greek grammar has as its primary goal the (synchronic) description of usage at the time of the writing under consideration, the Koine Greek used in the NT….” Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, xx-xxi. For a perhaps slightly wider time frame, see Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament with Scripture, Wallace, Daniel B.,Zondervan(1996 ed.) (hereafter “Wallace”), 4: “Specifically, it is assumed that light shed on the NT will come mostly from Greek writings that fall within the Hellenistic period (roughly from 330 BCE to 330 CE).” Compare Grammar of Septuagint Greek, Conybeare, F.C., Ginn and Company, Boston (1905) (hereafter “Conybeare”),16-17: “The New Testament, having itself been written in Greek, is not so saturated with Hebrew as the Septuagint: still the resemblance in this respect is close enough to warrant the two being classed together under the title of Biblical Greek.”

As discussed in detail below, apart from the lack of empirical parallels, the fundamental problem of this passage (which also directly relates to the passage’s many grammatical and syntactical issues) is the “awkward” and “troublesome” reference to the body (σώματος), raising the “quite unique [conceptual problem of having] bodily existence mentioned at all when the topic is the last judgment…” (Furnish, II Corinthians, 276 and 305). Synofzik,

Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus, 75, also noted the uniqueness of this phrase: “Die Wendung is weder in ähnlichen christlichen oder jüdischen Vergeltungsaussagen nachzuweisen.” The phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος appears in only one other passage in the Greek Bible, Romans 7:4, a reference to the mortification of the flesh through the body of Christ:  Ὥστε, ἀδελφοί μου, καὶ ὑμεῖς ἐθανατώθητε τῷ νόμῳ διὰ τοῦ σώματος τοῦ Χριστοῦ, εἰς τὸ γενέσθαι ὑμᾶς ἑτέρῳ, τῷ ἐκ νεκρῶν ἐγερθέντι ἵνα καρποφορήσωμεν τῷ θεῷ. Compare the grammatical construction in Hebrews 10:10: ἐν ᾧ θελήματι ἡγιασμένοι ἐσμὲν διὰ τῆς προσφορᾶς τοῦ σώματος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ ἐφάπαξ; 4 Maccabees 10:20, LXX: ἡδέως ὑπὲρ τοῦ θεοῦ τὰ τοῦ σώματος μέλη ἀκρωτηριαζόμεθα; and 4 Maccabees 1:35, LXX: φιμοῦται πάντα τὰ τοῦ σώματος κινήματα ὑπὸ τοῦ λογισμοῦ.

[8] “[U]nlike his predecessors, whose translations were based on the Latin of the Vulgate, Luther founded his translation on the Greek text of the New Testament…” Marijke de Lang, Five Hundred Years of Martin Luther’s September Testament, The Bible Translator, 2022, Vol. 73(3) 287–288.

[9] “The relative pronoun has the specialized function of relating clauses to clauses.” Chamberlain, An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 49. While the “relative usually agrees with its antecedent in gender and number” (Chamberlain, 49), sometimes the relative, and its antecedent where applicable, must be analyzed with reference to their respective meanings in the passage, that is, conceptually. For instance, in “1 Cor. 15:10, εἰμι ὅ εἰμι, ‘I am what I am,’ is not a grammatical slip. Paul wants to bring out a qualitative note by referring to himself with the neuter relative.” Chamberlain, 49. Likewise, in “1 Tim 3:16, τὸ … μυστήριον, is followed by ὃς because Christ is the ‘mystery’.” Chamberlain, 49. Here, as discussed below, this note is of the view that the article and the relative pronoun in 2 Cor. 5:10, though sharing a neuter plural, refer conceptually to entirely different “things.” See also Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 717, also citing 1 Cor. 15:10 as an example where the intended meaning of a relative pronoun can take precedence over its otherwise proper grammatical form.

[10] For the treatment of διάgenerally in this passage, see Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407: “διά is probably instrumental (‘through’), although a temporal sense is possible, ‘during (one’s bodily life on earth’).” See also A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament, Zerwick S.J., and Grosvenor, Mary, Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblico Roma, Unabridged, 5^th, Revised Edition, (1996) (hereafter “Zerwick”), 544: “διὰ τοῦ σώματος in the body (i.e. during his time on earth) though through (the instrumentality of) the body is also possible.” For his part, Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 582, cited the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος as one of many to illustrate the point that the “agent may be expressed by διὰ.”

[11] World English Bible: “that each one may receive the things in the body according to what he has done.” The New Heart English Bible, another online text, features an identical wording. Compare the Aramaic Bible in Plain English, which puts this idea of judgment in the earthly body even more plainly: “that each man will be paid in his body anything that was done by him.” The full verse reads in Aramaic; source, https://www.thearamaicscriptures.com, also detailing the underlying manuscripts referred to and the translational approach adopted:  ܟܠܢ ܓܝܪ ܥܬܝܕܝܢ ܚܢܢ ܠܡܩܡ ܩܕܡ ܒܝܡ ܕܡܫܝܚܐ ܕܢܬܦܪܥ ܐܢܫ ܐܢܫ ܒܦܓܪܗ ܡܕܡ ܕܥܒܝܕ ܠܗ ܐܢ ܕܛܒ ܘܐܢ ܕܒܝܫ  (translated therein: “For, we all are destined to stand before The Judgment Seat of Meshikha {The Anointed One}, so that each nash {man} might be recompensed in his body, the thing that was done with it, if of good, and if of evil.”) See also one of the earliest translations, the Coverdale Bible of 1535: “every one may receive in his body, according to what he hath done.” For additional texts with similar wording, see Smith’s Literal Translation: “that each might receive the things for the body, for what he did”; and Catholic Public Domain Version: “so that each one may receive the proper things of the body, according to his behavior.” For a discussion of whether some part or all of the Greek New Testament was based on written Aramaic sources, consult A Grammar of New Testament Greek, Moulton, James Hope, and Turner, Nigel, Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark Ltd (1976) (hereafter “Moulton”), 5-10, 5: “Students of an extreme persuasion have discerned Aramaic written sources behind the whole of the New Testament….It is safer to look sceptically…on the thesis of written Aramaic originals and to accept [the] proposition that some sources of the gospels were at one point extant in Aramaic….”     

[12] The following grammars contain no reference at all to 2 Cor. 5:10: Chamberlain, An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 230; Matthewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 300; Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 818; and Moulton, A Grammar of New Testament Greek, 171. Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 71, mentioned the passage in a footnote (fn 74) to support the notion that the phrase πρὸς ἃ, by denoting reference, relates to the verb ἔπραξεν by “delimiting the extent of that verb’s action.” Interestingly, this would seem to lend credence to the idea that the phrase πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν should be disconnected from the preceding phrase (τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος) in translation. Too much should not be made of this, however, since the authors were clearly not addressing the issue raised in this note, although their analysis may fit into a larger grammatical pattern as examined below. Likewise, a discussion of the grammatical underpinnings of this difficult passage in many of the leading commentaries, with a few exceptions discussed in detail below under the heading THE LITERATURE, is either lacking or non-existent.

Another way besides reference to view the preposition πρός is according to its root meaning of “near or “nearby.”Chamberlain, An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 128; and Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 622. This usage would arguably identify “the things done through the body” with their actual performance as expressed by the verb ἔπραξεν. According to this view, what is stressed is one’s personal responsibility for one’s actions. Perhaps this is what the scribe in Papyrus 46, discussed below in fn 17, had in mind when he replaced διά with ἴδια, “one’s own,” so that the phrase would read τὰ ἴδια τοῦ σώματος, “one’s own things of the body.” The problem here is that this largely unattested variant, as noted below, has virtually no chance of representing the original text. In any case, nothing in the proposed alternative translation diminishes this personal ownership of one’s own behavior. Indeed, by making the body the recipient for the consequences of one’s acts, this ownership is enhanced. For the use of πρός over time, compare Conybeare, Grammar of Septuagint Greek, 65: “The obliteration of the distinction between rest and motion is one of the marks of declining Greek. In the modern language εἰς has usurped the functions of both ἐν and πρός.”

Other prominent grammars referring to this passage discuss minor issues unrelated to whether the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος should be decoupled from the subsequent verb, ἔπραξεν, and instead be treated as delimiting the prior verb, κομίσηται, in the phrase’s role as a nominalized direct object. As noted above, Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 582, mentioned the passage in illustrating the semantic scope of the preposition διὰ. BDF referenced the passage three times: ¶ 239 (8) “in accordance with: πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν”; ¶ 275 (7) “τοὺς πάντας ἡμᾶς (not just he of whom Paul had previously spoken)”; and ¶ 286 (1): denoting a corrupted variant, Papyrus 46, discussed in this fn above and in fn 17, in which ἴδια was substituted for διὰ to rework the phrase as τὰ ἴδια τοῦ σώματος. See also An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, Moule, C.F.D., Cambridge University Press, 2^nd ed., (1959) (hereafter “Moule”), 53: “II Cor. v. 10 πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν, in proportion to his deeds.” Note that Moule would seem to contradict Synofzik’s notion (Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen, 75) that the two prepositional phrases are essentially redundant, since πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν would add the notion of proportionality between the deed and its recompense.  

[13] Compare Chamberlain, An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 56, where the author noted in relation to the prepositional phrase in Romans 3.24 (τῆς ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ) that “[w]ithout the article, the above phrase would be adverbial, as in κατέκρινεν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν ἐν τῇ σαρκί (Rom. 8.3). The insertion of the article, τὴν, before ἐν τῇ σαρκί would have located the sin in Jesus’ flesh. As the sentence stands, the phrase modifies the verb κατέκρινεν, so it is the condemnation of sin which is placed in Jesus’ flesh, not the sin itself.” Thus, the prepositional phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος in 2 Cor. 5:10 must either function adverbially or as a noun, more precisely as the direct object of the verb κομίσηται. It cannot do both. Compare Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 550, where the author opined that prepositional phrases “have the substantial force of adverbs.”    

[14] Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 82, listed as an example of the nominalizing effect of the Greek article the phrase τὰ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου in 1 Cor. 2:11, noting that the neuter plural article is “substantival.” See also Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 231: “The article can turn almost any part of speech into a noun: adverbs, adjectives, prepositional phrases…. As well, the article can turn a phrase into a nominal entity.”Wallace, 236,listed some examples of nominalized prepositional phrases: Phil. 1.27, ἀκούω τὰ περὶ ὑμῶν, translated therein: “τὰ περὶ ὑμῶν the things concerning you [= your circumstances]”; and Col. 3.2, τὰ ἄνω φρονεῖτε, μὴ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, translated therein: “Set [your] mind on the [things] above, not on the [things] on earth.” This usage is not limited to the New Testament. Compare Holmes, Apostolic Fathers, First Clement, 1.3, 46, τὰ κατὰ τὸν οἶκον σεμνῶς οἰκουργεῖν, translated therein: “to manage the affairs of their household with all dignity and discretion“; and The Epistle to Diognetus 7.2, 706, ᾧ πάντα διατέτακται καὶ διώρισται καὶ ὑποτέτακται, οὐρανοὶ καὶ τὰ ἐν οὐρανοῖς, γῆ καὶ τὰ ἐν τῇ θάλασσα καὶ τὰ ἐν τῇ θαλάσσῃ, πῦρ, ἀήρ, ἄβυσσος, τὰ ἐν ὕψεσι, τὰ ἐν βάθεσι, τὰ ἐν τῷ μεταξύ· τοῦτον πρὸς αὐτοὺς ἀπέστειλεν, translated therein: “by whom all things have been ordered and determined and placed in subjection, including the heavens and the things in the heavens, the earth and the things in the earth, the sea and the things in the sea, fire, air, abyss, the things in the heights, the things in the depths, the things in between―this one he sent to them!” For other examples of the substantive use of prepositional phrases after the article, see also New Testament Greek for Beginners, Machen, J. Gresham, The Macmillan Company, (1923) (hereafter “Machen”), 165-166. For the characterization of the article itself, see Zerwick, A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament, 544: “τὰ obj. of κομίσηται.” Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 80, pointed out that “[a]rticles can stand alone as substantives.” An interesting side issue thus involves whether the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματοςcould be viewed as an object-complement. See generally Wallace, Daniel B., The Semantics and Exegetical Significance of the Object-Complement Construction in the New Testament, Grace Theological Journal 6.1 (1985) 91-112. See also Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 479-484, where the author discussed what he called the “double accusative.”

[15] Much of the discussion of the relative pronoun in many of the grammars, such as BDF, ¶ 294, addressed the attraction of the relative pronoun “to the case of its antecedent even though it should take another case.” Here, that is not an issue since the relative pronoun ἃ and the preceding article τὰ both properly take the accusative case.

[16] Furnish, II Corinthians, 305, as discussed in detail below, referred to this as the “troublesome phrase,” not only grammatically but conceptually as well. It is also, this note suggests, as explained below, the key in attempting to unlock the mysteries of this passage, also both grammatically and conceptually. Compare Der zweite Korintherbrief, Windisch, H., MeyerK 6, Göttingen, 1924 (reprinted 1970) (hereafter “Windisch”), 172, where this prominent German theologian observed that the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος is difficult (schwierig): “Nicht ganz leicht sind die letzten Worte zu lesen und zu fassen: für das schwierige τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος.” Source of the Windisch text: https://archive.org/details/derzweitekorinth0000wind/page/170/mode/2up.

[17] The textual variants here, most notably D* F G, fifth century and onward (ἃ διὰ τοῦ σώματος ἔπραξεν), and the earlier Papyrus 46 (τὰ ἴδια τοῦ σώματος ἃ ἔπραξεν), likely sought to improve what overly zealous scribes believed to be Paul’s unnecessarily cumbersome grammatical construction, that is, “an obvious attempt to improve the syntax.” Furnish, II Corinthians, 276. But for the possibility of scribal error, see II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, ICC, Thrall, Margaret, T&T Clark, (2005) (hereafter “Thrall”), 396. Owing to their general lack of attestation, there is little chance that any of these variants represent the original text. See, for example, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, Metzger, Bruce M., United Bible Societies (Corrected Edition, 1975), 580, whichreported no variant readings under 2 Cor. 5:10; and Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 396: “The majority reading will be correct.”

[18] See also Chamberlain, An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 37: “The accusative measures an idea as to its content, scope, direction;” and Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 179: “The accusative substantive indicates the immediate object of the action of a transitive verb. It receives the action of the verb. In this way it limits the verbal action.” Compare Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 28: “Since the meanings of limitation (as expressed by the accusative case) and restriction (as expressed by the genitive) significantly overlap, it might be helpful to repeat that the accusative frequently limits the action of verbs as the default case for their direct objects, whereas the genitive more often restricts substantives.” Here, the prepositional phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος is nominalized by the accusative plural of the article, thereby turning the phrase functionally into an accusative direct object. For the full declension of the Greek definite article and relative pronoun, see Machen, New Testament Greek for Beginners, 34 and 173.

[19] In considering the role of κομίσηται, see generally Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 419, where the author stated with reference to the indirect middle (which would seem to best describe the verb form κομίσηται as used in 2 Cor. 5:10) that the “subject shows a special interest in the action of the verb”; and Chamberlain, An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 81: “The middle voice calls especial attention to the subject, but it does not indicate the particular thing about the subject which is emphasized. The context must do that.” Here, the context indicates that the action of the verb κομίσηται for which believers obviously hold a significant stake would be in receiving διὰ τοῦ σώματος divine recompense for their earthly behavior. See also Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 804: “In the active the subject is merely acting; in the middle the subject is acting in relation to himself somehow;” and BDF, ¶ 318: “NT authors in general preserve well the distinction between middle and passive. The middle is occasionally used, however, where an active is expected.” See also Moule, An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, 24: “Grammars sometimes describe the Middle as primarily reflexive. Whether or not this is true for certain periods, it is manifestly not true of N. T. usage.…It is safer to say…that the Middle (where a specific meaning can be detected) calls attention to the whole subject being concerned in the action.” 

[20] Whether this passage speaks of all people or just Christ-followers is not the focus of this note, although for purposes of discussion the note adopts the latter case. Interested readers are encouraged to review among other sources Commentary on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, Hodge, Charles,Eerdmans, (reprinted May, 1973) (hereafter “Hodge”), 125: “In all this, however, he [Paul] spoke as a Christian, and therefore in the name of other Christians.” See also Furnish, II Corinthians, 276; Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 406; Guthrie, 2 Corinthians, 289; and Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 394: “The ‘all of us’ is, of course, restricted to believers.”  

[21] “The antecedent of the relative pronoun is frequently left unexpressed.” Machen, New Testament Greek for Beginners, 174. See, for instance, Acts 10:15: Ἃ ὁ θεὸς ἐκαθάρισεν σὺ μὴ κοίνου.” For examples outside the New Testament, see Holmes, Apostolic Fathers, The Epistle of Barnabas, 7.6, 402: ἃ ἐνετείλατο, προσέχετε, translated therein: “Pay attention to what he commanded;” Barnabas, 9.1, 406: Ἀκοῇ ἀκούσονται οἱ πόρρωθεν, ἃ ἐποίησα γνώσονται, translated therein: “Those who are far off will hear with their ears, and they shall understand what I have done;” and Barnabas, 16.5, 430: καὶ ἐγενετο καθ’ ἃ ἐλάλησεν κύριος, translated therein: “And it happened just as the Lord said.” The chief problem with analogizing to these examples here is that, unlike with the passage in 2 Cor. 5:10, there is no obvious grammatical antecedent. For instances where a relative pronoun clearly relates back to a prior article, compare Holmes, Apostolic Fathers, The Letter of Ignatius to Polycarp, 2.3, 264: καὶ τὰ δεσμά μου, ἃ ἠγάπησας, translated therein: “my chains as well, which you loved”; The Shepherd of Hermas, Parable 6.3.6, 588: τότε ἀναβαίνει ἐπὶ τὴν καρδίαν αὐτῶν τὰ ἔργα ἃ ἔπραξαν πονηρά, translated therein: “the evil deeds that they did enter their hearts”; and The Shepherd, Parable 8.6.4, 608: ὅτι οὐδὲ εἷς αὐτῶν μετενόησε, καίπερ ἀκούσαντες τὰ ῥήματα, ἃ ἐλάλησας αὐτοῖς, ἃ σοι ἐνετειλάμην· ἀπὸ τῶν τοιούτων ἡ ζωὴ ἀπέστη, translated therein: “And you see that not one of them repented even though they heard the words that you spoke to them, which I commanded you. From people of this sort life has departed.” In these three examples, unlike the case in the subordinate clause of 2 Cor. 5:10 as discussed below, the connection between the relative pronoun and the preceding article is not only grammatically clear, but conceptually strong as well. See also Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 339: “The antecedent may be omitted for a variety of reasons in Greek. For example, the RP may incorporate a demonstrative pronoun in which case the object is clear enough from the context.” In support, Wallace, 340, also cited Hebrews 5:8, which he translated: “although he was a son, he learned obedience from [those things] which he suffered.” Arguably, the phrase πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν could likewise be read: “those things which he did.” BAGD, 583, 2: “A demonstrative pron. Is freq. concealed within the relative pron;” and 585, 8 e II: “Demonstrative pron. this (one).” The problem with relying on an embedded demonstrative as in Hebrews 5:8 to support a similar reading in 2 Cor. 5:10 is that in the former there is no obvious antecedent, whereas in the latter the antecedent seems clear enough, at least on the surface.

Instances of the relative pronoun after a preposition in which the prepositional phrase has an adverbial or conjunctive force include Acts 26:12: Ἐν οἷς πορευόμενος εἰς τὴν Δαμασκὸν, which Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 342, translated as “meanwhile/therefore when I traveled to Damascus”; Romans 5:12: εἰς πάντας ἀνθρώπους ὁ θάνατος διῆλθεν, ἐφ’ ᾧ πάντες ἥμαρτον, which Wallace, 342, translated as “death passed to all people, because all sinned”; and 1 Peter 3:19: ἐν ᾧ καὶ τοῖς ἐν φυλακῇ πνεύμασιν πορευθεὶς ἐκήρυξεν, translated (NLT) as “so he went and preached to the spirits in prison.” These examples are of little help here where the relative pronoun and the preceding article seem so closely connected in form. Moule, An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, 131, referred to these types of clauses as “vague resumptive” phrases “corresponding to our and so, well then.” Unlike Wallace, Moule, 132, translated the phrase ἐφ’ ᾧ in Romans 5:12 as “inasmuch as.”   

[22] In Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 2, the authors advocated for a “minimalist approach” to grammatical analysis, using case forms as an example: “This grammar will follow a ‘minimalist’ approach to the cases. That is, it focuses on the basic, more common, or exegetically significant usages of the case rather than multiplying numerous categories with their respective labels. This is not to suggest that there are not other valid usages or categories than those listed below. But it is important to remember that ‘these names are merely appellations to distinguish the different contextual variations of usage, and that they do not serve to explain the case itself’.” For a more traditional approach, with a deep bow to more modern methods, compare Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 1-11.

[23] “The most common aspect of the article is its ability to conceptualize, that is, it transforms a word or phrase into a concept … [I]t is essential to remember that the article can function with not just nouns, but virtually any part of speech. In other words, the article can take almost any non-substantive and make it function like a substantive. This includes adverbs, adjectives, participles, infinitives, prepositional phrases, particles, even entire clauses, statement, or quotations. … [T]he role of the article in such instances is to conceptualize.” Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 155 and 157. See also Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 756: “The article is never meaningless in Greek;” and BDF, ¶ 266 (2): “τὸ κατὰ σάρκα R 9: 5 where the addition of the art. strongly emphasizes the limitation (‘insofar as the physical is concerned).” Compare Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, xviii: “Any major theological points worth affirming and arguing for will certainly not be nuanced in small grammatical subtleties or fine distinctions…. Rather, they will be clear from their entire contexts.” See also Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 5 and 7: “The starting point of our investigations will be the given structures, from which we hope to make semantic conclusions….In sum, traditional (and formal) syntax often falls short in that it does not pursue meaning; modern semantics often falls short in that it does not have an adequate empirical base.” Owing to the peculiar grammatical and conceptual difficulties in this text, this note has taken a blended approach, starting neither from the vantage point of formal structures (Wallace, 5), nor of broader semantic contexts (Mathewson, xix), but attempting rather to balance and integrate both formal and narrowly defined conceptual elements as the analysis proceeds. Stated differently, this note advances the view that a proper “grammatical” treatment of a complex text requires the careful weighing of both formal and conceptual elements peculiar to the text. 

[24] The effort of some commentators, most persuasively Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 395, to circumvent this problem of the disconnect between the two clauses is discussed below under the heading, THE LITERATURE. There, an entirely different approach is taken to defend the traditional translations, an approach that likewise falls short, but for very different reasons. For the idea that the article in Greek can function as a substantive, compare Mathewson’s treatment of 1 Cor. 2:11 (Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 82 (τίς γὰρ οἶδεν ἀνθρώπων τὰ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου εἰ μὴ τὸ πνεῦμα τοῦ ἀνθρώπου τὸ ἐν αὐτῷ), translated therein: “For who among persons knows the things/thoughts of a person if not the spirit of the person that [is] in him/her?” Mathewson, 82, concluded that the “neuter article is substantival, filling the slot of a head noun modified by a genitive. The last article functions as an ‘adjectivizer,’ which turns the prepositional phrase into an attributive modifier of τὸ πνεῦμα.” Here, under this analysis the article τὰ in 2 Cor. 5:10 would be treated as a substantive (the accusative object of κομίσηται) denoting “things/deserts.” Compare also Matthewson, 77, where the authors noted that in Matt. 24:17 (ὁ ἐπὶ τοῦ δώματος μὴ καταβάτω ἆραι τὰ ἐκ τῆς οἰκίας αὐτοῦ), translated therein, “The one on the roof must not go down to take things from his/her house,” the articles function as substantives while also nominalizing their respective prepositional phrases, that is, turning “them into noun equivalents.” See also Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 119, where with reference to Romans 3:26 (καὶ δικαιοῦντα τὸν ἐκ πίστεως Ἰησοῦ), translated therein, “and justify the one who has faith in Jesus,” the authors concluded that the “article τὸν [translated as a substantive in its own right, “the one,” also] functions as a substantizer, turning the prepositional phrase ἐκ πίστεως Ἰησοῦ into a virtual noun.”  

[25] For another example of a conceptual disconnect between a relative pronoun and a preceding article that share a   neuter plural, see Holmes, Apostolic Fathers, The Shepherd of Hermas, Vision3.9, 470: καὶ καθιῇ μετ’ αὐτῶν καὶ ὅσοι ἐὰν ἐργάσωνται τὰ ἐκείνων ἔργα καὶ ὑενέγκωσιν, ἃ καὶ ἐκεῖνοι ὑπήνεγκαν, translated therein: “as will all who do what they have done and endure what they have endured.” In this text, the article τὰ refers to “works” that have been done, whereas the following relative pronoun ἃ refers to “trials” that have been endured. The fact that the author has chosen to translate both as “what” does nothing to disguise the conceptual disconnect between the two. In the same way, translating both the article and relative pronoun in 2 Cor. 5:10 as “things” or “what” likewise fails to mask their clear divergence in meaning. Compare the similar use of “what” in the English Standard Version (ESV) of 2 Cor. 5:10: “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.” Compare Machen, New Testament Greek for Beginners, 174, where the author described an example where a singular neuter accusative relative pronoun (ȍ) in which the antecedent is left unexpressed could properly be translated as what: “ȅχω ȍ θέλω, I have what I wish.Here the English word what is a short way of saying the thing which or that which and so is correctly translated by ȍ.”

While the result in this example of failing to recognize the conceptual mismatch between the relative pronoun and its formal antecedent is a less than optimally precise translation, the underlying meaning is still apparent from the context. That is not the case with the unusual grammatical construction in 2 Cor. 5:10, however. There, failure to recognize the conceptual disconnect turns the meaning of the dependent clause upside down by aligning the nominalized phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος with the verb ἔπραξεν, where instead it should be treated as delimiting the preceding verb κομίσηται in its role as an accusative direct object. “[W]hen all is said and done, all the grammatical and syntactical data are important only in that they enable us to grasp the meaning of the statement in their context.” Rodney J. Decker, Mark 1-8, A Handbook of the Greek Text (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2014), xxii-xxiii, a view roundly endorsed by Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, xix: “[W]e are committed to a minimalistic view of grammar, where maximal meaning is not attributed to the individual linguistic units but is found in their broader context.” Even the older grammarians hinted at this notion of meaning over form in what is otherwise considered to be a purely grammatical analysis, although they tended to take a very broad semantic perspective: “After all is done, instances remain when syntax cannot say the last word, where theological bias will inevitably determine how one interprets the Greek idiom.” Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 367. As discussed below under the heading THE LITERATURE, this note seeks to show that longstanding theological assumptions have distorted the conventional rendering of the text beyond what should be considered the permissible bounds of translation.

Contrast the above examples with The Shepherd of Hermas, Vision 4.1.3, 494-495: μόνος οὖν περιπατῶν ἀξιῶ τὸν κύριον, ἵνα τὰς ἀποκαλύψεις καὶ τὰ ὁράματα, ἃ μοι ἔδειξεν διὰ τῆς ἁγίας Ἐκκλησίας αὐτοῦ, τελειώσῃ, translated therein: “So, as I was walking by myself, I asked the Lord to complete the revelations and visions that he showed to me through his holy church.” Here, the linkage between the two articles and the subsequent relative pronoun is strong both conceptually and grammatically, even though the first article is feminine. The relative pronoun simply takes the neuter form from the second antecedent nearest to it (τὰ), rather than from the feminine of the more distant τὰς. The relative pronoun here does double duty conceptually, relating back to both τὰς ἀποκαλύψεις and τὰ ὁράματα without distorting the meaning of the passage. However, in the case in 2 Cor. 5:10, such a semantic distortion would occur if the relative pronoun referencing works were to relate back conceptually to the article referencing recompense. See fn 27 below for an example from a well-known translation of the semantic mismatch that results from seeking to connect the relative pronoun in 2 Cor. 5:10 conceptually to the preceding article.

Whether or not one is persuaded by the arguments advanced in this note to disassociate the two clauses on formal (grammar and syntax) grounds, the conceptual context supporting such a disconnect seems overwhelming. For additional passages, this time from the Greek Old Testament, where there is a strong grammatical and conceptual link between the relative pronoun and multiple preceding articles, see Jeremiah 8:2 LXX (καὶ ψύξουσιν αὐτὰ πρὸς τὸν ἥλιον καὶ τὴν σελήνην καὶ πρὸς πάντας τοὺς ἀστέρας καὶ πρὸς πᾶσαν τὴν στρατιὰν τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, ἃ ἠγάπησαν καὶ οἷς ἐδούλευσαν καὶ ὧν ἐπορεύθησαν ὀπίσω αὐτῶν καὶ ὧν ἀντείχοντο καὶ οἷς προσεκύνησαν αὐτοῖς); and ESDRAS II 11:7 LXX (διαλύσει διελύσαμεν πρὸς σὲ καὶ οὐκ ἐφυλάξαμεν τὰς ἐντολὰς καὶ τὰ προστάγματα καὶ τὰ κρίματα, ἃ ἐνετείλω τῷ Μωυσῇ παιδί σου).

[26] Other methods for linking διὰ τοῦ σώματος with ἔπραξεν might include reworkingthe passage to express “personal agency in which the body acts as the subject of the doing” (Rogers, The New Linguistic and Exegetical Key to the Greek New Testament, 402); or by treating the term “each” (ἕκαστος) as the implied subject of the verb ἔπραξεν so that τά, instead of πρὸς ἃ, would arguably begin the subordinate clause. On the merits of source-oriented translation theory as opposed to these more target-oriented approaches, see generally Wei Lu and Hong Fang, Reconsidering Peter Newmark’s Theory on Literal Translation, Theory and Practice in Language Studies, Vol. 2, No. 4, (April 2012) (hereafter “Wei Lu, Literal Translation“) 741-746. The obvious problem with the two approaches suggested above is that they stray far afield from the plain language of the text. Compare Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 418: “The minor words in a sentence [here, that would be ἕκαστος] in general…come close to the word to which they belong in sense.” The fact that these two terms, ἕκαστος and ἔπραξεν, do not fall near each other in this passage, but are separated by two prepositional phrases, should be a warning sign against any such efforts essentially to rewrite the text.

Rogers’ assertion that the body is the subject of ἔπραξεν is taken directly from the work of Robert H. Gundry, Soma in Biblical Theology, with emphasis on Pauline Anthropology, Gundry, Robert H., Cambridge University Press (1976) (hereafter “Gundry”). In contending that the term soma in Paul’s writings did not designate “man in the wholeness of his existence” (50), but rather that the term always had a physical or material connotation, that is, it referred to the body as the instrument in and through which a person lives and acts “in the concrete world” (187), Gundry sought to apply his theological views to 2 Cor. 5: 10 in arguing against what he considered Rudolf Bultmann’s objectification of the body. Theology of the New Testament, Bultmann R., vol 1, New York: Scribner (1951), 197. Gundry, 187, reasoned that “the grammar of the statement [διὰ τοῦ σώματος] requires sōma to be strictly instrumental” and that “the genitival object of διὰ [that is, τοῦ σώματος] is the doer” of the action.” Gundry, 187, then classified what he called “the actions” (τὰ …πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν) as the real “object” of the body’s “doing,” not the body itself. In formal, as opposed to theological, terms, Gundry made τοῦ σώματος the subject in the dependent clause acting upon the prior article τὰ, which in turn was linked to the following phrase (πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν) by means of the relative pronoun (187): “But the instrument is an agent, an actor, with the result that the genitival object of διὰ becomes the intermediate subject of the action. Since sōma does not refer to some lifeless instrument separate from the doer, but to a living part of the doer, the phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος expresses personal agency in which the body acts as the subject of the doing.” While this note is generally sympathetic to Gundry’s definitional approach to the body, τό σϖμα, and to the overall importance of meaning in Biblical exegesis, none of that justifies disregarding the formal elements and plain language of the text to advance a broad theological agenda. See Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 7: “[M]odern semantics often falls short in that it does not have an adequate empirical base.”    

[27] Ancient translators also struggled with exactly what Paul meant when he wrote about “the things.” See Tyndale Bible of 1526 (founded in part on the Greek text compiled by Erasmus; Partridge, A.C. (1973), English Biblical Translation, London: André Deutsch Limited): “For we must all appere before the iudgement seate of Christ that every man maye receave the workes of his body accordynge to that he hath done whether it be good or bad.” This obsolete translation (receive the works of his body??) is listed here only to illustrate the conceptual difficulties of attempting to link the two clauses. The “things” to be dispensed at Christ’s judgment seat are by their very nature far different from the “things” that one does while on the earth. The two categories simply do not mix despite their apparent grammatical congruity. To explore generally how the phenomena of translation and revision of biblical texts were handled in the humanist era, see Marijke de Lang (United Bible Societies): The Reformation and revisions of the Bible, CETRA blog, Center for Translation Studies @ KU Leuven.

[28] The faulty reasoning underlying efforts by some commentators reaching back to the 19^th century to equate works with recompense conceptually is discussed below under the heading, THE LITERATURE.

[29] One might have expected that Paul’s placement of the phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος so closely after the first verb, suggesting some relationship between the two, would spark at least some curiosity among commentators and grammarians. Moulton, A Grammar of New Testament Greek, 94: “Sometimes Paul brings closely connected words together.” Compare Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 196 (analyzing Phil. 1:7), where the author opined this way about the importance of word order: “The context must be determinative. But this has been argued both ways. In cases such as this, the best approach is to bring in word order―not as though nothing else mattered, but as the factor that tips the scales.” Compare, however, Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 454: “Greek grammars regularly note two things about the order of the Greek language: (1) Because Greek is an inflected language (i.e., nouns have case endings to tell the reader how they are functioning), word order matters much less in conveying meaning than in a language like English. (2) There are some regular patterns of Greek word order, though these patterns can be set aside for stylistic variation, emphasis, or some other literary purposes.” See also BDF, ¶ 472: “Word order in Greek and so in the NT is freer by far than in the modern languages;” and BDF, ¶ 472 (1): “On word order in subordinate clauses, especially relative clauses, in the NT…the verb comes early in the sentence more frequently than in the older language.”

Here, the verb κομίσηται precedes its subject ἕκαστος, while in the subsequent phrase the verb ἔπραξεν follows the relative clause. Whether anything can be made of this is debatable. Perhaps, however, the close association of ἕκαστος with κομίσηται calls into serious question any effort, as noted in fn 26 above, to rework the passage so as to couple ἕκαστος with ἔπραξεν. Also, the fact that ἔπραξεν follows its relative clause rather than preceding it might suggest that this entire phrase should be treated separately in translation, rather than being artificially connected to the preceding nominalized prepositional phrase, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος. Moule, An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, 166, noted this with respect to word order: “In Greek, the rule said to have been taught by Walter Headlam to his pupils is to reverse the English order, so that the emphatic word comes at or near the beginning of the sentence, whereas in English, it tends to gravitate to the end.” This would suggest that the key phrase in the subordinate clause of 2 Cor. 5:10 is τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος, rather than the add-on phrase, πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν, a phrase which Synofzik regarded as essentially redundant. CompareSynofzik, Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus, 75. Nevertheless, Synofzik, 75, would not have stricken the clause from the text on broadly theological grounds: “Umgekehrt wird man gleichfalls nicht den Relativisatz als Glosse ausscheiden können, da auch sonstige, traditionelle Vergeltungsaussagen ausdrücklich auf das Tun des Menchen bezug nehmen.”

[30] Some readers may question whether the generalized descriptions of judgmentin Matt. 25:31-46. (Judgment of the Nations); Rev. 20:11-15 (The Judgment at the Great White Throne); Romans 14:10 (often cited as a counterpart to 2 Cor. 5:10); or similar passages undercut the specific revision proposed here with respect to one aspect of divine judgment, that is, Christ’s earthly judgment of believers. Although these issues are beyond the scope of this note, it is suggested that upon a close reading, none of these passages excludes the possibility of the translation proposed here, that is, a bodily judgment by Christ during one’s earthly life. The many theological and eschatological implications of this revised translation are beyond the scope of this note, but see the CONCLUSION below for a general recommendation.

[31] Harris, 407, fn 231, viewed πραχθέντα and πεπράγμενα as interchangeable here. For the appropriateness of such uses of ellipsis to color the meaning of the text, see the discussion of Thrall’s commentary below. For the elliptical use of the article, compareBAGD, 552, 9a: “the elliptic use, which leaves a part of a sentence accompanied by the art. to be completed fr. the context,” citing among other verses Matthew 25:17: “ὁ τὰ δύο the man with the two (talents).”    

[32] One can only speculate about the dearth of discussion in the recent literature on the precise question whether the prepositional phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος should be decoupled from ἔπραξεν and read in conjunction with κομίσηται, even though some translations, both new and old (see fn 11 above), would appear to have adopted this approach. Perhaps the notion that judgment for believers can only take place in some future apocalyptic venue is so engrained in church teaching that many commentators when considering this passage simply overlook the possibility of some other outcome. In any event, because so much of the literature simply assumes the correctness of the standard translation, there seems little need to articulate in detail its grammatical underpinnings. Hodge, Commentary on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 125-126: “We are said to receive the things done in the body, because the matter is conceived of, or is here represented as an investment.” For a contrary view, compare two translations, one new and one old, that would seem to acknowledge the possible coupling of διὰ τοῦ σώματος with κομίσηται: the Aramaic Bible in Plain English: “that each man will be paid in his body anything that was done by him;” and one of the earliest translations, the Coverdale Bible of 1535: “every one may receive in his body, according to what he hath done.”)

[33] Another definition of pleonasm, this one from the Cambridge Dictionary, Dictionary.Cambridge.org: “is the use of more words than are needed to express a meaning, done either unintentionally or for emphasis…an example of this might be ‘kick it with your feet’.”

[34] See also Martin, 2 Corinthians, 97: “Paul sees this earthly body as subject to wear and tear. Yet, there is something that will replace it, namely, a body that is free from the frailties that hinder the earthly vessel;” 2 Corinthians, The Story of God Bible Commentary, Diehl, Judith A., Zondervan (2020) (hereafter “Diehl”): “Paul’s reasoning in 5:1-10 follows closely on the heels of his arguments in 4:7-18. Again, he shifted to new metaphorical pictures and used new imagery with stark antitheses in 5:1-10 in an attempt to explain the inexplicable―that is, the promised resurrected life of believers. Like most Greeks, the Corinthians had a difficult time grasping the ideas of death and the resurrected body”; Thrall, 2 Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 357, who entitled these verses (2 Cor. 5:1-10) “Future beyond death” and noted that Paul “draws a further contrast between earthly existence with its decay and anxieties and the invisible and eternal sphere upon which his attention is fixed and he affirms his confidence in face of the tension between these two realities. The precise nature of the contrast, however, and the basis of his confidence have occasioned extensive debate”; and Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 365, who referred to the overall theme of verses 1-10 as “Confidence in the face of death” and explained that this “twofold theme―life in the midst of death, glory through and after suffering ―is continued in 5:1-10.” 

[35] Furnish, II Corinthians, 305, summed up his view of Synofzik’s arguments this way: “Synofzik suggests that Paul is countering enthusiasts in Corinth who act as though it will make no difference what one does in the body. The problem is documented in an earlier letter (e.g., 1 Cor. 6:12-20), even if it is not very specifically reflected in the present one. Yet Paul could well be conscious of how his own negative remarks about the body in vv. 6, 8 might be misconstrued, and this may be enough to prompt the ‘body’ reference in v. 10…. Just as in the discussion preceding (4:15-5:5; 5:6-9) the basic concern has been for the present (mortal) life, not for one’s future (immortal) existence, so in the last verse the concern is really with the present. Nothing specific is said about rewards or punishments, or what those might entail. The emphasis falls on one’s present accountability.” Garland, 2 Corinthians, 266, fn 707, also cited Synofzik for a similar proposition: “Paul may have pointedly placed emphasis on what is done in the ‘body’ because some in Corinth had denigrated the moral significance of the body.” Synofzik’s reasoning, however, has come under pointed criticism; Calvin J. Roetzel, Book Review of Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus: Eine traditions-geschichtliche Untersuchung, Ernst Synofzik. Journal of Biblical Literature (1979) 98 (3): 452–454, found at https://doi.org/10.2307/3265791 (emphasis below in italics):

“Certainly, those involved in Pauline research in this country would applaud the author’s sensitivity to the role context plays in deciphering Paul’s strategy. It is hardly the method, however, but its application that will disturb many readers. For the context constructed in most cases is not rationalized but mostly assumed or asserted. Usually an a priori view of Pauline theology seems to dictate the context in question. In Synofzik’s opinion Paul adopts the primitive church’s view of Christ as the Savior from the judgment of wrath and assimilates it to his view of righteousness through which one is justified sola gratia. This justified person, however, remains a sinner in need of God’s grace which is mediated as a forensic event in the present and the future. This proclamation is antithetical to the understanding of the concept of righteousness and judgment according to works of the Law in Judaism. Such a statement reveals Synofzik’s presuppositions clearly-presuppositions that to many sound mistaken in light of recent studies of first century Judaism and in view of the fact that much of Paul’s judgment language appears in letters in which Judaism is not under consideration at all (e.g., 1 Corinthians). The attempt to be comprehensive is both the strength and weakness of the book. It is helpful to have in one place a discussion of all of the Pauline allusions to judgment. I am unaware of a single reference that escaped the author’s attention. At the same time, however, it is nearly impossible to give anything more than a superficial discussion of so many passages in only 100 pages of text. As a consequence, many of the author’s observations are tantalizing but not very instructive.”

[36] Compare Rogers, The New Linguistic and Exegetical Key to the Greek New Testament, 402, where the authors argued that the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος “expresses personal agency in which the body acts as the subject of the doing. Thisgives the body its positive meaning for eternity.” See also Gundry, Soma in Biblical Theology, 50: “The sōma denotes the physical body, roughly synonymous with ‘flesh’ in the neutral sense. It forms that part of man in and through which he lives and acts in the world. It becomes the base of operations for sin in the unbeliever, for the Holy Spirit in the believer. Barring prior occurrence of the Parousia, the sōma will die. That is the lingering effect of sin even in the believer. But it will also be resurrected. That is the ultimate end, a major proof of its worth and necessity to wholeness of human being, and the reason for its sanctification now;” and Gundry, 244: “[W]ithout having to do double duty for the spirit, sōma gains theological significance as the physical body, man’s means of concrete service to God.”

[37] If we were to ignore the article τὰ as Furnish suggested, the entire clause would read: ἵνα κομίσηται ἕκαστος διὰ τοῦ σώματος πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν. In that event, one might well ask why διὰ τοῦ σώματοςshould not be read to modify κομίσηταιadverbially. Note that with the article removed, διὰ τοῦ σώματοςwould no longer be nominalized and would instead function as an adverbial phrase.Chamberlain, An Exegetical Grammar of the Greek New Testament, 56.A choice would then need to be made between κομίσηται and ἔπραξενas to which verb the phrase would principally modify.In such close matters of scriptural interpretation,word order would seem to suggest the former. Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 196.Compare BDF, ¶ 472: “Closely related elements in the sentence …are usually placed together in simple speech. Poetic language and that rhetorically stylized in any way frequently pulls them apart to give greater effect to the separated elements by their isolation.”  

[38] A point of “some importance,” as Furnish suggested Paul was attempting to make here, could instead be matching the site of the judgment (σώματος) with the rather obvious vehicle by which the actions being evaluated are accomplished (likewise, the body).For the body, σϖμα, as the agent of human activity, see Gundry,Soma in Biblical Theology, 47, 187.Under this reading, the “emphasis” would clearly fall “on one’s present accountability.” Furnish, II Corinthians, 305. For the notion of the “flesh” as the repository of sin, see generally Romans 7:18-25 (οἶδα γὰρ ὅτι οὐκ οἰκεῖ ἐν ἐμοί, τοῦτ’ ἔστιν ἐν τῇ σαρκί μου, ἀγαθόν, Romans 7:18). Indeed, Paul was no stranger to the idea of bodily judgment: for example, 1 Cor. 11:29-34 (Partaking of the Lord’s Supper Unworthily), and Romans 1:27 (God’s Wrath against Sin). Compare Gundry, Soma in Biblical Theology, 50: “Barring prior occurrence of the Parousia, the sōma will die. That is the lingering effect of sin in the believer.”

This matching of judgment with the body for believers would seem, at least as a general matter, to far outweigh in significance any supposed commentary by Paul on the unsavory practices of some first-century Corinthians. Compare Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 337:”[T]he relation of the RP to its antecedent is sometimes complicated: the antecedent may be lacking, or the relative phrase may be adverbial and thus not refer to a noun or other substantive. As with demonstratives, the discovery of these syntactical ‘glitches’ occasionally yields a point of exegetical value as well.” Here, perhaps the point of “exegetical value” from this “syntactically…and also grammatically problematic” phrase, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος, Furnish, II Corinthians, 305, is the explanation of the very conundrum pointed out by Furnish, 305; that is, why “bodily existence” is mentioned at all in the context of the “last judgment.” This note suggests that it is arguably mentioned because the physical body is the site of Christ’s judgment of believers. Even if one were to accept Synofzik’s arguments that Paul here was commenting on the unwholesome behavior of some of his Corinthians readers, that does not preclude the idea that Paul was also making this much broader point about the importance of the physical body; namely, as the receptacle of judgment. Indeed, Synofzik, hinted at this, perhaps inadvertently, when he wrote, 76: “Denn die Christen werden nach ihren Werken διὰ τοῦ σώματος gerichtet”; and when he opined: “Paulus in 2 Kor. 5,10 die traditionelle Gerichtsaussage durch τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματοςinterpretiert habe.” This broader role for the body could account for Paul’s choice of a more complex syntactical structure in 2 Cor. 5:10 than would have been required if all he had intended was to point out some unwholesome aspects of his readers’ earthly activity. Compare Colossians 3:25, κομίσεται ὃ ἠδίκησεν (Zerwick, A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament, 611:”‘that which he did wrong’, the wrong he did“). See also A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Second Epistle of St Paul to the Corinthians, The International Critical Commentary, Plummer, Alfred, Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark (1956) (hereafter “Plummer”), viii: “There must, however, always remain a considerable number of questions to which no certain answer can be given, because certainty requires a knowledge of details respecting the Church of Corinth which we do not possess and are not likely to acquire.”

[39] Indeed, Thrall, 395, fn 1444, seemed to accept the notion that the second phrase stands alone to connote reference: “The following πρὸς may mean ‘in relation to’…or, more specifically, ‘in proportion to’….” Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, asserted that this phrase “points to the exactitude and impartiality … of the recompense….” This gloss of proportionality and impartiality would seem to undercut any notion that the two phrases are entirely redundant, since proportionality would not seem to form part of the semantic package embedded in the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος.    

[40] Such an “obscure” rendering would bear a close resemblance to the obsolete translation found in the Tyndale Bible of 1526 noted above: “For we must all appere before the iudgement seate of Christ that every man maye receave the workes of his body accordynge to that he hath done whether it be good or bad.”

[41] Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, fn 232, also endorsed this “extended” definition. For the definition of κομιζωgenerally, seeBAGD, 442-443, where the authors listed examples in which the object of κομιζω is specified in the text rather than being left to conjecture: 1 Peter 5:4 (τὸν ἀμαράντινον τῆς δόξης στέφανον); and Eph. 6:8 (τοῦτο). See also Holmes, Apostolic Fathers, The Letter of Ignatius to Polycarp, 6.2, 268: ἵνα τὰ ἄκκεπτα ὑμῶν ἄξια κομίσησθε, translated therein: “in order that you may eventually receive the savings that are due you.” Compare Colossians 3:25, κομίσεται ὃ ἠδίκησεν (Zerwick, A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament, 611:”‘that which he did wrong’, the wrong he did“). Note here the simplified format that Paul, had he wished, could have easily employed in 2 Cor. 5:10 to indicate the believer’s recompense for earthly activity. Perhaps his choice of a more involved grammatical and syntactical structure suggests that he was getting at something other than what some overly zealous scribes (textual variants D* F G, fifth century and onward, fn 17 herein) apparently attributed to him when they altered the text to read ἃ διὰ τοῦ σώματος ἔπραξεν.    

[42] Newman, A Translator’s Handbook, 671. Discourse is defined (670) as “the connected and continuous communication of thought by means of language, whether spoken or written.” An example of the proper use of ellipsis (671), with the bracketed words being elliptical, would be: “If (it is) necessary (for me to do so), I will wait up all night.” For another example, see Style and Discourse with special reference to the text of the Greek New Testament, Nida, E A, Louw, J P, Snyman, A H, Cronje, J v W, Bible Society of South Africa, First edition 1983, Second impression (1991) (hereafter “Nida, Style and Discourse“), 182-183. See also Cambridge Dictionary, Dictionary.Cambridge.Org: “When we can easily understand everything in the sentence because of the surrounding text, we use textual ellipsis.” Here, the text at issue is anything but easily understood. See also Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 368, where in discussing ellipsis the author wrote that “the sentence does not absolutely require the expression of either subject or predicate, though both are implied by the word used;” and,  809: “Each word and its context must determine the result.” As outlined in this note, the context here is profoundly unclear. While Furnish, for instance, relied on Synofzik’s speculations about Paul’s reference to the body in an attempt to explain some of these uncertainties, the passage, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος, remains “troublesome.” Furnish, II Corinthians, 305. The use of ellipsis to imply some predetermined result is thus inappropriate as illustrated in greater detail below. 

[43] Under the heading of Freer individual ellipses, the authors wrote (BDF, ¶ 481): “Ellipses dependent on individual style and choice go much farther, especially in letters, where the writer can count on the knowledge which the recipient shares with himself and where he imitates ordinary speech. In the latter there is likewise an abundance of elliptical expressions both conventional and those more dependent on individual preference.” In a related reference, the authors defined brachylogy as “the omission, for the sake of brevity, of an element which is not necessary for the grammatical structure but for the thought.” BDF, ¶ 483. To justify Thrall’s addition of the participle here under this freer notion of ellipsis, one might argue that Paul and his various readers all shared the insight, suggested by Synofzik, that the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματοςreferenced certainunsavory practices then being practiced by some in Corinth that denigrated the body, so that the explicit addition in Paul’s letter of the participle πεπράγμενα [things done] after τὰ to connote such reprehensible earthly conduct was rendered unnecessary. It should be noted that Synofzik’s reasoning has been criticized (fn 35 above) as “superficial” and “tantalizing but not very instructive.” Even supposing Synofzik was correct and that such an advanced degree of knowledge was shared by Paul and his Corinthian readers, the revised translation suggested here, far from diminishing the eternal importance of the believer’s mortal body, heightens its significance, since the body becomes not only the vehicle by which the actions being judged are accomplished, thus satisfying Synofzik’s concerns, but also the vehicle through which judgment is executed. The revised reading proposed in this note further answers the conundrum posited by Furnish of the “quite unique [conceptual problem of having] bodily existence mentioned at all when the topic is the last judgment” (Furnish, II Corinthians, 305), a conundrum which the conventional translations of the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος leave largely hanging and unaddressed, thus prompting Synofzik’s speculations about the reasons for its inclusion. Indeed, the conventional renderings of this passage are so unsatisfying that the phrase is often classified as a pleonasm that largely repeats the sense of the following phrase, πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν (Furnish, II Corinthians, 276; and Synofzik (Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus, 75). Thus, by implying a participle, Thrall did not affirm a proper understanding of the text, but instead distorted it by masking the passage’s underlying conceptual problem; that is, the linkage between the body and Paul’s notion of judgment.     

[44]The seven examples in the Greek Bible noted in fn 7 herein, where a participle appears in the actual text between the article and the subsequent prepositional phrase beginning with διὰ, are of no help to anyone seeking to bolster Thrall’s reasoning for an elliptical insertion of a participle here. In those examples the participle is obvious given the context: for instance, (Jer. 17:16 LXX) τὰ ἐκπορευόμενα διὰ τῶν χειλέων σου; (Esther 1:15 LXX) οὐκ ἐποίησεν τὰ ὑπὸ τοῦ βασιλέως προσταχθέντα διὰ τῶν εὐνούχων; and (Luke 18:31) καὶ τελεσθήσεται πάντα τὰ γεγραμμένα διὰ τῶν προφητῶν. Here, for the reasons noted above, the appropriateness of the participle implied by Thrall (πεπράγμενα) is anything but clear or inevitable.

[45] “The participle, like any other adjective, can be used substantively with the article.” Machen, New Testament Greek for Beginners, 108. See also Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 233, where the author noted that using the article τὰ to nominalize a participle is “commonplace”; Mathewson,Intermediate Greek Grammar, 77; and Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 157. Tracking Thrall’s elliptical construction with a nominalized participle, the text would read: receive the things done (τὰ πεπράγμενα) through the body. Thrall, 395, circumvented this “obscure sense” of receiving back”one’s earthly activity” byextending the meaning of κομίσηταιto include not only the action of the verb (receiving back), but also its object (recompense): “receive something in return for(earthly activity), receive recompense,” such earthly activity denoted by the implied participle, πεπράγμενα. Thrall, fn1443. Thus, in addition to the participle, a prepositional phrase (in return for) must also be implied for the sentence to make any sense. Under this note’s alternative approach, the grammatical structure of the subordinate clause speaks for itself without the need for any implied constructions, and the passage would simply read: receive recompense (κομίσηται, broad definition, BAGD, 443, 2a) through the body(τὰ substantivizing the prepositional phrase) in accordance with (or in proportion to, Moule, An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, 53) what one has done.For nominalized phrases generally, see Eph. 6:21: Ινα δὲ εἰδῆτε καὶ ὑμεῖς τὰ κατ’ ἐμέ (“so that you also may know how I am,” NIV); Eph. 6:22: ἵνα γνῶτε τὰ περὶ ἡμῶν (“that you may know how we are,” NIV); Phil. 4:18: δεξάμενος παρὰ Ἐπαφροδίτου τὰ παρ’ ὑμῶν (“now that I have received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent, NIV); and Col. 4.8: ἵνα γνῶτε τὰ περὶ ἡμῶν (“that you may know about our circumstances,” NIV). For examples in non-Pauline writings, see Holmes, Apostolic Fathers, First Clement, 1.3, 46: τὰ κατὰ τὸν οἶκον σεμνῶς οἰκουργεῖν, translated therein: “to manage the affairs of their household with all dignity and discretion”; Luke 24:19: Τὰ περὶ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ Ναζαρηνοῦ (“About Jesus of Nazareth,” NIV); and Hebrews 5:1 (also 2:17): καθίσταται τὰ πρὸς τὸν θεόν (“is appointed to represent the people in matters related to God,” NIV). See also Rogers, The New Linguistic and Exegetical Key to the Greek New Testament, 525: “τὰ πρὸς τὸν θεόν in reference to things pertaining to God.”

Here, the common construction of the article (τὰ) nominalizing the following prepositional phrase (διὰ τοῦ σώματος) controls, and there is no grammatical need for an elliptical construction to be imposed on the text, unless such an imposition is theologically rather than grammatically driven. Note that the theological imperative here would be to mask the conceptual difficulties inherent in the phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος, which appear to link “bodily existence” to “the last judgment.” Furnish, II Corinthians, 305. This note suggests that perhaps this linkage is the very point of Paul’s “awkward” (Furnish, 276) construction.

[46] It is useful to point out here that the investigation of the literature on this passage so far has suggested four possible interpretations of Paul’s enigmatic phrase, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος. It could either be a pleonasm essentially repeating the sense of the following relative clause πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν (Furnish, II Corinthians, 276; and Synofzik (Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus,75); or, according to Synofzik’s reasoning, Paul chose the phrase simply to admonish his Corinthian readers regarding their unsavory practices that denigrated the body (Synofzik, 76); or, that it established (Gundry, Soma in Biblical Theology, 187) the “body,” rather than “the whole person,” as the “doer” of the action (τὰ…πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν) according to which recompense will be received (“The observation that here sōma is the ‘tool of action’ (διὰ τοῦ σώματος) leads to the conclusion that sōma refers only to that physical part of man through which he acts in the concrete world,” Gundry, 47); or, finally, that the phrase represented an elliptical construction (Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 395) underscoring Paul’s notion generally of divine recompense received in return for earthly activity. Apart from the interpretation proposed by this note, that is, that the phrase indicates the site of the judgment, there is a fifth possibility, which is discussed below.

[47] Plummer, 157, cited the phrase ἵνα κομίσηται ἕκαστος τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος as correcting “the false inference which might be drawn from τοὺς πάντας ἡμᾶς. We shall not be judged en masse, or in classes, but one by one, in accordance with individual merit.” As pointed out previously, this viewpoint fully accords with an individualized judgment of each believer διὰ τοῦ σώματος.

[48] Sermons preached at Trinity Chapel, Brighton, by Rev. Frederick W. Robertson, Vol. II, Boston: Fields, Osgood, & Co., successors to Ticknor and Fields (1869), 317-319. “The sermons of Frederick William Robertson (1816 – 1853) were almost never written down as he preached them (as Spurgeon’s were).  He generally dictated them to a member of whatever family he visited―usually later the same day.” Source: http://www.fwrobertson.org. The sermons were published as he dictated them after his death. See also Sermons Preached at Trinity Chapel, Brighton, by Rev. Frederick W. Robertson, M.A., Vol. 1 and 2, Boston: James R. Osgood and Company, Late Ticknor & Fields, and Fields, Osgood, & Co. (1874.) Source: https://archive.org/details/sermonspreacheda02robe.

[49] See also Plummer, 158: “there will be exact correspondence between action and requital.” Plummer, 157-158, citing a number of passages from Latin texts, noted that this reading was “not always brought out in the Vulgate, which again varies greatly in its renderings.” Interestingly, Plummer referred to a Cyprian text pointing to a reading of ἴδια for διὰ (also noted in the corrupted text from Papyrus 46, fn 17 above), indicating that: “In the Pelagian controversy it came to the front, because infants have no ἴδια sins, and could not be supposed to be justly liable to punishment.” Plummer, 158, cited numerous passages from classical Greek to indicate that: “Done by means of the body” includes “words and thoughts as well as deeds, for the tongue and the brain are instruments in producing them.”

[50] For a perhaps more realistic, and certainly a more contemporary, assessment of sin and its impact on the lives of believers, see Diehl, 2 Corinthians, 190: “In truth, all Christians know that somehow we must cope with our own sins, guilt, failures, behavior, and attitudes. It is this recognition of sin in our own lives that is so painful, and we recognize that sin in any form keeps us from a close personal relationship with God.” 

[51] In a Critical and Exegetical Commentary on The New Testament, Parts V. and VI, The Epistle to the Corinthians, Vol. II, Meyer, H. A. W., Translated from the German with the Sanction of the Author, Translation Revised and Edited by Dickson, W. P., and Stewart, W., Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark (1870) (hereafter “Meyer”), 270-271, the author also asserted the close identification of deed with requital, expressing this idea as a kind of moral deposit: “Moral actions are, according to the idea of adequate requital, conceived as something deposited, which at the last judgment is carried away, received, and taken with us, namely, in the equivalent reward and punishment.” Compare Hodge, Commentary on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 125-126: “We are said to receive the things done in the body, because the matter is conceived of, or is here represented as an investment.” Like Plummer and unlike Thrall, Meyer, 272, did not refer in his treatment of the passage to any need for the elliptical insertion of a Greek participle: “τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος…that which is brought about through the body, that which has been done by means of the activity of the bodily life (τò σϖμα as organic instrument of the Ego in its moral activity generally; hence not: τῆς σαρκός). Meyer, 272, described the subsequent relative clause as the standard of righteousness: “The πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν contains the standard of righteousness, in accordance with which every one κομίσηται τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος: corresponding to what he has done.” On the Pelagian controversy referenced above in fn 49, Meyer, 271, noted that “Augustine, Ep. 107, laid stress on the imputation of Adam’s sin, according to which it was the moral property even of children.” Here, again, we have the idea of earthly action or deeds as a kind of moral possession or “property” carried by the believer into judgment. To demonstrate that the “striving” to please Christ (φιλοτιμούμεθα εὐάρεστοι αὐτῷ εἶναι, verse 9) “refers merely to the earthly life,” Meyer, 269, argued “that τò σϖμα is still the idea which continues operative from vv. 6,8 is shown by τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος in ver. 10, an expression occasioned by the very reference to the body, which is before the mind in ver. 9.”

[52] Windisch, 172, cited two parallels from classical Greek in support of his reading of the phrase τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος as used in 2 Cor. 5:10: Plato Phaedo p. 65A, τϖν ήδονϖν αί διὰ τοῦ σώματος εισιν (the pleasures that are through the body”; and τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος πραττόμενα (the things practiced through the body), Aelian Nat. hist. V 26. Even if one supposes that texts from classical Greek are useful for Biblical exegesis (contrast from fn 7 above Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, xx-xxi, arguing that the focus should be on the Koine Greek of the New Testament; and Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 4, extending the relevant time frame to the Hellenistic period), neither of these passages relied on by Windisch, while interesting, bears on the grammatical treatment of the text at issue here, where the key phrase, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος, is flanked by two transitive verbs and is followed immediately by a relative clause, the complex and unique nature of which poses the issue addressed in this note. Also, the participle πραττόμενα (Plato Phaedo p. 65A), unlike the participle implied here, πεπράγμενα, is both explicit and conceptually clear and appropriate to the text, in much the same way as were similarly explicit insertions of the participle in the passages quoted from the Greek Bible, both Old and New Testament, referred to in fn 7 above. All of this suggests that Paul’s unusual phraseology in 2 Cor. 5:10 is not only sui generis in all early Christian literature, but also in all extant ancient Greek writings.  

[53] Synofzik, Die Gerichts-und Vergeltungsaussagen bei Paulus, 75, is also critical of Windisch’s approach, which he claimed was simply a kind of artifice to eliminate the lectio difficilior of the text: “Die sprachlichen und syntaktischen Schwierigkeiten versuchten manchen Handschriften dadurch zu beheben, daß sie entweder in Angleichung an 1 Kor. 3:8 τὰ ἴδια τοῦ σώματος [the corrupt variant from Papyrus 46 discussed above and in fn 17] lasen, oder indem sie die Wendung in dem folgendem Nebensatz zogen. Beide Möglichkeiten der Leseart erweisen sich schon als sekundär, daß sie deutlich von dem Bestreben gekennzeichnet sind, die lectio difficilior zu beseitegen.” 

[54] Zerwick, A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament, xxiv, defined pleonasm in this way: “(πλέων more) The use of more words than are necessary to convey an idea. Unlike tautology it is not necessarily a fault of style but may be deliberately employed for effect.” Redundancy is generally defined as “the expression of the same information more than once. Anything that is completely redundant is entirely predictable from the context.” Newman and Nida, A Translator’s Handbook on The Gospel of John, 676. Why would Paul have inserted two phrases, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματοςandπρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν, to communicate the idea of a believer’s earthly activity when it is perfectly obvious that the physical body is the vehicle by which the deeds being judged are accomplished? The haste with which some respected sources have classified the phrase as a pleonasm suggests that commentators and other exegetes have not yet probed deeply enough into the meaning of τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος, but rather have contented themselves with facile explanations for Paul’s use of the phrase here. Only Synofzik seems to have made a determined and “tantalizing,” though still somewhat “superficial” (Roetzel, Book Review, 452-454) effort to explain this passage. While there have been various exhaustive efforts to explore generally the notion of sōma in scripture (Compare, for example Gundry, Soma in Biblical Theology with Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament), this note suggests that far more intensive and comprehensive scholarship on the question of its particular use in this passage is needed. 

[55] CompareLong, Fredrick J. “‘The god of This Age’ (2 Cor 4:4) and Paul’s Empire-Resisting Gospel.” Pages 219–69 in The First Urban Churches: Volume 2: Roman Corinth. Edited by James R. Harrison and Laurence L. Welborn. Writings from the Greco-Roman World Supplement Series 7. Atlanta: SBL Press, 2016. See also Heilig, Christoph. Paul’s Triumph: Reassessing 2 Corinthians 2:14 in Its Literary and Historical Context. BTS 27. Leuven: Peeters, 2017. But compare Plummer, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary, 156: “Fond as St. Paul is of military metaphors, and of comparing the Christian life to warfare, he is not likely to be thinking of a military tribunal here.”

[56] For a contrary perspective, see Furnish, II Corinthians, 276: “The verbprassein (here aorist, has done: ‘looking back from Christ’s tribunal, the whole life of the individual Christian is seen as a unity’….” Supporting this view is the notion that at the last judgment each person will give account of all that he or she did while in the body.But see Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 558, where he noted that the ingressive aorist stressing “the beginning of an action or the entrance into a state” can occur with “verbs that denote activities, especially in contexts where the action is introduced as a new item in the discourse.” Compare Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 117, where the authors emphatically disagreed with Wallace’s detailed classification approach regarding tenses: “One unique feature of this book is that it will avoid the labels that are commonly attached to verb tenses in most grammars. For example, one often finds such descriptive labels as progressive present, iterative present, inceptive imperfect, conative imperfect, constative aorist, ingressive aorist and consummative perfect. However, these labels are more appropriate for contextual information that gives evidence for the kind of action than for the aspects themselves.”

Regardless of which approach one takes to tenses, whether judgment occurs at some point after death or throughout the course of one’s life, a full accounting before Christ nonetheless takes place. Compare Martin, 2 Corinthians, 115, where the author applied a constative force to the other verb in this passage, κομίσηται: “The important point to note is the aorist tense of the verb rendered ‘receive.’ Paul’s use of it strongly suggests a constative force. If so, the Christian’s behavior is viewed by Christ as a unity and not as a concatenation of individual acts”; with Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 123: “A series of actions that occur over a period of time can be gathered up into a single whole with the aorist tense”; and Mathewson, 121: “The aorist can be used of action that takes place over a more or less extended period of time but is still viewed in its entirety.” For a modern perspective on tenses, see Martin M. Culy, I, II, III John: A Handbook on the Greek Text (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2004), xxiii: “Simply put, Greek verb tenses do not denote semantic features such as ingressive, iterative, or conative; they certainly do not emphasize such notions; at best they allow for ingressive, iterative, or conative translations.” Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, 118, concluded from this that “these labels are better set aside.” This note would tend to agree that such labels do more to confuse than to clarify and enlighten.

To the related argument that Paul included the phrase διὰ τοῦ σώματος for the very reason that Christ’s evaluation looks back to the believer’s entire earthly life from the vantage point of a future apocalyptic, post-death venue, if that were Paul’s intention the second phrase, πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν, would have sufficed. There would have been no need for the additional inclusion of the “troublesome” reference to the body. In other words, the text could have simply read: ἵνα κομίσηται ἕκαστος (receive recompense: BAGD, 443, 2a; Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 395, fn 1443; and Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 407, fn 232) πρὸς ἃ ἔπραξεν (according to, or in proportion to, what he has done: Compare Köstenberger, Going Deeper with New Testament Greek, 71; and Moule, An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek, 53 ), εἴτε ἀγαθὸν εἴτε φαῦλον. Even though a pleonasm can sometimes be used purely “for effect” (Zerwick, A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament, xxiv), the relative clause’s direct reference to the believer’s earthly behavior would seem clear enough to communicate Paul’s intent here

To the further argument that the relative clause elaborates or comments on the meaning of the prior prepositional phrase by associating “earthly activity” with the general nature and reality of the divine recompense, again, the second phrase alone would have sufficed.

[57] “[W] e should be wary of imposing upon him [Paul] too neat and logical a time-scheme.…It may be that Paul’s convictions about judgement and about resurrection, though firm, were not correlated chronologically with any precision.” Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 396.

[58] For the need of some sort of public “shaming” of the believer at judgment, see Martin, 2 Corinthians, 114: “The requirement is φανερωθῆναι ‘to appear (aorist infinitive), not in the sense of a simple ‘showing up’ but in the sense of being laid bare, for all the world to see the true nature of one’s character.” Compare Windisch, who also seemed to endorse the view that at Christ’s judgment seat all one’s hidden thoughts, emotions, impulses, and deeds (mit allen bisher verborgen gebliebenen Gedanken und Regungen und Werken) will become manifest to all (offenbar werden). Der Zweite Korintherbrief, 171: “φανερωθῆν ist… wie der iva-Saß zeigt, die Parastasis von Röm 14:10, die die vorher unbekannte Entscheidung bringt… es heißt also ‘offenbar werden in seiner wahren Gestalt mit allen bisher verborgen gebliebenen Gedanken und Regungen und Werken’.” However, the text of 2 Cor. 5:10 reveals no such explicit requirement of “shaming,” or even of a public judgment, a requirement that accordingly must be inferred from other passages. The important point here is that Christ’s judgment is uniquely tailored to each individual believer. Compare Plummer, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary, 163: “He [Paul] does not speak of a great assize in which all souls will come up simultaneously for judgment. What he is concerned to insist upon is that every individual soul will be judged; none can escape.” The proper dynamic is therefore a one-on-one evaluation between Christ and the believer. Windisch, 171: “jeder Einzelne wird zur Rechenschaft gezogen.” Indeed, if only believers are being judged in this venue, why the need for the “world” to be there at all to witness it? Martin, 2 Corinthians, 114, himself suggested this very point just a few lines later when he hinted that the judgment described in 2 Cor. 5:10 is restricted to Christians: “A question arises as to whether this judgment in 5:10 is universal or is restricted to Christians. From earlier Pauline writings, it appears there is a judgment intended for Christians,” citing 1 Cor. 3:10-15. As stated earlier, it is beyond the scope of this note to consider all the eschatological ramifications of the revised reading proposed here. On various aspects of the aorist tense noted by Martin above (2 Corinthians, 114) with reference to φανερωθῆναι and their relevance, see generally fn 56 above.  

[59] Rather than being overly literal, this note suggests that the revised translation proposed here comports rather well with the traditional exegetical approach of historical criticism. On why the historical-critical method of Biblical exegesis still matters, see Marijke de Lang, Historical Criticism Reformulated in the “Age of Imagination,” BT Vol. 63, No. 3: 109-118 (a review of Metavista: Bible, Church and Mission in an Age of Imagination, Greene, Colin and Robinson, Martin), 111-112:

 He [E. D. Hirsch] distinguished between ‘meaning,’ which is to be located in the text, and ‘significance,’ which he described as the relationship between a text and a reader (Hirsch 1967, 8). In a similar vein, the New Testament exegete Krister Stendahl distinguished between ‘what it meant’ and ‘what it means’ (Stendahl 2008, 2). It seems then, that there is some agreement that ‘not every reaction triggered by a text can be regarded as a valid meaning or interpretation,’ and that the historical-critical method is still needed to understand the ‘otherness’ of a text (Collins 2005, 17). Perhaps ‘reconstructing the original author’ is not a very fortunate way of describing this task, because it assumes that it is possible to reconstruct the author’s mind and thinking process. But historical criticism does presuppose that an author wrote for an historically definable audience, that he intended to communicate a certain message to this audience, and that he intended to provoke a certain response from this audience. Basing itself on these presuppositions, historical criticism aims at ‘reconstructing the original intent of a text in the original context’.

[60] In Newman, A Translator’s Handbook, 5, the authors pointed out the problems inherent in translating literally even something so simple as the title to The Gospel of John: “It is true that this title occurs frequently in English, but a literal translation can be misleading, for it might mean either ‘The Good News about John’ or ‘The Good News that belonged to John.’ A more satisfactory title is usually ‘The Good News according to John’.” Any perceived difficulty with the alternative translation of 2 Cor. 5:10 suggested in this note, however, arguably has nothing to do with whether it is or is not too literal. Rather the difficulty might be that it conflicts with longstanding assumptions as to the meaning of the text, assumptions which as discussed above reflect dubious grammatical underpinnings. For the markedly different so-called “post-modern” approach to translation, compare Marijke de Lang, Historical Criticism Reformulated in the “Age of Imagination, 111: “The more extreme postmodern thinkers would argue that meaning is not something inherent in the text, but something that is construed by each different reader, independently from the original author. But there are also postmodernists who acknowledge that there is a difference between the meaning of a text in its original context and the significance of the text in a present-day context….”

Building on this notion of “post-modern” Biblical exegesis, it is generally recognized that the meaning and references from various passages from the Old Testament are taken today in far different directions by modern Christian readers from the understanding received by the original audience. For an example of this, see Marijke H. de Lang, The use of Psalm 110 in the New Testament, United Bible Societies:

The original interpretation of Psalm 110 was changed in four ways by the Christian reading. Firstly, the earthly, political throne became a heavenly throne. Secondly, the earthly, political enemies became the enemies of God’s kingship. Thirdly, the speaker was no longer the poet of the Psalm, but king David himself, speaking as a prophet. And lastly, most importantly, the second κύριος of vs 1 (‘my lord’), to whom the first Lord (God) speaks was no longer a king of Israel, but Jesus Christ. Were the first Christians building on an already existing Jewish messianic interpretation of Psalm 110? The answer is that an interpretation of Psalm 110 connecting it to the expectation of a Messiah is not found in pre-Christian times.

It is suggested here that the Biblical basis for such a shift in understanding of scripture over time springs from 2 Tim. 3:16: “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness”; Romans 15:14: “For everything that was written in the past was written for our instruction”; and 2 Peter 1:21-22: “Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture comes from one’s own interpretation. For no such prophecy was ever brought forth by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” Is it not at least possible that the modern reader might likewise take away something from a New Testament passage that was not apparent to the originally intended audience? (But see fn 65 below for a contrary view of how the original audience might have viewed this passage.) Perhaps, therefore, a revised understanding of 2 Cor. 5:10 along the lines suggested in this note reconciles in some way the historical-critical method with the more “imaginative” post-modern methodology, at least in this one text.

[61] It is suggested here that many commentators, because of their failure to probe deeply into the meaning of Paul’s reference to the body, exhibit a tendency to conflate the timing and venue of the judgment of believers with the notion of the believers’ resurrection. See, for example, Martin, 2 Corinthians, 102: “In 5:9, 10 he [Paul] warns the Corinthians that the goal, while time remains, regardless of one’s state at the Parousia…is to please the Lord (5:9). The time is coming for judgment to be passed on how the Christians behave (5:10). Thus Paul ends this passage, 5:1-10, as he opened it. This earthly tent, or body, will pass away only at death and there is something better for those who are faithful to the call: to see the present experience of believers as incomplete since they await the resurrection as a future event.”

[62] There is disagreement among scholars as to precisely when believers put on their heavenly or spiritual bodies, whether at death, or after some intermediate state. See, for example, Thrall, II Corinthians 1-7: Volume 1, 391: “In Phil. 1.23, moreover, departure from this life appears to be followed immediately by existence with Christ. Whether Paul thought of this form of existence as bodiless, or whether he supposed that the believer would be clothed with the resurrection body is a further debatable question.” Compare Martin, 2 Corinthians, 97: “We do not know for sure what was Paul’s reason for including 5:2-4 in the epistle. Is Paul speaking of the Christian taking on the spiritual body at death or at the Parousia? Or does the Christan ‘already’ have this body? Furthermore, does the idea behind ‘being naked’ suggest an intermediate state (the period between the death of a Christian and the putting on of the spiritual body at Parousia) or does this suggest the concept of judgment as depicted in the Old Testament? There is no consensus as to the purpose for Paul’s writing of 5:2-4….”

It is not the aim of this note to resolve such disputes. The important point here is that Christ’s judgment of believers and the donning of their heavenly bodies need not take place in the same venue. See, for example, Kruse, Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament 2 Corinthians, 111 (quoting Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, 408-409; and also The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, Barnett, Paul, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans (1997), 276): “Since, then the tribunal of Christ is concerned with the assessment of works, not the determination of destiny, it will be apparent that the Pauline concepts of justification on the basis of faith and recompense in accordance with works may be complementary….Believers do not face condemnation at Christ’s tribunal… but rather evaluation with a view to the Master’s commendation given or withheld….”

Such an evaluation may thus quite logically take place while one is still in the body striving to please Christ. Indeed, though the precise nature and dynamic of Christ’s judgment is beyond the scope of this note, there is a certain logic to the divine evaluation of Christ-followers taking place while the risen Lord may graciously interact with them in this life when they still enjoy the opportunity to alter their behavior, rather than waiting until after they have put off this “earthly tent” (2 Cor. 5:1) when repentance may no longer be available to them. Compare Revelation 2 and 3, where the risen Christ crisply pointed out some of the strengths and weaknesses of his followers among the various churches of that time, while urging them in no uncertain terms to promptly alter their conduct. See also Plummer, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary, xlii: “It may be said of his [Paul’s] theology generally, that there is no system in it….This is specially true of what is commonly spoken of as his ‘Eschatology.’…’Paul did not write de novissimis….One must be prepared for a surging hither and thither of great thoughts, feelings, and exultations….”  

[63] Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 9: “Humility needs to be exercised where the data are insufficient or where the language is capable of many interpretations.”

[64] While the revised reading of this text is novel, the underlying arguments and support for it largely follow traditional and generally accepted lines of grammatical exegesis. Even the rejection of an elliptical construction seems traditionally well-founded in the obviously “troublesome” reference to the body (Furnish, II Corinthians, 276). The one notable exception in this note to conventional methodology is the reliance on a purely conceptual analysis to break the seemingly firm grammatical “bond” (Robertson, Greek Grammar of the New Testament, 711) between the relative pronoun and the preceding article. Yet, a general semantic approach to grammar has no shortage of modern-day advocates, and even adherents to a more traditional methodology see the value at times of looking to the meaning of a text in attempting to divine its appropriate grammatical treatment. This note makes the point that any such conceptual component in what would generally be considered a purely “grammatical” analysis must be narrowly defined to the text under examination. Compare once again Mathewson, Intermediate Greek Grammar, xviii: “Any major theological points worth affirming and arguing for will certainly not be nuanced in small grammatical subtleties or fine distinctions…. Rather, they will be clear from their entire contexts;” with Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, 5 and 7: “In sum, traditional (and formal) syntax often falls short in that it does not pursue meaning; modern semantics often falls short in that it does not have an adequate empirical base.”

Indeed, this note is apparently not the only translational source to notice a potential problem or incongruity with the traditional translations of 2 Cor. 5:10. See, for example, the Aramaic Bible in Plain English: “that each man will be paid in his body anything that was done by him;” and one of the earliest translations, the Coverdale Bible of 1535: “every one may receive in his body, according to what he hath done.” While the reading in these two sources admittedly represents the overwhelming minority view of this passage, and the reading from the Aramaic Bible in Plain English is taken in the first instance from the Aramaic and not the Greek, they do suggest at a minimum that at least to some translators a gray area exists in the conventional treatment of this passage that needs to be more fully examined. Such a rigorous exploration has been one of the principal goals of this note.

[65] Perhaps a fuller and richer understanding of the nature of Biblical judgment, especially at the granular level of everyday life as opposed to some rather vague post-death apocalyptic venue, will lead to a broader and deeper appreciation of the power of Christ’s transforming grace. For a hint as to how early Christians might have viewed the timing and nature of God’s judgment with respect to believers (see fn 59 and fn 60 above for why this early view of judgment might impact an evaluation of 2 Cor. 5:10 under the historical-critical approach to translation, and perhaps, more importantly, how such an approach might influence how believers even today go about, or should go about, their daily lives), compare Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers, 2 Clement, 9, 148,150:

1. Καὶ μὴ λεγέτω τις ὑμῶν, ὅτι αὕτη ἡ σὰρξ οὖ κρίνεται οὐδὲ ἀνίταται. 2. γνῶτε· ἐν τίνι ἐσώθητε, ἐν τίνι ἀνελέψατε, εἰ μὴ ἐν τῇ σαρκὶ ταύτῃ ὄντες; 3. δεῖ οὖν ἡμᾶς ὡς ναὸν θεοῦ φυλάσσειν τὴν σαπρκα· 4. ὃν τρόπον γὰρ ἐν τῇ σαρκὶ ἐκλήθητε, καὶ ἐν τῇ σαρκὶ ἐλεύσεσθε. 5. εἰ Χριστός, ὁ κύριος ὁ σώσας ἡμᾶς, ὢν μὲν τὸ πρῶτον πνεῦμα, ἐγένετο σὰρξ καὶ οὕτως ἡμᾶς ἐκάλεσεν· οὕτως καὶ ἡμεῖς ἐ ταύτῃ τῇ σαρκὶ ἀποληψόμεθα τὸν μισθόν. 6. ἀγαπῶμεν οὖν ἀλλήλους, ὅπως ἔλθωμεν´πάντες εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ. 7. ὡς ἔχομεν καιρὸν τοῦ ἰαθῆναι, ἐπιδῶμεν ἑαυτοὺς τῷ θεραπεύοντι θεῷ, ἀντιμισθίαν αὐτῷ διδόντες. 8. ποίαν; τὸ μετανοῆσαι ἐξ εἰλικρινοῦς καρδίας. 9. προγνώστης γάρ ἐστιν τῶν πάντων καὶ εἰδὼς ἡμῶν τὰ ἐν καρδίᾳ. 10. δῶμεν οὖν αὐτῷ αἶνον, μὴ ἀπὸ στόματος μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀπὸ καρδίας, ἵνα ἡμᾶς προσδέξηται ὡς υἱούς. 11. καὶ γὰρ εἶπεν ὁ κύριος· Ἀδελφοί μου οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ ποιοῦντες τὸ θέλημα τοῦ πατρός μου.

Although “virtually nothing is known about its author, date, or occasion” (Holmes. The Apostolic Fathers, 133), what has come to be known as 2 Clement is neither a letter, nor was it composed by Clement, but “[i]t is, in fact, a sermon or ‘word of exhortation’ composed by an anonymous presbyter,” and is regarded as “the oldest surviving complete Christian sermon outside the New Testament” (Holmes, 132). One notable scholar, J.B. Lightfoot, suggested that “2 Clement was a sermon, read to the Corinthian congregation sometime between AD 120 and 140, that was for some reason particularly notable and therefore preserved…” (Holmes, 134.)

Holmes’s translation of this passage reads as follows, 149,151:

And let none of you say that this flesh is not judged and does not rise again. 2 Think about this: In what state were you saved? In what state did you recover your sight, if it was not while you were in the flesh? 3 We must, therefore, guard the flesh as a temple of God. 4 For just as you were called in the flesh, so you will come in the flesh. 5 If Christ, the Lord who saved us, became flesh (even though he was originally spirit) and in that state called us, so also we will receive our reward in this flesh. 6 Therefore let us love one another, so that we all may enter into the kingdom of God. 7 While we still have time to be healed, let us place ourselves in the hands of God the physician, and pay him what is due. 8 What is that? Sincere, heartfelt repentance. 9 For he is the one who knows everything beforehand, and knows what is in our heart. 10 Therefore let us give him eternal praise, not from the mouth only but also from the heart, in order that he may welcome us as sons and daughters. 11 For the Lord also said, ‘My brothers and sisters are those who do the will of my Father’.

This early Christian preacher thus provided a concise and cogent rationale for the bodily judgment of believers. We are saved in the body; our sins are forgiven in the body; we are sanctified and redeemed in the body; but when it comes to judgment, we are told, it is mostly, other than for a few corrective admonishments now and then, put off into the vague apocalyptic future, while Christ stands by and watches us flounder about in this life. What this early preacher realized was that Christ, the judge, justifies those who follow him, each of us, in this life, thereby preparing us for heaven. Thus, as with most everything in Christian theology, it is not so much what we do that counts for eternity, but what Christ does on our behalf. Thus, the phrase, τὰ διὰ τοῦ σώματος, does not so much denote what we do in the body, but rather how Christ acts upon us in this life. Indeed, there could be no more personal and intimate vehicle by which Christ can interact with his followers than through their Soma. ἐν τῇ ἀνοχῇ τοῦ θεοῦ, πρὸς τὴν ἔνδειξιν τῆς δικαιοσύνης αὐτοῦ ἐν τῷ νῦν καιρῷ, εἰς τὸ εἶναι αὐτὸν δίκαιον καὶ δικαιοῦντα τὸν ἐκ πίστεως Ἰησοῦ. Romans 3:26. “he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.” (NIV)

[66] ἐν τούτῳ τετελείωται ἡ ἀγάπη μεθ’ ἡμῶν, ἵνα παρρησίαν ἔχωμεν ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῆς κρίσεως, ὅτι καθὼς ἐκεῖνός ἐστιν καὶ ἡμεῖς ἐσμεν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ τούτῳ. 1 John 4:17. “And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world.” (NLT)

“The Judgment Seat” by Ian Sane is licensed under CC BY 2.0.