Anf-03 v.iv.vi.x Pg 4
1 Cor. xv. 29.
Now, never mind5628 5628 Viderit.
that practice, (whatever it may have been.) The Februarian lustrations5629 5629 Kalendæ Februariæ. The great expiation or lustration, celebrated at Rome in the month which received its name from the festival, is described by Ovid, Fasti, book ii., lines 19–28, and 267–452, in which latter passage the same feast is called Lupercalia. Of course as the rites were held on the 15th of the month, the word kalendæ here has not its more usual meaning (Paley’s edition of the Fasti, pp. 52–76). Oehler refers also to Macrobius, Saturn. i. 13; Cicero, De Legibus, ii. 21; Plutarch, Numa, p. 132. He well remarks (note in loc.), that Tertullian, by intimating that the heathen rites of the Februa will afford quite as satisfactory an answer to the apostle’s question, as the Christian superstition alluded to, not only means no authorization of the said superstition for himself, but expresses his belief that St. Paul’s only object was to gather some evidence for the great doctrine of the resurrection from the faith which underlay the practice alluded to. In this respect, however, the heathen festival would afford a much less pointed illustration; for though it was indeed a lustration for the dead, περὶ νεκρῶν, and had for its object their happiness and welfare, it went no further than a vague notion of an indefinite immortality, and it touched not the recovery of the body. There is therefore force in Tertullian’s si forte.
will perhaps5630 5630 Si forte.
answer him (quite as well), by praying for the dead.5631 5631 τῷ εὔχεσθαι ὑπὲρ τῶν νεκρῶν (Rigalt.).
Do not then suppose that the apostle here indicates some new god as the author and advocate of this (baptism for the dead. His only aim in alluding to it was) that he might all the more firmly insist upon the resurrection of the body, in proportion as they who were vainly baptized for the dead resorted to the practice from their belief of such a resurrection. We have the apostle in another passage defining “but one baptism.”5632 5632
Anf-03 v.viii.xlviii Pg 10
Ver. 29.
we will see whether there be a good reason for this. Now it is certain that they adopted this (practice) with such a presumption as made them suppose that the vicarious baptism (in question) would be beneficial to the flesh of another in anticipation of the resurrection; for unless it were a bodily resurrection, there would be no pledge secured by this process of a corporeal baptism. “Why are they then baptized for the dead,”7630 7630
Anf-03 v.viii.xlviii Pg 11
Ver. 29.
he asks, unless the bodies rise again which are thus baptized? For it is not the soul which is sanctified by the baptismal bath:7631 7631 Lavatione.
its sanctification comes from the “answer.”7632 7632
Treasury of Scriptural Knowledge, Chapter 15
VERSE (29) - :16,32 Ro 6:3,4 Mt 20:22
