Baptized for the dead?

[aspen]

1 Corinthians 15:29
Now if there is no resurrection, what will those do who are baptized for the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized for them?

 

[veteran]

Apostle Paul was not supporting the idea of those alive being baptized for those who had already died that were not. He was only using that as a point to show how the resurrection of the dead is a true event to be hoped for, and not a myth.

 

[aspen]

Apostle Paul was not supporting the idea of those alive being baptized for those who had already died that were not. He was only using that as a point to show how the resurrection of the dead is a true event to be hoped for, and not a myth.

But why would Paul compare a true event (the resurrection) with a false practice in order to prove the resurrection is true?

 

[veteran]

But why would Paul compare a true event (the resurrection) with a false practice in order to prove the resurrection is true?

Granted, that's one of the more difficult passages in Scripture, and it's been interpreted many ways. Yet there's no historical evidence in Paul's days of Christians being baptized for the sake of someone else who was dead.

1 Cor 15:29
29 Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? why are they then baptized for the dead?
(KJV)

The more correct rendering is based on the idea of a believing Christian having hope in the resurrection that they will be raised, and that their baptism seals it, giving them the ability to withstand persecution by that hope in the resurrection. So in Paul's sense, "What else then can a believer hope for, if they are baptized into death but they are not resurrected?" The next verse naturally points to that idea...

1 Cor 15:30
30 And why stand we in jeopardy every hour?
(KJV)

This is simply a continuation of the idea Paul was covering back in the 1 Cor.15:13-19 verses...

1 Cor 15:13-19
13 But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen:
14 And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.
15 Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that He raised up Christ: Whom He raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not.
16 For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised:
17 And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.
18 Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.
19 If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.
(KJV)

If the resurrection is not true, then it would mean The Father did not raise up Christ. It would mean even those in Christ have perished. It would mean ONLY while alive on earth could we have hope in Christ, and nothing thereafter. That Message is what Paul began with, and then continued with the 1 Cor.15:29-30 verses.