2 Corinthians 5:15

κρίναντας τοῦτο ὅτι εἶς κ. τ. λ.: judging this; that One died for all (cf. Romans 5:15), therefore all died, and He died for all, that they who live (see 2 Corinthians 3:11) should no longer live unto themselves, but unto Him who died and rose again for them. To die ὑπέρ τῶν φίλων αὐτοῦ is the greatest proof that anyone can offer of his love (John 15:13). The proof to us of the Love of Christ to all is that He died ὑπὲρ πάντων. Of this Death two consequences are now mentioned: (a) one objective and inevitable, quite independent of our faith and obedience; (b) another subjective and conditional. (a) ἄρα οἱ πάντες ἀπέθανον, then all died, sc., in Him who is the “recapitulation” of all humanity, Jew and Greek, bond and free, faithless or believing. We must not weaken the force of οἱ πάντες : the Incarnation embraces all men (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:22). The A.V. “then were all dead” (the same mistranslation occurs Romans 6:2; Colossians 3:3) does not bring out the sense, which is that the Dying of Christ on the Cross was in some sort the dying of all mankind. But (b) the purposes of the Atonement are not completely fulfilled without the response of man's faith and obedience; He died for all, ἵνα οἱ ζῶντες κ. τ. λ. This is the frequent exhortation of St. Paul (Romans 6:11 and see 1 Peter 3:18); the purpose of Christ's Death is to lead us to Life, a life “unto God” (cf. Romans 6:11; Romans 14:7-8) the “life indeed” (1 Timothy 6:19) which must be begun here if it is to be perfected hereafter. The preposition ὑπέρ, “on behalf of” (cf. chap. 2 Corinthians 12:10), employed in these verses is the one usually employed in the N.T. to express the relation between Christ's Atoning Death and our benefit: it was “for our sake,” “on our behalf” (e.g., Luke 22:19-20; John 10:15; John 11:51; Romans 5:6; 1 Corinthians 1:13; Galatians 3:13; Ephesians 5:2; Hebrews 2:9; 1 John 3:16). It is not equivalent to ἀντί, “instead of” (although in Philemon 1:13 its meaning approximates thereto), and ought not to be so translated; although the preposition ἀντί is used of our Lord's Atoning Work in three places (Matthew 20:28; Mark 10:45; 1 Timothy 2:6), and the implied metaphor must have a place in any complete theory of the Atonement. But here ὑπέρ is (as usual) used, and the rendering “instead of,” even if linguistically possible (which it is not), is excluded by the fact that in the phrase ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν ἀποθανόντι καὶ ἐγερθέντι, ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν is governed by both participles. Christ rose again “on our behalf”; He is never said to have risen “instead of us”.