was
justified by spirit. From its obvious antithetic parallelism
with the preceding verse, this line may be expected to contain a reference to
Christ’s resurrection. The term spirit, like flesh, signifies something
intrinsic to Christ, the result of the operation, in his sacred humanity, of
the Holy Spirit: cf. « according to the Spirit of holiness » (Rom 1:4). The
main problem here is to determine the meaning of the operative word justified. It is not impossible that the
term is a borrowing from the vocabulary of the Greek Mystery religions, where
it signified « to divinize ». The meaning of the verse would then provide a
parallel to Rom 1:4, where Christ is said to « have been constituted Son of God
in power by resurrection from deaths » A. Descamps understands the word justified as synonymous with « glorified
», because of the affinity existing in the Bible between justice and glory. L.
Cerfaux remarks that the archaic title, « the Just One », given to Christ in
the primitive preaching, has a meaning analogous to « the Holy One », the other
early epithet used of Christ. Accordingly, it seems most probable that, however
we explain the meaning of justified,
there is question of Christ’s resurrection here, as both B. Weiss and J.
Jeremias insist. (David Michael Stanley, Christ’s Resurrection in Pauline
Soteriology [Analecta Biblica 13; Rome: Biblical Institute Press, 1961], 237-38)
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