1 Corinthians 15:5

5 that he presented himself alive to Peter, then to his closest followers,

1 Corinthians 15:5 Meaning and Commentary

1 Corinthians 15:5

And that he was seen of Cephas
Or Simon Peter; for Cephas was a name given him by Christ, ( John 1:42 ) . This was not another Cephas, one of the seventy disciples, as Clemens suggests {g}, but the Apostle Peter himself, to whom it is certain the Lord appeared. Not that he was the first person by whom Christ was seen after his resurrection, for he first appeared to Mary Magdalene, ( Mark 16:9 ) but the testimony of the women the apostle omits, and it seems as if Peter was the first of the men that saw Christ when risen, see ( Luke 24:34 ) . Whether he was one of the disciples that went to Emmaus, to whom Christ joined himself, and entered into discourse with, is not certain; it should rather seem, that the appearance here referred to was when he was alone;

then of the twelve;
though there were then but eleven of them, Judas being gone from them, and having destroyed himself; and at the first appearance of Christ to them, there were but ten present, Thomas being absent; and yet because their original number, when first chosen and called, were twelve, they still went by the same name; see ( John 20:24 ) ( Genesis 42:13 ) . The appearance or appearances here referred to are those in ( John 20:19 John 20:26 ) . The Vulgate Latin reads the "eleven"; and so the Claromontane exemplar.


FOOTNOTES:

F7 Apud Euseb. Eccl. Hist. l. 1. c. 12.

1 Corinthians 15:5 In-Context

3 The first thing I did was place before you what was placed so emphatically before me: that the Messiah died for our sins, exactly as Scripture tells it;
4 that he was buried; that he was raised from death on the third day, again exactly as Scripture says;
5 that he presented himself alive to Peter, then to his closest followers,
6 and later to more than five hundred of his followers all at the same time, most of them still around (although a few have since died);
7 that he then spent time with James and the rest of those he commissioned to represent him;
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.