Charles Ellicott Commentary 1 Corinthians 15:37-38

"and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not the body that shall be, but a bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other kind; but God giveth it a body even as it pleased him, and to each seed a body of its own." — 1 Corinthians 15:37-38 (ASV)

God giveth it a body.—Here it is implied that, though the seed grows up, as we say, “in the ordinary course of Nature,” it is God who not only has originally established but continually sustains that order. Each seed rises with its own “body;” a corn seed grows up into corn, an acorn into an oak.

All through this passage the word “body” is used in a general sense for “organism,” so as to keep strictly and vividly before the reader the ultimate truth to illustrate which these analogies are introduced. The points of analogy between the sowing and growth of seed and the life and resurrection of man are not, as some writers put it—

1. the seed is sown, and man is buried;
2. the seed rots, and man’s body decays;
3. the seed grows up, and man is raised.

Such a series of analogies is misleading, for there is no necessity for the body of man to decay, but only a necessity for it to die (1 Corinthians 15:51–52). The points of analogy are these:—

1. the seed is sown in the earth, and man is born into the world;
2. the seed dies and decays—man dies;
3. the seed grows through its very decay—man rises through death.