Bible Strands
1 Corinthians 15:45
So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam a life-giving spirit.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Paul writes to the Corinthian church in the middle of his argument for bodily resurrection (1 Cor 15), countering those who deny it.
The words — πρῶτος (prōtos, "first") marks Adam as the origin of the natural order; the verse's punchline is πνεῦμα (pneuma, "spirit"), identifying the last Adam as a life-giving spirit rather than a life-receiving body.
The thread — Genesis 2:7 supplies the "became a living being" quotation; John 5:21 and Romans 8:2 extend the claim that the Son gives life through the Spirit.
Why it lands — The verse forces a binary: if the first Adam produced death-bound flesh, the last Adam produces Spirit-born life, and the reader must decide which "Adam" they are aligned with.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Greek words
King James Version
And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.
Cross-references
- John 5:21 For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom He wishes.
- Genesis 2:7 Then the LORD God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils, and the man became a living being.
- Romans 8:2 For in Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set you free from the law of sin and death.
- Romans 8:10 But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.
- Romans 5:12 Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, so also death was passed on to all men, because all sinned.
- John 6:63 The Spirit gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.
- John 6:39 And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that I shall lose none of those He has given Me, but raise them up at the last day.
- John 14:6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
- John 6:57 Just as the living Father sent Me and I live because of the Father, so also the one who feeds on Me will live because of Me.
- John 6:33 For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”