One of the striking realities of theological discourse is that the same story can be told in radically different ways, yielding divergent meanings. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the early Christological debates, where scriptural texts functioned as battlegrounds for competing theological visions. This paper will explore how the interpretation of 1 Corinthians 15:28 at the Council of Nicaea reveals the extent to which presupposed narratives shape scriptural meaning. Specifically, it will examine how different readings of this verse were grounded in distinct understandings of Paul’s implicit gospel—what Richard Hays, N.T. Wright, and other modern scholars have described as the overarching theological and narrative logic that undergirds Paul’s letters.
The debate over 1 Corinthians 15:28 at Nicaea was not merely a textual dispute but a contest over the very nature of Christ’s subjection to the Father. The Arian reading of this text suggested an ontological subordination of the Son, while the ultimately accepted version affirmed Christ’s eternal co-equality with the Father. The way one interprets this verse depends heavily on one’s broader theological framework—particularly how one construes Paul’s vision of divine agency, eschatology, and the function of scriptural narrative.
By drawing on contemporary scholarship on Paul’s implicit gospel, this paper will argue that the concepts of implicit and explicit narrative in Paul’s letters are not so separate, but rather that one’s conscious or unconscious understanding of Paul’s implicit Gospel inevitably shapes and gives meaning, not only to Paul’s discourse, but to his explicit narratives. Just as modern interpreters of Paul reconstruct his theology through different narrative paradigms, so too did the Nicene theologians, consciously or unconsciously, shape the meaning of scripture to fit their larger Christological commitments. This case study, then, serves as a broader reflection on the dynamic interplay between story and interpretation, reminding us that no text stands apart from the frameworks that give it meaning.