Bodily Resurrection based on the Resurrection of Jesus

Bodily Resurrection …based on the Resurrection of Jesus Christ

• It must have happened for “if their [the disciples’] life-situation had not been transformed by some powerfully moving event it seems very unlikely that the tiny Jesus -movement within Judaism would have survived the execution of its leader and that there would today, nearly two thousand years later, be a Christian community numbering hundreds of millions. ”

• However, it is impossible to be entirely sure what the resurrection event consisted of. • Even the word ‘resurrection’ has to be used as a conventional name rather than a description

• We do not know if the disciples’ revived faith originated from a return from the grave or from a series of visions/auditions of Jesus as a glorified figure of exalted majesty… • … because any form of a return from the dead would, to Jesus’ contemporaries, be classed as a resurrection. • (only to a sophisticated minority would it mean a physical resurrection)

• HA Guy argues that bodily resurrection was the prevailing popular Hebrew conception of life after death. • Hick argues that this means that however Jesus appeared after his resurrection, the story of his appearing would be moulded by this Jewish expectation of bodily resurrection. • What impact does this have for our belief in resurrection?

• Hick: Therefore, the word ‘resurrection’ itself does not, with any certainty, teach us anything about what happened.

Questions to consider 1. Did the body of Jesus come forth from the grave to resume a full physical life? 2. Was it changed, somehow, in the tomb, so whilst retaining some physical attributes, it took on other contra-physical attributes? 3. Or was the resurrection a series of visions, seen by Jesus’ disciples? If so, were they produced in their minds by the living spirit of Jesus? 4. Did the resurrection take place entirely on the inner planes of the disciples’ faith? 5. Were stories about Jesus’ resurrection later invented as the disciples’ faith grew stronger?

• It is chiefly important for Christians to see that neither the reality nor the religious significance of the resurrection event depends upon the outcome of asking was it bodily or visionary, physical or psychological or para-psychological in character. • What is important is recorded in Acts: – That God had raised up Jesus, giving him power and authority; – and that Jesus was alive. • Both aspects of this message are based upon the glorified Lord showing himself to the disciples; and whether or not it was an actual physical appearance is relatively unimportant.

• The case for presuming a bodily resurrection rest entirely on the Gospel narratives. • Lk 24: 39 -40, Jn 20: 20 • Lk 24: 41 -43, Jn 21: 13 • Jn 20: 24 -29 • However, the body has been glorified.

• That the tomb was empty is evidenced by the story that the disciples has stolen the body - this would have been impossible for the disciples to do at Pentecost, less than 2 months after Jesus’ crucifixion; to have publicly proclaimed the resurrection in Jerusalem (within a mile or so of the tomb), if his body was still there and able to be produced. • Mt 28: 11 -15

• Alternatively, the case for supposing that the resurrection was a series of visions is supported by St Paul who gives an ‘official Christian list’ of the resurrection appearances, without making reference to the empty tomb! (Paul further documents his own encounter with the risen Lord on the road to Damascus – speaking of nothing more than a bright light. ) • 1 Cor 15: 3 -8 This is dated at c. 50 AD, whereas Mk (the earliest Gospel) is dated c. 70 AD

• Paul’s claim to be an authentic apostle rested upon his being a first-hand witness to the fact of the resurrection. • On this view, the entire cycle of stories about the burial, the tomb, the miraculous removal of the stone, the angels, the appearance of Jesus himself in the garden – indeed possibly the whole Jerusalem tradition – represents a legendary development.

• “Jesus’ body was probably placed in a common grave for executed criminals, and short of an elaborate exhumations it would seven weeks later, at Pentecost, have been impossible to establish anything corresponding to the empty tomb of the developed tradition. ” [Hick]

• But NT evidence is more complex, varied and confusing than appears when we simply question a bodily resurrection versus a series of visions:

The Jerusalem Cycle • In Mk, the women find the tomb and are told by a ‘young man’ that Jesus has risen and has gone to Galilee, where disciples are to follow him; • In Mt, there is the earthquake, the angel, ‘his appearance like lightning’, rolling back the stone, the guards who ‘became like dead men’, and the story that at the time of the crucifixion numerous bodies came from their tombs and were seen in Jerusalem. • In Lk, the angel at the tomb has become two, the mysterious encounter on the Emmaus road, followed by an appearance in Jerusalem and then Jesus’ ascension from Bethany. In Lk, this all happens within 24 hrs, excluding the possibility of appearances in Galilee!

The Galilean Tradition • Appearances to the disciples: – 11 on a mountain (Mt 28: 16 -20); – to Peter and 6 others by the Sea of Tiberias (Jn 21: 1 -3) • It is impossible to conflate the Jerusalem & Galilean cycles in view of Luke’s timetable of events.

Further difficulties • There are, however, additional difficulties when examining the NT narratives: • Who saw the risen Lord first? According to Paul (1 Cor 15: 5) and Luke (24: 34) it was Peter; but according to Matthew and John it was two women (Mt 28: 1 -10) or one (Jn 20: 14). • Did Jesus impart the Holy Spirit to the disciples when he appeared in a locked room on the evening of Easter day (Jn 20: 22), or some fifty days later at Pentecost (Acts 2)? • After the discovery of the empty tomb, did the disciples go immediately to Galilee (Mt 16: 7), or remain in Jerusalem where, according to John, a second appearance occurred eight days after the first (Jn 20: 26)? • Did the resurrection appearances begin and end on the same day (Lk 24), or where they spread over forty days (Acts 1: 3)?

Conclusion • It is obvious that the various strands of the tradition are incapable of being fully harmonised, and that the NT shows a progression from the simple proclamation of the risen Christ to detailed stories of his bodily presence and speech, characterised by progressive degeneration from history to legend.

• In the earliest experience and understanding of the disciples, there was probably no distinction between Jesus having ‘risen’ and his being ‘glorified’, ‘exalted’, ‘ascended to the right hand of the Father’. [Bornkamm]

• “The conviction, which was at the heart of the early gospel, that Jesus lives as exalted Lord and that men can find salvation through him, could thus have had as its simplest and, perhaps, most likely basis, a vision or visions, perhaps only momentary, of Jesus as a majestic figure shining in supernatural light – an experience which may be reflected in the Transfiguration story. ” [HICK]

• Less than this could hardly have launched the movement which sprang up so vigorously after Jesus’ death, and more is probably not required to account for it. • The resurrection may have been a bodily event…but the Gospel that Jesus lives, exalted by God to a glorious role in the process of man’s salvation, does not depend upon the historicity of any of these problematic elements of the NT tradition.