Resurrection Logic

How Jesus' First Followers Believed God Raised Him from the Dead

Bruce D. Chilton

• Publisher: Baylor University Press
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781481310635
• eBook ISBN: 9781481310673
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

Death does not speak the final word. Resurrection does. Christianity stands or falls with this central confession: God raised Jesus from the dead.

Bruce Chilton investigates the Easter event of Jesus in  Resurrection Logic. He undertakes his close reading of the New Testament texts without privileging the exact nature of the resurrection, but rather begins by situating his study of the resurrection in the context of Sumerian, Egyptian, Greek, and Syrian conceptions of the afterlife. He then identifies Jewish monotheistic affirmations of bodily resurrection in the Second Temple period as the most immediate context for early Christian claims. Chilton surveys first-generation accounts of Jesus' resurrection and finds a pluriform--and even at times seemingly contradictory--range of testimony from Jesus' first followers. This diversity, as Chilton demonstrates, prompted early Christianity to interpret the resurrection traditions by means of prophecy and coordinated narrative.

In the end, Chilton points to how the differing conceptions of the ways that God governs the world produced distinct understandings--or "sciences"--of the Easter event. Each understanding contained its own internal logic, which contributed to the collective witness of the early church handed down through the canonical text. In doing so, Chilton reveals the full tapestry of perspectives held together by the common-thread confession of Jesus' ongoing life and victory over death.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page, Half-title Page, Copyright
• Contents Overview
• Contents
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part 1. Crucibles of Hope
• 1. Resurrection and Immortality before Jesus
• 2. Israel’s Revolution of Hope
• 3. Bodies Raised in Israel’s Vindication
• Part 2. Catalyst of Transformation
• 4. Paul on How Jesus “Was Seen”
• 5. Seen “by Kêpha’,” Then “by the Twelve”
• 6. Seen “by More Than Five Hundred,” Then “by James”
• Part 3. Reasoning with the Resurrection
• 7. Seen by “All the Apostles”
• 8. After Paul, beyond the Tomb
• 9. Resurrection, History, and Realization
• Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index of Terms
• Index of Passages