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Part I
The Grounds for the Belief in the Resurrection
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Chapter I
The Statement of the Problems
BETWEEN the brief drama of the life of Jesus of Nazareth and the long process of development which makes up the history of the Christian Church the common belief of that Church has placed an event, in Baron von Hiigel’s phrase, “ a factual happening “—the Resurrection. Upon this event not only has the whole subsequent history turned, but it has furnished the key to the meaning of the universe and its order. Upon it may be said to rest the Christian view of Divine interposition in history and the Christian belief in the future life. It has often been said that the Resurrection of Christ is the crucial miracle; if that supreme act of Divine intervention is established other miracles offer no difficulty to faith.
Now it is at least clear that this event, like all other events in the life of Jesus and in the early history of the Christian movement, depends upon the evidence of the early Christian documents, and that evidence demands the same careful examination and the employment of the same principles of historical criticism which we give to any other group of events whose record is contained in contemporary documents. Before we can come to deal with the historical questions already mentioned, and especially the primary question of how the Christian movement started, it is absolutely necessary to deal historically with the grounds upon which the early Christian belief in the Resurrection of Jesus rested. In order to do this we have to inquire first of all into the beliefs about the Resurrection which were current in the time of Jesus. Secondly, we must examine the sayings of Jesus, which appear to refer to his own death and resurrection, in order to arrive at some conclusion as to his own attitude on this point. Thirdly, it is necessary to examine in detail the belief of the early Christian community prior to the formation and writing down of the Synoptic tradition. The evidence for this rests mainly upon Paul’s letters, and upon the early narrative of Acts in so far as they represent primitive conditions. Fourthly, we must undertake the task, as far as limits of space will allow, of examining the evidence of the Synoptic Gospels and of the Fourth Gospel. Lastly, a brief discussion of what Professor Hogg calls “ preternatural special providence “ closes this first section of the book.
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Chapter II
General Jewish Background of Resurrection Beliefs
IN the study of religious phenomena there is a distinction which is fundamental but which is very commonly unperceived. It is the distinction between the form and the content of a religious experience. For example, Joan of Arc was the subject of certain experiences, indubitably religious. These experiences culminated in visions and voices. The visions and the voices were attached in Joan’s experience to St. Michael and St. Catharine. The names and forms of St. Michael and St. Catharine belonged to the form of Joan’s experience. This form was due to certain traditional beliefs connected with these religious figures. But the reality of Joan’s experience which is unquestioned is no guarantee of the validity and independent existence of St. Michael as the cause of her experience.
In the same way we have to make the distinction between the experience which underlay and gave impulse to the movement arising after the death of Jesus and the forms which it assumed. The two earliest forms which this experience took on, one of which has remained with little change as the central article of Christian belief, while the other has faded into the background of a loosely held expectation, were the belief in the resurrection of the body of Jesus and the belief in his immediate return as Messiah. The second belief was directly connected with the first and will be dealt with later on. The question to be answered first of all is whether the belief in the resurrection of certain classes of people as a special act of God existed in the minds of those who, as a result of their experience with Jesus, afterwards attached this belief to his person.
It is worth noting, in the first place, that in Paul’s great exposition of the future state in I Cor. xv., he does not base the belief in the resurrection of the dead upon the fact of the resurrection of Jesus, but the reverse. He argues: “ If the dead rise not, then is Christ not risen.” To him the Resurrection of Jesus is a particular, though centrally important, case of an order of happenings which he already accepts on other grounds. The existing “ form “ of a belief in resurrection, not merely as a possible act of God, but as part of an accepted scheme of the future, made it easy for Paul to throw his special experience relating to Jesus into that form.
Paul, as an educated Pharisee, represents the general point of view of his order. We know from the New Testament and other sources that the Pharisaic point of view was not the only one prevalent in Jewish circles. Extra-canonical Jewish literature of the two centuries before Christ bears witness to the existence of a continually changing body of beliefs about the nature of the future Messianic Kingdom, the resurrection of the righteous, and the judgment connected with this Kingdom. Illustrative extracts from Jewish apocalyptic literature are given in an Appendix to this section of the book (see pp. 143-4).
The existence of a polemic against the resurrection such as is attributed to the school of Antigonus of Socho is in itself a witness to the existence of the belief which it opposed.
Three general considerations should be noticed:
First, there is no question of the ability of God to raise the dead. The old Jewish stories of the raising of the dead by Elijah and Elisha are accepted without suspicion While the existence of Greek influence in sceptical doubts and questionings appears in the Talmud and in the Wisdom literature, yet in general the attitude of pious circles in Palestine is well expressed in Paul’s words before Agrippa: “ Why should you consider it incredible that God raises the dead?
“ Second, the belief in the resurrection of a particular class of people at a particular point in the future is the outcome of the struggle between Judaism and Hellenism in the second century B.C. The belief is really a fundamental element in Jewish theodicy of the time. The growing sense of failure and disappointment with the actual political condition of the Jewish people in Palestine as contrasted with the glowing promises of the prophets had given birth to the literature known as Apocalyptic. In this literature an increasingly sharp cleavage between “ this age “ and “ the age to come “ appears. The hopes of the faithful became more and more occupied with the age to come. This state of future blessedness and prosperity on earth would be the result of God’s direct intervention. But the persecutions and martyrdoms which took place during the struggle with Hellenism created an acute problem which concerned the moral government of the world. The question of how the martyred righteous could share the blessings of the earthly Messianic Kingdom required an answer. The answer lay ready to hand in the existing belief in resurrection. The only way in which God could justify himself was by raising these sufferers for the sake of the Law to enjoy their due portion in the Kingdom of the Messiah. Hence we find this belief has taken firm root in Jewish thought of the second century B.C.
Third, while the general outline of this group of beliefs underwent changes during the first century B.C., yet the New Testament itself is sufficient evidence for the persistence of this particular view-point up to and beyond the lifetime of Jesus. There is a most interesting example of the working of this kind of reasoning in Paul’s first letter to the Christian community at Thessalonica. He had taught these people to believe in the near return of Jesus as Messiah to set up the kingdom of Jewish expectation. They had written to him concerning the problem of the fate of their believing relatives who had died before this speedily expected consummation. Paul’s reply shows the working of this very tendency already mentioned. He argues that God will raise these dead believers at the return of Jesus as Messiah. Hence there can be no ground for doubting the existence of this “ thought-form “ of a resurrection as part of the general background of belief in the lifetime of Jesus and his contemporaries.
Various popular beliefs, such as the belief in Nero redivivus, the return of Arminius, of Frederick Bar- barossa, the folk-myth of Drake’s drum, and similar psychological phenomena have no direct relation to this particular problem of Jewish thought. It is primarily theological, although the existence of such an attitude amongst the Jewish common people, as elsewhere, is illustrated by the belief in the return of Elijah, and would naturally form suitable soil for the reception of such theological beliefs.
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Chapter III
Sayings of Jesus Relating to Belief in Resurrection
The next stage of our inquiry is concerned with the sayings of Jesus as recorded in the Synoptic Gospels. These sayings fall into two classes: those that refer to resurrection in general and those that refer to his own resurrection. There are two passages that belong to the first class:
Matt. xii. 41, 42, Luke xi. 31, 32. In this saying the men of Nineveh and the Queen of Sheba are spoken of as rising in the day of judgment with the generation of Jesus to condemn them. The passage implies at the least a belief in a future judgment and in a resurrection connected with it. The genuineness of the saying has not been questioned.
Matt. xxii. 23-33, Mark xii. 18-27, Luke xx. 27-40. This is the well-known dispute with the Sadducees, who presumably are aware that Jesus believes in the Pharisaic view of resurrection, and seek to turn it into ridicule. If we take the Marcan version of his reply, there are three points to be observed:
He refers to the Scriptures, implying that the general position of belief in the resurrection rests upon the Old Testament Scriptures.
He refers to the power of God, i.e. presumably as exemplified in earlier cases of resurrection.
He uses a passage from the Torah in the familiar Rabbinical way to prove that the dead live with God.
The passage proves nothing as to the belief of Jesus regarding time or occasion of any special resurrection. It shows that He accepts the general view of resurrection and repudiates the grosser materialistic implications by which its opponents sought to turn it into ridicule.
A second appendix to this section contains illustrations from Rabbinical literature of the Rabbinical methods of defending this belief (pp 145-6).
From these two passages it would seem clear that Jesus accepted the general conception of resurrection as part of the plan of God for the future state. But they throw no light on the special problem of his belief as to the near approach of the “ age to come “ and the relation of his own death to that event. This brings us to the second class of passages.
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Chapter IV
Sayings of Jesus Relating to his Own Resurrection
As far as the text of the Synoptic Gospels is concerned there is no doubt of the existence of a number of sayings in which Jesus refers to his own death and resurrection. It is, however, impossible to take these sayings as they...
