Space, Time and Resurrection

Thomas F. Torrance

• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9780567682178
• eBook ISBN: 9780567682208
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Theology

In this sequel to Space, Time and Incarnation, Thomas F. Torrance sets out the biblical approach to the Resurrection in terms of the intrinsic significance of the resurrected one, Jesus; and demonstrates that the Resurrection is entirely consistent with who Jesus was and what he did. The Resurrection is thus taken realistically, and treated as of the same nature, in the integration of physical and spiritual existence, as the death of Christ. All this is elucidated in the context of modern scientific thought, in such a way as to show that far from being frightened by modern science into a compromise of the New Testament's message of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ in body, it actually allows us to take its full measure. This classic volume from one of the premier English speaking theologian of the 20th century remains an important contribution to the field of systematic theology. For this Cornerstones edition, the preface is written by Paul D. Molnar.

CHAPTER 1

THE BIBLICAL CONCEPT OF THE RESURRECTION

Resurrection as understood in the Bible appears to be without any parallel in the other religions. An idea of resurrection is certainly found very widely in Semitic and Hellenic thought, as is the notion of a dying and rising god, or the divinity immanent in the processes of nature who is reborn with every seasonal change from winter to spring and whose divine life becomes manifest in the resurrection of nature. Against all this the Scriptures, and not least the Old Testament, are sharply opposed. Resurrection has nothing at all to do with any dying or rising god and his cosmic rebirth. It must be admitted, however, that this heathen notion has invaded the Christian Church, probably through the syncretistic ideas that developed in early Mediterranean Christianity, and is still constantly reflected in hymns and sermons about the springing up of new life, as well as in Easter eggs and similar symbols of the dying and rising gods of nature religions.¹

'Earth with joy confesses, clothing her for spring,

All good gifts return with her returning King;

Bloom in every meadow, leaves on every bough,

Speak his sorrows ended, hail his triumph now.'

It is hardly less reflected in the romantic and phenomenalist notions of history lurking in the presuppositions of those biblical scholars who attempt to reduce everything to 'history', and interpret the saving acts of God, including the resurrection, only within the framework of the historical processes of decay and renaissance in the natural order of things.² In view of all this, the teaching of the Old Testament is peculiarly relevant today, not only in cleansing the worship and thought of the people of God from naturalistic ideas, but in laying such strong emphasis upon the transcendence of God, the Creator of heaven and earth, within the world and upon the consummation of his redeeming and renewing purpose for his people within the actuality of their physical and historical existence, for that has the effect of sweeping aside pseudo-concepts of the resurrection or pseudo-substitutes for the resurrection. If people today, including some Old Testament scholars, find so little in the Old Testament relating to the resurrection as it is presented in the New Testament, the reason may simply be that they are operating with a notion of the resurrection already corrupted through alien presuppositions.

1. The Teaching of the Old Testament

It is only by looking back at the teaching of the Old Testament Scriptures from the perspective created by the resurrection of Christ that we are able to discern the positive things they had to contribute to our understanding of the resurrection. They may be set out in the following series.

(a) Quite basic to everything is the conception of the Covenant which embraces the whole of creation but which is peculiarly related to the people of God. God has bound up his people with himself in the same bundle of life, so that his covenant faithfulness undergirds and supports them beyond anything they are capable of in themselves in life or death. The life and existence of Israel, for example, are so tied to the covenant purpose of God in mercy and judgment that they are restored again and again and are given miraculous continuity throughout the changes, chances and disasters of their history.

(b) Hence what is dominant in the Old Testament thought is the stress upon the corporate judgment, vindication and restoration of God's people. Any notion of individual resurrection or survival could only be subordinate to that, and in fact largely disappears behind the corporate picture of God and his covenant community. But here it is apparently the concept of restoration through judgment that is a predominating motif, as we can see in passages such as Hos. 2: 16f.; Jer. 3: 19ff.; 29: 10ff.; 31: 1ff.; Ezek. 37: 1ff. (cf. also Deut. 32: 39; 1 Sam. 2:6; 2 Kings 5: 7).

(c) Along with this corporate restoration there is found the promise of a Saviour who will be raised up out of the people, such as the Prophet whom God will raise up, like Moses, to lead a new Exodus (Deut. 18: 15), or the Shepherd who is to be raised up like David (Ezek. 34: 23ff.; 37: 24f.), or even the Servant of the Lord (Isa. 53: 10–12), upon which Mowinckel has laid such stress.³ This line of thought in the Old Testamen seems to be bound up with the promised Messiah who will spring from the seed of David and from the seed of Abraham, for all through the covenanted relation of Israel to God, there persists an inner organic continuity in the promised seed which cannot be destroyed but which will be raised up like a root out of the dry ground for the salvation of God's people.

(d) We have to add to this the notion of the Goel applied to God in his relations with Israel – i.e. the notion of a Redeemer acting out of a community bond or property tie, out of real or assumed kinship. As the Holy One of Israel God himself stands in as the Advocate who makes Israel's cause his own and redeems Israel out of all its troubles. This applies, apparently, not only to Israel as a whole but to all God's people within the Covenant, as is particularly evident in the Psalms such as 16: 10f.; 49: 16; 73: 26; and 17: 15.⁴ It is in dispute whether these passages have any bearing upon the development of the thought of the resurrection of God's people, but this dubiety may reflect a 'wrong' concept of the resurrection, as well as a failure in understanding 'sheol' (the biblical 'pit' or 'hell', Amos 9: 2; 1 Sam. 2:6; Ps. 139: 8; Job 26: 6 etc.) as the Hellenic 'hades' rather than as the state of existence after death, characterized by the suspension of God's final judgment. Then we have to note the remarkable passage in Job 19: 25, where the received text is certainly corrupt, but which nevertheless appears to contain powerfully the idea that God remains the Goel even in death to those who trust him. On the other hand Job 14: 10–12, 14 appears to reject the notion of a resurrection.

(e) In later strata of the Old Testament the conception of a resurrection of the righteous, and even of the unrighteous, appears to emerge, a resurrection to judgment as well as to life, Isa. 25: 8; 26: 19, 21, Dan. 12: if., 13. But it is with the Apocryphal literature, such as 2nd Esdras, 2nd Maccabees, the Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch, 1st Enoch, etc., that the apocalyptic aspect of resurrection begins to rise clearly. It is to this that the Epistle to the Hebrews appears to refer in its reference to 'the better hope' (Heb. 7: 19).

(f) In spite of all this it is a fact, as Jeremias has pointed out, that 'Judasim did not know of any anticipated resurrection as an event in history. There is nothing comparable to the resurrection of Jesus anywhere in Jewish literature'.⁵ It should not surprise us, therefore, that here not least, while the New Testament message is presented in deep continuity with that of the Old Testament, that can be done only with a profound revolution in the tradition of Judaism in which basic categories of thought have to be creatively reconstructed.

2. The Teaching of the New Testament

In the New Testament the resurrection is altogether a dominant concept. Basically it is the resurrection of the Shepherd Son of David and therefore of his people for whom he stands in as Redeemer and Advocate (Acts 13: 22f.; Rom. 15: 12). Here resurrection is not associated with the cyclic processes of becoming, but is the mighty act of God within our humanity and its sin, corruption and death, shattering the powers of evil in an utterly decisive way. It is the work of the Creator, now himself incarnate and at work in the midst of the fallen creation and its estangement from God the Father. The resurrection takes place in space and time, in physical and historical existence; yet the teaching of the New Testament indicates that it is 'not merely a great event upon the plane of history, but an act that breaks into history with the powers of another world. It is akin to the creation in the beginning; and the Gospel is the good news that God is creating a new world'.⁶ It is a creative event within the creation, an abruptly divine act within history, a decisive deed completely setting at nought all cyclic processes, putting an end to the futility to which they are shut up but opening and straightening them out in a movement toward consummation. Such a resurrection of the incarnate Word of God within the creation of time and space which came into being through him is inevitably an event of cosmic and unbelievable magnitude. So far as the temporal dimension of creation is concerned, it means that the transformation of all things at the end of time is already impinging upon history, and indeed that the consummation of history has already been inaugurated. And so far as the spatial dimension of creation is concerned, it means that the new creation has already set in, so that all things visible and invisible are even now in the grip of the final recreation of the universe. The resurrection of Jesus heralds an entirely new age in which a universal resurrection or transformation of heaven and earth will take place, or rather has already begun to take place, for with the resurrection of Jesus that new world has already broken into the midst of the old.

The fact of the resurrection altered the whole situation so drastically that quite new modes of thought and speech had to arise to cope with it, so that it is especially important to examine the language which the New Testament employs in order to speak of the resurrection, if we are to go on to interpret it in an appropriate way. Here we have the familiar problems with which scholars have to wrestle: while the forms of thought in the New Testament derive largely from the Hebraic world, the forms of speech derive largely from the Hellenic world, although as in the Septuagint translation of the Old Testament so here in the expression of the Gospel message in Greek, the Hebraic and Hellenic forms of thought and speech are well-nigh inextricably intermingled. But what is of decisive importance is the intrinsic significance of the resurrection, for it is the reality of the risen Lord that really gives the forms of thought and speech their significant shape, so that we must keep in mind the two-way relationship, the impact of the reality of the resurrection upon the language, and the bearing of the language and its use in the biblical witness upon that reality.

Two main terms are employed by the New Testament writers to speak of the resurrection, built up from the verbs anistēmi and egeiro (frequently compounded with the prefix ex). Both words mean to lift or raise up, which is the common meaning they have in profane Greek. Anistēmi is generally used of lifting up from a seat, or rousing from sleep, but also of waking from the dead or coming to life again. Egeiro is not used in profane Greek of raising from the dead or of raising the sick, as in the New Testament. Hence this use of egeiro is peculiar to the New Testament which would appear, in fact, to prefer egeiro to anistēmi, and then in the passive rather than in the active sense (although it does not exclude the latter).⁷ This preference for egeiro appears to lay the major stress on the mighty act of God in raising Jesus from the dead. The resurrection is a supernatural or miraculous event, quite inexplicable from the side of human agency or natural process. It is comparable only to the act of God in the creation itself or in the incarnation. The use of egeiro in the New Testament to speak of the raising up of the sick is an indication that the miraculous acts of healing are regarded as falling within the orbit of the resurrection, and as belonging to the creative and recreative activity of God in incarnation and resurrection. In these miracles the resurrection is already evidencing itself beforehand in signs and wonders.

Egeiro and anistēmi are also used in the New Testament in the middle voice, particularly anistēmi, that is, of Christ rising from the dead. Here the emphasis is upon his own victorious activity, his standing up out of the dead, his rising above corruption and mortality, all seen within the orbit of his own sinless life and the regenerating effect of his holiness upon other human life.

It is especially important, however, to consider the way in which these terms are used in the New Testament, within the context of the relation between the Old Testament and the New Testament revelation, for it is this that gives peculiar specification to their meaning. Certain Old Testament nuances are allowed to shine through the New Testament message in a very enlightening manner.

(a) We note first the Old Testament custom of speaking of the raising up of a prophet, or a king, or judge, or priest, where the ideas of provision and appointment are blended together. The New Testament uses both egeiro and anistēmi in this connection. Thus when the New Testament speaks of Jesus being raised up, it evidently refers not only to the resurrection of his body from the grave but to his being raised up as the appointed Messiah, the anointed Prophet, Priest and King. The resurrection implies the installation or enthronement of ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Other Titles in the Cornerstones Series
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Preface to the New Edition
• Introduction to the Cornerstones Edition
• Introduction
• 1. The Biblical Concept of the Resurrection
• 2. The Resurrection and the Person of Christ
• 3. The Resurrection and the Atoning Work of Christ
• 4. The Nature of the Resurrection Event
• 5. The Ascension of Christ
• 6. The Nature of the Ascension Event
• 7. The Ascension and the Parousia of Christ
• 8. The Lord of Space and Time
• Index of Names
• eCopyright