THE PERCEIVED NEED FOR A
RESURRECTION IN CHRISTIANITY
So what really
happened at the resurrection? Did Jesus rise from death on the cross and thus, according to orthodox theology,
conquer evil once and for all time, or did he survive the event and disappear to the South of France with Mary
Magdalene? Nobody knows with certainty. The accounts in the gospels and the Acts of Apostles are confusing and
contradictory.
Why is it necessary to believe in any form of resurrection? Current Christian doctrine
centres on a unique claim among all world religions, that conquest of death and sin on earth can be obtained only
through Jesus dying on the cross to pay for the sins of the whole world, his subsequent and demonstrable rising as
evidence that payment had been accepted. It has become, for better or for worse, the corner stone of the Christian
religion around which everything is made to fit. Not only does this doctrine of exclusivity create uneasy relations
with other world religions. It also seems to force Christianity into the extreme accepting only a bodily
resurrection as proof positive whatever the evidence. With this doctrine, as we shall see, it would appear that
theory is dominant; facts are subsidiary and subservient. Ultimately we are faced with the question of accepting
this doctrine as a matter of faith without the proper consideration of any historic evidence which might indicate an
alternative solution.
Without the resurrection our faith would be in vain, a pointless religion. So
ventured St. Paul. So maintains a former Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, who further narrows the options by
insisting on a physical resurrection of Jesus for the Christian religion to have any meaning. It is an issue,
therefore, of great importance but one which poses fundamental problems, not least because these two prominent
churchmen, despite their apparent agreement that Jesus did rise again, nevertheless put forward contradictory views
on the nature of this resurrection. St. Paul would not have agreed with the Archbishop’s insistence on a physical
manifestation because he held that authority for his own ministry and doctrine came from a vision of the risen
Jesus, not a physical appearance.
THE
RESURRECTION FROM PAUL'S POINT OF VIEW, A SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE
Herein lies the core problem. Was the resurrection of
Jesus a physical or visionary manifestation? Paul is the key. It needs to be understood that claims to Apostleship
(and therefore leadership in the emerging Church) were based on 'having seen the risen Jesus'. This is an
impossibility for Paul whose writings contain no reference to having met or heard Jesus, and who also, in his early
life, considered Jesus a Jewish heretic, and Paul devoted his time to persecuting Jesus' followers. Nevertheless his
journey to Damascus produced a visionary content which altered the rest of his life and led him to be accepted by
all the immediate followers of Jesus in Jerusalem, the Apostles, to be one of them.
From Paul’s first
letter to the Corinthians there is very clear evidence of a spiritual and not a physical resurrection. In chapter 15
we read: "For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins
in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with
the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then of the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred
brethren, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all
the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me."
Paul, a few
verses later on, continues: "But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised;
if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain?".
Such
a bold uncompromising (and greatly misunderstood) statement has been the foundation of that exclusive fundamentalism
which now affects Christianity world-wide in the conflict which besets both its own division into denominations and
its relations with other religions.
To repeat Paul's viewpoint. He was writing years after the supposed
ascension of Jesus yet still maintains that Jesus appeared to him in the same way that he appeared to his disciples.
This was not disputed by the Apostles. Maybe the reason is that theirs too was a spiritual experience. In support of
this one needs to understand two concepts. First, orthodox Judaism as practised by the priestly caste, the
Sadducees, considered that Genesis taught that this life was all we had. 'Dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou
return'. Thus any vision of a dead person was proof positive that death was not the end. It had indeed been
overcome, but it was never spiritual - it was existence on another plane. Secondly we need to consider the spiritual
state of Paul and the Apostles. Paul had undergone a traumatic experience. The Apostles had undergone intensive
training in the art of healing and teaching. Anyone who has met healers or those who practise deep forms of
meditation will know of such powerful visionary experiences as experienced by Paul on the way to Damascus, or the
Apostles in the upper room when Jesus appeared to them.
We are left to speculate what damage the western
mind, with its obsession for demonstrable, tangible, physical evidence of belief has done to the real events
surrounding the death of Jesus. We have to accept that there was a spiritual transformation of Jesus’ followers at
that time else they would not have been prepared to suffer persecution and death for their belief or have created
Sunday (the day of resurrection) as their holy day rather than the Jewish sabbath which Jesus followed. We know that
the early church itself was split over whether there was a physical or spiritual resurrection. Paul himself had a
spiritual, visionary appearance and most gnostics also firmly believed in a spiritual resurrection.
CHURCH HISTORY DEMANDS A PHYSICAL
RESURRECTION
But the gnostics eventually lost
out to the bishops and their ‘orthodox’ belief in a physical resurrection, and above all to their innate desire to
control the spiritual destiny of others. This occurred at the Council of Nicea in CE 321 with the formation of the
Nicene Creed, the required test of orthodoxy. It was probable that the Emperor Constantine played a part in this.
When the bishops could not agree on the exact nature of Jesus it was Constantine's own secretary, a Greek, who
suggested 'omoousios', or 'of the same substance' (as God). Besides which Constantine required a religion which
firmly placed its founder back up in heaven so that he ruled on earth by Divine Right.
So how to explain
it. Does it really matter whether the resurrection of Jesus was spiritual rather than physical? I think it
does.
No one is doubting the great importance of the death and resurrection in the context of the life of
Jesus. It is, however, a set of culminating events which can be understood only by an appreciation and, indeed,
experience of his ministry of healing and teaching. One does not come to a "liberated" belief in
Christianity through the death and resurrection of Jesus. (By liberated I mean a profound belief in Christianity yet
one which accepts the spiritual paths of others). Only when one understands the nature of Jesus in terms of his
desire to fulfil God's will for him to lead others into a spiritual union with God and a demonstrable love and
compassion for all humanity and then responds to it, only then can one appreciate the awful pattern of events which
led to his execution, a true self-sacrifice for the Divine's ideal of unconditional Love. To come to Christianity
purely by way of baptism and the death and resurrection (often expressed by such terms as "believe on the Lord
Jesus and be saved", or "Jesus died for your sins") carries with it the probability of an emotive
rather than a spiritual response and leads to the dreaded concepts of "fundamentalism", or exclusivity of
faith.
Instead one needs "metanoia", or change of view/lifestyle first to occur. This
transformation needs to be deep. Jesus' commandment was to love God first and then one's fellow human being, i.e.
the transformation is primarily on a spiritual rather than an emotional or intellectual plane. Further this
commandment enjoys universal appeal to all of whatever creed or culture,
RESURRECTION
IN 21ST CENTURY CONSCIOUSNESS
With this in
mind a spiritual resurrection keeps the Christian religion where it belongs, in the development of the mind, a sign
of the evolution of one’s own spiritual growth, a growth in inner knowledge that the spirituality as expressed by
the Christian religion works. It is something to be striven for, demanding time and effort, prayer, meditation and
putting into practice the teaching of Jesus to love God and all humanity of whatever condition. We may not have a
direct vision of Jesus (we are too far removed from direct contact with and knowledge of Him), but, through
developing our spiritual lives, we can experience the effect of His teaching and reach an understanding of His at
oneness with God, the harmony of the universe and love of our fellow human which was the central message of His
ministry. The disciples, even Paul, understood but had to work at this.
This is the religion which has
inspired monasticism, musicians, sculptors, architects, painters and enlightened missionaries and third world
agencies throughout the ages.
Evolutionary consciousness is the last piece in the jigsaw to understanding
the resurrection. Without it Christianity is a beautiful if tragic historical narrative of the first century CE, a
religion to be smiled at, accepted as providing a useful moral code and followed by a few devotees. Its integral
belief in a physical resurrection keeps Christianity rooted in historical and earthly dispute, always looking
backwards, never evolutionary, always quoting ‘faith’ (meaning blind acceptance) as the solution to the problem of
the empty tomb. With evolutionary consciousness Christianity becomes both a vibrant twenty first century philosophy
and an intensely practical religion, one to be desired and sought after as providing a personal solution to the
chaotic style of twentieth century living, to life now and in the hereafter, one to be striven for. It frees us from
history by allowing us to build on history, the history of a unique person called Jesus who possessed such insight
and imparted it to others.
Written in Limerick, Ireland in 2003