Resurrection: the vindication of the Christ

There is evidence that the period between Paul's writing (46-56CE) and the writing of the gospel according to John (90-110CE) saw developments in New Testament narratives in the service of the theology of the early Church. For example, Paul's letters do not refer to Mary or Joseph as the parents of Jesus but only that he was "born of a woman." He does not mention the miracles of Jesus that are so conspicuous in the synoptic gospels. He speaks about resurrection without details about the risen one, but in terms of "appearances" and he evidently did not know of the tradition of the empty tomb.

The gospel according to Mark (70CE), the earliest of the gospels, is curious for its ending that does not include appearances of the risen one. So curious, in fact that a hand other than Mark felt the need to add an ending (16:9-19) that shared with the other gospels accounts of the risen Jesus as well as an account of the ascension that only appears in Luke. Such an attempt to produce an ending that conformed to the other synoptic gospels bears witness to the fluidity and indeed vulnerability of biblical texts and lends support to the idea that each gospel writer added his own inventions for theological and contextual reasons. Hence, the bible is both a gift from God and the work of men.

Some of the differences between the gospels are due to them each addressing their particular community i.e. they were contextual. The writers did not think it strange to alter parts of the traditions they received to fit with the particular culture in which they found themselves. A similar process is active today. Our scientific culture has thrown doubt on the miraculous, and biblical scholars and theologians look for, and find, alternative and more theologically interesting readings.

The narrative development we find in the gospels take the form of legend that served a theological purpose. The most obvious is that concerning the infancy of Jesus. There is no mention of this either in Paul or Mark, a flourishing in Luke and Matthew that are quite different from each other, and again, none in John. We may conclude that the virgin birth, so central to Christian theology, is a legend that arose as an attempt to underline the divine origin of Jesus i.e. he had no earthly father.

Christian theology finds its sources in historical events and in the legends that Israel and later, the Church, spun as a way of speaking about God. Some legends had no historical basis, as in the creation stories, others, like the exodus of Israel from Egypt probably had an historical reference that was overlade with legendary material. It is unlikely that the infancy narratives of Jesus, the virgin birth, the resurrection, the empty tomb and the ascension as well as the events at Pentecost related by Luke have an historical basis. This does not mean that they are untrue and hence the stuff of fairy tales. Rather, they are essential stories that outline the character of God and are taken seriously in the writing of theology.

In my last essay I wrote about the resurrection being an expression of the continual presence of Christ to His Church. As Mark expresses it after Jesus was raised:

"But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you." So they went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid." (Mark 16:7,8)

The legend of resurrection is multi-vocal. While indicating the continuing presence of Christ as the risen and crucified one and the soul of the Church, it also speaks about the vindication of the rejected and abandoned Word of God. This theme began in Luke with the holy family finding no room in Bethlehem, in Matthew in the flight into Egypt and appears in the prologue of John where we are told:

"He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him." (John 1:10,11)

The theme of rejection is fulfilled on the cross. He was betrayed not by a distant enemy but by one close to him, Judas, who was one of the twelve and who conspired with the priests of the temple. The civil authorities abandoned him and relegated their duty to see that justice was served. And, heartbreakingly, the disciples fled to their homes leaving only Mary and some other women. History? Legend? Who knows? Whatever, the point is made, this Jesus is brother to all who die abandoned and alone.

It is this reality that prompts Peter to speak after Pentecost:

"You that are Israelites, listen to what I have to say: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with deeds of power, wonders, and signs that God did through him among you, as you yourselves know- this man, handed over to you according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of those outside the law. But God raised him up, having freed him from death,because it was impossible for him to be held in its power. (Acts. 2:22-24)

Humanity, in killing Jesus, killed the one who bore the image of God. How could this be atoned? Who can wipe out the horizon? Surely this guilt will remain with us forever! In this act of murder we are all guilty, if not individually but as universally human. There can now be no doubt about our sin, found not in some far dystopian communist or fascist country but right here at home among the people of God, Israel, and by association the Church. Is not the discovery of sexual abuse, committed by the ordained, yet another confirmation? It is clear now, after the murder of Jesus, that we do not see our own sin but that it must be revealed to us by God. To become Christian is to become a self-conscious sinner. The crucifixion is that revelation.

The current ideology, that Christianity may be summed up in the imperative to love, masks the darker imperative for the self to be broken on the cross, to be baptised into the death of Christ and hence to share in his resurrection. The cross unmasks our humanism that tells us that we are OK. To once again quote Dietrich Bonhoeffer; "When Jesus calls a man he bids him come and die." Without this death love is impossible.

If the legend of resurrection had not been written, first by Paul and then by all the evangelists, it may not have occurred to us that we were steeped in sin. After all, Jesus was just another victim of Roman tyranny, there were plenty of those at the time.The one we put to death is vindicated by being raised from the dead. The tables have been turned. We the judges are now the judged and the one we judged is raised in glory to sit at the right hand of God.

Paul continues:

^"Therefore, let the entire house of Israel know with certainty that God has made him both Lord and Messiah, this Jesus whom you crucified." Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and to the other apostles, "Brothers, what should we do?" (Acts 2:37)

This moment of realisation of our true identity, when we are cut to the heart, is bitter sweet. It is bitter because we now know that the game is up; we are not good persons as we have been pretending all our lives. It is sweet because we recognise the truth about ourselves; that the ego will assert its righteousness even in the most blatant wrong-doing and fault. Pretence is over and resurrection life has begun. We imitate the trajectory of Jesus who had to die before He was raised. We have to let go of ourselves. We can no longer be our own project because we now know we are unable.

The answer to the men who asked "Brothers, what shall we do?" is to be baptised, that sacrament in which we all go down into the waters of death only to rise to resurrection life in Christ. This is the centre of Christian faith without which we would be reduced to talking about love being the solution to all things as if that kind of love is in our power. It is no wonder that every Sunday is a celebration of the resurrection.

None of this understanding would come to us if we did not have the legend of resurrection. "Legend" here stands for the interpretation of the crucifixion without which Jesus would be just another dead man. It is the result of theological reflection concerning the puzzling figure that came among us from obscurity to obscurity but nevertheless destroyed our world. We must rid ourselves of the notion that truth only resides in fact; that pernicious conclusion of Enlightenment rationalism, that unless the resurrection can be taken as an historical event of the flesh then the Church must fall.

Timothy sums it all up:"Without any doubt, the mystery of our religion is great: He was revealed in flesh, vindicated in spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among Gentiles, believed in throughout the world, taken up in glory." (1Tim.3:16)