President Schurman believes the resurrection of Christ to be “an obsolete picture of an eternal truth—the fact of a continued life with God.” Harnack, Wesen des Christenthums, 102, thinks no consistent union of the gospel accounts of Christ's resurrection can be attained; apparently doubts a literal and bodily rising; yet traces Christianity back to an invincible faith in Christ's conquering of death and his continued life. But why believe the gospels when they speak of the sympathy of Christ, yet disbelieve them when they speak of his miraculous power? We have no right to trust the narrative when it gives us Christ's words “Weep not” to the widow of Nain, (Luke 7:13), and then to distrust it when it tells us of his raising the widow's son. The words “Jesus wept”belong inseparably to a story of which “Lazarus, come forth!” forms a part (John 11:35, 43). It is improbable that the disciples should have believed so stupendous a miracle as Christ's resurrection, if they had not previously seen other manifestations of miraculous power on the part of Christ. Christ himself is the great miracle. The conception of him as the risen and glorified Savior can be explained only by the fact that he did so rise. E. G. Robinson, Christ. Theology, 109—“The Church attests the fact of the resurrection quite as much as the resurrection attests the divine origin of the church. Resurrection, as an evidence, depends on the existence of the church which proclaims it.”
(e) The resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ—by which we mean his coming forth from the sepulchre in body as well as in spirit—is demonstrated by evidence as varied and as conclusive as that which proves to us any single fact of ancient history. Without it Christianity itself is inexplicable, as is shown by the failure of all modern rationalistic theories to account for its rise and progress.
In discussing the evidence of Jesus' resurrection, we are confronted with three main rationalistic theories:
I. The Swoon-theory of Strauss. This holds that Jesus did not really die. The cold and the spices of the sepulchre revived him. We reply that the blood and water, and the testimony of the centurion (Mark 15:45), proved actual death (see Bib. Sac., April, 1889:228; Forrest, Christ of History and Experience, 137–170). The rolling away of the stone, and Jesus' power immediately after, are inconsistent with immediately preceding swoon and suspended animation. How was his life preserved? where did he go? when did he die? His not dying implies deceit on his own part or on that of his disciples.
II. The Spirit-theory of Keim. Jesus really died, but only his spirit appeared. The spirit of Jesus gave the disciples a sign of his continued life, a telegram from heaven. But we reply that the telegram was untrue, for it asserted that his body had risen from the tomb. The tomb was empty and the linen cloths showed an orderly departure. Jesus himself denied that he was a bodiless spirit: “a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me having” (Luke 24:39). Did “his flesh see corruption” (Acts 2:31)? Was the penitent thief raised from the dead as much as he? Godet, Lectures in Defence of the Christian Faith, lect. i: A dilemma for those who deny the fact of Christ's resurrection: Either his body remained in the hands of his disciples, or it was given up to the Jews. If the disciples retained it, they were impostors: but this is not maintained by modern rationalists. If the Jews retained it, why did they not produce it as conclusive evidence against the disciples?
III. The Vision-theory of Renan. Jesus died, and there was no objective appearance even of his spirit. Mary Magdalene was the victim of subjective hallucination, and her hallucination became contagious. This was natural because the Jews expected that the Messiah would work miracles and would rise from the dead. We reply that the disciples did not expect Jesus' resurrection. The women went to the sepulchre, not to see a risen Redeemer, but to embalm a dead body. Thomas and those at Emmaus had given up all hope. Four hundred years had passed since the days of miracles; John the Baptist “did no miracle” (John 10:41); the Sadducees said “there is no resurrection”(Mat. 22:23). There were thirteen different appearances, to: 1. the Magdalen; 2. other women; 3. Peter; 4. Emmaus; 5. the Twelve; 6. the Twelve after eight days; 7. Galilee seashore; 8. Galilee mountain; 9. Galilee five hundred; 10. James; 11. ascension at Bethany; 12. Stephen; 13. Paul on way to Damascus. Paul describes Christ's appearance to him as something objective, and he implies that Christ's previous appearances to others were objective also: “last of all [these bodily appearances], … he appeared to me also”(1 Cor. 15:8). Bruce, Apologetics, 396—“Paul's interest and intention in classing the two together was to level his own vision [of Christ] up to the objectivity of the early Christophanies. He believed that the eleven, that Peter in particular, had seen the risen Christ with the eye of the body, and he meant to claim for himself a vision of the same kind.”Paul's was a sane, strong nature. Subjective visions do not transform human lives; the resurrection moulded the apostles; they did not create the resurrection (see Gore, Incarnation, 76). These appearances soon ceased, unlike the law of hallucinations, which increase in frequency and intensity. It is impossible to explain the ordinances, the Lord's day, or Christianity itself, if Jesus did not rise from the dead.
The resurrection of our Lord teaches three important lessons: (1) It showed that his work of atonement was completed and was stamped with the divine approval; (2) It showed him to be Lord of all and gave the one sufficient external proof of Christianity; (3) It furnished the ground and pledge of our own resurrection, and thus “brought life and immortality to light” (2 Tim. 1:10). It must be remembered that the resurrection was the one sign upon which Jesus himself staked his claims—“the sign of Jonah” (Luke 11:29); and that the resurrection is proof, not simply of God's power, but of Christ's own power: John 10:18—“I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again”; 2:19—“Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up”. … 21—“he spake of the temple of his body.” See Alexander, Christ and Christianity, 9, 158–224, 302; Mill, Theism, 216; Auberlen, Div. Revelation, 56; Boston Lectures, 203–239; Christlieb, Modern Doubt and Christian Belief, 448–503; Row, Bampton Lectures, 1887:358–423; Hutton, Essays, 1:119; Schaff, in Princeton Rev., May, 1880; 411–419; Fisher, Christian Evidences, 41–46, 82–85; West, in Defence and Conf. of Faith, 80–129; also special works on the Resurrection of our Lord, by Milligan, Morrison, Kennedy, J. Baldwin Brown.
6. Counterfeit Miracles.
Since only an act directly wrought by God can properly be called a miracle, it follows that surprising events brought about by evil spirits or by men, through the use of natural agencies beyond our knowledge, are not entitled to this appellation. The Scriptures recognize the existence of such, but denominate them “lying wonders” (2 Thess. 2:9).
These counterfeit miracles in various ages argue that the belief in miracles is natural to the race, and that somewhere there must exist the true. They serve to show that not all supernatural occurrences are divine, and to impress upon us the necessity of careful examination before we accept them as divine.
False miracles may commonly be distinguished from the true by (a) their accompaniments of immoral conduct or of doctrine contradictory to truth already revealed—as in modern spiritualism; (b) their internal characteristics of inanity and extravagance—as in the liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius, or the miracles of the Apocryphal New Testament; (c) the insufficiency of the object which they are designed to further—as in the case of Apollonius of Tyana, or of the miracles said to accompany the publication of the doctrines of the immaculate conception and of the papal infallibility; (d) their lack of substantiating evidence—as in mediæval miracles, so seldom attested by contemporary and disinterested witnesses; (e) their denial or undervaluing of God's previous revelation of himself in nature—as shown by the neglect of ordinary means, in the cases of Faith-cure and of so-called Christian Science.
Only what is valuable is counterfeited. False miracles presuppose the true. Fisher, Nature and Method of Revelation, 283—“The miracles