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St. Paul saw resurrection as a metaphor
Some of this column's most avid readers seem to have a limited view of who or what constitutes "a real Christian." Consequently, they write caustically stating why they believe I belong "outside the camp."
Fortunately, few things could matter less as long as these exclusivists keep reading and thinking. But, sometimes there's an irony. This is the case when, as often happens lately, they write saying that I cannot be a genuine Christian unless I believe literally among other things that Jesus was raised "physically" from the dead. In other words, unless you commit to the "physical resurrection" of a historical Jesus, you are beyond the pale of Christianity.
This judgment puts so many of us in such early and renowned Christian company that of those who had minds well beyond the learning or brilliance theologians today would dare to claim. Take, for example, St. Clement of Alexandria (150-215 C.E.) and his mightier pupil, Origen (185-254). Both took the allegorical/spiritual approach to scripture and would have been really shocked to see the way today's "Christianism" so often distorts the original spiritual reality.
Interestingly, however, there is another being tried with us on this issue, one weightier still than any church father or other biblical exegete. I refer to that great "lion" of the faith, St. Paul himself.
Paul couldn't be clearer, in his oft-quoted peroration in 1 Corinthians 15 on the resurrection of the dead, that Jesus' resurrection and hence our own one day was categorically and supremely a spiritual "event." He's so insistent on this, goes to such great lengths to expatiate upon it, and thunders it home with such eloquence that it's truly astounding how would-be Bible champions can read it and not comprehend its meaning. The entire passage is pure Platonism throughout.
Don't take my word alone. Let's look at it. As the chapter opens, Paul quotes the tradition handed on to him how various people "saw" the risen Lord and says that lastly the Christ was seen by him "as of one born out of due time" (a reference to his later, unusual Damascus road experience). Significantly, the Greek verb he uses to describe his own "seeing," opthe, is the one he uses to describe the sightings by the others. But, it's a technical term, widely used in the popular Mystery Religions of the day, to denote a paranormal, psychic vision. Paul is decidedly not talking here about ordinary physical sight at all.
Move on then to verse 35 and following where he actually discusses and answers the legitimate, pressing question: "How are the dead raised up?" His argument is a little tortured, but if you stick with it he makes the same point repeatedly: What goes into the ground at death is definitely not what moves on to the dimension of eternal life or the life of "the age to come." What goes into the grave is corporeal, physical, eminently corruptible. What comes out is immortal, spiritual through and through. As the old Egyptians said: The body to earth; the soul to heaven.
Paul uses the old metaphor of sowing a seed. Those who have planted seed potatoes and then encountered the rotting remains afterwards while harvesting new potatoes can identify with his point. You don't "sow" that which comes up. "God giveth it a (new) body."
Paul says plainly that this describes the resurrection of the dead, Jesus' and ours, for they are identical: "It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption. It is sown a natural, (or physical), body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body ... and as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly."
In case this is not completely transparent, he then lays it down as emphatically as possible: "Now this I say ... flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption ... we shall all be changed!"
Our decay-prone bodies "this corruptible" shall put on "incorruption," and that which is so clearly mortal "will put on" immortality. This leads him to that classic cry so often repeated at funerals: "Death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"
Paul, whose genuine epistles date much earlier than the Gospels, never mentions an empty tomb. Why not? He knew nothing of it. For him, the resurrection was an entirely spiritual matter. He knew nothing of the later resurrection stories in the Gospels about Jesus eating fish or walking about talking to fishermen. All of that was added as the demand for a more literalistic, made-for-the-lowest-common-denominator version imposed itself upon the original story.
St. Paul saw resurrection as a metaphor
Some of this column's most avid readers seem to have a limited view of who or what constitutes "a real Christian." Consequently, they write caustically stating why they believe I belong "outside the camp."
Fortunately, few things could matter less as long as these exclusivists keep reading and thinking. But, sometimes there's an irony. This is the case when, as often happens lately, they write saying that I cannot be a genuine Christian unless I believe literally among other things that Jesus was raised "physically" from the dead. In other words, unless you commit to the "physical resurrection" of a historical Jesus, you are beyond the pale of Christianity.
This judgment puts so many of us in such early and renowned Christian company that of those who had minds well beyond the learning or brilliance theologians today would dare to claim. Take, for example, St. Clement of Alexandria (150-215 C.E.) and his mightier pupil, Origen (185-254). Both took the allegorical/spiritual approach to scripture and would have been really shocked to see the way today's "Christianism" so often distorts the original spiritual reality.
Interestingly, however, there is another being tried with us on this issue, one weightier still than any church father or other biblical exegete. I refer to that great "lion" of the faith, St. Paul himself.
Paul couldn't be clearer, in his oft-quoted peroration in 1 Corinthians 15 on the resurrection of the dead, that Jesus' resurrection and hence our own one day was categorically and supremely a spiritual "event." He's so insistent on this, goes to such great lengths to expatiate upon it, and thunders it home with such eloquence that it's truly astounding how would-be Bible champions can read it and not comprehend its meaning. The entire passage is pure Platonism throughout.
Don't take my word alone. Let's look at it. As the chapter opens, Paul quotes the tradition handed on to him how various people "saw" the risen Lord and says that lastly the Christ was seen by him "as of one born out of due time" (a reference to his later, unusual Damascus road experience). Significantly, the Greek verb he uses to describe his own "seeing," opthe, is the one he uses to describe the sightings by the others. But, it's a technical term, widely used in the popular Mystery Religions of the day, to denote a paranormal, psychic vision. Paul is decidedly not talking here about ordinary physical sight at all.
Move on then to verse 35 and following where he actually discusses and answers the legitimate, pressing question: "How are the dead raised up?" His argument is a little tortured, but if you stick with it he makes the same point repeatedly: What goes into the ground at death is definitely not what moves on to the dimension of eternal life or the life of "the age to come." What goes into the grave is corporeal, physical, eminently corruptible. What comes out is immortal, spiritual through and through. As the old Egyptians said: The body to earth; the soul to heaven.
Paul uses the old metaphor of sowing a seed. Those who have planted seed potatoes and then encountered the rotting remains afterwards while harvesting new potatoes can identify with his point. You don't "sow" that which comes up. "God giveth it a (new) body."
Paul says plainly that this describes the resurrection of the dead, Jesus' and ours, for they are identical: "It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption. It is sown a natural, (or physical), body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body ... and as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly."
In case this is not completely transparent, he then lays it down as emphatically as possible: "Now this I say ... flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption ... we shall all be changed!"
Our decay-prone bodies "this corruptible" shall put on "incorruption," and that which is so clearly mortal "will put on" immortality. This leads him to that classic cry so often repeated at funerals: "Death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"
Paul, whose genuine epistles date much earlier than the Gospels, never mentions an empty tomb. Why not? He knew nothing of it. For him, the resurrection was an entirely spiritual matter. He knew nothing of the later resurrection stories in the Gospels about Jesus eating fish or walking about talking to fishermen. All of that was added as the demand for a more literalistic, made-for-the-lowest-common-denominator version imposed itself upon the original story.
