PAUL’S THEOLOGY OF THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST

Paul’s theology of the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ supports the unifying premise of the New Testament canon, namely that these events “fundamentally altered the reality of the cosmos, whether or not human beings actually recognize that such a cataclysmic change has occurred”[1] or not.  The proclamation, “He is not here, for He has risen just as He said,”[2] is the central focus of Gospel and Epistle.  Evidence to support this is obvious from the primary focus of the New Testament texts.  The Gospel accounts present the crucifixion and resurrection as the climactic event in the life of Christ and as the impetus for the birth of the Church.  The Acts of the Apostles or as some refer to it The Acts of the “Holy Spirit,” detail how the assurance provided by the Holy Spirit as to the veracity of the resurrection of Christ emboldened the apostles and disciples to carry the message of Christ resurrected to the “uttermost parts.”  The epistles show much evidence that the resurrection and all its implications was first and foremost on the minds of the authors.  Revelation of course, presents the resurrected Christ as both bridegroom and Lord of Lords and King of Kings, and as such provides the basis for hope and perseverance until the King comes again.

O’Day[3] argues that in spite of the central focus of the New Testament on the resurrection there is a diversity of form and function with one underlying, unifying theme – God is the focus as the one “who gives life to the dead and calls into being that which does not exist.”[4]  This diversity of form and function in turn reveals three themes found within Paul’s Gospel preaching of the resurrection.  Paul’s writing reveals first, that because God’s character is on display through the resurrection, Christians have a sure foundation for faith.  Second, Paul’s Gospel preaching of the resurrection reveals the character of the body of Christ and provides an assurance of hope for the same resurrection.  Third, Paul melds together the first and second functions to define an ethical foundation for the believer and this subsequently becomes the foundation of love within and without the community.

Pauline literature demonstrates the validity of these functions in numerous places. Consider for instance the apostle’s epistle to the Romans.  In 4:16-25 Paul draws attention to the faith of Abraham and the character of God that compelled Abraham to trust Him.  Because Abraham fully believed that God was able to do all that he promised in spite of the deadness of Sarah’s womb, the patriarch pressed on in faith.  It was this faith on the part of the patriarch, faith in the face of the deadness of life in Sarah’s womb that inspired Paul to write that Abraham’s faith was reckoned as righteousness, and not only his but also ours and all who believe in God who raised Jesus.  In presenting Abraham along side of the resurrection Paul deftly demonstrates that his theology sees God as life-giver to the patriarchs, Israel, Christians, and even Jesus Christ.  In this passage Paul clearly demonstrates Jesus as the object of the resurrection and God as the life- giver.  Therefore the Christian faith is grounded in the character of God as life-giver and He rightly receives the praise and glory of His children.

In 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 Paul demonstrates a second function of the Gospel proclamation of resurrection – it shapes the character of God’s people.  The context of life for the Corinthians Paul labors to point out is the death and resurrection of Christ.  Paul states in verses 1-4 that he was faithful to deliver the message of the Gospel – Christ’s death for our sins, His burial, and His resurrection – and it is in those truths that the Corinthian’s faith rested.  Here Paul is forcefully making the point that it is in the resurrection of Christ that Christianity finds identity.  It is the understanding that Christians persevere in this hope with an eye to the future that shapes the believer and gives meaning to living in the present.

In Philippians 2 Paul demonstrates a third characteristic of his theology, namely that the Gospel preaching of the resurrection builds upon God’s character and the hope of the believer to shape individual and community ethics.  After giving a list of exhortations that call all believers’s to demonstrate love, Paul gives the reason – this was the same attitude demonstrated by the incarnated Christ who willingly emptied Himself and suffered humility and death as a demonstration of the love His disciples were to show.  Thus love forms the basis for the new life in Christ and is the change agent of behavior used by the Holy Spirit.  This is the ethics of the resurrection which is in stark contrast to the ethics of the world that Paul characterizes as doing things out of selfish and empty conceit.  This high Christology is in fact antithetical to the prevailing emperor worship cults of the time.

Roetzel believes Paul’s resurrection theology is rooted primarily in his Pharisaism and Jewish apocalypticism.[5]  His argument is sound in that he calls attention to the fact that from the time of the Maccabean revolt and into the first century, a staunch belief in the resurrection was inherent in Jewish apocalypticism.  Likewise, Harrison sees in Paul’s resurrection theology, especially as conveyed to the Thessalonians, a distinct Jewish apocalyptic flavor.[6]  Contrasting Roetzel and Harrison is Bultmann who believed that the Hellenistic church tutored Paul and refined his theology.[7]

The question of the resurrection of Jesus Christ is of supreme importance for Christianity.[8]  It has been rightly stated again and again that Christianity stands or falls on the truth of the resurrection.  Without the resurrection of Christ there is no salvation.  Paul taught that if Jesus Christ was not raised then faith is useless, Christians are still under the bondage of their sins, and the apostles are false witnesses by proclaiming an event that did not happen.  Therefore, the critics who suggest that the resurrection theology of Paul is nothing more than “seed-picking” among the pagan resurrection myths must be answered. 

DID THE PAGAN CONCEPT OF APOTHEOSIS INFLUENCE PAUL?

The issue for a good many critics of Christianity as a whole and of the New Testament specifically rests upon the belief that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is myth built upon the prevailing beliefs of the apotheosis of men of honor and importance.  Liberal scholars are confident in their assertions that Paul transitioned from a purely Jewish theology of a literal, physical, bodily resurrection to a clear Hellenized view influenced largely by Alexandrian Platonism,[9] due no doubt in large part to the teaching of the immortality of the soul.

Did Paul find an ally in the Roman emperor cults and their practice of apotheosis of the emperors in his efforts to deify Jesus Christ?  Are criticisms suggesting that Christianity borrowed pagan myth concerning the deity of Jesus Christ weighty enough to cast doubt upon the testimony of the New Testament concerning Christ as the God-man?  Did Paul’s theology of resurrection undergo development as some have suggested?  These are questions that deserve attention.

Scholarship has demonstrated and acknowledged that the concept of apotheosis, of man becoming divine, has deep roots in Near Eastern cultures long before the Roman conquest of that area.  Drane points out that the Greeks were certainly not the first to hold some type of belief in resurrection of the dead.[10]  The Babylonian Tammuz and Ishtar were mirrored by Osiris and Isis in Egypt and Baal and Anat in Canaan.  It does not follow however that Paul’s thinking on the subject of the resurrection of the dead was borrowed from or influenced by pagan apotheosis.  A doctrine of the resurrection was prevalent within the Talmudic Judaism of Paul’s time.  Indeed, those Jews who denied the resurrection were thought to be excluded from the promise of resurrection.[11]  It is not tenable therefore to assert that Paul had to borrow the concept of resurrection to support his teaching on the subject.

Plevnik insists that Paul’s resurrection theology did not change and did not incorporate outside elements.[12]  He addresses three issues commonly raised by critics from 1 Thessalonians 4 concerning the resurrection.  First, did Paul teach the resurrection of the dead to the Thessalonians during his first encounter with them?  Second, does Paul show a change of perspective concerning the resurrection teaching between 1 Thessalonians and 1 Corinthians?  Finally, what can be learned from the distinctive translation-assumption motif in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18?  Plevnik suggests that indeed the Thessalonians were informed of the “life with Christ” related to the parousia.  Logically, those who had died in Christ would need to be raised again to life if they were to precede those already living when Christ returned.  This emphasis on translation-assumption adequately addresses the issue of the grieving Thessalonians.  Plevnik demonstrates that the cause of grief among the Thessalonians was not due to the lack of previous teaching concerning the resurrection but was due rather to a misunderstanding of their sharing in the parousia through their translation-assumption.  Additionally, the nine “you know” statements in 1 Thessalonians provide strong support to the belief that Paul did in fact teach the believers about many things concerning the resurrection including the parousia of Christ and what it meant for them.[13]

Another difficulty for critics of Christianity that has not been satisfactorily answered to date is this: how can the Roman myth of apotheosis which involves man becoming god be squared with Christianity which involves exactly the opposite, God becoming man?  The difference in these two positions cannot be underestimated or marginalized by those seeking to make a connection between the two.  The incarnational nature of Jesus Christ as the God-man is a very powerful theme within the Christian faith.

Werblowsky makes the same point in reference to the incarnation when he states it is “unheard of and almost outrageous, unprecedented, unrepeated and unrepeatable . . .”[14]  Werblowsky rightly describes the Christian doctrine of the incarnation as the single most important difference between Christianity and pagan myths of apotheosis.  The barrier between God and man was transcended not by man becoming god but by God becoming man.  Again, the importance of this distinction appears lost on critics of Christianity.  It is not convincing to make an appeal to the similarity of the Roman apotheosis myths and the Christian incarnation doctrine on the basis that both deal with the relationship between humanity and divinity.

While it must be admitted that Paul demonstrates a polemical style toward the imperial cult of emperor worship, most notably in 1 Thessalonians, this does not mean that he borrowed ideas and resurrection themes in order to develop his doctrine of the resurrection of Christ.  Speaking out against the authorities of power both politically and spiritually is a feature of many of the New Testament writers.  That some see in Paul’s writings clear references to the “presence of an aggressive imperial eschatology and the widespread circulation of Augustan apotheosis traditions” supports the point being made in this paper, namely that “Paul injected heavily loaded Roman political terms into his presentation of Christ,” and thus “transformed their ideological content to his theological and social advantage, and thereby overturned the absolutist claims of the imperial cult.”[15]  Speaking to the culture using themes and beliefs they regard as true is always an effective method of persuasion when sharing the Gospel.  Appeals to the probability of the gospel writers as well as Paul incorporating Greco-Roman ideas concerning apotheosis on this basis are misplaced and appear to be a priori assumptions.

Some have raised the issue that the manner of Christ’s death provides proof that He was not the Son of God as Christianity claims.  Celsus for example argued that Christ’s agony in the garden conclusively demonstrated His inability to be divine as no God would or could experience pain or find themselves at the mercy of mere mortals.[16]

Other critics have attempted to equate the resurrection of Christ with the Greco-Roman practice of hero cult worship and even hero translation based on the empty tomb.[17]  Supporters of the empty tomb motif have suggested that either a translation is apparent or most likely the empty tomb was a cenotaph, linking it to hero cult worship.[18]  The weakness of such an assertion is obvious in that a cenotaph presumes first of all that someone has died and secondly that there is in fact a body somewhere.  The Greeks and Romans were unaccustomed to leaving fallen comrades on the battlefield.  Burial was seen as proper and respectful and superstition regarded it as absolutely necessary to avoid offending the spirits of deceased mortals as well as the gods.  When expediency called for leaving the dead behind a memorial was established elsewhere in their honor.  Rightly understood this memorial or cenotaph was an empty tomb.  Thus empty tombs do not in themselves support a theory of translation nor were all empty tombs erected for heroes.  Beyond this, translation almost always represented the avoidance of death by the one translated.  Enoch and Elijah come to mind immediately in the Judeo-Christian tradition while in the Greco-Roman mythologies Ganymede, Herakles, Empedocles, Romulus, Semiramis, Aristeas, Euthymos, and Appollonius all escaped death by being translated and in this act were not immortalized as heroes but instead were thought to have become gods and thus undergone the process of apotheosis.[19]  Given the veneration of relics and especially bones and other artifacts connected to heroes and the cult of hero-worship prevalent in the time of Christ, it is easy to imagine the early church worshipping at the tomb of Christ if they believed that it contained His body.[20]  That they did not is strong evidence they understood the tomb was empty because He had risen.[21]

The Apostle Paul’s presentation of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead is on solid ground.  Bibliographically, internally, and externally the evidence is strong in support of Paul’s teaching as having been informed by Judaism while at the same time decidedly and distinctively what came to be defined as Christian.    Habermas supports this contention and provides a list of eleven historical facts concerning the resurrection that is agreed upon by all scholars regardless of their stance concerning Christianity.[22]  Among the generally accepted historically verifiable facts of note are: that Jesus Christ actually died due to crucifixion, that He was buried afterwards, that His death caused the disciples to experience great despair, that the disciples experienced renewed hope and joy as they witnessed what they believed to be the risen Jesus, that these experiences with the risen Jesus turned the disciples from timid to bold proclaimers of the resurrection, that this message of the resurrection of Jesus was proclaimed openly in the city of Jerusalem, and as a result of this bold preaching the church was born.

In a more recent essay, Habermas refines the discussion even further and insists that the historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus Christ cannot be disputed by scholars.  He lists two undisputable facts concerning the resurrection that lie within the historical-natural realm.  The first is that Jesus Christ was crucified and died as a result.  The second is that after He was buried in a tomb His disciples believed that he appeared to them on multiple occasions and that these appearances changed their lives forever.  By arguing these two points alone it is possible to shift the discussion concerning the resurrection to the “home turf” of critics by eliminating the metaphysical and philosophical realms, as they are not entertained.  Debating the supernatural or metaphysical implications of the resurrection on philosophical terms is outside the realm of historical review.  This perspective recognizes a very important distinction between the task of the historian and historical investigation on the one hand and the individual philosophical and/or theological perspectives one might bring to the discussion on the other.  History rightly concerns itself with time and space events.  Arguing the historicity of an event from a metaphysical viewpoint is confusing separate issues.  Thus, “whether this event (the resurrection) was a miracle or whether God raised Jesus from the dead are distinct philosophical questions and must be treated differently from historical questions.”[23]

Of course this is exactly where the Greco-Roman apotheosis mythological argument breaks down – when attempting to make a connection to Pauline teaching concerning the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Apotheosis depended entirely on the involvement of the gods and operated in the metaphysical and philosophical realms.  Translation of the emperors and heroes occurred without observation or witness and therefore could only be credited to the work of the gods.  There is no historical evidence of post-death appearances of the emperors.  While apotheosis was claimed for many there is no natural, historical, physical evidence to support those claims.  Additionally, locating the bodies of the emperors would have been easy enough.  Shrines, monuments, and mausoleums dotted the landscape of Rome for centuries.  But those marbled edifices to the reign of the emperors held them bound forever, in spite of the public declaration of their rise to divus.

In conclusion at least two points emerge from this analysis.  First, the fact that Paul critiques the emperor worship cults in sometimes pointed and other times veiled language in many of his letters does not mean he adapted their mythology to develop his resurrection teaching.  Second and perhaps more powerful, is the observation that Paul’s well defined Christology demonstrates a clear dichotomy of source, thought, and intent.  Pauline literature when it does touch on emperor worship proclaims Jesus Christ as Lord and Caesar as a pretender.  It is appropriate to remind readers of Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 15:12-19:

“Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?  But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain.  Moreover we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised.  For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.”

The necessity of this reminder is centered on the fact that the teaching of the resurrection of Jesus Christ is central to the Gospel proclamation.  It is not irrelevant to personal and individual faith as some would state.[24]  The resurrection of Jesus Christ is what makes personal faith possible and true.  In Pinnock’s words the resurrection event is based on historical verifiable fact and therefore, “Faith does not claw the air.  It lays hold upon saving verities planted in the fabric of history.”[25]  Paul certainly understood that truth and this in large part may have been responsible for his unflinching consistency concerning the historicity of his resurrection teaching and his refusal to adopt pagan mythologies into his proclamation.