April 2008

Dear Co-laborers with Christ,

There is an old story that says that the British playwright, critic, and avowed skeptic, George Bernard Shaw, once sent a telegram to his friend the Archbishop of Canterbury during the season of Lent. The communication read: “Cancel Easter. Body found.” The joke has been making the rounds of college and university campuses ever since, and one can imagine the Archbishop himself even having a chuckle over it.

It was funny at the time, but few practicing Christians ever took it seriously. After all, the raising of Jesus from death, the fundamental belief on which the Christian religion is based, has always been, well, an article of faith.

This resurrection faith has always been a stumbling block for “the world,” so it seems that every year about this time there appears evidence that seems intended to disprove it, at least in terms of historical fact. Last year, as The Christian Century reported, James Cameron (the Canadian director of the film Titanic) and his colleague Simcha Jacobovici, announced that 10 stone coffins unearthed by archeologists in a Jerusalem suburb once held the bones of Jesus, his parents, Mary and Joseph, his wife, Mary of Magdala, and their son, Judah. This announcement aroused near-hysteria among some Christians, but was been greeted with polite indifference by modern liberal thinkers.

In any case, the resurrection has always been a matter of faith, not of proof. The resurrection accounts in the four gospels were not written by eyewitnesses, and none of the writers claim that anyone actually saw Jesus coming out of the tomb. There have been hundreds of scholarly dissertations trying to explain the nature of such an unnatural event, and the idea was first brought to popular notice in 1906 by Albert Schweitzer, in his book The Quest of the Historical Jesus.

Is the physical resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth a historical fact? And if not, did the coffins unearthed in Talpiyot in 1980 once contain the remains of the family from Nazareth? And should we take Cameron's documentary, The Lost Tomb of Jesus, seriously, or dismiss it as being as fanciful as The Da Vinci Code?

And the greatest question of all: Does it matter one way or the other?

If the risen Jesus was seen first by Mary of Magdala, then later by many of his other disciples, in what form did he appear? Obviously not in his pre-crucifixion body for, according to the Luke and John gospels, the resurrected Jesus could appear and disappear at will, even morphing through locked doors, but at the same time he allowed Thomas to touch the wound in his side, and cooked and ate fish on the shores of Galilee.

Hundreds of people vowed they saw Jesus in the flesh after the crucifixion, and who are we to argue with them? People often see what they want to see, and one modern way of explaining these apparitions is that Jesus had such a powerful personality that many people felt his presence even after he was dead, just as there are people today who swear that their deceased loved ones come and talk to them. Who is to say that any of these people are wrong? We have no proof, either for or against, that would satisfy modern scientific research.

There is a great difference between the Jesus of history and the Christ of theology. We can be pretty sure that a man called Yeshua or Jesus was born, probably in Bethlehem, about 5 BC (calculations vary). A devout Jewish peasant, an itinerant preacher and healer, he was crucified by the Roman government about AD 30. That much can be established by sources outside the four gospels as well as the gospels themselves, and this man is the Jesus of history.

On the other hand there is the Christ of faith, a figure proclaimed and celebrated by the Pauline movement, the divine Son of God who was raised from death and later took his resurrected body up into the heavens, where he reigns forever as part of the Trinity. Paul describes his life-changing encounter with the risen Lord in dramatic detail, but never mentions the empty tomb. For Paul, the importance of the resurrection is found in the life of faith that Christians live day to day, and the hope in a promise that is foreshadowed by the “first fruits” of Christ’s resurrection that will be fulfilled in God’s future. There is no historical or scientific proof for this version of Jesus. It is purely a concept of faith.

But tht doesn't mean that people can't believe in his importance and that of the movement that was created in his name, or that they shouldn't try to live by the values he espoused.

And after more than 2000 years, what is more important: The bones (or lack of them), or the teachings of Jesus and the resurrection hope that has been proclaimed from the very beginning.

For people of the faith, the resurrection is a once and future event. It is far more than a question about a resuscitated corpse (a claim which scripture never makes – Jesus’ resurrection body is clearly a different kind of material, a foretaste of the new creation). It is the assurance that God does not abandon his beloved creation even in the face of death. It is the fountain of hope that sustains and refreshes us even when we pass through the valley of shadow and live with grief. The resurrection is not primarily about history (though it is attested to in history), or about the future (though that is where the promise is fulfilled by God’s grace). It is about the present hope that gets us through the day. That hope and promise give purpose to our lives, and assure us that God never leaves our side, no matter what.

The resurrection is a way of life. Thanks be to God!

Faithfully, your bishop,

B. Penrose Hoover