resurrection

Resurrection of the flesh (1499-1502) Fresco by Luca Signorelli
Chapel of San Brizio, Duomo, Orvieto

The resurrection of dead humans is a central doctrine of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. It may refer either to the resurrection of particular individuals, or a general resurrection of humanity.

The idea of resurrection is featured prominently in both Jewish and Christian scripture. There are many passages in the Hebrew Bible, or Old Testament which at least later have been considered as referring to the resurrection. Since the first century CE, most of the world associates the concept of resurrection with the resurrection of Jesus. The resurrection of Jesus is elaborated upon throughout the books of the New Testament, although the descriptions do not agree entirely with each other. Easter is a holiday which celebrates the resurrection of Jesus.

Judaism

The Hebrew Bible (Tanakh)

See: Jewish eschatology

Resurrection beliefs are referred to in the Tanakh, but it is unclear whether this relates to the resurrection of the flesh or just the resurrection of the soul or some spiritual body. The first five books of the Tanakh--known as the Torah--make some indications of an afterlife but none of the resurrection. For example, when Jacob dies, he says "I am about to be gathered to my kin. Bury me with my forefathers in the cave which is in the field of Ephron the Hittite" (Genesis 49:29). All the Jewish patriarchs and matriarchs (except Rachel) were buried in the family cave, and so were many other biblical personalities, including King Saul and King David.

The Hebrew Bible refers to the term Sheol, which in traditional Judaism is translated simply as "grave" and is perceived as a transitory state. Critical views (see below) interpret it as a referring to a permanent, shadowy underworld. For biblical references to Sheol see Genesis 42:38, Isaiah 14:11, Psalm 141:7, Proverbs 7:27 and Job 10:21-22, and Job 17:16, among others. Perhaps it is from Sheol, then, that the dead return.

There are three explicit examples in the Hebrew Bible of people being resuscitated from death:

• The prophet Elijah prays and God raises a young boy from death (1 Kings 17:17-24)

• Similarly, Elisha raises the son of the Shunammite woman (2 Kings 4:32-37); this was the very same child whose birth he previously foretold (2 Kings 4:8-16)

• A dead man's body that was thrown into the dead Elisha's tomb is resurrected when the body touches Elisha's bones (2 Kings 13:21)

Additional passages in the Hebrew Bible traditionally interpreted as referring to resurrection include:

• Ezekiel’s vision of the valley of dry bones brought to restoration as a living army, which is commonly taken to be a metaphorical prophecy that the house of Israel would one day be gathered from the nations, out of exile, to live in the land of Israel once more. Most scholars, however, do not hold this to be referring to a belief in a future resurrection:

"He said to me, 'Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath, 'Thus says the Lord God, "Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they come to life."' So I prophesied as He commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they came to life, and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army. Then He said to me, "Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel; behold, they say, 'Our bones are dried up, and our hope has perished. We are completely cut off.' "Therefore prophesy, and say to them, 'Thus says the Lord God, "Behold, I will open your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves, My people; and I will bring you into the land of Israel." (Ezekiel 37:9-12)

• Samuel - "The LORD kills and makes alive; He brings down to Sheol and raises up." (1 Samuel 2:6)

• Job - "Even after my skin is destroyed, Yet from my flesh I shall see God" (Job 19:26)

• Isaiah - "Your dead will live; Their corpses will rise. You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy, For your dew is as the dew of the dawn, And the earth will give birth to the departed spirits." (Isaiah 26:19)

• Daniel's vision, where a mysterious angelic figure tells Daniel, "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt." (Daniel 12:2)

Views of Pharisees and Sadducees

Many modern scholars refer to alleged first century BC debates between the Pharisees who, according to some Christian sources, believed in the future Resurrection, and the Sadducees who did not. The Sadducees did not believe in an afterlife at all.^[1]. However, according to Josephus, who was a Pharisee himself, the Pharisees actually believed in the immortality of the soul and resurrection. (Josephus BJ 2.8.14, 3.8.5; Josephus Vita 2). The Sadducees, politically powerful religious leaders, took a literal view of the Torah, rejecting the Pharisees' oral law, afterlife, angels, and demons. The Pharisees, whose views became Rabbinic Judaism, eventually won (or at least survived) this debate. Although a minority in Karaite Judaism, some still do not believe in a Future Resurrection or afterlife.^[2] The promise of a future resurrection appears in certain Jewish works, such as the Life of Adam and Eve, c 100 BC, and 2 Maccabees, c 124 BC.^[3]

Orthodox Judaism

Orthodox Judaism holds belief in resurrection to be one of the cardinal principles of Rabbinical Judaism. Jewish halakhic authority Maimonides set down thirteen main principles of the Jewish faith which have ever since been printed in all Rabbinic Siddur (prayer books). Resurrection is the thirteenth principle:

"I believe with complete (perfect) faith, that there will be techiat hameitim - revival of the dead, whenever it will be God's, blessed be He, will (desire) to arise and do so. May (God's) Name be blessed, and may His remembrance arise, forever and ever."^[4]

The Talmud makes it one of the few required Jewish beliefs, going so far as to say that "All Israel have a share in the World to Come...but a person who does not believe in...the resurrection of the dead...has no share in the World to Come." (Sanhedrin 50a).

The second blessing of the Amidah, the central thrice-daily Jewish prayer is called Tehiyyat ha-Metim ("the resurrection of the dead") and closes with the words m'chayei hameitim ("who gives life to the dead") i.e., resurrection. The Amidah is traditionally attributed to the Great Assembly of Ezra; its text was finalized in approximately its present form in about the First Century CE.

Conservative Judaism

Conservative Judaism's liturgy generally includes the traditional Hebrew text affirming belief in bodily resurrection, but its thinkers are divided. Many Conservative prayer books use an ambiguous translation into English that leaves open the possibility, but not the requirement, to believe in resurrection.^[5]

Reform and Reconstructionist Judaism

Reform Judaism and Reconstructionist Judaism reject Resurrection. Accordingly, they have modified the text to read m'chayei hakol ("who gives life to all"). In the new prayer book released by the Reform Judaism movement, they have returned the traditional prayer for the resurrection of the dead.^[6]

Ancient non-Abrahamic religions in the Middle East

The concept of resurrection is found in the writings of some ancient non-Abrahamic religions in the Middle East, but it doesn't pertain to human beings. A few extant Egyptian and Canaanite writings allude to dying and rising gods--such as Osiris and Baal. However, again, this article deals only with the regeneration of human life. Sir James Frazer in his book The Golden Bough relates to these allegedely dying and rising gods,^[7] but many of his examples, as been pointed out by various scholars, are really distorting the sources.^[8]

Ancient Greek Religion

In ancient Greek religion a number of dead mortal men and women were made physically immortal as they were resurrected from the dead. Asclepius, was killed by Zeus only to be resurrected and transformed into a major deity. Achilles after being killed was snatched from his funeral pyre by his divine mother Thetis and resurrected brought to an immortal existence in either Leuce, Elysian plains or the Islands of the Blessed. Memnon, who was killed by Achlles, seems to have a received a similar fate. Alcmene, Castor, Heracles, and Melicertes, were also among the figures sometimes considered to have been resurrected to physical immortality. According to Herodotus' Histories, the seventh century B.C. sage Aristeas of Proconnesus was first found dead, after which his body disappeared from a locked room. Later he found not only to have been resurrected but to have gained immortality. Many other figures, like a great part of those who fought in the Trojan and Theban wars, Menelaus, and the historical pugilist Cleomedes of Astupalaea, were also believed to have been made physically immortal, but withouth having died in the first place. Indeed, in Greek religion, immortality originally always included an eternal union of body and soul. The philosophical idea of an immortal soul was a later invention, which, although influential, never had a breakthrough in the Greek world. As may be witnessed even into the Christian era, not least by the complaints of various philosophers over popular beliefs, traditional Greek believers maintained the conviction that certain individuals were resurrected from the dead and made physically immortal and that for the rest of us, we could only look forward to an existence as disembodied and dead souls.^[9]

This traditional religious belief in physical immortality was generally denied by the Greek philosophers. Writing his Lives of Illustrious Men (Parallel Lives) in the first century CE, the Middle Platonic philosopher Plutarch's chapter on Romulus gave an account of this man's mysterious disappearance and subsequent deification, comparing it to certain Greek fables, such as the resurrection and physical immortalization of Alcmene and Aristeas the Proconnesian, “for they say Aristeas died in a fuller's work-shop, and his friends coming to look for him, found his body vanished; and that some presently after, coming from abroad, said they met him traveling towards Croton.” The Platonic Plutarch openly scorned such beliefs held in traditional ancient Greek religion, writing, “many such improbabilities do your fabulous writers relate, deifying creatures naturally mortal.”

The parallel between these traditional beliefs and the later resurrection of Jesus was not lost on the early Christians, as Justin Martyr argued: “when we say … Jesus Christ, our teacher, was crucified and died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven, we propose nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you consider sons of Zeus.” (1 Apol. 21). There is, however, no belief in a general resurrection in ancient Greek religion, as the Greeks held that not even the gods were able to recreate flesh that had been lost to decay, fire or consumption. The notion of a general resurrection of the dead was therefore apparently quite preposterous to the Greeks. This is made clear in Paul's Areopagus discourse. After having first told about the resurrection of Jesus, which makes the Athenians only interested to hear more, Paul goes on relating how this event relates to a general resurrection of the dead:

Acts 17:30-32 “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.” Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some began to sneer, but others said, `We shall hear you again concerning this.'”

Christianity

In Christianity, resurrection most critically concerns the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but also includes the resurrection of Judgment Day, as well as the resurrection miracles done by Jesus and the prophets of the Old Testament.

Resurrection of Jesus

Many Christians regard the resurrection of Jesus as the central doctrine in Christianity. Others take the Incarnation of Jesus to be more central; however, it is the miracles—and particularly his Resurrection—which provide validation of his incarnation. The Apostle Paul wrote in his first letter to the Corinthians:

'If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men. But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.' (Corinthians 15:19-20)

According to Paul, the entire Christian faith hinges upon the centrality of the resurrection of Jesus on the third day, and the hope for a life after our own death. Christians annually celebrate the resurrection of Jesus at Easter. Though there is no scriptural basis for this, a large majority of Christians have been led to believe that the day of worship was changed from Saturday to Sunday—or Lord's Day--the day on which Jesus rose to life again.

The vast majority of Christians; Catholics, Orthodox, Protestants and adherents of the Assyrian Church of the East accept the resurrection of Jesus as a real historical event, and condemn any denial of any metaphysical reality of the resurrection as a heresy. Docetism, the heresy that denied the death and subsequent resurrection of Jesus by emphasizing that Jesus was only God and not man, was condemned by the early Church in the late 1st to early 2nd century.

According to Juan Garces, a British Library project curator who has studied the Codex Sinaiticus, the resurrection of Jesus was not included in the original Bible manuscripts of the Gospel of Mark, except for the women present at Jesus' grave inferring it from hearsay, which means that inside this Gospel, only the apocryphal verses render the resurrected Jesus.^[10][11][12] Garces refers to common scholarly knowledge (textual criticism), saying that the texts of the Bible have changed since they have been written.^[13]

Resurrection of the dead

Christianity started as a religious movement within 1st-century Judaism, and it retains the 1st-century Jewish belief in the resurrection of the dead. Whereas this belief was only one of many beliefs held about the end of times in Judaism, this belief became dominant within Christianity and soon included an insistence on the resurrection of the flesh only rarely found within Judaism. Most Christian churches continue to uphold the belief that there will be a general resurrection of the dead at "the end of time", as prophesied by Paul when he said, "...he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world..." (Acts 17:31 KJV) and "...there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust." (Acts 24:15 KJV). Most also teach that it is only as a result of the atoning work of Christ, by grace through faith, that people are spared eternal punishment as judgment for their sins.

Belief in the resurrection of the dead, and Jesus Christ's role as judge of the dead, is codified in the Apostles' Creed, which is the fundamental creed of Christian baptismal faith. The Book of Revelation also makes many references about the Day of Judgment when the dead will be raised up. However, there are also many Christians who do not believe that individual consciousness continues after death, and a higher number who do not believe in a place or condition of eternal punisment for sins (hell).

Resuscitation miracles

The Resurrection of Lazarus, painting by Leon Bonnat, France, 1857.

The resurrected Jesus Christ commissioned his followers to, among other things, raise the dead.

In the New Testament of the Bible, Jesus is said to have raised several persons from death, but none of these became immortal in the process like Jesus himself and what was promised everybody at the end of times. These resuscitations included the daughter of Jairus shortly after death, a young man in the midst of his own funeral procession, and Lazarus, who had been buried for four days. According to the Gospel of Matthew, after Jesus's resurrection, many of the dead saints came out of their tombs and entered Jerusalem, where they appeared to many. Some scholars interpret this passage as a description of a legendary story rather than a real event.^[14]

Similar resuscitations are credited to Christian apostles and saints. Peter allegedly raised a woman named Dorcas (called Tabitha), and Paul restored a man named Eutychus who had fallen asleep and fell from a window to his death, according to the book of Acts. Proceeding the apostolic era, many saints were said to resuscitate the dead, as recorded in Orthodox Christian hagiographies. A book by Father Alfred J. Hebert, Raised from the Dead: True Stories of 400 Resurrection Miracles, describes many of these miracles including descriptions of Heaven, Hell and Purgatory reported by those who were brought back to life.

Bodily resurrection versus Platonic philosophy

In Platonic philosophy and other Greek philosophical thought, at death the soul was said to leave the inferior body behind. The idea that Jesus was resurrected spiritually rather than physically even gained popularity among some Christian teachers, whom the author of 1 John declared to be antichrists. Similar beliefs appeared in the early church as Gnosticism. However, in Luke 24:39, the resurrected Jesus expressly states "behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Handle me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have." For Greeks holding on to more traditional ancient Greek religion, this insistence on the physical nature of the resurrection held a distinct appeal as they usually considered immortality to be dependent on an eternal union of body and soul.

Contemporary Biblical criticism

According to Herbert C. Brichtothe, writing in Reform Judaism's Hebrew Union College Annual, the family tomb is the central concept in understanding biblical views of the afterlife. Brichtothe states that it is "not mere sentimental respect for the physical remains that is...the motivation for the practice, but rather an assumed connection between proper sepulture and the condition of happiness of the deceased in the afterlife" According to Brichtothe, the early Israelites apparently believed that the graves of family, or tribe, united into one, and that this unified collectivity is to what the Biblical Hebrew term Sheol refers. Although not well defined in the Tanakh, Sheol in this view was a subterranean underworld where the souls of the dead went after the body died. The Babylonians had a similar underworld called Aralu, and the Greeks had one known as Hades. For biblical references to Sheol see Genesis 42:38, Isaiah 14:11, Psalm 141:7, Daniel 12:2, Proverbs 7:27 and Job 10:21,22, and 17:16, among others. According to Brichtothe, other Biblical names for Sheol were: Abaddon (ruin), found in Psalm 88:11, Job 28:22 and Proverbs 15:11; Bor (the pit), found in Isaiah 14:15, 24:22, Ezekiel 26:20; and Shakhat (corruption), found in Isaiah 38:17, Ezekiel 28:8.^[15]

Mormonism

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (commonly called Mormons) teaches that upon death, righteous souls go to Paradise, while the souls of the unrepentant go to a spirit prison, where the former are sent from Paradise to preach the Gospel to the latter, and the living perform work in LDS Temples providing ordinances that can only be received in the flesh, which the repentant imprisoned ones can accept. The Book of Mormon describes both of these as temporary states, preceding resurrection and final judgement.^[16] When the time of the literal resurrection arrives, the spirits of everyone who has ever lived are reunited with their physical bodies. The degree of righteousness or unrighteousness in which a person had lived his or her life determines what level of glory they will attain after the final judgement.^[17] The teaching (see I Corinthians 15, Doctrine & Covenenants 76) further is that there are different resurrection states, the righteous resurrecting first with a higher, and the wicked at the end of the Millennium with a lesser state.

Islam

Concept

The Day of Resurrection is the Day of Judgement that God has promised, and His promise is True. This is the Day that no friend helps his friend nor they are helped. The judgement on that day is by God. The day when the sky bringeth visible smoke, and the Earth turns to unearth; the Moon and the Sun will be gathered the same way. The trumpet will be blown, and all who are living will die—then all creatures will be brought to life; all the people of old and present. And on that day they will be judged and the judgement is by God.

Happenings

All mankind will be judged by what they did; even a tiny portion of good and a tiny portion of bad will be counted and surely no one will be oppressed. On that day those who blasphemed to their Lord and those who were polytheist will be cast down to hellfire, and those who willfully denied the revealations and prophets of God will receive their due recompense. That day will be the day of separation; separation between true believers and hypocrites. Between them there will be a wall placed - inside, mercy and outside, torment. Paradise is the place of the righteous and hell is the place of the sinner.

Qur'anic References

"Some faces on that day will be shining, looking towards their Lord, but other faces will be dark realizing that something terrible is about to happen to them" (Qur'an:Resurrection:22-25)

"The day that men will be as moths scattered and the mountains will be as carded wool. So for one whose scales are heavy, he is therefore in the desired bliss, and for one whose scales prove light, for him is the abyss, and what can make you understand how that (abyss) is; fire is its abutment" (Qur'an:Calamity:4-11)

Zen Buddhism

There are stories in Buddhism where the power of resurrection was demonstrated on at least two famous occasions in Chan or Zen Buddhist tradition. One is the famous resurrection story of Bodhidharma, the Indian master who brought the Ekayana school of India to China that subsequently became Chan Buddhism.

The other is the passing of Chinese Chan master Puhua (J., Fuke) and is recounted in the Record of Linji (J., Rinzai). Puhua was known for his unusual or crazy-like behavior and teaching style so it is no wonder that he is associated with an event that breaks the usual prohibition on displaying such powers. Here is the account from Irmgard Schloegl's "The Zen Teaching of Rinzai".

65. One day at the street market Fuke was begging all and sundry to give him a robe. Everybody offered him one, but he did not want any of them. The master [Linji] made the superior buy a coffin, and when Fuke returned, said to him: "There, I had this robe made for you." Fuke shouldered the coffin, and went back to the street market, calling loudly: "Rinzai had this robe made for me! I am off to the East Gate to enter transformation" (to die)." The people of the market crowded after him, eager to look. Fuke said: "No, not today. Tomorrow, I shall go to the South Gate to enter transformation." And so for three days. Nobody believed it any longer. On the fourth day, and now without any spectators, Fuke went alone outside the city walls, and laid himself into the coffin. He asked a traveler who chanced by to nail down the lid. The news spread at once, and the people of the market rushed there. On opening the coffin, they found that the body had vanished, but from high up in the sky they heard the ring of his hand bell.^[18]

Disappearances (as distinct from Resurrection)

As knowledge of different religions has grown, so have claims of bodily disappearance of some religious and mythological figures. In ancient Greek religion, this was a way the gods made some physically immortal, including such figures as Cleitus, Ganymede, Menelaus, and Tithonus.^[19] In his chapter on Romulus from Parallel Lives, Plutarch criticises the continuous belief in such disappearances, referring e.g. to the allegedly miraculous disappearance of the historical figures of Romulus, Cleomedes of Astypalaea, and Croesus. In ancient times pagan similarities were explained by the early Christian writers, such as Justin Martyr, as the work of demons and Satan, with the intention of leading Christians astray.^[20]

In somewhat recent years we have learned Gesar, the Savior of Tibet, at the end, chants on a mountain top and his clothes fall empty to the ground.^[21] The body of the first Guru of Sikhs Guru Nanak Dev is said to have disappeared and flowers were left in place of his dead body. There is a traditional spot in Jerusalem whence, while mounted, Muhammad and his horse both ascend into the sky.

Lord Raglan's Hero Pattern lists many religious figures whose bodies disappear, or have more than one sepulchre.^[22] B. Traven, author of The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, wrote that the Inca Virococha, walked away on the top of the sea and vanished.^[23] It has been thought that teachings regarding the purity and incorruptibility of the hero's human body are linked to this phenomenon. Perhaps, this is also to deter the practice of disturbing and collecting the hero's remains. They are safely protected if they have disappeared.^[24]

In Deuteronomy (34:6) Moses is secretly buried. Elijah vanishes in a whirlwind 2 Kings (2:11). After hundreds of years these two earlier Biblical heroes suddenly reappear, and are seen walking with Jesus. Then again they vanish. Mark (9:2-8), Matthew (17:1-8) and Luke (9:28-33). The last time he is seen, Luke (24:51) alone tells of Jesus leaving his disciples, by ascending into the sky. But again, these are disappearances, and are thus distinctly different from resurrection.

References

Further reading

• Oscar Cullmann. “Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Dead?” in Immortality and Resurrection Ed. Krister Stendahl. New York: 1965. pp. 9-35. (available online)
• Dag Øistein Endsjø. Greek Resurrection Beliefs and the Success of Christianity. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.
• Nikolai Fyodorovich Fyodorov. Philosophy of Physical Resurrection 1906.
• Edwin Hatch. Influence of Greek Ideas and Usages Upon the Christian Church (1888 Hibbert Lectures).
• Richard Longenecker, editor. Life in the Face of Death: The Resurrection Message of the New Testament. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998.
• Frank Morison. Who Moved the Stone?. London: Faber and Faber, 1930. (available online)
• Markus Mühling. Grundinformation Eschatologie. Systematische Theologie aus der Perspektive der Hoffnung. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007, ISBN 978-3-8252-2918-4, 242–262.
• George Nickelsburg. Resurrection, Immortality, and Eternal Life in Intertestmental Judaism. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972.
• Pheme Perkins. "Resurrection: New Testament Witness and Contemporary Reflection." Garden City: Doubleday & Company, 1984.
• James McConkey Robinson, editor. The Nag Hammadi Library in English. New York: Harper Collins, 1977.
• Erwin Rohde Psyche: The Cult of Souls and Belief in Immortality among the Greeks. New York: Harper & Row, 1925 [1921].
• Charles H. Talbert. The Concept of Immortals in Mediterranian Antiquity, Journal of Biblical Literature, Volume 94, 1973, pp 419–436
• Charles H. Talbert. The Myth of a Descending-Ascending Redeemer in Mediterranian Antiquity, New Testament Studies, 22, 1975/76, pp 418–440
• N.T. Wright. The Resurrection of the Son of God. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003.
• Father Alfred J Hebert. Raised from the Dead: True Stories of 400 Resurrection Miracles

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Resurrection

• Properties and Endowment of Resurrected Bodies according to the Bible
• Resurrection of Jesus Christ - Catholic Encyclopedia
• Why I Don't Buy the Resurrection Story - Columbia University Historian Richard Carrier (analyzes evidence for the resurrection of Jesus)
• Perspectives on the Resurrection - ABC News 20/20 Special (focuses on resurrection of Jesus)
• Article on resurrection in the Hebrew Bible.
• Jewish Encyclopedia: Resurrection
• the Christian apostle Paul on the Christian belief in the resurrection of the dead (the Church) in I Corinthians 15 [1]
• The enticement of the Occult: Occultism examined by an scientist and Orthodox Priest
• Rethinking the resurrection.(of Jesus Christ)(Cover Story) Newsweek, April 8th 1996, Woodward, Kenneth L.
• Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Death and Immortality, Resurrection, Reincarnation