Learn seven key points about the death and resurrection of Jesus. Know the theories that deny the resurrection. Find out about other interpretations of the Resurrection—was it a historical fact like any other? Where does the resurrection “fit” and what does it mean? What does it mean to encounter the Risen Christ? What two extremes are we to avoid? Learn about the credibility of the Resurrection and the three ways it changed the nature of the universe.

1. Bible Alive:
Jesus Christ
Class Four:
Historical Facts &
Resurrection-Faith

2. The following presentation would be impossible without these
resources

3. And most of all…
By Father Roch A. Kereszty o. cist.
Thank you Father Roch!

4. Setting the Tone
• No Way there is by which to go
Unto the Light wherein God dwells:
Thou must thyself become the Light
Or God is hidden from thee else.
—Angelus Selesius

6. Setting the Tone
• One human thought alone is worth more than
the entire world, hence God alone is worthy of
it.
—St. John of the Cross

8. Setting the Tone
• You, O eternal Trinity, are a bottomless sea
Into which the more I plunge the more I find,
and the more I find the more I seek You still.
Of You it is never possible to say ‘enough.’ The
soul that is sated in Your depths desires you
yet unceasingly, For it hungers ever after
You....
—St. Catherine of Sienna

10. Let us Pray
Good Father
By your Word Jesus
Give us in the Spirit ears that hear and hearts that
wonder in humble awe
Shatter the idol of our intellects
And grant us eyes of faith
That we, as true mystics, might in your Love
Be Love
as being Sons and Daughters
For your Glory.
Amen.

11. Summarizing Last Class
• We explored the “rock bottom” facts which lead
us beyond history into Christology proper, since
they raise the meaning and significance of the
“Jesus event”
• We saw the extra-biblical documents that record
the execution of Jesus.
• We learned the pre-Pauline formula of 1
Corinthians 15:3b-5 and its ramifications.
• We discovered the meaning of the “empty-tomb”
narratives.

12. Establishing the Historical Facts
• What facts connected with the origin of
resurrection faith can be established by the
historian?
• Kereszty answers: We arrive at seven points,
seven historical facts connected to faith in
Jesus’ resurrection.

13. Seven Historical Facts
• 1. Jesus was executed by crucifixion by Pontius
Pilate. This ultimate embarrassment, this greatest of
scandals, shook the faith of the disciples.
• 2. Yet shockingly, soon after his death, the same
disciples announce Jesus’ bodily resurrection. They
do not merely affirm that his teaching, his personal
influence, or that his “cause” continues. These
disciples believe and proclaim Jesus is raised bodily,
and that he exists as a transformed spiritual body, and
that he personally lives IN God and among AND
within his disciples.

14. Seven Historical Facts
• 3. The resurrection proclamation is based on eyewitness
testimony. Peter and the disciples, together with Paul (a
converted enemy of the nascent Church) claim to have seen Jesus
ALIVE after his crucifixion.
• 4. The tomb of Jesus was found empty; established as a
historical fact. Had the story of the ancient tomb been a legend
developed later on, it would not have mentioned women finding
it, but a male witness. Moreover, even the enemies of Jesus speak
of the empty tomb from a time at least earlier than the
composition of Mark, which is accepted as being the first of the
canonical gospels to be written—they claimed that Jesus’ corpse
was stolen, hence its emptiness. As P. Althaus says, “the
resurrection kerygma could not have been maintained in
Jerusalem for a SINGLE day, for a SINGLE hour, if the existence of
the empty tomb had not been established as a FACT for all
concerned.” If you could produce a corpse, a skeleton, then the
message gets discredited immediately.

15. Seven Historical Facts
• 5. Faith in the resurrection radically transformed the outlook and
lives of the disciples. They now understood the tragic failure of
their messianic expectations in a new light: in Jesus they found the
fullness of God’s Plan to save the world, a plan that had been
foretold long ago in the sacred scriptures. This group, once
scattered in despair, now reassembles, and, in spite of a growing
storm of persecution announces the resurrection with courage and
a serene self-confidence.
• 6. Many eyewitnesses to the Risen Christ, in particular Peter, Paul,
and James “the brother of the Lord,” suffer martyrdom for their
faith.
• 7. Extra biblical sources reveal that as a result of apostolic faith
and preaching, millions accept the Christian faith, including faith
in the resurrection of Christ. This happens DESPITE the Greek
aversion to the idea of bodily resurrection and the widespread
moral corruption of the masses.

16. What Does this Mean?
• Given all of this we must face the question:
How can these facts be explained?
THE KEY TO THIS CLASS—no matter how
many interpretations of these seven facts that
there are, the ONLY INTERPRETATION(S) that
we MUST accept is THAT interpretation(s)
which explain(s) all the facts without denying
or distorting any of them.

17. The Three Theories That Deny Any
Form of the Resurrection
1. The Resurrection is a Fraud
2. The Evolution Hypothesis
3. The Psychological Explanation
These theories are called “negative
explanations” because they deny the
resurrection as really happening.

18. Negative Explanation One: Fraud
• The earliest negative explanation of what really happened is as old as
Christianity itself: the resurrection was a fraud.
Mt 28:11-15 While they were going, behold, some of the guard went into
the city and told the chief priests all that had taken place. And when they
had assembled with the elders and taken counsel, they gave a sum of
money to the soldiers and said,
“Tell people, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while
we were asleep.’ And if this comes to the governor’s ears, we will satisfy
him and keep you out of trouble.”
So they took the money and did as they were directed; and this story has
been spread among the Jews to this day.
• According to this theory, the disciples simply stole Jesus’ body. To deceive
the people the disciples invented the story of the resurrection.
• Variation: some have denied that Jesus actually died; he simply lost
consciousness. The disciples nursed Jesus back to health in the home of a
trusted friend. Pilate was amazed that Jesus died in mere hours after all.

19. Martyrdom of Paul
Martyrdom of Peter

20. Problems with the Fraud Theory
• The weakness of the first version of the fraud
theory—what motive could make the disciples
face the grief-filled lives of death for a sham?
• Again, we cannot deny or distort the fact of the
martyr apostles. Their martyrdom guarantees
their good faith.
• Granted, while it is true that people become
martyrs for false causes that they have been
convinced are true, who VOLUNTARILLY accepts
dying for what he knows to be a hoax?

22. Problems with the Fraud Theory
• The weakness with the second version of the same
fraud hypothesis is that it distorts the first fact, that
Jesus suffered death by crucifixion under Pilate in that
it excludes the professional expertise of the
executioners.
• We have records of criminals condemned to death on a
cross dying under the brutality of the flaggelum. Both
would regard bad faith on the part of the disciples, not
the faith witnesses in the martyrdom of believers.
• Kereszty claims that no historian accepts either
theory because of this.

23. Negative Explanation Two: The
Evolution Hypothesis
• The next “negative explanation” of the historical facts
of faith in the resurrection of Jesus is called “the
evolution hypothesis.”
• At first blush it appears more plausible than the “Fraud
Hypothesis”—belief in the Resurrection evolved as a
myth along the lines of the mystery religions, as a
strange mixture of the dying and rising gods in Egypto-
Hellenistic religions (e.g., Osiris, Dionysius, Mithras,
and Adonis) blended to the apocalyptic resurrection
scenarios of first century Judaism.
• But why?? It was invented to answer the existential
question of death and dying.

25. Problems with the
Evolution Hypothesis
 Upon closer examination, Jesus’ resurrection is different
substantially from the mythical stories. No one has
known the bodily resurrection of someone who they had
known before they died.
 The mythic heroes who “die” and “rose” are fictive
heroes FAR removed from the time of their religions. The
development of myth requires a LONG period of time.
(E.g., the immediate disciples of the Buddha NEVER
claimed that their master was a temporal manifestation
of the “universal Buddha nature.” Several hundred years
had to pass before Buddha’s divinity was proclaimed by
Mahayana Buddhism.) On the contrary, we have seen
that from the earliest time Jesus’ resurrection was
proclaimed all the way back to immediately after his
death and burial. And those who knew him best
proclaimed him raised. There is no parallel to it.

26. Negative Explanation Three: The
Psychological Explanation
• The Psychological Explanation, in short, says
that the disciples experienced an hallucination—
i.e., they convinced themselves that Jesus could
not have definitively died.
• First stated by D. F. Strauss (d. 1874), this theory,
which is proliferated in many different versions, is
a very popular one among scholars who will not
admit to the possibility of any supernatural
intervention in history. It means this: Jesus is not
really raised; the disciples did not really see him
raised. They imagined him raised. They had a
subject-induced experience.

27. Explaining the Psychological
Explanation
• One way that this has been expressed is that the
appearances were similar to what someone goes
through in a near-death experience, or, upon
experiencing a traumatic death of a beloved
family member, one sees, post-mortum, their
loved one alive.
• This would mean that the disciples were
psychologically imbalanced persons whose
lifelong mission, and the establishment of a
worldwide community of believers, was based on
a hallucination.

28. Problems with the
Psychological Explanation
 Kereszty wants us to ask (p. 53), Can a sick tree bear
healthy fruit? The various psychogenic theories assume
that the disciples’ lifelong missionary activity that
established a worldwide Church, and their martyrdoms,
were generated by nothing more than a few instances of
subjective vision based on subconscious forces in the
experiencing subjects. Would this be true, the disciples’
were victims of “benign” hallucinations.
 Considering the effects of their example and preaching,
the radical change from a life of corruption and
centripetal greed into one of generosity in so many, and
indeed a universal moral revolution toward never before
reached levels of forgiveness and unselfish love, could all
this have come from the victims of delusion?

29. Problems with the
Psychological Explanation
 What about Paul? Was he psychologically disturbed?
 Paul had been a dangerous enemy of the Jesus
movement, hardly a disciple of the earthly Jesus.
 One cannot reduce to a psychological process of
bereavement Paul’s vision of Christ and his ensuing
conversion.
 An analysis of Paul’s writings shows no sign of mental
illness/psychological disturbance.

30. Problems with the
Psychological Explanation
 The greatest weakness of the psychological explanation
is the historical fact of the empty tomb. One cannot
escape the testimony of the women-disciples; although
insufficient evidence in itself, when combined with the
multiple attestation of the recorded resurrection
appearances of the Risen One it shows the resurrection
could hardly be described exclusively as something
subjective.
 The resurrection proclaimed was bodily, an objective
reality. If we accept the factuality of the empty tomb, we
cannot reject as “apologectic concern” the sensory
perception of and bodily character of Jesus as a human
being in the resurrection accounts of the Gospels and
Acts.

31. Thus far we’ve learned…
• …That the three hypotheses just shown all
explicitly deny the resurrection.
• None of these interpretations can account for
all seven facts without distorting or ignoring
some of them.
• If we deny that Jesus has been raised, we
encounter an insoluble puzzle.

32. Other Contemporary Explanations of
the Resurrection
1. The Neo-Orthodox Theory
2. Rudolf Bultmann’s Theory
3. Willie Marxsen’s Theory
All of these, in some way, accept the claim of the
NT that Jesus has been raised, yet they disagree
sharply on just what that claim really means.
Therefore, these theories are called “positive
explanations” because they accept the
resurrection as really happening in some way.

33. Contemporary Explanation One: The
Neo-Orthodox Theory
• The Neo-Orthodox is also “the naïve theory of the
resurrection.”
• It holds that it is a provable fact—Jesus’ appearance
had to be ‘objective’ so that it can be verified by
everyone’s sense experience.
 Thus the resurrection can be adequately proven like
any other historical fact or event through the
consensus of verifiable eye witnesses.

34. How the Neo-Orthodox Theory Came
About
• Apologetics—the practice and part of theology which attempts to
demonstrate the reasonableness of the Christian faith and to refute
objections against it.
• Christians have always done apologetics.
• The Reformation—because the Reformers questioned the use of “fallen”
reason to defend and justify the faith against its critics, apologetics
became more explicitly Catholic. In turn various Christian groups, whether
consistently or not, defended their doctrinal positions based on rational
argument and logical demonstration.
• The 19th century—various Christian groups perceived science and
rationalistic philosophies as enemies to truth. Christians reacted—Catholic
apologetics argued for the necessity of revelation, the existence of a
supernatural order, and the essential need for a teaching Church whereas
some American Protestants, reacting against Darwinian evolution,
historical criticism, and ecumenical movements, rationalized the faith into
a bare set of “fundamentals.”

35. How the Neo-Orthodox Theory Came
About
• Catholic apologetics in the 20th century—at least
until the Second Vatican Council—worked to
present Christ’s divinity on the foundation of the
claims he made and the miracles he wrought in
support of those claims which were both
discoverable in the New Testament.
• HEAVY IRONY—Christian apologists were now
using the same methods that had been employed
by the Rationalists against the Christian faith.
• These “neo-orthodox” apologists were not simply
working out a defense of the faith; they were
“proving” its truth by history and logic.

36. How the Neo-Orthodox Theory Came
About
• For Catholic “Neo-Orthodox” Apologists, the
argument went like this (source, Richard
McBrien):
1. Jesus claimed to be divine and proved his claim by his miracles and
especially by the miracle of the Resurrection.
2. These claims and miracles are reported in the Bible, which is an
historically reliable source.
3. Therefore, Jesus is divine.
4. Next: Jesus founded a Church and conferred on its leaders and their
successors full authority to teach and to rule.
5. This, too, is attested in the Bible, which is an historically reliable
source.
6. Therefore, the Church is a divinely established institution with full
authority to teach and to govern its members.

37. How the Neo-Orthodox Theory Came
About
• For Protestant Fundamentalist Apologists, the
argument went like this (Source, Ravi Zacharias):
1. Truth as a category does exist.
2. It is possible in a majority of claims (i.e., philosophical and historical
statements) to verify the truthfulness of those affirmations.
3. There are also existential realities from which one cannot run which drive
one to find the answers to the existential struggles one must live with.
Everything is on the line—it is crucial to find the answers!
4. This raises the question of the Bible and what it proposes.
5. One sees in the Bible (Ravi Zacharias claims) 66 books, by nearly 40
different authors, composed over 1500 years—these are works on history,
philosophical thought, theological thought, etc.
6. Unlike any other source of proposed truth, the Bible makes a series of
assertions (historical, philosophical, existential, etc.) that are unfailingly
accurate. and demonstrably so. This is especially true of its “prophetic
schema,” seen all the way to its fulfilled predictions of Christ.
7. When one compares the enormous and consistent prediction-fulfillment
correspondence between centuries-old prophecies and Jesus Christ in
whom these are fulfilled, immediately one sees the supernatural.
8. Therefore, one can trust the Bible and Jesus Christ whom it proposes.

38. But… Who Saw the Risen Jesus?
• Acts 9:3-7
Now as [Saul] journeyed he approached Damascus, and suddenly a
light from heaven flashed about him.
And he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul,
Saul, why do you persecute me?”
And he said, “Who are you, Lord?”
And he said, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting; but rise and
enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.”
The men who were traveling with him stood speechless, hearing
the voice but seeing no one.
• Mt 28:16-17
Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which
Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him they worshiped
him; but some doubted.

39. Problems with the Neo-Orthodox
Theory
 The Bible evidence prevents the rationalistic and naïve
view of the naïve theory because Jesus was seen only by
selected eyewitnesses, whose sense perception was
aided by faith and who could refuse to believe.
 The testimonies of Paul and even the more empirically
descriptive narratives of the Gospels and Acts indicate
that Christ is a new eschatological reality: the risen Christ
is present IN this world but he is not OF this world.
 He is only seen by eyewitnesses SELECTED by God whose
sense perception was aided by faith AND who could
refuse to believe. All rationalistic approaches will
therefore FAIL.

40. Reaction to the Neo-Orthodox Position
on the Resurrection
• Many 20th century theologians and exegetes
reacted violently to this naïve and materialistic
interpretation of the resurrection.
• By way of the exegetes, they judged it contrary to
the real meaning of the biblical texts and by way
of the theologians, they judged it
incomprehensible to modern man.
• Some Protestant scholars said that this flew in
the face of sola fide, “by faith alone!” So they
intended to keep their faith in the resurrection,
but provided WIDELY different interpretations of
just what actually happened.

41. Rudolf Bultmann’s Theory
• Rudolf Bultmann (d. 1976) said that the Resurrection
is the meaning of Jesus’ death. It is faith in the saving
efficacy of the cross.
• For Bultmann, the resurrection is NOT an event
distinguishable from the Cross; they are ONE event.
• The historical event that is verifiable by the historian
(historie) is the crucifixion of Jesus. The resurrection is
merely the MEANING (gechshicte) of his death.
• What is this resurrection? Bultman says, resurrection is
faith. Faith in what? Faith “in the saving efficacy of the
cross.”

42. Bultmann Explained
• According to Bultmann, we come to resurrection (i.e., belief in
the saving efficacy of the Cross) through the kerygma of the
Church in which God’s word addresses us.
• What does this word tell us? Die and rise.
• Receiving the kerygma one MUST DECIDE. Choosing authentic
existence means we are to die with Christ to our existence in
this world (which is characterized by our inauthenticity in our
clinging to earthly securities) and to rise with Christ to a new
life here and now (which is a new existential self-
understanding, a radical openness and freedom for God’s
future).
• Bultmann claimed that it was fine to define his thought as
“Jesus is risen in the kerygma” PROVIDED the kerygma itself is
an eschatological event and one should state that Jesus is
really present in the kerygma—his word in the kerygma
reaches the listener.

43. Issues with Bultmann’s Theory?
The main difficulty: Christ does not seem to have a distinct
personal existence.
• For Bultmann, the Resurrection is not bodily. Bodily resurrection did
not happen because it COULD NOT happen, according to Bultmann
who held that God does not suspend the necessary cause-and-
effect processes of nature. A manifestation of God’s power in
nature and history interfering with the web of natural causes is
nonsense to the modern person.
• The Gospel stories that describe such an interference are
mythology in need of a critical re-interpretation for modern people
who have “seen the light bulb.”
• Bultmann held that even if Jesus really was raised bodily, this would
be irrelevant to Christian faith. The believer believes in the word of
God that authenticates itself in the very act of faith. To rely on a
miraculous proof of an empty tomb or on a sense-experience of a
Risen Jesus destroys the purity of soli fides.

44. Willi Marxsen’s Theory
• Willi Marxsen (d. 1993)—the center of his
Christology is not the saving efficacy of the cross of
Christ; but rather the activity and message of the
earthly Jesus is efficacious.
• After the crucifixion, the disciples had some type of
‘experience’ of Jesus. They interpret this experience
in a “two-fold way.”

45. Willi Marxsen’s “Two-Fold” Way
1. According to Marxsen, the first and most ancient way the
first Christians “experienced Jesus” was functional—the
disciples continued “the cause of Jesus.” What’s the
cause? The coming kingdom of God. So just as the
kingdom was coming in the preaching of Jesus so now in
the preaching of the disciples the kingdom is coming.
2. And the second way or interpretation, which came
significantly AFTER the first, was that which became
central to traditional Christianity, and that is that Jesus
was raised from the dead. Marxsen notes that this later
interpretation may have been necessary at the time of
the disciples and even through much of Church history,
but this is no longer possible for modern people. Modern
Christianity, in order to be RELEVENT, must return to the
FIRST, functional interpretation. The “appearances of
Jesus” mean that his cause continues as an eschatological
event in the preaching of the Church.

46. Issues with Marxsen’s Theory?
– Marxsen comes to a conclusion VERY similar to
Bultmann—Resurrection means that Jesus is
present in the kerygma of his witnesses.
– But for Marxsen, the presence of Jesus in the
kerygma does not mean the saving efficacy of his
death for the believer but the eschatological
validity of the message of the earthly Jesus.

47. Any Good to Bultmann & Marxsen?
• What is good about these scholars? THERE ARE
GOODS!
• Don’t we have to appreciate their efforts to reduce a
rationalistic misappropriation of the resurrection that
would reduce its great mystery to a mere historical fact
that can be proved like any other?
• Must we not sympathize with Bultmann and Marxsen
for desiring to express belief in the resurrection in
terms relatable to contemporary men and women?
• Should we not commend them for desiring to
safeguard what they believe to be the message of the
New Testament?
• Something to consider…

48. Problems with the Theories of
Bultmann and Marxsen
• Their interpretations distort—to varying
degrees—the meaning of the biblical texts.
There are difficulties with these positions:
1. They both ignore the evidence that the Gospels present of the
empty tomb is inexorably tied to the faith proclamations of the
resurrection.
2. Bultmann ignores that for Paul and the rest of the New Testament
the risen and glorified body of Christ and his personal existence
with God are ESSENTIAL parts to the kerygma and not additional
mythological crust which can be discarded without destroying the
heart of the New Testament message.
3. Bultmann reduces the appearance to the same faith event that
happens when the Word reaches the believer through the kerygma.
For him God only acts in human subjectivity.
4. Marxsen’s notion of the resurrection can be reduced to what
anyone without faith would say about a great personality. Like
Bultmann, the Gospel stories are a mere literary device.

49. Kereszty Responds to Bultmann &
Marxsen
o The death and resurrection are two parts of the
saving event. Resurrection cannot be reduced to
the cross of Christ.
o Christ has been transformed into a new
eschatological creation.
o Resurrection cannot be reduced to the meaning
of the Cross; amen, Jesus has been raised, he
exists as a new man, as an eschatological man or
final man, and new creation.

50. Kereszty Responds to Bultmann &
Marxsen
• Through his appearances, Christ, the beginning and
foundation for the new eschatological creation,
reveals himself to the world. He ALLOWS himself to
be seen in our history by witnesses of his choosing.
• Jesus’ new mode of existence allows him NOT ONLY
TO appear to his disciples, but also to be within them
and to share his life with them. He can make himself
visible at will. They cannot see him except only to the
extent that he ALLOWS himself to be seen.
• Between his reality and the reality of our world there
is a gap: there is an INFINITE qualitative difference.

51. Kereszty Responds to Bultmann &
Marxsen
• The empty tomb is a necessary complement. It
points out that God has not rejected the world.
• God will not annihilate, but transform the material
world. On the one hand, the abrupt appearing and
disappearing of the risen Jesus reveals a
discontinuity between the new eschatological reality
and our world. But on the other hand, the empty
tomb proclaims that God has not rejected this
world—the earthly body of Jesus, part and parcel of
the old cosmos, has been transformed by the Holy
Spirit to be the center of the new universe into which
our own risen bodies will be joined.

52. The Resurrection in Fundamental
Theology
• What does it mean to encounter the Risen
Christ?
• Two extremes are to be avoided:
1. Extreme to the Right—The disciples and Paul saw Jesus as he
actually was. We must reject this naïve fundamentalist realism. Any
position that reduces the Resurrection appearances to total
objectivity is incorrect.
2. Extreme to the Left—We must likewise reject the other extreme
where the appearances were only a figment of their imagination,
psychogenic vision, or a mere literary device used to express
something different than the actuality of the bodily appearances of
the risen Jesus Christ. Any position that reduces the appearances to
only a subjective experience is incorrect.

53. Taking SERIOUSLY 1 Jn 3:2
• We must take VERY SERIOUS the implications of 1 Jn 3:2—
Beloved, we are God's children now; it does not yet appear what
we shall be, but we know that when he appears we shall be like
him, for we shall see him as he is.
• Seeing the Lord “as he is” means seeing God “face to face.” Why?
Because the divine glory of the risen Christ is no longer hidden in
the earthly mortal human nature.
• Jesus’ humanity—while not disappearing—has been transformed
by the Holy Spirit and become completely transparent, so that his
divinity shines through without any diminishment or obscuring.
Such a face to face encounter has been reserved for the time of the
eschatological revelation, when we are raised, when we become
completely conformed to him.

54. Conclusions
• Our conclusion from our analysis of the biblical
texts are confirmed by an a priori systematic
reflection: the appearance of the resurrected
Christ is the appearance of THE eschatological
reality in our world.
• His true body refers him to our world; therefore it
makes sense for us to perceive him with our
senses.
• But in his risen, glorified state, he transcends our
world; it makes sense that we therefore recognize
him only through eyes of faith.

55. The Wisdom of St. Thomas
• Thus St. Thomas Aquinas’ (d. 1274) felicitous
expression that the resurrection appearances were
“Effective Signs” through which the Risen Christ
revealed himself to his disciples.
• The appearances were effective signs because they did
communicate to the seers the reality of the risen
Christ.
• Nevertheless, they were ONLY signs adapted to the
sense experience, imagination and understanding of
the disciples rather than a face to face vision of God
the Son in his glorified humanity, a vision beyond the
capability of mortal human beings.

56. Effective, but ONLY SIGNS
• The resurrection appearances of Jesus were true signs, but
only signs of the various aspects of a transcendent
eschatological reality that is not directly accessible in this
world. Some appearances revealed the glorious state of the
Son; others the identity of Christ’s risen body with his
crucified body; others the glorious entry into God’s glory as
described in the TWO ascension-scenes in Luke-Acts and also
in the words of Jesus to Mary of Magdala in the garden in
John.
• But to consider the ascension as it happened in these
accounts as an actual lift off with Jesus having a trajectory and
velocity misses the point entirely.
• These effective signs prepared the disciples for the act of faith
to recognize Jesus. They also needed God’s grace to transform
their hearts so they could recognize him.

57. So we must conclude that…
• The Resurrection appearances were true signs
BUT ONLY SIGNS of various aspects of a
transcendent eschatological reality that was
and is not directly accessible in this world.
• The risen Lord is seen just as he is, face to
face, only by those who themselves have
been fully conformed to his eschatological
form in heaven.

58. Credibility of the Resurrection
• It was not an ordinary historical event. Now its point of departure
(Jesus’ dead body) and its effects in our world (the belief of the
disciples that Jesus is risen and has appeared to them, the empty
tomb, the extraordinary success of their preaching, and their
martyrdoms for their preaching) ARE historical events without
qualifications.
• The glorified and risen Christ stands beyond history and has entered
God’s eternal realm. Even though he stands beyond history he is
also present in history as its transcendent consummation that
draws all humankind, and therefore the whole universe, to himself.
• The short post-resurrection appearances are revealing signs of this
permanent active presence in our history.
• The appearances are historical events of a unique kind. They are
not verifiable in principle by everyone, but only by chosen
witnesses (Acts 10:41) to whom Jesus chose to reveal himself.
• The historian needs the grace of faith to explain these appearances.

59. Resurrection—It Changed the World
• Kereszty says that the resurrection event changed the
nature of the world in three basic ways:
1. The qualitative leaps of evolution do not lead to the absurdity
of an ultimate disaster (disasters like mass extinction, solar
death, or the pessimistic cosmological models of “Big Chill” or
“Big Crunch”), but to a consummation in God. Jesus Christ
Risen is the “Omega Point” in the evolution of the Universe.
2. The deepest desires of the human person are not destined to
be frustrated, but transformed and fulfilled in eternal life.
3. The human hope for salvation will appear through his
redeemed body at home in a new spiritualized material
universe.
Questions & Assignment