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| Chapter IX.—The resurrection of Christ proves that the body rises.
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Chapter IX.—The resurrection of
Christ proves that the body rises.
If He had no need of
the flesh, why did He heal it? And what is most forcible of all, He
raised the dead. Why? Was it not to show what the resurrection should be?
How then did He raise the dead? Their souls or their bodies? Manifestly
both. If the resurrection were only spiritual, it was requisite that He,
in raising the dead, should show the body lying apart by itself, and the
soul living apart by itself. But now He did not do so, but raised the
body, confirming in it the promise of life. Why did He rise in the flesh
in which He suffered, unless to show the resurrection of the flesh? And
wishing to confirm this, when His disciples did not know whether to
believe He had truly risen in the body, and were looking upon Him and
doubting, He said to them, “Ye have not yet faith, see that it is
I;”2633
and He let them
handle Him, and showed them the prints of the nails in His hands. And
when they were by every kind of proof persuaded that it was Himself, and
in the body, they asked Him to eat with them, that they might thus still
more accurately ascertain that He had in verity risen bodily; and He did
eat honey-comb and fish. And when He had thus shown them that there is
truly a resurrection of the flesh, wishing to show them this also, that
it is not impossible for flesh to ascend into heaven (as He had said that
our dwelling-place is in heaven), “He was taken up into heaven
while they beheld,”2634
as He was in the flesh. If,
therefore, after all that has been said, any one demand demonstration of
the resurrection, he is in no respect different from the Sadducees, since
the resurrection of the flesh is the power of God, and, being above all
reasoning, is established by faith, and seen in works.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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