‘STAND FAST IN THE FAITH'

New Zealand Tablet, 2 May 1912, Page 3

‘STAND FAST IN THE FAITH'

(A Weekly Instruction specially written for the N.Z. Tablet by Ghimel.’)

THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY

'‘Christ’s Resurrection is the cause and model of ours’ (St. Thomas). The last article on this subject showed that men owe to their Saviour’s bodily resurrection the bringing to life of their bodies: the present article is intended to explain how His resurrection is the model of theirs. ■ ' •

But first it is well worth while to find out what Our Lord taught on the subject of the resurrection. While the greatest philosophers of ancient and modern times feel their spirit hesitate and their hearts quail, whenever they try to solve the great question of life after death. Our Lord confidently assures men of an eternal life for soul and body. It is no exaggeration to say that His teaching is simply saturated with this sublime and consoling truth. Here are a few examples taken, almost at random, from His discourses. He began His public teaching with the Sermon on the Mount, and there, in a series of Beatitudes or Blessings, the poor in spirit and the persecuted are promised the kingdom of heaven, the mourners are assured of comfort, the clean of heart are to see God—here certainly is an unmistakable proclamation of another and more just world. When Martha, in accordance with prevailing Jewish ideas, spoke hopefully of the future resurrection of her brother, Lazarus, Our Lord confirmed that belief : ‘ I am the resurrection and the life ; he that believeth in Me, although he be dead, shall live; and everyone that liveth and believeth in Me, shall not die for ever” (St. John xi. 25-26). In His last discourse to the Jews, He described the gathering together of the nations at the last day, to be followed by the welcome to an eternal life of joy or the banishment to an eternal life of misery (St. Matt. xxv.). The last moments of the repentant thief are brightened by the promise of Paradise, and Our Lord’s own final breath trembles away upon the words, so triumphant in hope: ‘ Father, into Thy hands I commend My Spirit.’ So much for a future life in general. When there was question of the resurrection of the body, Our Lord confirmed Jewish belief (St. John v. 28 vi. 39; xi. 25; St. Luke xiv. 14) and expressly defended it against the Sadducees on the authority of the Old Testament: ‘ And concerning the resurrection of = the dead, have you not read that which , was spoken by 'Txod , saying to you: “I am the God of Abraham, arid the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob ” (Exod. iii. 6). He is not the God of the dead, but of the living ’ (St. Matt, xxii., 31). Thus does this Divine Teacher make known to us a truth, which human philosophy by itself can only dimly discern, but which when once revealed is recognised by the human mind as most fitting. Christ’s Resurrection the Model of Ours. On this

point we, with St, Paul, have 1 hope in God that there shall be a resurrection of the just and the unjust ’ (Acts xxiv., 15), but when it comes to a question of ‘ how do the dead rise again, and with what. manner of body shall they come ’ (1 Cor. xv., 35), our faith is very vague and shadowy, because faith cannot outrun revelation, and revelation here is vague and shadowy (Rickaby) . At the same time theologians, following up some hints thrown out by St. Paul, come to these conclusions about the risen bodies of the just. (1) Christ ‘ will reform the body of our lowness, made like to the body of His glory,’ or as the passage runs in the original Greek,. ‘ who will fashion anew (i.e, transform) the body of our humiliation, (making it) configured to the body of His glory ’ (Philippians iii., 21). While, it is wrong to think it a misfortune for the soul to be in the body at allfor after all each human soul is made by an all-wise Creator for the particular body it inhabits ‘ the recurring necessities of the body, its liability to decay, the strength of animal appetites founded on the bodily structure, "all these are humiliations to the intellectual soul, still more to the Christian soul ’ (Rickaby). These animal necessi-

t ies v will .not, trouble the risen body, which will be

v forked, or energised, by the spirit. (2) More particularly, the risen bodies of the just, like ? Christ’s risen body, will be endowed with four

principal - qualities: — (a) Impassibility, including inc orruptibility and immortality. Christ Himself rising from the dead ‘ dieth now no more death has no more

dominion over Him’ (Romans vi., 9) so, too, ‘they that shall be accounted worthy of that world, and of tine resurrection from the dead , . . neither can they die any more’ (St. Luke xx., 35-36). The body 4 is sown in corruption, it shall rise in incorruption’ (1 Cor. xv,, 42), that is to say, man is begotten and, as it were, planted in this world, in corruption, a creature corruptible ; he shall rise incorruptible, for the physical frailty and perishableness of his mortal frame will have passed away, (b) Brightness . The body ‘ is sown in dishonor, it shall rise in glory’ (1 Cor. xv., 43). That is to say, ‘it will be entirely subject to the soul, God’s power so disposing, not in being only, but in all its actions, experiences, motions, and bodily qualities. As then the soul in the enjoyment of the vision of God will be replenished with a spiritual brightness, so by an overflow from soul to body, the body itself, in its way, will be clad in a halo and glory cf brightness (St. Thomas), (c) Agility, ‘lt is sown ii weakness: it shall .rise in power’ (1 Cor. xv., 43). In our present state, we experience weakness in the body, in as 'much as it proves incapable of satisfying the soul in the movements and actions the soul comiiands; but in the world to come, the body will absolutely obey the beck of the spirit in its every compand to move it will be agile, that is, endowed with the power of moving from place to place, so as to be inmediately anywhere the soul wishes. In this respect i. will be like Christ’s risen body, which appeared and cisappeared at His will, and ascended into heaven at Ibis.,good pleasure: (d) Spirituality or Subtlety. ‘lt it sown a natural body, it shall rise a spiritual body ’ (1 Cor. xv., 44). ‘The risen bodies,’ explains Father Mckaby, * are not transformed into spirit, but subjected tr the perfect control of the spirit that animates them. V hereas in mortal man the soul can go only as far a: the body will go, in the resurrection the body will g> as far as the soul will go, to the utmost limits of it? spiritual and quasi-angelic capacity.’ Man’s soul yill breathe its own spiritual energy direct into his body, with the result that the life of the risen body vill be more spiritual than animal.