"Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?" Acts xxvi, 8.
"How are the dead raised up, and with what body do they come?" 1 Cor. xv, 35.
We have already shown that the doctrine of the resurrection of the human body is deeply imbedded in the teachings of both the Old and New Testament Scriptures. In the Gospel, especially, it becomes a foundation truth, radiating from the very center of the system, and illuminating every part. Whatever, then, of absurdity or of philosophical impossibility skepticism has to urge against the resurrection, is so much, essentially, urged against the Bible itself. It is for this reason, with others, that we now propose a more particular examination of the popular objections urged against the resurrection.
When Paul preached "Jesus and the resurrection" among the Epicureans and Stoics of Athens, they said, "He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods!" So to many, in every age, the doctrine of the resurrection of the body seems little less than a misty fable, because it has never yet been encircled within the scope of their rational philosophy. Others give to the subject little reflection or thought, but, with Pliny, the ancient heathen philosopher, affirm that "the calling of the dead back to life, is among the impossible things that God neither can nor will do." Others would go still further and, with Celsus, denounce the resurrection as "the hope of worms—an abominable as well as impossible thing." Cæcilius, who personates a heathen in the dialogue of Minucius Felix, says of Christians: "They tell us that they shall be reproduced after death and the ashes of the funeral pile, and believe their own lies, so that you might think that they had already revived. Oh, twofold madness! to denounce destruction to the heaven and stars, which we leave as we found them, but to promise eternity to themselves, when dead and extinguished." There seems, indeed, to have been arrayed against this doctrine a persistency of opposition, wonderful to contemplate, when we consider how clearly it is revealed, and by how many and striking miracles it is demonstrated; and especially when we take into account how very little, that is really valid, reason, science, or philosophy, can urge against it.
In our own day, the objections to the resurrection of the body have been drawn out in precise philosophical forms and statements. They thus assume definite and tangible shape. This is well. We can now gain access to them, and subject them to careful examination and analysis. It is often the case that there is a broad, undefined idea that a doctrine is unsound, or a thing incredible. The idea, from its very vagueness, presents no salient points of approach, and seems absolutely insurmountable. But the moment the objection assumes definite form, and is distributed into parts, so that each by itself may be subjected to the critical process of examination, one after another they are dissolved, and disappear before the scrutiny of reason and truth.
Let us apply ourselves to an examination, in their order, of the chief objections urged against the resurrection of the dead. If the main intrenchments of the enemy are carried, we need not concern ourselves much about the rest.
I. IN THE FIRST PLACE, IT IS ASSERTED THAT THE DOCTRINE OF THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD IS UNPHILOSOPHICAL AND ABSURD.
This objection is a mere vague generality, and might be left to itself; but it will help us to a clearer understanding of the nature of this discussion, and of the points at issue, if we clear away somewhat of the rubbish it heaps up before us.
An opinion may be unphilosophical without being absurd. To be unphilosophical, is to be at variance with the principles of sound reason. When this variance attains a high degree, so as wilfully to stand in opposition to manifest truth, and to the plain dictates of common-sense, it reaches up to the absurd. An unphilosophical proposition may seem to be true, though in reality, contradictory to some of the hidden principles of philosophy. An absurd proposition is contradictory to obvious or known truth. The proposition, then, that "the dead are raised," is not absurd, because it is not contradictory to any known truth or obvious principle; for its opposite never has been and never can be established.
To say that it is unphilosophical, is only to say that it can not, so far as we can see, be brought about upon philosophical principles. And this, after all, may amount to nothing more than this—that we have not as yet attained to the knowledge of those high philosophical elements employed in bringing about the resurrection of the dead. To assume that we know it to be absolutely unphilosophical, is to assume that we have mastered all philosophy; and that we have made the application of its principles to the subject and found them inconsistent. The absurdity of such an assumption is too obvious to require exposure. Philosophy is continually enlarging her domain. Even within the present age she has developed new principles and new applications that would have been to former generations as incredible as raising the dead.
But, then, there is another reply to this whole objection. This is not a doctrine of philosophy, but of revelation. The question, then, is not whether the dead can be raised upon the principles of human philosophy, but whether God, by his own miraculous power, can and will do it. Whatever God does may be above us, and consequently mysterious. It may be incomprehensible to us. Our philosophy may be too contracted, too feeble, to rise to the full comprehension of the Divine ways; but his purposes and his acts will ever be in harmony with the sublime philosophy of the universe. They may seem to contradict both our reason and our sense—just as the doctrine of the diurnal revolution of our earth seems to contradict both the sense and reason of the untutored mind; but the higher revelation of truth may make apparent that it is inconsistent with neither. The objection, then, is nothing more nor less than the opposition of our ignorance to the wisdom and the power of God.
II. THE SECOND OBJECTION IS DRAWN FROM THE FACT THAT THE LIVING HUMAN BODY IS UNDERGOING A PERPETUAL CHANGE.
Stating this objection in full, it is this: As the human body is undergoing a perpetual change, each individual has many bodies during his life—each one of which the soul has inhabited, and it is, therefore, as much his body as that he possessed at the moment of his death; and therefore it is absurd to claim for this last body—possessed, perhaps, but a very little while—an exclusive resurrection.
It is contended that this change extends to every material particle that enters into the body. The time required for this complete renovation of the human body is, by some, limited to seven years. Others extend it to twenty. The caviler inquires whether all these particles that have ever entered into the composition of the human body, and which consequently as much belonged to it as those it happened to be in possession of at the particular moment of death, are to enter into the composition of the resurrection body? and if not all, what portion of them is to be rejected? Some have pushed this objection so far as to descant in terms of ridicule upon the bulky appearance of that resurrection body, which, after remaining here its fourscore years, and being changed many times, should call back all the particles which ever entered into its composition.
This is the old objection encountered by the apostle: "How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come?" It is an attempt to apply the little we know, and know imperfectly, too, to the mysteries that lie beyond. It richly merits the reply of the apostle—"Thou fool!" We might content ourselves by replying to the technical form of this objection; that its claim for the body of the ownership of all the particles which ever entered into its composition, is a stretch of fancy that would hardly be thought of in any other connection. Just as well might the individual prefer a claim to all the bits and parcels of property he had ever owned during his life, however long ago he might have parted with them, and however regular the process, or full the equivalent received for them. But it will be more satisfactory to enter upon the subject in detail.74
Now, with reference to this entire change of the body, it is rather assumed than proved. Some change is, undoubtedly, constantly going on in our system; but that every particle of the body, in process of time, passes from us, and the entire body is changed so that it is made up of an entirely new class of particles, is a supposition not only unproved, but one that is not susceptible of proof by any process known to human science. Certain it is that the bodily identity is still maintained through all the changes of the longest life. The man feels that the present is the same body—essentially—that he possessed in past time, and the same he will possess in the future. All his modes of thought, and all his consciousness of accountability, are based upon this idea. The old man, tottering upon the brink of the grave, still adheres to the thought that the body now worn out with age and enfeebled by disease, is essentially the same body that was fresh and blooming in the day of his youth. He does not say, "The body I then possessed was a lively, active body; but it has been exchanged for one that is decrepit and old." No, he says, "I have now exchanged the sprightliness of youth for the decrepitude of age." Thus, the bodily identity—that is, the idea of its being essentially the same body—seems as inseparable from us as life itself.
Great changes may take place in our bodies, within short periods of time, but we never waver in the recognition of their identity through all these changes. Disease may shrink us from the full habit to the skeleton form; we may suffer mutilation; the leg, the arm, may be amputated; the eye may be cut out; the flesh torn from the body; and the very form of humanity be almost obliterated; but we rise from all this suffering with an undoubted, unmistaken, bodily identity still remaining.
The conclusion, then, to which we are led, is that much of our bodily nature, the coarser parts of the physical system, are not essential to bodily identity; but that the essence of our physical being is, in a sense, independent of these and manufactured by them. In this view, the objection loses all its force. Whatever changes take place in the coarser parts of the bodily system, the elemental part—the essence—yet remains. And it is this that shall rise from the grave.
Does this appear mysterious? Take that clump of iron ore just from the quarry. Cast it into the furnace. Behold it there burning and seething in the lambent flames; its form changes; it is consumed; gone. But descend now, and behold the pure metal flowing from the furnace. Here again appears the clump; not, it is true, in its crude state, but freed from its earth; purged from its alloy, and yet preserving its elemental identity. Its essence is there. So shall it be with this earthly body as it passes through the furnace of death, and comes forth in the resurrection. "It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body;" for "flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God." Therefore "the dead shall be raised incorruptible and we shall be changed."
III. IT IS OBJECTED TO THE RESURRECTION THAT THE ELEMENTS OF WHICH THE BODY IS COMPOSED ARE NOT ONLY DISSOLVED, BUT WASTED, SCATTERED, AND EVEN TRANSFORMED.
After death the body is soon decomposed. The gaseous and watery elements soon escape away, and the more solid parts soon crumble into dust. "The body of a dead man may be burnt to ashes, and the ashes may be blown about by the wind, and scattered far and wide in the air and upon the earth. After it is resolved into its earthy or humid matter, it may be taken up by the vessels which supply plants with nutrients, and at length become constituent parts of the substance of these plants." By these and similar processes, the particles that constitute a single human body, may be dispersed over half the globe, may have passed through innumerable transformations, and be combined with other bodies. How can these widely-scattered elements be gathered together? how is it possible that they should be again so re-united as to re-form the body that once crumbled and wasted?
This is indeed mysterious. But is not the organization of our present bodies also mysterious and inexplicable? May not each individual say, "I am fearfully and wonderfully made?" The earth, the air, the sea have all been laid under contribution. The elements that constitute our bodies, have been drawn from remote parts of the earth, and from the depths of the sea. Some portions of these elements of our bodies have been drawn from the vegetable and animal productions of our own clime. Other portions are the productions of other climes—the tropical regions and the arctic, India and China, the islands of the sea and the mountains of the continents, the rivers and the oceans—have all brought their contributions to the erection of this mysterious temple. A thousand unappreciated and unseen influences have been working, under the all-controlling eye of God, to its completion. Let us, then, not stumble at the mysteriousness of the resurrection of the body from the dead, till we have solved the mystery of its first organization. Let us not be over-perplexed because we can not tell how its scattered and wasted elements shall be gathered, till we are able to tell how they were originally gathered and organized into a bodily system. If God has done the latter, may he not also be able to do the former?
"Sure the same power
That reared the piece at first, and took it down,
Can reassemble the loose, scattered parts,
And put them as they were."
But this objection is absolutely deprived of all force, when we contemplate processes of daily occurrence, and especially the apparent impossibilities science may and has achieved. Take that ingot of gold. First tell its exact purity and weight, and then give it into the hands of the chemist. He files it to powder; and as you look upon it you say, "My gold will never be gathered again." The chemist gathers that dust and dissolves it in acids; then you exclaim, "I can not even see it; every particle is gone." Again he takes it, alloys it with other metals; he grinds it again to powder; he throws it into the fire; he mingles it with soot, and ashes, and charcoal; and at length, when it would seem as though its very elements were utterly destroyed, he brings it forth, the same fine gold, brilliant and pure as it was before it was subjected to the ordeal. And does the skill of the chemist transcend the wonder-working power of Jehovah? Nay, the chemist may mistake; he may fail in his experiment; the precious gold may be lost. But over the garnered dust of his saints, God shall watch with that eye which never sleeps; and at the magic of his word, it shall be gathered together and again start to life.
IV. IT IS OBJECTED AGAIN THAT SOME OF THE ELEMENTS WHICH CONSTITUTED A PART OF THE BODY OF ONE MAN AT DEATH, MAY ALSO ENTER INTO THAT OF ANOTHER MAN AT THE TIME OF HIS DEATH, AND HENCE IT WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE, IN THE RESURRECTION, TO RESTORE THE SAME PARTICLES TO BOTH THE BODIES CLAIMING THEM.
Some have grown facetious over this objection, and presented us with the grotesque picture of two souls contending over a lump of materiality, each claiming it as belonging to himself. This may avail something among those who substitute fancy for fact and argument. But our humorist should first learn, in so grave a matter, whether, even upon the hypothesis of a resurrection, such a state of things as he has supposed can ever possibly occur.
Others meet the case more gravely. Assuming that the same substance may, at different times, enter into and become essential parts of the bodies of different men, they say that in the resurrection, this substance cannot enter into both of the bodies that once had it in possession. Hence, it is physically impossible for each to recover his own peculiar body; and therefore there lies this physical impossibility against the doctrine of the resurrection.
We shall be able to weigh more exactly the force of this objection, if we first consider the circumstances under which this alleged complication of the elemental parts of human bodies is said to occur. The case has been instanced where grain, raised upon a field enriched by the blood of man slain in battle, is eaten; or where the decaying bodies of men have nourished vegetables, which were afterward eaten by other men; or where the bodies of men drowned in the sea have been eaten by fishes, and those fishes afterward caught and eaten; or still again, where men have fallen into the hands of cannibals and been devoured by them, and thus their flesh enters directly into the composition of other bodies.
We cannot answer this objection more conclusively than is done by Dr. Kingsley, in his little work on the "Resurrection of the Dead;" and, therefore, without adhering closely to the language, we adopt, substantially, his argument. Let us take up the case where vegetation, raised upon soil enriched by the decomposition of a human body, is used for the nourishment of human beings. Here, at the outset, we are met by the fact that a very small part of the earth enters into the composition of vegetable existence. This is easy of demonstration. It has again and again been shown, from actual experiment, that if plants or trees be set in pots or urns,75
and the dirt to which their roots have access weighed, so that the tree may increase many pounds, while the dirt, if carefully shaken from the roots and weighed, will be found to be diminished only a few ounces. Based upon this fact, we have a calculation furnished to our hand. "Suppose a human being to have eaten grain—in quantity, say one hundred pounds—that had grown upon soil enriched by a human body. Now, not more than one twenty-fifth part of this grain—that is, four pounds—ever becomes actually a part of the human body. But not more than one twentieth part of the grain at first was converted earth; and thus not more than one-fifth of one pound in the hundred is incorporated into the body of the person who has eaten it. And, again, probably not more than one thousandth part of the earth absorbed by the roots of the grain could ever have been human dust. This must be a large estimate. The result, then, would be that of the one hundred pounds eaten, not more than one five-thousandth, or one three-hundred-and-twelfth part of an ounce of matter, could thus be transferred from one body to another. And strong probabilities exist against the transfer of even this small amount. But suppose it to have been actually transferred, a large portion of this small fraction of an ounce, would certainly go to the grosser parts of the system, not at all necessary to the resurrection body; and might not the whole be directed in the same way? Or, again, why may not this small part of human dust, absorbed by the growing grain, be lodged in the roots, the stalk, or the calyxes, without ever becoming a part of the kernel? Thus the objection, when subjected to severe scrutiny, becomes absolutely void.
But let us take the case which our objector regards as his stronghold—that of cannibalism. With reference to the cannibal himself, this kind of food with him was exceedingly rare, and formed but a very small fraction of his food; and then, again, but a small fraction of this fraction can become a part of his body. This small fraction, it is not at all inconsistent to suppose, may be directed to the coarser parts of the body—those parts that shall not enter into the composition of the resurrection body; or if the inquiry relate to the victim, and it is inquired, "How shall he recover his body which has been devoured by another?" it must be observed, that, in all such cases of cannibalism, there are large portions of the body, such as the skull and bones, that are not thus eaten. And, indeed, if the whole body were eaten, the parts essential to the resurrection body might still, as we have already seen, be guarded by the special workings of Divine Providence, or even by an established, yet undiscovered law of nature, which forbids the commingling of that portion of our body, or that essence of our physical nature essential to our bodily identity, thus preserving through all transformations, as well as through all time, our physical as well as mental individuality. This latter idea is of great force—especially when we remember that the blood as well as some other parts of our system is entirely devoid of any nourishing quality, and cannot, therefore, be incorporated by the ordinary process of taking and digesting food into any other system. Viewed, then, simply as a matter of rational inquiry, the objection is obviously specious and groundless. It is unsustained by either fact or science. But when we look at the subject in the light of revelation, and observe that it is a question of God's miraculous power and determination, who shall set limits to his skill or bound his power? If he has decreed that "the dead shall be raised and we be changed," can he not so guard the elements of which our bodies are composed, that the grand purpose of his wisdom shall be accomplished? The objection is based upon that essential infidelity that would circumscribe the power of God by the cavils of an unbelieving heart.
V. IT IS OBJECTED, ALSO, THAT AS THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY IMPLIES THE RAISING UP THE SAME BODY THAT DIED, THERE WOULD BE A WIDE DIVERSITY AMONG THE RESURRECTION BODIES.
Some would be young, others old; some fresh and beautiful, others deformed and repulsive; some healthful and vigorous, others wasted and ghastly. The great proportion die of wasting diseases or of old age, so that the body that goes into the grave is a mere skeleton—shriveled, ghastly, repulsive. As the true anastasis implies the standing-up again, it must be the resurrection of that which lay down—that is, the very body that went into the grave. And this is commonly the worst, the most unsightly and repulsive body possessed by the individual during all his life. Hence, if a literal resurrection is to take place, it would bring forth the most motley as well as the most repulsive assemblage of human beings that ever met the eye.
To all such cavilers we have one reply: "Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor yet the power of God." Matt. xxii, 29. In that glorious resurrection our bodies shall come forth—not as they now are—not as they went down into the grave—but like unto the glorious body of Jesus Christ. Though all the elements essential to bodily identity rise, yet shall they be changed. The mortal and the corruptible shall be purged away:
"Those bodies that corrupted fell,
Shall incorrupt arise,
And mortal forms shall spring to life,
Immortal in the skies."
But St. Paul meets this objection and solves this difficulty. He tells us that not as it went down into the grave does the resurrected body of the righteous come up in the resurrection. "It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural [animal] body, it is raised a spiritual body." 1 Cor. xv, 42, 44. It is sown an animal body—σῶμα ψυχικὸν—that is, says Dr. Gregory, "a body which previously existed with all the organs, faculties, and propensities requisite to procure, receive, and appropriate nutriment, as well as to perpetuate the species; but it shall be raised a spiritual body, refined from the dregs of matter, utterly impermeable by every thing which communicates 'pain,' freed from the organs and senses required only in its former state, and probably possessing the remaining senses in greater perfection, together with new and more exquisite faculties, fitted for the exalted state of existence and enjoyment to which it is now rising." It is in accordance with this that it is said, "Who [that is, the Lord Jesus Christ] shall CHANGE our vile body, that it may be fashioned like to his glorious body." Phil. iii, 21. Here the identical VILE BODY—that is, this body belonging to our state of abasement, subject to infirmities and sickness, and condemned to death and dissolution because of sin—is not to give place to another body, but to be CHANGED and fashioned after the glory of the resurrection body of Christ. The saints of God are to come forth "IN THE LIKENESS OF HIS RESURRECTION." Rom. vi, 5. And so, "when he shall appear we shall be like him." 1 John iii, 2. THE RESURRECTION BODY OF CHRIST, is the type and model after which the resurrection bodies of the saints are to be fashioned. The crucifixion occurred when the Saviour was yet in the vigor of his early manhood. To this age was conformed the resurrection body with which he ascended into Heaven. Some of his saints may be gathered home while the dew of life's early morning is yet upon them:
"Their all of life a rosy ray,
Blushed into dawn and pass'd away."
But they fail not of bliss; "For of such is the kingdom of God." Mark x, 14. Others, in the decrepitude of old age, are gathered to their fathers. And all along at every stage of gradation, from one extreme to the other, the saints, are passing away. As they come up from the grave in the resurrection, something of the distinctions of age, and sex, and peculiar conformation may remain. For St. John says, "I saw the dead, SMALL AND GREAT, stand before God." Rev. xx, 12. "Children," says Olshausen, "will not arise as men, nor aged men retreat to the period of youth; but every glorified body will represent clearly his degree of age, with the exception of all that is perishable; so that, all taken together, may declare the whole human race in its degrees and varieties with the most perfect clearness." But each of these shall wear its type of beauty and glory; each shall be fashioned like unto his glorious body, who is the "first-fruits of them that slept," and who has declared, "As I live, ye shall live also." There may be diversity, then, variety even, among the resurrected bodies of the saints; for "one star differeth from another star in glory." 1 Cor. xv, 41. But even this diversity, instead of being a blemish in the heavenly society, shall constitute one of its noblest beauties, and prove one of the richest sources of its ever-varying and unalloyed felicity. And even with regard to individuals, each one shall be more perfectly himself, and consequently better prepared to enjoy the heavenly delights now accessible to him, and those to which he shall rise as the ages of eternity roll on, from the fact that there are diversities—grades above and below him—infinitely varied.
Thus the objector has created his objection by casting the dark shadow of his unbelief over one of the most glorious truths revealed concerning the resurrection state.