The Resurrection by Ellet Joseph Waggoner

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jan 18, 1883

The Resurrection

By Ellet Joseph Waggoner

(To be continued.)

The Resurrection.

In a Spiritualist lecture recently delivered in Oakland, by a distinguished "Professor," the following statement is reported to have been made: "The word resurrection is not found in the Greek Testament." This statement would doubtless be received by some with pleasure, as it would seem to show that our Bible is unreliable, and by others with surprise. It will no doubt have the effect over those who heard or read it, which the lecturer intended it should have—to weaken their faith in the inspired record.

Now instead of denying this assertion, we are prepared to make another one still more astounding: The word "God" is nowhere found in the Greek Testament! Neither is any other English word found in the Greek Testament; if they were, it would be an English Testament instead of a Greek Testament. But the Greek word theos, meaning "God," is found in the Greek Testament; and so also is the word anastasis, which means "a making to stand up," "a restoration," "awakening," "resurrection;" and this "Professor" Phelps knew very well, providing he has any knowledge of the Greek, or of the New Testament, the latter of which, at least, we very much doubt.

Right in this connection it is proper to mention a somewhat similar statement recently made by the Christian Union. A correspondent of that paper quoted a benediction which is sometimes used: "The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ preserve thy soul and body unto everlasting life," and asked, "If man's body is mortal, from what is it preserved?" the reply was that this benediction "probably was connected with the old-time faith in the literal resurrection of the body; a faith which, in our judgment, is inconsistent with the teaching of the New Testament."

Turning our attention for a short time to the New Testament itself, we shall see not only that the judgment of the Christian Union is at fault, but that the Greek Testament teaches the doctrine of the literal resurrection of the dead even more strongly than does the English version. A few texts will suffice to show this.

In Luke 20:27–38 we have the record of the question which the Sadducees put to Christ, and his answer. Disbelieving the resurrection, and wishing to entangle Christ with their sophistry, they stated to him the hypothetical case of a woman who had married in succession seven brothers, each of whom had died, the death of the last one being followed by the death of the woman herself. The question was, "In the resurrection whose wife of them is she?" Now notice; the question had to do with people who were dead; not those who were living under different conditions. The Sadducees believed that when men died they absolutely ceased to exist forever. But the further clause of Christ's answer recognized the fact that these dead ones shall live again. "But they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead," etc.; literally, "The awakening of the dead ones."

Again, when Peter and John were preaching in the temple, "the priests, and the captain of the people, and the Sadducees, came upon them, being grieved that they taught the people, and preached through Jesus the resurrection of the dead," Acts 4:1, 2; literally, "the raising up or wakening of the dead." Those priests and Sadducees have their counterparts among the religious teachers of to-day. They do not like to hear of a resurrection through Christ; that eternal life can be obtained only through Christ. Professing great love and reverence for Christ, even to observing the day of his resurrection, they refuse to allow that he alone has the power which he gained by that resurrection. They are very zealous in honoring him in a way which he has not asked them to, but deny that which constitutes his badge of authority,—the ability to give life to those who are dead. See John 5:25–29.

Paul warned Timothy against profane and vain babblings, and cited as a specimen the words of Hymenæus and Philetus, whose words, said he, "will eat as doth a canker." The particular profane and vain babbling in their case was that they had erred concerning the truth, "saying that the resurrection is past already." If he used such language in reference to those who claimed that the resurrection was in the past, what would he have said of those who should claim that the doctrine of the resurrection is a myth, with no foundation in fact? And Paul, be it remembered, did not believe in the spiritual resurrection which should consist in taking something already alive, and pass it along to a higher sphere. He believed in a literal resurrection of the body; for he says: "For our conversation [citizenship] is in Heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ; who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body." Phil. 3:20, 21. Even David, who lived so long before the nineteenth century that his ideas are commonly supposed to have been very crude, seems to have had the same idea of the resurrection that Paul had, for he said, "I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness."

At a future time we will consider other texts that teach a resurrection, and will note more particularly how in every instance they convey the idea that the dead are asleep and unconscious, by saying that they shall awake; and that they are in the earth beneath, and not in the heaven above, by the use of the term "raising from the dead." We know, however, that these plain texts will not have any weight with a large majority, for the lecturer truly said, "The literal of the Bible is not in harmony with the spirit of the present age." This is about the only real truth which the lecture contained; and this was anticipated centuries ago by Paul, who said, "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned."

E. J. W.