Sunday, March 27, 2022

A Pattern Across All Of The Gospel Resurrection Narratives

Another line of evidence for the resurrection appearance discussed in my last post is the ordinariness of Jesus' resurrection body. Contrast that with what was said shortly beforehand:

"an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it. And his appearance was like lightning, and his clothing as white as snow." (Matthew 28:2-3)

The other resurrection appearance of Jesus, narrated later in Matthew 28, likewise has no reference to a glorious body. Notice the contrast to the descriptions of not only the angel early in Matthew 28, but also the righteous in 13:43, Jesus in the context of the Mount of Transfiguration in 17:2, and Jesus again in the context of the second coming in 24:30.

See my post here for a discussion of the same characteristics in Luke's writings. John's gospel doesn't offer any contrasting descriptions of beings with glorious bodies, as far as I recall, but there are references to beings with a glorious appearance, including Jesus, in another Johannine document, Revelation. The gospel of John agrees with Matthew and Luke in describing Jesus' resurrection body in ordinary terms. In fact, John's gospel has Jesus being mistaken for a gardener (20:15) and not being recognized in 21:4-6.

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