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More On The Unrecognized Jesus
by John Ray
Originally posted to BNN 3/8/2005
As I mentioned in my post of 7th., Jesus after his resurrection seems not to have looked anything like he was before his resurrection. He normally had to talk people into recognizing that he was the same person and even then they only recognized him by various signs, such as the wounds in his hands and the way he broke bread. And some followers never were convinced, it appears. See Matthew 28:17. And Mark, perhaps wisely, mentions no appearances at all -- which is why various extra bits are occasionally added on after the final verse (16:8) of his Gospel. Why would a historian of Jesus's life leave out the most dramatic part of that life? It very much sounds like Mark was one of those who did not believe that it really was Jesus who appeared. And the obvious conclusion from all that is that the resurrected Jesus was a smart impostor enjoying the attention he got. Any competent illusionist ("Magician") could have done what the allegedly resurrected Jesus did.
Such a conclusion is of course unacceptable to a person of faith and one of my readers has attempted to do what the scriptures do not -- explain WHY Christ was normally not recognized in his post-resurrection appearances:
I address the post-resurrected Christ. I believe you are searching for something that isn't there. There is no Scripture stating what you believe, ie the temporary body. And as for an imposter, I suppose this could happen, but it does not coincide with belief in an omnipotent, omnipresent, almighty God. He has no need for imposters, or magicians! As Moses displayed, God's power being used through Moses far outshone the abilities of Pharoh's magicians. Only God has authority and power over universal law, and Jesus being unrecognizable has no real merit or importance in the message of Christ.
But, to humor you, I will suppose, as many Christians and people do, why I think Jesus was not immediately recognized. First of all, He was probably in His "glorified body," already, and who knows exactly what that is or looks like? I sure don't, for all I know is what I read, and although Paul is fairly specific on telling us when this will happen and the results of being in this new body, he does nothing to describe it to us. We only know that it is imperishable, a term not relevant to spirit, and it is incorruptable, meaning there will never be any sickness again, something else that bears no relevance concerning spirit, and it is immortal. But how we will look, that is not revealed.
However, I have heard some suggest that it was because of this, "Glorified body," they did not recognize Christ. I wish to add that they also were of the mind set that once something is dead - physically, it will remain dead, for history had proven this to them. There was no expectation of ever seeing Christ again in this life. Perhaps their minds could not comprehend something that had definitely defied the laws of physics? I think that would be the case far more than Jesus looking so differently, for Scripture also tells us that, "They will look upon Him whom they pierced and weep." These people will definitely know Jesus.
This statement of Scripture also defies the idea that Jesus is only spirit. How could one look upon a spirit and recognize scars or that it was wounded in a particular way? Also, Jesus spoke to the women He met first making a statement that they shouldn't "touch" Him, because He had not yet been to the Father. So, sometime between then and the time He had Thomas touch Him, then He had been to our heavenly Father and was cleansed, or whatever may have happened. Again, I attribute the misunderstandings here as being on our part for trying to understand that which is infinite with finite minds. As smart as we think we are, we still will never understand universal mysteries until that time comes when God so designs.
One other possibility is that Jesus was SO scarred He wasn't easily recognized, for Isaiah says that, "He was marred beyond that of any man," and that the disfigurement was considerable. If Jesus had been to hell, "hades, gehenna, sheol," and witnessed to the souls there, but not yet ascended to God, then His disfigurements would still be quite obvious, as well as fresh. After the time He ascended, then He too would have put on that immortal body, which Scripture says we will have at the time of Christ's return.
Whatever did happen, and I believe the clues are there in Scripture for us to decipher, Jesus was not at first recognizable, but He could be recognized, and after a specific time, He was immediately recognized by the disciples. I have also considered that the disciples were so afraid of suffering what Jesus did, should they have been found, that their exteme paranoia kept them hostage from the truth. I have always thought that it wasn't because they did not believe Jesus couldn't resurrect, because they had seen Jesus resurrect the dead Himself, their biggest problem with believing had to do with the fact that Jesus first appeared to the women. Since women had low social value in those days, and were even thought of as property, the disciples had to wonder why Jesus would first come to them. I think the disciples had a bigger problem with this than the fact Jesus was alive.
If that explanation saves anybody's faith I am happy with it but I see various problems in the account:
It is true that the scriptures nowhere use the word "temporary" in connection with Christ's post-resurrection body but we are also told that Christ was bound for Heaven after his appearances and 1 Corinthians 15 tells us that there is no flesh and blood in Heaven so that makes his body temporary as far as I can see.
"Glorified" body? I don't know what is being referred to there. It must be some non-scriptural reference. Christ's Heavenly body is not a flesh and blood one but the one who appeared to the disciples emphatically was flesh and blood.
The fourth paragraph above is confused. Nobody has ever argued that the post-resurrection Jesus is only spirit. He argued during his life (e.g. John 8:58) that he was a spirit inhabiting a body and nobody argues otherwise after the resurrection. The reference to "do not touch me" (John 20:17) is a mistranslation. The RSV rendering ("do not hold me") makes much more sense in the context. Read the context if you doubt it.
The idea that Jesus was disfigured is nowhere mentioned. Those who met him seem to have always accepted initially that he was just another ordinary person.
That his followers simply did not want to believe what they saw is not inherently unreasonable but that is not what the texts say. The texts say that on various occasions they simply did not recognize him. They did not even suspect that it was he.
John Ray blogs at A Scripture Blog.
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