What is the big deal, really, about Christ's resurrection? Ignoring the full import of St. Paul's claim that the Christian's faith is sheer vanity if Christ is still in His tomb, is there any value, besides authenticating one's faith, to the idea of resurrection in general? What help is there; what meaning can be gathered in one's arms and carried to one's bedside, or even one's graveside, from the Easter story?
***
Let us assume that there is no resurrection of any kind; let us assume that there is no God. Let us also assume that life is as good as it gets; that your consciousness begins and ends here; that there is no beyond, that there is no out there, no heaven or bliss or happy state of reincarnate being. Death is as dead as death can be. There is nothing––nor is there the knowledge of nothing––in that sleep which is not sleep at all.
A former professor of mine, Peter Kreeft, introduced me to an article by a philosopher named D.E. Harding†. The essay was entitled "On Having No Head", and it was a pleasant and even whimsical little foray into epistemology, the study of knowledge, of knowing; and ontology, or the study of being, of what is. Without bogging the reader down with details, let me simply say that Harding posited that each of us, at least those of us whose senses are intact, walk not with heads atop our bodies; we walk with the universe atop our shoulders. He suggested that there was no cranial wall between my brain and the sun; the sun––and the moon, stars and the birds outside my window––are carried around with me where I think my head is. They are in me and I am around them. (Perhaps none of this make sense unless one is stoned; but it makes sense to me, and I am quite straight.)
In other words, people are not just people: People are little universes; nay, they are the universe.
Hence, in a sense, when a human dies, the universe dies with them. Death then becomes something prodigal, wasteful, for a universe is lost when each person dies. And all this in light of the fact that each of us is the product of the universe, with all of the force of cosmic history behind us (sort of like "the network" in those Verizon wireless commercials). We are not a few years or decades old: the ringing in your ears is the music of the spheres in the ancient empyrean glory.
Let me then posit point number 1: If there is no resurrection, the universe is a very wasteful place. How else to describe the tossing aside of a Rembrandt or Tolstoy; a Michelangelo or Mother Theresa; a Jesus, or even a child drawing with chalk on a sidewalk?
And now let me posit point number 2: There are no answers without a resurrection.
Let me put it this way. Imagine sitting in a toilet stall in the North Tower of the World Trade Center on the morning of September 11, 2001. Imagine a sudden tumult, a roar, a crushing sound of tremendous reverberation; imagine the lights going out and fire seeping down distorted ceilings and walls; imagine feeling in the dark the heat of hell's infernos pouring down around you, with the building swaying like a tree in the wind. Imagine leaping to your feet to escape, only to discover that the doors won't open; that the noise above has misshapen the building. There is no escape. You hear screams outside the door. Your world is about to end, and you know it, though panic drives you to yell and pound and pull. Smoke fills your lungs, you choke against it, falling low to the floor, a distant smoke alarm sounding too far away.
If this is your death, if this is the ending of your life and the shutting down of your universe, don't you think the universe owes you the courtesy of an explanation as to how you died? Don't you think the universe should answer your panicked questions: Am I the only one who will die here? Is this an earthquake? A bomb? The end of the world? Or do you think the universe which created you will toss you into that great chasm with nary a word?
Well, if you do, then the universe is not only a prodigal mother, she is a cruel one.
You see, without a resurrection, the victims of the World Trade Center attacks will never know the why? or what?; or whether justice was ever meted out. Without resurrection, in fact, there are no answers at all. But don't you think that others, too, like John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., have a right to know the end of their sad, yet important and transformative stories? Or shall those two great men just be scattered like so much fertilizer to feed more of the universe's vicious tricks?
Furthermore, without resurrection we can never know how life really began, for certain. We can't ever know, with absolute clarity, whether Newton or Einstein or Darwin was right; we will not know whether Jesus really did leave His tomb after dying on a cross. To paraphrase St. Paul, if there be no resurrection, all our hopes are in vain. For there is nothing we will ever know.
Where is Amelia Earhart? Even if she is found today, all those who have died looking for her will never know that answer. Who killed Nicole Simpson? We'll never know, for sure (and she, at least, deserves an answer, no?). What of the little Florida girl, raped for days, only to die buried alive by her monstrous neighbor? Does she deserve no answer, no report of justice, that explains and justifies the wood and dirt beneath her scratching fingernails?
Of course, all this only matters to those who care to have answers, to have closure and certitude and understanding and justice. If one doesn't care for these things, then complaining about the cold, cruel cosmos is a waste of consciousness and time.
***
A former professor of mine, Peter Kreeft, introduced me to an article by a philosopher named D.E. Harding†. The essay was entitled "On Having No Head", and it was a pleasant and even whimsical little foray into epistemology, the study of knowledge, of knowing; and ontology, or the study of being, of what is. Without bogging the reader down with details, let me simply say that Harding posited that each of us, at least those of us whose senses are intact, walk not with heads atop our bodies; we walk with the universe atop our shoulders. He suggested that there was no cranial wall between my brain and the sun; the sun––and the moon, stars and the birds outside my window––are carried around with me where I think my head is. They are in me and I am around them. (Perhaps none of this make sense unless one is stoned; but it makes sense to me, and I am quite straight.)
In other words, people are not just people: People are little universes; nay, they are the universe.
Hence, in a sense, when a human dies, the universe dies with them. Death then becomes something prodigal, wasteful, for a universe is lost when each person dies. And all this in light of the fact that each of us is the product of the universe, with all of the force of cosmic history behind us (sort of like "the network" in those Verizon wireless commercials). We are not a few years or decades old: the ringing in your ears is the music of the spheres in the ancient empyrean glory.
Let me then posit point number 1: If there is no resurrection, the universe is a very wasteful place. How else to describe the tossing aside of a Rembrandt or Tolstoy; a Michelangelo or Mother Theresa; a Jesus, or even a child drawing with chalk on a sidewalk?
And now let me posit point number 2: There are no answers without a resurrection.
Let me put it this way. Imagine sitting in a toilet stall in the North Tower of the World Trade Center on the morning of September 11, 2001. Imagine a sudden tumult, a roar, a crushing sound of tremendous reverberation; imagine the lights going out and fire seeping down distorted ceilings and walls; imagine feeling in the dark the heat of hell's infernos pouring down around you, with the building swaying like a tree in the wind. Imagine leaping to your feet to escape, only to discover that the doors won't open; that the noise above has misshapen the building. There is no escape. You hear screams outside the door. Your world is about to end, and you know it, though panic drives you to yell and pound and pull. Smoke fills your lungs, you choke against it, falling low to the floor, a distant smoke alarm sounding too far away.
If this is your death, if this is the ending of your life and the shutting down of your universe, don't you think the universe owes you the courtesy of an explanation as to how you died? Don't you think the universe should answer your panicked questions: Am I the only one who will die here? Is this an earthquake? A bomb? The end of the world? Or do you think the universe which created you will toss you into that great chasm with nary a word?
Well, if you do, then the universe is not only a prodigal mother, she is a cruel one.
You see, without a resurrection, the victims of the World Trade Center attacks will never know the why? or what?; or whether justice was ever meted out. Without resurrection, in fact, there are no answers at all. But don't you think that others, too, like John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., have a right to know the end of their sad, yet important and transformative stories? Or shall those two great men just be scattered like so much fertilizer to feed more of the universe's vicious tricks?
Furthermore, without resurrection we can never know how life really began, for certain. We can't ever know, with absolute clarity, whether Newton or Einstein or Darwin was right; we will not know whether Jesus really did leave His tomb after dying on a cross. To paraphrase St. Paul, if there be no resurrection, all our hopes are in vain. For there is nothing we will ever know.
Where is Amelia Earhart? Even if she is found today, all those who have died looking for her will never know that answer. Who killed Nicole Simpson? We'll never know, for sure (and she, at least, deserves an answer, no?). What of the little Florida girl, raped for days, only to die buried alive by her monstrous neighbor? Does she deserve no answer, no report of justice, that explains and justifies the wood and dirt beneath her scratching fingernails?
Of course, all this only matters to those who care to have answers, to have closure and certitude and understanding and justice. If one doesn't care for these things, then complaining about the cold, cruel cosmos is a waste of consciousness and time.
***
So, let us assume now, that there is a resurrection; that the cosmos does offer answers beyond the grave. Why would Christ's resurrection matter?
For one, if the cosmos does indeed give rebirth to the dead (reincarnation is ultimately unsuitable since, if I am reincarnated, I still have questions); and if the universe is indeed NOT prodigal, but pointed and forthcoming with answers, then there is no reason to suspect that Christ could not have been raised from the dead by the very forces that raised us all to life. Moreover, if Christ is indeed so raised, it speaks to the very heart of the matter because He might have something to say.
Alas, He does have something to say, and His message is quite simple: There is a loving Father to the cosmos, outside of space and time; a Being who stands in transcendant relation to the cosmos like a father stands outside his wife's reproductive womb; a caring and gentle and just Creator who has the vantage of being outside all things, knowing all, and therefore capable of answering our heart's deepest questions. If we but let Him; if we but desire life eternal; if we have hopes and dreams, and a need of answers.
***
Holy Week: Christ was nailed to a cross; He died and was buried, and descended into our very hells; all as proof that the Father would rather be in hell with us than in heaven without us. The only question addressed to us is whether we want to leave our hellish tombs; whether we want to "come forth!"; whether we can leave behind what cannot come to the place of Peace and Answers.
There are no answers if Christ is not raised.
Christ has died.
Christ has risen.
Christ has answered indeed.
Peace to you.
©Bill Gnade 2006/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.
†There is a book by Harding by the same name. It is small and quite good, though it was odd to learn from it (?) that Harding converted to Hinduism.
Update (April 21, 2006): It is trite to say this, but there are numerous thoughts recently posted to the blogosphere re: Resurrection that are worth noticing. I enjoyed the comments at Ocular Fusion; this brief passage at Table Talk is also strong. And this related essay at Stomata is enlightening.
Technorati tags: Easter, Christianity, Jesus, Resurrection, Peter Kreeft, D. E. Harding
For one, if the cosmos does indeed give rebirth to the dead (reincarnation is ultimately unsuitable since, if I am reincarnated, I still have questions); and if the universe is indeed NOT prodigal, but pointed and forthcoming with answers, then there is no reason to suspect that Christ could not have been raised from the dead by the very forces that raised us all to life. Moreover, if Christ is indeed so raised, it speaks to the very heart of the matter because He might have something to say.
Alas, He does have something to say, and His message is quite simple: There is a loving Father to the cosmos, outside of space and time; a Being who stands in transcendant relation to the cosmos like a father stands outside his wife's reproductive womb; a caring and gentle and just Creator who has the vantage of being outside all things, knowing all, and therefore capable of answering our heart's deepest questions. If we but let Him; if we but desire life eternal; if we have hopes and dreams, and a need of answers.
***
There are no answers if Christ is not raised.
Christ has died.
Christ has risen.
Christ has answered indeed.
Peace to you.
©Bill Gnade 2006/Contratimes - All Rights Reserved.
†There is a book by Harding by the same name. It is small and quite good, though it was odd to learn from it (?) that Harding converted to Hinduism.
Update (April 21, 2006): It is trite to say this, but there are numerous thoughts recently posted to the blogosphere re: Resurrection that are worth noticing. I enjoyed the comments at Ocular Fusion; this brief passage at Table Talk is also strong. And this related essay at Stomata is enlightening.
Technorati tags: Easter, Christianity, Jesus, Resurrection, Peter Kreeft, D. E. Harding
4 comments:
You had Peter Kreeft as a professor? I have a book by him, Summa of the Summa and he's one deep writer. I have not made it through this book. I think I need a tutor.
Yes, Dr. Kreeft was one of my profs. He was -- and surely remains -- a great teacher. I am glad that you've had some experience with him.
I have not read the book to which you refer. I am sure it is a weighty book, as St. Thomas is no easy read.
Blessings!
BG
I enjoyed this post, Bill. I appreciate the ability to meditate on this paramount theme of Scripture without defaulting to religious cliches and the usual expressions of the concept. Jesus was noted for teaching differently than the other scribes and teachers of the law. I think that had something to do with His ability to teach truth in fresh and relevant language. Of course, He accomplished that with ease because He embodied truth, not simply descriptions/language of truth.
Dear Jason,
It is heartening to learn that you have found this essay interesting. I was a bit nervous about it. You've allayed my fears.
Yes, you are right about Christ's teaching. It is amazing to think about not just what He said, but how He said it; and that, today, 2000 years later, we can still find not only something timeless, we can find something new.
Peace.
BG
Post a Comment