Jesus’ Mission and the Resurrection
Jesus’ Mission and the Resurrection
If Jesus went to Jerusalem expecting his death at the hands of the political elite (as we have argued) yet also envisioned a role for himself in the imminent kingdom (as we have also argued), he apparently trusted God to vindicate him. He certainly believed in an eschatological resurrection,194 so there should be no question that he expected to rise from the dead. By itself, this could explain his sayings about his role in the coming kingdom (e.g., Matt 19:28//Lk 22:30; Son of Man sayings; parousia sayings).195
But if Jesus also established a school to carry on after him, he may have envisioned an interim era between his martyrdom and the consummation of the kingdom. If we allow the possibility of his resurrection predictions (e.g., Mk 8:31; Jn 2:19), we can even entertain at least the possibility that he envisioned what in fact his disciples just days after his execution believed happened. Whether he expected his resurrection with others or in advance of them, but especially in the latter case, Jesus died expecting God to raise and vindicate him. This posture coheres with both the demands for radical faith (Mk 4:40; 5:36; 6:7-13; 9:23, 29; 11:22-24; Matt 6:25-34//Lk 12:22-32; Matt 7:7-11//Lk 11:9-13) and nonresistance (Matt 5:38-47; 7:1; Lk 6:27-37) found elsewhere in our gospel sources about Jesus.
Was Jesus’ faith in God’s intervention on his behalf misplaced? We cannot really begin to answer this question without asking a question involving the rest of his ministry. Was God active in Jesus’ ministry? Did Jesus cure people simply by giving them confidence (in which case he rose in the experience of his disciples only), or was the God of Israel actually working through him, in which case a yet greater miracle might be deemed possible? Some scholars, grappling with how to translate the disciples’ resurrection experience for a modern world, ask whether it should be interpreted in light of modern (nonsupernaturalist) premises, or whether such premises should be modified in light of the resurrection?196
Any approach to this question in turn raises a philosophic question: is it possible that a deity, if one exists, can do miracles?197 Can God act in history? I will treat this question only briefly, in appendix 8. (The question of miracles requires a separate book, a sequel to this one, where I can address ancient parallels, the objections of David Hume, and other issues. Even in that sequel, however, my primary focus will remain with the historiographic question regarding the plausibility of eyewitness testimony to miracle claims, more than with the philosophic question of divine activity.) While I do not, as I have said, agree with those who rule out of bounds the validity of such a question, my purpose in the main part of this book has been to make a case on other historical grounds without exploring that question here.
We mentioned earlier that Jesus’ movement survived in contrast to those of other Judean prophets because his followers distinctively believed that he remained alive. (This distinctiveness invokes a positive use of the dissimilarity criterion.) This belief invites the further historical question: Why did his movement in contrast to other first-century Jewish movements affirm that its teacher rose from among the dead? That question takes us to the heart of the question “What happened at the tomb?” We examine that question in Appendix 8.