(2) The significance of the term used in reference to tlie resurrection of Clirist has to be noted as setting forth St. Paul's conception of the nature of the event. He does not say simply, ' He rose on the third day,' but, ' He hath been raised (iy-qyeprai.) on the third day.' The use of the perfect tense signifies that the event was of such a character as had an abiding eft'ect on the condition of the Lord. His resurrection was not like other raisings from the dead recorded in the Scriptures, where the raising meant simply restoration to the old life and the old conditions, with the prospect of meeting death again in the future. Christ rose, St. Paul says, and remains in the risen state ; He has triumphed over death: 'Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more ; death no more hath dominion over him' (Ro 6"). As risen He belongs to a new and higher mode of being. St. Paul's conception of the nature of Christ's risen body is more fully elucidated by his teaching as regards the ' spiritual ' body (see more fully below, III. ii. and IV. ii. 2 (e)).
(3) This gospel which he had preached in Corinth, including as one of its great attirmations the fact that Christ was raised on the third day, was not, he says, peculiar or original to him. He had but ' delivered ' (irapiSwKa, ' passed on ' [Motfatt]) what he had himself ' received ' (irapeXa^ov) — received not by direct revelation from Christ, but through tra-
KESURRECTION OF CHRIST
RESURRECTION OF CHRIST 333
dition from those who were in Christ before him (see Lake, The Historical Eriiloicc for the Resur- rection of Jesus Christ, p. ;jSir.). The channel through whifli he received the tradition he does not here indicate. In the Epistle to the tJalatians, however, an Episth; accepted with practical un- animity by NT scholars tliou;,'h it is dillicult to date it delinitely, lie tells us that three years after his conversion he went up to .lerusalem expressly ' to visit Cephas' (1", laropi^aai Kij^Sx), that he stayed there for a fortnight, and that he saw St. James also. The term iaTopijaat ' implies a careful and searching inquiry on his [Paul's] part'(.\. Eders- heim, LT^, I/ondcm, 1887, ii. 625 ; cf. Knowling, Testimony of St. Paul to Christ, p. 222, and A. Sabatier, The Apostle Paul, Eng. tr., London, 1891, p. 81). That his knowledge of the details of the common Christian tradition may be traced to this visit and prolonged interview witli two of the primary witnesses of the Resurrection is, therefore, altogether probable. As Schmiedel acknowledges, ' during his fifteen days' visit to Peter and James (Gal 1'*'), he had the best opportunity to perfect his knowledge on the subject in the most authentic manner' (Elii iv. 4057).
Through this visit, therefore, if not indeed already at his conversion, he came into possession of the facts which he had handed on to the Corinthians as the common Christian tradition. Some hold (e.g., W. Bousset, Kyrios Christos, Gottingen, 1913, p. 90 ff.) that the tradition which St. Paul here repeats, though indirectly derived from the older apostles, was mediated for him by the Hellenistic Cnristianity of Damascus and Antioch, and suffered modification accordingly. But St. Paul distinctly asserts (v.") that the substance of his preaching in Corinth was identical with that of the other apostles. This is a fact of the first importance. St. Paul's conversion took place not long after the death of Christ. Lightfoot dated it six or seven years after the Crucifixion, but the trend of more recent criticism is to place it much earlier, within a year or two of this event. Harnack places it in the year following the Death, as do also McGirt'ert and Mofl'att, while Ramsay makes it three or four and Weizsacker five years after (see art. ' Chrono- logy of the NT ' in HDB i. 424). St. Paul's visit to Jerusalem, therefore, and his interview with St. Peter and St. James fall possibly within five years, but certainly well within ten years, of the Resur- rection. We have, accordingly, in documents which all reasonable critics admit, the clearest evidence as to what the fundamental facts of Christianity were, as taught in the primitive com- munity, within tlie first decade of the event, by those who were primary witnesses of the Resurrec- tion. These were that ' Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures,' that 'he was buried,' that ' on the third day he was raised from the dead according to the scriptures,' and that ' he appeared ' to His disciples. If St. Paul's testimony, therefore, proves anything, it proves that the earliest apostolic witness included not only the fact of appearances of the Risen Christ, but the empty grave and the Resurrection on the third day.
(4) One other point in St. Paul's summary state- ment is to be noted. The atoning death of Christ (' for our sins'), and His resurrection on the third day are represented as being 'according to the scriptures' (xard ras ypatpas, v."-). St. Paul's belief in the Resurrection on the third day has been re- presented as a deduction or inference from OT prophetic Scripture, based ' on theological rather than historical grounds' (Lake, Resurrect ion of Jesus Christ, p. 264), or as due to a ' Messianic dogmatic,' a pre-Christian sketch of the Christ- portrait derived from widespread non-Jewish myths jchiefly Babylonian in origin) and embodietl in