LlTK.RATt'iiK.— On the sii;iiiflcuiice of the UestnTcclion see W. Milligan, licsurn-cliim of our Lord, Loiuioii, IS&l, lectin. Iv., v., vi. ; B. F. Westcott,V,'i/.«i»'; of the lirmrreclionl, do., 1891, clla. ii. £111(1 iii. ; S. D. F. Salm'ond, Christian Dticlrinc of Immorialitu-^, KdinlJurnh, lOlll, bku. iv., v., vi. ; J. Orr, kcsurrectiuii of Jesus, Lciiidon, 19(18, ch. X. ; D. W. Forrest, Christ of llistorif ami of iCxpertfttceT, Edinburgh, 1914, lect. iv. ; E. Griffith-Jones, Thr AsceiU through Christ'^, London, 191)1, bk. iii. chs. i. and ii. ; W. J. Sparrow Simpson, Jicsurrrctiuti and Modem 7'Ac»U(;A(, do., 1911, bk. iii., art. ' Kesurreotion o( Christ,' in DCG ii. 51V!; B. Lucas, The Fifth Gospel, London, 1907, p. 160 If. ; D. S. Cairns, 'The Uisen Christ ' in Christ and Human Seed, do., 1912, p. 176f. ; H. Scott Holland, 'The Power of tlie Resurrection,' in Miracles, do., 1911, p. 11811. ; S. Eck. ' Die liedeutiiri^ (let .\iif'-rslehunjf Jesu fiir die Ur. t^etiieiiide und ttir uns,' in IJe/te zur christtichen Welt, xxxii. 1189b]; R. H. Gr\itzmAci\er, Modern-positive I'ortrdge, Leip- zi;^, 190U, pp. 109-1*29, 'Jesu Auferstehunif und der Meiisch der Gegenwart.'
V. Attempted explanations of tue be- lief.— The character and signilicuice of the apostolic belief in the resurrection of Christ have been considered, and the historical evidence on which the belief was based. It remains to review the attemjits which have been made to account for the apostolic belief and its consequences without acknowledging the full fact of the Resurrection, as this^s re]iresented in the apostolic writings.
i. Older form.sof explanation.— Some of the older naturalistic hypotheses may now be regarded as obsolete and .abandoned. They have practically only a historical or antiquarian interest, and do not need to be re-argued at length. Yet they are not on that account to be overlooked. As monu- ments not only recording past history, but serving as warnings to all time of the futility of certain methods of explanation, thej- demand passing notice.
1. The swoon theory. — According to this theory, Jesus' supposed death on the Cross was in reality only a swoon, a case of 'suspended animation.' In the cool air of the cavern tomb He revived and again appeared among His disciples. This ex- planation— a favourite one in the school of 18th cent, rationalism, and associated especially with the name of Paulus — is now hopelessly discredited. To escape with His life after having been nailed to the Cross meant that the Resurrection, if resurrec- tion it could be called, was a return to life under the same conditions as before, and this, as we have seen, is not the kind of fact with wliich the records deal. The practical ditficulties of the theory are insuperable. If Jesus had presented Himselfmerely as one who had stolen half-dead out of the sepulclire. His appearance would have produced the impres- sion of weakness and helplessness, not that of a conqueror over death and the grave. (For a trenchant statement of these practical difficulties see Strauss, New Life of Jesus, i. 412.)
2. The theft or fraud theory. — A second hypo- thesis, Mhich may also be taken as now practically discredited, is the theory that the disciples, in order that they might still have a message, stole the body and pretended that Jesus had risen. The theory is an old one — the oldest of all indeed, if we may believe the story of Mt 25"'", which was still current in the days of Justin Martyr (Dial, with Trypho, 17). Tlie theory thus anticipated by the Jewish authorities was urged, though with some difference of detail, by Celsus (see Origen, c. Cels. ii. 56). It is identified in modern times chiefiy with the name of Reimarus. The theory thus stated would found Christianity on imjiosture or fraud. But no sober critic now challenges the good faith of the first disciples in their witness. They ' really had the impression of having seen him' (Schmiedel, EBi iv. 40(il). A more recent form of the theory is that adopted by O. Holtz- niann (Life of Jesus, p. 409), that the body was qnietly removed by the owner of ihegr.ave without the knowledge of the di.'^ciples. Joseph of Arima- tlia;a, feeling, on rellexion, that it would not do to
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have in his respectable family vault the body of a man wliu had been cnu-ilied, liad the body of Jesus seeretly removed and buried elsewliere. Another form of tlie tliuory is that sugj^ested by A. Iteville (see Jisiis de JVazareth. Etudes critiques sur les ant(chlents de Vhisloire ivangilique, Paris, 1897, ii. 420 11'.), that the leaders of the Sanhedrin bribed the soldiers to remove the body lest the tomb mi^'ht become an object of jjilf,'rimage to Jesus' followers in Galilee, and fanatical outbreaks mi<;ht occur in Jerusalem. Lake gives what he holds to be a more possible hypothesis. His .suggestion is that the women in tlie dusk of the morning came to a tomb which they thought was the one in which they had seen the Lord buried. ' They e.xpected to find a closed tomb, but they found an open one ; and a young man, who was in the entrance, guessing their errand, tried to tell them that they had made a mistake in the place. " He is not here," said he ; " see the place where they laid him," and probably pointed to the next tomb. But the women were frightened at the detection of their errand and fled, only imperfectly or not at all understanding what they heard ' (The Resurrec- tion of Jesus Christ, p. 251 f.). B. H. Streeter (in Foundations, London, 1912, p. 134) claims that ' with a little ingenuity it is not difficult to imagine more than one set of circumstances which might account on purely natural grounds for the tomb being found empty.'