The Pulpit Commentary — John — Volume 2 — Section 459

at onoe compel them to follow their Lord'■ tum,aa the dlaolplea(or some of them) were eu.mple, drink of hia oup, and be ba.ptir;ed ready to euggeet. Bia ftnt word, thouah with bia baptiam. The doore were cloaed, oonaieting in form of the common ealut11l1~11 when J1111111 oam,, anti lltoocl in the mid■t-a of the East, muet have meant immeaaumbly phrue which ta here identioa.l with that in more to them than it doea In ordinary p11r• Lnlre's n1n-rative. Now, John who, oon- lanoe. And Jem■ ■a.lth unto them, Peaoa aonsntly with Luke, hae reoo~ed hie evi- be to you I which, uttered in well-remem- denoe that the body of Chrillt wu not a bered tonee, reminded them of how he b11cl phantBl!mal imagination, but a veritable, diacriminated hie "peace," and hia mnoocr visible, and tangible reality (Ree Luke niv. or gi'ring it from the world'a " pc11cc," aml 87-~), identifiable with the very body the world'a mauner of giving (eh. xiv. 27). whfoh hod been 10 omelly wounded and It meant the huehing of their fe11r, the brui~C'd for them, takee special paina to hint, expulsion of t.errible ahmn (see Luke xxiv. by a single clau11e, that the body of Christ 37, 38). This is John's summary of all was a new creation, and was submitted to that he ea.id. Luke, with much detail, lawa profoundly different from th011e which rcoords how tho Lord proved th11t he we.a, we have generalized from the intimatiom of not a mere subjective vision, but o. veritable the five Ensc• only. John does not say man, with floah, and bonea, and voice, and that the doors were opened by some magio power to tnke food. Conseq ucntly the evan- proceu, nor that Christ ■imply passed gelists labour to make evident the fact that tbrougb the cloeed door■, nor t.ha.t they the apiritue.l resurrection-body, though 11 were mira.culously removed; but that he oontinuation of the old life, with eigne of its bed. taken up his position before them by a identity, is, nevertheless, emancipated from procc&s which, to the body made of the dust the ordinary conditions of our materio.l cor- of the earth, would be eupremely miraculoll8, poreity, This is one of the places where Cere we have a revelation made to prepe.red the nsrra.tive tranacenda experience and minds of a new order of exieteDCe(■ee West- i.ma.gination, and appea.J.a to faith in a cott'e • Revelation■ of the Rieen Lord,' and higher order of bei.Dg than croeees the field Milligan'■ 'Rceurrection of Chriet.,' on the of scientific vision. likenes11 and on the unlikeness of the risen Ver. 20.-When he had Ba.id this-i.e. body with that which had died). It is more when he had uttered all that WBB involved than possible-nay, it is entirely presamable in his Divine aa.J.utation-he ehowed them -that the apiritu&l body becomes possessed hi.I bande ILild his Bide. Luke says "his of a.dditional BeilS8II, of whieb we have no hand.a and his feet;" John calls attention to conception or experience ; and, therefore, the the speciaJ. wound in his l!!lcred side, the spirit clothed with aneb body is alive to making of which be had 110 closely described properties of matter and dimeneione of epa.ce and verified (eh. xix. 33-35). Norwae thia and active forcea all of which would be vision of the Lord restricted to the ocular aupernatural to 'Ill, "c:ribbed, cabined, and testimony, to the bare fact of the Reeurrec- confined " u we are now and here. Our tion, but it WBB e. 10lemn assurance that he, Lard, before his P11111ion, gave numeroll8 though risen, bad died for them. He is the proofs of the dominance of his spirit over Living One that was dee.cl, and ia alive for the body : his repeated esca.pea from his evermore. He ia in the midst of the throne, enemies, the power of his voice and glance, a Lamb as it had been slain. In his greatest his transfiguration-glory, his auperiority to glory neither doce ho nor co.n his people gravitation in we.Iking npon the aea and forget his sa.crifioial death. "He showed hnahiDg its lltorms. So that he, on this them his hands and his eido." Some have occasion, is revealing to the world some of argued, from John's eilence about his" feet," the function■ of epiritual corporeity. 1 He that he intended to correct a. general im- is manifesting the kind of life which will pression which the synoptic narrative had eventually be the condition of all the r~ produced, viz. that our Lord's feet bad deemed-visible and tangible at will to those been nailed to the cross. There is no reBBon who are limited to our present condition whatever for any such hypothesie. The and at.age of being, bat also i.o. its normaJ. evangelist simply emphasizes the ghastly etat.e invisible, impe.lp&ble, to eye and touch proof of his Lord's actual dea.th, with it1 of mortu.l eense. There can be little doubt supernatural accompaniments, as a more that John df,Oply recogui.zed what Paul vivid evidence of identity than the piercing describt:d &s .. the spiritual body." Juu., of the feet: moreoYer, it was a fact to which 6'Dod auddenly i.o. their midst, not a phan- he had borne special testimony. Somo con- ception is given in both the ~ l e of the 1 See R. L Wilberforce,• The Doctrine of marks and vestigoa of the earthly pilgrimage the Iw:a.rnation;' hue Taylor, ' PhysicaJ. which will survive d£,e.th and J>BIS on into the Theory of Another Life;• Sears, •The Hean eternal world. 'l'he diloiples, ill.erafore, were of Christ.' gwl when theJ aaw the Lord. In Luke uiv, Oil, XL 1---81.] TltE GOSPEL ACOORnINo TO BT. JOHN. 473