Was Jesus’ Resurrection Spiritual or Physical?

The following is an article by Dr. Nicholas Schaser of the Israel Bible Center.^[1] I will present it in full with my comments. First, the email sent to me had this tantalizing introduction, followed by the main article:

Jesus’ body after the resurrection: seen and unseen, recognized and unrecognized, and is tangible and intangible. . So... which one is it?

What does the Bible — and ancient Jewish theology — really say about the nature of resurrection?

The Nature of Jesus’ Body
According to the Gospels, Jesus is raised bodily from the dead after his crucifixion. However, while the resurrected Messiah is embodied, that body does not behave like our earthly bodies. Instead, Jesus’ body both appears and disappears, is recognized and unrecognized, and is tangible and intangible. But did you know? This “both/and” presentation of Jesus coheres with Jewish views of post-resurrection bodies: when people are raised from the dead, their physical bodies are made of “spirit” material unfettered by the physics of our terrestrial realm!

Jewish Expectations of a Physical Resurrection
On the one hand, ancient Jews viewed resurrection in quite concrete terms. The Maccabean literature expects that the same body parts that exist in one’s earthly life will be reanimated through resurrection.

‘I got these from [God in] heaven… and from him I hope to get them back again’” (2 Maccabees 7:10-11).

The most gruesome description along these lines is in the death of the righteous Razi who, after being stabbed by the Seleucids,

“tore out his entrails, took them in both hands, and hurled them at the crowd, calling upon the Lord of life and spirit to give them back to him again” (2 Macc 14:46).

These texts show that Jews before Jesus hoped that God would restore the body parts that they had lost at the end of their lives by raising them from the grave. Jesus’ resurrected body affirms this Jewish belief when he tells Thomas,

“Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side” (John 20:27).

Jesus’ resurrection body retains the wounds he had sustained on the cross. Both the 2 Maccabees and the Gospel of John show that resurrection is a physical phenomenon by which the formerly deceased retain the bodies they had in life.

[Me: Jesus is identified, not explicitly by his face, but by two categories of wounds, the hand wounds from his crucifixion and the spear wound mentioned only in John 19:34. These wounds are also incomplete: there is no mention of foot wounds as in Luke 24:39, nor any notice of the crown of thorn wounds or even of scourging. This stands in contrast to the statement that “Jesus’ resurrection body retains the wounds he had sustained on the cross.”]

Transformation into a Spiritual Body
On the other hand, one’s resurrection body was made of material unlike the flesh and blood indicative of earthly existence. According to a text known as 2 Baruch, which is roughly contemporaneous with the Gospels, those who are raised from the dead will have their bodies changed:

“... They will be transformed… and made like the angels, and be made equal to the stars, and they shall be changed into every form they desire” (2 Bar. 51.3, 5, 10).

[Me: The complete text reads: 3: Also as for the glory of those who have now been justified in My law, who have had understanding in their life, and who have planted in their heart the root of wisdom, then their splendour shall be glorified in changes, and the form of their face shall be turned into the light of their beauty, that they may be able to acquire and receive the world which does not die, which is then promised to them. 5: When therefore they see those, over whom they are now exalted, but who shall then be exalted and glorified more than they, they shall respectively be transformed, the latter into the splendour of angels, and the former shall yet more waste away in wonder at the visions and in the beholding of the forms. 10: For in the heights of that world shall they dwell, And they shall be made like the angels, And be made equal to the stars, And they shall be changed into every form they desire, From beauty into loveliness, And from light into the splendour of glory.]

This vision of the resurrection echoes Paul’s description:

“If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body….he dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed (ἀλλαγησόμεθα; allagesōmetha). For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality” (1 Corinthians 15:42-44, 50, 52-53).

This “change” from flesh to spirit explains Jesus’ ability to appear suddenly in a room whose “doors were locked” (John 20:19), as well as his disciples being “kept from recognizing him” before he “vanished from their sight” (Luke 24:16, 31).

Jesus’ resurrection was both physical and spiritual: his physical body is the same one that was crucified outside Jerusalem and that body is changed in substance and appearance.

[Me: This is a contradiction though, even if in the “both/and” presentation. It cannot be both “the same” body and a “changed in substance and appearance” body. Something must be sacrificed for this to work—Jesus’ crucified body.]

According to Jewish theology, those who are raised from the dead are the same beings whose earthly bodies had been made in the image of God, and those bodies are reformed into imperishable spirit material.

[Me: Overall, I like Dr. Nicholas Schaser’s presentation. I especially appreciate his highly relevant citations to 2 Maccabees and 2 Baruch. The Maccabean texts were especially important as providing martyriological and soteriological templates for Christian theology. (See Comparing Abel’s blood with Jesus’ blood for the soteriological template seen in 4 Maccabees.)]

More on Maccabees:
This is what the SBL Study Bible and the Oxford Annotated Study Bible have said about 2 Maccabees 7:11 and 14:46:

SBL:
7.11 Hope in bodily resurrection is based on the power of God as creator, not on human nature.

14.46 Razis’s voluntary death was based on the conviction that God would restore his body in the resurrection (see 7.11, 22-23).

(22-23: I do not know how your life began in my womb, she would say, I was not the one who gave you life and breath and put together each part of your body. 23 It was God who did it, God who created the universe, the human race, and all that exists. He is merciful and he will give you back life and breath again, because you love his laws more than you love yourself.)

With that reference to 22-23, that note is:
7.22-23 See v. 11; Job 1.10-12; Ps 139.13-16; Eccl 11.5 for God as the origin of human life and so lord over its destiny.

Oxford:
He expected his body to be restored in the resurrection (7.11).

The difference with Jesus’ body is that it was sacrificed.—Hebrews 10:10, 20.

Footnotes:
^[1] lp.israelbiblecenter.com/lp-biblical-studies-content-was-jesus-resurrection-spiritual-or-physical-en.html