RESURRECTION, generally spoken of as resurrection of the dead, or of the body ( resurrectio mortuorum, resurrectio carnil, iivarracric vexp6v) is the doctrine of the reunion of the soul and body of man after their separation in death. This teaching of re vealed religion should be distinguished from that of the immortality of the soul, and the eternal survival of human personality after death. (See Immorraut7). Moreover, the miraculous resuscitation of the dead,— by the intercession of the prophets of the Old Law and the apostles of the New, or by the Divine power of Jesus Christ,—does not enter within the scope of the belief in a general resurrec tion. After summing up the traces of the res urrection-belief as they are found in paganism, this article will give the biblical, ecclesiastical and patristic evidence in favor of the revealed truth of a future resurrection; and will then establish the fundamental fact of Christianity, the resurrection of Christ.
I. Pagan Traces.— In pagan religions, de generated from God's primitive revelation to the human race, there is a common and definite belief in the survival of human personality after death; but the traces of a hope of a future resurrection are not universal nor distinct. Many savage tribes witness to a crude belief in metempsychosis. Such theories of reincarnation and transmigration of souls may readily be dis tortions of a primitive revelation of the resur rection of the body. The totemistic worship of the bear, the beaver, etc., which is found among the Sioux, Iroquois and other American In dians, follows upon the idea that the souls of the tribal ancestors have been reincarnated in those animals. Among the Egyptians, reincar nation was a purification of the soul and a prepa ration for final and separate existence. Consult Budge,
326; Lenormant,
IL Old Testament Teaching.— 1. Genesis. The human race, at its creation, was endowed with the preternatural gift of immortality. At the dawn of human life, the separation of soul from body in death was precluded by God's special providence. The tree of life stood in the midst of Eden (Genesis 9); and the eat ing of the fruit of that tree was somehow associated with the immortality of Adam's ani mated body. Jahweh intended to perpetuate this preternatural and deathless union of man's soul with his body, had Adam not sinned. But Adam sinned. He and the human race lost the preternatural gift of immortality. God had threatened: °Dying thou shalt die,' if thou disobey (Genesis u, 17 and iii, 3). After the disobedience, that threat was fulfilled: °Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return' (Genesis iii, 19). °By one man the sin entered into the world; and by the sin entered death. And in this wise death passed unto all men, for as much as all sinned' (Romans v, 12). However, the final triumph over death is im plied in the promised victory of the seed of the woman over the seed of the serpent `Genesis iii, 15).