DOUBTS CONCERNING THE RESURRECTION: LUKE

Luke 24 presents us with a whole litany of examples of unbelief and uncertainly regarding the person of the resurrected Christ. As Fitzmyer puts it, “the proofs of the resurrection of Jesus are confronted throughout by human incredulity and lack of perception. Luke has not depicted the disciples of Jesus fleeing and deserting him at his passion, but he has not played down their obtuseness at his resurrection.”

Luke 24:11

It begins with the women bringing the report of the empty tomb to the apostles. “These words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them.” The NEB translates it as “nonsense”and The Message reads “but the apostles...thought they were making it up.”

This could possibly be a reflection of the general belief at the time that women were unreliable witnesses. But Craddock feels that this is the real explanation: “No doubt men bringing the same report would have met the same unbelief. Their faith waits on a confirming experience of the risen Christ, an experience that was not without its own element of unbelief (v. 41).”

And K.L. Anderson adds, “The empty tomb did not, by itself, demonstrate that Jesus had been raised from the dead. The apostles responded with incredulity [24:11]. Peter verified that the tomb was empty, except for the presence of burial cloths, which probably ruled out the possibility of grave robbers. But he was struck only with amazement (Lk 24:12).”

And it turns out that there is even some doubt as to whether even Peter believed enough to look for himself since some early manuscripts even omit verse 12 entirely. Textual scholars are today divided on the question. Bruce Metzger and the other members of the RSV translation committee recognized this problem but in the end saw no reason to omit v. 12 and “regarded the passage as a natural antecedent to ver. 24.” By contrast, NEB leaves this verse out as a later addition by someone else than Luke.

Luke 24:13-32

Green writes concerning this incident at Emmaus: “Disbelief and astonishment continue even in the presence of the risen Christ...Simply put, the disciples lack the cognitive categories for making sense of Jesus' passion. The cross and empty tomb require a depth of insight available only to those who have had their minds opened to understand the Scripture (Lk 24:45).

Craddock appears to agree with this understanding when he writes, “Clearly, more is involved than their blindness due to shock or an inability to recognize Jesus due to some transformation of his appearance...Faith is not coerced or overwhelmed by revelations to the unprepared.”

Marshall is somewhat noncommittal as to the exact reason for the two men's actions: “The most puzzling feature is perhaps the initial blindness of the disciples but this is more theological than legendary in character, and it has parallels in some other resurrection appearance narratives; the motif that the risen Jesus looked 'different' is widespread.” But in another publication, he writes that “a supernatural failure to perceive the identity is meant rather than that He had a different form (though this is possibly implied in Mk. 16:12).”

The “supernatural failure to perceive” is also a factor brought out by additional scholars who note that the passive formulation “their eyes were kept from recognizing him” in v. 16 is often used to indicate a direct and supernatural act of God.

In any case, the two disciples from Emmaus were certainly convinced enough of the reality of their encounter that they walked the whole 7 miles back to Jerusalem in order to tell the others. And another point is worth bringing up here. It soon becomes obvious that they belong enough with the in-crowd of believers to know exactly where the Eleven are hiding. This indicates that they probably had had close encounters with Jesus before His resurrection and were in a good position to know exactly what he looked and sounded like.

Luke 24:36-43

The immediate sequel to the above event is the sudden appearance of Jesus in the the closed room where the Eleven were found. But even at that point in time, there were still doubts in their minds. First, in verse 37 we are told that they took him for a ghost or disembodied spirit. And that belief was attributed to the fact that they were “startled and terrified.” But even after Jesus tried to dispel that notion by his words in v. 39, “they were still disbelieving and still wondering.” And this time, their unbelief is attributed to “their joy.” To me this is clear evidence that those back in that day were psychologically aware of the need to be suspicious of anything that appeared to fit in too well with their own wishes and desires.

The bottom line again is that no mere fabricator of these resurrection stories in his right mind would have hinted even once that there was a shadow of doubt that Jesus had bodily risen from the dead. The Luke accounts possess the ring of truth.