Was the Lord Jesus bodily resurrected?

[Marc]

The Jehovah's Witnesses say no but I have a few passages that I believe say yes. If I am misinterpreting them or there are any others that exist please do tell.
a. Matthew 28:9 says the women who were at the tomb "took hold of His feet". His feet must have been physical in order for them to hold them.
b. In Luke 24:42, 43 He ate fish.
c. In John 20:17 Mary clung to Him.
d. I'm not sure about this one but I'll give it a go. Matthew 12:40 - for just "AS" Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster "SO" shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. Just as the same phyical body of Jonah both went into the sea monster and came out of it the same physical body of the Lord Jesus went into the grave and came out of it as well.

Thanks
Marc

[m273p15c]

I believe your passage from Luke is one of the best, because it clearly states that Jesus was not a spirit alone, but was also flesh:

36 Now as they said these things, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, and said to them, "Peace to you."
37 But they were terrified and frightened, and supposed they had seen a spirit.
38 And He said to them, "Why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your hearts?
39 "Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have."
40 When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet.
41 But while they still did not believe for joy, and marveled, He said to them, "Have you any food here?"
42 So they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish and some honeycomb.
43 And He took it and ate in their presence. (Luke 24:36-43)

Jesus clearly states that He was not a mere spirit. In addition to encouraging the apostles to handle them, He eats something to deliberately prove his fleshly presence!

That being said, I did not know that was the Jehovah's Witness position, exactly. I thought they believed in a bodily resurrection, just that it was a similar, but different body and different spirit, recreated from the memory of God....

[truth]

· Was Jesus Christ resurrected bodily as a man of flesh and blood?

According to the inspired Scriptures, Jesus Christ was not raised to life in the flesh. At 1 Peter 3:18 we read that he was 'put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit.' (New World Translation; American Standard Version; C. B. Williams translation) Other scriptures confirm that Jesus simply could not have been raised bodily as a man of flesh and blood.

It was God's purpose for his Son to resume heavenly life and not to continue living as a man on earth. This necessitated Jesus' being raised as a spirit person, for persons of flesh and blood cannot live in the heavens. The apostle Paul wrote: "Flesh and blood cannot inherit God's kingdom, neither does corruption inherit incorruption."-1 Cor. 15:50.

In the case of the man Jesus Christ, his flesh was a barrier that prevented access to the heavenly realm. Jesus' "flesh" is, therefore, spoken of at Hebrews 10:20 as being represented by the "curtain" that separated the Holy from the Most Holy in the tabernacle. Before he could enter heaven, the real "Most Holy," Jesus had to give up his fleshly existence and receive spirit nature. His body of flesh would have been a barrier to his going beyond the "curtain" as a spirit person.

[sledford]

truth, your response has a lot of various thoughts and ideas in it that I frankly don't believe is time to deal with until I ask this one question: How do you resolve your conclusion with the quotation from Luke quoted earlier? The words uttered by Jesus after his resurrection about his body, the eating of food, Thomas's seeing the nail prints and spear wound all speak pretty clearly about a bodily resurrection.

[truth]

How are we to understand Jesus' words? His disciples thought, because of his sudden appearance in their midst, that they were seeing an apparition, even as they so thought when he came to them upon the water when they were in distress because of a storm. (Matt. 14:26, 27) Rather than try to get them to understand something for which they were not yet ready, Jesus merely assured them that he was no ghost or apparition, which he was not, but that it was indeed he; and he did indeed have a fleshly body which he materialized for the occasion. In other words, Jesus was assuring them that he was not the product of their imagination, neither was he someone else, but in truth and in fact the very Jesus they had known before his death.

[sledford]

Rather than try to get them to understand something for which they were not yet ready, Jesus merely assured them that he was no ghost or apparition, which he was not, but that it was indeed he; and he did indeed have a fleshly body which he materialized for the occasion. In other words, Jesus was assuring them that he was not the product of their imagination, neither was he someone else, but in truth and in fact the very Jesus they had known before his death.

I'm struggling here to understand your conclusion and the previous comments so please bear with me for a moment. I read your first comments to be a conclusion that Jesus was not bodily resurrected but your reading of Luke is that he conjured up a body for just that occasion and this time only? It was "optional" at this point whether he had a physical body, in other words? I have to ask, what is the internal, contextual proof that this is the case?

The reason I ask the last question is for one simple observation: on the 3rd day when Jesus was raised and his disciples went to the tomb, they found it empty, no body at all. The Jews also concluded there was no body since they bribed off the guards of the tomb. Where did the body go if Jesus was not bodily raised from the dead?

Likewise, Jesus made the comments in John 2:

19 Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.
20 The Jews therefore said, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou raise it up in three days?
21 But he spake of the temple of his body.
22 When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he spake this; and they believed the scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.

The root word in John for "body" is for a fleshly body. This is not some allegory or figurative language for "body", this is a statement by Jesus that he would be raised bodily after his death. There is much to be said that Jesus and his disciples used the empty tomb and a bodily resurrection as proof that Jesus was indeed who he said he was, the son of God, the Word incarnate, and obtained salvation for all those that follow him. I'll be candid that a non-bodily resurrection conclusion would seem to take away that evidence and the very basis of my hope in Jesus.

But, I also don't want to start chasing down a trail without understanding where your conclusion takes you (and us by virtue of my engagement). There is generally a thesis behind one thought such as this, that is fundamental to another. Can you share with me your thesis then of where this conclusion on a non-bodily resurrection is necessary in a further thought? Or is this an isolated conclusion?

[truth]

were ever possible ,i use logic.

1 Corinthians 15:43 It is sown in dishonor, it is raised up in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised up in power. 44 It is sown a physical body, it is raised up a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual one. 45 It is even so written: "The first man Adam became a living soul." The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

You might recall that there were a number of angles that materialized a body.
Were did the body go when the angles were done with it ? It dematerialized.

Are you thinking that he could of just left the body? please remember he was dead, both body and sprite.
My self i am quite grateful that their was no body found . If there was a body, what would of it of meant?
Can you even imagine what religion would do with such a thing ? Or for that mater what the anti-Christ movment would do.

[sledford]

were ever possible ,i use logic.

That is indeed good and I will readily subscribe to your point. But logic also requires harmonization of evidence. If one piece of evidence says something clearly that contradicts a conclusion based on other evidence there are limited choices:

a) either the conclusion is wrong - OR -
b) the evidence contradicting it is wrong

But, BOTH options can't be right.

Personally, I view and hold the Scriptures to be the infallible revelation of God, and by God. I find the internal and external evidence to be overwhelming to that point. Given that foundation, when I find that one of my conclusions does not agree with something clearly stated in Scripture, I immediately re-evaluate my conclusion. Because of the two options above, option (b) is infallible in the evidence provided through Scripture which means only my side of the equation is flawed in my conclusions.

Now that is not to stand in judgment of your conclusion because we currently disagree. It is possible that I am not properly evaluating the evidence provided in scripture. Scripture is perfect but sometimes my understanding of it, and the evidence it presents, is not. But I go through this explanation to tie back to your original statement of truth, logic would demand that the statements by Jesus in Luke and John already quoted cannot be just discarded. They have to be weighed in the balance of what ever conclusion is reached.

1 Corinthians 15:43 It is sown in dishonor, it is raised up in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised up in power. 44 It is sown a physical body, it is raised up a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual one. 45 It is even so written: "The first man Adam became a living soul." The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

You might recall that there were a number of angles that materialized a body.
Were did the body go when the angles were done with it ? It dematerialized.

Ah, but none of these angels staked their assertion that they were the Son of God, the incarnate Word in the flesh, on the resurrection of their body after being murdered on the cross. That is what Jesus says in the quote from John 2.

Are you thinking that he could of just left the body? please remember he was dead, both body and sprite.
My self i am quite grateful that their was no body found . If there was a body, what would of it of meant?
Can you even imagine what religion would do with such a thing ? Or for that mater what the anti-Christ movment would do.

No, that is not what I would conclude or imply at all. A body left behind disproves that Christ was raised and who he says he is as the Redeemer, the Savior of them that follow him. But likewise, a non-existent body, one that is dematerialized, also disproves the same point. Jesus point in John 2 and proof in Luke demonstrates that he is indeed who he says he is, the Great Redeemer, the Son of God, the incarnate Word, come to save men. Why? Because he was crucified and on the 3rd day raised again.