Rev. Martin Lettow, of Shepherd of Hills Lutheran Church of Boulder, Colo., delivers his sermon as the sun rises over the reservoir. (Courtesy of AP)
Brandon Bub’s article this week concerning Easter warmed my heart. It reminds me of the great friendship that Jesus shared with his disciples and the unconditional love given to the world by dying what Bub has well described as a “particularly nasty way to go.” But Easter is not about death, but life. Certainly, part of life is memory, family and friends and Bub’s nostalgic ruminations are welcome.
However, I want to take a different direction on Easter. If Jesus was not resurrected, then Christianity crumbles.
Of course, some might draw issue with this, claiming the Resurrection is simply a metaphor; it’s about new inner life, not actual life. There is certain plausibility to this interpretation, but it doesn’t really have historical legitimacy. With widespread naturalism, the sense of attachment to religion has to be reinterpreted in order to accommodate current worldviews.
Christianity could hardly claim exclusivity of truth if it’s merely about change of the inner life or social reform. Many other religions and philosophies have that or even claim that. I do not want to disparage the very tangible and powerful transformation that faith in Christ’s life, death and resurrection can bring to the individual and society. However, I do want to give a little perspective.
If Christ was resurrected, then we have the conquering of both sin and death. If Christ died and was stolen away by the disciples, negating the Resurrection, then we have the most elaborate and convincing hoax in all of history. The disciples wanted to keep the hoax going, so they all went to violent and painful deaths.
If the Resurrection is just allegory, then there is no reason why we could not develop a better allegory to convey our ideas about God. Can an allegory even be true? In a sense, I think an allegory can convey truth, but allegories do not convey fact. Allegories create (often fanciful) analogies between the world and the story in order to share ideas and conceptions about the world. “The Stranger” by Albert Camus is just as much an allegory for the absurdity of human existence as Aesop’s Fables are for little life lessons. This certainly doesn’t make the stories true, just conveying truth.
However, I contend that the Resurrection would be much less than an allegory if it did not occur. Not only have people claimed that the Resurrection is fact for thousands of years, but it was purported to have occurred by Jesus’ disciples. Therefore, if we interpret the Resurrection as an allegory, then it makes a tremendous amount of people out to be liars and frauds. Now that is a bold claim.
We can never create an experiment to prove a Resurrection, especially since the definition of a miracle is an exception to the rule. As an exception, we can hardly test it. But might we not believe in it? I encourage everything to look at the evidence and the arguments for and against the Resurrection. However, the presuppositions that miracles cannot occur, that God doesn’t exist, that naturalism and materialism are entirely true, will entirely preclude the possibility of the Resurrection, and then there is no discussion to be had.
Dearman is a junior majoring in political science and philosophy.
