This is the precise truth in respect to the Evangelists. Not one of them professes to state all that occurred after the crucifixion, or all the instances of our Lord’s appearing to his disciples. Each writes for the particular object he has in view. And there is a great liability to mistake, if one forgets that it is true in narratives in respect to transactions subsequent to the crucifixion, as well as before, that there is often a passing from one event to another with nothing to indicate but that they were immediately connected in point of time, when, in fact, there was a considerable interval between them.[A]
Of the ten specified instances of his appearing, Matthew speaks of two, Mark of three, Luke of three, John of four, and Paul of five, or seven;[7] but neither contradicts the other, nor Luke’s statement in his subsequent “treatise,” that Jesus showed himself alive after his passion “forty days, and speaking the things concerning the kingdom of God.”
The instances were sufficiently numerous, the time long enough, and the acts tangible enough, to afford as undoubted proof as that which they had of the existence and bodily presence of each other. Peter might as well have doubted the denial of which he had so bitterly repented, as to have doubted that it was his Master who said unto him the third time, “Simon, son of John, lovest thou me?” and all of them might as well have doubted that they had ever listened to his teaching, as to have doubted the commission which they received from him.
The evidence that was personal to themselves we cannot have. We know they had it, and were capable of judging concerning it, and we can see that it was of a character that might be justly deemed conclusive.
There is, besides, much that is common to us with them. The judgment was not of one but of many, and not from a single appearance to one of their number, but from many appearances to different persons, at various times, and under circumstances most favorable to a true apprehension, usually in open day; and it would be passing strange if each and all were deceived by their own senses.
These appearances were never repeated after the ascension. None of the disciples under any excitement ever again saw their Lord as the man Christ Jesus walking the earth as before; or saw him coming to the earth, although they all believed that he would speedily return in like manner as they beheld him going into heaven. Stephen saw him not upon the earth, but “standing on the right hand of God.” Paul saw him, and “was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision” (Acts xxvi. 19). John saw him, in vision, not only as “the Son of Man” in glorious array, but as “the Lion of the tribe of Judah,” and also as a “Lamb standing as though it had been slain,” in the “midst of the throne” (Revelation i. 12-20, and v. 5-8).
Their subsequent experience is consistent, if they had been dealing with realities. But if all their interviews during those forty days were a delusion, and the ascension a delusion, it is wholly inexplicable that their imagination or senses never played them false afterward. They believed that he would soon return, just as strongly as they believed that he had ascended, and yet they never saw him returning, or as having returned.
If delusions created the faith, how much more should the faith multiply the delusions, and such appearances (as Godet[8] has well put it) “go on increasing as the square of the belief itself.” Yet at the very time when they should have multiplied, if they were not real, they ceased altogether!
We have, as the disciples had, our Lord’s predictions[9] of his death and resurrection (for the two events were generally referred to in the same discourse), and the prophecies concerning him.
The greatest obstacle to their acceptance of his resurrection was their inability to comprehend his death if he were indeed the true Messiah. And hence we find that Jesus in the walk to Emmaus, opens to the disciples the Scriptures concerning himself, and says, “Behoved it not the Christ to suffer these things, and to enter into his glory?” We may well suppose that with other prophecies, he interpreted to them what Daniel had said (c. ix. 26) that “after three score and two weeks, shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself;” and that wonderful chapter in Isaiah (the fifty-third) so descriptive of his passion, that it seems “as if written at the foot of the cross;” and all the sacrifices for fifteen hundred years; and that it was not possible “that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins;” and as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so was the Son of Man “lifted up.” And so to the Apostles he explained the Scriptures, and said to them, “Thus it is written that the Christ should suffer, and rise again from the dead the third day.” (Luke xxiv. 45, 46). He reminds them what he had said, that all things must needs be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses and in the Prophets and in the Psalms concerning himself (Luke xxiv. 44). The angels say to the women, “Tell his disciples and Peter he goeth before you into Galilee, and there shall ye see him as he said unto you” (Mark xvi. 7); and also, “Remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, saying that the Son of Man must be delivered up into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again” (Luke xxiv. 6, 7). And we find that when the disciples understood the mystery of his death, they joyfully accepted the proofs of his resurrection; and Peter, who had said, “Be it far from thee, Lord, this shall never be unto thee” (Matthew xvi. 23), on the day of Pentecost could explain that Jesus (whom God had “raised up, having loosed the pangs of death”), was delivered up to be crucified and slain “by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God”; and that David spake of his resurrection. (Acts ii. 22-31.)