According to the fourth gospel, Jesus, at the very commencement of his ministry, in figurative language, referred his enemies, the Jews, to his future resurrection ([ii. 19 ff.]). On his first messianic visit to Jerusalem, and when, after the abuse of the market in the temple had provoked him to that exhibition of holy zeal of which we have formerly spoken, the Jews require a sign from him, by which he should legitimatize his claim to be considered a messenger of God, who had authority to adopt such violent measures, Jesus gives them this answer, Destroy this temple, and after three days I will raise it up, λύσατε τὸν ναὸν τοῦτον, καὶ ἐν τρισὶν ἡμέραις ἐγερῶ αὐτόν. The Jews took these words in the sense, which, since they were spoken in the temple, was the most natural, and urged, in reply to Jesus, that as it had taken forty years to build this temple, he would scarcely be able, if it were destroyed, to rebuild it in three days; but the Evangelist informs us, that this was not the meaning of Jesus, and that he here spoke (though indeed the disciples were not aware of this until after his resurrection), of the temple of his body, ναὸς τοῦ στόματος αυτοῦ: i.e. under the destruction and rebuilding of the temple, he alluded to his death and resurrection. Even if we admit, what however the most moderate expositors deny,[46] that Jesus could properly (as he is also represented to have done in [Matthew xii. 39 ff.]) when the Jews asked him for a visible and immediate sign, refer them to his resurrection as the greatest, and for his enemies the most overwhelming miracle in his history: still he must have done this in terms which it was possible for them to understand (as in the above passage of Matthew, where he expresses himself quite plainly). But the expressions of Jesus, as here given, could not possibly be understood in this sense. For when one who is in the temple, speaks of the destruction of this temple, every one will refer his words to the building itself. Hence Jesus, when he uttered the words, this temple, τὸν ναὸν τοῦτον, must have pointed to his body with his finger; as, indeed, is generally presupposed by the friends of this interpretation.[47] But, in the first place, the Evangelist says nothing of such a gesture, notwithstanding that it lay in his interest to notice this, as a support of his interpretation. In the second place, Gabler has with justice remarked, how ill-judged and ineffective it would have been, by the addition of a mere gesture to give a totally new meaning to a speech, which verbally, and therefore logically, referred to the temple. If, however, Jesus used this expedient, the motion of his finger could not have been unobserved; the Jews must rather have demanded from him how he could be so arrogant as to call his body the temple, ναὸς; or even if not so, still, presupposing [[577]]that action, the disciples could not have remained in the dark concerning the meaning of his words, until after the resurrection.[48]
By these difficulties modern exegetists have felt constrained to renounce John’s explanation of the words of Jesus, as erroneous and made ex eventu, and to attempt to penetrate, independently of the Evangelist’s explanation, into the sense of the enigmatical saying which he attributes to Jesus.[49] The construction put upon it by the Jews, who refer the words of Jesus to a real destruction and rebuilding of the national sanctuary, cannot be approved without imputing to Jesus an extravagant example of vain-glorious boasting, at variance with the character which he elsewhere exhibits. If on this account search be made for some figurative meaning which may possibly be assigned to the declaration, there presents itself first a passage in the same gospel ([iv. 21 ff.]) where Jesus announces to the woman of Samaria, that the time is immediately coming, in which the Father will no longer be worshipped exclusively in Jerusalem (ἐν Ἱεροσολύμοις), but will, as a Spirit, receive spiritual worship. Now in the present passage also, the destruction of the temple might, it is said, have signified the abolition of the temple-service at Jerusalem, supposed to be the only valid mode of worship. This interpretation is confirmed by a narrative in the Acts ([vi. 14]). Stephen, who, as it appears, had adopted the above expressions of Jesus, was taxed by his accusers with declaring, that Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place, and shall change the customs which Moses delivered, ὅτι Ἰησοῦς ὁ Ναζωραῖος οὖτος καταλύσει τὸν τόπον τοῦτον, καὶ ἀλλάξει τὰ ἔθη, ἃ παρέδωκε Μωϋσῆς: in which words a change of the Mosaic religious institutions, without doubt a spiritualization of them, is described as a sequel to the destruction of the temple. To this may be added a passage in the synoptical gospels. Nearly the same words which in John are uttered by Jesus himself, appear in the two first gospels ([Matt. xxvi. 60 f.]; [Mark xiv. 57 f.]) as the accusation of false witnesses against him; and here Mark, in addition, designates the temple which is to be destroyed, as one made with hands, χειροποίητος, and the new one which is to be built, as another, made without hands, ἄλλος, ἀχειροποίητος, whereby he appears to indicate the same contrast between a ceremonial and a spiritual religious system. By the aid of these passages, it is thought, the declaration in John may be explained thus: the sign of my authority to purify the temple, is my ability in a short time to introduce in the place of the Jewish ceremonial worship, a spiritual service of God; i.e. I am authorized to reform the old system, in so far as I am qualified to found a new one. It is certainly a trivial objection to this explanation, that in John the object is not changed, as in Mark, where the temple which is to be built is spoken of as another (ἄλλος), but instead of this, is indicated by the word αὐτὸς, as the same with the one destroyed;[50] since, indeed, the Christian system of religion in relation to the Jewish, may, just as the risen body of Jesus in relation to the dead one, be conceived as at once identical and different, inasmuch as in both cases the substance is the same, while the transitory accidents only are supposed to be removed. But it is a more formidable objection which attaches itself to the determination of time, ἐν τρισὶν ἡμέραις. That this expression is also used indefinitely and proverbially, in the sense of a short [[578]]interval of time in general, is not adequately proved by the two passages which are usually appealed to with this view; for in them the third day, by being placed in connexion with the second and first ([Hos. vi. 2]: מִיֹמָיִם בַּיוֹם הַשְּׁלִישִׁי; [Luke xiii. 32]: σήμερον καὶ αὔριον καὶ τῇ τρίτῃ) is announced as a merely relative and proximate statement, whereas in our passage it stands alone, and thus presents itself as an absolute and precise determination of time.[51]
Thus alike invited and repelled by both explanations,[52] theologians take refuge in a double sense, which holds the middle place either between the interpretation of John and the symbolical one last stated,[53] or between the interpretation of John and that of the Jews;[54] so that Jesus either spoke at once of his body which was to be killed and again restored to life, and of the modification of the Jewish religion which was to be effected, chiefly by means of that death and resurrection; or, in order to repel the Jews, he challenged them to destroy their real temple, and on this condition, never to be fulfilled, promised to build another, still, however, combining with this ostensible sense for the multitude, an esoteric sense, which was only understood by the disciples after the resurrection, and according to which ναὸς denoted his body. But such a challenge addressed to the Jews, together with the engagement appended to it, would have been an unbecoming manifestation of petulance, and the latent intimation to the disciples, a useless play on words; besides that, in general, a double meaning either of the one or the other kind is unheard of in the discourse of a judicious man.[55] As, in this manner, the possibility of explaining the passage in John might be entirely despaired of, the author of the Probabilia appeals to the fact that the synoptists call the witnesses, who allege before the judgment seat that Jesus had uttered that declaration, ψευδομάρτυρας, false witnesses; whence he concludes, that Jesus never said what John here attributes to him, and thus gains an exemption from the explanation of the passage, since he regards it as a figment of the fourth Evangelist, whose object was both to explain the calumniations of the accusers, and also to nullify them by a mystical interpretation of his words.[56] But, on the one hand, it does not follow, from the fact that the synoptists call the witnesses false, that, in the opinion of the Evangelists, Jesus had never said anything whatever of that whereof they accused him; for he might only have said it somewhat differently (λύσατε, not λύσω), or have intended it in a different sense (figuratively instead of literally): on the other hand, if he said nothing at all of this kind, it is difficult to explain how the false witnesses should come to choose that declaration, and especially the remarkable phrase, ἐν τρισὶν ἡμέραις.
If, according to this, on every interpretation of the expression, except the inadmissible one relative to the body of Jesus, the words ἐν τρισὶν ἡμέραις form a difficulty: a resource might be found in the narrative of the Acts, as being free from that determination of time. For here Stephen is only accused of saying, ὅτι Ἰ. ὁ Ναζ. οὗτος καταλύσει τὸν τόπον τοῦτον (τὸν ἅγιον), καὶ ἀλλάξει τὰ ἔθη ἃ παρέδωκε Μωϋσῇς. What is false in this allegation (for the witnesses against Stephen also are described as μάρτυρες ψευδεῖς), might be the [[579]]second proposition, which speaks in literal terms of a changing of the institutes of Moses, and instead of this, Stephen, and before him Jesus, may very probably have said in the figurative signification above developed, καὶ πάλιν οἰκοδομήσει (—σω) αὐτὸν, or καὶ ἄλλον (ἀχειροποίητον) οἰκοδομήσει (—σω).
Meanwhile, this expedient is not at all needful, so far as any insurmountable difficulty in the words ἐν τρισὶν ἡμέραις, is concerned. As the number 3 is used proverbially, not only in connexion with 2 or 4 ([Prov. xxx. 15], [18], [21], [29]; [Wis. xxiii. 21], [xxvi. 25]), but also by itself ([Wis. xxv. 1], [3]); so the expression, in three days, if it were once, in combination with the second and first day, become common as an indefinite statement of time, might probably at length be applied in the same sense when standing alone. Whether the expression should signify a long or a short period would then depend on the connexion: here, in opposition to the construction of a great and elaborate building, to the real, natural erection of which, as the Jews directly remark, a long series of years was required, the expression can only be understood as denoting the shortest time.[57] A prediction, or even a mere intimation of the resurrection, is therefore not contained in these words.
As, here, Jesus is said to have intimated his resurrection beforehand, by the image of the destroying and rebuilding of the temple, so, on another occasion, he is supposed to have quoted the type of the prophet Jonah with the same intention ([Matt. xii. 39 ff.], comp. [xvi. 4]; [Luke xi. 29 ff.]). When the scribes and Pharisees desired to see a sign from him, Jesus is said to have repulsed their demand by the reply, that to so evil a generation γενεὰ no sign shall be given, but the sign of the prophet Jonah, τὸ σημεῖον Ἰωνᾶ τοῦ προφήτου, which, in the first passage of Matthew, Jesus himself explains thus: as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, ἐν τῇ κοιλίᾳ τοῦ κήτους, so also the Son of man will pass three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ τῆς γῆς. In the second passage, in which Matthew attributes this declaration to Jesus, he does not repeat the above interpretation; while Luke, in the parallel passage, explains it simply thus: For as Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites, so shall also the Son of man be to this generation. Now against the possibility of Jesus having himself given the interpretation of the sign of Jonah which Matthew puts into his mouth, [v. 40], a variety of objections may be urged. It is indeed scarcely a tenable argument, that Jesus cannot have spoken of three days and three nights, which he would pass in the heart of the earth, because he only lay in the grave one day and two nights:[58] since the phraseology of the New Testament decidedly has the peculiarity of designating the abode of Jesus in the grave as of three days’ duration, because it touched upon the evening of the day before the Sabbath, and the morning of the day after it; and if this one day, together with two nights, were once taken for three whole days, it would only be a round way of expressing this completeness, to add to the days the nights also, which, besides, would naturally follow in the comparison with the three days and three nights of Jonah.[59] But if Jesus gave the explanation of the sign of Jonah which Matthew attributes to him, this would have been so clear a prediction of his resurrection, that for the same reasons which, according to the above observations, are opposed to the literal predictions of that event, we must conclude that Jesus cannot have given this explanation. At all events it must have led the disciples who, according to [v. 49], were present, to question Jesus, and in that case it is not to be understood why he did not make the subject perfectly clear, and thus announce his resurrection in plain [[580]]words. But if he cannot have done this, because then the disciples could not have acted after his death as they are said to have done in the evangelical accounts: neither can he, by that comparison of the fate which awaited him with that of Jonah, have called forth from his disciples a question, which, if proposed to him, he must have answered; but which, judging from the sequel, he cannot have answered.
On these grounds, modern critics have pronounced the explanation of the σημεῖον Ἰωνᾶ in Matthew to be an interpretation made post eventum by the Evangelist, and by him falsely attributed to Jesus.[60] According to them, Jesus indeed directed the attention of the Pharisees to the sign of Jonah, but only in the sense in which Luke makes him explain it: namely, that as Jonah himself, by his mere appearance and preaching of repentance, without miracles, had sufficed as a sign from God to the Ninevites; so his own cotemporaries, instead of craving for miracles, should be satisfied with his person and preaching. This interpretation is the only one which accords with the tenor of the discourse of Jesus—even in Matthew, and more particularly with the parallel between the relation of the Ninevites to Jonah, and that of the queen of the south to Solomon. As it was the wisdom of Solomon, σοφία Σολομῶνος, by which the latter felt herself attracted from the ends of the earth: so, in Jonah, even according to the expression of Matthew, it was solely his preaching, κήρυγμα, which brought the Ninevites to repentance. It might be supposed that the future tense in Luke: οὕτως ἔσται καὶ ὁ υἱὸς τ. ἀ. τῇ γενεᾷ ταύτῃ (σημεῖον), So shall also the Son of Man be to this generation (a sign), cannot be referred to Jesus and his preaching as manifested at that moment, but only to something future, as his resurrection: but this in reality points either to the future judgment κρίσις, in which it will be made manifest, that as Jonah was reckoned a sign to the Ninevites, so was the Son of Man to the Jews then living; or to the fact that when Jesus spoke these words, his appearance had not yet attained its consummation, and many of its stages lay yet in futurity. Nevertheless, it must have been at an early period, as we see from the first gospel, that the fate of Jonah was placed in a typical relation to the death and resurrection of Jesus, since the primitive church anxiously searched through the Old Testament for types and prophecies of the offensive catastrophe which befel their Messiah.
There are still some expressions of Jesus in the fourth gospel, which have been understood as latent prophecies of the resurrection. The discourse on the corn of wheat, [xii. 24], it is true, too obviously relates to the work of Jesus as likely to be furthered by his death, to be here taken into further consideration. But in the farewell discourses in John there are some declarations, which many are still inclined to refer to the resurrection. When Jesus says: I will not leave you comfortless, I will come unto you; yet a little time, and the world sees me no more, but ye see me; a little while, and ye shall not see me, and again a little while and ye shall see me, etc. ([xiv. 18 ff.], [xvi. 16 ff.]); many believe that these expressions—with the relation between μικρὸν καὶ πάλιν μικρὸν, a little while, and again a little while; the opposition between ἐμφανίζειν ἡμῖν (τοῖς μαθηταῖς) καὶ οὐχὶ τῷ κόσμῳ, manifest to you (the disciples) and not to the world; the words πάλιν ὄψομαι and ὄψεσθε, I shall see you again, and ye shall see, which appear to indicate a strictly personal interview—can be referred to nothing else than the resurrection, which was precisely such a reappearance after a short removal, and moreover a personal reappearance granted to the friends of Jesus alone.[61] But this promised reappearance [[581]]is at the same time described by Jesus in a manner which will not suit the days of the resurrection. If the words because I live, ὅτι ἐγὼ ζῶ ([xiv. 19]), denote his resurrection, we are at a loss to know what can be meant by the succeeding clause, ye shall live also, καὶ ὑμεῖς ζήσεσθε. Again, Jesus says that on that reappearance his disciples will know his relation to the Father, and will no more need to ask anything of him ([xiv. 20], [xvi. 23]): yet even on the very last day of their intercourse with him after the resurrection, they ask a question of him ([Acts i. 6]), and one which from the point of view of the fourth gospel is altogether senseless. Lastly, when he promises that to him who loves him, he and the Father will come, and make their abode with him, it is perfectly clear that Jesus here speaks not of a corporeal return, but of his spiritual return, through the παράκλητος.[62] Nevertheless, even this explanation has its difficulties, since, on the other hand, the expressions ye shall see me, ὄψεσθέ με, and I shall see you, ὄψομαι ὑμᾶς, will not entirely suit that purely spiritual return: hence we must defer the solution of this apparent contradiction until we can give a more complete elucidation of the discourses in which these expressions occur. In the meantime we merely observe, that the farewell discourses in John, being admitted, even by the friends of the fourth gospel, to contain an intermixture of the Evangelist’s own thoughts, are the last source from which to obtain a proof on this subject.
After all, there might seem to be a resource in the supposition, that though Jesus did not indeed speak of his future resurrection, it was not the less foreknown by him. Now if he had a foreknowledge of his resurrection, either he obtained it in a supernatural manner, by means of the prophetic spirit, the higher principle that dwelt within him—by means of his divine nature, if that be preferred: or he knew it in a natural manner, by the exercise of his human reason. But a supernatural foreknowledge of that event, as well as of his death, is inconceivable, owing to the relation in which Jesus places it to the Old Testament. Not merely in passages such as [Luke xviii. 31] (which, as prophecies, can no longer have an historical value for us after the result of our last inquiry), does Jesus represent his resurrection, together with his passion and death, as a fulfilment of all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of man, πάντων τῶν γεγραμμένων διὰ τῶν προφητῶν τῷ υἱῷ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου; but even after the issue, he admonishes his disciples that they ought to believe all that the prophets have spoken, ἐπὶ πᾶσιν οἷς ἐλάλησαν οἱ προφῆται, namely, that Christ ought to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory, ταῦτα ἔδει παθεῖν τὸν Χριστὸν, καὶ εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὴν δόξαν αὑτοῦ ([Luke xxiv. 25 f.]). According to the sequel of the narrative, Jesus forthwith expounded to these disciples (going to Emmaus) all the passages of scripture relating to himself, beginning at Moses and all the prophets, ἀρξάμενος ἀπὸ Μωσέως καὶ ἀπὸ πάντων τῶν προφητῶν, to which farther on ([v. 44]) the psalms are added; but no single passage is given us as having been interpreted by Jesus of his resurrection, except that it would follow from [Matt. xii. 39 f.], that he regarded the fate of the prophet Jonah as a type of his own; and regarding the subsequent apostolic interpretation as an echo of that of Jesus, it might be concluded, that he, as afterwards the apostles, found such prophecies chiefly in [Ps. xvi. 8 ff.] ([Acts ii. 25 ff.], [xiii. 35]); [Isa. liii.] ([Acts viii. 32 ff.]); [Isa. lv. 3] ([Acts xiii. 34]), and possibly also in [Hos. vi. 2]. But the fate of Jonah has not even an external similarity to that of Jesus; and the book which narrates his history carries its object so completely in itself, that whoever may ascribe to it or to one of its particulars, a typical relation to events in futurity, assuredly mistakes its true sense and the design of its author. [[582]][Isa. lv. 3] is so obviously irrelevant that one can scarcely conceive how the passage could be brought into special connexion with the resurrection of Jesus. [Isa. liii.] refers decidedly to a collective subject perpetually restored to life in new members. [Hosea vi.] has a figurative reference, not to be mistaken, to the people and state of Israel. Lastly, the principal passage, [Ps. xvi.] can only be interpreted of a pious man, who by the help of Jehovah hopes to escape from the danger of death, not in the sense that he, like Jesus, would rise again from the grave, but that he would not be laid there—that is, obviously, not for the present, and with the understanding, that when his time should come, he must pay the tribute of nature:[63] which, again, will not apply to Jesus. Thus if a supernatural principle in Jesus—a prophetic spirit—caused him to discover a pre-intimation of his resurrection in these Old Testament histories and passages; then, as no one of them really contained such a pre-intimation, the spirit in him cannot have been the spirit of truth, but must have been a lying spirit, the supernatural principle in him, not a divine, but a demoniacal principle. If, in order to avoid this consequence, supranaturalists who are accessible to a rational interpretation of the Old Testament, resort to their only remaining expedient, of regarding the foreknowledge of Jesus concerning his resurrection as purely natural and human: we must reply, that the resurrection, conceived as a miracle, was a secret of the divine counsels, to penetrate into which, prior to the issue, was an impossibility to a human intelligence; while viewed as a natural result, it was a chance the last to be calculated upon, apart from the supposition of an apparent death planned by Jesus and his colleagues.
Thus the foreknowledge, as well as the prediction of the resurrection, was attributed to Jesus only after the issue; and in fact, it was an easy matter, with the groundless arbitrariness of Jewish exegesis, for the disciples and the authors of the New Testament to discover in the Old, types and prophecies of the resurrection. Not that they did this with crafty design, according to the accusation of the Wolfenbüttel Fragmentist, and others of his class: but as he who has looked at the sun, long sees its image wherever he may turn his gaze; so they, blinded by their enthusiasm for the new Messiah, saw him on every page of the only book they read, the Old Testament, and in the conviction that Jesus was the Messiah, founded in the genuine feeling that he had satisfied their deepest need—a conviction and a feeling which we also still honour—they laid hold on supports which have long been broken, and which can no longer be made tenable by the most zealous efforts of an exegesis which is behind the age.