ere goes my sixth and last Discourse on Jesus's Miracles; the Subject whereof is the literal Story of his own Resurrection; which, according to the Proposition in Hand, I am to shew to consist of Absurdities, Improbabilities and Incredibilities. And I hope our Bishops will quietly permit the Publication of this Discourse, especially if I assure them that I mean nothing worse by it, than to make way for the understanding what the Fathers write of the mystical Resurrection of Jesus out of the Grave of the Letter of the Law and the Prophets; of which mystical Resurrection of our spiritual Jesus, the Evangelical Story of the Resurrection of a carnal Christ is but mere Type and Shadow.
I am so far from designing any Service to Infidelity by this Discourse, that I aim at the Accomplishment of some of St. John's Apocalyptical Visions. The Fathers say that a Church, built on the Letter of the Scriptures, particularly on the Letter of Jesus's Miracles, is Babylon; and that antiliteral Arguments and mystical Interpretations will be the Downfal of her. Whether there is any Truth in this Opinion of the Fathers, I am minded to make the Experiment; and tho' I should bring the old House of the Church over my Head, and be crush'd to Pieces in its Ruins, I can't forbear it: But however, I would advise the Clergy to make Haste and come out of Babylon, for Fear of the worst; or they, who upon the Authority of the Fathers are the Merchants of Babylon, will weep[309] and mourn upon her Fall, because none will buy their Merchandize of the Letter any more. Dear Jesu, that such a Student as I am in the Revelations of St. John, and an Interpreter of them too, upon the Authority of the Fathers, should be charg'd with Blasphemy and Infidelity!
So to Work I went; and I had not been long musing by myself, how to sap this Foundation of the Church, before I was sensible of my own Insufficiency for it. Whereupon I sent to my old Friend, the Jewish Rabbi, for his Thoughts on this grand Miracle of Jesus's Resurrection, which he gave me some Promise of. But I desired him to forbear all Ludicrousness, Satire and Banter, for fear of Offence: For tho' our Clergy liked Volumes of Jests and Facetiousness, if they were discharg'd against Jews, Turks, and Infidels; yet when they were levell'd at Ministers of the Letter, the Case was alter'd, as quoth Plowden, and they were not to be borne with. Therefore he was to remember that Decency, Seriousness and Calmness of Argument, required by the Bishop of London[310] or I durst not print it.
In Compliance with my Desires he sent me the following Letter, which, having purg'd it of a few Puns and Cunundrums, because all Appearance of Wit, as of Evil, was to be abstain'd from, I here publish, and it runs thus.
SIR,
According to your Request, I here send you my Thoughts on Jesus's Resurrection, in which I shall be shorter than I would be, because of the customary Bounds of your Discourses.
The Controversy between us Jews and you Christians about the Messiah has hitherto been of a diffusive Nature: But as the Subject of this is the Resurrection of your Jesus; so, by my Consent, we'll now reduce the Controversy to a narrow Compass, and let it turn intirely on this grand Miracle and Article of your Faith. If your Divines can prove Jesus's Resurrection against the following Objections, then I will acknowledge him to be the Messiah, and will turn Christian, otherwise he must still pass with us for an Impostor and false Prophet.
I have often lamented the Loss of such Writings, which our Ancestors unquestionably dispers'd against Jesus, because of the clear Sight they would give us, into the Cheat and Imposture of his Religion. But I rejoice and thank God, there is little or no Want of them, to the Point in Hand. For I had not long meditated on the Story of Jesus's Resurrection, as your Evangelists have related it, but I plainly discern'd it to be the most notorious and monstrous Imposture, that ever was put upon Mankind. And if you please to attend to my following Arguments, which require no Depth of Judgment and Capacity to apprehend, I am persuaded that you and every one disinterested, will be of the same Mind too.
To overthrow and confute the Story of this monstrous and incredible Miracle, I was thinking once to premise an Argument of the Justice of the Sentence denounc'd against and executed upon Jesus, who was so far from being the innocent Person, you Christians would make of him, that, as may easily be proved, he was so grand a Deceiver, Impostor and Malefactor, as no Punishment could be too great for him. But this Argument (which I reserve against a Day of perfect Liberty, to publish by it self in Defence of the Honour and Justice of our Ancestors) would be too long for the Compass of this Letter; and therefore I pass it by, tho' it would give Force to my following Objections; it being hard and even impossible to imagine, that God would vouchsafe the Favour of a miraculous Resurrection to one, who for his Crimes deservedly suffer'd and underwent Death.
But waving, I say, that Argument for the present, which of itself would be enough to prejudice a reasonable Man against the Belief of Jesus's Resurrection; I will allow Jesus to have been a much better Man, than I believe him to have been; or as good a one in Morals as your Divines do suppose him; and will only consider the Circumstances of the Evangelical Story of his Resurrection; from which, if I don't prove it to have been the most bare-fac'd Imposture that ever was put upon the World, I deserve for the Vanity of this Attempt, a much worse Punishment, than he for his Frauds endured.