Men yearn for the great veil to be lifted; to communi[pg 265]cate with departed friends; to see the patriarchs and prophets; to learn the mysteries of the heavenly kingdom. Oh that some one, say they, could return from the unseen world and tell us all about these things! With what solemnity would we listen to his words! with what joy! with what faith!
They are the victims of delusion. If their dearest friends were raised from the dead after a year’s burial, they would find themselves disappointed. They would regard them at first with wonder and awe. They would believe until they began speaking. But when they described the resurrection which happens to all as it did to me; when they taught the doctrine of a spiritual body; the reality and substantiality of the spiritual world; the civil, social and religious life of heaven; doubt after doubt would crowd upon their minds, until they would reject the whole story as a dream or a fabrication.
Christ himself declared that the appearance of one from the dead would convince no man. It is a strange declaration, but my own case is evidence of its truth.
The grounds upon which the incredulity of my visitors was based, were of the most contradictory and sometimes of the most irrational nature. One disbelieved because I had not seen Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; and because I declared that no earthly names exist in heaven, and that respect is there entertained, not for persons, but for character or quality. Another doubted my report because I said that David was not king of all the Jews in the spiritual world.
One man, a great patriot, was indignant because I affirmed that all the Romans did not go to hell. An[pg 266]other, equally zealous for Judea, was personally abusive because I declared that more people were saved from the pagan or gentile nations than from the Jewish Church. Another was shocked because I said the angels were not always engaged in singing and praising God. Another, an ideologist, scouted the idea that there was any form, shape or substance to the soul, or even in the spiritual world.
The most ignorant and conceited of the Scribes and Pharisees denounced me bitterly as teaching doctrines utterly at variance with Scripture and subversive of the interests of vital religion. On the other extreme, our worthy old Greek gardener laughed at my narrative as a tissue of hallucinations, because I had not been rowed over the river Styx by Charon the ferryman, but honestly declared that I had seen neither Charon nor the Stygian river.
The majority insisted that I had not been dead at all; that my condition was only a trance, which had often occurred before, and had been prolonged to even a greater period. To this the Pharisees added, that it was no doubt a trick of magic in which I was guilty of collusion, and which was designed to extend the fame and influence of Jesus of Nazareth.
Some believed in the fact of my resurrection; and the more enthusiastic went so far as to affirm that my body had been decomposed in the grave. These were actually angry with me when I declared that, although I was so far dead as to be living consciously in another world, yet my separation from nature was not organic and final, my natural body being preserved in a peculiar manner for a reunion with its spiritual form.
I soon became wearied and disgusted with unprofitable discussions, and with credulities and incredulities equally absurd. Failing to convince my hearers, or to elevate their minds into the heavenly light which I myself enjoyed, I became more and more reserved; and at last I would not speak on the subject to any one but Mary and Martha.
These dear women listened with unfailing delight to all I had to say. The divine intuitions of woman recognize always a new truth before the calculating reason of man endorses it. Martha indeed doubted occasionally and criticised sharply, but was always satisfied after consulting the Scriptures and comparing what I related with their sacred teachings. Mary, full of love and trust, believed unquestioningly every word I said.