Interpretations of Jesus' Resurrection in the Early Church

This paper examines the issue of the historicity of Jesus' resurrection and discusses the early church's interpretation of the resurrection. The core controversy surrounding the historicity of Jesus' resurrection is whether Jesus was truly resurrected in the flesh. While in Galilee the disciples experienced an apparition of Jesus, in Jerusalem women discovered an empty tomb and experienced an apparition. When the disciples returned to Jerusalem and heard about the empty tomb, the apparitions and the empty tomb complemented each other and solidified the belief in resurrection. However, as Paul said (1 Cor 15,16), without the Jewish faith in the resurrection, Jesus would not have been resurrected. Since Jesus himself shared the Jewish faith in the resurrection, his death did not end in vain and he could predict God's victory. The issue of bodily resurrection raises questions about the steps prior to resurrection. Jesus taught that people live in spirit form even after death (Q 12,4-5). Jesus taught that humans are always before God, whether alive in body or alive in spirit after death (cf. Mk 12,27). The Jesus' proclamation of the Kingdom of God being both future and present is based on his conviction that everything is alive before God. Therefore everything is already in a continuous process toward the eschatological goal. The intermediate state between individual death and resurrection is seen as a continuous process toward eschatological resurrection. Jesus and the early Christians believed in an intermediate state of survival of the spirit after death. The reason the early church was able to solve the problem of delaying the Second Coming (Mk 13,32; 2Peter 3,4) was also due to the belief in the intermediate stage of being with Christ even after individual death (cf. Lk 23:43; Phil 1:23). The early Christians understood the period before the Second Coming as a time for the church to prepare for eschatological restoration (Acts 3:20-21) and actively carried out missionary activities to participate in the process of salvation history (Acts 1:8). Luke gives a narrative of birth of the church through the resurrection, ascension, and sending of the Holy Spirit. Mark and Matthew, who do not mention the ascension, emphasize that the crucified Jesus was resurrected and is still with his disciples. The early Christians who have experienced the resurrection and apparitions of Jesus as a force for leading history proclaimed the gospel of resurrection. Therefore, they were able to further commit themselves to the historical process toward the new creation for the final restoration of the whole world.