PASCHA-THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST

PASCHA-THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST. Faith in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ as the Son of God (q.v.), the Christian Pascha (Passover), is the foundation of the Church. But how this is understood in Eastern Christianity is frequently different from contemporary discussions of the topic in the West. At the end of the four Gospels (and in 1Cor 15) the Resurrection is described in twelve pericopes, which are read as separate stories during resurrection matins. In the liturgy of Basil (qq.v.) it is explicitly stated that Christians proclaim the death of Jesus and confess his Resurrection, i.e., the death is a historical fact while the Resurrection is a tenet of faith. As such, it has aspects that go beyond history in the usual secular sense, which aspects function in the past, present, and future.

In the past, the Resurrection was neither a “resuscitation” of Jesus, nor was it an observable phenomenon; rather, the Resurrected Christ was observed. The Resurrected Christ is depicted in icons (q.v.) with a body that is in continuity with his earthly body, but gloriously transformed (not someone who “just barely” rose) and clearly is not governed by the laws of physics as we know them. The Resurrected humanity of Christ, with Moses and Elijah, with the newly freed Adam and Eve, et al., resides with the Father in the Kingdom of God. It is the source of our vision of God “face to face,” although God remains unseen.

In the present the Resurrection is participated in by Christian believers, in a sense, through direct personal experience. This occurs par excellence in Baptism (q.v.), descending into the water as into the grave and rising from it again, in the joyous liturgical celebration of Pascha (Easter) as a present event, and in the Eucharist (q.v.) as the feast of the messianic and heavenly banquet of resurrected life. The light of the Resurrected Christ is not solely and personally God the Father’s, but is shared by the transformed humanity of Jesus, and cannot only be seen, but can be currently shared in by believers. (See Theosis.)

The future aspect of the Resurrection is the eschatological culmination of all creation in God’s Kingdom, according to God’s economy (q.v.), about which neither the time nor the details are known. It is the possibility of every Christian to imitate Jesus in his entrance to the heavenly. Nevertheless, Christians do not have to wait for the “Second Coming” or for their own deaths in order to see God, because the present aspect of the Resurrection makes that reality accessible now, and the future aspect guarantees an end to current tribulation and is evidence of the peace that can only come from above.

Pascha is considered greater than all other feasts (q.v.), is called the Feast of Feasts, and is celebrated not only once a year but on every Sunday. As the Christian Passover, it is seen in direct continuity with the pre-Jewish and Jewish feast(s) involving the paschal lamb, with the deliverance of God’s people in the sea with Moses, and with the liturgy (q.v.) of the Temple of Jerusalem; and it was identified as such as early as the Gospels. The Pascha, Jesus’ passing from death to life, was made possible by the crucifixion, but the Cross and Crucifixion are never absolutized without reference to the Resurrection-which facilitates the victory of the Cross in suffering. The Orthodox Church is correctly referred to-with an eye toward both theology (q.v.) and liturgy-as the Church of the Resurrection.