Jesus Christ, Resurrection of
Exported from Holy-Writings.com on 2026-06-20 - 1 clipping

Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Abdu'l-Bahá, Jesus Christ, Resurrection of, bahai-library.com.
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Jesus Christ, Resurrection of

Abdu'l-Bahá

Shoghi Effendi

Universal House of Justice, Research Department

, compiler

n.d.

From the Writings of 'Abdu'l-Bahá

As to the resurrection of the body of Christ three days subsequent to His departure: This
signifies the divine teachings and spiritual religion of His Holiness Christ, which constitute His
spiritual body, which is living and perpetual forevermore.

By the "three days' of His death is meant that after the great martyrdom, the penetration of the
divine teachings and the spread of the spiritual law became relaxed on account of the crucifixion
of Christ. For the disciples were somewhat troubled by the violence of divine tests. But when
they become firm, that divine spirit resurrected and that body - which signifies the divine word
- arose.

Likewise the address of the angels to the people of Galilee, "That this Christ will return in the
same way and that He will descend from heaven," is a spiritual address. For when Christ
appeared, he came from heaven, although He was outwardly born from the womb of Mary. For He
said: "No man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven."

He said: "I came down from heaven and likewise will go to heaven." By "Heaven" is not meant this
infinite phenomenal space, but "heaven" signifies the world of the divine kingdom which is the
supreme station and seat of the Sun of Truth.

"Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas", Vol. 1
(Chicago: Bahá'í Publishing Society), p.
192

...Thou hast written concerning the meeting of His Highness Christ after the crucifixion and that
some of the apostles perceived Him but did not recognize Him; but that they did recognize Him
after the breaking of bread.

Know thou that the Messianic Spirit and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit is always manifest,
but capacity and ability (to receive it) is more in some and less in others. After the crucifixion
the apostles had not in the beginning the capacity and ability of witnessing the Messianic reality.
For they were agitated. But when they found firmness and steadfastness, their inner sight
became opened, and they saw the reality of the Messiah as manifest. For the body of Christ was
crucified and vanished, but the Spirit of Christ is always pouring upon the contingent world, and
is manifest before the insight of the people of assurance.

"Tablets of Abdul-Baha Abbas",
Vol. 1 (Chicago: Bahá'í Publishing Society), p.
193
-
194

...The Cause of Christ was like a lifeless body; and when after three days the disciples became
assured and steadfast, and began to serve the Cause of Christ, and resolved to spread the divine
teachings, putting His counsels into practice, and arising to serve Him, the Reality of Christ
became resplendent and His bounty appeared; His religion found life; His teachings and His
admonitions became evident and visible. In other words, the Cause of Christ was like a lifeless
body until the life and the bounty of the Holy Spirit surrounded it.

Such is the meaning of the resurrection of Christ, and this was a true
resurrection....

"Some Answered Questions", rev. ed. (Wilmette: Bahá'í Publishing Trust,
1984), p.
104

From letters written on behalf of the Guardian

We do not believe that there was a bodily resurrection after the Crucifixion of Christ, but that
there was a time after His Ascension when His disciples perceived spiritually His true greatness
and realized He was eternal in being. This is what has been reported symbolically in the New
Testament and been misunderstood. His eating with His disciples after resurrection is the same
thing.

9 October 1947 to an individual believer

The two Biblical verses you had enclosed for explanation on behalf of Dr. ...; the Guardian wishes
you to explain to him that these passages are allegorical, and should not be taken literally. They
indicate the reality of the presence of the Spirit of Christ and not His bodily
resurrection....

14 August 1937 to an individual believer in response to a request for an
explanation of the Biblical verses Luke 24:39 and John 20:24-29 for a person who was
investigating the Teachings of the Faith.

METADATA

Views

18227 views since posted 2004-07-14; last edit 2022-03-01 23:31
UTC
;

previous at
archive.org
...
/compilation_resurrection_christ
;
URLs changed in 2010, see
archive.org
...
/bahai-library.org

Language

English

Permission

&copy; BIC, public sharing permitted. See sources
1
,
2
, and
3
.

History

Formatted 2004-07-14 by Brett Zamir;  Proofread 2010-08 by Romane Takkenberg.

Share

Shortlink:

bahai-library.com/2474

Citation
:

ris/2474

select Collection:

Archives

Articles

Articles-unpublished

Audio

Bibliographies

BIC

Biographies

Books

Chronologies

Compilations

Compilations-NSA

Compilations-personal

Documents

East-asia

Encyclopedia

Essays

Etc

Excerpts

Fiction

Glossaries

Guardian

Histories

Introductory

Letters

Maps

Music

Newspapers

NSA-documents

NSA-letters

Personal

Pilgrims

Poetry

Presentations

Resources

Reviews

Scripts

Software

Statistics

Study

Talks

Theses

Transcripts

Translations

UHJ-documents

UHJ-letters

Video

Visual

Writings

home

sitemap

series

chronology

search
:

author

title

date

tags

adv. search

languages

inventory

bibliography

abbreviations

links

about

contact

RSS

new
-- Jesus Christ, Resurrection of (Used by permission of the curator)