sm, and monistic idealism recognises no fundamental distinction
between matter and spirit. The fundamental reality is consciousness.
The so-called material world is the product of consciousness exercising
itself along a certain limited plane; the next stage of consciousness
above this is not an absolute break with it, although it is an
expansion of experience or readjustment of focus. Admitting that
individual self-consciousness persists beyond the change called death,
it only means that such consciousness is being exercised along another
plane; from a three-dimensional it has entered a four-dimensional
world. This new world is no less and no more material than the
present; it is all a question of the range of consciousness. It is
this view, the view that matter exists only in and for mind, that leads
me to believe that less than justice has been done by liberal thinkers
to the theory of the physical resurrection of Jesus. What is the
physical but the common denominator between one finite mind and
another? It is a mode of language, an expression of thought as well as
a condition of thought. Imagine a being free of a three-dimensional
world trying to converse with a being still limited to a
two-dimensional world, and we have a clew to what I think may have
happened after the crucifixion of Jesus. The three-dimensional body
would behave in a manner altogether unaccountable to the
two-dimensional watcher. The latter, knowing only length and breadth,
and nothing of up or down, would see his three-dimensional friend as a
line only. The moment the three-dimensional solid rose above or sank
below his line of vision, it would seem to have disappeared like an
apparition, although as really present as before. To the
two-dimensional mind it would seem as though the solid were a ghost.
Does this throw any light upon the mysterious appearances and
disappearances of the body of Jesus? The all-important thing after
Calvary was to make the disciples aware, beyond all dispute, that Jesus
was really alive, more alive than ever, and that His murderers had been
helpless to destroy Him. When we remember that to the ordinary Jewish
mind the thought of personal immortality was anything but clear, and
that to many of them death was synonymous with annihilation, we can see
how enormous was the change that had to be wrought in the mental
attitude of those who had seen Jesus die a violent and bloody death.
To see Him return triumphant