On the Glorious Resurrection

The Feast of the Resurrection in the Orthodox Church is commonly known as Pascha (Greek term for the word Passover). It is the Lord’s Pascha, since Christ, our paschal lamb, has been sacrificed (1 Cor. 5:7). The Son of God passed over from death to life, and from earth to heaven. This is the fulfillment of the Great Work of God and the economy of salvation – the redemption of mankind from enslavement to Satan and corruption.

Christ’s Pascha is the point of reference for all Orthodox Christians – it is the foundation of our faith and life. If there had been no Resurrection, the great apostle explains, then our Christian faith would have been deprived of any foundation or value,

‘If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain…If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.’ – 1 Cor. 15:14, 17

Without the message of the resurrection, there would be no Good News for the world to receive! The disciples of the Lord would have lived out their lives troubled and in despair, hiding behind closed doors for fear of the Jews. It was only after they encountered the risen Lord that their fear was overcome. The resurrection became their message and their hope. The resurrection became their Gospel. And the message was loud and clear,

Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death! The power of sin is destroyed and Death itself is abolished.

The resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth not only confirmed that He indeed is the expected Messiah of Israel, but unveiled Him as the King and Lord of the New Jerusalem…

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth…the holy city, New Jerusalem. And I heard a great voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people…He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away (Rev. 21:1-4).

The Resurrection of Christ grants us, the children of God, a share and an inheritance in the Heavenly Kingdom – thereby reclaiming the Paradise once lost.

Through the resurrection we share in Christ’s victory over death and are restored to communion with the living God.

May we never lose sight of the power of the Resurrection of Christ our Redeemer.

Wisdom of the Early Church Fathers on the Resurrection of Christ…

By His resurrection He raises up a standard over His saints and the faithful ones for all times (both Jews and Gentiles alike) in the body of His Church. I am convinced He was united with His body even after His resurrection. When He visited Peter and his companions. He said to them: Take hold of Me, touch Me and see that I am not a spirit without a body…After His resurrection, the Lord ate and drank with them like a real human being…

– St. Ignatius of Antioch (+c. 110)

[Christ says]

“Come here all you families of men, weighed down by your sins, and receive pardon for your misdeeds.
For I am your pardon.
I am the Passover which brings salvation.
I am the Lamb slain for you.
I am your lustral bath.
I am your life.
I am your resurrection.
I am your light, I am your salvation, I am your King.
It is I who brings you up to the heights of heaven.
It is I who will give you the resurrection there.
I will show you the Eternal Father.
I will raise you up with my own right hand.”

– St. Melito of Sardis in Lydia (+180)

How can they say that the flesh, which is nourished with the body of the Lord and with His blood, goes to corruption, and does not partake of life? Let them, therefore, either alter their opinion, or cease from offering the things just mentioned. But our opinion is in accordance with the Eucharist, and the

Eucharist in turn establishes our opinion. For we offer to Him His own, announcing consistently the fellowship and union of the flesh and Spirit. For as the bread, which is produced from the earth, when it receives the invocation of God, is no longer common bread, but the Eucharist, consisting of two realities, earthly and heavenly; so also our bodies, when they receive the Eucharist, are no longer corruptible, having the hope of the resurrection to eternity.

St. Irenaeus of Lyons (+202)

God Who first established this feast for us allows us to celebrate it each year. He Who gave up His Son for our salvation, from the same motive gives us this feast…allowing us to pray together and to offer common thanksgiving…He gathers to this feast those who are far apart…

– St. Athanasius the Great (+373)

“And they came to a place called Golgotha, which means the place of a skull…” (Mt 27:33). He did not suffer in any other place, neither was he crucified except in the place of a skull. This is identified by Hebrew mentors as the place of Adam‘s grave. They affirm that he was buried there after the curse. If it is so, I am amazed at the significance of that spot! For the Lord, wishing to renew the first Adam, had to suffer on it so as to tear down Adam‘s sin and remove it from his whole race. And inasmuch as Adam had previously heard the words, “You are dust and to dust you shall return,” for this reason the Lord was thrown into that place; in order to visit Adam and tear down his curse. Instead of “You are dust and to dust you shall return,” he says to him, “Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light” (Eph 5:14); and also, “Arise, come and follow me” that you may no longer remain cast down on the ground but ascend with me to heaven. For it was imperative that when the Saviour should arise, Adam and all who came forth from Adam should be resurrected with him.

– St. Athanasius the Great (+373)

If by the sign of the Cross, and by faith in Christ, death is trampled underfoot, it must be evident before the tribunal of truth that it is none other than Christ Himself that has displayed trophies and triumphs over death, and made him lose all his strength. And if, while previously death was strong, and for that reason terrible, now after the sojourn of the Saviour and the death and Resurrection of His body it is despised, it must be evident that death has been brought to nought and conquered by the very Christ that ascended the Cross. For as, if after night-time the sun rises, and the whole region of earth is illumined by him, it is at any rate not open to doubt that it is the sun who has revealed his light everywhere, that has also driven away the dark and given light to all things; so, now that death has come into contempt, and been trodden under foot, from the time when the Saviour’s saving manifestation in the flesh and His death on the Cross took place, it must be quite plain that it is the very Saviour that also appeared in the body, Who has brought death to nought, and Who displays the signs of victory over him day by day in His own disciples.

– St. Athanasius the Great (+373)

Now that the Saviour has raised His body, death is no longer terrible; for all who believe in Christ tread him under as nought, and choose rather to die than to deny their faith in Christ. For they verily know that when they die they are not destroyed, but actually [begin to] live, and become incorruptible through the

Resurrection…Their contempt for death is so great that they even eagerly rush upon it, and become witnesses for the Resurrection the Saviour has accomplished against it…And so, death having been conquered and exposed by the Saviour on the Cross, and bound hand and foot, all they who are in Christ, as they pass by, trample on him, and witnessing to Christ scoff at death, jesting at him, and saying what has been written against him of old: “O death, where is thy victory? O grave, where is thy sting?”

– St. Athanasius the Great (+373)

The reign of life has begun, the tyranny of death is ended…This is the day the Lord has made – a day far different from those made when the world was first created, and which are measured by the passage of time. This is the beginning of a new creation. On this day, as the prophet says God makes a new heaven and a new earth.

– St. Gregory of Nyssa (+384)

Since, then, there was needed a lifting up from death for the whole of our nature, He stretches forth a hand as it were to prostrate man, and stooping down to our dead corpse, He came so far within the grasp of death as to touch a state of deadness, and then in His own body to bestow on our nature the principle of the resurrection, raising as He did by His power along with Himself the whole man. For since from no other source than from the concrete lump of our nature had come that flesh, which was the receptacle of the Godhead and in the resurrection was raised up together with that Godhead, therefore just in the same way as, in the instance of this body of ours, the operation of one of the organs of sense is felt at once by the whole system, as one with that member, so also the resurrection principle of this Member, as though the whole of mankind was a single living being, passes through the entire race, being imparted from the Member to the whole by virtue of the continuity and oneness of the nature.

– St. Gregory of Nyssa (+384)

We needed an incarnate God, a God put to death, that we might live. We were put to death together with Him that we might be cleansed. We rose again with Him because we were put to death with Him. We were glorified with Him because we rose again with Him. A few drops of Blood recreate the whole of creation!

– St. Gregory of Nazianzus (+389)

Many indeed are the wondrous happenings of that time: God hanging from a Cross, the sun made dark, and again flaming out; for it was fitting that creation should mourn with its Creator. The temple veil rent, blood and water flowing from his side: the one as from a man, the other as from what was above man; the earth was shaken, the rocks shattered because of the Rock; the dead risen to bear witness of the final and universal resurrection of the dead. The happenings at the sepulchre, and after the sepulchre, who can fittingly recount them? Yet not one of them can be compared to the miracle of my salvation. A few drops of blood renew the whole world, and do for all men what the rennet does for milk: joining us and binding us together.

– St. Gregory of Nazianzus (+389)

O Death, where is your sting? O Hell, where is your victory?
Christ is risen, and you are overthrown!
Christ is risen, and the demons are fallen!
Christ is risen, and the angels rejoice!
Christ is risen, and life reigns!
Christ is risen, and not one dead remains in the grave!

– St. John Chrysostom (+407)

Now is the time when the blessed light of Christ sheds its rays; the pure rays of the pure Spirit rise and the heavenly treasures of divine glory are opened up. Night’s darkness and obscurity have been swallowed up and the dense blackness dispersed in this light of day; crabbed death has been totally eclipsed. Life has been extended to every creature and all things are diffused in brightness. The dawn of dawn ascends over the earth and “He who was before the morning star” (Ps 109:2) and before the other stars, the mighty Christ, immortal and all powerful, sheds light brighter than the sun on the universe. For all of us his faithful He has initiated a bright, new day, long, eternal, and unquenchable; it is the mystical Pascha, celebrated in figures under the Law but fulfilled in very truth by Christ; the marvellous Pascha, the wonder of divine virtue, the work of power, truly a feast, an everlasting memorial, impassibility born of suffering, immortality born of death, life born in the tomb, healing born from wounds, resurrection born from the fall, ascent to Heaven born from descent to Hell.

– St. John Chrysostom (+407)

As they were looking on, so we too gaze on his wounds as he hangs. We see his blood as he dies. We see the price offered by the Redeemer, touch the scars of his resurrection. He bows his head, as if to kiss you. His heart is made bare open, as it were, in love to you. His arms are extended that he may embrace you. His whole body is displayed for your redemption. Ponder how great these things are. Let all this be rightly weighed in your mind: as he was once fixed to the cross in every part of his body for you, so he may now be fixed in every part of your soul.

– St. Augustine of Hippo (+430)

We were crucified with Him when His body, with all our nature in Him, was crucified, like that which happened in Adam when he was cursed: all nature suffered the curse. It is thus said that we were also raised with Christ and were made to sit with Him in the heavens, because although Emmanuel is above us as God, but in that He became like us, He is considered one of us raised and seated with God the Father. In the same way the old man was crucified with Him and through His resurrection the power of the old curse was broken “that the body of sin might be done away with” (Rom 6: 6). I do not mean the body unrestrictedly, but the ingrained carnal appetites within it, that always disturbed the mind with shameful matters, casting it in the mud and mire of the delights of dust.

As for these matters that were fulfilled in Christ to the benefit of human nature, how can anyone doubt it when St Paul clearly declares: “For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom 8: 3).

Do you see then how the flesh of sin was done away with? The thorn of sin was condemned in the flesh and first died in Christ, then through Him and by Him this grace was also transferred to us.

– St. Cyril of Alexandria (+444)

For Christ arose from the dead on the third day, on which he also entered into heaven…So when our Lord Jesus Christ arose and waved himself as the first fruits of mankind before God the Father, it was then that our very depths were changed into a new life.

– St. Cyril of Alexandria (+444)

Just as, when He lived again after subduing the power of death, He accomplished not His Resurrection for Himself, as Word and God, but gave us this blessing through Himself, and in Himself – for man‘s nature was in Christ in its entirety, fast bound by the chains of death – in like manner we must suppose that he received the Father‘s love, not for Himself, because He was continually beloved of Him from the beginning, but rather He accepts it at His Hands upon His Incarnation, that He may call down upon us the Father‘s love. Just as, then, we shall be, nay, we are even now, as in Christ first the Firstfruits of our race, made conformable to His Resurrection and His glory, even so are we, as it were, like Him, beloved; but yielding the supremacy in all things to the Only-begotten, and justly marvelling at the incomparable mercy of God, shown towards us; Who showers, as it were, upon us the things that are His, and shares with His creatures what appertains to Himself alone.

– St. Cyril of Alexandria (+444)