When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. [Luke 24:28-32, NRSV]
Christ appeared to two disciples at Emmaus, artist unknown.
The two Emmaus disciples did not recognize the risen Jesus on the road. They remembered their hearts were burning on the road only after recognizing the risen Lord at the breaking of the bread and the Lord having vanished from their sight. There was a time-lag. How might we approach this time-lag?
1. Belief and Disposition
In Life of Christ, Fulton Sheen wants to correct a common error. People commonly believe that “anything religious must be striking and powerful enough to overwhelm the imagination.” The Emmaus story tells us otherwise: “the most powerful truths often appear in the common place and trivial incidents of life, such as meeting a fellow traveler on a road. Christ veiled His Presence in the most ordinary roadway of life.” Sheen tells it as it is about the two disciples: “what blinded their eyes was their unbelief.”
This unbelief had first to do with the disciples’ inability to accept what Jesus had told them all along, that he would suffer and die and then rise on the third day, that his glory would come through defeat, and that therefore cross and glory came together. Jesus’ interpretation of Scriptures on the necessity of the Messiah’s suffering followed by exaltation had caused the two disciples’ hearts to stir and “burn inside”. Resurrection as a previously unheard of event, however, and a matter of such stupendous proportions because it involved none other than the Master himself, would take time to really sink in. The disciples needed time to intellectually take hold of such a thing.
The heart of the matter is the heart, as the venerable Sheen explains:
- “Because they were interested in Him, He vouchsafed His Presence; because they doubted His Resurrection, He concealed the joy and knowledge of His Presence. Now that His Body was glorified, what men saw of Him depended on His willingness to reveal Himself and also on the disposition of their own hearts.”
From Sheen, we turn to Edward Schillebeeckx, the great Dominican theologian from Belgium-Holland. From his monumental work – Jesus: An Experiment in Christology – we learn that the first Easter experience was both a conversion experience and an experience of forgiveness, for desertion in the case of the early disciples, for persecution in the case of Paul. In the case of the two disciples from Emmaus, the conversion included acceptance of the truth that Jesus had risen, was still alive, had triumphed over death, and that they were still his disciples, that he was still their teacher and lord. From the huge legacy of Schillebeeckx’s theological work, we learn that Christianity is first and foremost a story and a practice. “People do not argue against suffering, but tell a story… Christianity does not give any explanation for suffering, but demonstrates a way of life” (Christ, 698-99). It was the story of the life of Jesus filled with his life praxis. What the two Emmaus disciples did, then, was to ransack their memories of their experiences with Jesus during his lifetime up to his death. In that recollection:
- Despite Jesus’ ultimate negative experience of cruel and unjust suffering, they found saving grace in Jesus’ resistance to evil, his refusing to turn his back on his mission of proclaiming the reign of God, his fidelity to Abba in the darkness even unto death, and his embrace of solidarity with all those who suffer;
- Just like the rest of the early disciples, they had abandoned Jesus and scattered at the time of his death, but now had a profound experience of being forgiven;
- The identity of the risen Christ was inspired by what the historical Jesus said and did when he lived among them. His table-fellowship was particularly poignant and the supper at Emmaus was a familiar reenactment of communion and acceptance; and
- At the “delayed” recognition, they also experienced a renewed call to re-gather with all disciples and a commission to proclaim the Good News of Jesus’ Resurrection.
For us today, reading the re-telling the stories of the Risen Christ, the early disciples are telling us something about the Jesus who lived among them. This means that our faith is rooted in the life of Jesus, as the event and experience of the resurrection was the catalyst which enabled the early disciples to know and appreciate Jesus’ life among them and its saving significance from the very beginning.
2. Revelation as a Process
From experience, Robert C. Tannehill’s answer to the question of recognition of the Risen Christ makes for the strongest appeal.
Tannehill notes well the important preparation on the road prior to recognition at the meal, so that as soon as Jesus vanishes, the disciples recall the conversation on the road. In retrospect, therefore, already there were signs of awareness, for the disciples’ hearts were “burning” then, only that their awareness of it had neither matured nor been verbalized so as to be brought out into the open and to the forefront of their consciousness. Tannehill observes incisively:
- The connection between the two phases of the Emmaus story is strengthened by reuse of the word “open” (dianoigô). Before their eyes were “opened,” Jesus “was opening” the scriptures to them (vv.31-32; cf. also v.45). The whole Emmaus narrative is a revelatory process, for the disciples needed to understand how death and resurrection befits the Messiah before they could recognize the risen Lord. So when the disciples report to Jerusalem, they tell about “what had happened on the road” (the conversation) as well as the recognition of Jesus “in the breaking of the bread” (v.35). [Tannehill, in the Abingdon New Testament Commentaries on Luke, p.358.]
Retracing the steps, the link between the gradual revelation and the heart is clearly seen in the following process.
- On the road to Emmaus, the disciples’ hearts were already stirred by the Lord’s breaking open the scriptures to them. They had begun to realize that as the prophets of old had foretold, the Messiah must suffer, just as Jesus himself had made three passion predictions saying the same thing.
- With hearts burning, they were prompted to reach out in hospitality towards the stranger.
- That familiar fourfold meal pattern (take, bless, break, give) and the words that accompany it finally triggers the recognition of the risen Lord. Their hearts burned with exhilarating excitement upon the recognition of the Lord at the breaking of the bread.
- Now with hearts burning stronger after verbalizing the fact, they could no longer sit back, but dropped their supper, and returned at once to Jerusalem. In that emotional state, we presume they dashed all the way on that seven-mile journey, in contrast to the dispirited walk of dejected bodies when their home-journey to Emmaus began.
- They had first to listen to the excited report from disciples in Jerusalem before they got their turn to burst out what they had run seven miles to tell: “The Lord has risen indeed! We have seen the Lord!” With burning hearts, they shared the Good News which Mary Magdalene, favoured by the risen Lord with the first post-resurrection appearance, declared in the first-ever Easter proclamation: “The Lord is risen! I have seen the Lord!”
3. An Encounter
There is no lack of authors preferring an alternative interpretation of the Resurrection as non-physical but spiritual. One such author is Peter C. Hodgson in Winds of the Spirit: A Constructive Christian Theology (1994). While we do not take that route, something that he wrote resonates with me. He proposes that Jesus’ resurrection appearance is a spiritual presence that drives ethical actions. Christ’s resurrection presence becomes the driving force within the person, the inner witness of the Holy Spirit, which empowers loving actions.
We must not for a moment imagine that benefits of the cosmic power of the Creator God are confined to believing and practicing Christians. All of the human race regardless of faith adherence, so long as their hearts are open to the movement of the cosmic Spirit of God, are capable of rendering loving service to others in need. We were once grateful beneficiaries of that power from non-Christians.
- A number of years ago, we were stranded at Senai Airport, JB. Our return flight to Kuching on Air Asia had taken off an hour and a half ahead of time, without any prior notice to a number of passengers who had not even checked in yet. Standing ahead of us at the airline counter was another gentleman from Kuching who had just attended a Buddhist seminar in JB. We ourselves had just conducted a Catholic seminar at Plentong Pastoral Centre. Airline counter clerk rescheduled all “free of charge” on the first flight out the next morning, but we needed to find accommodation for the night and transport on our own (the clerk “not authorized” to pay for accommodation and transport, meaning we had to make a separate “claim” afterwards if we wished). We might be furious, but fury would not resolve the fact that we were stuck. Meanwhile, the Buddhist gentleman had JB Buddhist friends on hand to see to his needs. Seeing us stranded, he and his friends volunteered to help. They patiently waited for us to finish the paper work at the counter before recommending a “moderately priced” hotel at a nearby town and driving us there, with further promise to come fetch us for the flight the following morning, which they did. When we thanked them for their kindness, the man said something which echoed the best ethical teaching the Christian faith has to offer: “On life’s journey, we all get wounded some time. It’s our human duty to help anyone in suffering and need.” (在人生旅途中，我们都会受伤害. 我们必须提供帮助给别人.) In William Barry’s poetic Christian language, in what the gentleman did for us, he practiced resurrection.
Copyright © Dr. Jeffrey & Angie Goh, June 2021. All rights reserved.
You are most welcome to respond to this post. Email your comments to jeffangiegoh@gmail.com. You can also be dialogue partners in this Ephphatha Coffee-Corner Ministry by sending us questions for discussion