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Is God Dead?
Last week, we looked in detail at the scientific implausibility of group hallucinations. That is, since hallucinations are personal mental events, groups of people can’t hallucinate the same thing in the same place at the same time. The significance of this is that half of the post-resurrection appearances of Jesus are to groups of people (cf 1 Cor 15:5-8).
But what about the appearances of the risen Jesus to individuals? After all, individuals certainly could have hallucinated Jesus, right? In fact, in Paul’s list (1 Cor 15:5-8), Jesus first appears to the individual Cephas, or Peter. Now, regarding Peter, on the surface, we do have some reason to believe that he may have suffered a hallucination.
Having denied Jesus three times (Luke 22:61-62), it has been postulated that Peter could have hallucinated Jesus “as an unconscious resolution to his cognitive dissonance,” what psychologists generally term as bereavement hallucinations or as “grief hallucinations.” Most often, these are hallucinations of a recently departed loved one.
It is postulated that Peter’s bereavement vision of Jesus could have been triggered by delusional “wishful thinking” and unsuccessful mourning in an attempt to gain some relief from his guilt. This seems plausible. There is certainly no doubt that Peter was stricken with heavy grief, and he was guilt-ridden for having denied Jesus three times in his time of need. However, there is a self-identifiable quality to grief hallucinations.
Research shows that those experiencing bereavement hallucinations know that their visions are hallucinations and are not real. As such, even under duress, Peter would have known that his vision of Jesus possessed a particular quality that would allow him to identify his hallucination as unreal.
In other words, if we hold to the current scientific understanding of the predispositions necessary for a person to hallucinate, it was not within the capacity of Peter’s subconsciousness to hallucinate a risen Jesus in order to relieve his guilt and bereavement. Now, remember that a hallucination is a projection of one’s own mind.
That is, hallucinations cannot exceed the content of a person’s mind. As far as Peter was concerned, Jesus was dead and cold, and in the tomb. Quite simply, Peter had absolutely no mental content nor expectation of seeing a risen Jesus.
Now, this is interesting in that one intriguing driver of hallucinations is that they “usually come to people with an anticipating spirit or hopeful expectancy.” Applying this principle to Peter, he knew Jesus to be crucified and dead, so Peter had no “anticipating spirit.” More than that, Peter was first and foremost a Jew.
It is noted that in Jewish thought, “the resurrection always (1) occurred after the end of the world, and (2) concerned all people, not just an isolated individual. Jesus’s resurrection was both within history and of one person.” So again, Peter had no “anticipating spirit” or a “hopeful expectancy” to see a risen Jesus. These things are given; even if Peter’s grief was overwhelming, he lacked the necessary mental content, he lacked the “anticipating spirit,” and he lacked the “hopeful expectancy” necessary to hallucinate a resurrected Jesus.
Beyond that, regardless of how compelling and plausible Peter’s bereavement hallucination theory sounds, it still stands that this was not Peter’s only experience with the risen Jesus. Recall Peter also experienced the risen Jesus at least two other times in group settings as a part of “The Twelve” and as a part of “all the apostles.”
And likely as part of “the 500” as well (cf 1 Cor 15:3-8). So, even if Peter hallucinated Jesus in a one-on-one setting, it is difficult to think that Peter would have hallucinated Jesus in at least two group settings, given that group hallucinations are not part of currently accepted psychiatric understanding.
Finally, to be sure, Peter thought the appearance of Jesus after the resurrection was real enough that he was willing to die for that belief. Peter’s boldness in the face of danger plays out over and again in the book of Acts, indicating his willingness to suffer to proclaim his faith that came directly from his belief that he had personally witnessed the risen Jesus.”
Considering all the canonical and non-canonical evidence, the historical claim that Peter was martyred for his belief in the resurrected Jesus is given by historians “the highest possible probability.” Peter was utterly convinced that the risen Jesus had appeared to him, and he died for that belief.
Join us again next time as we investigate whether or not Paul’s encounter with the risen Jesus could have been a hallucination. All this and more on our way to answering the question: is God dead?
Gloria in excelsis Deo.
Ty B. Kerley, DMin., is an ordained minister who teaches Christian apologetics and relief preaches in Southern Oklahoma. Dr. Kerley and his wife, Vicki, are members of the Waurika church of Christ and live in Ardmore, OK. You can contact him at dr.kerley@isGoddead. com.
