In this issue we continue the study of the book Posthumous Works, published after Allan Kardec disembodied and containing texts written by him. The present work is based on the translation made by Dr. Guillon Ribeiro, published by the Brazilian Spiritist Federation.
Questions for discussion
93. Is Christ’s deity proved by His miracles?
94. Is Christ’s deity proved by His words?
95. After Crucifixion, did the tone of Jesus' words about himself change?
96. Jesus, could He not have been mistaken and mistakenly concealed His divine nature?
Answers to the proposed questions
93. Is Christ’s deity proved by His miracles?
According to the Church, yes it is. The deity of Christ was established mainly based on His miracles, as a testimony of a supernatural power. This consideration might have had some weight at a time when the wonderful was accepted without examination. However, today, that Science took its investigation to the laws of Nature miracles have more unbelievers than believers. The Church, moreover, takes from the miracles all their importance as proof of the divinity of Christ when it admits that the devil can also make them as prodigious as Christ did. But if the devil has such a power, it is clear that facts of this kind do not have, in any way, an exclusively divine character. If the devil can do amazing things to seduce even the elect, how could mere mortals distinguish the good miracles from the bad ones?
The essential character of the miracle, in the theological sense, is to be an exception in the Laws of Nature and, therefore, an unexplainable fact by those same laws. From the moment that a fact can be explained and connected to a known cause it ceases to be a miracle. This is why Science findings classified certain effects as natural effects (classified previously as prodigious because what caused them was ignored). Later, the knowledge of the spiritual principle, of the action of the fluid on the economy, of the invisible world in the midst of which we live, the faculties of the soul, of the existence and properties of the perisprit, gave us the key to the psychic phenomena, and proved that they are not, more than the others, exceptions to the laws of Nature, on the contrary they are their frequent applications.
All effects of magnetism, somnambulism, ecstasy, dual view, hypnotism, catalepsy, anesthesia, transmission of thought, foreknowledge, instant cures, possessions, obsessions, of the apparitions and so on, which are almost all of the miracles of the Gospel, belong to this category of phenomena.
The possibility of most of the facts that the Gospel mentions as having been performed by Jesus is today fully explained by Magnetism and Spiritism, as natural phenomena they are.
Once they occur under our eyes, either spontaneously or caused, there is nothing abnormal that Jesus possessed powers similar to those of our magnetizers, healers, sleepwalkers, psychics, mediums, etc. From the moment that these same faculties are found, in different degrees, in a crowd of people, who have nothing of God, who are known as heretics and idolaters, they do not mean, in no way, a superhuman nature. (Posthumous Works - Study on the Nature of Christ).
94. Is Christ’s deity proved by His words?
No, of course not. The texts below, all copied from the New Testament, show it:
"He, who receives me, receives Him, the one who sent me, because the one, who is the least among you, is the greatest". (Luke, Chapter IX, v. 48).
"Whoever welcomes in my name a little child like this, welcomes me, and who receives me welcomes not only me, but receives Him, who sent me." (Mark, Chapter IX, v. 36).
"Jesus addressed them: I am still with you for a little while, and then I go to Him, who sent me." (St. John, Chapter VII, v. 33).
"He, who hears you, hears me; the one, who despises you, despises me, and he, who despises me, despises Him, who sent me". (St. John, Chapter X, v. 16).
"As for myself, I say what I have seen in my Father's house; as for you, do what you have seen in your father's house". (St. John, Chapter VIII, v. 38).
"Whoever acknowledges me and recognizes me before men, I will acknowledge and recognize him also before my Father which is in Heaven; and he, who renounces me before men, I, myself, will also renounce him before my Father, who is in Heaven". (Matthew, Chapter X, v. 32, 33).
"You heard what I said to you, I will go, and I will come back to you. If you love me, you will rejoice that I go to my Father, because my Father is greater than I…" (St. John, Chapter XIV, v. 28).
"Then a young man approaches Him and says: Good master, what good must I do to gain eternal life? Jesus answered him: Why do you call me good? There is only God, who is good. If you wish to enter life, keep the Commandments". (Matthew, Chapter XIX, v. 16, 17. St. Mark, Chapter X, v. 17, 18. Luke, Chapter XVIII, v. 18, 19).
"I have not spoken in any way of myself, but my Father, who sent me, was the one who ordered me, by His power, what should I say, and how should I speak, and I know that His power is eternal life; what I say, then, I say it according to what my Father has commanded me". (St. John, Chapter XII, v. 49, 50).
"Jesus answered them: My doctrine is not my doctrine, but His doctrine, of the one who sent me. If someone wants to follow the will of God, it will recognize if my doctrine is His, or whether I speak of myself. The one who speaks of his own movement seeks his own glory, but he, who seeks the glory of the one who sent him, is true, and in no way, is there injustice". (St. John, Chapter VII, v. 16, 17).
"Heaven and Earth will pass away, but my words shall not pass away. For what belongs to the day or to each hour, man does not know, not even the angels in Heaven, not even the Son, but only the Father". (Mark, Chapter XIII. v. 32. and Matthew, Chapter XXIV v. 35, 36).
"Jesus addressed them: When you have raised high the son of man, then you will know what I am, because I do nothing by myself, I say only what my Father taught me, and He, who sent me, is with me, and has never left me alone, because I always do what is pleasing to Him ". (St. John, Chapter VIII, v. 28, 29).
"Because of this, the Jews persecuted Jesus and wanted Him to die, because He had done these things on the Sabbath. But Jesus said to them: My father acts to the present, and so do I". (John, Chapter V, v. 16, 17).
"If you keep my Commandments, you will abide in my love, as I myself have kept the Commandments of my Father, and abide in His love." (St. John, Chapter XV, v. 10).
"Then Jesus, exclaimed: My Father, I rest my soul in your hands. And with these words, He died…" (Luke, Chapter XXIII, v 46). (Posthumous Works. - Study of the Nature of Christ).
95. After Crucifixion, did the tone of Jesus' words about himself change?
No. It is seen, therefore, that all his words show, when He is alive, and after His death, a duality of two perfectly distinct beings, as well as the deep sense of His inferiority and subordination in relation to the Supreme Being. For His insistence in saying it spontaneously, without being embarrassed or provoked to do so, it seems that He was making an early protest against the role that would be given to Him in the future by the Church.
These quotes regarding the postmortem period show it:
"Jesus answered them: Do not touch me, because I have not yet ascended to my Father: but go and look for my brothers and tell them on my behalf: I have ascended to my Father and your Father, to my God and to your God”. (Apparition to Mary Magdalene. St. John, Chapter XX, v. 17).
"And Jesus came up and spoke thus to them: All power was given unto me in Heaven and on Earth." (Apparition to the Apostles. St. Matthew, Chapter XXVIII, v. 18).
"Now, you are witnesses of these things. And I will send you the gift my Father promised you". (Apparition to the Apostles St. Luke, Chapter XXIV, v 48, 49). (Posthumous Works. - Study of the Nature of Christ)
96. Jesus, could He not have been mistaken and mistakenly concealed His divine nature?
If it was reasonable to assume that, when alive, Jesus ignored His true nature, this opinion is no longer acceptable after His resurrection, since, when He appears to His disciples, it is no longer the man who speaks, but the Spirit free from matter, who should have recovered the fullness of its spiritual faculties and the consciousness of its normal state, of its identification with the divinity. However, it is then that he says: I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and to your God! The subordination of Jesus is still designated by His own quality of mediator, which implies the existence of a separate person; it is He who intercedes with his Father, who offers himself in a sacrifice to redeem sinners; now, if He himself was God, or equal to Him in all things, He had no need to intercede, because one does not intercede with your own self. (Posthumous Works - Study on the Nature of Christ).
