What is the Hallucination Theory?

THE HALLUCINATION THEORY

Another theory put forth is that, those who professed to see the risen Lord, were the subjects of hallucination that is, they imagined seeing that which did not exist. One can understand it possible for an emotional overwrought individual, overwhelmed with grief, and in the dim light of the break of day, believing that he or she had seen the Lord, when it was not so. Have we not all imagined trees and shrubs in the dim moonlight taking shape like human beings, when we knew all the time it was only imagination. But our Lord spent no less than forty days on this earth after His resurrection and before His ascension, giving many tangible proofs of the reality of His resurrection.

There were too many witnesses to the fact of the resurrection to make it possible they were all the subjects of hallucination. Our Lord was seen on four occasions by His disciples. They were allowed to see the wounds in His feet and hands and side, even to the length of putting the finger in the prints of the nails. Moreover He did eat and drink with them. He walked miles with the two disciples going to Emmaus. He bid His disciples handle Him, and convince themselves that He was no apparition, that a spirit had not flesh and bones, as He was seen to have. Nay, more, the Apostle Paul spoke of five hundred brethren at once seeing Him. Were they all the subjects of hallucination? No, this theory will not stand examination, and can safely be dismissed as another lie of the enemy.

289 But let us ourselves examine the evidence St. Paul affords in writing to the Corinthians. The question was, Will the saints rise again? The proof of the resurrection, insisted on as evidence, is the fact of Christ's resurrection; for if there be no resurrection, then Christ is not raised; and the whole gospel, which is really founded on it, falls to the ground. Besides, therefore, a doctrinal statement (to which the evidence of his own mission, already afforded, gave authority), he appeals to historical proofs. And what are they? Some one apparition to an excited individual, whose imagination may have misled him? No; different and repeated manifestations of Himself by Christ to persons who very well knew Him. The apostle states (besides these manifestations of Christ taking place often to those who were intimate with Him) on one occasion He appeared to some five hundred persons, of whom the apostle takes care to say that the greater part are still living to testify, if needed, to the truth of the statement. Now what so good evidence can you have of a person being actually there, as being repeatedly seen by those who knew him well, his daily companions; and (if prejudice or feeling may be alleged as leading a dozen of them to concur in and continue a most elaborate falsehood, and suffer for it) having the certainty of the truth confirmed by His being seen by above five hundred persons at once, who were then most of them living to tell the story? It is difficult to imagine what "our logic" could have, in the way of evidence, more convincing.

It took a great deal to satisfy the disciples that their beloved Lord was indeed risen from the dead, with all that it meant for them. In spite of Mary Magdalene’s story that she had seen the risen Christ, and that He had sent through her the wonderful message, saying, “I ascend to My Father, and your Father; and to My God, and your God” (John 20:17), they could not bring themselves to believe her story. Was it not possible that, in her overwrought, emotional condition, and in the semi-darkness of early morning, she might have imagined something that never happened?

The witnesses to this mighty victory are overwhelming, and I do not therefore marvel at men, who wish to get rid of the fact, and yet do not feel that they can safely impute deceitful practices to the disciples, suggesting all sorts of theories which they consider sufficient to account for their belief in the event without it being really true. But I would like to ask these men a very old question: "Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you that God should raise the dead"? Had fallen man been the one declared to have gained such a victory, it would have been very reasonable to doubt it, but as it is declared to have been brought about by the power of God I see no reason to question it. No doubt the enemy would desire to treat the report as a fable. He is not likely to foster the notion in men's minds that his stronghold has fallen before the assault of the Son of God, but the witnesses are so many and of such unquestionable integrity that not to believe the fact is a terrible evidence of sheer self-will.

Paul tells us that Jesus was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve: after that He was seen of above five hundred brethren at once. After that He was seen of James; then of all the apostles. And last of all He was seen of Paul himself. Luke tells us in his Gospel that He appeared to two of them on their way home from Jerusalem to Emmaus; and was made known to them in the breaking of bread, the symbol of His death; that He ate and drank with His disciples, and that when they thought it was a spirit they were looking upon, He invited them to handle Him and see, telling them that a spirit had not flesh and bones, as they saw He had. Next, he tells us that He led a company out as far as Bethany, and that while, with uplifted hands, He blessed them, He was parted from them and carried up into heaven (Luke 24). And in what a pure and guileless atmosphere of holy affections this short history of the victory of God is enshrined. Never in the universe has appeared the liar who could set the baseless inventions of his corrupt imagination in such a framework of tender grace and evident piety. Had I no other testimony than that which is furnished by the writer of the third Gospel I dare not question the glad tidings of the overthrow of the king of terrors.

Because the Resurrection falls into the same supernatural category as the Trinity, many doubt that Christ actually did rise from the dead. Some theorize that He never really died but that He just passed out and was awakened later by His disciples. Or possibly the women went to the wrong tomb and found it empty. Another theory says that either His friends or His enemies stole the body.

As one Bible scholar has said, none of the "standard" explanations can account for the total change that occurred in Jesus' followers after they found the empty tomb. And as for His post resurrection appearances‑to as many as 5OO people at a time (see 1 Cor. 15:6) - they were far more than just a spiritual presence or apparition. Instead, "history, theology, and experience combine to show that the glorious fact is that Christ did rise from the dead" (see 1 Cor. 15:20, Phillips)."

Credulity is described as a readiness to believe on improbable grounds. This is ever a mark of opponents to the Bible that they are ready to believe anything that can set aside the Scriptures, such as the swoon theory, the hallucination theory. It has been put forward that Paul’s conversion was due to an epileptic fit, as if any person so affected would profess to have seen what Paul saw. It has been said that if Paul’s conversion was due to an epileptic fit, it is a great pity that tens of thousands more were not subject to fits of that kind.

Renan said that it was an uneasy conscience with unstrung nerves, fatigue of the journey, eyes inflamed by the hot sun, a sudden stroke of fever, which produced the hallucination. And this nonsense is repeated to this day. Others of the critics have stated that it was a thunderstorm which overtook him, and that a flash of lightning blinded him. In that lightning flash he imagined that he saw Christ. Again, others have tried to explain his vision by some physical disease. Jews and others have declared that he suffered from Epilepsy, which the Greeks called "the holy disease." This disease, they say, put him into a state of ecstasy, which may have greatly impressed his Gentile hearers. In such an attack he imagined to have seen a vision and heard a voice. All these and other opinions are puerile inventions. The fact is, the conversion of Saul is one of the great miracles and evidences of Christianity.

How perplexed those eleven men in Jerusalem must have been on that first day of the week, when it began to dawn upon them their crucified Master had risen up from among the dead. At first they would not believe it, the report that the women brought was a pack of idle tales, hallucinations of distraught women; and yet it did seem as though the impossible had become fact, for Peter and John had seen the empty tomb with their own eyes. What had happened? and if He was alive, where was He? and what would He do?

How perplexed those eleven men in Jerusalem must have been on that first day of the week, when it began to dawn upon them their crucified Master had risen up from among the dead. At first they would not believe it, the report that the women brought was a pack of idle tales, hallucinations of distraught women; and yet it did seem as though the impossible had become fact, for Peter and John had seen the empty tomb with their own eyes. What had happened? and if He was alive, where was He? and what would He do?

Here it is simply said, "She went and brought word to those that had been with Him, as they mourned and wept. And they, when they heard that He was alive, and had been seen of her, did not believe." It is very remarkable the simplicity with which the Evangelists relate the proofs of the incredulity of the disciples: there is no attempt to gloss it over. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, all tell it out plainly. They knew not the Scriptures, says John, that He must rise from the dead. They saw the fact, but did not take in its connection with the repeated counsels of God. It was believed on in the intelligence of evidence before their eyes, not yet entered into in faith, as it was soon about to be.