(1)

We know from Paul’s Philippian Christ hymn and Corinthian Creed that Paul thought God raised Jesus from the dead and because of his service unto death exalted Jesus to the highest possible position (Lord), a name and status Jesus didn’t previously have. Paul elsewhere declares Jesus the firstborn of many brothers and he was the apocalyptic “first-fruits” of the general resurrection of souls at the end of the age.

Paul claims Jesus was thus “translated” after death, and was seen by a number of people including Peter, the 12, James, the 500, and lastly Paul himself. Certainly, nothing supernatural is implied here. Bereavement hallucinations are common (my friend’s mother had them when her husband died), as are mass hallucinations (e.g., the Fatima Sky Miracle), and Paul may certainly have been under cognitive dissonance stress persecuting a movement he had relatives in (e.g., Junia) that his teacher Gamaliel also said to treat with kindness an understanding.

We see such things in ancient accounts with the ascension of Augustus Caesar. Augustus died in 14 CE, and the Roman Senate officially deified him, declaring him Divus Augustus (the Divine Augustus). This was a continuation of the Roman practice of deifying prominent leaders, as seen with Julius Caesar. His deification was formalized through state rituals, including the construction of the Temple of Divus Augustus

Ancient writers like Suetonius (The Twelve Caesars, “Augustus,” 100) and Dio Cassius (Roman History, 56.46) mention omens and portents surrounding Augustus’s death, which were interpreted as signs of his divine favor or transition to godhood. For example, Suetonius notes that a senator, Numerius Atticus, claimed to have seen Augustus’s soul ascending to heaven, similar to the story of Julius Caesar’s comet. The Roman concept of apotheosis (becoming a god) was Roman deification which relied on visions, omens, state decrees, and public rituals.

(2)

Luke 3:6 – “All flesh will ‘see’ the salvation of the Lord”

In Luke 3:6, the verse is part of a quotation from Isaiah 40:3–5 (via the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible). The Greek text of Luke 3:6 reads:

καὶ ὄψεται πᾶσα σὰρξ τὸ σωτήριον τοῦ θεοῦ
(“And all flesh will ‘see’ the salvation of God”)

The verb used here for “see” is ὄψεται (opsetai), a future middle form of the verb ὁράω (horaō). This verb commonly means “to see,” “to perceive,” or “to experience visually” and is frequently used in the New Testament for both physical and metaphorical sight (e.g., perceiving or understanding something divine). In this context, Luke is quoting Isaiah to describe a future revelation where all people will witness God’s salvation, likely referring to the work of Jesus or the establishment of God’s kingdom. The use of ὁράω suggests a broad, collective experience of perceiving God’s redemptive act, possibly with a visionary or spiritual connotation, given the prophetic context. The likely meaning of “see” here is “experience,” not that all people will physically “see” something.

Paul uses the same word to describe the various people seeing/experiencing the risen Christ.

1 Corinthians 15:5–8 – The Risen Jesus “Was Seen”

In 1 Corinthians 15:5–8, Paul lists appearances of the risen Jesus:

ὅτι παρέδωκα γὰρ ὑμῖν ἐν πρώτοις, ὃ καὶ παρέλαβον, ὅτι Χριστὸς ἀπέθανεν ὑπὲρ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν ἡμῶν κατὰ τὰς γραφὰς, καὶ ὅτι ἐτάφη, καὶ ὅτι ἐγήγερται τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ τρίτῃ κατὰ τὰς γραφὰς, καὶ ὅτι ὤφθη Κηφᾷ, εἶτα τοῖς δώδεκα· ἔπειτα ὤφθη ἐπάνω πεντακοσίοις ἀδελφοῖς ἐφάπαξ… ἔπειτα ὤφθη Ἰακώβῳ, εἶτα τοῖς ἀποστόλοις πᾶσιν· ἔσχατον δὲ πάντων… ὤφθη κἀμοί.

(“…that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he was seen by Cephas, then by the Twelve. Then he was seen by more than five hundred brothers at once… then he was seen by James, then by all the apostles. Last of all… he was seen by me also.”)

Given the Roman empire context in which Paul was writing, an “appearance” could have been a dream, an omen, a feeling, an apparition, the glance of someone in the crowd, a dove treated as symbolic, etc. The verb used here for “was seen” is ὤφθη (ōphthē), a third-person singular aorist passive form of ὁράω (horaō), the same root verb as in Luke 3:6. Both Luke 3:6 (ὄψεται) and 1 Corinthians 15:5–8 (ὤφθη) use forms of the same Greek verb, ὁράω (horaō). The passive ὤφθη in Paul’s writing aligns with Septuagint usage (e.g., Genesis 12:7, where God “appears” to Abraham), often indicating divine revelation, but Paul’s Post Caesar use suggests post-resurrection appearances the nature of which (physical sight, visionary experience, or both, omens like Caesar’s comet, etc) is not explicitly defined in the text.

In the gospels, the empty tomb and the ascension of Jesus most closely relate to ancient apotheosis narratives such as the Greek romances where a body goes missing from a tomb and it is naturally assumed the dead person has been deified. It was also such an issue in ancient times that bodies were being stolen from tombs that Caesar for instance had to decree an edict against it (e.g., the Nazareth Inscription). That doesn’t mean this happened to Jesus, but this gives a general idea of the atmosphere at the time.