Note 31 — Chapter V · THE ASCENSION.

As, according to this, those who knew of an ascension of Jesus, had by no means the same idea of its particular circumstances: there must have been in general two different modes of conceiving the close of the life of Jesus; some regarding it as a visible ascension, others not so.31 When Matthew makes Jesus before the tribunal of the high priest predict his exaltation to the right hand of the divine power (xxvi. 64), and after his resurrection declare that now all power is given to him in heaven and earth (xxviii. 18); and nevertheless has nothing of a visible ascension, but on the contrary puts into the mouth of Jesus the assurance: I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world, ἐγὼ μεθ’ ὑμῶν εἰμι πάσας τὰς ἡμέρας ἕως τῆς συντελείας τοῦ αἰῶνος (v. 20): it is evident that the latent idea, on which his representation is founded, is that Jesus, doubtless immediately on his resurrection, ascended invisibly to the Father, though at the same time remaining invisibly with his followers; and that out of this concealment he, as often as he found it expedient, revealed himself in Christophanies. The same view is to be discerned in the Apostle Paul, when in 1 Cor. xv. he undistinguishingly places the appearance to himself of the Christ already ascended into heaven, in one series with the earlier Christophanies; and also the author of the fourth gospel and the rest of the New Testament writers only presuppose what must necessarily be presupposed according to the messianic passage: Sit thou at my right hand, Ps. cx. 1: that Jesus was exalted to the right hand of God; without deciding anything as to the manner of the exaltation, or representing to themselves the ascension as a visible one. The imagination of the primitive Christians must however have felt a strong temptation to depict this exaltation as a brilliant spectacle. When it was once concluded that the Messiah Jesus had arrived at so exalted a position, it would appear desirable to gaze after him, as it were, on his way thither. If it was expected, in accordance with the prophecy of Daniel, that his future return from heaven would be a visible descent in the clouds: this would naturally suggest that his departure to heaven should be represented as a visible ascent on a cloud; and when Luke makes the two white-apparelled angels, who joined the disciples after the removal of Jesus, say: this same Jesus, who is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven (Acts i. 11): we need only take the converse of this declaration in order to have before us the genesis of the conception of the ascension of Jesus; for the mode of conclusion was this: as Jesus will at some future time return from heaven in the clouds, so he must surely have departed thither32 in the same manner.