The terrified disciples

Luke 24:36-39 Now as they said these things, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, and said to them, "Peace to you.” But they were terrified and frightened, and supposed they had seen a spirit. And He said to them, "Why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your hearts? Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.”

A couple of questions on this passage that have intrigued me:

1) what did the disciples think they were seeing that terrified them?

2) before I ask question #2 I would like to hear some responses to question #1

Thanks!

Maybe better- what did the disciples think the spirit was that they thought they were seeing.

When they saw Jesus walking on the water they thought he was a ghost; I believe the word ghost is specifically used in that passage but in the passage I quoted it says spirit, not ghost.

I guess the easiest way to ask it is is when they saw Jesus in the Luke 24 passage, did they think it was a ghost as we use the term today (I.e. a spirit of a dead person).

Reminds me of the old Lewis Grizzard story about Uncle Cleve and sittin' up with the dead. Some of you will be familiar. I won't link to it since Grizzard peppered in some profanities from time to time and may have in the telling of this particular tale.

I think they thought they saw a ghost like we think of it, more or less. Fear of the unknown. Any commentaries enlighten us?

I guess I can ask question #2, namely:

Why didn't Jesus tell them there was no such thing as ghosts as opposed to demonstrating why he was NOT a ghost.

I think the traditional evangelical position is that there are no ghosts because a person's spirit either goes directly to heaven or hell when they die.

But I recently re-read an account called "Blumhardt's Battle" about a humble German pastor in a small German town that had a multi-month spiritual battle, I.e. exorcism of a young woman in the town in the 1800s. The story is fascinating and pretty scary (she exhibited all the typical possession symptoms and some even more horrifying) but ultimately he discovered that it was not a demon that was inhabiting the girl but rather a "ghost" of a dead woman that had dabbled in black magic and murdered her children, and she told him she was cursed to roam in that state because of what she had done. Think "Marley" from A Christmas Carol.

The story is also told in a book called "the awakening". After the events of the exorcism, there was a major revival in the region, which this book tells about.

Both "Blumhardt's Battle" (which is Blumhardt's personal account) and "the awakening" used to be available to be read online but I don't think they are anymore. I really recommend them and the books can be purchased pretty cheap.

Brother Todd,
In answer to question #2 which may somewhat address question # 1...
1 Samuel 28 seems to suggest that there are ghosts,... especially if you look at the definition of "one with a familiar spirit"...
I mean this was in fact Samuel that was speaking through her, no?

I always thought it was Samuel, but many think it was a demon impersonating him.

I personally think it was Samuel's ghost.

Brother Todd,
That's how I've always read it, seems pretty straight forward.
If it were a demonic entity I doubt it would've scared the medium as surely they'd be familiar to her...
I think (if we're correct) that the disciples would most likely be familiar with that story and prolly others that would predicate their fear in seeing something as otherworldly as a man walking on water coming towards them,... I mean it woulda scared me prolly but I love Peter's response, "Lord IF it's you then call to me that I may come to you" and then he actually got out of the boat!!! Gotta love this guy;)

Fletcher wrote:
"Lord IF it's you..."

Good catch- never really realized the depth of Peter's question before.

Perhaps it is a question we ought to ask much more often than we do.