Did Jesus raise himself from the dead, or did God raise him?

The passages

John 2:19–22

“Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up”; he spoke “of the temple of his body”.

Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days? But he spake of the temple of his body. When therefore he was risen from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this unto them; and they believed the scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.

John 10:17–18

“I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.”

Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

Acts 2:24

Peter at Pentecost: Jesus is the one “whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death”.

Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be holden of it.

Galatians 1:1

Paul’s apostleship is from Jesus Christ “and God the Father, who raised him from the dead”.

Paul, an apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead;)

Romans 8:11

“The Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead” dwells in believers and will give life to their bodies.

But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.

Jesus says of his body, “in three days I will raise it up”, and claims the power to take up his life again. But Peter and Paul repeatedly say that God raised him, and Paul names “God the Father, who raised him from the dead”. Either Jesus raised himself or someone else raised him.

The answer

The New Testament ascribes the resurrection to God, and it presents Jesus as God the Son. So ‘God raised him’ and ‘I will raise it up’ are not rival claims. Most often the apostles say that God the Father raised Jesus (Acts 2:24; Galatians 1:1): the Father had sent the Son, and the resurrection is his verdict on the Son’s work. Jesus, speaking of “the temple of his body” (John 2:21), says that he himself will raise it, and in John 10:18 that he has power (exousia, ‘authority’) to lay down his life “and I have power to take it again”. In the same breath he adds, “This commandment have I received of my Father”. The Son takes up his life in full agreement with the Father, not apart from him. Romans 8:11 links the Holy Spirit with the resurrection too.

This fits Jesus’ own teaching that the Son does what the Father does: “as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son quickeneth whom he will” (John 5:21; compare 5:19). The historic Christian teaching is that the works of God towards the world are the works of the whole Trinity, each person acting in his own way. The resurrection is one act of the one God: the Father raised the Son, the Son took up his life again, and the Spirit gave life.

In his human nature Jesus truly died. As the eternal Son he did not cease to live, and so he could take up his human life again, as Barnes notes on John 10:18. Jesus’ claim in John 2:19 was itself a claim to be more than a man, which is why his disciples remembered it after Easter (John 2:22).

The Spirit’s part

Romans 8:11 speaks of “the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead”, and some read 1 Peter 3:18, “quickened by the Spirit”, as naming the Spirit as the one who gave Christ life. Others take ‘spirit’ there to describe the sphere of Christ’s risen life. Either way, the Spirit’s share does not compete with the Father’s or the Son’s.

From the classic commentators

The claim of "power to take it again" is no less important, as showing that His resurrection, though ascribed to the Father, in the sense we shall presently see, was nevertheless His own assertion of His own right to life as soon as the purposes of His voluntary death were accomplished.Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Commentary on John 10:18 (1871), at Bible Hub

Did Jesus raise himself from the dead, or did God raise him?

The passages

The objection

The answer

Other answers Christians give

The Spirit’s part

From the classic commentators

Sources

Further reading