Speaking
of Christ and His glorious resurrection, the apostle Paul wrote:
Without any doubt, the mystery of our religion is
great: He was revealed in flesh, vindicated in spirit, seen by angels,
proclaimed among Gentiles, believed in throughout the world, taken up in glory
(1 Tim 3:16 NRSV)
The
underlining Greek translated as “vindicated” is ἐδικαιώθη, the indicative
aorist passive of the verb δικαιοω. While one can (correctly) argue that
δικαιοω has the meaning of "vindicated," it also shows that the verb
also has a transformative sense too, by the mere fact that Christ in His
resurrection was literally transformed from a state of death to a state of
life.