The Pertinent Facts in the Case for the Resurrection:
1) The Crucifixion—Early Independent, Multiple Attestation: Letters of Paul, Gospels,
Extrabiblical sources: Josephus, Tacitus / Embarrassment: The idea that Messiah would
be crucified as a criminal instead of triumphing over Israel’s enemies instead of
triumphing over and re-establishing the throne of David was utterly unknown and
antithetical in Judaism (It was an obstacle to convert Jews and Gentiles)
2) The discovery of his empty tomb by a group of his women followers on the Sunday after
his crucifixion—10 lines of support
2.1 The historicity of the burial supports the empty tomb—This means that the burial site
of Jesus was known to both Jew and Christian alike; to Jew because of Joseph of
Arimathea, to Christians because the women observed the burial. If the tomb wasn’t
empty and the burial site was known then the disciples couldn’t have believed in the
Resurrection of Jesus (to believe in Resurrection with an occupied tomb was a
contradiction in Jewish thinking).
2.1.1 Even if the disciples had managed to believe in the Resurrection, nobody else
would have been able to believe in the Resurrection in Jerusalem. Jesus crucifixion took
place in Jerusalem under the eyes of his enemies and it is where the site of his grave was
known. Yet, the Christians movement first took off in Jerusalem, not in some far away
city.
2.1.2 Even if others would have come to believe in the Resurrection, the Jewish
authorities could have nipped the Christian movement in the butt by simply pointing to
the occupied tomb of Jesus and if necessary exhuming the body just as in fact they do in
the Medieval anti-Christian Jewish polemic known as Toledot Yeshu where they dig up
the body and expose it as not being risen from the dead.
OBJECTION: What if the body wasn’t identifiable as it probably wasn’t by the time of
Pentecost? RESPONSE: So long as the corpse still lay the tomb where Jesus was
interred it wouldn’t matter if the corpse wasn’t recognizable because the burden of proof
would be put onto the disciples to show that the body wasn’t Jesus.
*Critics who deny the historicity of the empty tomb are forced to deny the burial.
WHY THINK THE BURIAL IS HISTORICAL? In 1 Cor. 15:3-5 Paul is not writing in
his own hand, rather, Paul is transmitting an old tradition which he received and in turn
passed on to this Corinthian converts. The indications that Paul is quoting an ancient
tradition are the following: the terms for receiving and transmitting tradition are the
technical rabbinical terms for do so; there are many non-Pauline traits that appear, for
example, ‘according to the Scriptures,’ Paul usually says ‘as it is written,’ moreover, ‘has
been raised’ is a verb form that Paul doesn’t typically use (appears in 2 Tim. 2:8); the
tradition overshoots what Paul needs to prove, what Paul wants to prove is resurrection of
Jesus because the Corinthians were denying the general resurrection of the dead where
Paul is arguing that if Jesus was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scripture,
then we will also be raised; but the tradition cites the death, burial, and appearances
which is an overshoot for what he needs to prove; moreover, the parallelism of this
tradition is Semitic, the tradition consists of four lines which begin contain ‘and that’
which in the greek orders the tradition in four lines and there are Semitic expressions in
the tradition itself (i.e. ‘on the third day,’ ‘Cephus,’); what Paul hands on represents the
preaching of all the apostles which means that this tradition wasn’t unique to Paul or of
his own manufacture. Notice the events that are related in this tradition (death-burialresurrection on the third day-post mortem appearances); there are good reasons to think
that Paul is mentioning the successive events with respect to Jesus after his death; ‘and
that’; there is a chronological sequencing of events; moreover, there is a remarkable
concordance between 1 Cor. 15 and the Apostolic Sermons in the Book of Acts 13:28-31
(the preaching of the apostles that Luke records in Acts) v.28-death, v.29-burial in the
tomb, v.30-resurrection, v.31-appearances (keep in mind that Luke’s resurrection
appearances are grossly physical); Notice also the correlation between the Apostolic
Sermons and Mark 15 and 16 which has the same sequence of events (death-burialresurrection-appearances). Notice that the burial is not meant to underscore his death,
that is to say ‘he was dead and buried;’ rather (ordering of ‘and that’s’ which are
grammatically unnecessary, chronology, concordance of all three traditions) all goes to
show that the burial is mean to communicate the burial as a separate event. Moreover,
the age of this tradition is incredibly early. Paul wrote 1 Corinthians around AD 55, but
this tradition based on what Paul says we know that he had already handed this tradition
over to the Corinthians but when did he ‘receive’ it? We know from Gal. 1:18 that three
years after his conversion on the Damascus Road Paul was in Jerusalem for two weeks on
a fact finding mission; the verb he uses in Gal 1:18 is unique to the NT, it is the word
used outside the NT in Greek literature to indicate fact finding missions to places of
historical significance with a view toward determining the facts (we get our word for
history from this verb). Who does Paul meet with? He says in Gal. that he meets with
Cephus and James, the two who are mentioned in 1 Cor. Appearances, thus it is highly
likely that he received this tradition at this time if not earlier. This means that the
tradition in 1 Cor. 15 goes back to within 5 years after Jesus death (AD30-crucifixion;
AD33-conversion of Paul; AD36-Paul’s visit to Jerusalem)! There is no indication that
he would have received this tradition later in his career especially since when he begins
teaching in Antioch which in that capacity he would have been the one to draft that
tradition but he didn’t draft this tradition in 1 Cor. 15. This means that legendary
accretion could not have invented this tradition. Even Crossan says that it would take at
least 5-10 years for the early church to invent the details of the passion narrative using
OT motifs and prophecies. But Crossan admits that there is nothing in the OT that would
allow the disciples to invent the details of the burial-resurrection-appearances. Paul must
of known the stories that stood behind the traditions he delivered. For example, in 1 Cor.
11:23-24 Paul hands on the details of the Last Supper. What is interesting is that Paul
identifies the rites of the Last Supper being passed on the night in which Jesus was
betrayed but that detail is not part of the Last Supper story which means Paul knew not
just the tradition but the context of the tradition which suggests that he knew the stories
behind the tradition in 1 Cor. 15. Thus, the burial is very likely to be historical.
OBJECTION: CAN YOU INFER FROM PAUL ALONE THAT JESUS WAS BURIED
BY JOSPEH OF ARIMATHEA?
RESPONSE: No, but what Paul is handing on is summary that is an outline of these other
stories of which he knew the context and when you compare it to Acts and the Gospel
narratives on the other hand what the second line of Paul’s formula refers to is the burial
by Joseph of Arimathea.
Early, Multiple & Independent Attestation of the Burial in the Gospels/The burial is also
part of the source material Mark used for writing the story of Jesus passion (15:42-);
(what you have in Mark up until the final wee k of Jesus life is a bunch of disconnected
stories that have compared to pearls strung on a necklace, but when you get to the last
week of Jesus’ life you have one continuous narrative that carries right up to the
crucifixion and through the burial; the fact that it is even older than the Gospel of Mark
itself reduce the chances of it being legendary, the presence of eyewitnesses will still be
about who could affirm the story, and Paul’s tradition in 1 Cor. 15 provides independent
attestation; indeed the differences between the gospels in the burial account are not
plausible explained as being do to editorial changes because of the sporadic and uneven
nature of the differences (i.e. Mark-the tomb is described as a tomb that had been hewn
out of rock; Matt- the tomb is described as being hewn by Joseph in the rock; these kinds
of changes are pointless and therefore not due to editing); inexplicable omission of
certain events (i.e. Pilates interrogation of the centurion which is found in Mark but is
omitted in Matthew and Luke); Matthew and Luke sometimes agree in their wording in
contrast to Mark (i.e. Matt 27:58, Luke 23:52—identical in the Greek); John is
independent of the Synoptic Gospels and yet in John you have the same burial by Joseph
of Arimathea;
The Burial Story is Simple and Lacks Legendary Embellishment and Apologetic Dressing
Joseph of Arimathea is probably the figure that buried Jesus/ It is very unlikely that
Joseph as a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin all of whom (according to Mark) voted to
condemn Jesus to the cross would have been a Christian invention. Thus, a Jewish
Sanhedrist doing what is right for Jesus is almost inexplicable given the hostility toward
the Jewish leadership because they got Jesus crucified unless it really happened. The
Gospels description of Joseph also receive unintentional support by their incidental
details; they say he is rich; this is rendered very plausible by the type and location of the
tomb in the narratives; the tomb was a bench tomb which was uncommon in that it had a
low shelf running around the three sides of the tomb or you could have a nitch in the
tomb with an arch where the body would be laid; they wouldn’t hold as many bodies and
so were very expensive which could only be afforded by upper class persons such as the
high priesthood; moreover, this tomb had a large disc shaped stone and archaeology has
dug up these types of tombs during the time of Jesus; also his coming from Arimathea ,
this a town which has no theological significance; his being a sympathizer of Jesus (the
later Gospels describe him this way, not Mark) is not only independently attested but it is
also very likely in Mark description of Joseph’s special treatment of Jesus’ body as
opposed to those of the two thieves; Joseph comes on the scene out of nowhere which
means that if this was a legend then Jesus would have been buried by his disciples or
members of his own family such as his mother which is what pious Christian fiction
would invent (i.e. Mel Gibson’s passion of the Christ); the location of these rolling disk
tombs is in the area of high priests which would be mostly in Jerusalem; He ‘dared’ to go
into Pilate, Joseph had no legal right to do this; Placing the body of a condemned
criminal would have made the tomb unclean, thus the incidental detail mentioned in the
gospels that the tomb was new and unused speaks to the historicity of this account
because if there were family members in the tomb then placing Jesus in the tomb with
them would have made the tomb unclean. Joseph probably knew that the no one had a
right to Jesus’ body as a condemned criminal except him because he could exert his rank
and authority and the fact that Pilate hands him over probably means that Pilate thought
he was innocent as the gospels affirm which is yet another example of the gospels
dovetailing.
Jesus was probably buried late on the day of preparation/ The time of Jesus interment
given what we know from extra-biblical sources about Jewish regulations concerning the
handling of executed criminals and burial procedures must have been on Friday before
the evening star occurred; they could not allow the body to remain on the cross over
Passover because it would have defiled the land and the body had to be taken down
before nightfall. Moreover, since the Sabbath was impending when no work could be
done, the burial had to completed by Friday before the evening star. This makes it very
likely that the burial of Jesus had to take place late on the day of Preparation. With help,
Joseph of Arimathea should have been able to complete a very simple burial prior to the
Sabbath; he had about 3 hours (3pm-Jesus death, 6pm-Sabbath); If he had already
intended to bury Jesus he could have arranged for the linen shroud even before Jesus had
died so that he would be ready and he probably had servants because touching the corpse
would have defiled him and prevented him from eating on Passover. A simple burial
would have included a washing, packing of spices and aloes along with wrapping in
linens. Moreover, Joseph knew that his tomb was near as the gospel(s) inform us. In the
Book of Acts (5:5-7) Ananias and Sapphira, we see something similar in terms of burial
preparations of a simple burial of 3 hours.
The observation of the burial by women is likely historical (Gospels report women as
witnesses to the crucifixion, burial, and the empty tomb)/ A pious Christian legend
would have the disciples there at the cross and responsible for observing the burial but
the fact that women do so, is historical. Moreover, their roles in the burial and the empty
tomb are mutually confirmatory because it is unlikely that they would be in one without
being involved in both. They would likely come to anoint the body in keeping with
Jewish funerary practice which was to visit the grave of the deceased for four days after
the burial until the soul of the departed was gone for good. But, they couldn’t have
visited the tomb unless they witnessed the burial. We have three such lists of women
witnesses in Mark. These women continued to live in Jerusalem and were known. Even
if they couldn’t move the stone to doubt that they still would have gone is to treat them as
emotionless automata.
The graves of Jewish Holy Man during the time of Jesus were preserved and honored/
The disciples had no inkling of a resurrection that would take place prior to the end of the
world and thus this makes it plausible that the women would linger to see where the
burial would take place to anoint the body just as the Mishnah prescribes should be done
for the dead.
No other burial tradition exists/ If the burial of Joseph was a late legend then it is odd
that we do not have any competing burial stories anywhere, not even from the Jewish
polemic. That no remnant of the true story, or even a false story of the burial remains is
surprising if the burial account in the Gospels was a late fiction.
OBJECTION: What about the gospel of John 19:30-31? The Romans give us a
conflicting burial account don’t they?
RESPONSE: What is described is that the Romans break the legs of the thieves but not
Jesus and then you have the account of Joseph coming to take the body, so to think there
is a conflicting burial account is reading between the lines when there isn’t anything there
to read.
OBJECTION: Acts 13:29 (Doesn’t this passage give us a conflicting burial account?)
RESPONSE: Luke 13:29 is part of the Luke’s tendency to polemicize against the Jewish
authorities because of their judicial murder against Jesus. So, ascribing the burial to the
Jews is a form of blame. In Acts 2:23,36; 4:10 Luke ascribes the act of the crucifixion to
the Jews, but clearly the Romans actually carried out the act of crucifixion. In any case,
Joseph of Arimathea was a Jew and part of the Sanhedrin.
2.2—Paul’s testimony supports the fact of the empty tomb. Critical scholars will often
say that the tomb is a late legend because Paul doesn’t mention the empty tomb of Jesus.
The reason doesn’t mention the empty tomb specifically is because Paul’s letters were
occasional letters and he had no reason to mention it explicitly.
In any case, it is evident from the sequence of the ancient tradition he quotes in 1 Cor.
15:3-5 (died-buried-raised-appeared); for a first century Jew, the notion that a body could
be raised but still in the tomb was a contradiction in terms which implies an empty tomb.
The Jewish concept of resurrection implies an empty tomb since the very concept of
resurrection involves a bodily raising.
From Paul’s own Pharisical background we know that it is distinctive of Pharisees to hold
to the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead and Jesus also sided with the Pharisees.
Paul consistently uses Pharisaic language to describe the resurrection of Jesus. In Acts,
when Paul is on trial, he exploits the belief that the Pharisees hold to this doctrine.
From the expression, ‘on the third day’ in the formula Paul cites we must ask why did
Christians date the resurrection in this manner since nobody actually saw Jesus get up
why didn’t they date it some other day? The reason is because it was on the third day
that the women followers found the tomb empty. It is a time indicator for the discovery
of the empty tomb which would show that Paul knew of the discovery of the empty tomb.
Fifthly, the phrase ‘from the dead’ Rom. 4:24 means from among the dead (not he raised
from death), and this is referring to the corpses who are interred in the tomb.
Sixth, Paul’s doctrine of the resurrection and transformation of the body (1 Cor. 15:3550) implies the empty tomb as well. Paul is talking about the transformation of the
earthly body to a resurrection body (his analogy of the seed and plant; though
qualitatively different they are numerically identical). It is sown in Mortality-and raised
in immortality; weakness-power; dishonor-glory; physical-spiritual; The subject of the
verbs is the earthly body (there is no exchange of bodies), it is the body that is sown that
is raised in these ways. We can leave it an open question whether or not Paul conceived
of the resurrection body as non-physical or physical at this point because the point we are
making is that whatever the nature of the resurrection body, it is continuous with the
earthly body that is sown because even if it did turn into a non-physical body it would
still leave an empty grave behind! Notice the use of ‘this’ points also to the same
referent. There is no doubt that Paul is envisaging here a transformation of the body, not
an exchange.
OBJECTION: Richard Carrier argues that the word Paul uses for the word ‘change’ can
mean exchange (we can exchange money or clothes).
RESPONSE: It is true that this word can have a range of meanings taken alone, but the
primary meaning of the word is transformation, but what is absolutely critical is the
‘context’ and from the context Paul doesn’t mean exchange. In particular, Paul is using
the term change intransitively, not transitively. We shall not be exchanged but we shall
be changed in the sense of transformed.
Seventh, from Paul’s belief in the personal and bodily return of Christ (1 Thess. 4:14-17),
Paul’s belief in the empty tomb is implied.
--How could Paul believed the tomb was empty if in fact it wasn’t? Certainly when Paul
spoke with Peter and James and others; (Gal. 1:18) they must have believed that the tomb
was empty and that they must have believed that it had been empty from the beginning.
If this had not been the case, Pauline theology would have taken an entirely different
route exploring the way in which resurrection could be possible even if the body
remained in the grave. But neither Christian theology or apologetics ever had to face
such a problem. Moreover, the third line of the tradition (‘on the third day’) when you
compare that four-line formulae to the gospel narratives on the one hand and the apostolic
sermons in the book of Acts what corresponds to the third line is the empty tomb
narrative. So then, what lies behind this third line is the empty tomb tradition and the
verb used their ‘that he was raised’ corresponds to ‘he is risen.’ Two conclusions follow
from this: 1) the tradition that the tomb was found empty is reliable and there wouldn’t
have been enough time for a legend of the empty tomb to develop within only 5 years;
the presence of witnesses in the early Christian fellowship would have prevented such a
legendary accretion occurring so early; 2) Paul knew the tradition of the empty tomb
since in Juda’s betrayal he knew the wider context in which these traditions came out of.
QUESTION: ‘according to the scriptures’ what Scripture is Paul speaking of?
RESPONSE: Scholars have wrestled with this. With respect to the first line (Isa. 53),
with respect to he was raised on the third day (Hosea 6:1, Jonah prophecy) but it is
interesting that it is so difficult to find passages in the OT that neatly map on to the
details of the passion narrative and that is why Crossan says it there wasn’t anything in
the OT that could be used to invent the details of the passion narrative; it is only in
hindsight that these OT scriptures could apply to the details of the passion narrative.
This third day motif is a common motif that occurs and is thought to be a day of
deliverance when God delivers His people from danger. Thus, Christians adopt this
theologically laden language because the women really did discover the tomb empty on
the third day.
QUESTION: BUT STILL, WHY DIDN’T PAUL MENTION THE EMPTY TOMB
EXPLICITLY?
RESPONSE: Referring to the empty tomb would have pointless to Paul’s audience at
Corinth because he wasn’t trying to prove that the resurrection was physical, he was
trying to prove to them in some sense that it was spiritual and that therefore the
Corinthians shouldn’t gag at this doctrine. The Corinthians said that there is no
resurrection from the dead and how with what body are the dead raised. Paul wants to
explain to them that resurrection isn’t just a resuscitation of Jesus corpse, this is a
powerful, immortal , spiritual body. Moreover, the formula wouldn’t contain the empty
tomb because the empty tomb is not something Jesus did, and the subject of the formula
‘Christos’ (died-buried-raised-appeared)
We are not sure what exactly Paul saw at Damascus.
2.3 The presence of the empty tomb story in the pre-Markan passion story supports it
historicity (Mark 16:1-8).
The empty tomb story is bound up with the immediate context of the burial and passion
account. It is one continuous narrative that doesn’t break at chpt. 16.
Verbal and syntactical similarities bind the empty tomb story to the burial narrative. For
example, the antecedent of the pronoun in 16:1 (him) is in the burial account (15:43).
Similarly, the women’s discussion of the stone and their visiting of the tomb presupposes
the (15:47). The words of the angel (16:6) refers back to the burial narrative. Shows that
the empty tomb is not an independent narrative.
The passion story wouldn’t have been circulated without victory at its end.
The correspondence of the events of the passion and the early tradition in 1 Cor. 15: 3-5
confirms the inclusion of the empty tomb in the pre-Markan passion story.
There was no continuing narrative of the appearances because they were unexpected,
sporadic, and they occurred to different people at various location and occasion. The
empty tomb by contrast was common property. After the empty tomb, the gospels
narrate different appearance stories. Rudolph Pesch thinks the latest date for this preMarkan passion story is 7 years. The dominant view is that the passion narratives are
early and based on eyewitness testimony.
QUESTION: How significant is it that these sources are not identified?
RESPONSE: Not that significant. Paul does identify his source with the technical terms
of handing on tradition. In that day, they didn’t have a device of quotation marks. Luke
also mentions his use of sources.
The empty tomb is independently attested in Matthew and Luke. There is non-Matthean
vocabulary and writing style in the empty tomb, and they are unique in the all of the NT.
For example, ‘on the next day,’ ‘to seal’ ‘to make secure’ ‘deceiver’ are unique to all of
the NT. Moreover, ‘chief priests and Pharisees’ never appears in Mark or Luke and is
unusual for Matthew. ‘On the third day,’ is non-Matthean (he uses after three days).
Matt. 28:15 shows that he is working on a prior tradition. As for John, we are operating
on the assumption that John is independent of the Synoptics. Luke and John both have a
story of Peter and an unnamed disciple inspecting the empty tomb after the women
discover this and they are independent of Mark. The Sermons in the book of Acts 2:2932 we see the independent attestation for the empty tomb. Moreover, in Acts 13:36-37
we have more attestation of an empty tomb. Of course, Paul supports the empty tomb as
well. Thus, we have 4 or 6 independent sources for the empty tomb.
The use of the expression ‘on the first day of the week’ points to the primitiveness of the
tradition. In Mark 16:2, the third day is lacking but it is prominent in 1 Cor. 15 and
spread throughout the Gospels. If the empty tomb were a late secondary account that
arose many years later, it hardly could of avoiding being cast in the ‘third day motif’
because the ancient standard was the third day motif, it characterizes Jesus predictions,
the preaching of the resurrection in the other gospels. That is astounding since this motif
goes back to the first five years after Jesus’ death. Moreover, ‘the first day of the week’
is a Semitism.
The narrative of the Resurrection in the theologically apologetically unadorned that one
would expect to find in later legendary accounts. For example, the resurrection of Jesus
is not described, there is no description of Jesus conquering death, being the victor over
sin and hell, or his descent into Hades, or anything like that. The most powerful way to
show this is to compare this account with the later apocryphal accounts of the empty
tomb; i.e. The Gospel of Peter (The tomb is not surrounded by Roman Guards, but he is
placed there on Friday, the Jewish Pharisees are also there, as well as many others;
suddenly there rings a loud voice in heaven, the tomb rolls back by itself, three men come
out of the tomb, two of them supporting the third, the heads of the two men stretches up
to the clouds, then a cross comes out of the tomb and answers ye to a question to a voice
from heaven). This is how real legends look.
The most plausible explanation in light of the gospels description that the disciples were
in Jerusalem over the weekend for why women instead of male disciples discovered the
empty tomb is that this probably happen via the principle of embarrassment.
OBJECTION: The reason women were used in because the disciples fled to Galilee and
some male witnesses were not available.
RESPONSE: There is no contemplation in Mark of a flight to Galilee and it is unlikely
that the disciples would have fled all the way back to Galilee without being concerned for
what would happen to Jesus. Moreover, the denial of Peter are multiply attested and
embarrassing since he was the chief disciple of Jesus show that the disciples were in
Jerusalem over the weekend and that they hadn’t fled to Galilee. When did legends start
taking heed of historical facts; even if the disciples had fled to Galilee a legend could still
be easily constructed that males discovered the tomb. Also, the is no reason would want
to humiliate its leaders by hiding in Jerusalem while the women boldly carry out their last
devotions to Jesus body. Moreover, there are three lists of these women witnesses in
Mark to the crucifixion, burial, empty tomb and these women were known in the
Jerusalem fellowship where the pre-Markan passion story circulated.
OBJECTION: Crossan attempts to say that the women are the residue of an earlier secret
Gospel of Mark that contained sexually titillating behavior where Jesus met with a young
man who ran away naked to indoctrinate him secretly with secrets of God, and on another
occasion he refused to visit these women witnesses that appear in the canonical Gospel of
Mark. So what canonical Mark did was remove the sexually suggestive passages so he
breaks up the passages and turns the young man into the angel and makes the women the
discovers of the empty tomb.
RESPONSE: First, this presupposes that there was a Secret Gospel of Mark and that it
preceded the canonical gospel of Mark for which there is not a shred of evidence.
Second, if the canonical Mark did find these passages offensive why not just delete them
instead? Indeed, why not make male disciples discover the tomb instead of the women.
QUESTION: Where was Jesus’ mother?
RESPONSE: After the crucifixion, she only appears again in Acts 1 in the upper room.
She may have been so shattered by the crucifixion that she sequestered herself.
--The investigation of the empty tomb by Peter and John is likely historical (John 21:24).
The visit of the disciples is multiply attested in Luke, and John (In Luke 24:12-24/John
20:3). Peter’s denial of Christ makes it likely that Peter inspected the tomb since the
‘denial’ event places him in Jerusalem over the weekend. The disciples were in hiding
after Jesus’ death because the same thing could happen to them so it wouldn’t be
implausible that only a couple of disciples would come inspect the tomb.
It would have been impossible for disciples to proclaim the resurrection of Jesus in the
face of an empty tomb.
--The earliest Jewish polemic presupposes the empty tomb (Matt. 28:15b). The Jewish
opponents of Christianity didn’t deny that the tomb was empty, but they argued that the
disciples stole the body. The pattern of the dialogue presupposes a tradition history:
The disciples: He is risen
Jewish authority: Disciples stole his body
The disciples: the guard at the tomb would have prevented the theft of the body
Jewish authority: The guard fell asleep (had to be the Jewish response)
The Christians: the authorities bribed the guard to day this
The tradition that lies behind this story and drives the polemic back to pre AD 70 and
shows that this dispute presupposes an empty tomb.
The guard story as Matthew tells it has lots of non-Matthean traits and shows that
Matthew is drawing on an earlier tradition.
The fact that Jesus’ tomb was not venerated as a shrine is evidence that is was empty. It
was customary to so this because the bones of the prophet would reside there until the
general resurrection. We find no evidence for veneration probably because the tomb was
empty. It’s not that the tomb was forgotten, it is just that it wasn’t venerated.
(Pilgrimages, worship services, etc.)
OBJECTION: Couldn’t we argue that this means that the location of the tomb was
unknown or that he wasn’t entombed at all.
RESPONSE: Right, but this point comes at the end of a cumulative case where the burial
in a tomb is already shown to be probably historical.
OBJECTION: The empty tomb is filled with contradictions.
RESPONSE: The empty tomb is historical in its core whatever you make of the
secondary details.
3) Various individuals and groups of people on a number of occasions and under various
circumstances experienced appearances of Jesus alive after his death:
--The testimony of Paul in 1 Cor. 15 includes appearances to Peter, the Twelve, the 500,
and James, and all the apostles, and to Paul himself. The early date of this tradition
precludes legend as an explanation for the appearances.
--Paul was once a persecutor of the church. He spoke with Peter and Paul who went to
their deaths for their conviction in the resurrection appearances. This means there were
eyewitnesses in touch with each other.
--The appearance to Peter is independently mentioned in Luke 24:33-34; the
awkwardness of this appearance narrative point to an independent tradition that Luke is
drawing on which predates Luke itself.
--The appearance to the Twelve appears in Luke 24:36-43, John 21:19-20, and 1 Cor. 15,
and Paul’s first hand acquaintance with the disciples.
--The third appearance is very bizarre (the 500). We don’t have any sure story of this
appearance in the NT. Paul was acquainted with these people and that most of them
could be questioned. There would be no point in mentioning that they were still alive in
being questioned unless they were still alive. It is not impossible that this appearance is
actually referring to Matt. 28:16-17. This is the appearance in the Gospels that is by
appointment, whereas all the other are unexpected. Who were the some that doubted? It
could have been people who were bystanders.
--The appearance to James and subsequent belief is surprising as well because he was not
a believer in Jesus during his lifetime Mark 3:21-35. In John 7: 1-10, Jesus’ brothers
tried to goad him into a death trap. Acts 1, we see the unbelieving brothers believing in
Jesus. In Gal. 1:19, James is specifically named as an apostle. Acts 21:18, Gal. 2:9
James has a position of leadership in the church. 1 Cor. 9:5, it is not just James, but
Jesus’ other brothers who became involved in missionary service (According to
Josephus: James was martyred in AD 60 for his faith in Jesus as the Christ).
--The appearance to all the apostles is mysterious because we don’t know the details. In
the early church there were a broader grouped than the Twelve that were reckoned as
apostles Acts 1:21-22 that may be referred to here.
--The appearance to Paul himself is not found in the epistles only but is three places in
Acts (9:1-19;
--These appearances are early, independently and multiply attested, enemy attested
OBJECTION: Was the Resurrection In Principle Unobservable; Merely Intra-Mental? Acts
10:40-41
RESPONSE: Luke has a very physical description of the resurrection appearances. This
passage merely means that God selected those to whom these appearances would be made but it
doesn’t mean that these appearances were merely intra-mental. In fact, Luke is roundly
denounced for his grossly physical descriptions of the resurrection where Jesus could eat, fish,
and be physically present with the disciples.
2: The Gospel narratives of the appearances are fundamentally reliable, historically.
Given the historical credibly of what Paul says, the Gospels simply add multiple
independent attestation of the appearances. While it may be impossible to prove a
particular miracle or appearance, but the breadth and totality of the traditions behind
Jesus as a miracle worker and for the appearances are analogous in this sense; they
happened even if we can’t nail down all the particulars.
3: The appearances were bodily and physical; (a considerable number of scholars agree
with this). At the same time, a great number of critics hold that because the body was a
‘spiritual body’ the appearance of Christ were heavenly visions involving no physical
reality. Others speak of objective visions (not physical appearances, but a visionary
seeing that is not a hallucination, but is objective in the sense that God caused them but
there wasn’t an objective referent in the external world) in order to differentiate them
from mere hallucinations or subjective visions. However, there are two good reasons to
affirm physical appearances:
1) Paul implies that the appearances were physical in nature.
--Critics who want to deny the physicality of the appearances attempt to drive a sharp
wedge between Paul and the Evangelists concerning the nature of Christ’s resurrection
body. They argue that since Paul is earlier we should go with what he thinks, and since
Paul allegedly argues that Christ’s resurrected body was a ‘spiritual body’ (immaterial,
unextended, intangible, etc.). Thus, the physical appearances in the Gospel are a later
legendary materialization of the original and historical belief in a spiritual appearance.
RESPONSE: While Paul does teach that our resurrection body will be modeled after
Jesus’ body, and that Paul does teach that these bodies will be spiritual it doesn’t follow
that such bodies will be non-physical. If by a spiritual body one means a body that is
immaterial, unextended, etc then it is false that Paul taught this. NT commentators agree
that Paul meant spiritual in terms of orientation, not in terms of substance (i.e. the Bible
is a spiritual book, or Craig is a spiritual man). In 1 Cor. 2:15 we have decisive proof of
this where he uses the exact same terms to describe the natural man (oriented toward and
dominated by the sinful human nature) vs. spiritual man (oriented toward the things of
God). A soma that is unextended would have been a contradiction in terms. All
commentators on 1 Cor. 15 realize that Paul doesn’t teach only the immortality of the
soul but also the resurrection of the body. This affirmation of the resurrection of the
body becomes vacuous and indistinguishable from the immortality of the soul unless it
refers to a physical resurrection. Craig has challenged critics to show any difference
between the immortality of the soul and a spiritual resurrection in the sense of an
immaterial, unextended, intangible resurrection body. There isn’t any though. Thus, the
exegetical evidence doesn’t support a bifurcation between Paul and the evangelists. It
would be better to translate these terms as natural body and supernatural body.
However, there are reasons to think Paul implies physical appearances. First of all, Paul,
along with the entire NT makes a conceptual distinction between a vision of Jesus and a
Resurrection appearance of Jesus. Visions of Christ continued in the early church; Paul
had many visions of Jesus whereas resurrection appearances were unrepeated, and
confined to a short initial period of the church. A vision, whether subjective or objective
it was wholly in the mind whereas a resurrection appearance involved something
happening in the external world. This means that Paul’s listing the resurrection
appearances in 1 Cor. 15 was saying that these were extra-mental.
Because Paul’s Damascus experience, though semi-visionary in nature, included some
extra-mental content (audible speech and bright light) which were experienced by his
travelling companions can include himself with the other witnesses to the appearances.
Moreover, since Paul believed in a physical resurrection body; by saying that Christ was
raised and appeared in 1 Cor. 15 Paul meant that Jesus appeared physically and bodily
just as he was raised physically and bodily.
Secondly, let’s suppose that originally there were no physical appearances of Jesus. All
appearances were only visionary let’s say. In that case, it becomes very difficult to
explain Paul’s teaching on the Resurrection. He could not, as he did, teach that we would
have resurrection bodies patterned after Christ, and that it is unlikely that visionary
appearances would have led to belief in and doctrine of a resurrected Jesus.
Thirdly, why would the earliest church adopt this gross physicalist understanding of the
resurrection since it would be offensive to the pagans, and a stumbling block to the Jews.
Fourth, the Gospels also affirm that the appearances were physical and bodily.
OBJECTION: Some have alleged that this was developed in reaction to docetism (the
flesh is evil; Jesus didn’t really have a body).
RESPONSE: If the gospels contained an anti-docetic apologetic in the form of physical
bodily appearances, then we would have seen much more detail than we in fact due
where all Thomas demands is to see the wounds of Jesus. Instead, we would have seen
Thomas touching the wounds at least. In fact, the physicalism of the appearances are
only incidental features of the narratives, they are not the main focus. The main focus is
to show that Jesus is really risen from the dead, that the disciples aren’t just hallucinating.
Moreover, docetism is a much later belief that arose in response to the belief in the earlier
and widespread belief in a physical incarnation and resurrection of Jesus. In fact, some
docetists didn’t deny that Jesus took on a physical body but merely that the spirit left
Jesus on the cross. Thus, docetism didn’t precede belief in physical appearances.
Finally, Paul’s doctrine of the Resurrection body in 1 Cor. 15 shows an early belief in a
physical resurrection body that can’t be written of an anti-docetic apologetic and that
would have been counter-productive to his Corinthian audience. This means that Paul is
not inventing this doctrine, but is affirming the physical resurrection. Moreover, there are
positive reasons to affirm the reliability of the Gospel appearance narratives. First of all,
every resurrection appearance is a physical bodily appearance and the unanimity when
you remember that the appearance narrative were independent that the different
evangelists collected and put together. Than all of these separate traditions would agree
if all of the original appearances were purely visionary would be nigh impossible. That
no trace of all would be left of the original visionary nature of the appearances would be
without precedent. It would be nigh impossible that the physicalism of the gospel
narratives could have evolved in so short a time as well as in the presence of
eyewitnesses who were around controlling the tradition. Even if docetism came before
the physical appearance apologetics, what would be the motivation for the developing
such an apologetic in the first place? If everyone already believed that the appearances
were physical then there wouldn’t be any need for developing an anti-docetic apologetic!
Paul speaks of flesh and blood, whereas Luke speaks of flesh and bones. The former is an
anatomical description, but rather, it is a Semitic idiom that means mortal human persons.
For example, when Paul says in Gal. that after I received my heavenly vision I did not
confer with flesh and blood he is talking about cannibalism, he means he didn’t talk to
anybody. Or again, in Eph. 6, our struggle is not against flesh and blood, he isn’t talking
anatomically, he is saying that our struggle isn’t against mortal human beings but against
demonic beings. In other writings outside the NT, it is used in the same way. So, what
Paul means is that this mortal human nature will not inherit heaven; our mortal and
corruptible bodies must be made incorruptible and immortal.
However, in Luke, Jesus is talking about the physicality and anatomy of his body. Thus,
Jesus is saying that I am not a spirit, I am here bodily.
4) Despite having every predisposition to the contrary the earliest disciples came to believe
that God had raised Jesus from the dead
Even the most skeptical critics agree that this belief that Jesus rose from the dead lay at the
heart of the earliest Christian faith. It is difficult to exaggerate what a disaster the
crucifixion was for the disciples. The concept of Messiah was that he would come and
conquer Israel’s enemies, re-establish the throne of David in Jerusalem and reign forever. It
was the resurrection that allowed one to proclaim that Jesus was Messiah. The resurrection
also gave the positive salvific meaning to the death of Jesus. What caused this belief? There
must have been some x to get the Christian movement going. If you deny the resurrection
then you have to ascribe that belief to Christian, Jewish, or pagan influences. It can’t be
Christian influences because Christianity didn’t exist yet! It can’t be due to pagan influences
because scholars realized that alleged parallels were in fact spurious. In comparative studies
in religion and literature you have to be extremely sensitive to the similarities and
differences. In some of these stories, gods are mythically represented with the dying and
rising of the crop cycles (no historical individual is risen from dead). Other stories are about
the assumption of the hero into heaven. Other are disappearance stories (the hero lives on in
ahigher sphere). Some are stories of seizure by the gods out of amorous intents. Others are
political emperor worship. None of these is parallel to the Jewish idea of resurrection from
the dead. There is no parallel to resurrection found in Greco-Roman literature. The proper
context for interpreting Jesus is first century Palestine, not Hellenisitic genres. Secondly,
there is no causal connection between pagan myths and Judaism; they found them abhorrent.
There is no trace of cults of dying and rising gods in first century Palestine. It is unthinkable
to think that Jesus had risen from the dead on the basis of hearing folk tales. What about
Jewish influences then? Resurrection is mentioned three times in the OT (Isa. 26:19 Ez. 37,
Dan. 12:2). This doctrine flowered in the intertestamental period and became a widespread
Jewish belief. But, the Jewish conception of resurrection differed from Jesus’ resurrection in
two fundamental respects: 1)The Jewish belief always concerned a resurrection after the end
of the world; no resurrection event to glory an immortality as an event in history (Mark 9:913—Isn’t Elijah supposed to come first at the end of the world; John 11:24—Yes, Lord I
know he will rise again at the resurrection at the last day)
--Confronted with Jesus life and death, at most, the disciples would have preserved his tomb
and his bones until the eschatological general resurrection of the dead
2) Resurrection was always a corporate event, never the resurrection of an isolated
individual
The birth of the early Christian church cannot be explained by Christian, Jewish, or pagan
influences. In no case, in the century before or after do we hear any Jewish group saying that
there executed leader had been raised from the dead and that he really had been the Messiah
after all. This is not an argument that says that Christianity spread so rapidly WOW! How
can that be explained!? Rather, the argument is that the very origin of Christianity is best
explained by the Resurrection itself since it can’t be explained in terms of its historical
antecedents in the way Mormonism and Islam can be explained. For example, with Islam,
Muhammad drew on lots of pre-Islamic traditions including Christian traditions, Jewish
traditions, pagan-Arabian sorts of thinking, he claimed to have had a private visionary
experience.
OBJECTION: Didn’t Jesus predict his own death and resurrection which would readily
explain how it is the disciples might have believed he was raised even if he wasn’t?
RESPONSE: Most scholars do not think the historical Jesus uttered these predictions and so
the point is moot. However, for the person who does think Jesus uttered these predictions, it
doesn’t follow that the disciples would have understood them apart from an actual
resurrection. Indeed, this is what appears to be the case for example in Mark 9:9-13—Isn’t
Elijah supposed to come first at the end of the world; John 11:24—Yes, Lord I know he will
rise again at the resurrection at the last day. Moreover, even if the disciples did understand
Jesus in some degree, it doesn’t follow that they would have believed it to be true; indeed,
they were completely crushed when Jesus was crucified and went into hiding. To think that
they would have plainly understood it, or immediately embraced it as going to happen even if
they did understand it, is anachronistic, it would be to read Christianity back into a context
when it didn’t already exist.
(NOTICE the modesty of these facts: I’m not saying that we can prove the number of angels
at the tomb, the identity of the women who visited the tomb, the appearance in the upper
room or by the Sea of Tiberius, who first came to believe in the Resurrection of Jesus, etc.)
THE STANDARD OF COMPARISON HERE IS NOT SCIENCE, OR A LAW COURT,
RATHER IT IS OTHER COMMONLY ACCEPTED EVENTS OF ANCIENT HISTORY
and these facts are accepted by these standards by the majority or NT scholarship.