“The key to everything (in the Christian faith) is the resurrection of Jesus” ~ Lee Strobel, former Atheist, Author and preacher.
If we can reliably figure out if this historical event ‘The resurrection’ is a myth or a fact, we can, in essence, unlock an entirely new way of life.
For many years, the question of whether Jesus, known as “The Messiah” really died is one that still raises eyebrows. Although Judaism and Christianity is the first ‘religion’ to ever exist, there are still questions about certain texts and the claims they make in the Bible, since they argue a case for the supernatural, which many of us, understandably, find difficult to accept due to the absence of concrete facts.
To commemorate Easter, we decided to go back thousands of years and do our best to investigate the facts and hopefully prove “The Case for Christ” as Lee Strobel so eloquently did, many years ago.
JESUS’ EXISTENCE
Many people and faiths would agree that Jesus, in fact, existed - whether he was God or the Messiah is still a mystery but for the sake of brevity in this article, let’s say that Jesus did exist: a fact many Atheists would attest to.
The American Atheists foundation says, “I had taken it for granted that Jesus, although certainly not a god, was nevertheless an historical personage – perhaps a magician skilled in hypnosis. To be sure, I knew that some of the world’s greatest scholars had denied his existence. Nevertheless, I had always more or less supposed that it was improbable that so many stories could have sprung up about someone who had never existed”
Now let’s look at some of the arguments used to prove Jesus’ death and resurrection and come to our own conclusions.
THE RESURRECTION APPEARANCES
1. More than 500 people believed they saw Jesus alive - but does this prove that Jesus was alive?
“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.” (1 Corinthians 15:3-8)
The resurrection appearances have puzzled many scholars as Paul tends to be a bit vague about who these people are, but here’s what Christian pastor John Piper has to say about its relevance.
“What makes this so relevant is that this was written to Greeks who were skeptical of such claims when many of these witnesses were still alive. So it was a risky claim if it could be disproved by a little firsthand research.”
Could there have been group hallucinations?
In an article by The Conversation, they would argue that just because people claim to have seen Jesus it doesn’t mean it actually happened and that perhaps grief or mourning played a part in it. They back up this statement by saying that in a study of nearly 20,000 people, 13 percent reported seeing the dead. They claim that there are a range of explanations for this phenomenon, from the physical and emotional exhaustion caused by the death of a loved one all the way to the belief that some aspects of human personality are capable of surviving bodily death.
While there is some plausibility to this explanation that people were simply ‘seeing things’, it does sound to me like the thoughts of a highly skeptical individual because it cannot be ignored that over 500 people saw Jesus.
Can 500 people see the exact same person?
Where in history does it prove that these many people in the world, at any given time, had the exact same hallucination about a single person?
To have hundreds of people see the same mirage is more unbelievable than the notion that they saw the risen Jesus, considering they would have seen him on separate occasions and circumstances, touched him, had meals with him and talked to him. Furthermore, Psychologists even say that there is no such thing as group hallucinations and the resurrection appearances were recorded over a course of about 6 weeks, and not over a few years, giving this story by The Apostle Paul a bit more credit.
An article from ‘Uncover’ mentions the following
“As we read Mark’s Gospel we see that the disciples were repeatedly confused by Jesus when he said he would rise from the dead. We read that they ‘did not understand what he meant’ (Mark 9:32) and ‘they kept the matter to themselves, discussing what “rising from the dead” might mean’ (Mark 9:9). The reason for this is that at the time, the Jewish belief was that ‘rising from the dead’ meant the rising of all the righteous at the end of time. The idea of one individual being resurrected in the course of human history wasn’t part of their thinking. It would be very unlikely that they later hallucinated something they couldn’t imagine happening.
The accounts of the resurrection appearances report that the disciples were initially skeptical. In one case they assumed they were seeing a ghost (Luke 24:37), and so they took steps to confirm that Jesus was really, physically present in front of them. They not only saw Jesus, they touched him and gave him food to eat in front of them to confirm what they were seeing (e.g. Luke 24:39–43; John 20:26–27). The hallucination theory can’t account for the physical nature of these experiences, nor for the fact they occurred in many different places at different times, with different people present.
In John 7:5, James the brother of Jesus didn't even believe his brother was the Son of God. He was convinced by a resurrection appearance and that is one of the facts that the vast majority of scholars and skeptics can agree on. It would take a real, personal encounter to convince your own brother that you are resurrected and the Son of God, and should my own siblings ever make such outrageous claims, they are likely to be counteracted with mockery.
However, I will admit that the mere case of people claiming they’ve seen Jesus, in itself, isn’t a strong enough point in The Case for Christ. Several people would claim to have seen aliens or UFOs but there isn’t any evidence for that either. Besides, we aren’t at the advantage where we know with all certainty who those 500 witnesses are, and what their deal is, so we cannot assume what Paul is talking about with 100% certainty. That is information only Paul would know.
WAS HIS BODY STOLEN?
2. Many have said that Jesus Christ simply never died and his body was stolen, probably by the disciples themselves.
There are two main problems with this theory and here’s why the disciples simply could not have stolen Jesus’ body:
1 - They told everyone that Jesus was resurrected. There were many disciples who came from a Jewish background, and so Jews were reputed as religious, reliable, honest, law-abiding people. It was unlikely that a number of them would so blatantly tell a huge lie like this.
2 - They were tortured and martyred claiming Jesus had resurrected - Now, if the disciples were running a grand hoax by telling the world that Jesus died, why would most of them willingly be martyred for Jesus? Both Biblical and non Biblical sources state that many of the disciples were killed for their belief and faith in Jesus - some of them were killed in horrific ways; crucifixion, being sawed in half, beheading etc. One of the disciples, Andrew, who was crucified in a starfish position on the cross - it took him days to die like this, and at any point he could have fessed up to his deception.
In essence, the disciples genuinely believed Jesus had resurrected and they don’t seem to be a good suspect for stealing Jesus’ body.
“Considering that the apostles fled and even denied knowing Jesus following His initial arrest makes their courage in the face of persecution and execution even more astounding. The apostles attributed the strength of their newfound character to their direct personal encounter with the resurrected Christ. In Christ’s resurrection, the apostles found their unshakable reason to live and die.”
There are plenty of other theories about who could have stolen the body and you can read beliefmap to investigate each claim and see why the stolen body theory doesn’t work.
DID JESUS REALLY DIE?
3. Some say that Jesus drifted into a coma from the pain of the crucifixion and woke up in the tomb later on. But if you’ve read the Bible it says that before they took Jesus down from the cross, the Roman soldiers stuck a spear into His side. Once they pierced the skin, a mixture of water and blood came out. Such a mixture indicates heart failure, which should be enough proof to anyone that Jesus was in fact dead.
Aside from the Bible - should you not trust its authenticity, Roman soldiers were trained killers. If they had failed in their duty to execute someone, they would be held liable — likely at the cost of their lives. This gave them the incentive to complete every execution with precision.
Also, all historical accounts agree that Jesus was in fact buried in a tomb. The men who took the body for burial in the tomb, which was guarded by a group of Roman soldiers, were Jesus’ followers. His own followers would not have buried the body if they did not also believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that Jesus was in fact dead.
Let’s look at what the academics and historians have to say:
John Dominic Crossan, a historian co-founded the Jesus Seminar, a controversial group of scholars who held public forums that cast doubt on the authenticity of many sayings and deeds attributed to Jesus, but even he has said that Jesus’ crucifixion is ‘as sure as anything historical can be’.
James D. Tabor, another high-profile attacker of Christianity said that ‘Given Jesus was executed by Roman soldiers, he was, in fact, dead.’
More importantly, ancient non-Christian sources: Tacitus, Joe Cephas, the Jewish Babylonian Talmud and Lucian of Samosata who not only were anti-Christianity, they also persecuted, tortured and killed Christians, but they all attested to the fact that Jesus of Nazareth did die.
Four separate books written by seperate people account for Jesus’ death. Even though many question the Bible’s authenticity, it cannot be ignored that there were in fact, four different authors telling the same story.
It’s also worth mentioning that Jesus’ death is one of the historical events that most people take as fact. Gerd Lüdemann - an Atheist historian says “Jesus’ death as a result of crucifixion is indisputable”
However, Jesus’ death is just one fact to be established and just because some guy called Jesus of Nazareth did die, doesn’t mean he was ‘The Christ’ or a ‘miracle worker’ or was even resurrected, so let's move on to establish some other facts and ask ourselves some more questions to investigate the resurrection, shall we?
COULD JESUS HAVE SURVIVED THE CRUCIFIXION SOMEHOW?
4. I’ll be straight up and say this theory is very unlikely. I’d even go so far as to say that Jesus - a human being, surviving the crucifixion would be even more of a miracle than his resurrection. Here are some details that had to be true, if Jesus had survived:
He would have had to survive intense flogging
He would have had to survive a crucifixion from the world’s most powerful execution force
He would have had to survive a spear through the heart
He would then have had to unwrap himself from yards of cloth that were wrapped around him
He would need to then roll over a very heavy tombstone
Then he’d have to fight off and overpower at least 2 or more guards in order to finally make his escape
And all of this is supposed to happen after he had been tortured, nailed, stabbed and flogged?
If all this were true, that would make Jesus a liar and a hoaxer who concocted the most elaborate deception in the world: Christianity.
THE TOMB
The fact that the tomb was empty seems to be one that is universally agreed upon. Most people, Atheists and skeptics included, would agree to this simple fact that 3 days after Jesus’s death - the tomb was empty. What actually happened to Jesus is a mystery to many, but the fact that there wasn’t a dead body isn’t something that has been questioned much.
But could Jesus’s body simply have been left to rot on the cross or thrown somewhere else?
In the Digesta which is the Roman law it says that crucifixion victims and execution victims could be buried.
In 1968, the remains of a crucifixion victim from the 1st century was found buried with the spike still through his ankle bone, and in 2018 there were remains found from another crucifixion victim who had been buried.
So there is archaeological evidence that burial was the way some crucifixion victims were taken care of, and also Jesus’ burial location was well known in society, with many sources saying that he was buried in the tomb.
Dr. Jakob Kremer, an Austrian historian, states, “By far most exegetes hold firmly to the reliability of the biblical statements concerning the empty tomb.” Similarly, Dr. D. H. van Daalen states, “It is extremely difficult to object to the empty tomb on historical grounds; those who deny it do so on the basis of theological or philosophical assumptions.”
The Bible cared about women at a time when no one did
The first people Jesus appears to after the resurrection were women. Think about that. This is the single most significant moment in the history of mankind, and God chooses to reveal it to women.
It’s a simple detail that is often overlooked. But at a time where women were deemed untrustworthy and gossips; Jesus chose women to be the first people he revealed himself to, after his resurrection. Surely, due to the reputation of women in Bible times any one would choose to reveal themselves to men as they didn’t have an untrustworthy reputation attached to them. JesusFilm rightly claims, ‘If anything in the gospel drives home the importance of women in God’s economy, it’s this moment.’
DID HE RESURRECT?
5. One of the most compelling evidence for Jesus’ resurrection is Saul of Tarsus. There is evidence that Saul was a persecutor and killer of Christians, but he claims that the reason he became a believer is because he saw and had a conversation with the resurrected Jesus. Let’s look at Paul for a second.
Luke, Clemence of Rome, Polycarp,Tertullian, Dionysius and Origen are among the historians that confirm the story that Paul was a persecutor of Christians. So basically, this proves that Paul isn’t a fraudulent person, masquerading as a Christian and claiming to be saved. He actually was someone who had an encounter with Jesus.
Most people these days say they need proof and evidence to believe in God. Surely if Atheists or Agnostics say that, a serial killer of Christians would need proof and very real evidence, in order to turn him away from his destructive path. This makes for a compelling argument that it took Jesus’ personal revelation to Saul (who we now refer to as The Apostle Paul) to change and convince him that Jesus, in fact, resurrected and is God.
Let me continue by asking a few questions.
Let’s say that the resurrection never happened. We still do have a lot of historical accounts that Jesus died, in fact Roman historian Tactitus says ‘there were a multitude of christians in Rome in 64 AD and they were willing to die for Jesus.’
Question - Why would an immense multitude of people give up their lives and worship as God; Jesus, who had suffered the ultimate humiliation in Roman society of being crucified - which in their culture could be equivalent to being a pedophile in our culture?
It’s like saying ‘Oh I praise you; scum of the earth’.
Question 2 - Even if we support the mass hallucination theory, how does that explain the empty tomb? How come the Romans didn’t produce the dead body and immediately dispel the rumors, if they in fact, had the body?
Here’s an interesting fact you may not be aware of. First-century Jews were considered as very strict mono-theists, meaning that the last thing they would ever do was worship a man, because that was an appalling thing to do. However, ‘Christianity’ exploded into life when thousands of Jews started worshiping a man. And not just a man, but a man who had died a horrible death and was apparently raised to life. Now Jews were almost just as skeptical as you, me and any one else.
So why did thousands of Jews suddenly start committing idolatry by worshiping a carpenter as God?
I’ll leave those questions as rhetorical, for you to think about.
Paul seems to identify the core problem of people’s lack of belief with laser precision.
“Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. (1 Corinthians 15:12-15)
…if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. (1 Corinthians 15:17-19)
In Christ’s resurrection is the only way we have hope. If we believe Jesus to be a mere prophet, or we don’t even believe he really existed we are of all people most to be pitied because it means that death is it for us and we’re doomed to perish for eternity. But in His resurrection, there is hope and life, the promise for eternity. Without that, we truly have nothing.
Now we come to our final, most important point: What does it mean for us if in fact Jesus was risen? If Jesus resurrected, death isn't the end. If Christ is risen, there really is hope. Life after death, and good news for the whole world.
Reference links
תגובות