Scientific and historical critical challenges to the resurrection Flashcards
What is the significance of Mark 16:1-8
Mark ends with this passage. It mentions how Jesus rose again and promises that JC will appear to the disciples again in Galilee as had been promised. This is crucial because the oldest account of the resurrection actually doesn’t involve any post resurrection appearances by JC or an ascension
There is a later part of Mark 16 but this is now generally viewed to have been added centuries later
What key text did Ian Wilson write
Jesus: The Evidence
What key text did Frank Morison write
‘Who Moved the Stone?’
What was Morison best known for
His Christian apologetics. This has made him much better liked among conservative Christians than Wilson even though Morison and Wilson often make the same naturalistic challenges to examples of miracles in the Bible
What does ‘Who Moved the Stone’ do?
The book addresses the issues with the empty tomb, offering a defence of the resurrection on the basis of a lack of convincing alternative historical explanations for the events surrounding it
How are the gospels different in terms of their accounts of the resurrection
Easy to note the differences in the resurrection accounts of the Gs. Apart from the basic outline of the disciples finding the empty tomb, there is little consensus for what happened next
This does not necessarily mean Jesus’ resurrection was false
Describe the differences between the synoptics in their account
All have the central symbol of the empty tomb being found after the Sabbath. However, in each gospel different figures discover the empty tomb, meaning even this idea is controversial
Matthew has the women being addressed by an angel instead of the young man in Mark and they flee in joy instead of fear and are suddenly met by JC himself
What could be the cause of these differences
Perhaps the author of Matthew found the Marcan ending too ambiguous and wanted to stress the certainty and importance of the resurrection appearances
We could perhaps account for the differences by using RC to determine the motives of each of the evangelists in editing their Gs
Describe the empty tomb in John
Jesus meets Mary and tells her that he will be ascending and to tell the others
Timeline and series of events very different to the Synoptics
Uncertain what sources the author used to compose this account
The lateness of the composition of John implies that by this point the symbol and story of the empty tomb was well established in Christian communities
How do the Pauline epistles challenge the historicity of the resurrection
It is unusual that this symbol doesn’t appear in any of the Pauline epistles, as this was the earlies account of Jesus. Some have claimed that this is evidence that Mark invented the story, knowing that pre-existing Jewish beliefs about bodily resurrection meant that audiences would understand the lack of a body meant that Jesus had been resurrected
What does the fact that the Pauline epistles do not mention the empty tomb perhaps suggest
The lack of feature in the epistles may suggest that the resurrection was an accepted part of Christian tradition, with the empty tomb simply being a narrative reinforcement of this event. This would mean that the empty tomb is used as evidence to show the resurrection occurred, not as a theological foundation for the resurrection
Explain the idea that Jesus’ body was taken by someone else
This is perhaps a more rational explanation as to why the disciples found an empty tomb. Potentially a variety of suspects who could have performed such an act. Perhaps the Roman authorities took it to prevent any further religious or political conflict occuring around his remains. Maybe one of the disciples took it to another resting place and a misunderstanding occurred, meaning the other believed he was resurrected. Both of these rational explanation align with our scientific understand of the world more than the idea of a resurrection
Explain the hallucination hypothesis
The same is true for the resurrection appearances. If there was a misunderstanding surrounding the empty tomb, it is easy to imagine how in the grief and fervour after JC’s death the disciples hallucinated or lied about the resurrection appearances. Perhaps mass hysteria and a strong desire for him to return led to an escalating series of visions that ramped up the theological importance of the empty tomb. Similar events have occured before in history
Most scholars aren’t interested in the veracity of the empty tomb accounts. What are they interested in instead?
More interested in undertanding how the evangelists wrote their accounts, what sources they used and how their accounts reflected the demands of their communities at the time
What was Wilson trying to do in Who Moved the Stone
Morison attempts an intellectual examination of the historical events surrounding the resurrection. Initially he did not intend to defend the resurrection, bur rather critique the idea. As his research progressed he became more and more convinced by the evidence to the point that he saw it as a real historical fact
What is the traditional Christian view on the resurrection
The traditional Christian view is that it was a miracle, with the empty tomb and later appearances signifying how Jesus really did rise from the dead. While this is the traditional view it is also the most controversial as it requires believing something that goes against our natural scientific instinct
How do enlightenment thinkers such as Hume challenge this view
Hume makes the arguement that the unreliability of testimony, especially from past cultures and societies, means that on balance it will always be more rational to believe that the laws of nature have not been broken. This arguement came against the back of the enlightenment where people began to promote trusting reason over religious dogma. Enlightenment thinkers started to question the assumption that Jesus was resurrected and looked upon the Gs with fresh eyes. They eventually drew the conclusion that scientifically and historically the resurrection could not have been verified. According to Hume the empty tomb and some testimonials from what he called ‘barbarian nations’ was not enough to suggest that God had intervened on Earth to break the laws of nature. According to them belief in the resurrection is always going to require a leap of faith
How does Morison try and counter this
This is the view that Morison is fighting back against. His works attempt to show that there is a rational case for the resurrection, with it being the best possible explanation for the empty tomb when we look at the alternatives. If we adopt a purely scientific view, then Morison has to prove beyond reasonable doubt that there are no better alternative explanations. He does not have to prove that the resurrection definetely happened, just that it is a better explanation for the historical sources than the alternative. However, the alternative explanations are hard to rule out, especially when it comes to questioning the testimony and experience of other humans
Explain the idea of the resurrection as fiction
The idea that the resurrection is just fiction also has a set of requirements it must fulfil in order to be true. We have to consider what events might have reasonably transpired such that the disciples mistook the empty tomb to be a sign of resurrection, when the body might simply have been taken for example. In this sense the resurrection is only a fiction in the sense that there was a series of errors that led to the disciples falsely attributing a resurrection narrative towards events that had a perfectly reasonable alternative explanation
How do the gospels contain a counter to this within themselves
What stands in the way of these views is that in the accounts of the empty tomb the evangelists often take pains to pre-empt and counter these alternative explanations. They understand that simply finding an empty tomb was not sufficient evidence for resurrection. For example, the author of Matthew includes a line about the Jewish authorities paying the guards to lie about Jesus body being stolen. This suggests that the belief that the resurrection was a fictional event was already present among early Judeo-Christian circles, with followers of Jesus having to specifically spell out why Jesus’ body could not have been moved
What is the main issue with the idea of the gospel as fiction
While there may have motivations for the Roman or Jewish authorities or the disciples to move the body, supporters of the idea of the gospel as fiction have the issue of why no one later discovered the body at the place where it had been taken
Explain the idea that it was a hoax by the disciples
Another arguement that the resurrection was fiction suggests that the disciples and others lied about the empty tomb and the resurrection appearances. Followers of Jesus colluded to pretend he had been resurrected following the humiliation of his crucifixion.
Counter this idea
However, such a conspiracy is hard to imagine. A lot of people would have had to have been involved and they would have still had to have removed his body. Furthermore, why would the disciples have been willing to die for something they knew was a lie. These flaws mean that people who make the arguement that the resurrection is fiction instead focus on what could have caused the disciples to mistake the empty tomb to be a resurrection, rather than this idea. Such arguements may be popular but they are not taken seriosuly academically
Explain Celsus idea that the resurrection story was just a myth
This idea was pit forward by the Greek critic Celsus, who often reserved a great deal or ire for early Christian communities. Said that it was a myth propounded by early Christians who couldn’t face that fact that there leader wasn’t truly the Son of God. In developing this story, they made the mistake of drawing too heavily on Jewish prophecy and myths, in particular the suffering servant in Isaiah
What is the flaw in this idea
How would such a myth occur when there were seemingly so many eyewitnesses or testimonies about the resurrection appearances. Again it would seem like the evangelists and disciples would be having to construct some sort of elaborate lie
Explain the hallucination hypothesis
Perhaps after the body was moved or disappeared, the disciples hallucinated the resuurection experiences in their fervour. Perhaps even in finding the tomb itself and seeing figures within it was a kind of hyserical hallucination that quickly spread among other disciples and followers
What is the flaw of this arguement
However, this view rests on the idea that there was not one sceptical or rational member among the disciples who might question their unreliable senses. Indeed, in the gospel accounts there are attempts to show that the disciples were not initially convinced by the empty tomb and that Jesus took pains during the resurrection appearances to demonstrate his reincarnated physical form
How does the hallucination hypothesis actually align with our historical understanding
However, such instances of mass hysteria do occur, and it is potentially the case that the growth of Christianity arose from a particularly acute instance of wish fulfilment, with the disciples seeking a happier end to the death of Jesus and projecting this onto a set of experiences which confirm this wish. Further evidence for this might come from considerations about the broadly mythological worldview of the disciples. Back in the first century there were no good naturalistic explanations for alot of phenomena. For example, miracle workers existed. Therefore, the kind of explanations the disciples would have given to hallucinatory experiences would have been much more religious or mythological as a result
What is the counter to this view
However, if such experiences were commonplace, it is fair to ask what made Jesus’ resurrection appearances so special or particularly convincing for the disciples. Still the rebuttal that the resurrection was unique in such a number of ways which other miraculous events at this time were not, and this is key to understanding why Christian had the impact that it did.
Why must we specifically look at the gospels narratives in trying to discount the resurrection
So far we have looked at broad scientific and historical reasons to deny the resurrection could have occured rather than looking at the specific historical accounts given in the Gs. While these arguements are convincing for many, they rely on discounting the historical sources we have about the resurrection. A proper rebuttal of the empty tomb arguements for Christianity should ideally be able to give another explanation for the evenys leading up to the resurrection. We don’t just want to mount a scientific challenge, but a historical challenge also. If we can provide a convincing and consistent account for Jesus’ missing body then we can meet biblical scholars on their own level and demonstrate that the resurrection is more likely to be fiction than fact
If this is not possible, then perhaps it is not so irrational for Christians to have faith in the gospel accounts, even if they do contradict our scientific beliefs
What is the major challenge in trying to mount such a historical challenge to the resurrection
the relative paucity of historical accounts
There are few historical sources about the resurrection and no witnesses to the act of resurrection. We don’t have much to work with. What happened in the three days between the crucifixion and the disciples finding the empty tomb is completely unknown. It is therefore hard to judge exaclty what good alternative explanations we could posit about the lack of a body and the reasons that it disappeared. What we have is a series of rather conflicting accounts about who discovered the empty tomb and reported this to the disciples
What kind of things CAN we conclude when we attempt to harmonise the gospel accounts
When we harmonise all of these gospel accounts we can perhaps establish that Joseph of Arimathea buried the body of Jesus (perhaps with help) in an empty tomb and this tomb was subsequently discovered without a body by Mary Magdalene (and most likely others) three days later, accompanied by a vision of Jesus. However, if we take the Synoptics as our primary source, then we might conclude that Mary also observed the burial and that other figures accompanied her at this moment and upon her return to witness the empty tombs and the appearances of an angel like figure.
What is Matthew notable for doing in his account
Matthew is largely notable for adding embellishments that are intended to provide evidence for the central narrative, such as the securing of the tomb and the bribing of the guards. These embellishments were likely a response to early critics of Christianity at the time of the composition of Matthew
Why are the gospel accounts of the empty tomb not that reliable
The gospel accounts of the empty tomb are not exactly reliable. For instance, the only person agreed upon to be a witness to the empty tomb and the early resurrection appearances was Mary Magdalene, a woman who was said to have been cured of ‘7 demons’ by Jesus (Luke 8:2). This suggests that Mary may have had some sort of mental disorder, meaning we can question the reliability of her testimony. The other witnesses who appear in the synoptics are not well known enough for us to draw conclusions about their mental states
How does Mark limit the historicity of the other gospel accounts
The earlies manuscripts of Mark do not include verses 9-20, which were most likely to have been later additions. This means that the earliest gospel account saw the women simply flee and not tell anyone about what they saw. This undermines the longer accounts in Matthew and Luke, who are likely to have used Mark as a source. Is this evidence that these authors embellished the original account of Mark?
What is the counter to this idea
We could perhaps instead say that mark was unfinished and then later completed by other evangelists. Perhaps the details of the resurrection appearances were more robustly analysed by Matthew and Luke, who gathered various oral and written sources on the empty tomb to construct their narratives.
How does 1 Corinthians 15: 5-8 challenge the gospel accounts
If we consider this possibility, it is worth briefly noting that other NT sources about the resurrection. The Pauline epistles, which were earlier than the gospels, give a vague number of resurrection appearances and do not specify the order of them and do not mention the women at all (1 Corinthians 15: 5-8)
Why is evaluating the historicity of the empty tomb so difficult
Given the two issues above (there are not many sources and the sources we do have are not reliable) this question is difficult to answer
How can the resurrection be proven historically
We do not need to prove that the empty tomb proves the resurrection absolutely, but rather show that by our conventional historical standards, the resurrection is either a possible or probable explanation for the empty tomb. This mean that one necessarily has to accept the resurrection as a real event. One can accept the gaps and biases in the records that we have. However, it perhaps mean that Christians can trust the resurrection accounts in the gospels as authentic; that there is a genuine mystery about the empty tomb to which naturalistic explanations cannot give an effective answer
What is the issue with trying to historically prove the resurrection in this fashion
However, it is also important to question whether this question is meaningful. We can ask whether it is actually possible to treat the empty tomb as a kind of court case for Christianity when there is so little historical evidence and the resurrection is such a weighty important event in the context of Christian tradition. It may be impossible to judge such a momentous event when we have so little real access to the details and so much rests on it being true or false
Explain the idea that Joseph of Arimathea moved the body
Says he moved the body between the time it was buried and when the empty tomb was discovered
The gospel accounts are unanimous in agreeing it was this figure who saw Jesus’ burial, and so both Morison and Wilson recognise that this is a conceptually strong possibility
He knew where the body was, he potentially had access to it even if it was secured, and as a member of the council, he might well have had good reasons for wanting to ensure its safety (or even destruction)
What three factors does Morison like to examine when evaluate these alternative explanations
Examine an individual’s actions in the context of religious and cultural practises at the time
Examine an individual’s actions based on their character and dispositions as described in the NT and other historical sources
Examine an individua’s actions based on logistics, planning and time required for certain feats
Each of these methods may well clash at times and it is not always easy to decide which we should prioritize in judging a person’s actions in a difficult and dramatic situation
Counter the idea that Jospeh moved the body
Joseph is a high ranking religious authority and so was likely a devout Jew. This is bolstered by gospel accounts in Luke affirming his good character. It is therefore unlikely that he would have wanted to perform actions that would contravene the sabbath and the law, least of all moving a dead body
Morison supports the idea that this would make it likely that Joseph would not have wanted to move the body. He says that method two leads us to the same conclusion. Joseph is described by Matthew as a prominent member of the council who goes boldly to Pilate to request Jesus’ body. Luke even suggests that the council had not agreed to this and that Jospeh was acting alone. John is the only outlier here, not mentioning that he was part of the council and simply saying that he was a secret disciple of Jesus. Morison says that if this was the case and Jospeh did believe in Jesus then he would have wanted to see him buried
Make the claim that he would have wanted to move the body
However, Joseph may well have sought a temporary burial by sunset in accordance with Torah Law (Deuteronomy (21: 22-23) but could have also desired a proper burial as described in the Talmud. Sceptic Richard Carrier suggests that Joseph could have felt it necessary that Jesus be moved to a secondary graveyard reserved for serious criminals, due to council regulations. Although the women went to the tomb after the ending of the sabbath, we don’t have strict times to work off. Maybe Jospeh went earlier and had the body removed before the women could arrive
It’s not clear from Joseph’s character that he would have desired the body to remain in the tomb
Describe the logistical problems with the idea that Joseph moved the body
It’s not clear from Joseph’s character that he would have desired the body to remain in the tomb. However, the third method could also swing this verdict. What kind of resources did he have at his disposal to move the body? It was true that he organised the burial, but Matthew states that the tomb Jesus was interred in was Jospeh’s own tomb. Would he have had access to another tomb, and if he did how did he move away the heavy body. If he was acting alone then moving the body would have been very logistically difficult. If he did have help, then this begs the question of how the removal of the body did not become public knowledge
If Jesus’ body had have been moved, then how did the perpetrators hide this fact so effectively. It would require the collusion of a large number of people, none of which could have let it be known to the followers of Jesus that his body had been taken. Also begs the question of why this was kept a secret in the wake of resurrection stories among early Christian communities. Perhaps they did but they were not believed by the disciples. This might explain why Matthew details the bribing of the guards, but it doesn’t explain the broader logistical and social complications of the body being moved
In the case of Joseph, we can question whether someone who was broadly sympathetic towards Jesus would have created and continued this conspiracy. Unless he was determined to see the rise of a new religion so much that he persisted with this lie throughout his life
Why is the arguement that the body could not have been removed by the Jewish authorities because this would have broken the Torah a weak one
We have already seen that the Jewish authorities may have professed their commitment to the law they were hypocritical and willing to bend it to persecute Jesus.
Why does historian Charles Freeman think that the Jewish authorities may have moved Jesus’ body
Historian Charles Freeman argued that the Jewish authorities potentially wished to avoid Jesus’ tomb becoming a shrine, so removed the body in an attempt to further disperse his followers
What is the counter to this idea
However, if the Jewish authorities did move the body, and then resurrection stories subsequently started to appear, why didn’t they simply reveal the real grave? Since there presumed aim in moving the body would have been preventing the growth of the Christianity why wouldn’t they have revealed the body to do this
Why would the Romans have had the practical means to move the body
Pilate is likely to have known where Jesus was buried since he gave permission to Joseph of Arimathea to move this area according to the gospels
The Romans were not bound by Sabbath rules so they could have retrieved it whenever they wished
What would have been the motivations for Pilate doing this
Perhaps Pilate was worried about the religious and revolutionary fervour around Jesus’ death. By moving the body he removed evidence of Jesus’ torture and crucifixion and also prevents it from being visited by his followers, where they might gather and plot. Jesus was a potential problem for Pilate if he was seen as a martyr or the messiah. Indeed he was executed partly due to the political overtones of his title ‘King of the Jews’
Counter the idea that Pilate moved it
However, the Romans were keen in keeping records of crime and punishment, so if Jesus’ body was moved there would likely have been a record of this, unless Pilate ordered it in secret. Also, if such logs existed why were they not released in an attempt to quell the fervour brought about by the resurrection stories that emerged
The death of Jesus was a religious matter for the Jews and the Romans probably didn’t care about the death of one criminal
For instance, many scholars have doubted the historicity of Matthew’s idea that Roman guards partolled the tomb of a random Jew on these grounds. Matthew seems to be embellishing his account to support the empty tomb arguement. William Lane Craig has argued that they were Jewish temple guards rather than Roman guards
Morison argues that there is little direct evidence for Roman involvement in Jesus’ death. Simply claiming Pilate might have wanted the body to be moved is stretching our historical understanding if his character
No overwhelmingly strong case for either set of authorities moving the body, although it is possible that they did
Counter the idea that Jesus died on the cross
Research into the Roman method of crucifixion does not support this idea. It was a brutal method of execution that often resulted in death, even when a person was removed from the cross while still alive
Explain the swoon hypothesis
However, this did occasionally occur, and some scholars have speculated about what is sometimes called the ‘swoon hypothesis’, that Jesus was removed from the cross before death and then subsequently fled his tomb, with or without help
How does Wilson think we should examine the swoon hypothesis
Wilson says that this explanation is not readily apparent in the gospel narratives. For the alternative explanations we have examined so far, there are parts of our historical sources which potentially rebut or shed light on their likelihood, but the same is not true for the swoon hypothesis, so Wilson argues that this explanation needs no further insight. We must therefore draw on comtemporary scientific knowledge as well as exploring the logistical issues with the idea that Jesus not only escaped death on the cross but did not return to his former life
Describe Hugh Schonfield’s swoon hypothesis
The scholar Hugh Schonfield gives the suggestion that the sponge Jesus was given in the gospel narratives wasn’t soaked in vinegar but instead a drug to make it seem like he died. However, Schonfield then suggests that Jesus was accidentally killed by the lance that was thrust into him. The person Mary subsequently encounters at the tomb is thus not an angel or a divine messenger but the man who had been sent to revive him
How are other versions similar
Other explanations invoke the same general formula – that there is some method by which Jesus survives the crucifixion and is then able to escape the tomb sometime between his burial and the end of the sabbath
What are the two main issues with these kind of explanations
Faking death isn’t an easy feat to pull off, especially in societies that had less of a knowledge of drugs or physiology. Some have suggested that natural sources of drugs tetrodotoxin or reserpine could have been used. Both of these drugs can induce states of paralysis or very slow breathing, but the idea that they could have been sourced and correctly applied by the followers of Jesus is unlikely. Wilson notes that even if Jesus did survive he could hardly recovered in an empty tomb without medical treatment, let alone broken out. Perhaps Joseph of Arimathea found him while he was still alive and treated his wounds.
If Jesus did survive, why did no one hear about this? One possibility is that he survived for a bit but died somewhere else. It is even more inplausible to say that Jesus survived and continued living, as it seems likely someone would have recognised him afterwards. If we accept this claim then we have to accept the Jesus was willing to reject his previous mission and did not care about religious and ethical change. It would be strange if Jesus was so cowardly and duplicitous considering how the gospels depict him
What sceptical questions can we ask about the account that Mary and others found an empty tomb and came across a mysterious figure
What if the women got the wrong tomb? This is discounted by the fact that Mary and the other women witness Jesus being buried here. They were at the crucifixion and had a vested interest in making sure Jesus was buried properly
What if the women mistook a gardener or worker for a mysterious person or angel and fled before they could explain the situation with the tomb and the body? It is perfectly possible that a gardener or worker may have been at the tomb, we run into a number of concerns that strain the credulity of these figures somehow being mistaken for angels or divine beings. For instance, it said that the women to the tomb the morning after the Sabbath. It therefore could realistically have been dark when they arrived, which would suggest that no one was working. Alternatively, if it were light, why would the women have mistaken the garderner for something else. Similarly in many of the other accounts the disciples then come and access the tomb, would they have not encountered the same worker? Morison points out why the chief priests, the council or anyone with a vested interest in discrediting Jesus would not just release evidence of this gardener to undermine evidence for the resurrection? In all the gospels, there is quite specific wording that the gardener apparently said, wording that the gardener is supposed to have said, which would be strange if he were simply a gardener working around the tomb. There appears to have been a specific kind of encounter which would have been odd if the women simply mistook the worker for something else
How does Marcan primacy challenge the historicity of these accounts
The original ending in Mark is shorter than the current canonical one and finishes with the women fleeing the tomb. However, if we look at the other gospels, it is clear they have at least partially based their accounts of the empty tomb on the one found in Mark. The synoptics share a similar general structure, from the discovery of the empty tomb to the meeting of figures outside. This means we can question the historicity of the gospels. What if Mark got it wrong and then the rest of the gospels copied this faulty source. If this is the case, then the gospels don’t mutually support one another but simply share one another’s mistakes
There are a few ways of seeing this in action. For instance, in Mark the description of the figure is very basic. He is just a man in a white robe sitting in the tomb. His words are straightforward, telling the women Jesus is not here and is heading to Galilee. The parts that hint at the resurrection could just be the women mistaking the context of his words. The empty tomb account in Mark is modest and may well point towards a different situation around the empty tomb. We could even note that temple authorities wore white, and if they had have moved his body, they might have spoken directly to the women in a way that alarmed them. All this indicates that if we take the marcan priotity serioiusly, then the questions around this figure become more difficult
How does this become an even greater issue when we consider that Mark cites Mary as his main witness
The same is true when we consider the fact that Mary appears to be the core figure present at the empty tomb. We have noted that she may have had a mental condition. If this is the case then in the hysteria following Jesus’ death could have caused Mary to not be a reliable witness, and this problem is exascerbated by the issues that arise with the marcan priority as described above
It seems that we have one meaninful source (Mark), which details a potentially hallucinatory witness mistaking a figure in white’s words for something more portentous
Who else could have moved the body aside from the Jewish or Roman authorities
Grave robbers
Make the case that grave robbers took the body
What is the tomb was empty because grave robbers rather than authorities moved the body?
If this was the case, then perhaps the figure at the tomb was intentionally frightening and mysterious to scare the women away
As criminals, they wouldn’t want to release the truth about Jesus’ body to the authorities for fear of punishment. This would allow resurrection stories to grow unchecked
We could imagine that Joseph or others left items of value behind which might be considered a good target for robbery
Counter this idea
Why would robbers be interested in someone who didn’t cultivate wealth during his ministry? They would have needed to have advanced knowledge in knowing where Jesus was buried or they would have had to have taken a guess at to which tombs where valuable
Seems like a strecth and just speculation with little basis in evidence
What is the problem with analysing the gospel accounts in terms of their historical merit
By analysing the gospel sources on their own historical merits, we are taking their accounts of the empty tomb in good faith, when we should perhaps be a little more cynical and sceptical. These are writers with their own agenda and a personal investment in the resurrection being true. Without an objective or antagonistic witness, we struggle to judge what is a good explanation and what is a bad one
One possibility we haven’t looked at is that there was no specific event where the women visited Jesus’ tomb. This says that the events logged in the gospels are completely erroneous. As proclamations of faith, perhaps these gospels were not concerned with historical accuracy. They might just have fashioned lots of hearsay and tradition into a narrative that support the notion of resurrection. Perhaps the resurrection appearances did happen to the disciples but the empty tomb did not. In this case, the empty tomb does not support the resurrection, but instead the empty tomb was a narrative crafted out of of an attempt to bring together a wild set of experiences in the immediate aftermath of Jesus’ death
This is not an unfair theory as any gospel account of the empty tomb is likely to have been influenced by the resurrection appearances
Furthermore, memory is unreliable. We tend to craft narrative in our mind when there were none and put together sequences of events that were largely separate. Perhaps it is natural that the evangelists sought an easy narrative where there was none, a shorthand way of demonstrating the physical resurrection of Jesus without simply talking about the experiences of the disciples
This arguement is hard to evaluate but it aligns with what we know about human experiences and the way we remember them. Morison and Wilson both take this arguement seriously on the grounds that we’re putting alot of faith into a set of accounts that, at least from basic instinct and reason, we should probably intuit not to be as reliable as many in the Christian faith take them to be
How is this idea supported by 1 Corinthians 15: 5-8
1 Corinthians 15:5-8 states that over 500 people witnesses resurrection appearances (though Paul curiosuly does not mention Mary). Even if we account for the fact that this may have been slightly inaccurate, we’re still left with an incredible amount of excitement and fervour after the death of Jesus. Wilson points out how characters such as Paul and Peter speak with great zeal after the resurrection appearances
Where did the first systematic challenges to the resurrection come from
The first systematic challenge to the resurrection came from pagan philosophers from the Roman Empire, criticising the rise of Christianity. Later these challenges would be restated by enlightenment philosophers
Where do most of these enlightenment arguements find their origin
Most of the enlightenment arguements around the resurrection were framed back in 180 CE by Celsus in his work ‘The True World’. Celsus launches two attacks on Christianity
He writes one section from the perspective of a Jew, interpreting Christianity as a corruption of Judaism and a misunderstanding of Jewish scriptures
The second part challenges Christianity head on by ridiculing the resurrection of Jesus
Who replied to Celsus
Christian scholar Origen tried to reply in 248 CE in ‘Against Celsus’
What scientific explanation does Celsus give for the resurrection appearances
Celsus suggests that Jesus’ resurrection appearances may have been hallucinations caused by wishful thinking
How does Origen respond to this
Origen replies that the appearances were in broad daylight to groups of people and that there is no evidence in the gospels that the witnesses were mentally unbalanced or delirious
Explain Celsus’ idea that the resurrection story is myth
Celsus suggests that the resurrection was just a poor copy of the ‘fantastic tales’ of pagan heroes descending into the underworld and returninh. This arguement was used by 20th century scholar James Frazer and the sociological approach to interpreting scripture
How does Origen respond to this
Origen replies that, unlike the myths of gods like Osiris, Jesus died in a public place under a Roman official. It is history not mythology
What role does Celsus suggest the disciples could have played in the resurrection
Celsus suggests that the resurrection is a hoax and that the disciples lied about meeting the risen Jesus
How does Origen use the changed character of the disciples to prove the resurrection
Celsus suggests that the resurrection is a hoax and that the disciples lied about meeting the risen Jesus
Give a quote from 3rd century Christian writer Eusebius to support this arguement
‘Why would they die for him when he was dead, after they had deserted him when he was alive’ (3rd century Christian writer Eusebius)
Give a quote from Jacques Abbadie to support this idea
‘No one dies for a fiction they have invented’ (Jacques Abbadie, 1698)
How does Thomas Woolston counter this idea
Thomas Woolston responds to this by saying ‘many other criminals and cheats have gone to their death proclaiming their innocence’
How did the debate between Origen and Celsus end
Origen’s replies to Celsus were considered to be the last word on the subject for several centuries, but versions of Celsus’ arguements returned, strengthened with scientific evidence, during the enlightenment
What did enlightenment thinkers broadly do
Rejected many of the beliefs and traditions of previous generations and developed new ways of looking at the world based on three key ideas
What were these three key ideas
Rationalism – Truth comes from the use of reason, rather than accepting tradition or authority
Empiricism – Knowledge comes from sensory experience of the world and is explored using the scientific method
Scepticism – The reasonable starting position is to doubt the truth of all knowledge claims
These three factors combine together in the scientific worldview that emerged during the enlightenment. This worldview undermined the plausibility of the resurrection for many people
How did Baron D’Holback undermine the gospels
Baron D’Holback uses contradictions between the 4 gospels to question whether they really could be inspired by God
How did Hermann Reimarus counter the resurrection
Hermann Reimarus argued that the historical Jesus was a Jewish prophet turned political revolutionary who never claimed to be the SoG and whose disciples stole his body to fake the resurrection. Challenges such as this were essentially the same as those proposed by Celsus, but this time they were strengthened by a new scientific worldview that was deeply sceptical about miracles and a scientific approach to analysing the bible which weakened confidence in the idea that the gosples were reallly eyewitness accounts of the events they describe. Because of this, these challenges could not be so easily countered by Origen’s arguements
How did Thomas Woolston challenge the resurrection
Thomas Woolston’s ‘Six Discourses on the Miracles of our Saviour’ (1730) calls the resurrection ‘a monstrous fraud’. Woolston proposed that the disciples stole Jesus body. He echoes Hume’s arguement that even if this is unlikely, it is a better explanation than the scientifically impossible idea of a resurrection
Give a quote from Woolston to support this idea
Because the resurrection violates the course of nature, no human testimony could possibly establish it, since it had the whole witness of nature against it’ (Thomas Woolston)
What must we accept about the resurrection if we do not accept any naturalistic alternatives
That this miracle really did occur
Why can the idea that the resurrection did happen be seen as parsimonious in a certain sense
Many of the naturalistic explanations are deeply improbable, whether or not God exists, whereas if God exists and if God performs miracles, the resurrection might not be that improbable at al
Give a quote from WLC to support this idea
That Jesus rose naturally from the dead is fantastically impossible. But I see no reason to think that it is improbable that God raises Jesus from the dead
How did the enlightenment counter arguements such as this
However, the enlightenment brought increasing scepticism regarding miracles and the idea of an interventionist God who would perform them
Enlightenment scientists, building on Newton’s laws of motion constructed a notion of the universe operating according to unvarying laws. This would view made the idea of these rules being suspened or broken less likely
Enlightenment deism proposed a God who created the universe but does not intervene in it
Part of the deist arguement was that miracles were impossible: the God of deism does not perform miracles because that would be against the very laws that he himself had created
Give a quote from Reimarus to support this idea
‘Miracles contradict the order of creation and that therefore is impossible for a rational man to believe in them’
Reimarus’ view assumes that the order of creation does not allow for miracles
Counter this idea
However, if the interventionist God of the Bible is real, then the order of creation is supposed to be contradicted on accosions, and the resurrection would be one of those cases
In what year did Hume write an influential attack on miracles
1748
What miracle does he specifically seem to be targeting in ‘Of Miracles’
The resurrection
Explain Hume’s issue with the resurrection
He writes that we don’t regard unusual events as a miracle because, despite being unusual, unusual events are sometimes observed to happen but…
‘It is a miracle that a dead man should come to life; because that has never been observed in any age or in any country’
Hume argues that by definition a miracle will always be the most improbable thing that could have happened. Therefore if a miracle is reported it will always be more likely that the witness is lying or mistaken…
‘When anyone tells me that he saw a dead man returned to life, I immediately consider whether it be more probable that this person should either deceive or be deceived’
He is not arguing that miracles cannot happen; he argues that a rational person should always prefer a naturalistic explanation of an apparant miracle, even if it is incredibly unlikely, to the miracle, which by its very definition will be even more unlikely
Why has this arguement been criticised for being a circular arguement
Hume’s arguement has been criticised for being a circular arguement. He starts with the assumption that the laws of nature are supported by exceptionless testimony, but that this testimony is only exceptionless if we discount all miracles. For example, he says that ‘a dead man coming to life has never been observed in any age or country’, but the resurrection is exactly such an observation
Hume goes on to make a series of criticisms of testimonies about miracles that are clearly aimed at the resurrection in particular…
People enjoy incredible stories which excite ‘surprise and wonder’
Miracles tend to come from ‘ignorant and barborous nations’
These stories belong in the past, because over time societies progress out of believing in supernatural events. Very clear enlightenment outlook here: scientific progress is curing European societies of supernatural beliefs, but religions are rooted in the pre-scientific past when people were more gullible
Why is Hume perhaps unfair in describing pre-enlightenment thinkers as gullible and ignorant
Hume probably exaggerates how gullible people in the past were. We have seen that disbelief and proposing naturalistic alternatives were the first responses to the accounts of the resurrection, even from early figures such as Celsus
The idea of a resurrection was just as improbable to the people of first century Palestine than it would have been to Hume
Give a quote from NT Wright that expresses this view
‘The discovery that dead people stay dead was not first made by enlightenment philosophers’
Hume tackles the question of why a disciple might invent a fiction that he was prepared to die for…
‘He may know his narrative to be false, and yet persevere with it, with the best intentions in the world, for the sake of promoting so holy a cause’
Hume means that if religious fanatics are willing to die for a cause they will be willing to lie for it too. If the disciples were determined to spread Jesus’ message of love and forgiveness of sins, they might have been prepared to invent the resurrection to help spread the message.
This arguement from Hume invites two responses
Were the disciples really fanatics of this sort? The NT portrays them as simple men without great conviction: they run away when Jesus is arrested and the bravest, Peter, denies Jesus three times; they disbelieve in the resurrection at first and they don’t go to much effort to make their accounts of the resurrection agree
Would the story of the resurrection have made their holy cause more persuasive? In the Bible, most people disbelieve in the resurrection when they first hear about it. Jesus’ moral teachings could have been spread effectively without the resurrection story. Why invent an inplausible story to support a moral teaching that is already appealing to most people?
Make the case that enlightenment ideas make an effective challenge to the resurrection
Saw the birth of science which shows us how the universe works according to fixed laws that do not require God to explain them. The resurrection therefore goes against our understanding of how the universe works
Hume demonstrated that a miracle is so improbable that it is always reason to assume the witness is mistaken or lying
Hume points out that Jesus’ disciples came from an ‘ignorant and barbarous’ time and were motivated to invent the resurrection to promote their holy cause
Make the case that enlightenment ideas do not disprove the resurrection
Scientific laws describe how the universe is meant to work on average, but if God exists then he is the source of these laws then he can suspend or reverse them as he chooses. Science doesn’t show that a miracle is impossible or even unlikely if we assume God exists
Hume’s arguement is circular, because he assumes that dead men never come back to life and then uses this to argue that no one should ever believe that a dead man could come back to life
His cynical view of people in the past of being gullible or fanatical does not match with what we know about people at this time or even descriptions within the gospels
What type of explanation did enlightenment thinkers propose for the resurrection instead of miracles
Naturalistic explanations
Explain the theft hypothesis
One of these is the theft hypothesis, which says that the disciples stole Jesus’ body, either to deliberately fake the resurrection, or perhaps they did not even mean to do this, with the women then finding the empty tomb and jumping to conclusions. This hypothesis is as old as Christianity itself, since Matthew 28: 11-15 references it being spread around by the Jewish leaders, with Celsus bringing it up as wel. The standard objection is given by Origen, that the disciples would not embrace suffering, persecution and death for the sake of a lie
Explain the swoon hypothesis
This is another arguement that the resurrection is fictional
Argues that Jesus didn’t really die on the cross but that the disciples misinterpreted his reappearance as miraculous resurrection
Suggests that Jesus passed out (swooned) on the cross but did not die, later recovering consciousness in his tomb
The main support for this arguement is medical. Jesus died after 6 hours on the cross, which is a very short time. Mark 15:44 records Pilate being surprised to learn that Jesus had died so soon. Justus Lipsius argues that healthy adults would suffer crucifixion for 2-4 days, up to 9 days in some cases
Explain Karl Bahrdt’s swoon hypothesis
Karl Bahrdt proposes that Jesus’ followers gave him a drug that brought on a near death state so that it would appear he had died on the cross, allowing him to then recover in safety. He thought that Jesus pretended to be a spiritual messiah to encourage the jews to abandon their belief in a violent kingly messiah. The creation of the separate religion of Christianity was not part of the plan. Scholars like Bahrdt argue that Jesus was a member of a secret society and that the man or men in white robes described in synoptics were conspirators who helped Jesus recover. The women at the tomb then surprised them in the act, but mistook them for angels. Since the essenes wore white robes, this theory often proposes that Jesus was an essene and that the essenes revived him and helped him recover in one of their desert monasteries
Give an example of a proponent of the swoon hypothesis who does not share Barhdt’s thinking
Not all supporters of the swoon hypothesis support this theory. Heinrich Paulus argues that Jesus went into a coma on the cross but awoke naturally because of the cold air of the tomb
Why is it perhaps reasonable to think that Jesus really did die after 6 hours
Critics of the swoon hypothesis point out that Jesus had been beaten and flogged before the crucifixion. He was too weak to carry his own cross so Simon of Cyrene was made to carry it for him. Given this physical state, it’s quite possible he would have died quickly. Furthermore, Roman soldiers who had carried out hundreds of crucifixions would not have allowed prisoners to be taken down if there was any reason to suppose they were still alive
Give a quote from Bruce Chilton that supports this idea
‘These executioners knew what they were doing, and theories that Jesus somehow physically survived the cross represent a combination of fantasy, revisionism and half baked science’ (Bruce Chilton)
How does Flavius Josephus support the idea that Jesus would have died after 6 hours
The wounds resulting from the crucifixion would have been dramatic. Falvius Josephus describes friends who were crucified but rescued and says that two of the three died from their injuries despite the best medical care on offer
How does David Strauss counter the swoon hypothesis
David Strauss argues that it’s impossible to believe that ‘a being who had stolen half dead out of the tomb’ could have convinced the disciples that he had returned to a full and supernatural life
Give a quote from WLC where he counters the swoon hypothesis
The suggestion that a man so critically wounded then went on to appear to the disciples on various occasions in Jerusalem and Galilee is pure fantasy (WLC)
Why does the principle of parsimony encourage us to prefer naturalistic solutions
Naturalistic solutions should always be preferred to supernatural ones. This aligns with the principle of parsimony or occam’s razor. We know that hoaxes occur and that people who seem dead can sometimes recover.
Explain the idea of a conspiracy theory
A conspiracy theory would explain the disciples beliefs and the escape from the tomb. If an essene sect drugged Jesus then later revived him it would explain his suspiciously quick death on the cross and the appearance of the white robed men at the empty tomb. The disciples mistook them for angels because they weren’t ‘in on it’
What is the counter to the idea that we should favour naturalistic solutions due to the principle of parsimony
Naturalistic solutions are not parsimonious at all: they just involve more speculation
Counter the idea of a conspiracy
Why would the disciples be willing to suffer and die for what they knew to be a hoax
How could a wounded Jesus recover from his wounds enough to escape from a tomb will a stone rolled across the exit
Conspiracy theory ideas would have involved large groups of people working in complete secrecy and nothing getting out
How could Jesus have been part of an essene plot that none of his disciples knew about
How could the essenes have healed his wounds enough to pose as the resurrected SoG in front of people who knew him
When did the idea of the resurrection as fiction lose popularity
The 19th century
How did the idea of the resurrection as myth crop up
The idea of the resurrection as fiction lost popularity in the 19th century, but sceptics continued to propose naturalistic alternatives. One such idea is that the resurrection is a myth and that 1st century beliefs about pagan gods and Jewish prophets got attached to the story of Jesus
Explain the idea that the resurrection is a myth
This view was first proposed by Celsus in the 2nd century. He noticed the similarities between Jesus’ death and resurrection with the character of pagan gods
For instance, the Egyptian God Osiris was heralded by a star in the heavens. Osirs was a healer and a prophet and was betrayed by someone close to him and murdered; he body was hidden away, but not for long, as he returned in miraculous resurrection to reign in heaven as the god who judges the dead and assigns rewards in heaven and punishments in hell
Anthropologists who study ancient cultures describe this sort of being as a ‘dying and rising god’. There are lots in different mythologies all around the world. Just because Jesus is the best known resurrected figure it does not mean he is the only one or even the first.
We saw such an example with the suffering servant in Isaiah 53
The prophet Elijah did not die a mortal death and was instead taken up to heaven in a fiery chariot; it was widely believed by 1st century Jews that Elijah was immortal and would return to Earth one day
According this theory, after Jesus’ death, pagan and Jewish myths such as this became mixed up with Jesus’ story, including the all important rising and dying motif. This happened gradually over multiple retellings in a Chinese whispers fashion
A crucial part of this arguement is that the disciples originally believed in a spiritual resurrection - that Jesus had risen as a spirit – but that over time the myth took over that Jesus had returned to spiritual life. There are details to support this view…
The earliest writer is Paul and his encounter with Jesus seems to be more spiritual than physical. Paul never mentions the empty tomb or any physical appearances of Jesus
Mark, which originally seems to lack resurrection scenes, which was written 10-20 years after Paul’s epistles and the other gospels that do feature resurrection scenes were written 10-20 years after Mark
Jewish followers added to this with all sorts of details from Isaiah’s servant songs and legends about Elijah. When the Gentiles joined the church they added details from their pagan culture
Give an example of a scholar who supports the idea that the resurrection was a myth
David Strauss
Explain Strauss’ theory
He argued that the disciples attributed to Jesus all the miracles that Jewish myths had said the messiah would do
By myths, Strauss meant unintentional poetry that looks like history. Strauss admits that there is spiritual truth in these myths, but that they are not history. Strauss thinks that a myth is a kind of dream that humans naturally come up with to express feelings that are important to them
Give the flaws in this theory
One flaw with this idea is that in many ways Jesus actually doesn’t fit the template to be the Jewish Messiah, the suffering servant or the son of david. If a mythic detail like the resurrection was added to Jesus’ story then why were awkward ideas such as his galilean origins not removed
Many scholars argue that the 30 years between the crucifixion and the appearance of the first Christian writings is not long enough for the process of myth making to take place
How does Julius Muller counter Strauss’ idea
‘One could not imagine how such a series of legends could arise. If eyewitnesses were still at hand who could be questioned respecting the truth’ (Julius Muller)
What should the mythicist hypothesis not be confused with
The mythicist hypothesis should not be confused with the Christ Myth Theory, which suggests that the entirety of Jesus’ life was a myth, rather than just the resurrection
Make the case that the resurrection is a myth
People in the 1st century viewed the wolrd in a mythological way and expected their heroes to live mythic lives. In adding these mytgic details to Jesus’ story, they wouldn’t have thought they were receiving anyone
Jewish Christians would retell Jesus’ story in a way that made him more like Elijah, and Gentiles would make him more like the dying and rising pagan gods
1st century Christians lived in a world before the study of history had been discovered. It was natural for them to create ‘unintentionally poetic sagas’ to communicate their intense love and reverence for Jesus: they exaggerated his achievements in the only way they knew how, by making him resemble the great figures of mythology, including coming back to life
Make the case that the resurrection is not a myth
Myths do not pop up this quickly; they take time to develop and evolve
The Ancient Greeks and Romans had their historians too and they knew to be sceptical about myths and legends
The idea that Christians strated with a belief in a purely spritual resurrection then mythologized it into a physical resurrection fails to account for the historical details such as the empty tomb, the testimony of the women and meetings with the risen Jesus who can be touched and eats
The development of what discredited the idea that the resurrection can be understood as a myth
As anthropology developed in the 20th century, the view of the resurrection as myth became less plausible
On what grounds does David Strauss support the idea that the resurrection appearances were hallucinations or visions
David Strauss supports the idea that the disciples hallucinated Jesus’ return from the dead because ‘incapable of thinking of Jesus as dead, they were deluded in thinking that he had risen and appeared to them’
Celsus suggested this and Origen rejected it on the grounds that the disciples were ‘neither mentally unbalanced nor delirious’. However, the evidence from modern psychology shows that otherwise healthy people under tremendous emotional stress can show psychotic symptoms (such as hallucinations) while appearing normal in other respects
Give an example of visions being a natural reaction to the loss of a loved one
Reports from Singapore General Hospital following the tsunami tragedy in Thailand (2004) describe accounts of ghost sightings among survivors who had lost loved ones. This may have been motivated by cultural or religious factors since many Thais believe that spirits can only be put to rest by relatives
How does neurologist Oliver Sacks support this idea
Neurologist Oliver Sacks explains how such hallucinations can be psychologically comforting…
Seeing the face or hearing the voice of one’s deceased spouse, siblings, parents or child may play an important part in the mourning process
On what grounds does Christian Weisse support this idea
Christian Weisse writes the resurrection ‘has its source in the disciples’ experience of the presence of Christ’ - but that all the precise details were from their imaginations
On what grounds does Ernest Renan support this view
Ernest Renan claims that the resurrection was created by by the imagination of Mary and was passed onto the disciples as a kind of mass hysteria
‘The little Christian society, resuscitated Jesus in their hearts by the intense love which they bore towards him’ (Ernest Renan)
How does Jack Kent support this idea
Offers a psychiatric interpretation of the resurrection experiences of the early disciples, based on current medical knowledge
He argues that the women at the tomb and later disciples experienced ‘normal, grief related hallucinations’.
Peter experienced guilt over denying Jesus before the crucifixion; Paul experienced inner conflict over his part in the stoning to death of Stephen and his persecution of Christians. Kent proposes that these men suffered a ‘conversion disorder’, a recognised psychiatric illness that can occur in times of anxiety and self doubt.
How does Gary Habermas respond to this
Gary Habermas points out that conversion disorder usually occurs in women (up to 5 times more often), adolescents and people with poor education or low socioeconomic status, especially with former soldiers. None of this applies Paul although the other disciples seems to have been poor and uneducated. The women who visited the empty tomb were probably uneducated but they don’t seem to have been poor as they helped fund Jesus’ ministry
How does the idea that the resurrection appearances were visions solve the issues with the idea that the resurrection was a hoax
This idea avoids the issues with the idea that the disciples or later Christians were fictionalising or carrying out a hoax: they are sincere witnesses but mistaken
What three questions does the idea that the resurrection appearances were visions beg
Why did the hallucinations stop? Why didn’t the mass hysteria spread to other believers just as the first hallucinations had?
Why did all the witnesses have the same hallucinations? Hallucinations are subjective and unique to each person – yet the disciples seem to have shared one. Even in the case of mass hysteria, individuals do not all experience the same thing
The hallucination hypothesis does not explain the empty tomb, and so another naturalistic explanation would be needed to cover this
Explain the objective vision hypothesis
Some Christian scholars argue that hallucinations might be genuine REs
Hans Grass claims that Jesus’ body remained dead and that his resurrection appearances were God given visions. This is the objective vision hypothesis, in which the resurrection appearances were genuine supernatural visions, but not physical encounters
Theodor calls this sort of vision a ‘telegram from heaven’
This explains why a group of people could share the same visions
What is the flaw in this idea
However, the issue is that such hallucinations were deceptive. Why would God send a vision to fool his followers into thinking that a physical resurrection had taken place? Moreover, why believe in a God who causes utterly realistic visions but not a God that can raise the dead to life
Give a quote from WLC that summarises this view
‘God would have no conceivable reason for skipping the physical miracle of a resurrection and befuddling his earnest followers into the bargain (WLC)
Make the case that the resurrection was a hallucination/vision
We know that people undergoing bereavement can hallucinate their loved one still being alive and this can explain Mary
Conversion disorder can produce hallucinations in people like Peter and Paul undergoing tremendous guilt ot moral confusion
Belief in the resurrection began as visions, only later being changed to physical encounters
We know mass hysteria can be contagious, especially in a tightly knit group of people under great stress with powerful beliefs
When one person starts hallucinating it can spread to others
The hallucinations might even be genuine visions sent by God to inspire faith in the disciples
Make the case that the resurrection was not a hallucination/vision
Hallucinations are subjective, but those who met the risen Jesus all experienced the same thing
Paul does not fit the profile for conversion disorder, being older and educated etc. We don’t have enough information to know whether Peter and the other disciples could have suffered from this disorder
Even mass hysteria is subjective and produces different hallucinations
Hallucinations don’t explain why the hallucinations stopped after 40 days following the ascension or why the tomb was empty
If God sent visions of Jesus, then the disciples misunderstood those visions as a physical resurrection, which brings into question the wisdom and omnipotence of God
Give some examples to show how naturalistic interpretations are as old as Christianity itself
Naturalistic interpretations are as old as the resurrection itself. The theft hypothesis was proposed by Jewish critics of Christianity, while Celsus proposed the mythicist and hallucination hypotheses in 185 CE
When did the theft hypothesis come back into fashion
During and after the enlightenment, the theft hypothesis was restated very forcefully
What is the benefit of the theft hypothesis
The theft hypothesis allows for Jesus to remain a wise and holy man who taught a simple moral message, but his fanatical disciples corrupted this by faking a resurrection. By extension, the established churches which teach these miracles betray Jesus’ original moral message
Why did the theft hypothesis fall out of fashion
The theft hypothesis fell out of favour in the 19th century. Improvements in biblical criticism made it clear how sophisticated early beliefs about the resurrection were and how sincere the first Christians were in their faith
How did David Strauss argue against the swoon hypothesis
The related swoon hypothesis was demolished by David Strauss, who argued that someone who survived a crucifixion would have been too frail to have convinced the disciples that he had been resurrected or to produce such awe and worship in them
How did the mythicist hypothesis gain traction
The mythicist hypothesis became popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was given a boost by the new field of anthropology which studies ancient cultures and looks for common links across all religions. Anthropology tends to view religious beliefs as expressions of social situations, so this view regards the resurrection as a way for early Christians to express their beliefs about Jesus in the form of a story and make their new religion resemble their previous Jewish/Pagan beliefs
Why did this view fall out of fashion
However, as anthropology developed over the 20th century this view came to be seen as too simplistic. Myths do not emerge this quickly and when the gospels are subjected to literary analysis, they do not resemble myths
How does the mythicist hypothesis link to the ideas of Bultmann
The mythicist theory links to the views of Bultmann, who interprets that gospel stories as myths that once made sense to pre-modern people but which cannot be accepted by the scientific world of today. He argues that the NT must be de-mythologised to understand the symbolic meaning of the resurrection and make it relevant to today
How does Culpepper support the mythicist view
Culpepper argues we have to read the resurrection accounts like a novel in order to ‘read the gospel as the author’s original audience read it’. This is because post enlightenment readers automatically separate the literal and symbolic reading, but 1st century readers would not have done this
Give a quote from RE Brown about how he thinks that naturalistic solutions are failures
‘Serious scholars pay little attention to these fictional reconstructions’
Why has the hallucination hypothesis come back into fashion
However, the hallucination hypothesis is coming back into favour. Gary Habermas says this theory is growing in popularity again in the 21st century. This is perhaps due to changes in our understanding of the psychology of mental disorders, which increasingly focuses on the minor abnormal disorders that impact otherwise normal people. The theory is made more plausible when psychologists such as Jack Kent proposes that the disciples could hallucinate for a temporary period and then fully recover, perhaps as a response to stress in their lives
How does Allen Frances challenge such views
However, not everyone is happy with loose and easily applied diagnoses such as ‘conversion disorder’. Allen Frances complains that the new medical textbook for mental disorders ‘medicalises’ healthy experiences like grief, anger and forgetfullness, turning them into mental disorders. Writers like Jack Kent are ‘medicalising’ the resurrection in the same way
Make the case that the resurrection has been successfully disproved
Naturalistic explanations for the empty tomb and the appareances of the risen Jesus will always be more persuasive to scientifically minded people than the idea that Jesus miraculously rose from the dead
We now have a good understanding of how false beliefs come about and can diagnose why the disciples might have become convinced that Jesus had risen
Even though there are problems with individual naturalistic explanations, it remains more than likely that one of them is the truth rather than the laws of nature being violated
Make the case that the resurrection has not been successfully disproved
Jesus was raised from the dead by God. If God exists and can perform miracles then it is very possible that this was the case
1st century Christians weren’t gullible fools. It was as difficult for them to accept the resurrection as modern scientifically minded people. They accepted the resurrection only because the total weight of evidence pointed towards it
Give a quote from Frank Morison which explains how studying the resurrection accounts changed his thinking
‘It effected a revolution in my thought. Things emerged from old world story that previously I should have thought impossible’
What does ‘Who Moved the Stone’ do
Who Moved the Stone goes through the final 24 hours of Jesus’ life and the days that follow in the style of a lawyer sifting evidence, calling witnesses and discrediting them and arriving at a conclusion that is beyond reasonable doubt
What does Morison consider in the chapter in question
In this chapter, Morison considers what happened to Jesus’ body on Easter morning.
Why does he reject the idea that the resurrection was a hoax
He dismisses the idea proposed by Celsus and Reimarus that the disciples stole Jesus’ body, thinking that all 11 apostles would not have defended such a claim to the point of persecution and suffering if they knew it to be a lie. Here he is repeating the objections made by Origen and Abbadie that ‘no one dies for a fiction they have invented’
How does Woolston counter this idea
Woolston disagrees, pointing out that ‘criminals and cheats have gone to their death proclaiming their innocence’. There is also the possibility of a conspiracy that the disciples would bot have known about, such as a rival group of disciples, with Woolston describing the Essenes
However, most scholars agree with Morison here
What 6 explanations for the empty tomb does Morison consider
Joseph of Arimathea moved the body
The Roman authorities moved the body
The Jewish authorities moved the body
Jesus was not really dead and later recovered in the tomb
The women went to the wrong tomb
No one visited the tomb and the story is a myth
How do the gospel narratives support the idea that Joseph of Arimathea took the body
All of the gospels say he provided an unused tomb for Jesus body. It is plausible that this was just a temporary arrangement and Jesus’ body was the moved to a more suitable permanent resting place
Why does Morison dispute this idea
Morison asks why Joseph would have done this in the middle of the night? This would have been difficult and inconvenient and there was no need to hide what he was doing. Even if he arrived first thing in the morning after the Sabbath the women would have found him there
Morison admits that Joseph might have had some reason to want to avoid attention so it’s possible that he moved the body in the night
What two possible motives does Morison say Joseph could have had
He was a pious Jew and did want a body to remain hanging overnight as this is forbidden by Deuteronomy 21:22-23. Morison rejects this theory because no effort was made to bury the two criminals who were crucified alongside Jesus
He was a secret follower of Jesus and wanted to show him a last respect. However, if he was a secret follower, then he would have been happy to see Jesus body remain in his tomb. It would have been an honour
Why does he reject the idea that Joseph moved the body to a different resting place
If Jospeh moved the body to a better location, then that location would have become ‘a tomb or shrine at the centre of veneration and worship’. However, there were never any rumours of an alternative resting place for Jesus body
What does Morison conclude about this theory
Morison concludes that although the empty tomb is unlikely, the idea of Jospeh removing the body but concealing its location is even more unlikely
Counter this conclusion
Morison assumes that the story of Joseph providing a tomb for is historical in the first place but some scholars assume otherwise
Bart Ehrman argues that standard practise for the Romans was to bury convicts together in a shallow grave where they would probably be dug up and eaten by animals, they ultimate disgrace. John Dominic Crossan proposes that Jesus’ body was eaten by scavenging dogs. This is known as the shallow grave theory. It is improbable that Pilate made an exception to this practise for Jesus
Joseph is a character never previously mentioned in the gospels and is never mentioned again. ‘Arimethea’ is an unknown place and may well be fictional
The earliest account of Jesus’ death and resurrection is from Paul, who states that Jesus was buried but never mentions a tomb (1 Corinthians 15:4). The tomb therefore could have been a fiction created by Mark’s gospel which was then copied by the others
Why does Morison think that the roman authorities would not have moved the body
Morison thinks it unlikely that a ‘very obstinate man’ like Pilate would have changed his mind about Jesus’ burial once his decision was made.
Why does he reject the idea that the Jewish authorities moved it
The priests did not even request that the body be removed. On the contrary, the records show them requesting a guard of soldiers to prevent anyone else from moving the body
Morison believes he has an even stronger counter arguement than this. He says that even if the priests did get permission from Pilate for the burial site to be moved, then they would have known the final resting place of Jesus, and in that case they would have never been content with the unsatisfactory and untrue statement that Jesus had risen. If the authorities knew the final resting place then they could have announced this and ‘destroyed forever the credibility of anyone asserting the physical resurrection of Jesus’
This arguement is strong because we know that both the Roman and Jewish authorities would go on to persecute Christians for their beliefs, so they would have had a clear motive to disprove Christianity if they had had the knowledge that had allowed them to do this
Counter this arguement
However, even if the authorities did remove Jesus’ body, producing it again to silence Christian claims of the resurrection would have been difficult. Luke-Acts says that the disciples did not start preaching the resurrection until after the ascension, which took place 40 days later. This means that the body of Jesus would no longer have been recognisable enough to put a stop to these claims
Furthermore, to make this counter claim, the authorities would need to admit what they did. For the Jewish authorities this would mean admitting to having desecrated a grave, which is a sin in Judaism. For the Romans it would mean admitting to grave robbing, which would have had the potential to start a riot, which is exactly the kind of thing that Pilate was trying to avoid if we accept the arguement that Jesus was executed out of political expediency
Give some examples of enlightenment thinkers who advocated for the swoon arguement
Karl Bahrdt and Heinrich Paulus
Which version of the swoon hypothesis does Morison mention
Morison mentions Karl Venturini’s 1800 version of the swoon theory: Jesus survived and was rescued by essense allies, made surreptitious appearances to his followers anf final died a natural death 40 days later, which his disciples mistook as him ascending into heaven
How does Morison counter this idea
Morison says that this is implausible from a medical POV. It ignores the deadly wounds inflicted upon Jesus, the loss of strength and blood
Morison refers to the ‘death blow to this theory’ from David Strauss. Strauss points out that even if he did survive crucifixion and escaped the tomb, Jesus would have been ‘a being who had stolen half dead out of the tomb, who crept about weak and ill wanting medical treatment’. Somebody in this condition could not have ‘given the disciples the impression that he was a conquerer over death and the grave.
There are not many supporters of the swoon theory today and Morison and Strauss’ arguements don’t have many critics
How do other versions of the theory counter this
However, most versions of the swoon theory suggest that it was a conspiracy theory and that Jesus received help and assistance from others
How does Christopher Bryan challenge the swoon hypothesis
‘Anyone who imagines that the survivor of a crucifixion would be in a state to convince anyone that he was a victorious conquerer of death clearly has very little idea of what crucifixion was like. To put it mildly, people did not walk away from it’ (Christopher Bryan)
What does the book Holy Blood, Holy Grail suggest
‘Holy Blood, Holy Grail’ speculates that Pilate was bribed to allow Jesus to be rescued before he was dead. The book proposes that Jesus went to live with his wife, Mary, in the south of France, and that his descendents still exist today
Explain the explanation that the women made a mistake
Morison credits this theory to Prof Kirsopp Lake. Lake argues that in the darkness before dawn, the women arrived at the wrong tomb, which would be a natural explanation for the fact that the tomb was both open and had no body inside
Mark 16:5 describes the women finding a young man dressed in a white robe, sitting inside the tomb. The other gospels present this as an angel, but both Lake and Morison agree that this was a human. Lake argues that this was a gardener who tried to tell the women they had come to the wrong place. ‘See the place where they laid him’ (Mark 16:6) is the gardener trying to indicate to a different tomb. Lake proposes that the women were running in fear and only half heard the gardener’s instruction
What is the glaring issue in this arguement
However, the disciples came to the tomb and checked for themselves as soon as they were notified, as described by both Luke and John. Did they also go to the wrong tomb, in broad daylight?
How does Lake respond to this objection
Lake’s response is that the other disciples had already left Jerusalem and returned hom to Galilee. Lake thinks that the disciples had visions or hallucinations of the risen Jesus In Galilee before they knew about the empty tomb. When they returned to Jerusalem, they met the women who told them about Jesus’ body disappearing
How does Morison respond to Lake’s theory
The gospels do not present all the disciples as running away. Peter remained in Jerusalem and so perhaps did the beloved disciple. Earky in his book, Morison argues that the other disciples only escaped as far as nearby Bethany, not all the way to Galilee
It would be very strange for the disciples to abandon these women in Jerusalem for weeks, especially since some of them were their own family and mothers. Morison argues that if a group of women felt safe enough to visit Jesus’ tomb, then so would a group of men felt safe in hiding in Jerusalem
Why would the gardener have been in sitting inside an empty tomb?
If the Jewish authorities wanted to disprove Jewish claims about the resurrection, then they could have brought the gardener as a witness to the woman’s mistake, yet there is no reference to this even as a rumour
How do the observations of Ian Wilson give credence to Lake’s theory
Ian Wilson says that there are several contenders for the true tomb of Jesus, so it is certainly possible the women went to the wrong tomb
Give a quote from Paul Gwynne that supports Morison’s rejection of this idea
‘The mistaken tomb theory has very few serious supporters these days’
Give a quote from CEB Cranfield that supports Morison’s rejection of this idea
‘It is difficult to imagine how a wrong tomb mistake would not have been quickly corrected’ (CEB Cranfield)
Morison actually agrees with Lake on several points
Morison agrees with Lake that the women were frightened away by a strange man in the tomb and he shares his view that the other gospels were fictionalising when they presented this man as an angel
Morison also thinks it likely that the women did not understand what the man was trying to say
Morison also agrees with lake that at first the women did not think anything supernatural had happened: they just thought Jesus’ body had been taken somewhere else
Who does Morison argue that the mysterious figure in the tomb was
Morison argues that the man in the tomb was a servant of the high priest who had been in charge of the guards outside the tomb (Matthew 27 62-66). These guards fell asleep at their posts but awoke to find the tomb open and empty. The guards ran back to the city, but the high priest’s servant stayed behind to investigate
What does Morison say about the idea that the tomb was not visited by the women
Morison suggests that this is the only logical alternative to the resurrection
‘If it could be proved that the grave was not visited on Sunday morning, and that it lay undisturbed and perhaps unthought of for many months afterwards, then the rock upon which all the preceding hypotheses ultimately founder would be removed’
How does Morison respond to this arguement
Morison does not disprove this theory, other than to suggest that it doesn’t account for what happens afterwards
Afterwards, the disciples become convinced of the resurrection and go into the streets of Jerusalem, preaching and winning converts. This takes place in a city where ‘anybody could go and see the tomb between supper and bed time’ according to Morison
Morison concludes that the empty tomb was the one thing that the first Christians and their opponents agreed upon
‘We are nowhere told that any responsible person asserted that the body of Jesus was still in the tomb’ (Morison)
He therefore concludes that the women arriving at the correct tomb and finding it empty on easter morning is far more plausible than the idea that the tomb was not visited
‘However baffling and disconcerting it may seem at first sight, the evidence for the essential accuracy of the women’s story is overwhelming in its consistency and strength’ (Morison)
How does WLC support Morison’s arguement
Prominent contemporary Christian apologist WLC repeats these arguements made by Morison. Craig shares the view that the disciples would not have been able to preach about the resurrection in Jerusalem if the body was still known to be in the tomb
What is the counter to Morison’s arguement
A powerful arguement that Morison ignores is that there was actually no interest in visiting Jesus’ tomb in the early years of Christianity because the disciples preached a spiritual resurrection. This would mean they claimed that Jesus had been risen from the dead as a spiritual being but that his physical body had remained dead. If this is the case, then belief in a bodily resurrection developed much later, but by then it was too late to track down Jesus’ tomb
In support of this, Paul’s encounter with the risen christ on the road to damascus seems to have been with a spiritual being rather than a physical person. The gospels contain episodes where the risen Jesus behaves like a spirit (appearing and disappearing and changing his appearance). The examples of the disciples touching Jesus in Luke and John could have been later editions (RC)
What is the counter to this view
However, there are problems with this interpretation. Jews like Pharisees believed in a physical resurrection, whereas Hellenic philosophers supported a spiritual resurrection. You would expect that considering Jesus’ early followers were Jews that they would believe in a physical resurrection and that ideas about a spiritual resurrection would only creep in over time as gentiles began to enter the church. This is the trend we observe in the gospel of Thomas and the gnostic texts, which favour a spiritual resurrection and are likely to have emerged later than the other gospels in the 2nd century or later
How can Morison be accused of cherry picking
Morison can also by accused of cherry picking: he harmonises the gospels into one narrative by selecting details that support his case and ignoring details that don’t. For example, he omits the scene in Matthew 28:2 where the women see an angel come down and roll away the stone blocking the tomb. He also interprets the figure in the tomb to be a man rather than an angel. This is because he is generally a rationalist and prefers naturalistic explanations (apart from the resurrection itself) and explains away the other supernatural details
What is the issue with Morison’s apparent preference for naturalistic explanations
In this, Morison is following Hume’s idea that even very improbable naturalistic explanations are more likely than supernatural ones. However, he doesn’t follow this to Hume’s conclusion, which states that no matter how improbable the alternative explanations might be, these explanations are still more probable than the idea that a dead man rises back to life
Make the case that Morison makes a persuasive case that the resurrection is a historical fact
Goes through the naturalistic explanations for the empty tomb, methodically pointing out what is plausible in tgem but then analysing the contradictions that come from them. He shows how they contradict the known history of the early church or ordinary human nature. He is left with the resurrection as the only remaining hypothesis
Morison is a rationalist who doesn’t believe in any and all supernatural events. He rejects the description of angels at the tomb and prefers naturalistic explanations of the young man in the white robe. However, when all naturalistic explanations fail, he is prepared to accept that a miracle has occurred and this is what he concludes about the empty tomb
Make the case that he doesn’t
He makes all the opposing explanations seem weaker than they really are
He respects Hume’s advice that ‘a wise man proportions his belief to the evidence’ but doesn’t follow it through. He cherry picks his evidence to produce a naturalistic account but then changes his position at the end by proposing a miraculous resurrection: even improbable naturalistic explanations are more plausible than miracles
Explain Ian Wilson’s beliefs
He was a sceptic in his younger years but converted to Catholic Christianity after researching the Turin Shroud. This curious relic has been kept at the Cathedral of JTB in Turin since the 14th century. Legend claims it is the burial shroud Jesus was buried in after crucifixion – the same wrapping found neatly folded in the empty tomb by Peter in Luke 24:12 and John 20:6. The shroud is a linen cloth bearing the image of a man who is alleged to be Jesus
Radiocarbon dating suggests that the shroud is from the middle ages rather than the first century, but Wilson and other ague that it is genuine and preserves the real likeness of Jesus
Perhaps because of his association with trying to prove the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin, Wilson is not taken very seriously as an NT scholar. He doesn’t get much praise from conservative Christians. This seems to be because he is a rationalist who usually prefers naturalistic explanations fir the supernatural events in Jesuss life. For instance, he thinks that some of the miracles and signs could be evidence that Jesus was a talented hypnotist
Explain the debate over the location of the real tomb
Nothing is now left of what is thought to be the original rock tomb (believed to be at the modern day Church of Holy Sepulche) due to clumsy excavation, the building of a church on the site and then centuries of war over Jerusalem between Christians and Muslims
There are other contenders for the burial site of Jesus. Wilson claims that there are 60 examples of ancient rock tombs in Jerusalem. The ‘Garden Tomb’ is a popular site for pilgrims because its relatively untouched and in beautiful surroundings, outside the Damascus Gate of the Old City
Wilson points out how strange it would be for Jesus to be buried in an empty tomb in which ‘no one had ever been laid’ (John 19:41) since these rock tombs would typically be used by several generations of a Jewish family
There are good reasons for Wilson to be suspicious about the Church of Holy Sepulchre’s claim to be the site of the empty tomb. Its discovery by Helena was a publicity stunt on behalf of her husband, Constantine, the first Christian Roman Emperor. The fragments of the true cross and the titulum (the notice at the top of the cross identifying Jesus as ‘The King of the Jews’) are widely thought to be fake
Since all the gospels describe the tomb as being outside the city walls, it’s odd that she identified a site inside that walls of the city. However, the walls had been rebuilt since the 1st century and the site she picked would have been outside the walls in 30 CE. This suggests that Helena did not pick a site at random: she perhaps really was guided by a local tradition that this was indeed the genuine location of the empty tomb. There must have been something very compelling about the location for Helena to have ignored the clear description of the gospels
Archealogist Dr Kathleen Kenyon discovered in the 1960s that the Church of Holy Sepulchre site would seem to have been in a quarry used for burials at the time and that it was outside of the city walls at Jesus’ time
On the other hand, the Garden Tomb has been dated back to the 8th century BCE. This would mean that it would not have been a new and unused tomb when Jesus was buried, as Matthew and John both claim
Most archeaologists agree with Wilson that there is little evidence to connect the garden tomb to the real tomb of Jesus, but it is regarded as the real tomb by certain religious groups such as the mormons
How is he similar to Morison in his interpretation of the gospels
Like Morison, Wilson produces a harmonised gospel narrative by bringing details from all of them together
Also like Morison, he rejects the idea of an earthquake and angel in Matthew’s story as ‘pious embroideries by an author over fond of the miraculous’. This sort of comment makes Wilson unpopular with conservative Christians
How is he different to Morison in how he looks at the resurrection appearances
Unlike Morison, Wilson lists the resurrection appearances, distinguishing between those that appear to be spiritual and those that are clearly physical. He also links these appearances to the way that the first Christians preached about the resurrection, as described in the Book of Acts…
39 “We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They killed him by hanging him on a cross, 40 but God raised him from the dead on the third day and caused him to be seen. 41 He was not seen by all the people, but by witnesses whom God had already chosen—by us who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. 42 He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead.
Where does Wilson date Paul’s belief in the resurrection to
36 AD
What does he say about the validity of the different rational explanations for the resurrection
Suggests that ‘there remains no uncontested rational answer’ to ‘the central mystery of the Christian religion’, which is, how did the resurrection come about? (Wilson is careful with his words here, as there is a non rational answer: the supernatural rising of Jesus from the dead
Wilson highlights some of the differences between the gospel accounts of the resurrection…
The Synoptics have Mary arrive with others but in John she arrives alone
In John the tomb is empty and open, in Matthew and angel opens the tomb, in Luke the tomb is already open and then two men/angels appear, while in Mark the tomb is already open and a young man is inside
In Mark the women tell no one what they have seen, in John they tell just Peter and the BD, in Matthew they tell the 11 and are believed, while in Luke they tell the 11 and are not believed
Matthew and Mark say that Jesus appeared to the disciples in Galilee, whereas John and Luke say that he appeared to them in Jerusalem
Why does Wilson think Mary may be a poor witness
Wilson says that Mary is a poor witness as she was possessed by ‘7 demons’, which means that she may have had a mental illness
Why does Corinthians 15: 5-8 make him doubt Mary as a witness
He also says that Paul’s account in 1 Corinthians 15: 5-8 has a different order of appearances, with no mention of the women at all
Corinthains 15: 5-8…
5 and that he appeared to Cephas,[a] and then to the Twelve. 6 After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, 8 and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
Why does Wilson counter this and support the testimony of the women
They possess ‘the same quality as the memories of witnesses after a road accident’ which makes them sound like ‘personal and highly confused versions of the same story’
If the accounts were invented, why would the gospel writers have made women the prime witnesses, especially since women’s testimony carried a particularly low weight in Jewish Law
Describe the debate over whether the Book of Acts supports the idea that early Christians held views of bodily resurrection
The speeches in acts are evidence that early Christians believed in a bodily resurrection. However, Luke-Acts was not composed until around 70-80 CE, meaning some of the speeches by Peter recorded may not be authentic, since there are 40-50 years between these speeches and this being written down
Why are the Pauline epistles a better guide to what early Christians believed
Paul’s epistles are written in the 50s CE by someone who knew Peter and the other disciples personally. They are probably a much better guide of what the first Christians believed, but Paul seems to describe encountering Jesus as a vision or spirit
How does the critereon of embarrassment support the testimony of the women
The presence of women as witnesses passes the critereon of embarrassment since this is not a detail the evangelist would invent if they wanted their accounts to be believed
How does Wilson explain Corinthians 15: 5-8
Wilson says that Paul omits the women from his account of resurrection appearances out of sheer sexism
What is the counter to this view
Wilson says that Paul omits the women from his account of resurrection appearances out of sheer sexism. However, this does not fit well with Paul’s dealings with Christian leaders such as Lydia and Chloe: Paul entrusts his epistle to the Romans to Pheobe, who delivers to Rome on his behalf. This is not the behaviour of someone ‘for whom women didn’t count’
Explain Wilson’s 6 basic hypotheses
The women went to the wrong tomb – Wilson dismisses this in the same way as Morison and WLC: ‘It would have been an easy matter for any sceptic to go to the right location, show the body still there and set the whole matter to rest’
Someone removed Jesus’ body – As pointed out by Morison, argues that once to disciples started preaching the resurrection that ‘we might surely have expected someone, some time, to produce it’
The disciples removed Jesus’ body – Seems to regard it as inevitable that if a follower of Jesus did take the body, that that person would have confessed to what they have done (perhaps because of the persecution they faced)
The risen Jesus was a hallucination – He is dubious about the idea that hallucinations could feel so real to so many people but his main arguement is that the hallucination hypothesis does not explain the empty tomb
Jesus survived the crucifixion – Wilson mentions versions of the swoon hypothesis by Hugh Schonfield, DH Lawrence and Barbara Thiering, but refutes them all with David Strauss famous comment ‘a being who had stolen half dead out of the sepulchre’ could not have convinced the disciples that he really was the ‘Prince of Life’
Jesus really did rise from the dead – Wilson says this is the most persuasive. In support, he cites the transformation of ‘the previously denying and demoralised’ Peter into a confident and passionate missionary. He also cites Edwin Yamauchi in support of the idea that Paul listing so many witnesses to the resurrection who were alive at the time he wrote is strong evidence that ‘something like the resurrection actually happened’
Explain Wilson’s criticism that some of the gospels may have been written to disprove these hypotheses
Wilson offers another criticism, that the gospels were specifically written to counter some of these hypotheses
Wrong tomb – The Synoptics all make a point of mentioning that the women took careful note of where Jesus was buried
Theft of the body – John has Mary believing that someone had stolen the body
Hoax by the disciples – Matthew specifically accuses that Jewish leadership of spreading this rumour
Hallucination – Luke and John include scenes where the disciples are disbelieving until they touch Jesus’ hands and feet
If these were standard criticisms leveled at the earliest Christians for their beliefs, then the evangelists might have added these details in purely to answer critics (RC). They are therefore writing to address issues at their time rather than in a genuine attempt to reproduce what happened on Easter Morning
Why is Wilson doubtful about such ideas
Wilson concludes by surveying the immense impact the resurrection had on the lives of early Christians. He gives the example of Stephen the Martyr and Jesus’ own family (such as his brother James) who faced torture and death ‘with astounding cheerfulness, totally confident that what they professed was truth’
‘What cannot be expressed enough is that those who made such claims had no expectation of any material gain for their outspokenness. Their reward instead, as in the following decades and centuries would demonstrate, was all to frequently to be faced with some form of violent death, from being stoned, to being torn to pieces by wild animals in the Roman arena, to being crucified in some yet more grotesque and painful manner’
Why is his counter to the theft hypothesis flawed
His treatment of the theft hypothesis was perhaps too brief. When the disciples started preaching Jesus resurrection in public, it was weeks after the crucifixion according to Luke-Acts, which would have made it impossible for anyone to produce a recognisable corpse to refute these claims. It is also possible that some disciple had died without telling anyone that the resurrection was a hoax
Counter his idea that the transformation of the disciples’ personalities proves the resurrection
The idea that the transformation of Peter and the other disciples somehow proves the resurrection is a weak arguement. We don’t know much about what Peter was like before the resurrection, as the gospels focus on Jesus rather than his disciples personalities. Perhaps Peter had always been a confident and charismatic public speaker and just needed an opportunity to step out from underneath Jesus’ shadow. Even if Peter did transform from a cowardly nobody into an amazing preacher, this doesn’t prove his resurrection experience was objectively real, only that Peter and the others believed that it was real. If is not unusual for people to reinvent themselves after a life crisis and this might have been what happened to people like Paul, Peter and Stephen. The fact that belief in the resurrection was psychologically good for Peter and the others does not prove that it was true
Evaluate Wilson’s theory that the evangelists redacted counters to arguements against the resurrection into their gospels
The theory that the evangelists redacted details into their accounts to refute criticism by believers is unprovable. However it can be proven to be unlikely if there were other naturalistic explanations of the resurrection which the gospels do not make a point of refuting in this way
One hypothesis that Wilson does not consider is the substitution hypothesis: Jesus was replaced on the cross by a substitute who looked like him, perhaps even his identical twin brother. This is not a modern idea but it present in 2nd and 3rd century texts like The Acts of Thomas (the Disciple Thomas being Jesus’ twin, since ‘Thomas’ is Greek for ‘twin’). However, the gospels don’t make a point of refuting this substitution hypothesis (e.g., by making it clear that Jesus didn’t have any twin brothers). The evangelists would surely do this if they were redacting material just to refute all the popular criticisms of the resurrection that were going around. However, this arguement is limited as it could be the case that this idea cropped up after the gospels were written and so the evangelists would not have known about them
What does Wilson conclude at the end of this work
Wilson’s conclusion is that the rapid spread of Christianity was unusual despite great opposition and ‘something very powerful had fired them into such resoluteness of belief’.
Wilson is not trying to prove the resurrection happened so much as encourage his readers to view the matter more open mindedly before arriving at their own conclusions
Wilson makes a persuasive case for the resurrection as historical fact…
Argues that the Church of Holy Sepulchre probably is the true site of the empty tomb
Argues that the transformation of disciples such as Peter is best explained by the fact of the resurrection
Demonstrates that all the naturalistic alternative explanations are flawed
Wilson is fair minded and balanced by presenting both arguement for and against the resurrection but his ‘for’ arguements are simply stronger
The biggest section of the extract focuses on the transformation of early Christians into fearless martyrs, which is best explained by the resurrection
Wilson does not make a persuasive case for the resurrection as historical fact
Wilson makes an equally persuasive case against the resurrection, pointing out that that gospels were redacted to address early counter claims against the resurrection, which makes them poor sources of evidence in favour of it
Points out that the accounts of the resurrection are full of discrepancies and contradictions
Wilson devotes too much time to the weakest of the ‘Six Basic Hypotheses’ (the swoon theory) but doesn’t give enough contradiction to the stronger ones (that the body of Jesus was stolen) and gives no consideration at all to the idea that the disciples originally believed in a spiritual resurrection, not a bodily one
Too willing to believe that, because the disciples were empowered by their belief in the resurrection, something like it must have happened
