When I was a junior in high school (quite a few years ago!), one of my best friends became a Christian. Because I was an atheist at the time and because my friend Paul had been one of my partying buddies, I gave him a really hard time about his newfound faith in Jesus. I remember going up to him once and saying, "Hey Paul, did you hear they cancelled Easter this year? They found the body." Paul didn’t think my joke was very funny.
Well what was an irreverent joke of a 16 year old atheist actually became a movie this year. Maybe you’ve heard about the release of a new movie called "The Body," starring Antionio Banderas. The premise of the movie is that an Arab hardware merchant discovers an ancient tomb underneath his hardware shop in Jerusalem. In the movie, archeologists conclude that the body in the tomb of the body of Jesus. Banderas portrays Father Matt Gutierrez, a priest sent by the Vatican to disprove the evidence. The premise of the movie is that if someone actually found the remains of Jesus, that discovery would destroy the Christian faith.
That premise is a true one. In fact, this is one thing that both Bible believing Christians and atheists can both agree on. The Christian faith stands or falls on the truthfulness of the claim that Jesus truly rose from the grave. The Bible itself says that if Jesus didn’t really rise from the grave, then the Christian faith is empty and void (1 Cor 15:17).
Did Jesus really rise from the dead? That’s our question today. We’re finishing a series today called "Common Questions About Jesus." In this series we’ve been trying to look at some of the most basic questions people have about Jesus. So far we’ve looked at the questions: Did Jesus really exist? Who did Jesus think he was? And was Jesus really God? We’ve seen that the evidence for the existence of Jesus is overwhelming, even the evidence outside of the Bible itself. We’ve also seen that Jesus’ action of driving the money changers out of the temple-an action that virtually all historians agree really happened-clearly indicates that Jesus saw himself as Israel’s Messiah. Then last week Pastor Gary demonstrated that the New Testament also teaches that Jesus is fully God, as well as being fully human.
But the reality is that there have been lots of people throughout history to have made strange claims about themselves. In Jesus’ generation there were about a dozen other people who had claimed to be Israel’s messiah. So who’s to say that Jesus was really the Messiah and not, say, Judas the Galilean or Simon son of Giora or Bar Kochba, who all made similar claims (Horsely 260-61)? And many people throughout history have been called God, so we certainly shouldn’t be surprised that the Bible calls Jesus God. You see, the question of whether Jesus was really the messiah and whether he is truly God in the flesh is intertwined with the question of whether he rose form the grave. If Jesus really did rise from the grave, then he did something that no other messianic figure and no other person called God has done. But if the resurrection of Jesus were proven to be untrue, or a myth or a fable, then Jesus is no different than any other messianic pretender.
Today we’re going to finish our series on "Common Questions About Jesus" by looking at the question, "Did Jesus really rise from the dead?" To do that we’re first going to look at six historical facts surrounding the resurrection, then six alternate theories to try to explain these facts, and then finally some reasons to believe that the bodily resurrection of Jesus provides the best explanation for the facts. In two weeks we’ll be returning to our series through Romans, but today we’re going to look at whether Jesus really rose from the dead or not.
1. The Facts (1 Corinthians 15:3-8)
Let’s be Joe Friday from Dragnet and ask, "Just what are the facts surrounding the claim that Jesus rose from the dead?" To do that we’re going to look at the earliest historical mention of Jesus’ resurrection, which happens to be in the New Testament book of 1 Corinthians. Before we read this section together, let me explain just how important this section is. You see, even though the four gospels--Matthew, Mark, Luke and John--in the New Testament recount the life of Jesus, they were written a thirty to forty years after the death of Jesus. That doesn’t mean that they’re unreliable, but it does mean that they’re not as close to the events as we’d like. But Paul’s letter to the Corinthians was written earlier than the four gospels, probably about 55 AD according to most historians.
The section we’re going to look from Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians in 55 AD at is an early Christian creed--or statement of faith--that Paul claims to have received from the other apostles. Most historians believe Paul received this creed shortly after his own conversion to the Christian faith when Paul visited the apostle Peter and James in Jerusalem between 34 or 35 AD. Now do the math with me: if Jesus died somewhere between 30 and 33 AD (which is where historians place his death) that puts this creed Paul quotes in 1 Corinthians within a few years years, perhaps even within just a few months, of Jesus’ death. That makes this creed remarkable from the perspective of ancient history because it’s so close to the events.
Now let’s actually look at the creed Paul quotes in vv. 3-8. The Greek terms translated as "received" and "passed on" in v. 1 are technical terms that describe the passing on of an authoritative tradition. The key when passing on a tradition like this is to pass it on exactly as you received it, kind of like faxing an important document from one person to another. Paul is saying that this is exactly what he received--most likely from Peter and James--and this very thing is what Paul also passed on the Corinthians. Even those historians who reject the Bible as God’s word admit that this creed is our earliest source of solid historical facts about Jesus’ death and the church’s belief in Jesus’ resurrection (see Craig).
Now there are several facts we can draw from this early Christian creed that are relevant to our discussion of the resurrection of Jesus. The first fact is this: Jesus was really dead and buried. Not only does the creed state that Jesus "died" and "was buried," but the four New Testament gospel accounts also record the death and burial of Jesus. We also saw a few weeks ago that the non-Christian Roman historian Tacitus also speaks of Jesus being executed by the Romans, as well as the Jewish historian Josephus. Most historians accept as a historical fact that Jesus was really dead and buried. There are a few exceptions to this, and we’ll talk about them a bit later, but the vast majority agree with this first fact, that Jesus was really dead and buried.
The second fact is that in light of Jesus’ death, Jesus’ disciples were experiencing despair and grief. Now the creed doesn’t tell us this, but we can infer it from the fact that Jesus’ followers believed Jesus to be the Messiah. You see, Jesus is one of several people who have claimed to be Israel’s messiah during this period of Jewish history (Wright 1999, 138). When these other messiahs were killed by the Romans (as they all eventually were) their followers had two choices: Either give up the dream or find another messiah. For instance, when a messianic figure named Judas the Galilean was executed in about 6 AD, people followed his sons as the messiah; and after the Romans killed his sons, they followed his grandsons; and eventually they following one of his descendants named Eliazer during the disastrous Jewish battle against the Romans at Masada in 73 AD (Wright 138). Their choice was to either give up the dream or to find another messiah. There’s no reason to think it would have been any different for Jesus’ followers when Jesus was executed, that his followers would’ve been dejected and grief stricken, afraid for their own lives. There’s no evidence Jesus’ first followers looked to Jesus’ half-brother James for messianic direction. Their hopes and dreams had collapsed when the Romans executed Jesus. This is also consistent with what we read about Jesus’ followers in the four New Testament gospels.
Now let me give you the third fact: Three days after Jesus’ burial the tomb was empty. The empty tomb is inferred here in 1 Corinthians 15, and it’s explicitly stated in all four New Testament gospels. British historian N.T. Wright says, "To say that someone had been buried and then raised three days later was to say that the tomb was empty" (Wright 141). None of the enemies of the early Christian movement denied that the tomb was empty three days after Jesus was crucified.
Now the fourth fact: The disciples claimed to have seen Jesus alive again. This creed recounts several "appearances" of Jesus mentioned here, including an appearance to Peter, an appearance to the 12 apostles, an appearance to a group of 500 people, an appearance to James, an appearance to all the apostles, and finally Paul adds his own encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus. The Greek word "appear" here is a form of the Greek verb HORAO, which normally means to see something physically. So this word doesn’t normally refer to a spiritual vision but it usually describes an actual visual occurrence in time and space. These appearances of Jesus seem to stop with Paul, as if there was only a limited window of time for them to occur. Again, most historians agree that Jesus’ followers claimed to have seen him alive again.
The fifth fact is that after thinking they saw Jesus, Jesus’ disciples were transformed from fear to courage. Once they had this experience of seeing Jesus alive--however we explain that experience--it changed them dramatically. Instead of cowering in fear for their lives, now they’re boldly proclaiming the resurrection of Jesus. Since Jesus really died at the hands of the Roman government, anyone who proclaimed Jesus’ resurrection faced the very real possibility of also being executed by the Romans. Again, virtually all historians agree that some kind of remarkable transformation occurred in the lives of Jesus’ disciples.
The final fact is that Jesus’ resurrection was the central claim of the first century Christian church. British historian N. T. Wright tells us that there’s no form of early Christianity known to historians that did not affirm Jesus’ resurrection as the central point of their message (126). The resurrection of Jesus formed the very heart of the Christian church’s proclamation, which is why Paul calls it something that was "first in importance" in v. 3.
Again, these are the facts that most historians-whether Christian or non-Christian-agree on. Now the question is how to best explain these facts.
2. Alternate Theories
Before I share why I think the literal, bodily resurrection of Jesus best explains these six facts, let me share some alternate theories that have been offered to explain them. The first alternate theory is the mythology theory. This mythology view was popularized by James Frazer’s 1890 book The Golden Bough. People who hold to the mythology view point out that some ancient Greek religious have myths about gods dying and being reborn. These people claim that what the early Christians did was adopt this terminology of dying and rebirth and apply it to Jesus. So the resurrection was simply something that developed slowly as a myth, and to form this myth the Christians borrowed from pagan mythology. Now most of the mythological parallels Frazer notes are very superficial, because none of these myths claimed that this death and rebirth was a one time historical occurrence that occurred in time and space. But the most devastating criticism of the mythology view is that there’s simply not enough time between Jesus’ death and the claim that he rose from the grave to allow for mythology to develop. It usually takes about a century for myths to develop about a person, but here we have a claim that he rose from the grave within just a few years--perhaps even a few months--after his death (Craig 382-87). This would be the only known case in all of ancient history for such myths and legends to develop in such a short time. This is why there are so few proponents of the mythology theory today.
Another alternate theory is the swoon theory. A theologian named Frederich Schlermacher held to this view, but it was popularized in the 1960s by a book called The Passover Plot but Jewish historian Hugh Schonfield. I also found a philosophy professor at Columbia University that embraces the swoon theory as well. Now the swoon theory claims that Jesus didn’t really die in the cross, so these are the few people who would contest my first fact, that Jesus really died on the cross. In this view, the scourging and crucifixion caused Jesus to pass out, perhaps going into a coma, and the Romans presumed Jesus to be dead. But in the coolness of the tomb Jesus woke up, rolled the stone away, and then appeared to his disciples alive again. So what we have here is a recovery from near mortal wounds, not a resurrection from the dead.
Now this theory seems wildly far-fetched to me. Here’s why: the Romans knew how to kill people (Wright). Roman executioners killed dozens of people a day, thousands every year, so it seems improbable that they’d be so incompetent as to let an unconscious person slip through the cracks. And even if Jesus was somehow able to survive crucifixion, role the stone away, and find his disciples, they’d hardly say, "he’s risen." More likely they’d say "Somebody call a doctor quick." It seems incredible that a battered and bleeding Jesus could persuade his followers that he’d conquered death. This is why even the atheist philosopher Anthony Flew calls the swoon theory "rubbish" (Habermas and Flew 70).
A third alternate explanation is the conspiracy theory. According to the conspiracy theory someone stole the body of Jesus. Some claim it was Jesus’ followers, others claim it was the Jewish or Roman authorities, still others that it was grave robbers. Now seems doubtful that Jesus’ followers would steal the body, and if they did, it’s even more far-fetched to claim that risk their own lives for a story they knew was a lie. In fact, Matthew’s gospel records that this was a concern of the Jewish high priest, which is exactly why he requested that a Roman guard be posted at the tomb. The view that someone stole the body is pure speculation, and more importantly it fails to explain how the early Christians came to believe Jesus had appeared to them alive again.
Another alternate theory is the wrong tomb theory. According to this view the disciples simply went to the wrong tomb. A New Testament scholar named Kirsopp Lake reconstructs the events this way:
"The women came in the early morning to a tomb which they thought was the one in which they had seen the Lord buried. They expected to find a closed tomb, but they found an open one; and a young man…guessing their errand, tried to tell them that they had made a mistake in the place. ’He is not here,’ said he, ’see the place where they laid him,’ and probably pointed to the next tomb. But the women were frightened…and fled" (cited in Harris 35).
All I can say about this theory is that it assumes Jesus’ followers were really stupid. It assumes that they had an abnormally poor sense of direction, that they had forgotten in just a few hours where they had been the night before. I admit the wrong tomb theory is very creative and imaginative, but it seems really far-fetched to me.
Another view is the hallucination theory. This is the view favored by atheist Anthony Flew in his debate about Jesus’ resurrection with Christian philosopher Gary Habermas. According to this view, the disciples really thought they saw the risen Jesus--that much is certain--but it must have been a mass hallucination. Now the problem with this view is that psychologists tell us that hallucinations are a very personal, private experience. So to claim that all 12 apostles or all 500 people mentioned in 1 Corinthians 15 had the same hallucination seems implausible in light of what modern day psychology says about hallucinations. In fact, there has never been a recorded case of two people have the same hallucination at the same time.
Finally, there’s the vision theory. Many professing Christians who are part of mainline churches hold to this view. For example, this is the view of John Shelby Spong, the recently retired Episcopal bishop of Newark, New Jersey. According to this view, Jesus’ disciples really did see something, it was really Jesus, but that the body of Jesus didn’t rise from the dead. Perhaps it was Jesus’ soul or spirit, perhaps a ghost, perhaps some sort of vision, but it wasn’t Jesus’ bodily presence. For instance, Jesus Seminar participant Marcus Borg says "the discovery of Jesus’ skeletal remains would not be a problem" to his faith as a Christian in the least (Wright and Borg 131).
The problem with this view is that it’s hard to distinguish it from the hallucination view. Furthermore, it’s clear that the early Christians thought that Jesus rose bodily from the dead, that they didn’t interpret these appearances mentioned in 1 Corinthians 15 mystical or visionary experiences, so this view makes the early Christians mistaken in their understanding of the resurrection.
Now these are the major alternate theories to the view that Jesus actually rose bodily from the dead. Each of these views has its own set of problems when you take into account the six facts I mentioned earlier. In fact, none of these views can sufficiently explain how the early Christian church became the movement it did if the resurrection was a myth, a recovery, a conspiracy, an honest mistake, a hallucination or a vision.
3. Evidence for a Literal Resurrection
Let me share some evidence for the actual, literal resurrection of Jesus. The first is simply the empty tomb. No one has been able to adequately explain how the tomb of Jesus came to be empty. The claim that the disciples stole the body seems far-fetched and speculative. Grave robbers generally steal things from the body, not the body itself. Given that the creed we looked at from 1 Corinthians dates within just a few years--perhaps a few months--of Jesus’ death, and given that the creed originated from Jerusalem, it would be no problem for a skeptic of the Christian faith to simply go to the tomb of Jesus and look for him or herself. Yet there’s no evidence that anyone every challenged the claim that the tomb was empty. Hallucinations and visions also can’t explain the empty tomb either.
The second line of evidence is the lack of tomb veneration. It’s well know that at the time of Jesus the tombs of religious leaders who died were venerated as shrines (Craig 372). In fact, King David’s tomb-which is on your screen-is an example of this tomb veneration continuing even up to the present day. The reason people did this was because the remains of a prophet or holy person was thought to impart special status on the tomb, so it became a shrine. But there is no evidence that this ever happened with the tomb of Jesus, which is further evidence that the grave was empty.
A third line of evidence is the failure to produce the body of Jesus. All a critic would have to do to disprove the Christian faith at its inception would be to produce the remains of Jesus. The Antonio The movie "the Body" is right that a discovery of the remains of Jesus would bring an end to the Christian faith. Yet there’s no evidence that anyone was ever able to do this.
Finally, a fourth line of evidence is the changed disciples. The fact that the people who claimed to have seen Jesus alive again were willing to face arrest, torture, and even death for their claim is powerful evidence that at least they really believed they had seen Jesus. Again, this rules out the conspiracy, and it seems highly implausible that it was a vision or a hallucination given the existence of the empty tomb. This transformation in the lives of the disciples is why the early church flourished as it did, and had Jesus not been raised from the grave, the Christian movement would’ve suffered the exact same fate as all the other messianic movements of the first century.
These lines of evidence make the actual resurrection of Jesus the most plausible and rational explanation for what happened. British historian N.T. Wright says, "Once you allow that something remarkable happened to his body that morning, all other data fall into place with astonishing ease. Once you insist that nothing so outlandish happened, you are driven to ever more complex and fantastic hypothesis to explain the data. For the historian…the answer should be clear" (Wright and Borg 124). In fact, one of the more fascinating studies of Jesus’ resurrection was by a Jewish historian and Orthodox Jewish rabbi named Pinchas Lapide, who wrote a book called The Resurrection of Jesus: A Jewish Perspective. Listen to Lapide’s conclusion: "I accept the resurrection of Easter Sunday not as an invention of the community of disciples, but as a historical event." Yet Dr. Lapide doesn’t believe Jesus is the Jewish Messiah.
Conclusion
What does all this mean? If Jesus truly rose from the dead, death has been conquered and the questions of life have been answered. The resurrection of Jesus would vindicate Jesus’ claim to be the messiah and the New Testament’s claim that Jesus is truly God in human form. This would mean that death no longer has to be an enemy to be feared, but that someone has crossed the threshold of death and not only returned, but has conquered death itself. This would mean that the questions of life have been answered by the life and teachings of Jesus, because his resurrection vindicates his way of life.
You see, if Jesus has risen again, you can know him today. We don’t merely sing our songs about Jesus, but as you’ve seen today, we sing them to Jesus, because we believe he has conquered death. If Jesus is alive, he can be known and loved.
Sources
Borg, Marcus J. and N. T. Wright. 1999. The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions. Harper San Francisco.
Craig, William Lane. 1989. Assessing the New Testament Evidence for the Historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus. Studies in the Bible and Early Christianity Vol. 16. Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press.
Davis, Stephen T. 1993. Risen Indeed: Making Sense of the Resurrection. Eerdmans Publishing.
Habermas, Gary and Anthony Flew. 1987. Did Jesus Rise From the Dead? The Resurrection Debate. Harper & Row.
Harris, Murray J. 1994. 3 Critical Questions About Jesus. Baker Books.
Horsley, Richard. 1999. Bandits, Prophets & Messiahs: Popular Movements in the Time of Jesus. Trinity Press International.
Wright, N. T. 1999. The Challenge of Jesus: Rediscovering Who Jesus Was and Is. InterVarsity Press.
