The historicity of Christ, including his death by crucifixion, is a fact that about as well attested as any in the ancient world. The evidence for Christ's existence is much stronger than that for Socrates, Alexander the Great, and numerous figures of ancient times whose historicity no one doubts. Historians are unanimous that Christ was born, that he developed a following, that he antagonized the Jewish and Roman authorities, and that he was put to death. But what about the resurrection?
"If Christ had not been raised," Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15:17, "our preaching is useless and so is your faith." The resurrection is the most important event in Christianity. (For this reason, Easter is actually a more important holiday for Christians than Christmas.) Other religions such as Judaism and Islam may feature miracles but miracles are not central to their theology. Christianity, by contrast, is based on the miracle of the resurrection.
Since the nineteenth century, some biblical scholars have refused to accept the biblical account of the Resurrection because it was produced by people obviously biased in Christ's favor. Interestingly Christ's followers, by their own admission, did not expect the resurrection. Arriving three days after his death, the women brought spices to his tomb to anoint and preserve his body. Only then did they observe that the stone had been rolled away and the tomb was empty.
The fact of the empty tomb was admitted by the Roman guards and also by the Jewish magistrates, who told the Roman authorities that Christ's followers must have stolen the body. In Jewish polemic against Christianity, this has been the standard explanation for the empty tomb. Yet it is prima facie implausible, since how could a handful of female disciples have subdued Roman guards and moved the stone blocking access to the tomb?
The apostles were deeply skeptical about reports of a resurrection, and Christ had to appear to them several times before these doubts were dispelled. Paul writes that Christ "appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, although some have passed away." Paul here appeals to direct empirical evidence: the testimony of multiple witnesses who actually saw Jesus alive after his execution. Of this group, Paul says that many are still alive, which means they are in a position to refute him if what he is claiming is wrong. In the history of hallucinations, is there a single instance in which five hundred people all saw the same person--a figure known to them--and were all equally mistaken?
But is the testimony of the early Christians reliable? Well, let us see. The disciples became so convinced of what they had seen that their dirges of lamentation were replaced with cries of joy. Proclaiming Christ crucified and Christ risen, they launched the greatest wave of religious conversion in history. Historians tell us that the number of Christians increased from around 100 at the time of Christ's death to around 30 million by the early fourth century, when the Roman emperor himself converted to Christianity.
These conversions occurred in the teeth of fierce political opposition and the persecution of the greatest empire in the ancient world, the empire of Rome. The early Christians did not hesitate to identify themselves with a man who had been branded a traitor and a criminal. They endured imprisonment, torture, exile, and death rather than renounce their commitment to a resurrected Christ.
Imagine a disputed event in court where numerous eyewitnesses gave evidence of the same fact and stood by their testimony so firmly that they would be willing to endure life imprisonment or even the death penalty rather than say the contrary. Would any jury doubt that such people, who would have little to gain and everything to lose, were telling the truth?
"Yes," an atheist friend of mine conceded. "But aren't the radical Muslims also willing to die in order to get the virgins in heaven?" Perhaps so, but the two cases are not comparable. The radical Muslims are taking on faith that their actions will take them to an Elysian place where the virgins will be waiting. By contrast, the Christians who went to their deaths at the hands of the Romans did so because they refused to renounce an event in their own experience. Why would someone be willing to die for something that he knew to be a lie?
Even from a secular point of view, the evidence for Christ's resurrection is surprisingly strong. It might even be sufficient to convince an impartial jury in a court of law. The big question surrounding Good Friday and Easter is not: did all this happen? It did. The big question is whether we will let Christ into our hearts, so that he can raise us up on the day of judgment.
This Easter reflection is adapted from my book What's So Great About Christianity.
Reader Comments ( Page 8 of 56)
106. His body was left on the cross to be eaten by wild animals and birds. Part of the Roman punishment for "Treason" was not handing the body over to the relatives, but tossing it in a mass grave.
"The Empty Tomb" was a play written by the early church. The author had never been to Jerusalem. He used a story about Jesus visiting a young boy named Lazaras, who had spent the night in a tomb as part of an initiation rite. changed the story around so Jesus was in the tomb instead of Lazarus.
Once you understand that the people who start an End of the World cult are Dishonest, then it's easy to accept that ALL the stories are simply LIES.
William Hays at 5:11PM on Mar 21st 2008
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This bozo makes it up as he goes.
You are the stupidest idiot I have ever known by your lying comments.
How do you know Haze is lying? Answer; When you read his posts.
Observant at 5:24PM on Mar 21st 2008
107. UnObservant, ALL biblical scholars agree that Mark originally ended at 16:8. Every. Single. One.
It's a fact.
You have a LOT to learn.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 5:24PM on Mar 21st 2008
108. 106. UnObservant, ALL biblical scholars agree that Mark originally ended at 16:8. Every. Single. One.
It's a fact.
You have a LOT to learn.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 5:24PM on Mar 21st 2008
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Thats no secret knight, But I do n ot believe it.
Observant at 5:27PM on Mar 21st 2008
109. Then you don't believe the truth, UnObservant. You have admitted to willingly believing a LIE. You have willingly chosen to delude yourself, UnObservant.
That is the most disgusting thing I have ever seen someone do, UnObservant.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 5:30PM on Mar 21st 2008
110. Observant mentioned Adam and Eve.....Now these two crazy kids had two sons Cain and Able. Yo Observant who did they sleep with to produce children? MOM?
Larry at 5:32PM on Mar 21st 2008
111. Observant,
When you preach, you are interpreting the bible for your audience. Since you are merely a man and certainly not as great as your god, you couldn't possibly know exactly what he wants. An example is the hundreds of different sects of Christianity with many various different beliefs from one group to the next. Penecostals believe you need to speak in tongues. Others that you should drink cyanide and hold poisonus snakes. You're all the same: you make shit as you go along too.
K at 5:34PM on Mar 21st 2008
112. ATHEIST
You need to analyze the story.
If the Roman governor gave permission to have the body of Jesus taken to a rich man's tomb, that would imply that he LIKED Jesus.
If he liked Jesus, why would he have Jesus crucified?
I'm just saying, use some common sense.
The Roman authorities thought Jesus was guilty of a CRIME.
Thirty years later, when Peter was an honored guest at a new church in Rome, he changed a few of the facts so it would APPEAR that the Roman governor thought Jesus was innocent.
but if the Roman governor thought Jesus was innocent... he would NOT have been crucified.
simple as that.
Some of the Gospel of Mark is a story that Peter told a church in Rome. Most of it was invented after 70 AD. You need some training to know how it all fits together.
William Hays at 5:35PM on Mar 21st 2008
113. ATHEIST
Actually, many scholars believe that the Gospel of Mark originally ended with the words of the Centurion.
"Surely this was a good man."
If you look at the first sentence, it only makes sense that the last sentence agrees with it.
It was very easy to ADD new material at the end. Probably there were some women in the early church who felt the Gospel of Mark needed to add some women to the story.
William Hays at 5:37PM on Mar 21st 2008
114. Mnay of the responses to Dinesh's post miss points he actually made pretty darn obvious. I don't know if this is a result of intentional attempts to misrepresent what he wrote, or if it evinces a lack of ability in the area of reading comprehension.
First, some say, "other religions have accounts of miracles too." True enough. But the difference is that Christianity is founded on a miracle, and on a miracle that one can locate in history. No Jew believes in god because Moses parted the Red Sea; no Muslim believes in Allah because date trees came to Mohammed when he commanded them to; but (most, by far) Christians are Chritians because they believe that Christ rose from the dead. One can easily imagine Judaism without the parting of the Red Sea (they could've escaped in an entirely natural way), or Islam without Mohammed's obedient date trees, but Christianity without the resurrection in very nearly a contradiction. Also, Christ's other miracles were not simply "wonder-working" or "faith healing"; they were deeply symbolic, and expressed Christ's teaching that no one was unclean because of some ailment or condition or status, but that people became unclean because of the content of their hearts. Therefore, if you remove Christ's miracles from his ministry, you're unwittingly removing one of the strongest expressions of the ultimate equality of all people in world literature.
Second, some have said, "Ah, these are just stories. What if someone took the Lord of the Rings seriously?" This is absurd. We have letters from Paul, six of which are judged to be authentic (thought they may each contain portions of different letters). In these letters, Paul speaks about meetings he has had with Peter and James, Jesus' brother. Paul is talking to members of communities about people they are familiar with. Now, Peter and James knew Jesus. In ancient and classical studies, this is damn solid evidence for the existence of Jesus, so any comparison of the biblical accounts with "The Lord of the Rings" or "Harry Potter" does no damage whatsoever to the historical claims of Christians, but it says very much indeed about the historical ignorance of the person who made the comparison.
Third, of course there are other possible accounts of what happened on the first Easter. But the problem is that none of them hold up, as an explanation, as well as the resurrection does. In other words, they're possible accounts, but not plausible accounts. I'd refer anyone interested in a scholarly, in-depth defense of Jesus' resurrection to "The Resurrection of the Son of God" by N. T. Wright, one of the most highly respected NT scholars alive today. The possibilities you advance are there shown to be much less likely than the resurrection itself, given the historical data. Yes, it is a data driven argument, though, of course, the conslusion that the resurrection occured isn't compelled by the evidence. In other words, it's an inference to the best explanation, not a logical deduction. in this sense, faith comes into play after the data has been digested.
Finally, are there contradictions in the gospel accounts? Absolutely. But they all adhere quite tightly to the core story expressed by Paul in the early creeds of the earliest Christian communities (some of these creeds, such as the one in 1 Corinthians 15, have been dated to within a decade of the crucifixion). And isn't this what we would expect? If the accounts agreed in evey detail, you would be shouting conspiracy. If they disagreed at pivotal points, I would not be a Christian. But if they give different accounts of the same, fundamental core of a story -- which they do -- then they are exactly what any reasonable person should expect them to be.
Tiny Tim at 5:48PM on Mar 21st 2008
115. Larry...
Don't be silly! We couldn't have incest in the Bible! Cain (after "doing" his brother) took a wife from the people of Nod.
Now exactly where the people of Nod came from (if Adam and Eve were the only two humans at the time) is never made clear in the Bible.
Paul at 5:51PM on Mar 21st 2008
116. 108. Then you don't believe the truth, UnObservant. You have admitted to willingly believing a LIE. You have willingly chosen to delude yourself, UnObservant.
That is the most disgusting thing I have ever seen someone do, UnObservant.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 5:30PM on Mar 21st
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You are under the opionion that the scholars are correct. I believe they are wrong.
If I am right, it is not a lie now is it?
Observant at 5:52PM on Mar 21st 2008
117. ATHEIST
Reply to: there are other possible accounts of what happened on the first Easter. But the problem is that none of them hold up, as an explanation, as well as the resurrection does.
______________
NONSENSE.
do you know what you're saying?
Here's the OTHER possible explanation.
Jesus overturned the tables of the moneychangers, and left the Temple. The Romans had no idea who he was, so they paid an informant who led them to Jesus. Jesus was crucified without a trial because he was a Galilean. His body was left on the cross to be eaten by wild animals.
Thirty years later, when Peter visited a church in Rome, he INVENTED new details to make it APPEAR that the Romans in charge had been favorably impressed with Jesus. A Roman Centurion watches Jesus die and says, "Surely this was a son of theos." Which was the same title as Augustus Caesar had used.
WHY would a Roman Centurion say that about Jesus?
If the Romans had been impressed with Jesus, why arrest him?
____________
Reply to: In other words, they're possible accounts, but not plausible accounts.
NONSENSE.
A Roman centurion comparing Jesus to Augustus Caesar is implausible.
Do you have any judgment? Common sense?
__________
Reply to: I'd refer anyone interested in a scholarly, in-depth defense of Jesus' resurrection to "The Resurrection of the Son of God" by N. T. Wright,
I posted my N. T. Wright story earlier, about how I embarrassed him at a conference at Champan University.
Christians seem to lack good judgment. Can't tell plausible from ridiculous.
William Hays at 5:57PM on Mar 21st 2008
118. You aren't correct, UnObservant. You believe a lie. Plain and simple.
And the fact that you are smugly arrogant about your believe in a lie is all the more pitiable.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 5:59PM on Mar 21st 2008
119. Correcting above: belief, rather than believe.
Knight_of_BAAWA at 6:02PM on Mar 21st 2008
120. Observant; you are wrong. The two points I listed are fact. They very well could be proved wrong in the future, but at this time. They are fact.
They are most certainly not opinion.
I remember learning the difference between fact and opinion very early in elementry school.
Ryan Anderson at 6:11PM on Mar 21st 2008