Thanks for the suggestions, Dave. I left two alternative scenarios on the comment thread. Here is one of them. Tell me what you think. I welcome anyone else’s comments also.
Jesus is crucified. His body is left to rot on the cross for days, as was the Roman custom, as a warning to other trouble-makers. After a few days, what was left of his body was tossed into an unmarked hole in the ground with the bodies of other executed criminals, as was the Roman custom. Jesus disciples were devastated. He had told them he was the Messiah. They had made plans, even telling family and friends, that they were going to rule on thrones with Jesus in the New Kingdom. But now he is dead. All their hopes and dreams are dashed to smithereens.
They return to Galilee to take up fishing again.
Then, several weeks or months or years later, a group of female disciples are walking down a road and see a man in the distance standing on a hill. He looks familiar. “It’s JESUS!” they shout with joy. “He DID rise again!” But before they reach the man, he has disappeared behind the hill and can’t be found. The women return to the Eleven and tell them that they have seen Jesus. They doubt at first, but soon the disciples and others, desperate to believe that there is still hope in Jesus’ claims, are “seeing” Jesus…and the legend of the resurrected Jesus begins.
At the beginning what are the central “facts” of the story:
1. Jesus has been first seen alive after his death, by women disciples.
2. The women rushed back to tell the male disciples who at first did not believe…but so wanted to believe it was true.
3. The male disciples start “seeing” Jesus in false sightings and in visions.
4. The belief in the resurrected Jesus so changes the disciples and Jesus’ family that they begin to boldly preach his resurrection as fact.
Fast forward 20-25 years to Paul. All Paul says is that Jesus died, was buried, and rose on the third day. He then gives a list of witnesses, not in order, and not with any details. This is perfectly consistent with my counter-scenario. And, my counter-scenario is much, much more probable to be the explanation of the Resurrection belief than that an ancient middle eastern god reanimated a dead prophet in a never heard of before and never heard of since supernatural act.
Fast forward to circa 70 AD. We are now FORTY years after the crucifixion of Jesus. The average life span in first century Palestine has been estimated by experts to have been forty years. So how many of the witnesses would still be alive just calculating normal life span? Now take into account the persecution that Christians had faced in Palestine by Saul and the high priest. How many more eyewitnesses were killed prior to circa 70 AD? Then we have the Roman-Jewish wars in the mid 60’s. How many more witnesses were killed during these wars? Then, in 70, the Romans destroy Jerusalem and kill tens of thousands of more people.
So when “Mark” writes his first gospel talking about an empty tomb, writing his gospel in Antioch or Rome as most scholars believe, NOT in Palestine, how soon does a copy of this gospel, containing claims of an empty tomb, make it to Palestine, where any possible surviving witness could refute the gospel’s claims??
Gary, I think that is a good start and is certainly more probable than someone coming back from the dead.
I have a few thoughts of my own:
-I would not give too much significance to the so-called criterion of embarrassment regarding the women finding the tomb empty. This could have easily been an invention by the author of Mark which was then borrowed by the other gospel writers. It’s not at all embarrassing to have the women out tending to the burial chores. To me, it reads like a fictional story: “Who will move the stone for us?” makes no sense for the women to say. If they knew it was going to be a problem, why go in the first place? or why not bring some muscle along? Because the author knew that he was going to have the stone moved for them.
-The earliest source is Paul and he says that Jesus appeared to Cephas first and then to the twelve and then to the 500 others. It’s possible that Peter was overwhelmed with grief and had a legitimate vision (ADC) of Jesus or perhaps just a very realistic dream. Either way, once he had one everyone else claimed to have one too. Just like jealous fans of Elvis all claiming to have sightings of the “king”. Obviously anyone who wanted to be respected needed to claim having a vision of Jesus and this would include Paul.
I think there a few things you could add to your scenario to really cover all of the bases. You could provide an explanation for Paul’s conversion. You could mention the persecution of Christians as a result of being blamed for Nero’s fire. You could also bring up the fact that there were many different “gospels” being promoted at the time and that we just happen to have Paul’s version preserved within the pages of the NT.
My “debate with Nick the Christian has picked back up on Theology Web, but now in the comment thread. If anyone is interested in following along, go to the link below and click on the final page. Nick is currently asking me to prove that most scholars believe that the Gospel of Matthew was written between 80-90 AD, as I had previously claimed. I believe I have given some pretty strong evidence and scholarly references.
one thing that means something to me, at least, is that the bible could have been written in stone. It could have been written in some way that preserved the originals, so that there’d be no doubt as to the time period something was written.
That, at least, would have eliminated certain debates from even taking place if this were all real. Surely, preserving the originals would have been very easy for an all powerful God who created the universe.
There are stone monuments in South America and in Egypt that were carved and hewn in ways we do not understand and would have a hard time replicating today with our power-tools and laser precise machines. Having the text inscribed in stone in way that was far beyond the technology of the time would have been helpful too.
It seems that there could have been so many easy fixes, so many ways to completely remove certain questions from the Bible’s validity, if it were true, but they weren’t. Instead, God in His wisdom, decided to leave apparent issues in His Book… to trip people up? to place stumbling blocks in the way of searchers… because God wants all to be saved and come to knowledge of Him?
That is another way of saying: “God wants you to turn off your educated brain and just believe what a bunch of Churchmen and their apologists tell you to believe.”
now it’s clear. Of course! There’s an empty Tomb! where else could a body be if not Heaven? Women saw the empty tomb, so it must be true.
And there were lots of eye witnesses to a resurrected Jesus, so how can you explain that, other than lies, or embellishments or mistaken identities? It must true.
The majority of Scholars agree Jesus was a real man! So not only is it plausible that he was the son of God, it is the most likely scenario.
good honest people will see this. Bad, selfish and rebellious and ungrateful people will reject it. which are you? but this is nothing the like the Emperor’s New Clothes… nothing like it….
William, one of the best critiques I saw of the Chrsitian message was posted by Zach over on Charles’ blog:
This is just part of what Zach said:
Here are a few characteristics of God which are disturbing:
1) God demands perfect obedience, and anything less than that (even something as insignificant as indulging God-given sexual desire in your mind) can be punished with earthly pain, death, and then eternal torture.) Christians call this “justice”, yet in real life they call it “totalitarianism.” The only difference is that totalitarian governments are less brutal, more discriminate, and didn’t create their people with desires that would lead them to disobey.
2) God doesn’t warn us personally, but used ghost writers to give us a collection of ancient writings in dead languages for us to translate and then argue about for a couple of millenia. These tell us the truth; but often cryptically, through contradictory statements, seemingly incomprehensible poems and love-songs, and descriptions of strange visions utilzing symbolism that is two thousand years out of date. We then have the task of assimilating all of this into a single, cohesive storyline and converting the world to belief in the storyline, the eradication of all alternate storylines, and the opposition of scientific theories that contradict the particular storyline we embrace.
3) God doesn’t tolerate criticism or opinions. Like every good dictator, he threatens and punishes those who disagree with him. One of the worst crimes you can commit is denying that he exists, despite the fact that he has never made a public appearance and we have only ever seen his PR people. His PR people have made it clear that everyone knows he exists deep inside, but the big guy still won’t show his face to the world.
4) God blames everyone for the mistakes of the world he created, despite the fact that he created the people whom he blames (poor craftsmanship anyone?) As any good dictator, he has made it clear that no matter how bad things are, it is never the result of His leadership. Many of his PR people insist that political leaders are to blame for the mess our country is in, but believe an all-powerful God could never be held responsible for anything bad in the universe.
Gary, I just read your recent comment (#481) on TheologyWeb. My first thought is that you are conceding way too much. I think you should continue to challenge the existence of an actual empty tomb. The analogy you gave does not account for this kind of coincidence and someone will probably point that out. If the idea that Jesus was alive again was based on a single vision and then multiplied via mass hysteria then it does not explain why there is an empty tomb. I think the common grave scenario you gave earlier was better.
There is no mention of an empty tomb until around 72 AD when Mark writes his gospel, right? And Christians have no record geographically of where this tomb is. The greatest miracle of all time and no one knows where it happened. Wouldn’t people have been checking out this empty tomb if it was real? Wouldn’t it have been mentioned in the 1 Cor. 15 creed? Wouldn’t Paul have wanted to see it when he stopped in Jerusalem? The apologist theory that the location was lost during the siege of 70 AD does not make sense. Even if every Christian left town they still would have remembered its location and re-visited again after the siege was over.
By the way, I tried signing up on TheologyWeb, but have not been approved for posting yet.
1Cor 15…3For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.…
but i still agree, the empty tomb is not a known fact. It’s a fact that believers think there was an empty tomb, but that could have been a rumor, lie, accidental fabrication, that’s just been repeated and repeated and repeated… Plus, as we all know, an empty tomb is still a far cry from confirming dead men returning to life.
I think all that creed shows is that there was an early belief that Jesus was still alive in some sense and was “appearing” to people. It could have been referring to a spiritual resurrection just as easily as a physical resurrection. Later in the chapter Paul pretty much argues that bodies are raised spiritually:
1 Cor. 15 42-44: So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown a perishable body, it is raised an imperishable body; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body.
What’s wrong with you idiots??? If someone was “buried and raised”, there had to have been a hand-hewn tomb! EVERYONE in the first century was buried in a tomb, don’t you know. It is IMPOSSIBLE that even one first century Jew in Palestine was thrown into an unmarked hole in the ground with other criminals, just for committing the petty crime of high treason!
Finding Truth 
one guy on that forum said that Paul quoted from Luke, but didn’t say where. I have no idea what he’s talking about.
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Impossible – the Gospel of Luke was written about 85 CE – now it’s possible that the author of “Luke” and Paul were using the same older source —
The same author used Paul’s letters to write The Acts (see the Acts Seminar, by Westar).
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Thanks for the suggestions, Dave. I left two alternative scenarios on the comment thread. Here is one of them. Tell me what you think. I welcome anyone else’s comments also.
Jesus is crucified. His body is left to rot on the cross for days, as was the Roman custom, as a warning to other trouble-makers. After a few days, what was left of his body was tossed into an unmarked hole in the ground with the bodies of other executed criminals, as was the Roman custom. Jesus disciples were devastated. He had told them he was the Messiah. They had made plans, even telling family and friends, that they were going to rule on thrones with Jesus in the New Kingdom. But now he is dead. All their hopes and dreams are dashed to smithereens.
They return to Galilee to take up fishing again.
Then, several weeks or months or years later, a group of female disciples are walking down a road and see a man in the distance standing on a hill. He looks familiar. “It’s JESUS!” they shout with joy. “He DID rise again!” But before they reach the man, he has disappeared behind the hill and can’t be found. The women return to the Eleven and tell them that they have seen Jesus. They doubt at first, but soon the disciples and others, desperate to believe that there is still hope in Jesus’ claims, are “seeing” Jesus…and the legend of the resurrected Jesus begins.
At the beginning what are the central “facts” of the story:
1. Jesus has been first seen alive after his death, by women disciples.
2. The women rushed back to tell the male disciples who at first did not believe…but so wanted to believe it was true.
3. The male disciples start “seeing” Jesus in false sightings and in visions.
4. The belief in the resurrected Jesus so changes the disciples and Jesus’ family that they begin to boldly preach his resurrection as fact.
Fast forward 20-25 years to Paul. All Paul says is that Jesus died, was buried, and rose on the third day. He then gives a list of witnesses, not in order, and not with any details. This is perfectly consistent with my counter-scenario. And, my counter-scenario is much, much more probable to be the explanation of the Resurrection belief than that an ancient middle eastern god reanimated a dead prophet in a never heard of before and never heard of since supernatural act.
Fast forward to circa 70 AD. We are now FORTY years after the crucifixion of Jesus. The average life span in first century Palestine has been estimated by experts to have been forty years. So how many of the witnesses would still be alive just calculating normal life span? Now take into account the persecution that Christians had faced in Palestine by Saul and the high priest. How many more eyewitnesses were killed prior to circa 70 AD? Then we have the Roman-Jewish wars in the mid 60’s. How many more witnesses were killed during these wars? Then, in 70, the Romans destroy Jerusalem and kill tens of thousands of more people.
So when “Mark” writes his first gospel talking about an empty tomb, writing his gospel in Antioch or Rome as most scholars believe, NOT in Palestine, how soon does a copy of this gospel, containing claims of an empty tomb, make it to Palestine, where any possible surviving witness could refute the gospel’s claims??
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Gary, I think that is a good start and is certainly more probable than someone coming back from the dead.
I have a few thoughts of my own:
-I would not give too much significance to the so-called criterion of embarrassment regarding the women finding the tomb empty. This could have easily been an invention by the author of Mark which was then borrowed by the other gospel writers. It’s not at all embarrassing to have the women out tending to the burial chores. To me, it reads like a fictional story: “Who will move the stone for us?” makes no sense for the women to say. If they knew it was going to be a problem, why go in the first place? or why not bring some muscle along? Because the author knew that he was going to have the stone moved for them.
-The earliest source is Paul and he says that Jesus appeared to Cephas first and then to the twelve and then to the 500 others. It’s possible that Peter was overwhelmed with grief and had a legitimate vision (ADC) of Jesus or perhaps just a very realistic dream. Either way, once he had one everyone else claimed to have one too. Just like jealous fans of Elvis all claiming to have sightings of the “king”. Obviously anyone who wanted to be respected needed to claim having a vision of Jesus and this would include Paul.
I think there a few things you could add to your scenario to really cover all of the bases. You could provide an explanation for Paul’s conversion. You could mention the persecution of Christians as a result of being blamed for Nero’s fire. You could also bring up the fact that there were many different “gospels” being promoted at the time and that we just happen to have Paul’s version preserved within the pages of the NT.
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Thanks for the suggestions, Dave.
My “debate with Nick the Christian has picked back up on Theology Web, but now in the comment thread. If anyone is interested in following along, go to the link below and click on the final page. Nick is currently asking me to prove that most scholars believe that the Gospel of Matthew was written between 80-90 AD, as I had previously claimed. I believe I have given some pretty strong evidence and scholarly references.
http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/showthread.php?7724-Comment-Thread-for-The-Resurrection-of-Jesus-Apologiaphoenix-vs-Gary
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Nick,
Comments are taking an eternity to post. Could you do a continuation thread for this post?
Gary
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one thing that means something to me, at least, is that the bible could have been written in stone. It could have been written in some way that preserved the originals, so that there’d be no doubt as to the time period something was written.
That, at least, would have eliminated certain debates from even taking place if this were all real. Surely, preserving the originals would have been very easy for an all powerful God who created the universe.
There are stone monuments in South America and in Egypt that were carved and hewn in ways we do not understand and would have a hard time replicating today with our power-tools and laser precise machines. Having the text inscribed in stone in way that was far beyond the technology of the time would have been helpful too.
It seems that there could have been so many easy fixes, so many ways to completely remove certain questions from the Bible’s validity, if it were true, but they weren’t. Instead, God in His wisdom, decided to leave apparent issues in His Book… to trip people up? to place stumbling blocks in the way of searchers… because God wants all to be saved and come to knowledge of Him?
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Sorry! I called Nate “Nick”.
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God wants you to have faith, William.
That is another way of saying: “God wants you to turn off your educated brain and just believe what a bunch of Churchmen and their apologists tell you to believe.”
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I’m sure that a lot of Christians would agree with you.
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God wants me to have faith?
I never thought about it like that.
now it’s clear. Of course! There’s an empty Tomb! where else could a body be if not Heaven? Women saw the empty tomb, so it must be true.
And there were lots of eye witnesses to a resurrected Jesus, so how can you explain that, other than lies, or embellishments or mistaken identities? It must true.
The majority of Scholars agree Jesus was a real man! So not only is it plausible that he was the son of God, it is the most likely scenario.
good honest people will see this. Bad, selfish and rebellious and ungrateful people will reject it. which are you? but this is nothing the like the Emperor’s New Clothes… nothing like it….
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Gary, have they still not responded to you over there?
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wow. I haven’t checked in to the theologyweb comment page recently and it has exploded to 45+ pages.
So glad that William and Gary are putting up a good fight there 🙂
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William, one of the best critiques I saw of the Chrsitian message was posted by Zach over on Charles’ blog:
This is just part of what Zach said:
The full comment can be found here:
https://skepticjourney.wordpress.com/2015/03/29/answersingenesis-defense-of-the-god-of-the-old-testament/#comment-3289
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great comment! I’m sure it went ignored… stuff like that usually does.
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Not by me, I’m spreading it!
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Gary, I just read your recent comment (#481) on TheologyWeb. My first thought is that you are conceding way too much. I think you should continue to challenge the existence of an actual empty tomb. The analogy you gave does not account for this kind of coincidence and someone will probably point that out. If the idea that Jesus was alive again was based on a single vision and then multiplied via mass hysteria then it does not explain why there is an empty tomb. I think the common grave scenario you gave earlier was better.
There is no mention of an empty tomb until around 72 AD when Mark writes his gospel, right? And Christians have no record geographically of where this tomb is. The greatest miracle of all time and no one knows where it happened. Wouldn’t people have been checking out this empty tomb if it was real? Wouldn’t it have been mentioned in the 1 Cor. 15 creed? Wouldn’t Paul have wanted to see it when he stopped in Jerusalem? The apologist theory that the location was lost during the siege of 70 AD does not make sense. Even if every Christian left town they still would have remembered its location and re-visited again after the siege was over.
By the way, I tried signing up on TheologyWeb, but have not been approved for posting yet.
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Dave, paul did mention the Resurrection, so even if he did not specifically mention an empty tomb, a resurrected dead body may imply that, no?
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1Cor 15…3For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.…
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but i still agree, the empty tomb is not a known fact. It’s a fact that believers think there was an empty tomb, but that could have been a rumor, lie, accidental fabrication, that’s just been repeated and repeated and repeated… Plus, as we all know, an empty tomb is still a far cry from confirming dead men returning to life.
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Hi William,
I think all that creed shows is that there was an early belief that Jesus was still alive in some sense and was “appearing” to people. It could have been referring to a spiritual resurrection just as easily as a physical resurrection. Later in the chapter Paul pretty much argues that bodies are raised spiritually:
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hm. you make a good case for it.
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What’s wrong with you idiots??? If someone was “buried and raised”, there had to have been a hand-hewn tomb! EVERYONE in the first century was buried in a tomb, don’t you know. It is IMPOSSIBLE that even one first century Jew in Palestine was thrown into an unmarked hole in the ground with other criminals, just for committing the petty crime of high treason!
Where are you guys’ brains?
Sheesh!
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Your brains must be possessed by an evil demon king who has blinded you to all truth and righteousness.
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BTW: I referred to Jesus’ resurrected body as a “zombie” and got my comment edited and then deleted.
Sooooo sensitive, those theists.
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