Jesus’ Resurrection on Easter morning is the focal point of Christian apologetics. As the apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians:

“For if the dead are not raised, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is useless; you are still in your sins. … For if only in this life we have hope in Christ, we should be pitied more than anyone.” (1 Corinthians 15:16-17, 19 NET)

From this, he concludes:

“If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” (1 Corinthians 15:32 NET)

And, while that’s not all I might be doing, I certainly wouldn’t be writing Christian apologetics articles!

Collection of previous series on the Resurrection of Jesus

Over the last few years, I wrote a series of articles on the Resurrection. I thought this might be an appropriate time and place to gather them all here.

The Resurrection of Jesus: A Christian Apologetics Cornerstone

The Resurrection of Jesus: Investigation & Apologetic Approach

The Resurrection of Jesus: A Look at the Evidence

And, just in case your church doesn’t have enough excellent Easter music, (and even if they do) you can check out one of my favorite contemporary hymns, which is certainly appropriate for the occasion, or just about any day of worship!

In Christ Alone: A Great Contemporary Hymn Example

Another look at the evidence for the Resurrection

In my last post about the recent Apologetics Canada Conference 2016, I told you about case-maker (a.k.a. Christian apologist) J Warner Wallace. So, for a bit⁽¹⁾understatement of the century! You’ll be blown away. of new material to add to my articles above, I’d like to share his presentation on the Resurrection. (Also, if you’re in eastern Canada, the conference is still upcoming in April, and you can buy access to a digital version of the conference if you weren’t/aren’t able to attend.)

Update: the particular video described above seems to no longer be on YouTube, so I’ll replace it with Jim’s excellent ‘God’s Crime Scene’ presentation I saw at one of the early Apologetics Canada conferences. But, here is a YouTube search link where you can see some of Jim’s resurrection oriented presentations at other conferences and on his own channel.

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In part I, The Resurrection of Jesus: A Christian Apologetics Cornerstone, we looked at importance of this event to Christianity, as well as look at the nature of testimony and bias. In part II, The Resurrection of Jesus: Investigation & Apologetic Approach, we looked at how we might approach such an investigation and how some of the various ‘camps’ approach the subject. We noted how the majority of people seem so ignorant of the facts, that they are satisfied by silly Internet memes. And, that the more ‘scholarly’ skeptics come up with explanations which fall short of encompassing the data.

In this third part, we’re going to work through some of the data. As I’ve noted previously, I’m not going to attempt to cover all the bases, as entire books and doctoral dissertations have been produced at that kind of depth. I’m only going to brush the surface, but I’d like to give you a feel for it. Consider it a starting point for your own investigation.

The basic argument goes something like this. We have a set of data, consisting of points with varying degrees of historical certainty, for which any explanation must cover, especially the more historically certain pieces of data. We have a historical figure who was alive at point A, dead at point B, and allegedly alive at point C. There is no serious contention about points A and B. The focus is almost entirely on point C, the Resurrection.

It is easy to come up with an explanation if we don’t pay attention to the entire set of data. One could say, “Well, Jesus followers were so intent on this movement succeeding, that they just made up the Resurrection account.” That sounds good until you start to look at ALL of the data. First, it doesn’t fit much of the actual historical record, including factors which someone making up such a story within that context would fail to include or would state differently (such as women as witnesses). Second, it would be hard to establish a motive for doing so within a Jewish/Roman context. Third, it would be highly unlikely for a number of conspirators, acting relatively independently, to give up their lives defending a lie. And then try explaining how a religious movement, which those in power were trying to squelch, could flourish based on a lie. Remember, this all took place in a city with a population estimated at maybe 40,000. Even without modern media, it would be pretty hard to miss such an event, or fail to check out lying adherents.

Some have tried to get around such problems by varying the explanation slightly. Maybe it was a hallucination, so the disciples really did believe it happened. That clears up some of the above problems, but ignores most of what we know about hallucinations, and again, ignores the actual account. For example, “To the same apostles also, after his suffering, he presented himself alive with many convincing proofs. He was seen by them over a forty-day period and spoke about matters concerning the kingdom of God.” ⁽¹⁾Acts 1:3, NET That doesn’t sound anything like hallucination, so we’re back to a lie.

What are some of these points which need to be taken into consideration? Here is a short list: the mode of death, crucifixion; the report of blood and water from the wound; the despair of Jesus’ disciples; the empty tomb; the Roman guard; Joseph of Arimathea; testimony of women; report of a literal risen Jesus; the resurrected Jesus ate fish; transformed disciples, including skeptical James and converted Paul; Sunday worship and extreme growth of the early church; the eye-witness nature and detail accuracy of the accounts; external reference to the event in secular texts, etc.

Even seemingly insignificant pieces of data in this puzzle become powerful in that they are hard to otherwise explain. For example, how does one account for a change in the worship pattern of a bunch of Jewish people to Sunday morning? It seems we’re always back to trying to defend the lie or hallucination explanation.

Or, for those who would like to say this was all a later development, invented for theological purposes, they have to have explanations for things like: Paul’s citing of what appear to be creeds from VERY early after the actual events; the knowledge of details, such as burial practices only in effect for roughly a 100-year timespan.

Think through the following list of attempted explanations, and see if you think they even begin to hold up: unknown or wrong tomb (where the ancients that daft? what about eating fish, etc?); twin of Jesus (seriously?); hallucination or legend (already covered); existential or spiritual resurrection (see above); swoon theory (crucifixion); disciples stole the body (lie); authorities hid the body (why & conflict with historical accounts).

However, as Dr. Craig Hazen once noted, there is one theory, apart from the claimed Resurrection, that works: Jesus was an alien. ⁽²⁾Apologetics Canada Conference keynote, 2011 It seems possible that Jesus was not God, but instead some kind of being with extraordinary powers who was able to trick the various Jewish figures throughout history to invent Judaism, and then fulfill those ‘prophecies’ by allowing himself to be crucified, beaming out to heal, and then beaming back to the disciples and others. As I think about that, I guess it works, (apart from all the other arguments for God necessary to put a cohesive worldview together).

Tinfoil hats aside, one then starts to question which is actually more likely… a super-unlikely grand cosmic conspiracy, or that what is portrayed in the Bible could be true. While the modern, highly revered discipline of science sometimes has trouble deciding if it can weigh in on the matter of deity, there is quite a bit of evidence we can examine about the likelihood of aliens or their potential ability to even visits us in the first place (before we get to the conspiracy aspect of it).

Ahh, the skeptic will say, but the majority of this ‘evidence’ comes from Biblical sources. That doesn’t count, right? First, if this is what you’re saying, go back and read my first two articles on the topic. That the evidence originating in Judeo/Christian writings could so easily be dismissed is just hand-waving. But let’s entertain that thought for a minute. What might we know if, for the sake of argument, we tossed out the documents contained in the Bible?

J. Warner Wallace has put together an excellent list of hostile pagan and Jewish sources regarding Jesus, “Is There Any Evidence for Jesus Outside the Bible?” In it, he has a paragraph which sums up the data, and I’d like to include the relevant section of it here. (Reading the whole thing is eye-opening.)

“He was persecuted by the Jews for what he said, betrayed by Judah Iskarioto. He was beaten with rods, forced to drink vinegar and wear a crown of thorns and crucified on the eve of the Passover. His crucifixion occurred under the direction of Pontius Pilate, during the time of Tiberius. On the day of his crucifixion, the sky grew dark and there was an earthquake. Afterward, he was buried in a tomb and the tomb was later found to be empty. He appeared to his disciples resurrected from the grave and showed them his wounds. These disciples then told others that Jesus was resurrected and ascended into heaven. … The disciples were also persecuted for their faith but were martyred without changing their claims. They met regularly to worship Jesus, even after his death.”

This summery contains a number of our most important points, and remember, we’ve excluded the Bible. Do any of the alternate theories encompass this data? Not that I can see. But again, there is no good reason for us to limit ourselves to hostile, extra-Biblical witness. This exercise simply shows that what is external to the collection of documents we Christians consider ‘The Bible’ is in general historical agreement.

And so, we end up full circle. Is the Resurrection possible, even likely, and in fact the best explanation we have? Or must one come up with an alternate explanation, no matter how ludicrous it might be? It seems that for most skeptics I come across, we’re back to a priori convictions driving the results, or sheer ignorance and an unwillingness to take a serious look.

This Easter, we Christians already know that Jesus lives, Hallelujah! But it is always nice to see how the historical data backs up our claim. For the skeptic, such an investigation should give pause. The Internet memes on which so many place their faith, are demonstrated empty of substance. With a little study, we should be equipped to expose this blind-faith, hopefully sparking a new journey of investigation to a clearer view of Jesus.

Update: Wednesday, April 30, 2014

I found a couple of great resources recently, which are quite interesting and unique. The first is by my friend J Warner Wallace (mentioned above). He puts his background as a homicide detective to work in this podcast in examination of the Resurrection account. For example, he talks about a medical explanation of the account of Jesus sweating blood. Amazing information which solidifies the testimony as eye-witness and authentic.

Abductive Reasoning and the Case for the Resurrection (Podcast)

The second is yet another amazing episode of Unbelievable? radio podcast from the UK. Justin Brierley produced a special Good Friday episode looking at the Shroud of Turin, the purported burial clothes of Jesus. I’ve always had an interest in this piece of possible evidence, and its authenticity now appears more likely than ever.

The Turin Shroud – a relic of the resurrection?

Both of these podcasts are also highly recommended and well worth subscribing to get every episode.

Resources:
Gary Habermas
William Lane Craig
Mike Licona
N.T. Wright – The Resurrection of the Son of God
Craig Hazen – video (starts about 28:30 min in)
J Warner Wallace – excellent compilation of information on Jesus – new Alive resource (I haven’t seen this yet, but knowing Jim, I’m pretty confident it is excellent.)
Eric Chabot – The Earliest Record for The Death and Resurrection of Jesus: 1 Corinthians 15: 3-7

Image credit: Resurrection of Christ by Waiting For The Word

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“… God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.” Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some began to sneer, but others said, “We shall hear you again concerning this.” (Acts 17:30–32 NASB)

I decided to move the evidence to a third part and spend a bit more time looking at how we go about this investigation, as well as some of the apologetic methods which approach this topic. For those too anxious to get to the evidence, please see the ‘Resources’ at the end of the article.

Last time, we looked at the presuppositions which often underlie the skeptic’s arguments put forth against Jesus’ Resurrection. Are they really neutral as portrayed? If one rules something out of possibility from the get-go, they exclude the very thing under investigation. If a police chief – upon hearing witnesses describe a 6-foot caucasian leaving the murder scene – tells the investigation team to find the killer, except ignore the testimony about ‘caucasian’ because we all know white people don’t murder, he won’t be seen as the noble skeptic, but more likely as part of some other nefarious, less than objective, group.

For the Christian, a presupposition or bias is also involved, as we have not only the historical evidence to consider, but the inner witness of the Holy Spirit, our experience with Jesus, and the revelation of God’s Word. I believe it is justified bias, but bias nonetheless. But as we learned last time, if you witnessed a crime, you’re biased, but that isn’t a bad thing. This is just to say that the average Christians typically doesn’t weigh the evidence for the Resurrection, arrive at a 52.3% likelihood, and thus become a convert. On the other hand, seeing how strong the evidence really is should bolster their faith and give skeptics pause.

In this segment I would like to take a look at some methods of weighing the evidence. This (or especially when we get to the data) will not be an exhaustive examination by any means. Entire books (many of them!) have been written on the subject, along with doctoral dissertations at prominent universities around the world. ⁽¹⁾Like Gary Habermas at Michigan State University, or William Lane Craig under Wolfhart Pannenberg at the University of Munich I’m only going to scratch the surface, but I want to provide a taste of the evidence and look at the flow of argumentation to see why it is so powerful. I’m also not going to attempt to properly cite most of the information, as I’ve collected this stuff over the years from many of the figures I’ll list in the ‘Resources.’

Method

I see five major approaches to interpreting and conveying the data. The first is that of the Christian. Since a Christian has the inner testimony of the Holy Spirt, they recognize the truthfulness of the Biblical account and their Lord and Savior in its pages. They know Jesus lives, so the account makes sense. Recognizing the historical accuracy of the accounts, and how alternate attempts fail to explain the data, confirms their inner witness and experience. A sub-category of this would be the skeptic turned Christian, who feels the weight of this evidence played a role in the convicting work of the Holy Spirit, and thus, their conversion.

The second is a kind of ‘reliable witness’ apologetic method promoted throughout the history of Christianity, but probably most familiar in recent times through the work of Josh McDowell. The apostle Paul used this type of argument in 1 Cor. 15 in what is one of the earliest recordings of the event. Paul seems to be drawing from a credal statement which likely goes back to within months to a few years following the event. ⁽²⁾About 25 years at max for Paul writing it down, according to Habermas; more likely about 18 years post-crucifixion. Paul is essentially pointing to witness testimony of the event in a ‘check it out and see’ type of way. This extends to today, where the Bible has been scrutinized more than any historical text and has come out looking great in terms of historical reliability and accuracy. Jesus makes claims of deity and what he will do and then backs them up. If everything we can test shows historical reliability, why toss what we can’t test, apart from an a priori rejection of the supernatural? Factor in the actions of Jesus’ disciples and the massive growth of the Christian church, and you almost have to conclude that something similar to the event happened. Worst case, Jesus’ early followers were tricked or delusional but something big certainly happened.

The third is a more recent ‘minimal facts’ method originated by Gary Habermas. This method basically says to the skeptic, “OK, for the sake of argument…” we’ll narrow the data down to some minimal points which even the most skeptical of the experts seem to agree upon. Then we can look and see what explanations seem plausible and which must be rejected. That should narrow things down, at minimum. Obviously, one can’t get to certainty, but that is true of anything historical. What we can do is figure out which explanations are reasonable, given the data, and drop the rest. If an explanation can’t cover the minimal data, there is little need to continue arguing about more controversial data.

A fourth approach would be what I’ll call ‘rejection of the supernatural.’ Many scholarly skeptics seem to fall into this camp. As Habermas pointed out in his research (and William Lane Craig has demonstrated in his debates), they agree about much of the historical data and its reliability, until they reach the resurrection itself. Much like the apostle Paul’s audience, they assume resurrections are impossible. ⁽³⁾While we certainly have more technological tools to investigate things today, it is anachronistic to assume people in Jesus’ time were simple or easily fooled by stories of miracles. Just like … Continue reading The difference is that Paul’s audience did not yet have philosopher David Hume to give such a position a veneer of scholarly credibility. It doesn’t matter how strong the evidence is, it could never be strong enough to prove something supernatural occurred to the satisfaction of one who holds this position.

The fifth is what I’d call ‘rejection from ignorance… or worse’ position. In my experience, this is the most common position within our culture today. Many are simply ignorant of the depth of Christianity’s claims and are too distracted to care. They’ve adopted a few memes which sound persuading enough to satisfy them. And since they are rarely challenged on their position, they believe they have rightly rejected some cultural baggage. This has the side benefit (or is it the driving force?) in some cases, of freeing them to chase desires which were taboo in previous generations, let alone to simply do other ‘better’ things with their time. This creates a situation where emotion is forbidding the intellect to take an honest look at the data. You’ll recognize this if you start hearing names like Horus and Osiris from the pseudo-scholars, or Sky-Fairies and Jewish-zombie from the obnoxiously arrogant. From the kinder sort, you’ll hear statements such as, “I’m glad that has meaning in your life, but I’m just not into that.”

It is worth noting that Gary Habermas’ doctoral dissertation had the following stipulation placed on it: “The topic was approved by his committee, but he was told specifically that he could not use the New Testament as evidence, unless the individual passages could be affirmed by ordinary critical standards, apart from faith.” ⁽⁴⁾http://www.garyhabermas.com/vitainnuce.htm And, of course, Gary did get his doctorate degree from that dissertation, so apparently, at least in the eyes of the faculty of Michigan State University, he must have met the criteria. If you fall into the last couple positions above, this might be an indicator you should take a more careful look.

Next time, we’ll take a look at some of the evidence and see how well it squares with various explanations.

Resources:
Gary Habermas
http://www.garyhabermas.com
William Lane Craig
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-resurrection-of-jesus
Mike Licona
http://www.risenjesus.com
N.T. Wright
“The Resurrection of the Son of God”
Craig Hazen
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKoyhN83OOA (starts about 28:30 min in)
J Warner Wallace (excellent compilation of information)
http://pleaseconvinceme.com/category/jesus/
http://pleaseconvinceme.com/2012/is-there-any-evidence-for-jesus-outside-the-bible/

Image credit: Resurrection of Christ by Waiting For The Word

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Paul makes a pretty strong claim. And let’s face it, if Jesus is either myth or dead somewhere, the rest of our apologetics are pointless. And it wasn’t just Paul highlighting the importance of the resurrection; the other disciples based their case on the testimony of this event throughout their writings. Even Jesus points to the centrality of this event in Matthew 12:39-40. It is the KEY piece of evidence.

It is also an interesting claim in that it is historically grounded and testable in a unique way among world religions. The majority of world religions make no historical claims crucial to the religion. Sure, if Siddhartha Gautama never lived, it might throw a bit more skepticism on Buddhism, but it would have little impact on the truthfulness or falsity of the Buddhist worldview. Anyone could make similar claims about reality, which would need to be evaluated based on their own merit. Who made them, apart from this individual’s piety and sincerity (which might help credibility), is fairly irrelevant.

For a Christian who recognizes the nature of inspired Scripture, little more is needed. The claim of Jesus’ resurrection is well supported by the Biblical texts. But how are Christians supposed to respond to the challenges of the skeptics concerning this historical event? How can a Christian be sure this event happened as recorded?

First, a bit more about the Biblical witness. There is not room in this article for a strong defense of why Christians hold the Bible as the trustworthy (and usually inerrant) Word of God, nor is there room to get into topics like textual criticism, or detailed evidence and argument concerning historical reliability. ⁽¹⁾We cover those topics in other articles. However, we can argue from the historical evidence generally agreed upon by historians to make a very strong case. This kind of defense won’t get you all the way to certainty, but demonstrates the reasonableness, as well as the best-explanation nature of the historical claim. Rather than being crazy to believe, it becomes rather crazy not to.

Many skeptics immediately dismiss the Biblical account from the start. They say that since the Bible is the Christian text, it has to be tossed out based on bias. This is simply faulty reasoning. Let me give you an example to make this clear. Suppose you were a juror at a murder trial. The first witness is called; the wife of the victim. You listen to her testimony and hear the horrifying story as she recounts watching the fateful event. After she finishes, the judge instructs the jury to ignore this testimony, as the witness is biased. After all, she isn’t impartial because she believes the defendant murdered her husband!

The next witness is a bit different. He certainly was impartial initially. He didn’t know any of the people involved. But, he saw the defendant run from the victim’s home, bloody, with weapon in hand. He ran into the house and saw the victim, comforted the wife, and called for help. He can’t be 100-percent certain of what happened, but he’s fairly convinced he knows. Again, the judge strikes this testimony from evidence, citing bias. After all, he believes the defendant is guilty, so he is hardly impartial either.

Do you see the problem here? With this kind of reasoning, we would have to toss out all testimony-based history (which would  be nearly everything). This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t use our reason in evaluating the testimony. If we found out the wife recently took out a huge life-insurance policy, or discovered the second witness actually had a grudge against the victim, we’d probably have a different take on what bias might mean in those circumstances. Problematic bias doesn’t mean you’ve been convinced of something and are no longer neutral, but that you have an unreasonable disposition towards one conclusion.

Mike Licona and Greg Koukl make the point that if Christians can’t write history, Jews can’t write about the Holocaust, nor a feminist about women’s issues. If we throw out historians on the basis of bias (in that they believe something on the issue), there would be NONE. ⁽²⁾Stand To Reason – 04/27/09 – “Mike Licona – Resurrection Myth Stories”

But even if we were to discount the Biblical testimony, the event would not run counter to the non-Biblical evidence. We just would’t have nearly the detail to go on – though we might still have enough to reach a fairly certain conclusion.

Making the Case

Unfortunately, we don’t have a time machine, and video recorders weren’t yet invented at the time of Christ. ⁽³⁾I often wonder if skeptics would trust a video recording anyway, as they can be faked. We do have a lot of witness testimony and some archeological evidence to consider. The key is in how we go about evaluating this evidence. Most skeptics consider alternate explanations prematurely, which fail to match the overall evidence or even take the majority of it into consideration.

Gary Habermas states this clearly:

“… the more popular approach through the centuries has been to pose a naturalistic theory to account for the data. Such a move basically attempts to allow for historical facts where the evidence is the strongest, while veering off in a natural direction before getting to the punch line involving the resurrection. Here they need to propose an alternative scenario: ‘Jesus didn’t really rise from the dead. What really happened was (fill in the blank).’

However, this is probably the most difficult method of all. In fact, when faced with this option, the vast majority of critical scholars opt out. They are often well aware that when an option is chosen, the weight of the known historical facts comes crashing clown against their proposal. In fact, they are so well aware of this eventuality that only a few attempt it. Even among scholars, it is generally conceded that none of these options work.” ⁽⁴⁾Gary Habermas, “The Case for Christ’s Resurrection.” In To Everyone an Answer: A Case for the Christian World View, ed. Francis J. Beckwith, William Lane Craig, and J. P. Moreland, … Continue reading

And, we Christians need to appreciate that this debate is nothing new. The apostle Paul also faced an audience skeptical of resurrections. Mike Horton notes with his typical humor:

“Paul doesn’t say, ‘Yes they are; the dead are raised.’ He says, ‘If the dead are not raised, generally speaking, then Christ is not raised. But reverse that, if Christ is raised, then your universal a-priori is hooey.’ It’s amazing how many people with a scientific or historical mind will come to Christianity as if it were any other religion making subjective claims about how I feel and what is good for me and what I find useful, and will simply say, in a similar way, abstractly, resurrections don’t happen. As if people who use electric washers are the first people in the universe to ever have said the dead are not raised. Paul is saying, that is what folks are saying here. The problem is, you have a resurrection on your hands; deal with it.” ⁽⁵⁾White Horse Inn – “What the Gospel Is & Why We Should Believe It, Part 2” – 2013-06-08

Now that we have set the ground-work for taking an honest look at the data, in part 2, we will take a look at the evidence and lines of historical argumentation, as well as the faults in some common alternate explanations. We’ll also look at what we could learn using non-Biblical testimony.

It is worth noting that a hyper-skeptical position exists which holds that the whole account is simply a myth based on past ‘dying and rising’ gods. This type of position has been thoroughly refuted within scholarship – even scholarship otherwise critical to Christianity – yet it can be quite popular within the general public and on Internet forums. See our other article which generally critiques this concept of parallels or look for the many great refutations by various scholars which get into the details.

Some resources:

• “Is There Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus?” – William Lane Craig and Bart Ehrman debate. March 28, 2006 – College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Massachusetts
• Habermas, Gary. The case for the resurrection of Jesus. Grand Rapids MI: Kregel Publications, 2004. & http://www.garyhabermas.com/
• More Than a Carpenter by Josh McDowell
• “Jesus’ Resurrection: Fact or Figment?” by William Lane Craig and Gerd Ludemann (debate)
• The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus by Gary Habermas & Michael Licona
• “The Resurrection of Jesus” by Dr. William Lane Craig – http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-resurrection-of-jesus#ixzz2VnM4JI1Q

Image credit: Resurrection of Christ by Waiting For The Word

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