The Resurrection of Jesus an Apologetic View

8/14/2019 The Resurrection of Jesus an Apologetic View

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The Resurrection of Jesus

by

Revanth.T


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Five independently establishedfacts:

Death of Jesus on the Cross

Details of Jesus Burial

Discovery of the Empty Tomb

Direct encounters with Risen

Jesus Dawning of the Church


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1. Death ofJesus on theCross


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There is no evidence to suggestthat Jesus was drugged.

The heavy loss of blood makes

death highly probable. When His side was pierced with a

spear, water and blood flowed out.

Jesus legs were not broken. Pilate asked for assurance beforereleasing the body.


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6. In the article On the Physical Death ofJesus Christ theJournal of the AmericanMedical Societyconcluded: Clearly, theweight of historical and medical evidenceindicates that Jesus was dead before thewound to His side was inflicted andsupports the traditional view that thespear, thrust between His right ribs,probably perforated not only the rightlung but also the pericardium and heart

and thereby ensured His death.Accordingly, interpretations based on theassumption that Jesus did not die on thecross appear to be at odds with modernmedical knowledge. (March 21, 1986, p. 1463)


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2) Detailsof JesusBurial


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1. Jesus burial is attested in the veryold tradition quoted by Paul in

I Cor. 15:35. Paul quotes an old Christian received no

later than his visit to Jerusalem in A.D. 36(Gal 1:18)

The second line of this tradition refers toJesus' burial.

It thus goes back to within the first fiveyears after Jesus' death.

We can match the events of this Christian

tradition with the events described in thegospels and in the apostles' preaching inActs


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Matching of the events

"But go, tell his disciplesand Peter that he is goingbefore you to Galilee;there you will see him."

. . . and for many days heappeared to those whocame up with him fromGalilee to Jerusalem, whoare now his witnesses tothe people.

he appeared . . .

"He has risen, he is nothere; see the place wherethey laid him."

But God raised him fromthe dead . . .

he was raised . . .

And he [Joseph] bought a

linen shroud, and takinghim down, wrapped him inthe linen shroud and laidhim in a tomb.

they took him down from

the tree and laid him in atomb

he was buried . . .

And Jesus uttered a loud

cry and breathed his last.Though they could chargehim with nothing deservingdeath, yet they askedPilate to have him killed.

Christ died . . .

Mk15:3716.7Acts13:2831I Cor 15:35


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2. The burial is part of very oldsource material used by Mark inwriting his gospel.

Mark is working with a preMarkan

passion narrative This multiplicity of independent sources is

important Marcus Borg explains, "if a tradition

appears in an early source and in anotherindependent source, then not only is it

early, but it is also unlikely to have beenmade up."


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3. The gospels record that Joseph ofArimathea, a member of the JewishSanhedrin gave Jesus an honorable burial.

Christian tradition would not invent astory of Jesus' honorable burial by his

enemies The members of the Sanhedrin were too

well-known

False stories were not allowed to be

spread about one of its actual members


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4. No other competing burial storyexists.

If the burial story were a legend, then

there would be competing burial legends There is none

The only burial story known is the burialby Joseph of Arimathea.


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The honorable burial of Jesus is

"one of the earliest and best attested facts about Jesus.

- John A. T. Robinson


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3) Discovery

of the Empty Tomb

h l l b l f h


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1. The Historical Reliability of theStory of Jesus' Burial Supports theEmpty Tomb.

The tomb must have been empty, whenthe disciples began to preach that Jesus

was risen. The disciples could not have believed in

Jesus' resurrection if his corpse still lay inthe tomb

The Jewish authorities would haveexposed the whole affair simply bypointing to Jesus' tomb


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2. Paul's Testimony Implies the Factof the Empty Tomb.

Paul does not explicitly mention the empty tomb

"He was buried," followed by the expression "Hewas raised" implies the empty tomb.

As E.E. Ellis remarks, "It is very unlikely that theearliest Palestinian Christians could conceive ofany distinction between resurrection and physical,'grave-emptying' resurrection. To them ananastasis (resurrection) without an empty gravewould have been about as meaningful as a squarecircle."


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3. Paul's expression "on the thirdday" implies the Empty Tomb.

Since no one actually saw Jesus rise fromthe dead, why did the early disciples

proclaim that he had been raised "on thethird day"?

It was on the third day that the womendiscovered the tomb of Jesus empty

"on the third day" is a time-indicatorpointing to the discovery of the emptytomb

4 Th E t T b St I P t f


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4. The Empty Tomb Story Is Part ofMarkan Source Material and IsTherefore Very Old.

Mark apparently employed a source ofinformation that is accordingly very early.

Pre-Markan passion source never refers tothe high priest by name.

This is incredibly early and makes thehypothesis of legend with regard to the

empty tomb an idle theory.


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5. The Tomb Was ProbablyDiscovered Empty by Women.

Women were not qualified to serve aslegal witnesses.

Women occupied a low rung on the Jewishsocial ladder.

Consider these Jewish texts: "Sooner letthe words of the Law be burnt than

delivered to women!" and again: "Happyis he whose children are male, butunhappy is he whose children are female!"

6 Th Di i l C ld N t H


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6. The Disciples Could Not HavePreached in Jerusalem Had the TombNot Been Empty.

One of the most amazing facts about theearly Christian belief in Jesus' resurrection

was that it originated in the very citywhere Jesus was crucified.

If the proclamation of Jesus' resurrectionwere false, all the Jewish authorities

would have had to do was to point to thetomb.

7 Th E li t J i h P d


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7. The Earliest Jewish PropagandaAgainst the Christians Presupposesthe Empty Tomb.

In Matt 28: 11-15 we have the earliestChristian attempt to refute the Jewish

propaganda against the Christianproclamation of the resurrection.

The Jewish propaganda that the disciplesstole the body presupposes that the body

was missing and that the tomb wasempty.


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"It is extremely difficult to object to

the empty tomb on historical grounds;

those who deny it do so on the basis

of theological or philosophical

assumptions. - D. H. Van Daalen


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"By far most exegetes hold firmly to

the reliability of the Biblical

statements concerning the empty

tomb. - Jacob Kremer

4) Di t t ith Ri J


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4) Direct encounters with Risen Jesus


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1. Paul's Testimony Proves theDisciples Saw Appearances of Jesus.

Appearance to Peter (Luke 24:34)

Appearance to the Twelve (Luke 24:36-42

and John 20:19-20) Appearance to 500 brethren

Appearance to James

Appearance to "all the apostles

Appearance to Saul of Tarsus


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"The more we study the tradition with

regard to the appearances, the firmerthe rock begins to appear upon which

they are based."- Norman Perrin


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2. The Resurrection AppearancesWere Physical, Bodily Appearances.

Paul, and indeed all the NT, makes aconceptual (if not linguistic) distinction

between an appearance of Jesus and avision of Jesus.

The unanimous testimony of the gospelsin this regard is quite impressive.

The gospel accounts have been shown tobe fundamentally historically reliable


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"It may be taken as historically

certain that Peter and the discipleshad experiences after Jesus death in

which Jesus appeared to them as the

risen Christ."- Gert Ldemann


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5) Dawning of the Church

1 Without this belief in the


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1. Without this belief in theresurrection, early Christianity couldnot have come into being.

The origin of Christianity hinges on thebelief of the early disciples that God had

raised Jesus from the dead. R.H. Fuller says, even the most skeptical

critic must posit some mysterious X to getthe movement going. But what was that

X?

2 If d i th t th ti it lf


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2. If one denies that the resurrection itselfwas that X, then one must explain the

disciples' belief in the resurrection

Not From Christian Influences

Not From Pagan Influences

3. The parallels are dubious.

4. There is in any case scarcely any trace atall of such pagan cults of dying and risinggods in first-century Palestine.

Grass: it would be "completely

unthinkable" that the original disciplescould have come to believe in Jesusresurrection on the basis of pagan mythsabout dying and rising seasonal gods.


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3. Not From Jewish Influences

Isaiah 26:19, Ezekiel 37, and Daniel 12:2

The Jewish conception of the resurrection

differed in two fundamental respects3. The resurrection always occurred after the

end of the world.

4. They had no conception of the

resurrection of an isolated individual.


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Best Explanation

Explanatory scope

Explanatory power

Plausibility Ad hocness

Accord with accepted beliefs

Superiority to rival hypotheses


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God raised Jesus from the

dead is the best explanation


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The Resurrection of Jesus an Apologetic View