- Dec 22, 2017
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"And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain." --1 Corinthians 15
Recently, I started a thread that was just asking for non-Christian perspectives on the Crucifixion. The responses were interesting, and among them was multiple mentions of the Resurrection. So, here we go!
The first Christian doctrine is the idea that Jesus rose from the dead. For the last 2,000 years, this has been a source of controversy, from the doubting Apostles to many of our fellow forum-users here. Many Christian beliefs really come down to a matter of faith; explanations may be offered for the Trinity, for Christ's dual God-Man nature, for the souls in Purgatory (and for the notion of a soul at all!), yet they ultimately come down to a matter of faith.
The Resurrection is different. If this man they called Jesus truly did rise from the dead, that would be an astonishing historical fact. As such, there would be evidence to prove it.
J. Warner Wallace is an excellent author, a cold-case detective, and a self-described angry atheist who would constantly ridicule his Christian co-workers for their beliefs. This all changed when he began to view Christianity like the cold cases he worked on for so many years; something happened a long time ago, none of the original witnesses or documents are available, yet there still are pieces of evidence. He follows a very logical & methodical process, which resulted in the fantastic book Cold Case Christianity. I challenge anyone, from the curious skeptic to the anti-religion people, to read this book & tell me what is more rational & factual: Belief in the Christian God, or unbelief? The passage on the Resurrection from this book will form the basis of my post.
Generally speaking, people tend to doubt whether Jesus rose from the dead, or if was just a lie the Apostles made up. In that case, there has to be some motive for making the lie. Certainly, the Church was powerful in the Middle Ages, and at various points the Pope has had an immense amount of power. None of this was true at the time of the Apostles. It is a well-known historical fact that Christianity was viciously persecuted for the first few centuries of its existence, and there are no records that disprove the idea that 11 of the Apostles (and countless other original followers) were martyred, far apart from each other. Death & despair was all that faced the first apostles; hardly a reason to make something up! Retracting the lie would've been far more effective in the lives of the first Christians.
Or, people may believe that Jesus never actually died, and the Apostles only thought He rose from the dead. Yet the Romans were very brutal with their prisoners, as well as the executioners; anyone who let their death-sentenced prisoner go alive was put to death. Non-Christian, non-Jewish executioners would not take any chances letting this "Messiah" guy go alive. There are various bodily features that show death over unconsciousness; for example, some skin turns purple from blood pooling (no more heartbeat means no more blood pressure). If their job was to kill, they would be pretty good at telling when someone was dead! Furthermore, someone who lay comatose for 3 days in a cave would be hardly "glorified", as the Resurrected Jesus is said to be. Barely able to crawl out of a cave (somehow moving a stone that blocked it off?), no one would believe with a death-defying conviction that this was divine intervention; human incompetence rarely inspires much more than memes & political cartoons.
I do not intend for this post to be an exhaustive list of the reasons; there are far more thorough descriptions available. Looking up "historical reliability of the resurrection" can bring up a variety of good sources. This is simply something I want to start a train of thought; it can be taken for granted that all religious beliefs are a matter of faith in old books or weird sayings, but the Resurrection can be seen through the lens of rational historical analysis. And if Jesus truly did rise Himself from the dead, what greater miracle can show that He truly was divine?
If you're not sure of the Resurrection, that's okay, history takes time to learn. A slower analysis can be more reliable than just accepting it because some guy named Alex made a post on the Internet! It just gets terribly frustrating when people call Christianity as little more than a highly influential fairy tale. Even if this post doesn't convince anyone of anything, I still want an intelligent discussion on the topic. Expressing disbelief without evidence is hardly any better than expressing belief without evidence, so please try to make a good case if you disagree, lest you too fall into the trap of faith over reason.