The only way such a thing would even be possible would be if someone put a body other than the body of Jesus there and fabricated the whole thing so as to try and disprove the Christian faith.
I would continue to believe because I have had a very real encounter with Jesus. But I would grieve over the way such a thing might be used by the enemy to shake the faith of some.
Of course it is not a bad thing that we go by evidence and base our faith in facts. If the facts go against what we believe it is not a bad thing that we reevaluate our beliefs. In the train example of faith, facts are the engine, faith goes behind facts, and feeling goes behind faith.
Therefore I know that the real evidence will always point to the resurrection of Christ as being the reality in wolrd history. If there were ever any evidence to the contrary I would say that it had been fabricated.
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Hello, justbyfaith,
Not everybody can handle conflicting evidence in the same manner.
It depends on the relative value one places upon facts provided either by the Bible or by the physical sciences and philosophy.
You posted, "
I would continue to believe because I have had a very real encounter with Jesus. "
Some where in the faith of each of us is this subjective fact - the encounter with the Lord Jesus.
You added a caveat to this.
"Therefore I know that the real evidence will always point to the resurrection of Christ as being the reality in wolrd history." This is not so much of a statement of faith as it is placing trust - regardless of the presumed facts.
My caution, not intended toward you but these ideas, is that subjective knowledge is open to attack by logic and contemporary analytic philosophy, the issue of subject—and more specifically the "point of view" of the subject, or "subjectivity"—has received attention as one of the major intractable problems in philosophy of mind (a related issue being the mind-body problem). In the essay "What is it like to be a bat?", Thomas Nagel famously argued that explaining subjective experience—the "what it is like" to be something—is currently beyond the reach of scientific inquiry.
Your second quote which is repeated is blatantly opposed to any claim of objectivity.
I am not disagreeing with your approach, nor am I without ultimately using it myself.
We just need to be aware of the weaknesses.
In Christian apologetics there is only one defense when it comes to the resurrection.
1. It is historical -
2. attested to by apostles and disciples -
3. not by their testimony but by their account as eye witnesses -
4. eye witnesses who actually died rather than deny what they said was witnessed -
5. recorded by the Apostle Paul as early as A.D 42-44 - therefore, not legend but attested to by thousands.
My made up find of an ossuary with bones and the execution order by Pilate for Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews was faked from an actual find. The actual find does not cast doubt but seems to be authentic historical evidence of the Lord Jesus.
A modest limestone burial box, known as an ossuary, typical of first-century Jerusalem, is owned by Oded Golan, an Israeli antiquities collector. Chiselled on the side are the words "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus."
Read the entire article at this site:
Ancient burial box claimed to have earliest reference to Jesus
Actually, the best place to be in when it comes to faith is when you cannot not believe. The realty of ones life in the relationship to YHWH becomes a
desperate necessity.
Nothing else has any rational weight which could ever convince you otherwise. I have desperate faith.
We have two excellent examples from the gospels.
John 5:66-69 ISV
This passage has enormous power only if understood from the perspective of the early first century Jewish expectations of the Messiah. Messianic expectations dominated Jewish life. The time frame from Daniel's 70 sevens was ending if not already expired. Was there time for the disciples to expect there might be another claim to messianic prophecy? For them it was the Lord Jesus or they had wasted the years following the prophet from Nazareth. I suspect Levi (Matthew) had already given up on the messianic hope of Judaism to become a Roman tax collector when the Lord Jesus called him from disillusionment.
66 As a result, many of his disciples turned back and no longer associated with him.
67 So Jesus asked the Twelve, “You don’t want to leave, too, do you?”
68 Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69 Besides, we have believed and remain convinced that you are the Holy One of God.”
John 20:24-25 ISV
24 Thomas, one of the Twelve (called the Twin), wasn’t with them when Jesus came. 25 So the other disciples kept telling him, “We’ve seen the Lord!” But he told them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands, put my finger into them, and put my hand into his side, I’ll never believe!”
