Why the Resurrection narratives cannot be eyewitness testimony with a challenge

[AchillesHeel]

Observation and thesis: The resurrection narratives are not reliable historical reports based on eyewitness testimony because they deviate too much from one another and grow in the telling in chronological order. This is not expected from reliable eyewitness testimony but is more expected from a legend developing over time. In order to show the resurrection narratives evolve like a legend developing, I'm going to compare the ways Jesus is said to have been "seen" or experienced after the Resurrection in each account according to the order in which most scholars place the compositions. Remember, these accounts are claimed to be from eyewitnesses who all experienced the same events so we would at least expect some sort of consistency.

Beginning with Paul (50s CE), who is our earliest and only verified firsthand account in the entire New Testament from someone who claims to have "seen" Jesus, he is also the only verified firsthand account we have from someone who claims to have personally met Peter and James - Gal. 1:18-19. Paul does not give any evidence of anything other than "visions" or "revelations" of Jesus. The Greek words ophthe (1 Cor 15:5-8), heoraka (1 Cor 9:1) and apokalupto (Gal. 1:16) do not necessarily imply the physical appearance of a person and so cannot be used as evidence for veridical experiences where an actual resurrected body was seen in physical reality. In Paul's account, it is unclear whether the "appearances" were believed to have happened before or after Jesus was believed to be in heaven, ultimately making the nature of these experiences ambiguous. Peter and James certainly would have told Paul about the empty tomb or the time they touched Jesus and watched him float to heaven. These "proofs" (Acts 1:3) would have certainly been helpful in convincing the doubting Corinthians in 1 Cor 15:12-20 and also help clarify the type of body the resurrected would have (v. 35). So these details are very conspicuous in their absence here.

Paul's order of appearances: Peter, the twelve, the 500, James, all the apostles, Paul. No location is mentioned.

Mark (70 CE) adds the discovery of the empty tomb but does not narrate any appearances so no help here really. He just claims Jesus will be "seen" in Galilee. This is very unexpected if the account really came from Peter's testimony. Why leave out the most important part especially, if Papias was correct, that "Mark made sure not to omit anything he heard"? Did Peter just forget to tell Mark this!? Anyways, there is no evidence a resurrection narrative existed at the time of composition of Mark's gospel circa 70 CE.

Mark's order of appearances: Not applicable. 

Matthew (80 CE) adds onto Mark's narrative, drops the remark that the "women told no one" from Mk
16:8 and instead, has Jesus suddenly appear to the women on their way to tell the disciples! It says they grabbed his feet which is not corroborated by any other account. Then, Jesus appeared to the disciples on a mountain in Galilee, another uncorroborated story, and says some even doubted it! (Mt. 28:17) So the earliest narrative doesn't even support the veracity of the event! Why would they doubt when they had already witnessed him the same night of the Resurrection according to Jn. 20:19? Well, under the development theory - John's story never took place! It's a later development, obviously, which perfectly explains both the lack of mention of any Jerusalem appearances in our earliest gospels plus the awkward "doubt" after already having seen Jesus alive!

Matthew's order of appearances: Two women (before reaching any disciples), then to the eleven disciples. The appearance to the women takes place after they leave the tomb in Jerusalem while the appearance to the disciples happens on a mountain in Galilee.

Luke (85 CE or later) - All of Luke's appearances happen in or around Jerusalem which somehow went unnoticed by the authors of Mark and Matthew. Jesus appears to two people on the Emmaus Road who don't recognize him at first. Jesus then suddenly vanishes from their sight. They return to tell the other disciples and a reference is made to the appearance to Peter (which may just come from 1 Cor 15:5 since it's not narrated). Jesus suddenly appears to the Eleven disciples (which would include Thomas). This time Jesus is "not a spirit" but a "flesh and bone" body that gets inspected, eats fish, then floats to heaven while all the disciples watch - conspicuously missing from all the earlier reports! Luke omits any appearance to the women and actually implies they *didn't* see Jesus. Acts 1:3 adds the otherwise unattested claim that Jesus appeared over a period of 40 days and says Jesus provided "many convincing proofs he was alive" which shows the stories were apologetically motivated. There is no evidence that Luke intended to convey Jesus ever appeared to anyone in Galilee. Moreover, Luke leaves no room for any Galilean appearance because he has Jesus tell the disciples to "stay in the city" of Jerusalem the same night of the resurrection - Lk. 24:49. It looks as though the Galilean appearance tradition has been erased by Luke which would be a deliberate alteration of the earlier tradition (since Luke was dependent upon Mark's gospel).

Luke's order of appearances: Two on the Emmaus Road, Peter, rest of the eleven disciples. All appearances happen in Jerusalem. Lk. 24:22-24 seems to exclude any appearance to the women. The women's report in Lk. 24:9-10 is missing any mention of seeing Jesus which contradicts Mt. 28:8-11 and Jn. 20:11-18.

John (90-110 CE) - the ascension has become tradition by the time John wrote (Jn. 3:13, 6:62, 20:17). Jesus appears to Mary outside the tomb who does not recognize him at first. Then Jesus, who can now teleport through locked doors, appears to the disciples minus Thomas. A week later we get the Doubting Thomas story where Jesus invites Thomas to poke his wounds. This story has the apologetic purpose that if you just "believe without seeing" you will be blessed. Lastly, there is another appearance by the Sea of Galilee in Jn. 21 in which Jesus appears to seven disciples. None of these stories are corroborated except for the initial appearance (which may draw upon Luke). It looks as though the final editor of John has tried to combine the disparate traditions of appearances.

John's order of appearances: Mary Magdalene (after telling Peter and the other disciple), the disciples minus Thomas (but Lk. 24:33 implies Thomas was there), the disciples again plus Thomas, then to seven disciples. In John 20 the appearances happen in Jerusalem and in John 21 they happen near the Sea of Galilee on a fishing trip.

Challenge: I submit this as a clear pattern of "development" that is better explained by the legendary growth hypothesis (LGH) as opposed to actual experienced events. Now the onus is on anyone who disagrees to explain why the story looks so "developed" while simultaneously maintaining its historical reliability. In order to achieve this, one must provide other reliable sources from people who experienced the same events but also exhibit the same amount of growth and disparity as the gospel resurrection narratives.

Until this challenge is met, the resurrection narratives should be regarded as legends because reliable eyewitness testimony does not have this degree of growth or inconsistency.

[TRANSPONDER]

For starters, there is the fact that Matthew and Luke say the women told the disciples which is an explicit contradiction of Mark 16:8.

Source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/diction ... tradiction


That is hardly "an explicit contradiction". And claimed "contradiction" depends on if one reads Mark statement to be relative or absolute. What proof do you have that the writers intentions were the latter? Unless you lay claim to mind reading capacities, any response you provide is a mere supposition, hardly catagoric and verifiable "proof".

Supposition does not a contradiction make.

You cannot have the women "leave and tell the disciples" while at the same time "leave and tell no one." That is an explicit contradiction.

You are simply repeating your original claim. Repetition does not a counterargument make. I Will ignore this first statement for this reason.

...this "absolute" nonsense

• Are you suggesting the very notion of making statements that are true relatively do not exist? You believe such a notion is ficticious? Or ...

• Are you suggesting that normal everyday interaction always (or even predominently) involve statements that are to be taken literally in the absolute? If so, argue your case.

• Or do you acknowledge the existence and use of the various types of speech but are applying some "special pleading" to this text? If so , argue your case.

Please clarify the above

The overall point was to show Matthean priority (Mark's dependence on Matthew) doesn't make sense due to this.

You have yet to prove the "this" (a claim if an explicit contradiction). You presented a premise based on a faulty (linguisticaly weak/ arguably untenable) premise and have yet to address (provide evidence) that your premise should not be dismissed as supposition.




JW

Yet again, I have to copunt to ten and tell myself 'Dave old son, he is merely making his case look bad, not getting your goat".

Ok (and sorry for the typos in my previous, I had a distraction).

The above remarks are merely evasions. It is clear. A cons tradiction is where two statements do not confirm each other. This is well ujnderstood, in court, in reasoning and in society. Trying to pretend it something else or something not usable is merely showing how terribly bad and untrustworthu y Bible apologetics are.

IUt would be bad enough if Mark just said the women ran away in fear and tremblking. One could argue that the rest got lost, and thje rest could be assumed. But to say they said nothing to anyone blatantly contradict that w they ran to the disciples and told them everything.

Denial doesn't make the Bible critic look bad; it makes the bible apologist look bad.

Sure one could argue everything from the women running away in fear was lost and mark (my theory) added that they said nothing to e anyon to explain why he had no more.See? I can do it, wearing my theist hat.

But that is just one contradiction out of many.

John says that Mary (and the other is implied ("we do not know...") reported to the disciples and knew nothing of any angel or message (the attempts to make the appearances After the disciples had checked the tomb an appearance to Mary Before they had reported to the disciples, is disgraceful and disrespectful to what the Bible says, so I trust you won't do it)

Luke says that M. Magdalene was there repeating everything and the fact (ignored by everyone, so far as i know) is that he alters the angelic message, and i know why.

The disciples go and check the tomb, according to John and the addition to Luke, though Cleophas confirms that is what Luke knew.

They return with Mary at the tomb meeting Jesus for the first time - clearly, and Cleophas hears what they say and relates it to Jesus while Jesus is appearing to Simon back in Jerusalem). No mention of the women seeing Jesus, though he knows about the angels and the message.

This is clear and a contradiction to any but a denialist - It contradicts Matthew's claim that the women ran into Jesus. Twist the scripture into knots and invent stuff as one may, this is a real contradiction and sinks Matthew's credibility, as if his descending angel perching on the rock door like a leprechaun wasn't enough

That should be the clue that his tomb - guard is also invented as nobody else has one. And yet it has been accepted as canon all this time. How could we allow Bible apologetics to pull the wool over our eyes like that?

I trust that at least the open - minded will wise up and understand, they have been lied to and will not tolerate anyone else trying to do so.

[TRANSPONDER]

Beginning with Paul (50s CE)

I'm struggling to understaand what your point is here:.

• Are you suggesting that the Christian movement did not exist until some 20 years after the death of its declared leader ?

• Or are you suggesting that the judeo-christians did exist but their tradition did not include a risen Messiah?

• Or is your point that Christians did believe in a risen Messiah but they didn't know why as they and no authoratative narratives testifying to this ?

In any case , short of pointing out that letters that are clearly not claiming to be a narrative of the events following of Jesus death... don't relate the events following Jesus death ... what is the point being made? WHAT began with Paul?!


RELATED POSTS

Can Pauls letters be considered the first testimony of the events following Jesus death ?
viewtopic.php?p=1154603#p1154603

Christianity, in a sense, began with Paul, on chronological terms between 35 and 45 AD (between the attack on Damascus, which Paul fled, and the Judean famine, which allowed Paul to bribe the disciples into accepting him)

But the trick and fraud is to use the figure of Paul, the disciples, the resurrection - belief and the idea of redemption from sins to validate the Greek Paganised Christianity we got 'twenty years later', with Jesus turned into a god.

You can save denial and demands to be convinced. I have done that before and the Believers simply ignore it.

I'm saying to those with open minds (and will be happy to discuss the case) that Jesus being crucified - yes, true, the disciples believing in a resurrection (of spirit, not body) and Paul alone and with nothing but opposition from everyone but his own converts, it seems, was teaching a gentile - friendly version of Jewish Messianism with a resurrected messianic spirit which would return soon, into the gradually - evolving Greco - Roman religion that we find in Christian scriptures twenty years after Paul vanishes, and you can date that by the 'predictions' of the Jewish war that lace the pages of the gospels.

[AchillesHeel]

Beginning with Paul (50s CE)

I'm struggling to understaand what your point is here:.

• Are you suggesting that the Christian movement did not exist until some 20 years after the death of its declared leader ?

• Or are you suggesting that the judeo-christians did exist but their tradition did not include a risen Messiah?

• Or is your point that Christians did believe in a risen Messiah but they didn't know why as they had no authoratative narratives testifying to this ?

In any case , short of pointing out that letters that are clearly not claiming to be a narrative of the events following of Jesus death... don't relate the events following Jesus death ... what is the point being made? WHAT began with Paul?!


RELATED POSTS

Can Pauls letters be considered the first testimony of the events following Jesus death ?
viewtopic.php?p=1154603#p1154603

Why do all your responses ignore how the Resurrection story evolves? That was the point of the post so I'm hoping we can get back on topic. Can you give an explanation for why the story looks so much like a legend evolving but without it being one?

If you read past the first sentence of what you quoted I explain exactly why I begin with Paul. He is our earliest and only firsthand source. He is also our only source by a person who says he met Peter and James. Do you realize the importance of firsthand testimony when doing a historical investigation?

[JehovahsWitness]

Beginning with Paul (50s CE)

I'm struggling to understaand what your point is here:.

• Are you suggesting that the Christian movement did not exist until some 20 years after the death of its declared leader ?

• Or are you suggesting that the judeo-christians did exist but their tradition did not include a risen Messiah?

• Or is your point that Christians did believe in a risen Messiah but they didn't know why as they had no authoratative narratives testifying to this ?

In any case , short of pointing out that letters that are clearly not claiming to be a narrative of the events following of Jesus death... don't relate the events following Jesus death ... what is the point being made? WHAT began with Paul?!


RELATED POSTS

Can Pauls letters be considered the first testimony of the events following Jesus death ?
viewtopic.php?p=1154603#p1154603

Why do all your responses ignore how the Resurrection story evolves? ...

I'm not ignoring it, I'm trying to decipher what : The evolution of the "resurrection story". IS !Right there in the OP you state it (I presume said evolution) began with Paul in the 50's, correct? Is it not appropriate to ask you what you think began in the 50s and how?

JW

[Goose]

You sure do if you want to establish the antecedent in the premise: what Irenaeus says is true. How do you propose to establish that what Irenaeus says is true without Irenaeus’ reliability?

I was assuming the person I was responding to endorsed Irenaeus' reliability. If he did, then we are able to derive a contradiction.

There is no derived contradiction from your argument, you’ve only argued for it being “at least partially false.” If you think there is a contradiction to be derived, go ahead and spell it out logically for me.

Look, if you’re not prepared to argue for and affirm the antecedent in your own argument that what Irenaeus says is true then you can’t infer the consequent that Mae von H’s claim is at least partially false. Your argument, then, doesn’t amount to anything meaningful and can’t serve as an argument against the initial claim of Mae von H, the claim you wanted to show partially false. Let’s not forget it was you who first introduced Irenaeus as evidence against Mae von H’s claim.

Papias wasn’t necessarily his only source. I’ve argued Irenaeus’ comparative reliability on the grounds of 1) temporal proximity to the Gospels and 2) being connected to John and eyewitnesses through Polycarp.

First of all there were 3 or 4 different "Johns" cited in the church fathers. Does Irenaeus ever explicitly call John, "John, the son of Zebedee?"

You aren’t addressing the two arguments here for Irenaeus’ comparative reliability. And are you asking about his connection to John? If so, it’s clearly implied in the context. Or are you are asking about Irenaeus’ attribution of authorship to John? If so...

"Afterwards, John, the disciple of the Lord, who also had leaned upon His breast, did himself publish a Gospel". (AH 3.1)

Irenaues later unambiguously quotes from the Gospel of John and attributes it to John and to the disciple of the Lord (AH 3.11).

He may have believed that he was but the point is different "Johns" were posited as the author behind the Gospel of John and Irenaeus is only one source on that.

Obfuscation isn’t much of an argument. What other sources say are irrelevant to my arguments here regarding Irenaeus’ relative reliability.

There was also a tradition of John being written by the gnostic Cerinthus. See Found Christianities: Remaking the World of the Second Century CE By M. David Litwa, pp. 39-43.

That claim emerged late in the second century by the Alogi. All we know of them is what the church fathers wrote about them. As far as Epiphanus is concerned even the Alogi take for granted that the only other view was that the Gospel was written by John.

"For they say that they are not John’s composition but Cerinthus’, and have no right to a place in the church". (Heresies 51.3)

As far as what other sources Irenaeus was using, those "sources" have never been demonstrated to contain reliable information. That's why internal evidence should be preferred over uncertain and late church father testimony.

Unless that church father evidence helps your argument right? Let’s not forget you first introduced Irenaeus to counter Mae von H’s argument.

Though internal evidence is valuable it is only one line of evidence when determining authorship of any ancient text. Any methodology that simply hand waives aside the external historical record is just a bad way of doing history. In fact, it’s not even doing history at all.

The internal evidence has to be at least consistent with eyewitness testimony, and it's not....

The internal evidence is consistent with the traditional attributions of authorship.
Matthew
Mark
Luke
John

Not only are the growth and discrepancies quite suspicious but historical literature always made sure to cite eyewitness testimony when it was available.

viewtopic.php?p=1096100#p1096100

You’re Begging the Question. How do you know those non-Christian works are legitimate eyewitness accounts? The link you gave makes a circular argument. On the one hand it cites a number of second century texts that are thought to be pseudepigraphical even though they internally claim authorship. Then it cites a number of texts that internally either claim authorship or eyewitness status as though they really are written by either eyewitnesses or the authors that make the claims. The salient question you need to answer is what is your methodology for determining an eyewitness account? Surely it can't merely be that it internally claims that as your link demonstrates. Your preference for internal evidence breaks down here.

In any case, you’re going to have a very difficult time defending “always.” The list you linked to is cherry picked evidence and does not represent every work from antiquity so it doesn’t establish “always.” But let’s take your assertion that historical literature always made sure to cite eyewitness testimony when it was available and let’s look at Tacitus’ Agricola from the list in the link you provided to test this assertion. It’s a good case for comparison because it’s a biography written near the time of the Gospels by someone who was apparently close to the subject and a professional historian.

"Meanwhile this book, intended to do honour to Agricola, my father-in-law, will, as an expression of filial regard, be commended, or at least excused." [Tacitus: Agricola. 3]

This incidental mention in chapter three that Agricola is the author’s father in law isn’t an explicit claim to authorship. You don't get to argue as though it was an expected convention for ancient authors to make these kind of disclosures and then point to what seem to be happenstance instances. Nowhere in the text proper does Tacitus explicitly name himself as the author. Rather it’s this piece of information that tells us Tacitus was the son-in-law of Agricola assuming that Tacitus did indeed write Agricola, which you would need to establish. You would need to turn to external evidence to establish that Tacitus was the author. Your preference for internal evidence doesn’t get you far here.

If you take the time to read Tacitus’ Agricola you’ll be hard pressed to find an instance where he explicitly names any source. He just narrates events and lengthy speeches as though they are a matter of fact. He doesn’t seem at all concerned with naming sources or reassuring his readers that his sources are reliable. With a couple of incidental exceptions such as Tacitus saying he learned from Agricola himself that he loved philosophy in his early youth (Agr 4) and one other possible exception in chapter 24.

"I have often heard him say that a single legion with a few auxiliaries could conquer and occupy Ireland, and that it would have a salutary effect on Britain for the Roman arms to be seen everywhere, and for freedom, so to speak, to be banished from its sight". (Agr 24).

It’s unclear from the context, however, to whom exactly Tacitus is referring. If it is Agricola why is it only here, on this curious comment about Ireland, that Tacitus reveals his source if, as you’ve asserted, “historical literature always made sure to cite eyewitness testimony when it was available”?

It’s noteworthy that Tacitus never explicitly names a source for Agricola’s exploits in Britain, which occupies the bulk of the book. If your assertion holds then this passing comment about Ireland, not about anything Agricola did mind you, is the only piece of information Tacitus actually received from a witness about Agricola’s exploits in Britain since it’s the only time he cites, albeit indirectly and ambiguously, a witness as his source if it is indeed Agricola. Your argument implies no other eyewitness sources were available to Tacitus for anything else Agricola did or said in Britain because he never cites any eyewitness sources for anything else and, according to you, ancient authors “always made sure to cite eyewitness testimony when it was available.”

If the assumption is that Tacitus’ main source for Agricola’s exploits in Britain is Agricola himself, or some other witnesses, then we would expect Tacitus to explicitly state that at the outset given your argument. That he doesn’t is a counter example to your assertion that “historical literature always made sure to cite eyewitness testimony when it was available.”

Furthermore, if an eyewitness was Tacitus’ source on Britain how could he get the geography so wrong?

"Britain... is so situated that it faces Germany on the east, Spain on the west..." (Agr 10).

Surely if Agricola, or an eyewitness, was Tacitus’ source on Ireland he wouldn’t get Ireland’s geography wrong either.

"In that part of Britain which looks towards Ireland, he posted some troops, hoping for fresh conquests rather than fearing attack, inasmuch as Ireland, being between Britain and Spain"... (Agr 24)

Tacitus made other dubious claims about Britain.

"It is said that, if there are no clouds in the way, the splendour of the sun can be seen throughout the night, and that he does not rise and set, but only crosses the heavens." (Agr 12).

Tacitus attributed lengthy speeches to the Britons (Agr 15) and a very lengthy speech to Galgacus (Agr 30-32), one of the leaders of the Britons, before a battle for which no Roman could have been present. And the lengthy response from Agricola follows (33-34) with no citation of sources.

That rules out Mark and Matthew.

I’m not sure why you think Mark is ruled out. Is it because he doesn’t explicitly cite his sources? If so, I’ve already shown with Agricola that isn’t always the case. Another work I could point to is Nicolaus of Damascus’ Life of Augustus.

As for Matthew, why is it ruled out? Is it because the account is written in the third person? We already know, from the authors in the list you linked to, that it wasn’t unprecedented for a firsthand account to be narrated in the third person. For example Josephus in his Jewish Wars narrates his part in the war in the third person. We could add other sources such as Caesar’s Gallic War commentaries and Nicolaus of Damascus’ autobiography which were likewise written in the third person.

Luke at least attempts to mimic the historical standard in his prologue but we can tell from how he redacts Mark, he's not telling the truth.

Oh I see, when Luke meets your standard it’s dismissed as mimicking. Gotchya. Even if we grant that Luke redacted Mark that doesn’t allow you to dismiss Luke wholesale. There is plenty of material in Luke unique to Luke which includes the resurrection narratives.

John has an anonymous "we" group claim that a disciple wrote this stuff down and they know his testimony is true but that's obviously not convincing and would be expected by a group trying to usurp authority or in pseudepigraphical writings as detailed in the apocryphal gospels.

And when John meets the standard it’s “not convincing” and waived aside. We can apply this kind of reasoning to virtually any work from antiquity that internally claims to be written by a witness or by any particular person of authority. Even with Tacitus’ Agricola one could argue the claim to have been written by his son in law is strategically placed to reassure the reader that this obviously biased account comes from a close source. The same kind of argument can be applied to Philo's Embassy to Gaius which never explicitly names Philo but contains anonymous first person plural references (“we” passages), occasionally refers to the Jews as “the Jews”, and concludes with the implication that a group composed it, "We have now related in a concise and summary manner..." Sound familiar at all? Lastly, your argument is easily falsified. If your argument holds then we should expect Matthew, Mark, and Luke also to have made some kind of similar claim, especially Matthew.

Your internal evidence is itself uncertain and hinges on a number of debatable premeses (Paul's view of Jesus' resurrected body, chronology of the Gospels, Markan priority). It doesn’t seem you have much of a counter argument here and are essentially arguing in a circle, your argument is true therefore evidence against it is false.

The main point, which you didn't cite, is that the testimony itself isn't consistent with how other eyewitness accounts look.

Well so what? You’ve got a number of very debatable premises undergirding your overall argument. And how exactly do other eyewitness accounts look then? Because it seems to me they all look quite different. The list you linked to demonstrates that. You seem to think there is some specific characteristic(s) that delineates an eyewitness account from a non-eyewitness account and that it’s always present in an eyewitness account. You seem to think it can be determined solely from internal evidence. So what is it? Aside from your earlier assertion that “historical literature always made sure to cite eyewitness testimony when it was available,” which is problematic to say the least, what else is there?

Tell me the methodology you employ to determine an eyewitness account.

Please just find one example that shows otherwise.

Please stop shifting the burden.

The chronology and Markan priority are consensus positions and so have the most scholarly support. That's hardly a cause for concern here.

Having “the most scholarly support” doesn’t establish this key premise though. It’s a sufficient reason to believe a premise but not to prove one.

I don’t see anything you’ve listed here that can’t be reasonably explained as simply a difference in reportage. That Mark pared the accounts down also explains this data.

Really? That's your explanation?

Your incredulity is not a counter argument. Nor is a demand for further evidence. And besides, you already accept that Matthew pared down Mark at some points; you have to in order to hold Markan priority (e.g. Matt 8:28/Mark 5:2-5, Matt 9:2/Mark 2:2-5, Matt 9:20-22/Mark 5:24-34).

Is there any evidence where ancient authors "pared the accounts down" when what their source said would have been important for them to mention?

Read the anonymous biographies Brutus (36, 48, 52) and Caesar (69) which are attributed to Plutarch. The accounts of the phantom visiting Brutus and his subsequent suicide are significantly pared down in Caesar to just a few sentences even though there are important details we might expect to be mentioned. Indeed, the two accounts are so different that an uncharitable reader might argue the author was contradicting himself or could use it as evidence to argue they were not written by the same person.

Where is another example where this type of "difference in reportage" happens in what we would reasonably call reliable sources?

There is a difference in reportage in virtually every example of where we find more than one ancient account reporting the same event. Take for example Pilot’s erection of standards in Jerusalem reported by both Philo (Embassy 38) and Josephus (Antiquities 18.3.1). The two authors are so contradictory it’s caused some scholars to question whether they are even reporting the same event. Yet, sceptics often take the reliability of these sources for granted and use them to argue the character and actions of Pilate in the Gospels are implausible.

Prevailing views change. The two source hypothesis has come under serious criticism in recent decades. That’s one of the problems with your over arching argument. It hinges on the assumption that Markan priority and the two source hypothesis are effectively proven true. They aren’t and they have competing theories that also explain the data.

Since the synoptics show evidence of shared verbatim Greek, that's proof of copying. So why would the author of Mark read Matthew 28 or Luke 24 and end his gospel with this?

Mk 16:8

Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.

It's an abrupt ending to be sure, which has led some to think we have lost the original ending to Mark. We can only speculate as to why any author would write the way he did. Even if Mark did originally end at 16:8 it’s worth mentioning he does explicitly state Jesus has risen and there will be appearances. He just doesn't flesh the narratives out as do Matthew, Luke and John. Which was not unprecedented as evidenced by the preaching found in the book of Acts. It likewise does not flesh out the appearances (Acts 2:32; 3:15; 10:40-41; 13:30-31).

That would make him quite the liar wouldn't it?

Why does that make him a liar? It’s an awkward way to end, sure. But Mark wrote that the women said nothing to anyone because they were afraid. The initial fear is quite understandable, they had just met an angel after all. But there's no reason to think that fear was permanent. Mark doesn’t say the women said nothing to anyone ever. There's no reason to think the women wouldn't go tell the disciples, as they had been instructed to do by the angel, once the initial fear gave way to joy and excitement.

It makes more sense that Matthew and Luke expanded upon Mark's unsatisfactory ending.

That's by no means a necessary conclusion though. If you are correct why, then, did Luke par down the appearances in the preaching he recorded in Acts?

Those who argue for Matthean priority would point out roughly seventeen texts in Mark such as the following supporting an argument from conflation:

When Jesus came into Peter’s home, He saw his mother-in-law lying sick in bed with a fever. And He touched her hand, and the fever left her; and she got up and waited on Him. Now when evening came, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed; and He cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all who were ill. This happened so that what was spoken through Isaiah the prophet would be fulfilled: “HE HIMSELF TOOK OUR ILLNESSES AND CARRIED AWAY OUR DISEASES.”

Then He got up and left the synagogue, and entered Simon’s home. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was suffering from a high fever, and they asked Him to help her. And standing over her, He rebuked the fever, and it left her; and she immediately got up and served them. Now while the sun was setting, all those who had any who were sick with various diseases brought them to Him; and He was laying His hands on each one of them and healing them. Demons also were coming out of many, shouting, “You are the Son of God!” And yet He was rebuking them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew that He was the Christ.

And immediately after they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was lying sick with a fever; and they immediately spoke to Jesus about her. And He came to her and raised her up, taking her by the hand, and the fever left her, and she served them. Now when evening came, after the sun had set, they began bringing to Him all who were ill and those who were demon-possessed. And the whole city had gathered at the door. And He healed many who were ill with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and He would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew who He was.

The text in blue is found in Matthew and the text in red is found Luke. What makes more sense, that Matthew and Luke used Mark and just happened to choose their respective portions or that Mark used Matthew and Luke and conflated them together while adding his own material?

The salient point here is there is no clear and consistent progression of legendary growth. Something like a continual increasing of the number angels at the tomb from one Gospel to the next. Further, you aren’t addressing the elements of the story that were dropped (or regressed), even though we would expect them to grow if your argument holds water. In other words you aren’t addressing the evidence against your argument. For instance, John drops the darkening of the sun and tearing of the temple veil found in Luke.

This is all a red herring. We are investigating the veracity of the Resurrection appearance narratives. So the comparison was in regards to how each consecutive account says the Resurrected Christ was seen/experienced by the disciples. You appealing to other tangential details is just a distraction from this problem.

Oh I see how this works now. When you point to the addition of the virgin birth in Matthew to show legendary growth from Mark that’s a good argument. On the other hand, when I point to John dropping the darkening of the sun and tearing of the temple veil found in Luke’s crucifixion account to argue against legendary growth, well, that’s a red herring.

Oh I see, so basically your argument is true until proven otherwise. That’s sounds dangerously close to an Argument from Ignorance fallacy.

I'm responding to apologists who claim that we should believe what the gospels say because they're reliable documents. Well, the burden of proof is on you to provide other reliable documents that have this degree of discrepancy!

Shifting the burden again. The burden is upon you to prove your argument, not on me to disprove it.

No one has offered a single example yet which speaks volumes. These type of drastic discrepancies simply aren't found in accounts we would consider "reliable" in any other context. Please feel free to provide a single counter example that satisfies two criteria:

1. The differences in reportage have the same degree of discrepancy (basically tell entirely different stories of what took place)

2. The sources are considered reliable in what they report.

I gave at least one with Pilate’s erecting Roman standards in Jerusalem reported by Philo and Josephus.

Pilate was one of the emperor's lieutenants, having been appointed governor of Judaea. He, not more with the object of doing honour to Tiberius than with that of vexing the multitude, dedicated some gilt shields in the palace of Herod, in the holy city; which had no form nor any other forbidden thing represented on them except some necessary inscription, which mentioned these two facts, the name of the person who had placed them there, and the person in whose honour they were so placed there. (300) But when the multitude heard what had been done, and when the circumstance became notorious, then the people, putting forward the four sons of the king, who were in no respect inferior to the kings themselves, in fortune or in rank, and his other descendants, and those magistrates who were among them at the time, entreated him to alter and to rectify the innovation which he had committed in respect of the shields; and not to make any alteration in their national customs, which had hitherto been preserved without any interruption, without being in the least degree changed by any king of emperor. (301) "But when he steadfastly refused this petition (for he was a man of a very inflexible disposition, and very merciless as well as very obstinate), they cried out: 'Do not cause a sedition; do not make war upon us; do not destroy the peace which exists. The honour of the emperor is not identical with dishonour to the ancient laws; let it not be to you a pretence for heaping insult on our nation. Tiberius is not desirous that any of our laws or customs shall be destroyed. And if you yourself say that he is, show us either some command from him, or some letter, or something of the kind, that we, who have been sent to you as ambassadors, may cease to trouble you, and may address our supplications to your master.' (302) "But this last sentence exasperated him in the greatest possible degree, as he feared least they might in reality go on an embassy to the emperor, and might impeach him with respect to other particulars of his government, in respect of his corruption, and his acts of insolence, and his rapine, and his habit of insulting people, and his cruelty, and his continual murders of people untried and uncondemned, and his never ending, and gratuitous, and most grievous inhumanity. (303) Therefore, being exceedingly angry, and being at all times a man of most ferocious passions, he was in great perplexity, neither venturing to take down what he had once set up, nor wishing to do any thing which could be acceptable to his subjects, and at the same time being sufficiently acquainted with the firmness of Tiberius on these points. And those who were in power in our nation, seeing this, and perceiving that he was inclined to change his mind as to what he had done, but that he was not willing to be thought to do so, wrote a most supplicatory letter to Tiberius. (304) And he, when he had read it, what did he say of Pilate, and what threats did he utter against him! But it is beside our purpose at present to relate to you how very angry he was, although he was not very liable to sudden anger; since the facts speak for themselves; (305) for immediately, without putting any thing off till the next day, he wrote a letter, reproaching and reviling him in the most bitter manner for his act of unprecedented audacity and wickedness, and commanding him immediately to take down the shields and to convey them away from the metropolis of Judaea to Caesarea, on the sea which had been named Caesarea Augusta, after his grandfather, in order that they might be set up in the temple of Augustus. And accordingly, they were set up in that edifice. And in this way he provided for two matters: both for the honour due to the emperor, and for the preservation of the ancient customs of the city.

But now Pilate, the procurator of Judea, removed the army from Cesarea to Jerusalem: to take their winter quarters there; in order to abolish the Jewish laws. So he introduced Cesar’s effigies, which were upon the ensigns, and brought them into the city: whereas our law forbids us the very making of images.6 On which account the former procurators were wont to make their entry into the city with such ensigns as had not those ornaments. Pilate was the first who brought those images to Jerusalem, and set them up there. Which was done without the knowledge of the people; because it was done in the night time. But as soon as they knew it, they came in multitudes to Cesarea, and interceded with Pilate many days, that he would remove the images. And when he would not grant their requests, because this would tend to the injury of Cesar; while yet they persevered in their request; on the sixth day he ordered his soldiers to have their weapons privately; while he came and sat upon his judgment seat. Which seat was so prepared, in the open place of the city, that it concealed the army that lay ready to oppress them. And when the Jews petitioned him again, he gave a signal to the soldiers to encompass them round; and threatened that their punishment should be no less than immediate death, unless they would leave off disturbing him, and go their ways home. But they threw themselves upon the ground, and laid their necks bare, and said they would take their death very willingly, rather than the wisdom of their laws should be transgressed. Upon which Pilate was deeply affected with their firm resolution to keep their laws inviolable: and presently commanded the images to be carried back from Jerusalem to Cesarea.

Once you’ve reconciled that mess, I’ll give you some more.

But merely arguing it’s ambiguous or that Paul didn't say what you think he should have said doesn’t by default establish that Paul understood Jesus’ resurrection as immaterial. And that’s what you need to establish in order to get your first premise off the ground. You have to argue immaterial resurrection (Paul) to material resurrection (Gospels) in order to show some kind of “growth” starting with Paul. If Paul held to a material, bodily resurrection of Jesus your entire argument begins to crumble.

I never said Paul believed Jesus' resurrection was "immaterial." I'm challenging the fact that what Paul (our earliest and most reliable account) says regarding the veracity of the appearances. The appearances are the only evidence that proved Jesus had, in fact, risen from the dead. If the earliest evidence is insufficient to establish the appearances were even veridical, then that shatters the whole foundation of the claim. The burden of proof is, again, on you to show Paul definitely meant veridical sightings of a physically resurrected person in physical reality. I maintain the earliest evidence is insufficient to establish that claim.

But you aren't merely making an under cutting argument. You are trying to make the argument that the Resurrection narratives cannot be eyewitness testimony. It's the title of your OP remember? If you can't establish that Paul held to an immaterial resurrected Jesus, then the first premise in your argument regarding Paul fails and your entire argument stalls out in first gear.

[TRANSPONDER]

[Replying to Goose in post #105]

By and large, I only see the above as raising doubts about the veracity of the gospels. Yes, there is a basic story, and the bare bones of this are surely factual.

But look at this this way. Propaganda does not Usually invent stories as they risk being exposed. Even Trump's helicopter story had a basis even though he added a hard landing that never happened.

Your post about burden of proof is fair; the gospels look like a narrative, but there are good reasons to question them.

Pilate is a real person, but his actions do not look like Pilate. They look like a culprit that Roman writers are trying to excuse for killing Jesus.

The Sanhedrin is real, Sanhedrin hearings are real, but there are problems. John doesn't have it at all. That is a contradiction, not an excusable error. The blasphemy charge makes no sense and can't be explained as anything but a Christian writers' view of the title of Messiah or Son of God (already a deification
of the post of Messiah, a rather mundane concept in Judaism

There is tons of this stuff, from different locations for the healing at a distance and contradictory Nativities that make no sense, to a Transfiguration that John has never heard of to a raising of lazarus that nobody But John has heard of.

This is not permissible memory glitches, this is elaboration of a basic story (itself open to question) and is identiable as Greco - Roman Christian propaganda, and I will argue for that in nearly every point of the gospels.

[AchillesHeel]

You sure do if you want to establish the antecedent in the premise: what Irenaeus says is true. How do you propose to establish that what Irenaeus says is true without Irenaeus’ reliability?

I was assuming the person I was responding to endorsed Irenaeus' reliability. If he did, then we are able to derive a contradiction.

There is no derived contradiction from your argument, you’ve only argued for it being “at least partially false.” If you think there is a contradiction to be derived, go ahead and spell it out logically for me.

I interpreted the original claim as asserting that the writing of the gospels occurred while all key witnesses were alive.

The claim from Irenaeus indicates that at least some of the gospels were written after key witnesses (Peter and Paul) had died.

Since both claims cannot be true at the same time, there is a logical contradiction. If the gospels were indeed written after the deaths of Peter and Paul, then it cannot be said that they were all written while all witnesses were still alive.

The rule of inference is modus tollens.

(If P, then Q):
P: The Gospels were written during the lifetimes of the witnesses.
Q: Key witnesses (Peter and Paul) were alive when the Gospels were written.

(Not Q):
According to Irenaeus, Mark wrote after the deaths of Peter and Paul.
This implies key witnesses (Peter and Paul) were not alive when at least some of the Gospels were written.

(Therefore, not P):
Therefore, it is not true that "the Gospels were written during the lifetimes of the witnesses."

You aren’t addressing the two arguments here for Irenaeus’ comparative reliability.

Sorry, for the copy/paste but I feel this is a sufficient rebuttal.

"Also, the first person who attests to authorship of the four Gospels, Irenaeus, is an extremely problematic source when we can fact-check him. For example, he thinks that Jesus died when he was almost fifty under the reign of Claudius. And he explicitly says that this is something he confirmed with the presbyters of Asia who knew the apostles. What? By the time Claudius took power, both Pilate and Caiaphas were already out of office!

If you actually read the passage, you see clearly what Irenaeus is doing - he read that in John, the Jews point out how Jesus is not even fifty. He then flashes out an entire theology about how the Saviour needed to go through all phases of human life including old age because otherwise his salvific power would not be able to work on people of all ages (complete hogwash). From that he concludes that Jesus must have died when he was almost fifty (which, if you do the math from the beginning of Jesus' ministry in his thirties, according to Luke, incorrectly places his death to the reign of Claudius). And then he claims this was verified by a chain of witnesses.

This is massive red flag because you have to remember that Jesus dying when he was almost fifty is one of the only pieces of information which supposedly came from a line of eyewitnesses independently from the Gospels. This is one of the rare opportunities to see how the "oral tradition" (as opposed to just reading a written text) was propagated. And what we see is not only that what is supposedly transmitted in the oral tradition is, you know, not true, it even looks like the reason why the entire claim of the chain witnesses is appealed to in the first place is to lend artificial credibility to what are clearly just Ireneaus' own theological speculations based on bits and pieces he's pulling from the Gospels (i.e., written texts)."- kamilgregor

Obfuscation isn’t much of an argument. What other sources say are irrelevant to my arguments here regarding Irenaeus’ relative reliability.

If the gospel of John had other attributed authors then that is entirely relevant to Irenaeus' reliability when it comes to what he says about the author of John.

"1. The Alogi rejected it as written by Cerinthus.
2. Only later, Irenaeus was the first who claimed it was written by John (it's unclear which John he has in mind, possibly John son of Zebedee) against Cerinthus.
3. Around the same time, Polycrates of Ephesus claims that the Beloved Disciple was someone named John who wore the sacerdotal plate (meaning he was a Temple priest) and who had died in Ephesus. Clearly, this is neither John son of Zebedee nor Cerinthus.
4. The Anti-Marcionite Prologues to the Gospels (difficult to date but could be as early as 2nd century) claim that the Gospel was dictated to Papias of Hierapolis by someone named John and that person was alive in 140s to excommunicate Marcion of Sinope. So clearly that could not have been a disciple of Jesus.
Can you show me any other text from antiquity which was attributed to four different authors within a century or two after its composition but scholars still think we know who actually wrote it?" - kamilgregor

Why is Irenaeus any more reliable than these sources on the author of John?

That claim emerged late in the second century by the Alogi.

Irenaeus wrote late second century too...

Unless that church father evidence helps your argument right? Let’s not forget you first introduced Irenaeus to counter Mae von H’s argument.

The person gave no argument. They just made an assertion without any evidence whatsoever. It doesn't matter one way or the other if Irenaeus was right on this. There is no evidence any of the key "witnesses" survived past the Jewish War which the gospels all post date on internal grounds. The gospels being "written within the lifetimes of the witnesses" is a non-sequitur as it doesn't follow the texts themselves contain any eyewitness testimony or that the eyewitnesses would have wholly endorsed the narratives.

Though internal evidence is valuable it is only one line of evidence when determining authorship of any ancient text. Any methodology that simply hand waives aside the external historical record is just a bad way of doing history. In fact, it’s not even doing history at all.

I'm not handwaving it away. I just think the internal evidence should be given more weight given those are the documents claimed to have been written by eyewitnesses or have eyewitness testimony contained within them. A person writing over 100 years later who is engaged in polemical disputes against people he labeled "heretics" is not exactly the most objective source you can appeal to.

The internal evidence is consistent with the traditional attributions of authorship.

That's not what I claimed. Eyewitness accounts should largely agree with one another. That's what I meant by "consistent." The "internal evidence" is also consistent with the documents being written anonymously so these claims just cancel each other out leaving us right back where we started.

You’re Begging the Question. How do you know those non-Christian works are legitimate eyewitness accounts? The link you gave makes a circular argument. On the one hand it cites a number of second century texts that are thought to be pseudepigraphical even though they internally claim authorship. Then it cites a number of texts that internally either claim authorship or eyewitness status as though they really are written by either eyewitnesses or the authors that make the claims. The salient question you need to answer is what is your methodology for determining an eyewitness account? Surely it can't merely be that it internally claims that as your link demonstrates. Your preference for internal evidence breaks down here.

LOL! Nice attempt at spinning this around on me but it's not going to work. I cited ancient historians and historical literature that explicitly claim to be eyewitnesses or make sure to cite it when available due to its importance. This establishes what the common practice was. By questioning the legitimacy of those non-Christian works as eyewitness accounts, you are shifting the burden of proof onto me and moving the goalposts to prove the legitimacy of these ancient historical accounts, rather than addressing the original point that the gospels do not explicitly claim to be eyewitness accounts. The burden of proof remains on you to explain why the gospels should be considered eyewitness accounts if they do not follow the common ancient practice of explicitly citing or claiming eyewitness testimony. If the gospels don't meet this standard, the onus is on those arguing for the gospels' eyewitness status to explain why they should be considered as such despite not following this practice. So make no mistake, this is a problem for you, not me.

Your response backfires because I can turn this around on you easily. What is your methodology for determining that the gospels contain eyewitness testimony? If you rely on uncorroborated internal or external claims - by your own logic, this would also be circular reasoning unless you can independently verify that these claims are legitimate. If you question the legitimacy of non-Christian works despite their explicit claims of eyewitness testimony, you should apply the same skepticism to the gospels, which do not even make such explicit claims.

In any case, you’re going to have a very difficult time defending “always.” The list you linked to is cherry picked evidence and does not represent every work from antiquity so it doesn’t establish “always.” But let’s take your assertion that historical literature always made sure to cite eyewitness testimony when it was available and let’s look at Tacitus’ Agricola from the list in the link you provided to test this assertion. It’s a good case for comparison because it’s a biography written near the time of the Gospels by someone who was apparently close to the subject and a professional historian.

How many examples are sufficient? Over 20 were supplied. Asking me to "represent every work from antiquity" is quite unreasonable. The examples supplied show what the common practice was and you haven't disputed that.

"Meanwhile this book, intended to do honour to Agricola, my father-in-law, will, as an expression of filial regard, be commended, or at least excused." [Tacitus: Agricola. 3]

This incidental mention in chapter three that Agricola is the author’s father in law isn’t an explicit claim to authorship. You don't get to argue as though it was an expected convention for ancient authors to make these kind of disclosures and then point to what seem to be happenstance instances. Nowhere in the text proper does Tacitus explicitly name himself as the author. Rather it’s this piece of information that tells us Tacitus was the son-in-law of Agricola assuming that Tacitus did indeed write Agricola, which you would need to establish. You would need to turn to external evidence to establish that Tacitus was the author. Your preference for internal evidence doesn’t get you far here.

You're again misdirecting to something that I wasn't arguing for - a "claim of authorship" which misses the point. The author points out his relationship to the person in question. By making this personal connection, the author is establishing his authority and credibility as someone who had a close relationship with Agricola. This strengthens the reader's trust in the account, as it implies he had firsthand knowledge or access to reliable information about Agricola. This is something that doesn't happen anywhere in the New Testament except for when Paul says he met Peter and James. Why doesn't Mark just say he knew Peter or that Matthew knew Jesus? That's what we would expect given the common practice as shown by the numerous other examples where an author does something similar to relate himself to a person or events.

We already know, from the authors in the list you linked to, that it wasn’t unprecedented for a firsthand account to be narrated in the third person. For example Josephus in his Jewish Wars narrates his part in the war in the third person. We could add other sources such as Caesar’s Gallic War commentaries and Nicolaus of Damascus’ autobiography which were likewise written in the third person.

No, I didn't say anything about the accounts being written in third person - misdirecting yet again. Josephus identifies himself as the author of Jewish Wars in the first person in JW 1.3 and also at the prologue of Antiquities. The Gallic War has first person narration at least once which is more than the gospels.

Oh I see, when Luke meets your standard it’s dismissed as mimicking. Gotchya. Even if we grant that Luke redacted Mark that doesn’t allow you to dismiss Luke wholesale.

He doesn't meet the standard though. He's reliant upon Mark which doesn't meet the standard of ancient eyewitness testimony as previously demonstrated and he is a dishonest redactor. The most egregious examples are how he removes all of the imminence of the Kingdom of God arriving from Mark and completely erases any trace of the earlier Galilean appearance tradition.

There is plenty of material in Luke unique to Luke which includes the resurrection narratives.

"Unique" is tantamount to saying "uncorroborated" and the unique material looks embellished compared to what Paul, Mark and Matthew report in regards to the resurrection appearances.

And when John meets the standard it’s “not convincing” and waived aside. We can apply this kind of reasoning to virtually any work from antiquity that internally claims to be written by a witness or by any particular person of authority.

Again, this isn't a problem for me. It's a problem for early Christian literature. If there were other Christian sources claiming to be from eyewitnesses that weren't, then that trend of falsely attributing authorship had to start somewhere. Why not with Luke and John? It seems the only difference is those two made it into the canon while the apocryphal gospels did not.

Well so what? You’ve got a number of very debatable premises undergirding your overall argument. And how exactly do other eyewitness accounts look then?

Consistency in the story they tell is the bare minimum. And we've established that the earliest gospels do not meet the standard for eyewitness testimony as found in the historical genre. Also, saying I'm using "debatable premises" while simultaneously rejecting Markan priority is laughable.

Having “the most scholarly support” doesn’t establish this key premise though. It’s a sufficient reason to believe a premise but not to prove one.

By making the move to deny Markan priority you're implicitly acknowledging that placing the gospels in the scholarly consensus order would support my argument about the development of the resurrection narratives. Your need to reorder the gospels to avoid this implication suggests you understand that the consensus order poses a significant challenge to your view.

Your incredulity is not a counter argument. Nor is a demand for further evidence. And besides, you already accept that Matthew pared down Mark at some points; you have to in order to hold Markan priority (e.g. Matt 8:28/Mark 5:2-5, Matt 9:2/Mark 2:2-5, Matt 9:20-22/Mark 5:24-34).

Those are three examples of "pared down" in the sense that they are "edited" but I thought you were using the phrase as getting rid of the story entirely because that's what you have to believe Mark did if he was copying from Matthew in the examples I gave. You simply have no explanation for the omission choices Mark made here which is a weakness in your hypothesis. On Markan priority, however, the additions by Matthew are much easier to explain.

Read the anonymous biographies Brutus (36, 48, 52) and Caesar (69) which are attributed to Plutarch. The accounts of the phantom visiting Brutus and his subsequent suicide are significantly pared down in Caesar to just a few sentences even though there are important details we might expect to be mentioned. Indeed, the two accounts are so different that an uncharitable reader might argue the author was contradicting himself or could use it as evidence to argue they were not written by the same person.

And are these regarded as historically accurate eyewitness accounts without embellishment? It is my understanding that Plutarch's style emphasized moral character and philosophical insights over strict historical accuracy.

Yet, sceptics often take the reliability of these sources for granted and use them to argue the character and actions of Pilate in the Gospels are implausible.

Well, it's pretty telling that every time Pilate is mentioned in Philo and Josephus it's for something he did to piss off the Jews. He's never painted in a positive light by either author. Contrast that with his depiction in the gospels and there is an obvious inconsistency. The trial before Pilate scene is another obvious case of progressive embellishment. Read in the order of Mark 15:1-15, Matthew 27:11-26, Luke 23:1-25 and John 18:28-19:42 there is an ever growing trend of trying to whitewash Pilate's role in Jesus' death by giving Jesus more and more opportunities to not be at fault. Also, compare Jesus' near complete silence in Mark's version to their full on philosophical conversation in John's!

It's an abrupt ending to be sure, which has led some to think we have lost the original ending to Mark. We can only speculate as to why any author would write the way he did. Even if Mark did originally end at 16:8 it’s worth mentioning he does explicitly state Jesus has risen and there will be appearances. He just doesn't flesh the narratives out as do Matthew, Luke and John. Which was not unprecedented as evidenced by the preaching found in the book of Acts. It likewise does not flesh out the appearances (Acts 2:32; 3:15; 10:40-41; 13:30-31).

That wasn't the point of Acts. The same author had already provided a Resurrection narrative as pointed out in Acts 1:1-3 so why would he do it again? Acts 10:41 does include the "ate and drank with the Risen Lord" tradition.

Why does that make him a liar?

Because the texts he was reading/copying from say the women told the disciples right after leaving the tomb! Saying they "left and told no one" makes him a liar!

It’s an awkward way to end, sure. But Mark wrote that the women said nothing to anyone because they were afraid. The initial fear is quite understandable, they had just met an angel after all. But there's no reason to think that fear was permanent.

But the accounts are still contradictory. No story says "at first they were afraid and didn't tell anyone but then they did." That is making up your own version of events.

Mark doesn’t say the women said nothing to anyone ever. There's no reason to think the women wouldn't go tell the disciples, as they had been instructed to do by the angel, once the initial fear gave way to joy and excitement.

Mark doesn’t say the women told anyone eventually. Mark uses a double negative οὐδενὶ οὐδὲν. Elsewhere Mark uses the conjunction εἰ μὴ "but/except" but not in this case - Mk. 2:26, 5:37, 6:4-5, 6:8, 9:8-9, 9:29, 10:18, 11:13, 13:32.

Those who argue for Matthean priority would point out roughly seventeen texts in Mark such as the following supporting an argument from conflation:

These numbers are not that impressive when you look at the broader picture. See Tuckett, The Revival of the Griesbach Hypothesis pp. 20-21

"For the GH, there is nothing to disprove the theory, but equally nothing to support it. Mark's pleonastic style can only be explained by his conflating his two sources in 17 out of 213 cases. He could have taken over a dual expression from one of his sources in 49 cases. But in the remaining 147, he must have created the duplicate expression himself, either by adding a redundant second half to a phrase from one of his sources, or by creating both halves himself. Thus the vast majority of instances of Mark's pleonasms must, on either hypothesis, be due to Mark's own style. By the criterion of coherence, neither hypothesis is shown to be preferable, although the GH must explain why Mark does not conflate his sources more often, especially when he is presented with the opportunity in his sources."

Scholars don't find the "conflation" hypothesis convincing for these reasons:

"In particular stories in triple tradition passages, Mark is in fact typically longer. The argument is rather that it seems more convincing that Matthew and Luke would expand Mark by adding birth and resurrection stories and additional sayings material rather than Mark would omit them....Likewise, difficult Markan stories such as Jesus' family considering him mentally unbalanced (Mark 3:30-31) and Jesus requiring two attempts to heal a blind man (Mark 8:22-26) can understandably have been omitted by Matthew and Luke, but it is difficult to think of Mark making difficulties for himself and his readers by adding these stories after omitting so much else Matthew and Luke have in common." M. Eugene Boring - An Introduction to the New Testament: History, Literature, Theology, p. 483

"It is difficult to explain why Mark would lengthen individual pericopes from the other two Gospels and then eliminate such important material. It is easier to explain Matthew and Luke expanding Mark than Mark abbreviating Matthew and Luke at the expense of such significant testimonies to Jesus." - The Cradle, the Cross, and the Crown: An Introduction to the New Testament

For more reasons, see Christopher Tuckett's From the Sayings to the Gospels pp. 96-98

Have you thought about the implications this has for Papias testimony who says Mark's source was Peter? After eliminating all the stuff Mark "conflated" from Matthew and Luke, how much is left? And does it comport with what we'd expect to come from Peter? Does any of "conflated" stuff involve Peter? If it does, that would be a problem as there would be no need to conflate written sources when you had access to the eyewitness himself.

Mark also has more difficult texts which do not make sense if he was writing after Matthew. The more difficult or embarrassing text is generally regarded as the earlier one.

Both Mark 1 and Matthew 3 open up with a citation attributed to Isaiah but Mark's version includes Malachi 3:1. Matthew correctly has just the Isaiah passage. Now, does it make more sense for Mark to be copying Matthew (who has the correct attribution) but end up writing down the wrong one since he includes a verse from Malachi? Or does it make more sense for Matthew to copy Mark and drop the incorrect passage from Malachi? Obviously, the latter is correct.

Mark 1:28 says news about Jesus spread over the whole region of Galilee. Matthew 4:24 says news about him spread all over Syria. So under Markan posterity, Mark lessens Jesus popularity! This is not plausible.

Jesus' family considers him mentally unbalanced (Mark 3:30-31) and Jesus requires two attempts to heal a blind man (Mark 8:22-26) both of which are omitted from Matthew and Luke.

In Mark 2:26, the wrong high priest is mentioned. Abiathar was not the high priest, Ahimelech was - 1 Sam 21:1-7. Matthew 12:3 does not have the name Abiathar. So Mark copied Matthew's verse but added the wrong name? Or Matthew copied Mark's verse and omits the wrong name? Again, the latter makes sense.

Mark 6:14 calls Herod a "king." Matthew 14:1 and Luke 9:7 correctly call Herod a tetrarch. Thus, Matthew and Luke were correcting Mark's error. It does not make sense for Mark to be copying the correct title but get it wrong in his text. See Mark Goodacre's article on Editorial Fatigue.

Mark 10:18
“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.

Matthew 19:17
“Why do you ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One who is good. If you want to enter life, keep the commandments.”

Why would Mark copy the latter but change the phrasing to make it seem like Jesus was saying he wasn't good? It makes more sense the other way around - Matthew edits Mark in order to smooth it over.

The Markan Jesus seems to expect an imminent Parousia like Paul (our earliest source) does - 1 Thess 4:15-17, 1 Cor 7:29, 10:11, 1 Cor 15:51-52, Rom. 13:12. Jesus' answer to the question in Mk. 13:4 connects the events to an imminent Parousia without any temporal interruption. Now notice how in Matthew 24:3 the question is changed to separate the "signs of the end times" from the destruction of the Temple. Matthew 24:43, 48; 25:5, 19 all add a theme of delay to the mix. This supports the idea that Matthew is writing after Mark as enough time had passed from 70 AD that the return of the Son of Man had to be treated as a separate event that the disciples were still waiting for. Now go on to Luke who basically redacts/removes all of the imminent statements from the Markan Jesus - Mk. 1:15/Lk.4:43, Mk. 9:1/Lk. 9:27, Mk. 13:5-6/Lk. 21:8-9, Mk. 14:62/Lk. 22:69. Then in John all of the imminent eschatology is basically non-existent. John 21:22-23, 2 Thess 2 and 2 Peter 3 all have to make excuses for why the end hadn't come yet. This is because the earliest Christians believed the Kingdom of God was going to "appear immediately" - Lk. 19:11. When that didn't happen, the predictions had to be rewritten/erased.

So the point is you'd have to believe Mark read Matthew and Luke but made Jesus more of an imminent apocalypticist which seems implausible. There are loads of problems like this that are created from positing Mark was posterior. You have to play an endless game of whack-a-mole. For these reasons, Markan priority reigns supreme as it has no difficulty explaining all the data.

Oh I see how this works now. When you point to the addition of the virgin birth in Matthew to show legendary growth from Mark that’s a good argument. On the other hand, when I point to John dropping the darkening of the sun and tearing of the temple veil found in Luke’s crucifixion account to argue against legendary growth, well, that’s a red herring.

My original post was a comparative analysis of the Resurrection narratives. In this comment you asked:

What do you mean by “empirical observation of Matthew's additions to Mark's narrative”?

To which I responded with the Matthean additions to Mark overall. It seems you're expecting a straight linear line with regards to growth but that's now how anything ever works. There is only a high positive correlation when it comes to growth. For instance, while John may not mention certain things, John can arguably be the most "developed" overall due to the highly developed Logos Christology and high Christological statements which are absent from the synoptics, Jesus performs totally different miracles, there is a unique/developed teaching of the Holy Spirit, then of course there is the teleporting through locked doors incident, the Doubting Thomas story and the miraculous catch of 153 fish! There are also Jn. 20:30 and 21:25 which are smoking gun evidence that the author had no problem mentioning legendary material. Oh, and there's the fact that the author refers to the "Jews" dozens of times, many of which are in a derogatory sense when the synoptics were careful to point out Jesus' opponents were the Chief Priest, scribes and Pharisees. Did the author of John just forget both he and Jesus were Jewish?

The burden is upon you to prove your argument, not on me to disprove it.

1. Reliable eyewitness testimony does not look like a legend evolving.
2. The gospel resurrection narratives look like a legend evolving.
3. Therefore, the gospel resurrection narratives are not reliable eyewitness testimony.

I gave at least one with Pilate’s erecting Roman standards in Jerusalem reported by Philo and Josephus.

Earlier, you wrote:

The two authors are so contradictory it’s caused some scholars to question whether they are even reporting the same event.

So you'd have to first establish they are both in fact referring to the same event in order to proceed.

But you aren't merely making an under cutting argument. You are trying to make the argument that the Resurrection narratives cannot be eyewitness testimony. It's the title of your OP remember? If you can't establish that Paul held to an immaterial resurrected Jesus, then the first premise in your argument regarding Paul fails and your entire argument stalls out in first gear.

Yes, if Paul was equating his visionary experience with the other "appearances" (a likely reading of 1 Cor 15) then no one actually witnessed or hallucinated a physically resurrected corpse that was touched or seen floating off to heaven. Again, I don't need to establish Paul held to an "immaterial resurrected Jesus." That is a complete straw man. Rather, it is on you to establish that Paul was referring to the physical encounters we see later on in Luke and John.

[AchillesHeel]

I'm not ignoring it, I'm trying to decipher what : The evolution of the "resurrection story". IS !Right there in the OP you state it (I presume said evolution) began with Paul in the 50's, correct? Is it not appropriate to ask you what you think began in the 50s and how?

JW

Did you read the comparative analysis of the resurrection narratives? Here is a summary:

None of the resurrection narratives from the gospels match Paul's appearance chronology from 1 Cor 15:5-8. The story evolves from what seems to be Paul's spiritual/mystical Christ who is experienced through visions/revelations from heaven, to a missing body story in Mark without an appearance narrative, to a "doubted" appearance in Galilee in Matthew, to a totally different and much more realistic/corporeal appearance (no more doubting) in Luke (followed by a witnessed ascension in a totally different location), to a teleporting Jesus that invites Thomas to poke his wounds to prove it's really the Resurrected Jesus in John (the theme of doubt is overcome). The last two stories have clearly stated apologetic reasons for invention.

Given the fact that the story grows in the telling, this makes it entirely inappropriate to read the gospel resurrection narratives into 1 Cor 15:5-8 because you're likely reading in later legendary material that never took place.

[TRANSPONDER]

That's all good stuff and very informative. I have long had doubts about the assumptions of the early writers.We (we ( have seen how the Bible - n believers airily assume what the gospels appear to relate is trustworthy. There is no reason to suppose the church fathers knew for certain what they took as being true.

One of them claimed to hear from someone who knew John the evangelist. If so I don't got the truth or passed it on because John is invention and contradiction, and that is harder truth that church father claims that Mark got the gospel from Peter.

Similarly Irenaeus I think claimed to have seen a gospel of Matthew in Caesarea. And maybe he did see a version of it. The Synoptic original or the version used by Mark and Matthew, but not Luke (because of the Great omission and some other stuff not there, like the shedding of the fig leaf). But that - if it was anything like the present synoptics - is not reliable because it is full of contradictions, Christian propaganda and prediction of a war that (if one rejects prophecy, and I do) means the basic gospel in the sparsest form had to date after 80 AD.


So some disciples might have still been alive, or people who sat at their feet taking notes (1). But it cannot have happened as in the gospels, not even in the common original, which in basics - John grovelling to Jesus as the Real messiah, shifting from Nazareth to Capernaum, the feeding of 5,000...oh yes, there is NOTHING according to john between those events... and the events of Holy week, all of which are (I am pretty convinced) a failed messianic attempt, and through attempted insurrection, too, and a Roman execution with the Christian writers trying to excuse Rome and blame the Jews, and you may bet on that as sure as Kamala taking Georgia, which means that even the bare bones of the story - not just the synoptic version - was Christian propaganda written after 80 AD and the later gospels, even Mark, which is not the synoptic original as maintained or accepted as so by those who ought to know better.

I'd say that Mathew is even later than John as John has never heard of the Nativity (he has never heard of the transfiguration, either) and Luke is surely that last with not only w extensive additions, but a whole new chapter, because he, of all of them, knew that Paul had pretty much invented Christianity on his own. And what's more. I can't shake the suspicion that John and Luke knew what had really happened at Holy Week and tried to cover it up even more than the synoptic original did.

Personal theory, if not 'Pet' theory, of course

(1) "Mary Magdalene, well we all twelve adored her , but she was Jesus' special girl you know. I don't know whether Jesus already knew her, from when he ran with that Bethsaida democratic league in Magdala, but when he met her at that well in Samaria, he had her number ok."

"Sir, I have no husband, let alone five."

"You have now" He said...are you taking all this down correctly?"

"Sort of.."

[Difflugia]

One of them claimed to hear from someone who knew John the evangelist. If so I don't got the truth or passed it on because John is invention and contradiction, and that is harder truth that church father claims that Mark got the gospel from Peter.

Being John seems to have been a sort of cottage industry in the late first and early second centuries. The Church Fathers seem to have known of several, but whose stories don't really seem to mesh. Eusebius tried to make sense of this by attempting to match various Johns with which Church Fathers they knew and which Johannine books they wrote. That might explain why some traditions said he was martyred, yet he was still alive many decades after sidekicking for Jesus.