The Alleged Resurrection of Jesus

[Haven]

Evangelical Christian apologists often assert that the bodily resurrection of Jesus is the best explanation of the "minimal facts" "evidence" -- the existence of Jesus, his preaching ministry, his execution, the empty tomb, and the post-resurrection "visions" of the apostles. Apologists point out that the majority of modern non-evangelical academic Biblical scholars who reject the resurrection (for instance, Marcus Borg and Bart Ehrman) accept these "minimal facts" events occurred. This so-called "minimal facts approach" is pushed by academics and fundamentalist apologists such as W.L. Craig, J.P. Moreland, Craig Blomberg, Mike Licona, and Gary Habermas, who claim only a physical resurrection could explain these facts. They point out (correctly, in my opinion) the flaws in popular naturalistic or pseudo-naturalistic hypotheses, such as the "stolen body view" (which states the disciples stole Jesus' body), the "visionary hypothesis" (which states God caused the disciples to have visions of a risen Jesus), the "Jesus myth view" (which states Jesus never existed), and the "hallucination hypothesis" (which attributes the resurrection appearances to mass hallucinations by the apostles).

However, even if we grant the apologists' "minimal facts," which are based on nothing but the interdependent, inconsistent religious writings known as the gospels, this is not the case for several reasons:

1) Apologists depend on an inerrant reading of the gospel accounts to defend their resurrection belief. They assume that the gospels accurately report on the "post-resurrection appearances" and the apostles' visions, when in fact, it is likely such visions and appearances were legendary accretions. Contrary to the claims of apologists, legendary accretion can occur in a relatively short period of time. For instance, legends about Elvis' survival sprung up within a year of his death, and numerous individuals have reported seeing Elvis alive over the past 35 years. As most scholars agree the gospels were written between 40 and 70 years after Jesus' execution, they could certainly contain legendary accretions. Additionally, the Elvis legends sprung up in the age of television, radio, telephones, and computers, when such legends would have been trivial to debunk, unlike the Jesus legends, which sprung up in the premodern era.

2) Even if the tomb was empty (which is disputed by many scholars), there exists a perfectly plausible explanation for the missing body. The tomb's owner, identified as "Joseph of Arimathea" in the gospels (this name is unlikely, as "Arimathea" was almost certainly a fictional location), did not desire to inter the body of an executed "criminal" in his family's gravesite. Therefore, he moved Jesus' body shortly after it was left there by the disciples. When Jesus' followers returned on "Sunday" (Saturday according to the gospel of John), they found the body missing and eventually surmised that he came back from the grave.

Debate question: Do you agree that these explanations explain the so-called "resurrection" of Jesus? Is a bodily resurrection the "best explanation of the evidence?" Do you have an alternative explanation for what happened to Jesus' body?

[OpiatefortheMasses]

Well;, Paul wrote that there were a bunch of eye witnesses.. yet.. he didnt' say who those eye witnesses are, what they said, and NONE OF THOSE ALLEGED eye witnesses actually wrote anything down.

There seems to be a BIG difference between the claim for an eye witness, and there actually being an eye witness.

David Copperfield also made the space shuttle disappear. Eyewitnesses saw it. Does that mean it was something more than an illusion?

I think it's more believable that a group of people bribed the authorities to allow them access to the body, smuggled it out and buried him in secrecy, and then spread rumors that he was resurrected to his followers who honestly would have little reason to disbelieve it. I can see that being planned and executed in 3 days. Either way, infinitely more probable than the story itself.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

And there were how many eyewitnesses to this event?

How many direct eyewitnesses were there to the resurrection of Jesus? That would be NONE! None that mentioned it at any rate, at the time event was supposed to have occurred. No one mentioned it at all for the first quarter of a century after the time frame established by the Gospels for the execution of Jesus in fact. 1 Corinthians represents the earliest ever mention of the resurrection of Jesus, and it was written just about a quarter of a century the execution of Jesus was supposed to have occurred. Paul says that "above 500" disciples witnessed the resurrected Jesus on one particular occasion, but Paul was not himself present at the event he describes, was not in fact present to personally witness ANY of the events described in the Gospels, nor did Paul ever personally meet Jesus. So you see we don't actually have 500 eyewitnesses at all. We have A STORY of 500 eyewitnesses provided years after the fact by an individual who was not himself present. STORIES of events are known as "hearsay" and are most definitely NOT admissible in court. At the time the event was supposed to have occurred however, and for the first quarter of a century afterward, no one claimed to have witnessed anything. According to Matthew 27:52-53 the streets were teaming with resurrected dead people, and yet no one mentioned THAT at the time either. How very odd! But then people do generally fail to mention things which never occurred. Dead people roaming the streets though... well one would think THAT would have provoked some notice.

The problem is, most of what you have been conditioned your entire life to accept without question, doesn't hold up to actual scrutiny, and it concludes with a reanimated corpse flying off up into the sky. See the problem?

[Student]

The authors of the gospel account were clearly aware of the risks associated with daring to request the release of the body of a condemned rebel (let alone giving the body a decent burial). The Roman Prefect would himself have come under suspicion should he have acquiesced to such a request. He would also have to answer for failing to punish someone who clearly sympathised with a known rebel leader. The most likely outcome would have been for the petitioner to join the lately deceased on an adjacent cross.

I believe the objective of the evangelists was to exonerate the Romans from all responsibility for executing Jesus so as to avoid alienating Rome, and potential Roman converts. So, the story goes, although the Romans certainly executed Jesus they really didn’t want to do it, the old softies. It was the naughty Jews, their leaders and general populace, who insisted, several times, that the Romans do it. In the end the Romans just had to give in and do the deed.

Student, your theory is brilliant, but I have a few issues I think I can advance against it.

Hello Haven
I’m sorry I haven’t responded sooner but I’ve been somewhat busy. Unfortunately the powers that be have this rather quaint notion that in return for the meagre stipend they lavish upon me I should do something called ‘work’. As if being graced by my very presence were not enough!

1) If Jesus never made it to the tomb, then why are there three probably independent accounts (the synoptics, John, and Paul) of Jesus' burial? The tomb story is unlikely to be a total fabrication for reasons Mithrae highlighted earlier (the lack of a witness to the resurrection, the women as the first witnesses to the empty tomb, the Jewish custom against leaving corpses out on the Passover, etc.).

As far as can be ascertained, the earliest confessional statement was simply that:
a. Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures;
b. he was buried
and
c. that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures

The first thing to note in this confession is that there is no mention of an empty tomb or of its discovery by women.

Furthermore, although Jesus died and rose again “according to the scriptures� it is simply stated that he was buried. The significant events are therefore that Jesus died and that he was subsequently resurrected – the burial gets barely more than a casual mention.

From this we can deduce that details of the burial were not central to the earliest Christians belief in the resurrection. The concept to the empty tomb played no part at all.

It only became necessary to elaborate the burial and introduce the empty tomb motifs to refute claims that Jesus hadn’t died, and that rather than having been “resurrected� Jesus had simply been “resuscitated�. To counter this argument it was necessary to emphasise that Jesus had really died and that he had really been buried. Hence Mark’s brilliant invention of Joseph of Arimathea, who recovers the body, and the same women who witness the burial discover the empty tomb, thereby ensuring that Jesus was actually dead and refuting the accusation that they had subsequently visited the wrong tomb.
The discovery of the empty tomb thereby ‘proving’ that Jesus’ body had been resurrected.

However, this raised another question; why wasn’t the empty tomb part of the original confession? Mark once again comes to the rescue and demonstrates his literary genius: the women don’t tell anyone about what they had seen!

16:8 “And they went out and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them; and they said nothing to any one, for they were afraid�.

“The Greek here would naturally mean: ‘they kept their experiences to themselves’, ‘they said nothing to anyone about what they had heard’, rather than ‘they did not (for the time being) deliver their message, and so it is not easy to see, after this very definite and solemn statement (in the Greek it is very emphatic), how a transition could have been effected to any scene of the sort depicted in the other Gospels.�(D.E.Nineham; The Gospel of Mark; p. 447)

In fact the only way the other gospels can develop their resurrection themes is to discard the last sentence in its entirety as they twist and turn with their highly original and highly diverse accounts of the discovery of the empty tomb, the number and names of the women, the number of angels, what subsequently transpired with the women/woman, and the various adventures of the resurrected Jesus etc.

These variations show that the burial/post burial events were not part of the earliest oral traditions – subsequent authors felt under no constraint and freely modified the story, as they felt fit, to conform to their particular imperatives.

2) How would Jesus' disciples conclude that he was resurrected if his body simply hung on the cross for weeks before it was moved to a mass grave? Any claims of resurrection would be quickly refuted by pointing to Jesus' body hanging on the cross. Are you arguing the disciples believed the resurrection was purely spiritual?

For the disciples to see Jesus body on the cross they would have had to remain in or around Jerusalem. According to the biblical accounts the disciples all fled. They were well advised to do so. From the historical record we know that when dealing with messianic claimants the normal Roman practice was to capture and execute the leader along with as many of his followers as they could round up. According to Josephus, various messianic claimants were executed along with some 2000 of their followers by Varus in 4BCE.

So, beyond the fact that Jesus was crucified, the surviving disciples had no idea where Jesus was crucified, or exactly when he died, or what subsequently happened to the body. As Crossan puts it, those that cared didn’t know and those that knew didn’t care.

The earliest tradition therefore was little more than a statement that Jesus had been buried. Perhaps there was an unstated hope that Jesus had been accorded a decent burial. The gospels accounts transform this hope of burial by his enemies into a narrative in which he is buried by his friends with ever more elaborate details of the burial rituals with each subsequent account e.g. Mark is emphatic that there was no anointing of the corpse; compare this with John 19:39ff.

We should not underestimate the ‘prophetic’ influence of the Old Testament in the development of these accounts.

Regarding the risen Christ, according to Paul, it was as a ‘spiritual body’, and not a physical one. It would appear that in Paul’s opinion his experience of the risen Christ, other than being later than that of James, Peter, the twelve and the 500, was in no way inferior to their experience i.e. the common experience of the resurrected Christ was with a ‘spiritual body’.

As an aside, in my opinion, one of the most singular problems with the post resurrection accounts in the gospels is the fact that Jesus only appears to his followers. He does not present himself to either the Roman authorities or, as he most certainly should have, to the Jewish authorities, in particular, the High Priest.

[Student]

Upon what evidence do you make this claim?

Most scholars agree the 1 Cor. 15 creed was formulated no less than five years after Jesus' death.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1_Corinthians_15

Surely it is faintly ridiculous to ascribe such a precise date as to when the confession was formulated, given that no-one knows with any certainty the date when Jesus was crucified.

Assuming Jesus was crucified whilst Pilate was prefect, then the terminus a quo is between 26CE and 36CE. The terminus ad quem is the composition of 1Corinthians which is variously ascribed as sometime between 50CE and 60CE.

[Student]

The authors of the gospel account were clearly aware of the risks associated with daring to request the release of the body of a condemned rebel (let alone giving the body a decent burial). The Roman Prefect would himself have come under suspicion should he have acquiesced to such a request. He would also have to answer for failing to punish someone who clearly sympathised with a known rebel leader. The most likely outcome would have been for the petitioner to join the lately deceased on an adjacent cross.

Where is the evidence that Jesus was a rebel leader?

Anyone claiming to be the Messiah, would in effect be claiming to be the King of the Jews, and therefore, in the eyes of the Romans would be rebelling against their rule. If anyone was going to appoint a King of the Jews it was going to be Rome.

The Romans had considerable experience of Messianic claimants and knew that making a bid for national independence was something that was expected from the Messiah. Consequently they crucified quite a number of “Messiah’s� including Judas the Galilean in 6CE together with 2000 of his followers. Later his two sons, Jacob and Simon were arrested and crucified c.47CE on a similar pretext.

Jesus was arrested, probably after the disturbance at the Temple, and executed by the Romans because he was seen as a threat to their rule. The assault on the Temple would be seen as an attempt to disrupt the Roman revenue stream which would be committing an act of sedition and that could have only one outcome.

What did the temple have to do with Roman taxation? I was not aware of this.

That aside, if Jesus had a following as large as the gospels imply there'd probably be a lot of merit to your view. But I think most of us are at least a little sceptical of the thousands of followers he supposedly had, considering the only certain 1st century non-Christian reference is a passing comment on his brother's death. I imagine that the Jews weren't alone in chafing under Roman rule, and I'd be surprised if they went chasing after every person who seemed to represent nationalistic hopes.

Did Jesus claim to be King of the Jews? Did he even publicly proclaim himself to be Messiah? Mark's messianic secret notwithstanding, the gospels suggest at least that some people thought he might be the Messiah. It is possible that the governor had him crucified of his own initiative, but if so the (questionable) evidence at our disposal would imply that it would have been more a case of nipping a possible problem in the bud, rather than some big issue of a "condemned rebel leader" which would endanger his comrades' lives and Pilate's own job if he gave them the body.

However, since I agree that the disturbance at the temple seems likely to be the biggest contributing cause of his arrest (which John therefore moves to the front of his gospel), pending information on how this directly affected the Roman government I'd say it's more likely that the Jewish authorities were the ones to act.

You seem to be ignoring what little evidence we have available and working with the idea that common practice may as well be considered universal practice.

I have not ignored the evidence. I have simply stated what history shows to be the normal Roman practice regarding the disposal of the bodies of rebel leaders.

Normal Roman practice would be a significant factor if there was some big fuss to be made about this "rebel leader." But you can't have a rebel leader without a rebellion, and we have no evidence of that. What we do have, as previously mentioned, are oddities like the fact that there's no claimed witnesses of the actual resurrection ('til gPeter, at least) and women as the first witnesses of the empty tomb, which suggest that the story was not concoted from scratch. Playing a probability game (in the order of a 1 in 20 chance, did we agree?) is not the same as assessing evidence.

The gospels (and Paul) portray Jesus as an apocalyptic prophet and religious teacher, highly critical of the Jewish religious status quo - both the Saducees and Shammai's Pharisees. If he'd gained even a fraction as much popular support as the gospels imply, then started causing disturbances in the temple during Passover, they could be expected to want to do something about him. They weren't allowed to execute anyone, but however insensitive he may have been to the nuances of Jewish religion can you really claim that Pilate would not have granted a request by the priesthood to nip a potentially unsettling situation in the bud? Was he so very concerned about justice that he wouldn't execute a two-bit rabble-rouser from Galilee? Or did he hate the priests so much that he'd leave them and this preacher to keep on agitating the crowds further?

The depictions of Jesus’ arrest, his trial before the Sanhedrin, and subsequently before Pilate, in the gospels accounts are almost certainly spurious. They flatly contradict all that is known of the order of the Sanhedrin at that time (as well as contradicting the depiction of the Sanhedrin later in Acts).

If Jesus had committed blasphemy he wouldn’t have made it out of Galilee let alone getting as far as Jerusalem. As for the claim that the Jewish authorities didn’t have the powers to execute Jesus, this is flatly refuted by their later execution of Stephen (Acts 7). The Romans certainly did not interfere in the execution of local religious laws.

As for Pontius Pilate, in the gospels he is seen as a just, kind, but somewhat weak man who simply gives in to the Jewish demands to execute Jesus, much against his better nature. In secular history he appears to have had an entirely different nature and wouldn’t have given a second thought to ordering the death of another Jewish peasant.

So why did the gospel authors depict Pilate in they way that they do. Why do they deny that the Jewish leaders had the authority to kill Jesus when evidently they did have the necessary powers to kill him by stoning?

You believe that the portrayal in Acts of the Sanhedrin being driven to murderous rage by Stephen's noble testimony is a reliable source for their authority to execute people? If anything, the author is implying that they violated conventions of justice and Stephen was thoroughly innocent (certainly quoting Daniel was not blasphemy!). Moreover it's my understanding that Josephus records concerning the death of Jesus' brother James that a high priest was deposed, when some prominent Jewish citizens complained about it, for presuming to execute someone without the governor's consent. It's certainly plausible, as East of Eden's site suggests, that the Romans may have turned a blind eye at times if Jewish piety got the occasional nobody blasphemer or adulteress killed. But I don't think I've ever seen anyone saying they had the right to do so - quite the opposite - so I'd appreciate a better source for that claim than Acts 7.

That said, both the temple incident and the general character and teachings of Jesus portrayed by the gospels and Paul imply friction with the Jewish authorities rather than Roman. Certainly, the gospels' portrayal of events is coloured by their agenda - Pilate probably nodded through the priests' request in a minute, because his job was to keep the peace. But, in that scenario, we have little reason to suppose that he'd be any more reluctant to hand the body over to the fellow's followers... 'cos his job was to keep the peace.

In my opinion painting Jesus as a rebel leader opposed by Roman authority, rather than a religious teacher opposed by Jewish authority, both lacks any real evidence and raises more questions than it answers.

If we examine what is known of the means of administration of the period, according to Lietzmann:

The procurator was responsible for the rates and taxes, but otherwise the internal government and the legal administration were largely left to the Jews. The Jewish central magistracy, the Sanhedrin, meeting under the presidency of the High Priest, ruled in Judea………

(H. Lietzmann; AHistory of the Early Church; Volume 1; p. 23)

Clearly then, the day to day administration of Judaea was under the control of the Sanhedrin who could exercise the death penalty, should they so wish.

But we can say with some certainty, that the Sanhedrin came to no legal condemnation on the count of blasphemy, for then they would have had to execute Jesus on their own authority by stoning. That was prescribed by the Law, and was accordingly carried out, as we shall see, e.g. in the case of Stephen. It is an error, which the gospels themselves share and have spread, that the Great Sanhedrin did not possess the power to pronounce and carry out capital sentences.
…..the course of events shows that the Jewish authorities, probably on quite good grounds, refrained from dealing with the matter in the form of a religious trial, and preferred to hand Jesus over to the Roman authorities as an insurgent. The procurator, Pontius Pilate, is well known to us from other records…………
……………… Jesus was denounced to him (Pilate) as the “King of the Jews�, which is as much as to say a Messianic agitator in the political sense.

(ibid; p. 60)

Therefore, according to Lietzmann, the Sanhedrin had the authority to execute Jesus if they deemed it necessary; Jesus was executed by the Romans as an insurgent, a Messianic agitator.

The Romans certainly used the Temple as a means to raise revenues.

The High Priest was a Roman appointee so there was no hindrance to Roman access to the funds. From the historical record we know of two occasions when the Jewish population rioted because the Roman Prefect/Procurator was found to have used Temple funds:
Pilate used the Temple treasury to fund the construction of an aqueduct to bring water to Jerusalem.
Gessius Florus was accused by the Jewish population of pilfering the temple treasury.
That neither official was sanctioned by the Romans clearly demonstrates that the practice, of the Romans using the temple funds, was the accepted norm.
After the Roman victory in 70CE this ‘covert’ practice was made overt:

When victory was decided by the capture of the capital, Rome made the full political consequences felt: Judea became a Roman province separate from Syria and subject to a legatus pro praetore. It also received a more powerful military garrison, and a whole legion, the tenth, was transferred to Jerusalem, where it camped among the ruins of the city, which had been rendered uninhabitable………
………………..The Sanhedrin was dismissed and the High-Priest deposed at the same time. The Romans were spiteful enough to continue the temple-tax paid by the Diaspora, the proceeds being devoted to the temple treasury of Jupiter Capitolinus in Rome. The Jewish national state, and the central religious organization of all Judaism, were thus destroyed

(ibid p.181)

[pax]

And there were how many eyewitnesses to this event?

How many direct eyewitnesses were there to the resurrection of Jesus? That would be NONE! None that mentioned it at any rate, at the time event was supposed to have occurred. No one mentioned it at all for the first quarter of a century after the time frame established by the Gospels for the execution of Jesus in fact. 1 Corinthians represents the earliest ever mention of the resurrection of Jesus, and it was written just about a quarter of a century the execution of Jesus was supposed to have occurred. Paul says that "above 500" disciples witnessed the resurrected Jesus on one particular occasion, but Paul was not himself present at the event he describes, was not in fact present to personally witness ANY of the events described in the Gospels, nor did Paul ever personally meet Jesus. So you see we don't actually have 500 eyewitnesses at all. We have A STORY of 500 eyewitnesses provided years after the fact by an individual who was not himself present. STORIES of events are known as "hearsay" and are most definitely NOT admissible in court. At the time the event was supposed to have occurred however, and for the first quarter of a century afterward, no one claimed to have witnessed anything. According to Matthew 27:52-53 the streets were teaming with resurrected dead people, and yet no one mentioned THAT at the time either. How very odd! But then people do generally fail to mention things which never occurred. Dead people roaming the streets though... well one would think THAT would have provoked some notice.

The problem is, most of what you have been conditioned your entire life to accept without question, doesn't hold up to actual scrutiny, and it concludes with a reanimated corpse flying off up into the sky. See the problem?

No problem for me. But I see you have a problem in how to distinguish the historicity of accounts written by ancient historians from non-historical accounts. If I applied your methods to other historical figures, all of history would be shrouded in darkness. How do you know that Julius Caesar ever lived? All of the accounts of Caeser were fabricated by the Gaius family to secure their hold over the Roman government. If you cannot produce the actual writings of Caesar (copies are not allowed by you) or the actual eyewitnesses (first hand accounts only, ne hearsay) then you cannot prove that Caesar ever existed. It was all just a big scam by the Gaius family (if indeed they even existed) to cement their hiold over the Roman governement (if indeed the Roman Empire ever existed).

My point is that there is a line drawn by historians where written documents are accepted as factual, and the Gospel accounts fall well within that line.

[JoeyKnothead]

From Post 96:

Realizing pax prefers to ignore my refutations and challenges to his arguments, I'll just leave this here for the rest of y'all...

...If I applied your methods to other historical figures, all of history would be shrouded in darkness...

And so it is, what with our having to rely on others to do the reporting. When someone reports a cow jumping over the moon, I trust that report just as much as one who reports a dead guy strolling about town.

...My point is that there is a line drawn by historians where written documents are accepted as factual, and the Gospel accounts fall well within that line...

Only parts of these writings fall "well within that line". Those parts that insult the senses are excluded as to historical accuracy.

Only to those who accept the fantastical parts of these tales to be literally true events do we ever hear of them being presented as such.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

No problem for me. But I see you have a problem in how to distinguish the historicity of accounts written by ancient historians from non-historical accounts. If I applied your methods to other historical figures, all of history would be shrouded in darkness. How do you know that Julius Caesar ever lived? All of the accounts of Caeser were fabricated by the Gaius family to secure their hold over the Roman government. If you cannot produce the actual writings of Caesar (copies are not allowed by you) or the actual eyewitnesses (first hand accounts only, ne hearsay) then you cannot prove that Caesar ever existed. It was all just a big scam by the Gaius family (if indeed they even existed) to cement their hiold over the Roman governement (if indeed the Roman Empire ever existed).

My point is that there is a line drawn by historians where written documents are accepted as factual, and the Gospel accounts fall well within that line.

Let's examine your views on historicity and ancient historical accounts, shall we? There were ancient reports of a half man half bull creature who lived in the labyrinth on the island of Crete, the result of a bestial union between the wife of the king of Crete and an especially beautiful bull. Both the island of Crete and the labyrinth actually do exist. Should the story of the Minotaur be considered a valid historical account by modern historians, or simply an example of human imagination and mythology at work? And the answer would be THE LATTER. What of the race of one eyed giants called cyclops mentioned variously in ancient reports by Hesiod, Homer, Euripides, Theocritus and Virgil? Homer even puts a name to one of the creatures, Polyphemus. Should these accounts be considered to be valid historical accounts by modern historians, or simply an example of human imagination and mythology at work? And the answer would be THE LATTER. What of the Greek hero Achilles, who led the Greeks in the battle with the inhabitants of the city of Troy? The city of Troy actually existed, and it was actually destroyed in just about the time frame attested to in Homer's Iliad. Did Achilles actually exist as well? Well, perhaps. His existence is certainly strong in Greek legend. Should therefore the entire story of Achilles, invulnerable except for one single heel, the result of having been dipped into the river Styx as an infant, be considered a valid historical account by modern historians, or simply an example of human imagination and mythology at work? And the answer of course would be THE LATTER.

Name one single historical account EVER, which is predicated on the acceptance of a metaphysical supernatural event which is generally accepted by modern historians as historically valid? Outside of your personal mythological beliefs of course, in which the unchallengeable acceptance of your personal metaphysical supernatural claims are an intrinsic PART of your mythological belief system.

[pax]

Name one single historical account EVER, which is predicated on the acceptance of a metaphysical supernatural event which is generally accepted by modern historians as historically valid?

The Resurrection.


(I know that one-liners are verbotten here, but that one-liner really is an appropriate answer to the above assertions. After all, thousands upon thousands of people were not willing to die rather than deny any of the other events so specified, nor did any of the other events have eyewitness accounts written within after the event within the lifetimes of those who witnessed the event, meaning that if these accounts were not factual there is a good chance that some one of those eyewitnesses would have said so. People don't die horrible deaths at the hands of inhuman torturers for myths, nor are myths written with a few years of the event in question.)

The bottom line is you first reject it because it is miraculous, and then build your case around that initial rejection.

[Haven]

Name one single historical account EVER, which is predicated on the acceptance of a metaphysical supernatural event which is generally accepted by modern historians as historically valid?

The Resurrection.

The resurrection is not accepted by modern historians as historically valid. In fact, I can count on one hand the number of academic historians who accept the resurrection of Jesus as fact, and all of them are devout Christians who were likely raised in the faith. If they were not raised Christian, they probably would not believe in the resurrection.