Why no witnesses for the actual resurrection ?

[Regens Küchl]

The sacrosanct canonical four gospels have it in it that they avoid to narrate details about or have actual witnesses for their most miraculous and important point.

So we are to assume that in the dark cave Jesus body suddenly regained life and consciousness, stood up, unsheathed the shroud of turin leaving it right there as evidence of the miracle for the future vatican, with newfound superhuman powers opened his tomb careful not to wake up the roman guards and staying nearby did unknown things (garden work?) until he was mistaken for the gardener.

But like a three that falls over in the wood alone, no one witnessed that.
We are at last to assume that no human saw it or found it worth mentioning, for that is indicated by the whole new testament.

The apocryphal gospel of Peter is among the few, perhaps almost the only, (can anyone provide a list, please?) who narrates detailed important information (walking talking cross) about the actual resurrection and also has it witnessed by people.

"9. And in the night in which the Lord's day was drawing on, as the soldiers kept guard two by two in a watch, there was a great voice in the heaven; and they saw the heavens opened, and two men descend with a great light and approach the tomb. And the stone that was put at the door rolled of itself and made way in part; and the tomb was opened, and both the young men entered in.

10. When therefore those soldiers saw it, they awakened the centurion and the elders, for they too were close by keeping guard. And as they declared what things they had seen, again they saw three men come forth from the tomb, and two of them supporting one, and a cross following them. And the heads of the two reached to heaven, but the head of him who was led by them overpassed the heavens. And they heard a voice from the heavens, saying, You have preached to them that sleep. And a response was heard from the cross, Yes."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Peter

Now It is really funny from every possible standpoint, believer, unbeliever, mythicist, historicist, whatever that we are told of not a one actual witness.

If it was a divine happening to save humanity, then why not let humans witness the most miraculous part of it ?

If it was invented than why not invent actual witnesses too ?

A Believer could say : "Because we have to believe out of faith in the resurrection!" - But this point is moot because we would also have to take it on faith even if the gospels mentioned actual witnesses.

A Mythicist could say : "Because it makes the better drama when witnesses only meet the already risen Jesus!" - But that point is moot beause we, that grew up with this fact in the gospels, are biased that way.

Questions for Debate 1) Why no actual witnesses ?

2) Why dismiss scriptures like the gospel of Peter when it includes actual witnesses and narrates important details.

3) And that is the little brother and second funny thing about the resurrection: The running gag in the gospels about old accquintances never recognicing the risen Jesus at first look.
Mary Magdalene Mistaking him for the gardener, Cleopas and another disciple walking with him to Emmaus without knowing, Apostle Thomas only recognicing him by his wounds . . . .

Why first no actual witnesses and than no recognicing? Dont this two facts together cry aloud : "Hoax"?

[Regens Küchl]

Why wants no one here tackle a major important question concluded above :

WHY DID AN OMNIPOTENT GOD WISH NO WITNESSES FOR THE ACTUAL RESURRECTION?

And about the noncanonisation of the GoP I believe the scholarly consens sees as important reason that it contains theology that would have been useful to the fiendish gnostics.

As for Pauls 500 witnesses:
Wherefrom the exact round number?
Paul is not producing the place where this happened and not a single name of even one witness.
While Elvis witnesses Names can be researched aplenty and they are detailed interviewed in dTV documentarys too.

If a number in the hundreds and more of average honest healthy people cant be wrong in attesinv a miracle than that means the sun realy danced at Fatima which proves Catholicism is the one true faith. It is the end of Protestantism and Evangelical Christianity!

[LilytheTheologian]

The biblical canon is composed of works written by those who knew Christ personally or who were writing on behalf of those who had known Christ personally.

This is an enormous distinction. The evidence suggests none of the gospels were written by either an eyewitness or anyone who "knew Christ personally. These anonymous writers, writing decades after the supposed events were writing on behalf of the church, and as you say attached others' names to their works. This was done to elevate the status of these works; to lend them credibility.

What evidence do you speak of? Are you familiar with the most modern dating techniques?

Recent scholarship of the Dead Sea Scrolls indicate the authors named are most likely the actual authors. Modern dating techniques show all four gospels to have been written between 40-65, so all are most probably the work of eyewitnesses. They are works of theology, not history, so that has to be kept in mind.

St. Irenaeus identified the author of the Gospel of John as the apostle John, and John is curiously almost absent from the book itself, something that lends credence to his authorship. Irenaeus' own teacher, St. Polycarp, was a disciple of John, and John was the one apostle who lived to be quite old. The book contains numerous details that tell biblical scholars that the author was, indeed, an eyewitness to the events surrounding the life - and death - of Jesus, and that he knew Jesus personally.

New dating done on the fragments of the gospels found show that all were most likely written between 40-65 CE, indicating eyewitness authors and accounts even if their names were not Matthew, Mark, and Luke. The 26th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew has been dated to the year 40, making it almost surely an eyewitness account of the life of Christ.

We will probably never know for sure who wrote the gospels, but the newest dating techniques do tell us that they were all composed prior to the year 65 CE, something that lends itself to eyewitness information. If they were written as a "hoax," they would agree more on the little details, such as the Nativity accounts. Almost every Biblical scholar agrees that Jesus lived (even the Roman and Jewish authors, such as Josephus agree that he lived), he was baptized by John the Baptist, and he was crucified in either 30 or 33 CE by the order of Pontius Pilate. They do not agree on where he was born. Some believe Bethlehem, some believe Nazareth. Certainly Jesus, himself, considered himself a Nazarene.

[LilytheTheologian]

[Replying to post 91 by Regens Küchl]

Do you want to tackle the question of why, if the Resurrection was a "hoax," the Jewish authorities, who knew full well where he was buried, did not produce the body and punish the perpetrators of the so-called hoax?

The Resurrection happened while Jesus was alone, in a sealed tomb. Why should there be eyewitnesses? No one expected him to be resurrected. If someone you know is buried, no one jumps in the grave with him or her. The fact that people saw him after his death, in a flesh-and-blood body, attests to his resurrection. Thomas was allowed to touch Christ's wounds as proof that he was not a "ghost." Christ fried and ate fish. Yet he also appeared in one place one second and in another, miles and miles away, the next.

An omnipotent God doesn't have to conform to what we want him to conform to. He offers abundant evidence, and we can choose to believe it or not.

The gospels are filled with small, tell-tale marks of eyewitnesses. For example, the fact that Jesus wrote in the sand when asked if the adulteress should be stoned or not (Jn 8:6). There is no reason for this little detail. It adds nothing to the outcome. It is there simply because the writer, himself, was witness to it. If this detail, and countless others like it, were invented by eyewitness authors, then they invented a new literary genre - realistic fantasy - nineteen centuries before it was invented in the twentieth.

[LilytheTheologian]

If a number in the hundreds and more of average honest healthy people cant be wrong in attesinv a miracle than that means the sun realy danced at Fatima which proves Catholicism is the one true faith. It is the end of Protestantism and Evangelical Christianity!

Protestantism, even atheism, has nothing to worry about. Christ himself told us that only the small remnant would survive the heresy and secularism of the modern world (Mt 7:13-14).

I don't know your religion or even if you have one, but Catholics are not obligated to believe in private revelations such as those that occurred at Fatima. Many do, as many claimed to see the sun revolve in the sky, and their names are known. I am a devout Catholic, with a PhD in theology and psychology, and I am unsure of Fatima, and look askance at the goings-on in Medjugorie. Revelation, itself, is considered closed with God's revelation of himself in Christ. Christ, himself told us that there will be no more revelations until the end of time.

[Regens Küchl]

[Replying to post 93 by LilytheTheologian]
Tackle I will! I will do the tackling now! Just watch and see me tackling and tacklinglng again.

If your roman authoritys were that interested as you assume to go to work and punish whenone Jew hoaxes on another Jew or a Jew lieing to his brethren they would have had no time anymore for serious work and the roman empire would have crumbled further.

But perhaps they produced the body and punished some hoaxers.
That would not been have written down in the acta senati, the acta publici and in no case in the gospels.
So why do you pretend to know they didnt?

Or perhaps the hoax included logically the theft of the body and the romans produced only thin air.

You already made the error of saying that Paul met Jesus in the Flesh when acts clearly say that Paul only saw a light and heard a voice.
Light and voices are everyday common experiences. Very poor that not even the Collosal self stiled apostle got a good clear view of Jesus.

And now please someone be interested in tackling:
WHY DID THAT GOD WISH THAT NO ONE WITNESSED THE ACTUAL RESURRECTION?

[FarWanderer]

And now please someone be interested in tackling:
WHY DID THAT GOD WISH THAT NO ONE WITNESSED THE ACTUAL RESURRECTION?

Because it wouldn't work if someone were watching.

Do I get a cookie?

[pshun2404]

A better question is why would they be there to see it since they really did not believe it would happen? So the question "Why no witnesses?" Is an illegitimate question since the actual witnesses, 2000 years later by people not even close to the events, are simply dismissed as liars or legend builders or deluded. They have no basis for these accusations, and they fly in the face of what governs reliable testimony, but we should believe them rather than the witnesses...yet though not one person has even said they witnessed a fish becoming an amphibian or non-living matter becoming a creature (even a single celled organism) they will certainly believe this...get this straight...science ONLY proves that life comes from previous life and that the offspring is of the same genome as its parents.

[FarWanderer]

The Jews certainly knew where Jesus was buried. If any sort of hoax was being perpetrated, the Jews would have produced the body and crucified or stoned or otherwise punished the apostles and anyone else behind the hoax.

A miracle that can be proven wrong isn't a miracle at all.

Is anyone saying the tomb wasn't empty?

[Zzyzx]

.

A better question is why would they be there to see it since they really did not believe it would happen? So the question "Why no witnesses?" Is an illegitimate question since the actual witnesses, 2000 years later by people not even close to the events, are simply dismissed as liars or legend builders or deluded.

Actually, two thousand years later some people claim that a long-dead body came back to life based on unverified tales about empty tombs, guards, angels, visitors, etc – that supposedly prove that a "resurrection" occurred.

Those tales were written decades or generations after the claimed events by people who cannot be identified by Christian scholars and theologians and who cannot be shown to have had any personal knowledge of events.

In honorable debate a person making a claim is expected and required to substantiate the claim if challenged.

When a challenger states that alternative possibilities exist (such as the tales being myth, legend, exaggeration, fabrication) those possibilities DO exist by virtue of human nature well known to all – and when they point out that long-dead bodies are not known to come back to life that IS true.

They have no basis for these accusations,

Listing alternatives as above does NOT constitute accusation. Instead, it recognizes human frailties that can be involved in tale telling. If someone wishes to claim that human frailties could not have been involved in the tales, they have difficulty defending that position.

and they fly in the face of what governs reliable testimony,

To what "reliable testimony" does this refer? Who gave testimony to whom when?

but we should believe them rather than the witnesses...yet though not one person has even said they witnessed a fish becoming an amphibian or non-living matter becoming a creature (even a single celled organism) they will certainly believe this...get this straight...science ONLY proves that life comes from previous life and that the offspring is of the same genome as its parents.

When one cannot support favorite tales they can always try to change the subject to a rant against science (while perhaps believing that people can live inside fish or whales for days). However, that ploy is transparent and ineffective.

[Regens Küchl]

And now please someone be interested in tackling:
WHY DID THAT GOD WISH THAT NO ONE WITNESSED THE ACTUAL RESURRECTION?

Because it wouldn't work if someone were watching.

Do I get a cookie?

You gave the only serious answer here and your conclusion deserves even its own thread fo debate at a later time.

But tell me is the magic only hindered by the presence of living persons?

Or would an automatic camera problemless gotten the resurrection filmed?
Mechanical devices are after all never sceptical and do not count as anyone around.

Even better would be if robots and androids could problemless stay for watching miracles.
Captain Picards ship could time travel to Jesus crucificion and then smuggle Data into the tomb with Jesus body.
Then with Data as reliable witness we would learn if and how exacly the resurrection happened.
And Worf could put on his Nightgown playing angel and scaring the women away from the tomb.

What do you say? Your answer please.