Is the Resurrurredction really a historical fact, or not?

[polonius]

In Paul’s oldest and first epistle, written in 51-52 AD, he states without qualification that:

“Indeed, we tell you this, on the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord,* will surely not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16For the Lord himself, with a word of command, with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet of God, will come down from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first.g17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together* with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Thus we shall always be with the Lord.� 1 Thes 4:15-17

But it didn’t happen. Thus we must conclude that either Paul or the Lord were incorrect.

How much else of what Paul told us is also incorrect?

Recall, it was Paul who reported the Resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15 written about 53-57 AD.

Was his story historically correct (did it actually happen) or is it just a story that was used by and embellished by the writers of the New Testament?

Since the basis of Christian belief is the historical fact of the Resurrection, let’s examine the evidence and see if the Resurrection really happened or can an analysis of the story show that it is improbable if not impossible.

Opinions?

[Danmark]

*winces* Please don't link to Biblearchaeology.org. They're Statement of Faith'ers: they admit to discarding if not outright manipulating of any evidence that contradicts their pre-determined beliefs. ....
(Since you're responding here to Danmark, I'll ask his/her opinion: Danmark, what's your opinion on Faith'ers? Are you like me and just ignore whatever they say outright, or do you allow your debate opponents to use them as support for their arguments?)

Never heard of 'em.
So I looked them up. They don't believe in evolution. They believe in a world wide global flood and apparently in a 6 day creation of the universe, so yes, I would completely dismiss and ignore anything they have to say. They freely admit that if facts contradict a literal interpretation of Genesis, then it's the facts that must go:

A strong temptation for Christians with advanced training in the sciences is to compromise on the plain sense of the biblical text when faced with apparent conflicts between it and popular scientific views. Some such views are clearly contrary to Scripture, such as Darwin’s theory of evolution....
Some who claim to be biblical Christians nevertheless refuse to accept the straightforward sense of Scripture in every case. In particular, many who are steeped in the sciences say that it is impossible, scientifically speaking, for the Earth to have been created in six literal 24-hour days and for the Flood to have been a worldwide cataclysm. Notwithstanding the unambiguous, comprehensive language of Genesis 7:19, which states that the Flood covered “all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens,� they insist that, due to difficulties they see in reconciling certain scientific understandings with a worldwide Flood, it had to have been a local Mesopotamian event.
Such nonsense does not deserve a 12 point font.

[Tired of the Nonsense]

Reply to Claire Evans


More on the words used by Matthew:27, Kustodian and Koustodias.

Englishman's Concordance
κουστωδίαν (koust�dian) — 1 Occurrence
Matthew 27:65 N-AFS
GRK: Πιλᾶτος Ἔχετε κουστωδίαν ὑπάγετε ἀσφαλίσασθε
NAS: to them, You have a guard; go,
KJV: Ye have a watch: go your way,
INT: Pilate You have a guard Go make [it as] secure
http://biblehub.com/greek/kousto_dian_2892.htm

Englishman's Concordance
κουστωδίας (koust�dias) — 2 Occurrences
Matthew 27:66 N-GFS
GRK: μετὰ τῆς κουστωδίας
NAS: secure, and along with the guard they set a seal
KJV: the stone, and setting a watch.
INT: with the guard

Matthew 28:11 N-GFS
GRK: τινες τῆς κουστωδίας �λθόντες εἰς
NAS: some of the guard came
KJV: behold, some of the watch came into
INT: some of the guard having gone into
http://biblehub.com/greek/kousto_dias_2892.htm

Notice that very clearly the words DO NOT mean or in any way imply ROMAN guards. It is a very non specific word.

[rikuoamero]

[Replying to post 667 by Danmark]

They freely admit that if facts contradict a literal interpretation of Genesis, then it's the facts that must go:

Which is why I challenge my debate opponents who quote evidence cited from Faith'ers (as I call them). It's akin to fruit from a poisoned tree: these people admit to discarding evidence they don't like, and there is a very strong implication that they manipulate evidence too.
How can I trust anything such people say?
Of course, other people can manipulate evidence as well, but at least other people don't crow it as a virtue. I'll take other non Faith'ers at their word, at the least and examine the evidence to see if it stands up to scrutiny.

[Claire Evans]

Considering that swine herding was not a known practice there, I believe that this Jesus exorcism story was a metaphor or parable for the war on the Gadarenes. Gadarenes were also gentiles and were considered swine.

I think the problems with a definitive answer to this question are at least two-fold. First is that variants in the texts exist (Gadarenes, Gerasenes, Gergesenes). Additionally, it is not specific, but rather refers to the general area (e.g. ‘ch�ran t�n’ translated variously as ‘land’ or ‘region’ of). Best guesses place that in the area of the Decalopolis which was a heavily gentile region. Moreover, pig raising wasn’t entirely absent from the region conceding that the evidence is fragmentary, but not absent. This article from the Journal of Ethnobiology probably provides more information than you ever wanted to know about ancient Palestinian pork production:

https://ethnobiology.org/sites/default/ ... /Hesse.pdf

Please keep this comment. I'd like to make a new thread on this topic.

[Claire Evans]

Replying to Claire Evans

I would also like to point out that the guard at the tomb controversy is hardly the only instance where Christians assumptions and Christian assertions do not hold up to a detailed evaluation of them. For example, most Christians conceive of the resurrection of Jesus as a well known event at the time, widely known to have been true, and that the risen Jesus was seen by hundreds. Far too many for it to have been a hallucination or a hoax. Nor did anyone even bother to deny it at the time. This last claim is at least is true, although completely misleading. No one denied the at the time. In fact no one even mentioned any of it at the time. The very first historical mention of the resurrection occurs in Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, written circa 55 AD, or about a quarter of a century after the time frame established by the Gospels for the execution of Jesus. The Resurrection of Jesus from the dead, the most glorious and significant moment in human history according to Christians, went entirely unrecorded at all at the time it was supposed to have occurred.

1 Corinthians in fact is the source of the claim that the risen Jesus was seen by hundreds. Paul mentions that "above 500" of Jesus' followers saw and communed with the risen Jesus on one particular occasion. This is widely accepted as evidence that the risen Jesus was seen by hundreds, entirely overlooking the fact that this is one report, and not hundreds of reports. Paul himself would not become a Christian believer for some years yet after Jesus was executed, and was not himself a witness to ANY of the events portrayed in the Gospels, including the claims of post crucifixion appearances by Jesus. In fact Acts 1:15 places the total number of Jesus' disciples after the supposed "ascension" of Jesus, but just prior to the day of Pentecost, at "about an hundred and twenty." It was from this group that the entire rumor of the risen Jesus was derived. Just as the chief priests had predicted.

This is not the preferred view of the majority of Christians though, is it? It just happens to be a completely accurate view, taken directly from Christian documents themselves. There is a general agreement among Christian and secular scholars that the Gospel According to Luke, and Acts of the Apostles were written by the same person. Almost every other aspect of Christian claims and Christian beliefs fall completely apart during a detailed examination of them however.

Who else should have written about the resurrection?

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to Claire Evans]

Anyone at all would have been a good start. Christians suppose that it was a well known event after all. Some few of Paul's famous phantom 500 for example might have mentioned it, one would think. One would think that a resurrected dead man would have made enough of an impression on SOMEONE to have made some mention of it at the time.

[marco]

To compare what Cicero wrote to what Paul wrote is to attempt to say that Cicero made claims of meeting dead demigods too, or other extraordinary claims. I've never read Cicero, can you tell me if he ever said anything like this in complete seriousness?
If Cicero writes that he was a political enemy of Julius Caesar, what's so strange about that?

Cicero was a brilliant lawyer, fond of sarcasm. His works are speeches in defence of people or against. He also wrote about worship, about friendship, about old age.. He famously defeated in court the powerful Verres, corrupt governor of Sicily and he exposed Catiline's conspiracy.

He didn't like Caesar and he probably would have happily literally stuck the knife in; Caesar was remarkably indulgent with him. However Cicero bravely or foolishly wrote philippics against Antony, even comparing him to Hannibal, Rome's greatest enemy. Antony didn't show Caesar's magnanimity. He had Cicero's hands and head cut off.

There is a beautiful letter to him from his friend Sulpicius, consoling Cicero on the death of Tullia, his daughter.

These intimate details come down to us through history. It seems absurd that we should place them beside the resurrection of Christ, hugely contentious in itself, far less standing as a historical fact.

[polonius]

[Replying to Claire Evans]

Clare Evans post 671
Tired of the Nonsense wrote:


Replying to Claire Evans

I would also like to point out that the guard at the tomb controversy is hardly the only instance where Christians assumptions and Christian assertions do not hold up to a detailed evaluation of them. For example, most Christians conceive of the resurrection of Jesus as a well known event at the time, widely known to have been true, and that the risen Jesus was seen by hundreds. Far too many for it to have been a hallucination or a hoax. Nor did anyone even bother to deny it at the time. This last claim is at least is true, although completely misleading. No one denied the at the time. In fact no one even mentioned any of it at the time. The very first historical mention of the resurrection occurs in Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, written circa 55 AD, or about a quarter of a century after the time frame established by the Gospels for the execution of Jesus. The Resurrection of Jesus from the dead, the most glorious and significant moment in human history according to Christians, went entirely unrecorded at all at the time it was supposed to have occurred.

1 Corinthians in fact is the source of the claim that the risen Jesus was seen by hundreds. Paul mentions that "above 500" of Jesus' followers saw and communed with the risen Jesus on one particular occasion. This is widely accepted as evidence that the risen Jesus was seen by hundreds, entirely overlooking the fact that this is one report, and not hundreds of reports. Paul himself would not become a Christian believer for some years yet after Jesus was executed, and was not himself a witness to ANY of the events portrayed in the Gospels, including the claims of post crucifixion appearances by Jesus. In fact Acts 1:15 places the total number of Jesus' disciples after the supposed "ascension" of Jesus, but just prior to the day of Pentecost, at "about an hundred and twenty." It was from this group that the entire rumor of the risen Jesus was derived. Just as the chief priests had predicted.

This is not the preferred view of the majority of Christians though, is it? It just happens to be a completely accurate view, taken directly from Christian documents themselves. There is a general agreement among Christian and secular scholars that the Gospel According to Luke, and Acts of the Apostles were written by the same person. Almost every other aspect of Christian claims and Christian beliefs fall completely apart during a detailed examination of them however.


>>Who else should have written about the resurrection?<<

RESPONSE: Perhaps some of the 500 witnesses Paul claimed in his first letter to the Corinthians written about 55 A.D. Of course, his letter was written to people living 817 miles from Jerusalem, so he probably didn’t really expect to have his claim challenged.

None of the supposed 500 wrote anything nor any of the hundreds (perhaps) thousands of other who they would have been expected to tell about this great miracle. Not Christians, Jews, or Romans wrote anything nor do we hear anything more about any “resurrection� until Mark’s Gospel written about 70 A.D.

And Paul mentions nothing about any Ascension because that story hadn’t been created yet!

Do you really think Paul's claim is credible?

[Danmark]

Regarding the claim of the 500, there are two issues with any statement. One is credibility and the other is the basis or foundation for knowing. Paul is writing about 25 years after the event. He is writing to the Corinthians, who have no basis for knowing whether Paul's claim is true. They are too far away to check his facts.

One thing we know is that Paul certainly did not witness the resurrection, because he never saw Jesus. At best Paul is talking about something he heard from others. Who are they? None of them are mentioned. Paul makes no specific claim whatsoever. He picks a nice round number for which no basis is given. He might as well have said, "I heard somewhere that a lot of people saw the risen Jesus and some of them are still alive."

"Name one, Paul. Name just one. Tell us who told you this? When did you hear it? Paul, aren't you the guy who used to call himself Saul? You were near death for 3 days, eating and drinking nothing, then you claimed you saw Jesus in the sky and he talked to you, right? Was it after that, that you heard these rumors?"

[tfvespasianus]

Regarding the claim of the 500, there are two issues with any statement. One is credibility and the other is the basis or foundation for knowing. Paul is writing about 25 years after the event. He is writing to the Corinthians, who have no basis for knowing whether Paul's claim is true. They are too far away to check his facts.

One thing we know is that Paul certainly did not witness the resurrection, because he never saw Jesus. At best Paul is talking about something he heard from others. Who are they? None of them are mentioned. Paul makes no specific claim whatsoever. He picks a nice round number for which no basis is given. He might as well have said, "I heard somewhere that a lot of people saw the risen Jesus and some of them are still alive."

"Name one, Paul. Name just one. Tell us who told you this? When did you hear it? Paul, aren't you the guy who used to call himself Saul? You were near death for 3 days, eating and drinking nothing, then you claimed you saw Jesus in the sky and he talked to you, right? Was it after that, that you heard these rumors?"

Of interest is that the ‘500’ claim if further flushed out in the Gospel of Nicodemus in the Acts of Pilate section in the 14th chapter:

‘And a few days after there came from Galilee to Jerusalem three men. One of them was a priest, by name Phinees; the second a Levite, by name Aggai; and the third a soldier, by name Adas. These came to the chief priests, and said to them and to the people: Jesus, whom you crucified, we have seen in Galilee with his eleven disciples upon the Mount of Olives, teaching them, and saying, Go into all the world, and proclaim the good news; and whosoever will believe and be baptized shall be saved; but whosoever will not believe shall be condemned. And having thus spoken, he went up into heaven. And both we and many others of the five hundred besides were looking on.’

Full text here: http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/t ... berts.html

Of course, one could argue that text is late and it is most likely spurious. Moreover, it’s non-canonical. However, the part that intrigues me is the motivation as to writing it and, in a related sense, the details like this it contains. The author(s) wrote it with the motivation of adding to an existing foundation and one must wonder how often this was done in documents more credibly than this one.

Take care,
TFV