What is the best hypothesis to explain the resurrection?

[Willum]

Alternatives to explain the resurrection seem to be a theme of late. So even if wrong, is there a best way forward on what actually happened?

I think if we put our heads together we can form the best explanation of the resurrection, that does not involve anything impossible, like aliens, or magic, etc., we can come up with one or more reasonable explanations.

AlexxJRO, ToN and many others have specialized approaches - let's see what happens if we go for the most elegant, Occam's Razor solution to the subject, perhaps incorporating the best elements of each - seeing if they fit like a puzzle.

Let's not assume any particular fact is valid until the group weighs in on reasonability.

I'll start with my own hypothesis: Rome, had a long history of using religion to pacify it's conquests - beginning long before the Caesars:

It would invade countries, draw analogies between and hybridize Roman and other deities, claiming, ultimately, that Zeus was the supreme deity, Zeus empowered Rome, and therefore everyone should obey Rome.

The corollary for the resurrection, is; Jesus and the Apostles advocate obeying Roman Law (something no Jew would), paying Roman tax with idolatrous coins (as no Jew would), claiming Jesus was a demi-god (as no Jew would), and so on.

This neatly explains the Diaspora, Rome unable to assuage Jerusalem, dispersed it.

So, Liam - could an invisible undetectable creature with the power to resurrect someone, have used such an ineffective means to make converts to principles mankind adopts anyway?
AlexxJRO, could Joseph of Arimathea been a Roman stooge? The crucifixion staged and false?
ToN - the Bible presents good explanation itself...
Riku...
Others...?

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to post 3 by Tired of the Nonsense]

The nature of supernatural claims is that for them to become even remotely plausible, they must represent be the only available answer. And yet they never are!

I disagree. If my TV is missing from my house, yet there are no signs of forced entry, it doesn't follow that someone offering "Scotty beamed it to the Enterprise" as 'the only available answer' means that Scotty beamed it to the Enterprise. What positive evidence do we have that transporters can actually exist? Even within Star Trek lore, they have to resort to the equivalent of magic by saying that a 'Heisenberg compensator' is able to, well, compensate for Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle (with no explanation for how it is able to do it. It just does apparently).

We don't disagree at all. If my TV was missing (It's a 70 inch flat screen, not easily portable), and there was no signs of forced entry, I would first contact the people that have a key to my house. If that proved to be not the answer, I would start to consider the possibility that I had not locked the door correctly, or that someone had picked the lock. What I would NOT do is immediately jump to the conclusion that Kirk and and Scotty were responsible, or that it had been done by some supernatural method.

My original point was that things occur for natural reasons the overwhelming amount of the time. Such an overwhelming amount of the time in fact that there is actually no reason to ever conclude that the answer is a supernatural one. Yet when confronted by a question that they can't immediately answer, many people immediately jump to a supernatural conclusion. But supernatural conclusions should really be reasonably considered as the very LAST possibility, when all other natural solutions have been exhausted. In fact I would never consider a supernatural explanation as a reasonable possibility at all. I would simply conclude that there is a natural answer, and I have simply failed to discover it.

In the case of the missing body of Jesus, and the origin of the rumor that he had risen from the dead, a perfectly natural explanation is right at hand. The supernatural conclusion has no actual probability for being true at all. It's just that the supernatural explanation happens to be prefered by many people for personal emotional reasons.

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 18 by Willum]

I personally think it is possible that Jesus was a literary fiction created 300+ years after the fact.

AFter what fact? The fact of him getting killed?

[liamconnor]

Anyhow,

Did you guys come to a uniform, concrete theory yet?

[rikuoamero]

[Replying to post 21 by Tired of the Nonsense]

What I would NOT do is immediately jump to the conclusion that Kirk and and Scotty were responsible, or that it had been done by some supernatural method.

I think what I got hung up on was when you said The nature of supernatural claims is that for them to become even remotely plausible, they must represent be the only available answer.
So let's say my TV is missing, I and seasoned detectives investigate but we're all left scratching our heads. If someone comes up to us and says "Oh, maybe Scotty beamed it up to the Enterprise", what I thought you meant was that, at that point, you yourself would consider it, even though we don't have any evidence that transporters are even possible.

(oh and 70 inch? I'm turning green with envy. Lemme guess...4K?

[rikuoamero]

Anyhow,

Did you guys come to a uniform, concrete theory yet?

Why uniform and why concrete? Is your point to say that since none of us can come up with a detailed concrete explanation, that the Christian explanation wins by default?

[Willum]

[Replying to post 22 by liamconnor]

"After the fact..." just an expression, Liam, don't get excited - I mean from when your good book says stuff happened.

and yes, we are honing in on something, it is pretty disappointing, we are discovering that the best solution, the one that explains the most succinctly, Occam's Razor if you will, is that is was all just trussed up rumors.

I don't like it myself, but the simplest solution is often the best.

But no consensus has been reached.
If you are going to participate, kindly read.

[YahWhat]

It's quite simple really. Jesus had a merry band of committed followers who were in a culture where some were saying other recently executed prophet leaders like John the Baptist had been "raised from the dead" - Mark 6:14-16. Obviously, if this concept existed it's no surprise that the followers of Jesus' apocalyptic sect claimed the same for him after he died. Moreover, according to the Gospels, Jesus even predicted his own death and resurrection which means his biased followers would have automatically been primed to proclaim the resurrection without any evidence whatsoever! It's quite telling that Jesus only returns and "appears" to people that were already in his inner circle and committed to him before his death (besides Paul, but the appearance to him was a vision). Why didn't Jesus come back and appear to the Jewish or Roman authorities that were responsible for his death? That would have made for a better and slightly more believable story.

[Willum]

So,now I think that the time has come to figure out what we need to explain.

Historic events, the resurrection, empty tomb...

What do we really need to find the answers for?

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 25 by rikuoamero]

If a bunch of Christians couldn't explain data which the evolutionary hypothesis explained, but still, they just knew deep down in their hearts that evolution was wrong...what would you say to them?

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 26 by Willum]

just trussed up rumors.

what was the rumor at first?

Who started the rumor?

Why did he/she start the rumor?

Did the rumor grow?

Where in the texts do we see evidence for these answers?

These are concrete questions which the Christian theory explains, and which my alternative hallucination theory explains.

As far as your comment "I don't like it", then why not abandon it and find one you do like. If you can't, then why not say, "I can't" and just withhold your verdict on Christianity entirely?