Jesus' Life and Resurrection.

[LiamOS]

In his Head-To-Head debate with otseng, WinePusher claimed that Jesus' life and resurrection can be attested to with outside, objective evidence.

For debate:
Can the life and resurrection of Jesus Christ be supported with objective evidence? If so, please provide such evidence.

[Druijf]

(excuse me I pressed a wrong button, could a moderator please remove this post?)

[Zzyzx]

.

Paul is considered a witness,

Paul / Saul is CLAIMED to have been a "witness" through a "vision", which cannot be shown to be anything more than hallucination, delusion, imagination or fiction. He evidently did not know Jesus in person or witness any of his teachings or "miracles". How does that qualify him as a "witness"?

Some to choose to "interpret" the "road to Damascus" tale as being a "witness". However, that is a matter of personal opinion, not fact.

and we know much about his life.

What is known of the life of Paul / Saul OUTSIDE bible tales? What are the sources of information and what do they convey?

[The Nice Centurion]

Personally, I've never seen any extra-biblical evidence for the resurrection.

In this other Head-to-head debate Goose and ChaosBorders are debating whether the resurrection of Jesus is historical or not, and I have to say that so far there seems to be no unbiased evidence for it whatsoever.

Edit to add: I'm not usually one to think that absence of evidence = evidence of absence. However, in this case I think absence of evidence is very significant. You'd think that a guy who walks around healing the sick and walking on water would attract enough attention that there'd be several texts mentioning him.

Healers and fake healers were and are overly common always in history and present time.

A great example for modern fake healers that shamefully even are legitimated by law: Handlers of Homoeopathic medicine. Doctors who give Homoepathic threatment.

As for the walking on water; Like many of Jesus miracles it was conveniently performed in front of a bunch of his closest admirers only. Hmmm.

So here we might find: Absence of evidence = Evidence of the absence of sceptical witnesses!

Uri Geller and Jesus both disliked or were unable to perform the supernatural in front of sceptic gaffers.

[The Nice Centurion]

Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence.

What is the evidence for the resurection of Jesus? An empty tomb story and questionable post mortem occurrences?

If a body is missing from a tomb, do we assume that the corpse has resurrected? Or do we try and discover who moved the corpse?

There are many possible explanations of why the corpse was moved. Ask me if you can't think of any. But Matthew's gospel appears to close the "loophole" with the guards on the tomb. But the guards on the tomb story is most certainly fiction. We have four gospel writers telling the same tale and yet only Matthew mentions guards. The guards are so important to the tale, that if it were true the other gospel writers would most certainly have mentioned the guards.

But Matthew didn't close the loophole tight enough with his guards on the tomb fiction.
Matthew 27:62-66 (New American Standard Bible)
62Now on the next day, [day in the Greek means daylight hours] the day after the preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered together with Pilate,
63and said, "Sir, we remember that when He was still alive that deceiver said, 'After three days I am to rise again.'
64"Therefore, give orders for the grave to be made secure until the third day, otgaffers.Thiis disciples may come and steal Him away and say to the people, 'He has risen from the dead,' and the last deception will be worse than the first."
65Pilate said to them, "You have a guard; go, make it as secure as you know how."
66And they went and made the grave secure, and along with the guard they set a seal on the stone.

So you see that Jesus' corpse was placed in the tomb, and the NEXT DAY, during daylight hours, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered together with Pilate, and requested a guard be placed on the tomb. THE FIRST NIGHT THE CORPSE WAS IN THE TOMB THE TOMB WAS UNGUARDED. Anyone could have opened the tomb, removed the corpse, and closed the tomb to conceal the fact that the tomb was now empty.
So the empty tomb story proves nothing.

But what about those that saw Jesus post mortem?
We have Mary Magdalene.
Mark 16:9 (New American Standard Bible)
9Now after He had risen early on the first day of the week, He first appeared to Mary Magdalene, from whom He had cast out seven demons. [See also Luke 8:2]
I would expect that any woman with seven demons would be considered a crazy woman mentally ill in today's world. Jesus may have calmed her down so she appeared normal.[cured] But most likely the shock of Jesus' sudden death and the loss of his soothing words may have pushed her back into a state of delusion. In any event she was not a competent witness.

But what about those 500 brethren who all saw Jesus at the same time post mortem according to Paul? This fiction is ridiculous. Did someone rent out a "Hall," and invite 500 brethren to all come at the same time to see Jesus? I am certain that this is Paul's fiction since Jesus only had 120 followers in the upper room on Pentecost when they all received the Holy Spirit.

What about Jesus' Apostles?
Matthew 28:16-17 (New American Standard Bible)
16But the eleven disciples proceeded to Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had designated.
17When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some were doubtful.
This is an amazing Scripture passage. Here we have 11 men who lived with Jesus several years, they see Jesus post mortem and some of them have doubt?

I have my own theory of how the Jesus resurrection story started with the Apostles. Many were fishermen, probably others were laborers of some kind. Fishing in those days was hard work. But when they traveled with Jesus they got used to the soft life. They preached, and passed around the baskets, and didn't have to row boats and pull nets out of the sea.
After Jesus died they went back to their old hard life.
John 21:3 (New American Standard Bible)
3Simon Peter said to them, "I am going fishing." They said to him, "We will also come with you." They went out and got into the boat; and that night they caught nothing.
They fish, they catch nothing, but then one disciple thinks he sees Jesus on the shore.
John 21:7 (New American Standard Bible)
7Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, "It is the Lord." So when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put his outer garment on (for he was stripped for work), and threw himself into the sea.
Notice that Peter does not recognize Jesus. He "heard that it was the Lord." It is just some stranger on the shore, but at that moment Peter realizes that if Jesus were alive they could all go back to the soft evangelists life and to Hell with the hard fisherman's life.

It is interesting that post mortem, Jesus only shows himself to his own followers. He promised the high Priest and his entourage that they would see him. [Mark 14:62] But they never did.
Jesus promised his evil and adulterous generation that they would see him post mortem, [Matthew 12:39-40] but they never did.
If the Scientologists claimed that L Ron Hubbard resurrected, came to their conference, and then went to Heaven, would you believe them? So how can we believe a story when only Jesus' followers are the witnesses?

We have an extraordinary claim that Jesus rose from the dead, but the evidence for the claim is very poor.

Christ Shepherd

This is a great Hypothesis. Yes, why should Benny Hinn and Television Pastors be the only ones to prefer a sweet evangelists life before hard work?

All shady encounters with the risen Christ can be explained excellently by sly apostolic liars like St. Peter Hinn !

That this excellent theory is mentioned so seldom proves that even sceptics suffer from the sickening habit of bowing before christian tradition of placing the first christians upon a podest

[TRANSPONDER]

I agree that even Bible doubters and skeptics do tend to work with the Gospel record and do not question that it is to be taken seriously. I reckon that, if the apostles had invented the resurrection to start a nice asy money making reliogion, they would have made the accounts work together.This (as the apologists say) precludes collusion.

But at the same time, the contradictions suggests they cannot be telling a story that is credibly the same. That's why I argue that there was originally no resurrection story (only a belief) and the differing accounts were made up to put meat on the bare bones of that belief - claim.

[The Nice Centurion]

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #45]
Consens roughly assumes a span of 30 years between Mark - John.

Short livespans back then. John probably not born when Mark wrote, who might have been long gone when John was born.

See how it is if today one Author writes a story. After years a filmmaker produces it as a movie. Another some years and it gets to be adapted as a cartoon series. Time passes and Dan Slott makes a comic book out of all that.

Do you assume all storys would be the same, or rather contradictions everywhere

[TRANSPONDER]

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #45]
Consens roughly assumes a span of 30 years between Mark - John.

Short livespans back then. John probably not born when Mark wrote, who might have been long gone when John was born.

See how it is if today one Author writes a story. After years a filmmaker produces it as a movie. Another some years and it gets to be adapted as a cartoon series. Time passes and Dan Slott makes a comic book out of all that.

Do you assume all storys would be the same, or rather contradictions everywhere

That's a nice analogy. I might leave the dating open - for example I utterly reject a pre Jewish war date for even the synoptic original, but this is all arguable.However 30 years from Mark (Aka the synoptic original which Mark plainly is not) and John which is given an expansive ballpark figure of sometime in the 2nd C AD.

I'd certainly put John before Matthew and Luke, simply because he waves away the problem of Jesus not being born in Bethlehem, he does not invent a story to correct Reality. And while we are at it I'd put Luke the latest because clearly and evidently he has access to Paul's writings whereas Matthew (for instance) knows Pauline doctrine, but does not ada pt his gospel to fit in with it. Nor for than matter with Josephus; Luke does.

Matthew does however know of a story going around that the disciples took the body. That is why he invents the tomb guard to put a stop to that, which of course it doesn't

I think there are some clues to date the gospels, which maybe the experts do, though I have never seen them refer to the evidence - almost as if they haven't noticed it. I'm even seeing some dude arguing that Theophilus is a Roman patrician who has converted to Christianity. It is not totally impossible, but I'd guess that Luke is being (at best) a bit waggish in imitating the swank of a scholar addressing a work to a patron of high status, where all he is doing here is addressing it to his readers - lovers of God (Theo -philus).

I could be quite wrong.Discussion would make the case or break it. But I never do see discussion - of any of it. I just hear the old 'gMark was probably written within a decade of the crucifixion and was the basis for Matthew and Luke..'

[Difflugia]

I'd certainly put John before Matthew and Luke, simply because he waves away the problem of Jesus not being born in Bethlehem, he does not invent a story to correct Reality.

Why is John being early more parsimonious than John knowing, but just not liking Matthew's and Luke's theologies? I think the theology of John's Gospel just doesn't require Bethlehem. I don't, however, think that any of the evangelists were writing intended history. Whatever the order, each evangelist knew the theological reasons for the details of the previous ones and either incorporated or modified them as they saw fit. Matthew and Luke each wanted Davidic descent and a Bethlehem nativity, but like Mark, John saw no reason for them.

I could be quite wrong.Discussion would make the case or break it. But I never do see discussion - of any of it. I just hear the old 'gMark was probably written within a decade of the crucifixion and was the basis for Matthew and Luke..'

The one datum that I find convincing is that Matthew's knowledge of the destruction of Jerusalem is somewhat more concrete than Mark's, putting Mark slightly earlier than or contemporaneous with the destruction of Jerusalem. It's obvious that the Synoptics share a literary dependency (rather than an oral on, for example), so Matthew was either based on Mark or something close enough that it might as well be.

[TRANSPONDER]

I'd certainly put John before Matthew and Luke, simply because he waves away the problem of Jesus not being born in Bethlehem, he does not invent a story to correct Reality.

Why is John being early more parsimonious than John knowing, but just not liking Matthew's and Luke's theologies? I think the theology of John's Gospel just doesn't require Bethlehem. I don't, however, think that any of the evangelists were writing intended history. Whatever the order, each evangelist knew the theological reasons for the details of the previous ones and either incorporated or modified them as they saw fit. Matthew and Luke each wanted Davidic descent and a Bethlehem nativity, but like Mark, John saw no reason for them.

I could be quite wrong.Discussion would make the case or break it. But I never do see discussion - of any of it. I just hear the old 'gMark was probably written within a decade of the crucifixion and was the basis for Matthew and Luke..'

The one datum that I find convincing is that Matthew's knowledge of the destruction of Jerusalem is somewhat more concrete than Mark's, putting Mark slightly earlier than or contemporaneous with the destruction of Jerusalem. It's obvious that the Synoptics share a literary dependency (rather than an oral on, for example), so Matthew was either based on Mark or something close enough that it might as well be.

John (in describing a row between Jesus and a bunch of Jews) has them remark that the messiah is to come from Bethlehem. Now I'd argue this reflects a problem that was around in John's day (not Mark's) and he simply blusters it away. But IF he had known of the nativity -claims, surely he wouldn't have ignored it, whether having Jesus tell that "I was born in Bethlehem" or put it into a parenthetical comment. The only reason he would have ignored it (on all reasoning other than denialist) is if he never heard it.And this is the answer (and the best if not the only credible one) to why he had no transfiguration and why the synoptics don't have a raising of Lazarus. These were inventions that the others never got to hear and did not know, which (without other supportive arguments) shows that the writers were not eyewitness and they invented stuff.

I should like to hear examples of how Matthew knows more of the destruction of Jerusalem (though it is likely). I would myself simply argue the omission in Mark of material in Matthew and the later writers, because I don't like the proposal that Mark would leave out stuff like the nativity claim, the sermons, the centurion's servant or indeed the raising of Lazarus and of course the resurrection appearances. I would bet the farm of he never heard of them and they were made up later - which is all the reason I need to give Mark an early date.

[Difflugia]

John (in describing a row between Jesus and a bunch of Jews) has them remark that the messiah is to come from Bethlehem. Now I'd argue this reflects a problem that was around in John's day (not Mark's) and he simply blusters it away.

Mark doesn't address Bethlehem, but does bluster away Davidic ancestry the same way in 12:35-37 ("The Lord said to my lord..."). Bafflingly to me, both Matthew and Luke repeat this pericope, despite having David in their genealogies. However, both Matthew and Luke each address Jesus being born in Bethlehem and do it differently. John addresses this, but in yet a third way.

But IF he had known of the nativity -claims, surely he wouldn't have ignored it, whether having Jesus tell that "I was born in Bethlehem" or put it into a parenthetical comment. The only reason he would have ignored it (on all reasoning other than denialist) is if he never heard it.

Why? Each evangelist is writing his own story. Are you a fan of Frank Herbert's Dune? The movie by David Lynch includes the concept of the "Weirding module" that wasn't in Herbert's novel. Neither of the recent remakes (2000 or 2021) includes the Weirding module. Does that mean that none of the later writers and directors saw the film by Lynch?

And this is the answer (and the best if not the only credible one) to why he had no transfiguration and why the synoptics don't have a raising of Lazarus. These were inventions that the others never got to hear and did not know, which (without other supportive arguments) shows that the writers were not eyewitness and they invented stuff.

Why do you think that each author must accrete or address every Jesus story that they've heard? Not only is the overall story historically implausible, but each Gospel contains implausible details not present in the others. Of course, they weren't eyewitnesses. I'm more than half convinced that there was nothing to witness. Instead, I think each Gospel was much more of a remake than either a compilation or correction of historical detail. If first century readers were aware that Jesus' birth in Bethlehem was a theological detail rather than a historical one, why did John need to address that competing theology directly? If you think it was necessarily a historical detail that John wouldn't omit, why did he omit other details that are arguably no less historical nor important? John's baptism in the Jordan, for example, omits the "you/this is my son" theophany and replaces it with "the one upon whom the dove lands will baptize with the Holy Spirit." I interpret this as John replacing the theology of the Synoptics with a different one. Must I instead think that John simply didn't know the competing theologies?

I should like to hear examples of how Matthew knows more of the destruction of Jerusalem (though it is likely).

Scholarly consensus is that Matthew's parable of the wedding feast includes an unambiguous reference to the destruction of Jerusalem in 22:7:

The king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.

I would myself simply argue the omission in Mark of material in Matthew and the later writers, because I don't like the proposal that Mark would leave out stuff like the nativity claim, the sermons, the centurion's servant or indeed the raising of Lazarus and of course the resurrection appearances. I would bet the farm of he never heard of them and they were made up later - which is all the reason I need to give Mark an early date.

I (by now obviously) put less stock in material that's merely omitted. I would claim that Mark's lack of a nativity is because Mark's Christology is adoptionistic. I wouldn't expect such a genealogy even if there were no other reasons for thinking Mark early. John similarly omits a nativity, but John's Jesus was preexistent. John's Jesus isn't son of David because John's Jesus existed in the beginning.

For me, the clues for the order in which they were written lie primarily in passages and stories that were reused, but modified. Matthew, for example, wants to include Mark's baptism as the start of Jesus' ministry, but now has to deal with the uncomfortable detail that Jesus was already divine at birth. Matthew adds the "to fulfill all righteousness" excuse for the baptism. Mark was first and Matthew used Mark.