Did Jesus restore dead people to life?

[marco]

Here are three accounts of people from the first century AD. They should be among the most remarkable people in the history of the planet but they are loud in their anonymity.

Luke 7:

14 Then he came up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood still. And he said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.� 15 And the dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother. 16 Fear seized them all, and they glorified God, saying, “A great prophet has arisen among us!� and “God has visited his people!� 17 And this report about him spread through the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country.

MARK 5
“Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep.� 40 But they laughed at him. After he put them all out, he took the child’s father and mother and the disciples who were with him, and went in where the child was. 41 He took her by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum!� (which means “Little girl, I say to you, get up!�). 42 Immediately the girl stood up and began to walk around (she was twelve years old). At this they were completely astonished. 43 He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this, and told them to give her something to eat.

John 11

43 When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!� 44 The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.�

A boy, a girl, a young man were brought to life from the dead, witnessed by crowds. Do these clearly fictitious events destroy Christ's credibility? The uproar and reportage from one such event - people being as they are - would have made a huge explosion in the history of that period, reaching the centre of civilisation, Rome. We have details of the stutter Claudius had and the love affair of Catullus, the Roman poet, but these massive events did not disturb the pax Romana. Why? Obviously because they didn't occur.

Were Luke, Mark and John lying or just reporting some rumours? Do we deduce Jesus was a charlatan or that he was a young god? What is the reasonable person's reaction to these accounts?

[Inigo Montoya]

It's damn fine storytelling is what it is, and serves to enrich the texture of the backstory. It's vital. Take Superman, for example. You know he can fly, has heat vision, insane strength, and is nearly invincible. But did you know he could phase through solid objects? Or had a telekenesis mode of vision? Super smell? Can translate mermaid speech? Look it up!

Point being, none of these extra abilities and deeds penetrated society enough to make the news, but rather serve as the foundation for character building when the adventures are circulated amongst, well, yes, a largely fictional backdrop...

I don't know what I'm saying anymore.

[marco]

It's damn fine storytelling is what it is,........I don't know what I'm saying anymore.

I believe that is what Mark said when he finished his gospel. We can enjoy Superman (I loved him!) for he allows us to sigh: "IF ONLY!" That is what I say when I read tales of Jesus messing around with corpses and getting them ready for death again. A wonderfully fulfilling job.

[Inigo Montoya]

And getting them ready for death again, you say. How interesting. What if just one had been allowed to live on indefinitely? A walking storybook thousands of years old. Lazarus himself, perhaps, available to chat with even today at a Starbucks in Palestine. Keep your regrown legs, my new standard is a resurrected immortal with which to hold palaver.

Apologies for the silliness, Marco. Your thread is a great one, but was on its way to being ignored with a certain quiet malice I found unsatisfactory. We'll get some bites, don't you fret.

[Willum]

[Replying to post 4 by Inigo Montoya]

"...restore dead people to life?"

No, but I think he restored living people to death, quite a bit.
When I think of all the wars he approved of and such...

[marco]

[Replying to post 4 by Inigo Montoya]

Your replies echo the absurdities of walking, talking corpses. And thank you for the kindness of your attention. My OP was just a couple of hours old, not quite Methuselah standard. Jesus has many modern defenders who are presumably freed from the Lord's odd prohibition not to talk about his big miracles.

[marco]

[Replying to post 4 by Inigo Montoya]

"...restore dead people to life?"

No, but I think he restored living people to death, quite a bit.
When I think of all the wars he approved of and such...

Well to be fair, Willum, he did warn us that people would suffer horribly because of him; children would turn against their parents and those that liked him would receive zero physical support when they were tortured, crucified or burned. Churchhill offered nothing but blood, toil, tears and sweat; Muhammad offered lots of clean water and couches packed with beautiful women; Jesus wasn't able to specify anything nice, insisting that he hadn't a clue when things were going to happen.

[Inigo Montoya]

Dear Christian apologists and fervent supporters of historical methodology as it relates to supporting your risen Lord,


I'm reminded of how often I suffer through resurrection threads on this site regarding Jesus, and how the Seven Steps to Kevin Bacon approach serves to satisfy the criteria for reanimated corpses.

Marco has given you three more examples of the dead coming back to life in this OP.

Where is the historical support?

Where is your Tacitus now? Josephus? Seneca? Philo? Tiberius? Pliny? Seutonius? Plutarch? Petronius? And on and on and on.

Why is history so quiet on these three extraordinary events at a time when a fourth, that of Jesus's resurrection, is so commonly defended here using a methodology employing the credentials of so many named above and their associations with the people these stories revolve around?

[marco]

Why is history so quiet on these three extraordinary events at a time when a fourth, that of Jesus's resurrection, is so commonly defended here using a methodology employing the credentials of so many named above and their associations with the people these stories revolve around?

That's the whole point - three fantastic resurrections in a short space of time and yet history is silent. And we are supposed to accept that we have historical evidence for a fourth. Raising people from the dead is a great selling point. Best, perhaps, to accept the events were all metaphorical, like so much else in the Bible. An amusing facet of the Resurrection is that people didn't recognise the revitalised corpse but were able to affirm it was Christ, not a living relative or an imposter. People actually saw the other three rising from the dead - but sadly, we have no account from any of the dead people. They just accepted their luck and sank into obscurity, as living-dead do.

[bjs]

A boy, a girl, a young man were brought to life from the dead, witnessed by crowds. Do these clearly fictitious events destroy Christ's credibility? The uproar and reportage from one such event - people being as they are - would have made a huge explosion in the history of that period, reaching the centre of civilisation, Rome. We have details of the stutter Claudius had and the love affair of Catullus, the Roman poet, but these massive events did not disturb the pax Romana. Why? Obviously because they didn't occur.

Were Luke, Mark and John lying or just reporting some rumours? Do we deduce Jesus was a charlatan or that he was a young god? What is the reasonable person's reaction to these accounts?

I was under the impression that news of these events did make it to Rome. Less than a decade after the young man was supposedly raised to life, a church – a group of people regularly talking about these events and their importance – had been formed in Rome.
https://bible.org/article/origins-church-rome

I was also under the impression that this did disturb the Roman Peace. Various Roman Empires acted ruthlessly to eradicate Christianity and its claims of people coming back to life.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecuti ... man_Empire