Loading...Do you yourself think there can be empirical proof that Jesus was raised from the dead? There’s not a right answer – I’m just asking, so you can express your opinion.
Last week I held a live Q&A for the Gold Members of the blog (if you’re not familiar with the perks that go along with being a Gold member, check the options out here: https://ehrmanblog.org/register/ ) There were lots of intriguing questions on a range of topics. One that I found particularly, well, intriguing was about an argument sometimes used to show that Jesus must have been raised from the dead and that the Christian claims are therefore demonstrably true.
The questioner asked what I thought of the argument made by William Lane Craig that the amazing expanse of Christianity, as it began to grow into the world’s largest religion, shows that the resurrection of Jesus must have happened. How else would one explain the incredible success of the Christian claims? It must have
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A miracle is something positive that occurs because of divine intervention which cannot be explained by scientific or natural laws. In other words, a miracle cannot be proven true by any logical explanation or any rational tools currently at our disposal. Again, to emphasize my point, there is no way to prove a miracle; there simply is no proof. When I was a theist and I expressed doubt to the elders of my church about demon possession, raising the dead (Lazarus), making the earth stop rotating, or parting the sea I was given the simple answer “miracles must be accepted on faith alone.” It is perfectly fine to believe, in faith, that Jesus bodily rose from the dead but there is no way to “prove” that this actually happened. Faith does not equal reason, that is why it is called faith. I used to waste a lot of mental energy attempting to prove the unprovable to eliminate my own skepticism about something I was struggling to accept on faith. However, there is no way to actually prove the resurrection. This is just my opinion and I do not wish to offend anyone.
Even faith must be based on truth. So certainly miracles cannot be accepted on faith alone. It is not perfectly fine to believe that in the whole human history one person and only one person out of 20 milliard rose from the dead without strong arguments from trustful independent witnesses to support it.
It is also very weird that the resurrected one had nothing interesting to tell about the other side, even not about his mother, that nobody posed him an interesting question and that he left again after some hours.
The largest growth in Christianity occurred before anything was known of the size of the universe and was predicated on the existence of a single God who created the single world we live in. The universe of billions of galaxies and trillions of stars was totally beyond human knowledge but the concept of a God who sent his son to “save” humanity both from itself and from the actions of that God who mandated the destruction of peoples who stood against ‘his” will was attractive to an illiterate population mostly living at subsistence level.
The addition of the myth of the resurrection gave hope that something better was available after death, something not offered by most pagan religions – exceptions eg Valhalla.
The adoption by Constantine, the subsequent adoption as the state religion in 380 by Theodosius and the subsequent self interest of the increasingly wealthy, politically powerful and intolerant clergy was in my opinion far more a factor in the spread of Christianity.
Occams razor. Its a story.
Or, its part of a larger story in which you are asked to believe that the triune God who is the omnipotent, omniscient creator of all sent himself to earth as a human to suffer and die to atone for the sins of everyone else. Everyone else that he also created in forms that would sin, knowing they would sin (he’s omniscient) when, being omnipotent, he could have created them without sin. And, this was his plan all along to change his relationship with his creations and bring salvation to them from himself. Rather than just forgiving them for sinning, or forgiving himself for creating the sinners..
Well said, Mini
I think your points are absolutely valid. It seems to me what EVIDENCE we have, i.e., there were claims/reports he was resurrected, does not constitute proof. I think it’s a matter of faith. I’d go further and say the understanding of his life and teachings must have seemed remarkable to some after his death, enough so that they decided to follow his teachings. Perhaps the resurrection stories/accounts resulted from their belief in what they thought was unique about him. So, for me, while I’m willing to believe he was resurrected, I can’t prove it, nor do I worry about being unable to do so. And fundamentally, I don’t think it matters what is true about it. I’m pretty confident that his life as portrayed by those who knew him or claimed to know him, is enough for me. If I’m wrong and blink out of existence when I die what harm has come to anyone, including me, from my following what I think is the normative principle of love for others?
Bart,
This also comes down to words and definitions. ‘Raised from the dead’ — by raised, what do we mean? What qualifies as a ‘resurrection’? If a ‘physical’ resurrection is to be proved that would certainly be much more difficult than a ‘spiritual’ resurrection. Can anyone even be sure that Lazarus was ‘physically’ raised from the dead or was it a metaphor? Mormons claim to spiritually ‘raise’ us from the dead via a post-mortem baptism (occasionally without permission!)
We hear of ‘raising’ people up via prayers…with a feeling that the prayers succeeded (were answered by God) – might that was also an abstract form of resurrection in antiquity?
“This also comes down to words and definitions. ‘Raised from the dead’ — by raised, what do we mean?”
A good question. According to the scriptures, Jesus was crucified, arose from the dead, met with his followers, and then ascended to heaven. How would this differ from Jesus being crucified, ascending to heaven, then coming back as an angel and meeting with his followers?
And if Jesus physically arose from the dead and then ascended to heaven, what happened to his body when he did so? Did it stay on earth, or did he take it to heaven?
The Gospels and St Paul all say pretty specifically that he was raised from the dead *in a physical body*. This is the point of the “Doubting Thomas” story, where Thomas was persuaded to believe in the resurrected Christ by actually touching his wounds. The resurrected Jesus ate fried fish with his followers. The Gospels make it very clear that they are NOT just talking about a “spiritual resurrection”; they’re talking about a dead body that was reanimated, left the tomb, walked around, ate fish, etc.
I don’t believe any of this myself, any more than I believe other ancient claims of bodily resurrection. And I agree there’s no empirical proof that could indicate that the resurrection of Jesus’ physical body really did happen — but that is the claim. And yes, the texts also claim that his physical body ascended into heaven.
As for the argument that the success of Christianity proves it must be true, I agree with Prof. Ehrman about the flaws in that. If the success of a religion in gaining converts proves its truth, then Islam has to be true as well, not just Christianity and Mormonism.
First-century Christianity based their entire religion on the death and resurrection of Jesus. For them, it symbolized the death of The Word (the “first covenant”). With the resurrection of The Word, Paul and the author of Hebrews regarded that event as the process for transitioning to the new covenant. It may have even been more literal for them than symbolic, based on the wording of Hebrews 9:15, Ephesians 2:15, and Colossians 2:14. This doesn’t necessarily mean he was resurrected — an idea opposed by Muslims — nor does it mean he was necessarily crucified. Yet, the reports of numerous appearances of Jesus in the flesh, and not as a spirit (Luke 24:39), lend credibility to his existing as a human being, for forty days according to Acts 1:3, whether having resurrected, recovered, or escaped. If they did not encounter him after the crucifixion, the Christian messianic movement could not have survived. Paul accurately expressed the necessity of the belief that Jesus was raised as essential to their faith — “And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:14).
Your statement that Christianity could not have survived if Jesus had not been resurrected is simply wrong. All that was actually necessary was that people BELIEVED Jesus had been resurrected. You are correct in your statement that Paul regarded the BELIEF in the resurrection as essential. But a belief in something does not equate to a fact. All of us believe things that are not true. Just as in Dr Ehrman’s comparison to the Mormons. The fact that Mormons believe the things they believe does not make them true. The exact same principle applies to Christians.
My favorite sayings (whether accurate quotes or not) are “The plural of “anecdote” is not “evidence”: and “If 50 million people say a wrong thing, it is still a wrong thing”.
Islam is currently the fastest-growing major religion. If Islam is actually growing faster than Christianity, then would that be grounds for arguing that Islam (rather than Christianity) must therefore be true?
If Islam eventually eclipses Christianity in sheer population numbers, displacing Christianity as the world’s largest religion (which prognosticators see as likely to occur later this century), would that then constitute evidence for Islam being (or — even more problematically — suddenly becoming) the one true faith?
(Would Christians today who argue that Christianity’s current status as the world’s largest religion is proof of its truth then be prepared to follow that same line of logic, and duly covert to Islam as soon as it surpasses Christianity in size?)
Bart, I agree with the reasons you delineated for why the argument purportedly made by William Lane Craig is unconvincing.
Bart,
I would agree. How many people once thought the world was flat and the center of the universe? Most? From one perspective that seemed reasonable & rational to the majority of people. That did not make it correct of course & as time went on was found could not be more wrong. Crowd psychology is self reinforcing and tends to remove or dissuade doubts one might have thinking critically as an individual. Many people NEED that crowd reinforcement to do that very thing but are unaware of it. Eh, just what I think.
Jesus got raised from the dead on Sunday morning. Went out to brunch with the Apostles. Walked through a few walls. Told the Apostles to keep the Resurrection on the down low until after he ascends into outer space…
I don’t buy it. Sounds made up.
For working reason, i had to often study subjects related the human body; anatomy, physiology, biology and many others. When i study how we function i constantly have the same thoughts in my head that go like this: ” This is unbelievable”, “the reality we represent is more fantastic than any fantasy our imagination is capable of conceiving”. And i end up thinking the same with pretty much everything that surrounds me of the natural world both when i observe it and especially when i study it.
I don’t know if Jesus really raised from the dead, but I don’t consider the idea preposterous at all because i look at natural world we’re into, that we are part of and i know that it is already something miraculous and mysterious and powerful and unique and beautiful, on the same level of a resurrection if not higher, right under my nose.
I don’t know if Jesus really raised from the dead but i would love he did
There is no shortage of stories of people who ‘came back to life’ after a begin declared dead in the hospital and many have the “ultra white light” experience placed in their memory when they revive. Some of this may be tied to how our brain works under duress — I know when I got conked on the head, I saw plenty of lights…! The physics behind a multi-day dead (with no brain or heart activity) corpse getting raised is more difficult to comprehend. The gospel explanations just don’t fully align with any single scientific possibility. I choose to accept that the gospels stories are embellished explanations that tie to scriptures or local legend-lore for the numerous post-crucifixion visions. What scientifically occurred between Jesus’ crucifixion and the vision of Paul is impossible to know and is relatively unimportant compared to the teachings of Jesus and his non-violent sacrifice. What one can accept as ‘possible’ is what determines how the resurrection scene gets played out in their faith. My resurrection scene remains largely incomplete…
“Do you yourself think there can be empirical proof that Jesus was raised from the dead?”
The only possibility of an empirical proof would be if Jesus were to come in person today. But then he would have to prove that he was killed 2,000 years ago. As for myself, however, I cannot provide an empirical proof that he either did or did not rise from the dead, nor can anyone living today.
Bart,
I agree with you. Your arguments are logical and spot on. If you have faith in Christianity, in my opinion, you do not need to prove anything. Your faith is your faith and more power to you.
Proof is in the Second Coming. The fulfillment of Matthew 24 and 25 and the Nicene Creed. (Future tense). Preterism interpretations are not proof because the Nicene Creed is not Preterism.
I myself, have a strict interpretation that it was a prophecy to be fulfilled before the first generation of disciples and the original 12 apostles of Jesus had died.
The promise of a happily ever after could also explain the growth of Christianity. Living forever, in heaven, with God, streets of gold, no illness/hunger/disease/sadness/death… That’s about as powerfully positive a thought that a human can have. Seriously. Can you think of anything more positive? And no circumcision!!
The foundation of cognitive behavioral therapy is that feelings follow thoughts. Happy thoughts lead to happy feelings, and negative thoughts lead to negative feelings.
Christianity spread because it offers the ultimate happy thoughts and thus happy feelings. Though one could argue 72 virgins might be right up there with it. 🙂 The story could have ended with Jesus remaining in the grave like everyone else, but with heaven waiting, Christianity still could have spread just the same.
Dr. Ehrman, from Jesus’ crucifixion until Constantine, did any other religion offer an infinite reward like Christianity did?
Some of the Mystery Religions in the Greek and Roman worlds guaranteed a happy afterlife for those who were initiated into them.
I agree on the happy ending of the afterlife being a powerful drive, however what it’s more difficult to reconcile is the fact that that is only promised in a far distant future, whereas in the present one is told to love your enemies, turn the other cheek, share your wealth with who’s in need, love God above anything even your family and the list goes on… basically all stuff that is not exactly easy to follow…so I’m not convinced that the christian message appealed for purely its happy ending…life is quite brutal for everyone sooner or later, so for me it would take more than the beautiful happy thought of the afterlife to accept the christian faith… evidences of its truth would be more valuble
I agree that it would need to be argued in a larger case.
I think the idea would be that we would take the fact that Christianity grew the way it did and we ask if we would expect that if 1. God raised Jesus from the dead and if 2. Jesus stayed dead. I think the idea is that if he stayed dead, why did his followers think he had a singular resurrection event? Why did they continue to follow a dead man instead of abandon the belief? etc. etc. I won’t really get into it because I am more interested seeing if this can be applied to other religions and their growth as you point out in Mormonism.
Whether Joseph Smith was lying or telling the truth about the plates, I don’t see how that changes the number of followers or the fact that he creates a movement. I don’t think it makes him more or less persuasive whether he peddles the truth. For Christianity, it seems that the resurrection itself is a central part of the new belief that grows. It’s not like Jesus claimed he was resurrected and Christianity is about whether you believe him.
I don’t see how there could be empirical proof that Jesus was raised from the dead. However, I can allow for the possibility. There are many things we can’t know with absolute certainty, and many things we can’t currently explain. The fact that Christianity has persisted for 2000 years implies that there was something extraordinary in the man and his message and reason enough to continue to explore and question the early stories.
I the the number of believers in the resurrection is proof of the existence of a basic human concern about death and a hope of somehow avoiding it for oneself and for loved ones. This I think is at the heart of the almost universal practice of religion among human groups and the religion-like practice even among those who reject all religious belief (see, for example, the Soviet Union’s use of the term ‘the immortal Lenin’.
I can’t immediately thus of a large group of Christians who reject the resurrection – even those who say it did not happen physically often assert it has a spiritual reality.
So because it addresses itself directly to the anxiety at the heart of religion it is a myth of considerable power and welcomed by many who hear it.
This, it seems to me is the most likely reason so many people believe in the resurrection. It helps us, as Marx said, as the spirit of spiritless conditions and the heart of a heartless world. There is no comfort in coming to realise that not only is the resurrection improbable but that it is impossible. There is every comfort in believing the opposite.
I agree there can be no empirical evidence of the resurrection and that the success of Christianity does not prove the resurrection happened. But followers of Jesus felt, somehow, that he was with them after he was crucified and literally billions of Christians have accepted that as true over the course of several thousand years. That is also not empirical evidence of the resurrection, but would Christianity have thrived if people hadn’t believed? The belief, somehow, must be key. Which brings us to John 20:29… 😉
I’d say people certainly believed. But nearly 2 billion believe in the claims of the Quran as well, and in my view that has no relevance to the question of whether or not it is true.
Bart!
I’m glad you’re back. (And that you had plenty of books to read in your wilderness sojourn.) 😉
Whether the Quran is true? I’m not sure how to parse that.
From my perspective, the relevance of a huge number of believers committed to a spiritual text over millennia (the Bible, the Torah, the Quran, the Dhammapada, the Bhagavad Gita, etc.) is that it demonstrates the efficacy of the text for establishing union/communion between its believers and God or with whatever they conceive as the ultimate.
Empirical proofs are an intellectual abstraction that do not factor in such a wholly subjective context. To me, Christians arguing empirical proofs have lost their way, and have rather missed the point of Doubting Thomas, which is a parable about the folly of such arguments.
This is a great question: does the size of Christianity prove its underlying truth claim that Jesus rose from the dead? Obviously, no.
I think great evidence against this claim is the number of Christian conversions in the 4th century. It is obvious more and more people converted because the emperors converted and Christianity received favored status throughout the empire. Laws were eventually passed closing down pagan temples, outlawing pagan practice, discriminating against Jews, etc. Additionally, Constantine did not convert because of the resurrection claim. He converted because he saw a vision predicting military victory.
Resurrection claims were even dubious to the first century Corinthian church. They doubted whether Jesus resurrected or not. Paul’s “ proofs” were based on his own “ visionary” experience and hearsay. The Corinthians converted to Christianity for other reasons other than a resurrection claim.
The idea that you can prove something happened that is ordinary, like that Julius Caesar was assassinated, for which we have a lot of independent corroborating evidence, is difficult enough, Proving something extraordinary, like Jesus resurrection happened, for which we have little independent corroboration is impossible.. Craig’s argument has some merit but it falls far short of a proof. Your points go a long way to casting doubt on Craig’s argument but neither is a proof, in my opinion. However I don’t buy his and I agree with yours.
Hi Bart,
I did discusses this subject many times, however, I always try to explore a different angle every time.
Now … I assume that you refuse the resurrection because it is scientifically impossible … and “impossible” claims require definite proofs, and we don’t have definite proofs for the resurrection of Jesus.
But let us replace the word “resurrection” with “resuscitation”. So, would the available data be sufficient to support this “resuscitation”?
The “resuscitation” here means that Jesus didn’t die on the cross but he went into deep coma, and this phenomenon is rare but it has been “noticed” many times, and it is not “impossible”.
As Jesus head hasn’t been hit, his neck hasn’t been cut, his legs haven’t been broken, and six hours on the cross is not normally deadly …. and as there are *multiple attestations* (which were documented between 25 to 70 years after Jesus) that Jesus has been seen after the crucifixion event …. and as the deep coma is *possible*,,, then isn’t it valid to say that: {Jesus death on the cross is not certain}?
No, I don’t see any evidence that Jesus was resuscitated.
If we used the Gospels as a reference in this particular discussion, then I think our difference here is probably due to one main point:
You are taking the Gospels statement that Jesus died on the cross as true, therefore you regard the witness accounts of seeing Jesus after the crucifixion-event as false due to group hallucination or other reasons.
However, I am looking at the witness accounts of seeing Jesus after the crucifixion-event to be an evidence that Jesus didn’t die on the cross, especially that “deep coma” is a possible phenomenon, therefore, I do regard that the Gospels statement about the death of Jesus to be an error due to a wrong assumption by them.
Also, I am very precise here: I didn’t try here to enforce the proposition that Jesus didn’t die on the cross, but I simply saying that “Jesus death on the cross is not certain”, and there is a clear support for this proposition which is the multiple attestation that Jesus has been seen after the crucifixion-event.
I don’t accept the statement that JEsus actually died as true simply because the Gospels say so. People who were crucified died. To my knowledge we know of one exception out of many thousands, and that one is because they guy was taken off the cross not long after he’d been put on it.
We should accept that Paul had a NDE (near death experience — his report matches clearly the accounts of thousands of other folks in modern times). Paul’s spiritual being (soul) saw and was talked to by the spiritial being of Jesus. He had died and not resurrected back into human life.
Bill
There is another similar but in my view stronger argument than the numbers that is often used. The extremely exceptional stubbornness with which the martyrs defended their faith in Jesus must have its origin in an equally extremely exceptional Jesus-fact, and that is the resurrection.
Personally I don’t be believe it is valid.
And let’s suppose the resurrection happened then why the all the witnesses missed the opportunity to ask Jesus a smart question : for instance how it was at the other side, did he saw his mother, was God a man and maybe even more important why God only made use of this magic power only once in his life time.
I don’t see why the persistence of a belief shows that it is more likely true. For the vast majority of Christian history the vast majority of Christians have believed the world was created in six literal days; but the fact of the persistence of the belief is not related to its truth.
I’m also afraid we don’t know how the the apostles died for the most part — the idea that they all were martyred for their faith is a modern legend.
For me, the only somewhat argument for the resurrection is that the apostles and some Jesus’s followers continued thinking he was the Messiah after his death. If not, what is the reason to insist that a crucified man was it? To human view is a complete failure for a Messiah and his followers which would have been terribly shocked would have given up. Said that, this have nothing to do with William Lane Craig’s argument. Only a few of his followers in life continued proclaiming the resurrection after his death. But every person that experienced the death of a close person knows how difficult would have been to invent something just to keep going
They certainly believed he was raised from the dead. The historian’s task in this and every other case is to figure out whether what people think/believe is true or not (whether we’re dealing with resurrections or modern elections).
I would like to clarify the 6-days creation (which was mentioned here in the post) as it is also mentioned in the Quran.
It can be seen from the Quranic verses that this creation is not for the universe but for the earth and atmosphere. The day in Arabic (and in Hebrew) is the appeared motion of the sun from sunset to the next (i.e. the rotation of earth around itself relative to the sun). Currently. The average day is 24 atomic-hours (i.e. 24 hours using atomic clock). However, we can argue that earth at its start was almost in a gravitational-lock with the sun, meaning that one rotation might have taken millions of atomic-years.
According to the “Giant Impact Hypothesis”, a Mars-sized meteor collided with Earth, which caused earth to rotate with about 5 atomic-hours per day. This collision had altered the systems on earth which ultimately made the planet suitable for life.
Science today cannot prove this 6 days creation, but also it cannot refute it, which would make the 6 days creation within the margin of possibility.
I did write two articles about this subject:
A short brief one:
https://omr-mhmd.yolasite.com/resources/66.03-6Days-Humans-5.pdf
And a more detailed one:
https://omr-mhmd.yolasite.com/resources/56-The-6-Days-of-Creation-3.pdf
Of course, the resurrection sounds made up because it does not happen. Albert Einstein said that Jesus had to exist because of all the wonderful words attributed to Him. Imagine if all the world lived like Jesus asked us to in Matthew 5 & 6 and in Luke 11 & 12 from the time he asked that. The highly educated from the east would not have wiped out those living in the west (who were living more like Jesus asked us to). Jesus said that many would be false disciples. Thomas Jefferson wrote that all were created equally and had the right to liberty but he was a slave owner. Isaac Newton predicted that Israel would be a nation again in the 20th century and that the world would be in turmoil in the 21st century. In 2 Samuel 7:9 it is recorded that GOD told David his name would always be mentioned among the great names. If one reads the Bible as a book from beginning to end it fits together like a beautiful puzzle with lots of incredible cross references and things are being discovered that are in the Bible. Is this a miracle?
Lots of the cross references, of coures, are there because later writers were familar with what earlier ones said. The authors of the Gospels, for example, well versed im the wrtings of the Old Testament prophets and Psalms, and so coincidental connections are usually not coincidental.
Yes, but not all and some are only known now because we have search engines for the Bible.
The word “proof” has been mentioned extensively in the post and comments. Mathematics and logic are the only disciplines where “proof” has any meaning. Those are the only two areas where you can prove something 100%. Scientists talk about evidence rather than proof. So, is there any evidence the Resurrection took place? None. It’s all hearsay.
I agree. Some scholars do use the term “proof” loosely, not to mean 100% certainty necessarily but, say, 99.9% or even less. whether they are using it in the best sense of not is another question. (Of course in philosophy and some kinds of religious studies they speak of “proofs” for the existence of God!!)
Of course you can prove a miracle…xray shows cancer yesterday it’s gone today…no rational explanation. Miracle. The question to ask yourself is…if my neighbor was dead 3days in the hospital and came back to life would I call it a miracle or an event that will have a rational explanation one day? If your world view does not include miracles— that precludes proof.
If we use the same tests that Bart uses to determine what Jesus says I think Bart has indicated….not enough info. I’m just glad the first believers made a point of loosing his tomb and the fact that Jesus didn’t promote his babies … otherwise we’d be doing the Christian hajj and fighting over which offspring to follow.
Compare the growth of Islam or Buddhism, no Christian would argue that they are true due to their growth rates in history.
I think you dealt with it well in your response.
This reminded me of an article I read about Richard Swinburne’s argument in “The Resurrection of God Incarnate” where he comes up with a 97% probability that the resurrection happened, purportedly using Bayesian theory. I didn’t read the book, but after seeing your post I went and watched a YouTube video of him setting out his argument, and then read a number of academic reviews of the book. None were at all convinced by it, but they were generally kind, although one said it was risible. Have you come across Swinburne’s argument, Bart? Any views?
Is empirical proof of the resurrection possible? I think it’s in the category of finding Russell’s teapot orbiting in space. Some would say it’s theoretically possible, but I’d just say it isn’t going to happen, so why bother?
Yeah, I think it’s a scream. The other person who uses Bayes Theorem for establishing information about Jesus is Richard Carrier, who uses it to establish the high level of probability that he NEVER EXISTED!! Something’s awry here. 🙂 TWO somethings, I think….
I would gladly believe in resurrection and a happy after life for christians. But what disturbs me most is wether you have to stay in your body as it was at the moment of your death: what kind of happyness staying in a maimed, old body eternally ? Can you imagine the horror of such a general resurrection at doomsday ? Jesus came back in his torn body, unfit for further human life; though he ate with his disciples, his wounds didn’t bleed nor disturb him. Who was he is my big question.
There’s a prolonged discussion of this among ealry Christian thinkers, with all sorts of interesting variants. Soince in antiquity it was thought that food you ate became literally a part of your body, what if a sailor died at sea, was eaten by a fish, and a fisherman later caught the fish and ate it. Who would get which parts of the man’s body? (!!)
Proof of the event is not the same as proof of the belief in the event, of course. We know the latter is true because of history. If the former was true, then no ‘proof’ is possible because the resurrected Jesus is not here, by definition.
Dr. Ehrman,
I agree with the argument you make throughout your debates on this subject, which is that we can’t say that the *least* likely explanation of the evidence is the *most* likely explanation. However, if at some point in the future Jesus comes down through the clouds with an army of angels, wipes out all the armies of the world, and sets up God’s Kingdom on earth, I think that would constitute sufficient evidence of his resurrection.
Question:
From a historical perspective, isn’t this ultimately a matter of whether it is more likely that: a) we don’t know exactly what happened two thousand years ago; or
b) someone rose from the dead? I’m thinking of the argument that’s based on the claim that all 11 of Jesus’ disciples were willing to die rather than give up their claim that they had seen Jesus physically alive after his crucifixion. Given the paucity of information about what happened to the disciples, this argument doesn’t even seem to be worth discussing.
Yup, if he comes back tomorrow, he’s clearly not still dead. Same with anyone from 2000 years ago. And the chances are the same for all of them. We know lots of what happend 2000 years ago, such as — everyone alive then died, and everyone who died had once been alive. Other things we know reasonably well — there was a Roman Empire. Other things less well: how did Nero commit suicide? Did he commit suicide? Other things … and it goes like that. We have evidence for the various perspectives. We don’t have evidence for someone being truly dead (flat-linin’ dead) and being raised frm the dead. so I’d say it’s different.
For many years I’ve taken courses by Dr Ehrman through The Great Courses, read his books and lately taken his courses on his web site. I have learned a tremendous amount from Dr Ehrman and would say he’s convinced me Richard Dawkins is correct when he states: Presumably what happened to Jesus was what happens to all of us when we die. We decompose. Accounts of Jesus’s resurrection and ascension are about as well documented as Jack and the Beanstalk.
As the human race became self aware they needed to believe in life after death. For Christians if Jesus was raised then there is life after death for all who believe in him. If you question this belief you question the existence of Heaven and without Heaven there is no point.
I’d say the argument backfires rather badly.
Firstly, as you’ve pointed out, the rate of growth prior to Constantine getting involved was in fact pretty low. If you look back at the years immediately after Jesus’s death, his movement seems to have made barely a ripple on non-Christian history (just those couple of passing mentions in Tacitus and Josephus, Pliny having no experience of dealing with cases involving Christians). Far from the rate of spread showing that something miraculous happened, I’d say it’s a good indication that there was not, in fact, any sort of convincing evidence at the time.
And secondly, even looking just at those relatively early centuries, the vast majority of converts would have been from years and years afterwards, with no personal knowledge of whether Jesus actually was resurrected or not. So what these numbers in fact show is how many people convert to Christianity without any proof of the resurrection, hence meaning that we can’t take the fact that some people did convert early on as proof of anything much at all.
You should read Bart’s book The triumph of Christianity…. The cause for all these pagans leaving their polytheism for Christianity was……. miracles.
I was shocked when Bart said that
In answer to question: no, I see nothing miraculous about the growth of Christianity, although it is an interesting historical phenomenon worth investigating.
However, the growth of Christianity is a minor argument of Craig’s. He continues to argue that the Resurrection is proven be the “facts” of the empty tomb, post mortem appearances and the origin of the disciples’ belief that God had raised Jesus from the dead. Here’s a fairly recent exposition of Craig’s: https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/popular-writings/jesus-of-nazareth/the-resurrection-of-jesus
Oh yes, I know his fuller argument. We had a live debate about it years ago at Holy Cross.
Proof? No. Empirical evidence? Not to my knowledge. Events that could make one wonder if maybe it did happen? Yes. The humiliating death of an itinerant preacher spawned a religion now 2 billion strong. A pious Jew at the time did an apparently instant and complete 180 after some sort of visionary experience and spent the rest of his life actively promoting this preacher, writing about him, and enduring hardship and apparently execution as a result. Cathedrals, churches, artwork, literature, music, holidays: Did it happen? Maybe a spiritual phenomenon rather than resuscitation of a corpse? Don’t know. But I wonder.
What is death? What does “dead” mean referring to a human being?. Find one definition here (have fun!): Neurology 2023;101:1112-1132.
Was Jesus “dead?” We can’t know because the gospels–those that we have, all kabillion copies/versions of them–are not reliable historical documents.
If Jesus was “dead,” whatever the cause of his death (crucifixion will do, so could sticking a spear into someone’s chest), he did not return to life. Plain & simple. If Jesus was dead, there was no resurrection.
Everyone retains the option to believe otherwise.
And I would like to ask Dr Ehrman why the early christians didn’t choose the figure of the resurrected Jesus as emblem of the religion ; why the suffering crucified man ?
Do you mean for their art? Even the crucifixion didn’t start showing up for a few centuries. One of the most common images was the use of Jonah — precisely an image more of the resurrection. But in general my sense is that throughout history Jesus’ followers have identified more with his suffering for them as more important than his being glorified.
It wouldn’t surprise me to find that a certain amount of “thuggery” and strong arm tactics contributed to the spread of Christianity. The essence of the belief system is intolerance of deviation. “One way”, and so on. So Christian groups would have been quite insular. At some point, they would have begun to shun non-Christians and exclude them from both business relations and personal relations. “So, you wanna make shoes in this town? Got Jesus? Won’t get no business if you don’t have Jesus. In fact, you set up shop and there could be a bad accident, like maybe somebody breaks your arm, know what I mean? Better get you some Jesus.”
No one claims, to my knowledge, that many of the early converts to Christianity were witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus. Paul claims that more than 500 people witnessed the resurrected Christ at one time, but even this claim is disputed. Therefore, growth beyond a few hundred followers depends not on whether Jesus rose from the dead or how many witnesses there were, but rather whether people came to believe that he did. And such belief is wholly independent on whether it was factually true. Numerous examples show that myths can develop quite quickly and gain numerous followers. The deification of Halie Selassie, the Roswell UFO crash, the development of the Cargo Cults, and so on are examples of myths taking off very quickly. And I doubt many Christian apologists want to make this point about rapid growth while also talking about the number of Muslims. Pew Research predicts Islam to surpass Christianity as the most popular religion in the world by 2050.
Having a long history in the healthcare field I have always held the view that Jesus might not have been dead when he was entombed. There are many cases of people being declared dead only to revive at some later point, especially before the advent of modern medicine with it’s monitors and advanced equipment. My best friend’s father died on the table after open heart surgery. The team was unable to restart his heart, so they left the room to tell the family he was gone. It was almost 15 minutes later that a nurse noticed that he had a rhythm on a monitor and was breathing! So it’s very possible that Jesus revived in his tomb and was conscious when the women found him. Is this resurrection?
No, that’s known as resuscitation. (The problem is that hte women did not find him in the tomb)
Craig’s argument is reasonable evidence that Jesus existed, but poor evidence for any resurrection. Reminds me of the “Santa Claus” argument of “how can millions be wrong”?
I think it’s rubbish. Or, to put it mildly, a very, very weak argument.
The only empirical proof for this claim or any claim of that particular kind would be to somehow go back in time and see for ourselves what *actually* transpired.
By the way, will this session be uploaded somewhere for the people that couldn’t attend it live?
I like what John Dominic Crossan and others have observed: it must have been the case that followers of Jesus believed he appeared to them after he died. Speaking in psychological terms, his death at the hands of the Romans would have been traumatic and devastating, so the story was transformed in a way that made sense to them. It doesn’t mean the resurrection was a lie; it means it was a way of seeing a deeper truth. He wasn’t defeated by his tragic death, and neither were they. Crossan also said (to paraphrase) that the period between what we call Good Friday and Easter Sunday could have been at least five years. This is a view that makes sense to me, even as a believer.
I think Paul must have converted aout three years after Jesus’ death, so I don’t think the interval could be five years…
Christian growth over 300 years is interesting, but most interesting to me is the 0-60 acceleration. What got things started?
I’ve felt like whatever else is true about Christianity, there are a couple solid things: 1. Jesus really did exist. (Jesus as myth is not serious scholarly thought) 2. SOMETHING happened to make early followers believe Jesus was significant – more significant than the average rabbi.
I thought that SOMETHING had to be a physical resurrection, but several thoughts have caused me to change. Here are two: 1. Decades later, resurrection stories remained inconsistent (even incoherent?) in the gospels. (Surely, if the physical resurrection were that important, there would be a core set of stories accessible to the gospel writers.) 2. Paul seems more convinced by his own (NOT physical?) encounter(s) with Jesus than other people’s real encounters (I remain SOOO puzzled why Paul had so littleinterest in learning from disciples who walked with Jesus.)
So, the rise of Christianity is significant, and “resurrection” is important to it. But, I am no longer convinced the growth hinged on a belief in a “physical resurrection”. With that, I no longer think a growth argument contributes to a physical resurrection argument.
Be aware that there is not one credible actual eyewitness account from anyone in the Bible claiming to have seen a risen Jesus, other than that sketchy vision that Paul claimed?
All we have are accounts from somebody . . . . . saying that somebody else . . . .saw a risen Jesus . . . . . NEVER, an actual eyewitness account from any person! Think about that! Of all the hundreds that Paul claims saw a risen Jesus . . . . we DON’T have a single eyewitness account! NOT ONE !!!!!!!
It’s like trying to track down a rumor. People have heard it and passed it on . . . but you can’t find someone who is the actual original source !!!!
I define death as “the ending of life WITHOUT THE POSSIBILITY OF RESURRECTION.” Any other definition amounts to “appears to be dead.” If someone cuts down a tree, “kills” a tree, it could be considered dead. But if the tree re-sprouts, if it is “resurrected”, that just means that it was not really dead. If any dead being comes back to life it was not really dead in the first place. All it takes for a seemingly miraculous resurrection is for someone to be wrong declaring something, or someone, dead. And of course people are wrong all the time.
So suppose the events in the Gospels are true, Jesus was crucified but taken down after a relatively short time by supporters. A few days later he is seen walking and talking. What conclusion can be drawn? Is it more likely he was miraculously resurrected or that someone made a mistake declaring him dead. The answer is obvious to me. But it’s a good story, Jesus miraculously rising from the dead. No wonder Christianity spread the way it did. Everyone likes a good story whether it is true or not.
Yes, resurrection is different from resuscitation or a NDE.
Considering this argument to be a historical proof is the wrong frame of thinking. It’s an apologetic argument, and as usual it’s not rooted in any objective logic.
This argument goes well with the myth of martyrdom. The view among the William Lain Craig sect of Christians is that Christianity was mostly opposed with death penalties during the first few centuries. It would have died out, except that a combination of personal persuasion and the miraculous action of the Holy Spirit kept it growing.
That a non-miraculous mechanism can explain the growth of Christianity is irrelevant to the argument. So much of apologetics is not about giving the most probable explanation, but about creating a space where the miracle is a possible explanation.
I strongly believe, based on the epistles of Paul and the Gospels, that early Christians believed the man Jesus really died and really physically rose from the dead. Some, possibly all, believed he then ascended bodily to heaven. Do I believe in Jesus’s bodily resurrection and ascension? Since I’m required to believe it to maintain membership in my branch of Christianity, sure, I believe. I say so publicly every Sunday. Do I find it plausible? Absolutely not. The existing evidence is far too weak and there are other far more convincing explanations for the rise and spread of Christianity. For instance, the fervency of current Mormon believers attests to the power of collective belief in the face of plenty of evidence to the contrary. I used to believe with emotional fervor as well. No more.
The argument presented is, in my opinion, a good example of a non-sequitur as demonstrated by Bart.
However, I thought Craig’s “proof” is basically the following:
1. Presupposing the existence of God, capable of enacting a resurrection.
2. That Jesus actually died. (reminds me of the Oz coroner’s testimony about the wicked witch of the East)
3. He was placed in a tomb.
4. The tomb was discovered empty. [Grave robbery ruled out due to alleged presence of guards]
5. Most importantly, was reportedly seen alive by dozens to hundreds postmortem.
Craig’s contention is that Resurrection is the “most likely explanation” of the above.
I think most of those posting here could envision numerous other scenarios not requiring divine intervention to account for the above.
Bart’s arguments work for me. I’ve had the case presented that *only* the actual resurrection can explain the zealousness of the disciples after the event. The problem in that case is that I don’t know anything about those who claimed to have seen the “risen” Jesus. They didn’t write anything that survives, and what is documented about them is inconsistent, fantastical, and beyond hearsay. Many people are zealous in their religious beliefs without having seen anything miraculous.
Christianity succeeded because of organizational abilities, the hierarchy of the authorities, and, not least, by providing a social safety net to people who were considered less valuable to monarchs than the dirt they farmed.
It seems Dr. Craig is arguing the following:
If X% amount of people believe the claim is true within Y amount of time, it must be true.
Ask Dr. Craig what these threshold numbers are for both the Resurrection and other religious events (like the virgin birth), and any event in general. Are the values different for religious claims versus scientific claims? Does the rule only apply to ‘miraculous’ claims? Has this ‘rule’ ever been shown to be incorrect (like flat earth, or Islamic claims like the moon slitting in two, etc.)? If the rule becomes ‘false’ at some point in the future (like the percent of believers decreasing), does that mean the event did NOT occur?
For the above reasons, I find the argument laughably unconvincing. However….
It seems logically the ‘X’ MUST be greater than 50%, otherwise the negation of the claim would then be true by the same rule. Since only about 20% (at best) believe the Resurrection claim, I don’t see how this is even a valid position at all.
I’ve heard this argument and it in no way shows any empirical evidence. It’s based on the idea that the earliest followers of Christ believed he was raised and spent their lives preaching this and many died for their belief, so clearly they were being honest.
Well, they also believed that the world would end within their lifetime. Did that belief make it true? Clearly not!
It’s not proof but evidence (reason to believe).
Please stop dismissing observations as not evidence: the fact that your parents believe is reason to believe, inter alia, because they normally care for your best interests. Usually popular ideas, like the world not being flat, are correct; but there are exceptions, such as the former belief that smoking tobacco is good for one’s health.
I have long wondered how belief in miracles came to be such prevalent beliefs in the early church and then of course to this day. Then I ponder the influence of Paul in the early days of the church. Since Paul wrote his epistles first, all of the gospel writers were probably influenced by some of his writings, writings which emanated from a vision he had. Paul must have been a charismatic fellow, loaded with such energy and conviction that he preached, taught and argued the correctness of his case wherever he went. A result was that he convinced many others of the rightness of his thinking.
My point in the above is that I see how Paul’s model may have worked in the first century by observing our current political situation. I am surprised when today, a charismatic fellow can, with conviction, energy and persistence utter a claim without evidence and many of our fellow citizens will accept it as truth. I am astonished when the same charismatic fellow can utter a claim that can be quickly disproved, and many fellow citizens will continue to believe.
Was this model perhaps at work in Paul’s day?
I’d say Paul constantly marshalled “proof” for his claims of the resurrectoin: he actually saw Jesus (he said). That’s different, I think, for saying things that are factually able to be shown to be false.