Loading...In my previous post I began to discuss Craig Evan’s essay “Getting the Burial Traditions and Evidences Right,” which was his attempt to show that the views I set forth in How Jesus Became God were flawed. In his view, the New Testament portrayal of Jesus’ burial is almost certainly historical: Jesus really was buried, in a known tomb, on the afternoon of his death, immediately after he expired, by Joseph of Arimathea, a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin who had, the night before, called for his execution. My view is that this is entirely unlikely, that Jesus was probably left on his cross to suffer the ravages of time and, possibly, scavenging animals, as was the practice of Romans for crucified victims. In no instance was this practice more constant than in the case of “enemies of the state,” anyone, for example, who was involved in an insurrection or who threatened a violent opposition to Roman rule (or was thought to have threatened). Jesus himself, of course, was executed on just this charge, of planning to supplant the Roman governorship of Judea in order to set himself up as king.
In the previous post I dealt with Craig’s discussion of a passage in Philo – the one text from antiquity that explicitly indicates that a governor might sometimes show clemency in allowing a crucified victim to be buried. I argued that Craig completely misconstrues this evidence.
Craig goes on to argue that clemency was in fact a Roman practice more generally. His reason for arguing so is to show that it is not inconceivable that Pilate would be merciful and would allow Jesus to be buried, since Roman authorities frequently, in Craig’s opinion, did show mercy. In his words, “the Romans not only permitted the bodies of the executed, including the crucified, to be buried [Craig never does show this was a policy or custom – he only has the quotation from Philo], they even pardoned those in prison and sometimes even pardoned those awaiting or faced with the threat of execution, whether by crucifixion or by other means” (p. 75). Craig refers to this as the “Roman practice of granting clemency.”
When I read this statement for the first time I expected Craig to cite some examples of Roman administrators who stayed the execution by crucifixion of criminals – or even just their execution by any means. Oddly enough, Craig next cites four instances of clemency –none of them from the days of Jesus and none of them in the land of Israel – and none of them involves a person convicted to be executed, let alone crucified, let alone for committing high treason against the state.
So why does he say
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‘Jesus himself, of course, was executed on just this charge, of planning to supplant the Roman governorship of Judea in order to set himself up as king.’
You seem to place significant historical certainty on a very small aspect of the Gospel accounts – the charge on the cross, “King of the Jews” – but you discount the context of the charge from the very same Gospels.
The Gospels indicate the charge of sedition was from the Sanhedrin (Luke 23:2 5 14, John 18:30) and Pilate was suspicious of the charge (Matt 27:18, Mark 15:10, Luke 23:14). Jesus is never portrayed as wanting to overthrow Roman rule. Jesus never refers to himself as the King of the Jews. This is a title Pilate asks of him (Matt 27:11, Mark 15:2, Luke 23:3, John 18:33-34) and Jesus responds, “Thou sayest.” Pilate’s label of this charge (Matt 27:37, Mark 15:26, Luke 23:38, John 19:19) is an emotional mockery in crucifying Jesus. The Jewish elders even ask Pilate to change the inscription to, “This man claims to be King of the Jews” (John 19:21), but Pilate responds, “What I have written, I have written” (John 19:22).
The charge of sedition was really against Judaism and the Nation of Israel (Luke 23:2 5 14 – Sanhedrin claim of Jesus stirring up the people and perverting their nation) and not against Rome.
The Gospel accounts suggest the Sanhedrin recognized something unique with Jesus, and therefore, were cautious – maybe even fearful of carrying out justice. The Gospel accounts have the tone of the Sanhedrin masterfully manipulating Pilate to do something he didn’t want to do, since on the surface, why would the Roman Prefect care about executing a Judean peasant? It wouldn’t be the first time in history where surface appearances hid something deeper.
Some suggest the interesting human interactions portrayed in the Gospels were shaped/changed over decades. However, even Paul’s letters (much sooner than the dates attributed to the Gospels) provide no hint of Roman motivation behind the crucifixion, but instead on Judean motivation (1 Thessalonians 2:14-15), which is consistent with the Gospels.
I understand the desire of historians and biblical scholars to shift the blame of Jesus’ charge and crucifixion squarely onto the shoulders of the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire is not around to be persecuted or be the target of horrible, unjustified, religious-biased hatred. But if Jesus promoted false teachings in attempts to pervert the Jewish nation and potentially reduce their resistance to Roman authority (give unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, love your enemies, turn the other cheek, a friend of tax collectors, declaring a centurion has the greatest faith in all Israel, one centurion calling Jesus “Lord”, another declaring Jesus as “the Son of God”, emphatic criticism of Jewish authority, etc.), then the Sanhedrin was justified in its suspicions of Jesus. If the miracles attributed to Jesus were fabricated stories or orchestrated events to gain attention, with Jesus condemning entire Judean cities to hell for not taking his miracles seriously, then we should give the Judeans credit for rejecting his ministries. Not that Jesus deserved a death sentence, but how can we judge the desperate and fearful conditions of the Judean people under Roman occupation, one that eventually resulted in the massacre of thousands only four decades later?
Josephus says “the Jews used to take so much care of the burial of men that they took down those that were condemned and crucified, and buried them before the going down of the sun.”
He’s telling his readers that although the general practice elsewhere is that crucified victims are left on the cross, in Judea their bodies are taken down and buried before sunset. They couldn’t have done this without Roman approval.
Unless something can be found that says this practice didn’t apply to enemies of the state isn’t there no good reason then to deny the claim in the four gospels that this is what happened to Jesus?
Yes, that’s right. That’s what he says. And yes, the statement needs to be examined. I’ll be doing that in a later post or two.
Every single jewish judge had condemned jesus to die for his blasphemey, this means that later christians had every reason to invent secret pro jesus jewish judge.
how would the story have looked like if it was invented? Exactly as how we find it in the gospels.
This raises an interesting possibility: Joseph didn’t simply ask Pilate for Jesus’ body; he bribed him for it! Perhaps the Christians did not hear about that, or maybe it was edited out, to make Pilate look like a reasonable guy, as his reputation was rehabilitated by the Gentile Christians. Of course, there is no record of a bribe, so that is pure speculation. I’m surprised Evans doesn’t use this idea: a bribe makes more sense since there is precedent for it. And Jesus was already executed; I can see Pilate accepting a bribe for a dead body.
Very good point fishician!
Jesus was a Jew executed for sedition against Rome.
The Torah states a prohibition against one man receiving punishment for another man’s crime, as well as against human sacrifice for any reason. Also consuming the blood of any sacrifice was forbidden.
Again, Jesus was a Torah observant Jew.
So … how did Christians get the idea that Jesus willingly (because it was his purpose) gave up his life for the forgiveness of sins, for the sins of the world?
He was executed for sedition against Rome.
Even IF Jesus was a Messiah figure, the Jewish Messiah was not required to forgive sins. The Messiah was not thought to be a god. The Messiah was expected to free Israel from foreign oppression (sedition), and sit on the throne of David as King of Israel.
And … how did Christians get the idea that consuming, (even symbolically with wine) the blood of an innocent human sacrifice would absolve guilty people of their sins, and that the Messiah/Christ willing “laid down his life for the forgiveness of sins”?
Where does the Torah prohibit hat? It wsa a traadition by the time of Jesus that this did happen and was a good thing; read, for example the stories of the Maccabean martyrs who died “for” others.
Hi Bart, I’m a big fan of your blog. A couple of questions on today’s post:
1) What reason do we have for believing Joseph of Arimathea was at the trial of Jesus and called for his execution? The trial is said to have been hastily convened. It would be a tactical nightmare to get the full Sanhedrin together on such short notice. It seems much more plausible that the judges were few in number, drawn from the inner circle of Annas and Caiaphas. It seems very plausible that the majority of the Sanhedrin members would not have been at the trial. Luke 23:51 (for what it’s worth) denies that Joseph consented to the execution of Jesus, and no other Gospel account says he did.
2) In Life of Josephus, 419-421, Josephus tells how he asked Titus for 3 crucified friends to be taken down from their crosses while still alive, and this was granted. Is that not clemency? In the same passage, Josephus tells how he asked Titus for the lives of his brother and 50 friends, and these were granted. That might be clemency also, no?
1. There’s little historical reason: we have not mention of it anywhwere else and the trial itself would be highly unusual, not to say unprecedented. (For an itinerate preacher from out of town that no one had heard of?) 2. Yes, Josephus made the request and was a highly placed favored person (he was made part of the emperor’s court back in Rome). But his request was not for a decent burial. It was that these peole not be killed. It’s such an exceptional case that, to my knowledge, we hear of nothing similar anywhere else in all of Roman antiquity.
If Joseph of Arimathea deliberately disobeyed Pilate and buried Jesus, then what sort of `Roman’ punishment would Joseph have received from a governor like Pilate?
We don’t have much evidence of htat, except a rather humorous story in Petronius’s Satyricon that indicates it would being a death sentence. The whole story is very interestng. I think I’ll post if tor the whole blog to see.
Allowing a man to be taken down off the cross before he dies is even greater clemency than allowing him to be taken down after he’s died. I am not claiming that either kind of clemency is common. I’m just pointing out that we do have an example of clemency for some crucified men from first-century Judea, barely 40 years later than the time of Jesus.
I don’t know of any reason to think Titus was less cruel than Pilate. If Titus could grant the request of Josephus, it doesn’t seem like a great stretch to think Pilate could grant the request of Joseph of Arimathea. We know almost nothing about this Joseph, so we don’t know what kind of relationship he might have had with Pilate, if any.
Professor Ehrman. Speaking of clemency, I have a question about Barab′bas. Mark and Luke wrote that he was an insurrectionist and a murderer. Matthew wrote that he was a notorious prisoner. But in John he writes that he was just a robber. Do you think this difference is because they were using different sources or is there another possible reason?
They certainly had reasons for presenting him differently. John’s case is the most interesting. The word “robber” he uses is LESTES; it’s a term used by Josephus of Jewish nationalists who engaged in guerilla warfare against the Romans. Barabbas is probably being portrayed as a true enemy of the state as opposed to Jesus, the savior of the world.
Bart,
I was listening to a youtube video titled “Theologians in Conversation – The Chronology of the New Testament” at url https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNXrN6GtEcA&ab_channel=UniversityofNottingham.
At time 11:32 Dr Sara Parks said that after reading a book on the chronology of the New Testament by Marcus Borg she now believed that the gospel of John was written before that of Luke. That goes against almost every other dating of heard of, even yours. Can you expound Borg’s reasoning and do you agree with it?
It’s a highly unusual view but I’ve known a couple of scholars who thought so. I was on a dissertation committee at Duke years ago, for a PhD student who was arguing it. (none of the committee agreed with him, but he passed it!) I’m not sure what Borg argued, but the standarda rgument one would use is that Luke and John have more similarities in many of their details than the other Gospels do with John (e.g., in both Pilate explicitly declares Jesus innocent three times; and in both Jesus does not seem to experience much personal torment/agony in the passion narrative). You’d have to argue that the way John phrases these things seems to be more “original” than Luke’s phrasing and that Luke appears then to have edited John. It’s pretty hard to argue; it’s often a kind of subjective judgment that this way of phrasiing it seems earlier than that…
First, use of the word “evidences” — in the title, no less — immediately undercuts all subsequent arguments, IMO. Does the author have no knowledges of common English usages?
And yet I wonder if Joseph of Arimathea might have used his influence with Pilate to take Jesus’s body from the cross and secrete it in a tomb, not out of kindness, but simply because he wanted to remove the potentially inflammatory sight of Jesus’s dead body from the eyes of his followers.
But that would have been a temporary arrangement and certainly not an agreeable one to Jesus’s family and disciples. After all, J of A was no friend of theirs. So, on Saturday night, when the sabbath was over, a group of them entered the tomb and removed the body.
Where did they take it? My theory: they carted it to Bethany, to the house of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. They had a handy tomb nearby, did they not? I’ve been wondering how Jesus, in Nazareth, came to be so well-acquainted with this family just outside of Jerusalem. Perhaps they were relatives whom he’d visited often while growing up.
“The Case of the Missing Corpse.” Have I read too many detective stories?
Is it possible to?
I am left wondering where this leaves the story of Barabbas and his pardon by Pontius Pilate. The common telling as I have heard it growing up is that he was a leader among the zealots being tried for rebellion, but I cannot remember what precisely is said of him in the Gospels themselves. If you are highly suspect of the burial of Jesus after his crucifixion, I presume that you are even more suspicious that the Roman Governor would pardon a man unquestionably caught as a member of a rebellion? What do critical historians usually say on the subject of Barabbas?
I’ve devoted some posts on this in the past. Do a word search for Barabbas and you’ll see. I don’t think “Barabbas” and the account about him can be historical. (I have a longer discussion of it in my book Jesus Before the Gospels)
The point that Jesus wasn’t enough time on the cross to die from the crucifixion was raised on the issue of whether Jesus survived.The theory goes that he was drugged and looked dead.Never mind the wound on the side.Only one Gospel mentions it .
This in itself,namely,Arimathea’s urgency to take him down on account of the Shabbat,with or without conspiracy,sounds to me like
reason enough to give serious credence to the possibility that Jesus indeed was taken down from the cross.Once he was taken down,it’s not much of a leap to assume he was buried.
Arimathea had clout as a member of the Sanhedrin.And money.He could have bribed Pilate.
I remember Josephus telling of three crucified men that he requested to take down from their crosses.One of them even survived.
Moreover,if Arimathea was denied his request,and Jesus was left to rot,why even make up such an elaborate story?In the face of such horror,silence would have been preferred.
Still,playing Devil’s advocate,the tragedy was turned upside down by the salvific sacrifice.It was in principle possible to make up a story precisely because of the horror of reality.
Another caveat is that having a tomb people could go back to,even to an ossuary,would strengthen the followers of the leader.This was against Roman interests.
BTW, was John the Baptist buried?
Apparently John’s disciples buried hm. Of course he wasn’t crucified by Romans for crimes against hte state.
I am thinking of the other people crucified on Friday throughout the Roman occupation. Those perhaps thousands of them.
Would most or all of them have been taken down by their mourners-why not?- or left to rot on the Shabbat? And, in our case,on Passover too.
Or can one speculate that crucifixions on Friday (or Saturday) must have been avoided by the Romans, and therefore Jesus’ case – and the two robbers and anyone else we don’t know about- would have been an exception?
Would each and everyone crucified need their mourners to secure a permit to take them down to avoid profanation of the Shabbat?
Doesn’t seem feasible, but such a profanation would have been a very bad idea for the Romans, as it could easily lead to insurrection.
I understood that the Romans, at least before the destruction of the Temple, respected Jewish religious sensitivities. Fighting back riots was costly and the Pax Romana would have avoided them if they could.
Summarising, I tend to think that executions on Friday might have been problematic,that if Jesus was indeed crucified on Friday -particularly THAT Friday,both Shabbat and Passover-,either he was an exception and Friday and Saturday crucifixions otherwise didn’t happen.
I don’t understand why the Resurrection would have needed a retroactive entombment story.
Jesus could have been left to rot and still the Resurrection could have been experienced.
The experience of the Resurrection did not depend on an empty tomb.
The story is an elaborate one.
1.Arimathea going to Pilate; 2.The taking down from the cross; 3. the wrapping of the body in fine linen;4. the personal tomb ;5. the closing of the tomb with a stone, a fine historical detail, as is the stone; 6. the empty tomb.
The angel could of course have been an embellishment, as would also have been Jesus’ dialogue with Mary Magdalene inside the tomb.
But the *entire* thing a fantasy made up *just* to prove the Resurrection?Moreover,it is too coherent to have been made up by multiple authors over decades.
Even if there is fiction, the big story,like so much of the Bibles’ content,sounds as having a kernel of truth.And even if only a kernel,it would still mean that Jesus was taken down,or was not crucified on Friday.
All 4 Gospels mention the Arimathea saga. I think Arimathea is also mentioned in other apocryphal sources, but that is easily referred to the existent four Gospels informing of it.
“Roman power was not to be crossed?” The inner pun-monster has been at work here, I see.
Ha!
James Tabor seems to think Jesus was buried twice. See “Paul and Jesus” page 74. A discussion in the book indicates the bodies of the crucified were taken down before sundown. He cites the Gospel of Mark and the story of Joeseph of Arimathea getting permission from Pilate to remove Jesus’ body.
Bart, is there a difference between bible scholars on the veracity of this story? Is one generally accepted or does it vary?
The vast majority of scholars probably think that Joseph of Arimathea buried Jesus that afternoon. I don’t recall anyone selse thinkig that there were two burials, except those who think the disciples stole the body and re-interred it elsewhere (a view around since Hermann Samuel Reimarus in the 1770s, but not held by any biblical scholars I know of)
I looked in Wikipedia which has a good explanation of the expert opinions so I don’t need a response to my earlier question. Wiki refers to Bart in their article.
Why, if there was a tomb, was there no veneration of it until over 300 years later? Did early Christian’s not venerate anything related to Jesus until after Constantine’s mother named them? Or, was the tomb actually unknown and/or nonexistent?
Yup, some scholars see this as a major argument against there being an empty tomb.
I have trouble accepting that if most, if not all, of the gospel accounts promote mythical, religious, cultural purposes, that any historical credence would be accorded Jesus’ crucifixion and burial. This also promotes mythic, religious and cultural purposes.
Now, I understand the historical defense that Romans did not practice benevolence toward those crucified. End of defense.
BTW James Tabor does argue for the two burial scenarios in his book, Paul and Jesus, beginning on page 74. It is a long explanation with citations. Mr. Tabor includes a response to Jerome Murphy-O’connor, another NT professor who argues against the two-burial theory in an e-mail to JT.