Greentree Community Church

Historical Proof of the Resurrection of Christ[1] 

We've discussed why alternate theories of resurrection don't work, now I want to offer positive proof that the resurrection literally and physically occurred.  I'll let you consider this evidence and then next time try to draw some conclusions.  I'd love to hear any thoughts you have by email.

A. Jesus' resurrection differed from anything then believed-Even if we granted that ancient people were much more likely to believe in miracles than we are, belief in Jesus' resurrection the way it is described is next to impossible. The invention of such a belief by nostalgic disciples is similarly impossible. Here's why:

1. Jews of that day had no concept of an individual resurrection. We now root our    resurrection in Jesus' but prior to Jesus this was not the case. Some didn't believe in resurrection at all and some believed that all believers would be raised from the dead at the end of history. What we have with Jesus is one person going first in the middle of history, which no person of that time believed was possible.
2. Jews who did believe in resurrection believed that it would either a) reproduce exactly the same body over again or b) produce a luminous body, one shining like a star (Based on Dan. 12.1-2). But the early Christians didn't say any of those things. They described a new kind of physicality which is solid but transformed so that it is now not susceptible to pain, suffering, or death. That picture of resurrection is not in Judaism.
3. Up to that point, ‘resurrection' had only been used as a metaphor for return from exile (see Ezek. 37), but early Christians began to associate it with Christian living, baptism, and holiness.
4. Though the Gospels are replete with references to Jesus' fulfilling of Scripture in nearly every other event in His life (crucifixion and Psalm 22, Is. 53), Scriptural warrant is surprisingly absent in the resurrection narratives. Anyone simply imagining or inventing this story would have based it on Daniel 12 or Ezekiel 37, but we see no such re-writing.
5. Resurrection moves from being one doctrine among many to the forefront, the center of everything. As N.T. Wright notes, "Take it [resurrection] away from Paul, say, or I Peter, Revelation, or the great 2^nd century church fathers, and you will destroy their whole framework. We have to conclude that something must have happened to bring resurrection from the periphery to the center.
6. Jews, Romans, and Greeks had many viewpoints about what happened after death, but in early Christianity, there is only one-resurrection. Romans and Greeks considered bodily resurrection impossible, not even an option.
7. Although early Christians disagreed about a number of things, they are unanimous in their view of the resurrection and how it works. This unanimity is especially striking when considering how unique their particular take on resurrection was.

B. The Place of Women in the Narrative-The place of women in the narrative make it impossible that the story was envisioned, hallucinated, created, or imagined. If you wanted good witnesses to key events in the ancient world, women were not the way to go, and yet Mary Magdalene who was not only a woman but a woman of low reputation, is there as the prime witness in all 4 Gospels! Women could not serve as trial witnesses or in any other official capacities because it was assumed that they were unreliable. Thus, it is inconceivable that all 4 Gospels would have simply made up that part of the story.

[1]  I will follow the argument of N.T. Wright, Resurrection of the Son of God, and his appendix in Tony Flew's book, There is a God.