he resurrection of Jesus Christ is the event which separates Christianity from all other spiritual beliefs. If Jesus simply died and stayed dead, then He is just another dead spiritual teacher, just another prophet like Mohammed, Buddha, and others. However, if he has risen, if He returned from death in his own body, then He is unique, and the claims He made about Himself must be taken seriously. Some suggest that Jesus never rose from death and that His disciples invented this story. Jesus had claimed that He would be resurrected and His enemies, the Pharisees, tried to prevent the possibility by asking the Roman governor to seal and place a guard at his tomb. When Jesus’ body disappeared, the guards having failed to prevent this occurrence, the Pharisees then spread a rumour that Jesus had never truly died, but been taken out of the country in secret, and that He married Mary Magdalene and had children, possibly living in Kashmir (Dan Brown’s novel The Da Vinci Code perhaps borrows from this idea).
Before we can answer questions about a resurrection, we firstly need to establish that Jesus truly died. The first point we can make is in understanding the
efficiency of the Romans. The Romans were profes- sional killers. They tested to see if a person beingcrucified was dead by piercing their abdomen with a spear. When the body dies the blood and water separate; when still alive the blood is mixed with water. In John 19:32-37 the eye witness mentions the Romans testing Jesus body in this way. If the victim wasn’t dead the legs were broken so that the person suffo
cated immediately. John testifies that Jesus was dead, not to prove that He had died, but to show how Hefulfilled prophecies about being pierced with a spear and his bones not being broken. John didn’t realize that people would ever question that Jesus truly died on the cross. The idea of Romans not doing the job properly would have been ridiculous to John.
Secondly, Pilate himself ordered a report on the death, and he ordered the Roman guard at the tomb. The Roman guards who were on duty that night would have been in serious trouble for losing Jesus’ body. Roman soldiers did not just fall asleep when executing Pilate’s own commands. Matthew claims it was an angel who rendered them unconscious. Taking all of these facts into account, we can safely assume that Jesus was dead.
But what of the disciples’ claim that He came alive again three days later. The main objection to this claim is that the only written accounts are the gospels, although there are more than the Bible’s four which make the claim. For our purposes we will confine ourselves to the four gospels, and the Apostle Paul’s account in his letter to the Corinthian church (1 Corinthians 15: 3-8). As we read the gospels and Paul’s account we discover that some of the details given appear to contradict each other. If the accounts are different, then which one is correct, and if they cannot agree should we disregard them all? These are serious questions.
The chart below points out some of the main differences between the gospel accounts.Gospel Matthew 1st Witness Magdalene Women Two
Time of day Dawn
Mark
Magdalene Three
Luke
Magdalene Several
Early
John
Magdalene One
Still dark
Not
mentioned Not
Mentioned
All agree that the first witness to the resurrection was Mary of Magdalene. There is disagreement about the number of women with Mary, the time of day that the women went to the tomb, the number and placement of angels, and the earthquake. It is possible that the angels may have moved about which would explain this difference, however, the names and number of women, other than Mary, are too different to reconcile. It is also impossible to reconcile the women visiting the tomb after sunrise and while it was still dark. It would appear that at least three if not all of the disciples got some of the details wrong. Considering the fact that these accounts were written at least twenty years after the event, this is not surprising. The disciples generally speaking had the impression that Jesus would return within their own lifetimes. When time past and it appeared that this was not going to happen, they wrote the gospels as a witness to future generations. However, a deeper investigation and understanding of the cultural prejudice of the time reveals some powerful points.
The apostle Paul had the task of preaching toGreeks and Gentiles throughout Asia Minor. In his first letter to the church at Corinth he writes an account of Jesus’ resurrection. This was almost certainly written before the gospels.1 There is one glaring omission in this account. Women! Paul never mentions women to his Greek speaking audience, and for good reason. At this time, as in much of human history until recently, a women’s testimony was considered almost worthless. The English word for ‘testify’ comes from the word ‘testes’, from which we take our English word for a man’s reproductive organs, ‘testicles’. The connection is simple. Without ‘testes’ you cannot ‘testify’. Even today in some Moslem countries one man’s
testimony is considered equivalent to five women, a similar cultural perspective as in Paul’s time.Most of Paul’s audience did not believe in the idea of a resurrection. If Paul had told them that the first witness of the resurrection was a woman they would have laughed at him. If he had added that she had previously been possessed by seven demons and had most likely earned her living as a prostitute, he would have been run out of town as a fool. Paul understood his audience would react unfavourably to the fact of women being some of the key witnesses, so he simply omitted them, although what he says about the men is quite accurate.
It is interesting that the single detail which every gospel writer remembered accurately was that Mary of Magdalene was the first witness to Jesus’ resur- rection. When Mary told them the Lord had risen, they didn’t believe her, even though Jesus Himself had promised this would happen. It is no accident that Mary was the first to see Jesus. He waited until the male disciples had left before appearing to her for reasons which we cannot know for sure.2 Perhaps it was to test the other disciples’ faith, perhaps it was to elevate the position of women and perhaps it was just like God to honour this changed woman who loved Him because of the forgiveness she received. Like the shepherds who were invited to be witnesses of Jesus’ birth, Mary was a social outcast until Jesus changed her life. I believe the disciples were extremely embarrassed that they had refused to believe her, and so they all remembered the important detail that she had been the one to tell them, especially when Jesus appeared to them shortly after Mary’s proclamation.
In Paul’s account the most respected people are mentioned by name, including the Lord’s brother James who was a public figure in Jerusalem. Paul’s was most likely the first account written, so why didn’t the disciples simply follow his example and leave potentially embarrassing details out altogether? The answer is clear. They wrote their accounts as accurately as they remembered, they didn’t try to make the story more credible for their readers. Neither Paul nor the gospel writers invent anything; the gospel writers simply write what they recall, and Paul chooses to leave out potentially embarrassing details. If the disciples had wanted to invent a story surely they would have chosen highly respected people, perhaps a Pharisee or two as there were some Pharisees who believed in Jesus such as Joseph of Arimathea, the man who provided the tomb where Jesus’ body was laid. It is also perfectly obvious that they didn’t sit around a table together inventing a story and making sure all of their details were exactly the same.
We may not, by logical argument, prove that Christ has risen; indeed that is an existential experience one needs to encounter for oneselves as did the apostle Paul and millions of people over the past 2,000 years. However, we can adequately show that Jesus was killed by the Romans, that everything was done to prevent a fraudulent stealing of His body, and that His disciples recorded for us exactly what they remembered about His resurrection, even though they knew this would make that message unbelievable to the majority of 1st century people.