Biblicial Questions Answered
By Jake Kohl
Question I
1. Describe the
"minimal" facts approach to the resurrection question. Be sure
in your answer to provide a general description and outline of this approach
when applied to the resurrection of Christ. Do you agree or disagree with
this approach?
The
minimal facts approach to the argument for the resurrection of Jesus Christ is
an approach that uses the least amount of facts about the events of the
resurrection in which nearly all are accepted by scholars on the issue. The
minimal facts approach does not argue for anything outside of the resurrection but
only for the resurrection by itself. Furthermore, it does not even apply
to the inerrancy of the Word of God or the reliability of it. Using nothing but
facts surrounding the resurrection in which are most commonly accepted as true
(with scholars and critics alike), it achieves the focus on nothing but the
resurrection and the resurrection alone. When applying the minimal facts
approach to the resurrection of Jesus – the resurrection is irrefutable on each
level. The fact is – if Jesus was truly
raised from the dead, then Jesus is truly someone special and if He was raised
from the dead, then someone had to raise Him.
As we
begin, there are four facts plus one (4+1)
,
facts that are so accepted by even skeptical scholars that they cannot be
refuted. These facts make up the minimal facts method of arguing for the
resurrection of Jesus Christ. The first fact is that
Jesus died by
crucifixion. This fact is not only accounted for in all four gospels,
but is also mentioned by several secular historians such as, Josephus, Tacitus,
Lucian and Mara Bar-Serapion – as well as the Talmud in which they all refer to
Jesus Christ being executed by crucifixion.
These references make the crucifixion of Christ irrefutable since there would
be no gain or purpose for someone in the secular arena to write about something
not true – which makes it a more reliable source, aka, enemy attestation
.
According to Habermas, even John Dominic Crossan, the highly critical scholar of
the Jesus Seminar writes, "That he was crucified is as sure as anything
historical can ever be."
The case for Christ’s resurrection is now beginning to surmount using only the
minimal facts approach as described.
Facts that are stated in a non-biblical source from non-Christians, such
as those against Christianity and historians are excellent documents that go in
favor for the evidence of His resurrection; as mentioned above – it’s a true
definition of what enemy attestation means. It goes back to the statement of
what gain would these critics (enemy's) have to lie about a man whom they didn’t
regard as the Messiah.
As we
continue, the second minimal fact is that
the disciples believed as well as
preached that Jesus rose from the dead and even appeared to them. The
first evidence for this minimal facts approach is that the disciples claimed
that this was so. One may believe that the disciples could have made this claim
up by other motives, but it is extremely important to understand the
consequences that they faced for making such a claim. These consequences
resulted in them enduring and facing harsh punishment by making these claims.
The testimony of Paul that this was the belief of the early disciples; the oral
tradition passed down through the early church and then the written works of
the early church all testify to this being the case.
An example of this is within I Corinthians 15 and the early creed that
gives us Paul's testimony – the oral tradition of the creed and then the
written work to the Corinthians. It wasn’t just a claim that the
disciples made about Jesus’ resurrection, but it was also something they firmly
believed – something they were willing to suffer and die for indeed. It is hard
to imagine that many would believe a self-made lie to the point of torture and
death. It would have been rather simple to reject the lie and live, however,
there is not one account of a disciple recanting, but willingly going to
martyrdom if need be.
Something interesting to point out regarding the disciples were the fact of who
they were before Christ’s resurrection. Before, they were almost as if they
were cowardly; even Peter went as far as denying Christ, but after they
witnessed the risen Christ, they became bold as ever in proclaiming who He was
– without denial but to the death! If Jesus didn’t rise from the dead – the
gospel would have ceased and his disciples would have remained in their state
beforehand – they wouldn’t have carried on the oral tradition nor proclaimed
Jesus in writing – they would have remained in the state of coward-ness.
Moving
on, the next two facts that will be brought up, that make up the minimal facts
argument is that both
the church persecutor Saul (Paul) and the skeptical
half-brother of Jesus (James) were converted and became prominent leaders within
the church after having seen what they believed to be the resurrected Christ. They
were both
devout Jews who lived under
Jewish law and would not easily convert to Christianity, however, after their personal
experience with the resurrected Christ, they did just that! The fact that
they believe they saw the resurrected Jesus cannot be disputed – their lives
changing afterwards is evident. They both had no reason since one was an enemy
of Jesus/church and the other was a skeptic, which again, draws us back to the
enemy attestation fact. We have both their own testimony and the testimony of
secular historians that both Paul and James was converted and martyred for
their faith in the resurrected Jesus.
All for a lie… not even possible!
There is
one more fact that is helpful, but not as important, that can be applied to the
minimal fact approach, yet worthy to be brought up – the plus one (+1) of the
approach. The fact that
the tomb of Jesus was empty is accepted by
nearly all scholars, this particular approach doesn’t hold with the majority,
as the previous four does, it is however, quite provable that the tomb was
empty.
The evidence goes beyond the scope of thought, but the facts that are
presented. First – the first witness’ that the tomb was empty was by a group of
women, and when seen in context, women during that period were looked at as second
class. They didn’t hold credibility. This would have been an embarrassing
admission
on behalf of the writers and early church and would have been omitted or
changed to reflect men if the tomb case was fabricated. This supports
historical claims that the tomb was indeed empty. It would have been simple to
crush out Christianity for the Romans to have produced the body of Christ,
which again, historical documents support the fact that they would have loved
to crush Christianity altogether. It was however, not done.
In
conclusion, I solidly agree with the use of the minimal facts approach for
defending the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is clear that the use of
this approach takes out everything other than the facts on the resurrection,
using information that is generally accepted overall by both scholars as well
as critics. Using this approach doesn’t take away the role of the Holy Spirit
but uses the basics to possibly draw one into a deeper discussion of the gospel.
Using this approach bridges the gaps of uncertainty and paves the way for the
truth of Jesus’ resurrection with certainty.
Question II
Why is it so important to deal
with the question of "legend" as it pertains to the
resurrection? What is the relationship between the early dating of New
Testament documents and the dispelling of accusations that the resurrection
story developed as a legend? Why is it so important that resurrection
testimony be dated back to the years immediately following the crucifixion of
Christ? Why is the recognition of "creeds" so important in
establishing an argument refuting the "legendary development"
objection to the resurrection?
The
assertion that the gospel narratives were affected by legend and therefore are
unreliable cannot be upheld under even the tightest scrutiny. The legend
theories take on three main types: embellishments, non-historical
literary genre and myths of other religions.
Legends allow people to poke around and
choose what’s real or not. These arguments do not hold much merit. The
testimony of the two skeptics, Paul and James, and the testimonies of the
disciples that Jesus had raised from the dead immediately after it was said to
have happened argue greatly against the embellishment argument.
There
are examples of non-historical literature at this time in history, but that
does not mean that is what the gospel authors were writing. Just because
it was present does not mean that all literature at this time was
non-historical. The fact that the disciples, Paul and James believed it
to be a true historical event argues against this.
So this embellishment of the resurrection is easily traced back to the
eye-witness experiences of the apostles.
Another
theory used is the theory that the resurrection is stolen from ancient myths of
resurrected gods does not hold any weight either. Some of the myths that
are said to be parallel to the resurrection of Jesus are unclear if they are
even resurrections or not, and none of them are bodily resurrections. The
myths have too much dissimilarity to be called parallels with Jesus'
resurrection. The closest parallels that can be found in mythology appear
100 years after the resurrection had been preached.
It is clear that the resurrection story is by no means a myth or fairy tale as
some would argue.
It is
also worthy to note that the dates of the writing of the gospels and the dates
of the origination of the first Christian creeds do much to negate the legend
theories as well. The Gospel of Mark is considered to be the first
written can be dated around the year 60.
That is within 30 years of Jesus’ crucifixion. The creeds of the early
church are even more convincing and go towards the credibility of the
crucifixion. I Corinthians 15 show the first oral tradition put into the
form of a creed. It states that without a doubt, Jesus died and was
resurrected and seen by many witnesses. 1 Corinthians was written between
55-57, but it probably can be traced back orally to 32 or 38 when Paul first
received it in Damascus or Jerusalem after his conversion.
This is immediately follows after the crucifixion. This is amazingly too soon
and leaves no time for any legend to cause embellishments to what the disciples
witnessed and testified to.
In
conclusion, what we really have is enough evidence to dispel legend as the
culprit behind the resurrection. The biggest ones in my opinion are: the
firsthand accounts of what actually happened – namely Matthew and John’s
testimony as well as with secondhand testimony from Mark and Luke, a physician,
which was a respected profession in the 1st Century as it is today. Another big one that carries a lot of weight
is Paul’s conversion and life history as well as Jesus’ brother James’ conversion
and subsequent ministry, and early proponents addressing the empty tomb as well
as the life of Jesus as though it happened as an historical event rather than
legend or myth.
Question III
6. Can one
"prove" that Jesus was raised from the dead? Why or why
not? Can evidence from the case for the resurrection be used to further
any other apologetic inquiries or arguments? If so, which ones?
Proving
that Jesus was raised from the dead depends a lot on the definition some would
use for the word
prove. Historians generally
do not speak in terms of
absolute
certainty when speaking of historical events, but in degrees of certainty.
The resurrection, like most historical events was not captured on video or
audio recordings like we have today so it cannot be proven absolutely, but it
can be known to be fact with a reasonable amount of certainty.
This
certainty is however, relied on the evidences we have and not on proof. In
order to prove something to be fact, it must go beyond evidence. For example,
dropping a ball does not prove the law of gravity; rather, it is evidence for
it. There is much more in proving that there is such a law, which goes more in
depth than evidence alone. The ball may seem to have fallen and it may seem to
apply to the law of gravity but again… this is just evidence. If you take into
account that our earth is turning, that there is a magnetic field, etc., it
goes to further argue towards proof. Defining proof is therefore a slippery
slope that can hinder any argument. Proper apologetics can redefine that
slippery slope and argue in favor based on the information we have as evidence.
The historical evidence from archaeology and the written records make the case
for the resurrection quite reasonable and interesting to say the least.
The number of New Testament manuscripts in existence today is about 24,000.
That is far more than any other ancient work of literature that has been
preserved to date
than of anyone else in history. "Archaeology's repeated affirmation
of the New Testament's accuracy provides important corroboration for its
reliability."
This resurrection is not proven by these evidences, but proves the biblical
sources that teach that the resurrection is worthy to be trusted. Taking
this information and the minimal facts method of arguing into account, one can
reasonably with certainty, trust that Jesus was resurrected as evidenced.
The
evidence we have can be used to further the argument for apologetics in any
area pertaining to the resurrection of Christ, but as long as there are critics
and those that want to debate and make an opposing argument, we will always
have evidence, not proof. We have numerous amounts of evidence in favor of the
resurrection; and while our evidence is growing on almost a daily basis, you
will always have critics that will go against whatever evidence we have. If we
had proof, there would be no need for argument because the resurrection would
be accepted throughout the world as undeniable.
The
resurrection serves as a great starting point and beginning, for arguing
several other issues that has been debated and argued over the centuries.
Furthermore, even the New Testament's
reliability argues for the resurrection just as the resurrection argues for the
New Testament's reliability and trustworthiness.
The resurrection also argues for the existence of God.
The resurrection does not prove either one of these two arguments, but it is a
strong argument for them based on the evidence we do have. The resurrection
is a central doctrinal belief to Christianity and is an excellent point in
sharing the good news by witnessing to others just as Christ had done after His
resurrection.
References
Habermas,
Gary R. and Michael R. Licona. The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus.
Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 2004.
Strobel, Lee. The Case for Christ.
Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998.
