Critics of Christianity often try to explain away the early Christian claim that Jesus rose from the dead by saying they either hallucinated or had visions of the dead Jesus. In this video, Karlo explains why the historicity of the empty tomb deals a lethal blow to these objections.
Transcript:
There are many ways critics try to explain away the early Christians’ claim that Jesus rose from the dead. One way is to say they hallucinated. Another is to say that the disciples were like the boy in the movie The Sixth Sense who says, “I see dead people.”
But there’s one detail that these sorts of objections fail to consider: the empty tomb. Here are a couple reasons why we think Jesus’ empty tomb is a matter of history.
First, if the early Christians were merely hallucinating, or the appearances of Jesus were merely visions, then skeptics could have easily produced the body since it’s reasonable to think they would have known the location of Jesus’ tomb. Surely, the guards ordered to watch the tomb would have known the location. Morever, Jesus was a popular preacher and was placed in a tomb that belonged to Joseph of Arimathea, a member of the Sanhedrin. So skeptics would have had no problem proving the tomb was not empty and falsify the claim that Jesus rose from the dead. But, of course, this didn’t happen.
Second, the empty tomb is attested to by six different sources that range in dating from six to sixty years after the reported event, which for ancient literature is gold. We have Paul’s creedal formula in 1 Cor. 15:3-5 which dates to six years after the alleged event. Paul says Jesus was buried and raised, which implies the tomb was empty. Mark’s account of the empty tomb comes from source material that scholars date to seven years after the event. Matthew and Luke’s account, along with Luke’s record of Peter preaching the resurrection in Acts 2, are right at thirty years removed. Finally, John’s Gospel makes for a sixth independent source, which dates to approximately sixty years after the event.
Since the skeptics never produced the body, and the empty tomb narrative meets the criteria of multiple attestation and early testimony, we can confidently judge, as a matter of historical inquiry, that Jesus’ tomb was empty as the New Testament records.
As to why it was empty? The early Christians said he rose from the dead. And since we have good reason to believe they weren’t lying, we can trust their testimony and profess Jesus is risen from the dead. Can I get a hallelujah?
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For Catholic Answers, I’m Karlo Broussard. Thanks for watching.