Godless (48 page)
• John: the body had already been spiced before they arrived (19:39, 40)
Was the tomb open when they arrived?
• Matthew: No (28:2)
• Mark: Yes (16:4)
• Luke: Yes (24:2)
• John: Yes (20:1)
Who was at the tomb when they arrived?
• Matthew: One angel (28:2-7)
• Mark: One young man (16:5)
• Luke: Two men (24:4)
• John: Two angels (20:12)
Where were these messengers situated?
• Matthew: Angel sitting on the stone (28:2)
• Mark: Young man sitting inside, on the right (16:5)
• Luke: Two men standing inside (24:4)
• John: Two angels sitting on each end of the bed (20:12)
What did the messenger(s) say?
• Matthew: “Fear not ye: for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified. He is not here for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay. And go quickly, and tell his disciples that he is risen from the dead: and, behold, he goeth before you into Galilee; there shall ye see him: lo, I have told you.” (28:5-7)
• Mark: “Be not afrighted: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold the place where they laid him. But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you.” (16:6-7)
• Luke: “Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen: remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, saying, The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.” (24:5-7)
• John: “Woman, why weepest thou?” (20:13)
Did the women tell what happened?
• Matthew: Yes (28:8)
• Mark: No. “Neither said they any thing to any man.” (16:8)
• Luke: Yes. “And they returned from the tomb and told all these things to the eleven, and to all the rest.” (24:9, 22-24)
• John: Yes (20:18)
When Mary returned from the tomb, did she know Jesus had been resurrected?
• Matthew: Yes (28:7-8)
• Mark: Yes (16:10, 11
34
)
• Luke: Yes (24:6-9, 23)
• John: No (20:2)
When did Mary first see Jesus?
• Matthew: Before she returned to the disciples (28:9)
• Mark: Before she returned to the disciples (16:9, 10
34
)
• John: After she returned to the disciples (20:2, 14)
Could Jesus be touched after the resurrection?
• Matthew: Yes (28:9)
• John: No (20:17)
and
Yes (20:27)
After the women, to whom did Jesus first appear?
• Matthew: Eleven disciples (28:16)
• Mark: Two disciples in the country, later to 11 (16:12, 14
12
)
• Luke: Two disciples in Emmaus, later to 11 (24:13, 36)
• John: Ten disciples (Judas and Thomas were absent) (20:19, 24)
• Paul: First to Cephas (Peter), then to the 12. (Twelve? Judas was dead). (I Corinthians 15:5)
Where did Jesus first appear to the disciples?
• Matthew: On a mountain in Galilee (60-100 miles away) (28:16-17)
• Mark: To two in the country, to 11 “as they sat at meat” (16:12,14
12
)
• Luke: In Emmaus (about seven miles away) at evening, to the rest in a room in Jerusalem later that night. (24:31, 36)
• John: In a room, at evening (20:19)
Did the disciples believe the two men?
• Mark: No (16:13
12
)
• Luke: Yes (24:34—it is the group speaking here, not the two)
What happened at that first appearance?
• Matthew: Disciples worshipped, some doubted, “Go preach.” (28:17-20)
• Mark: Jesus reprimanded them, said, “Go preach” (16:14-19
12
)
• Luke: Christ incognito, vanishing act, materialized out of thin air, reprimand, supper (24:13-51)
• John: Passed through solid door, disciples happy, Jesus blesses them, no reprimand (21:19-23)
Did Jesus stay on earth for more than a day?
• Mark: No (16:19
12
) Compare 16:14 with John 20:19 to show that this was all done on Sunday
• Luke: No (24:50-52) It all happened on Sunday
• John: Yes, at least eight days (20:26, 21:1-22)
• Acts: Yes, at least 40 days (1:3)
Where did the ascension take place?
• Matthew: No ascension. Book ends on mountain in Galilee
• Mark: In or near Jerusalem, after supper (16:19
12
)
• Luke: In Bethany, very close to Jerusalem, after supper (24:50-51)
• John: No ascension
• Paul: No ascension
• Acts: Ascended from Mount of Olives (1:9-12)
It is not just atheist critics who notice these problems. Christian scholars agree that the stories are discrepant. Culver H. Nelson: “In any such reading, it should become glaringly obvious that these materials often contradict one another egregiously. No matter how eagerly one may wish to do so, there is simply no way the various accounts of Jesus’ postmortem activities can be harmonized.”
35
35
A. E. Harvey: “All the Gospels, after having run closely together in their accounts of the trial and execution, diverge markedly when they come to the circumstance of the Resurrection. It’s impossible to fit their accounts together into a single coherent scheme.”
36
36
Thomas Sheehan agrees: “Despite our best efforts, the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ post-mortem activities, in fact, cannot be harmonized into a consistent Easter chronology.”
37
37
The religiously independent (though primarily Christian) scholars at the Westar Institute, which includes more than 70 bible scholars with a Ph.D. or the equivalent, conclude: “The five gospels that report appearances (Matthew, Luke, John, Peter, Gospel of the Hebrews) go their separate ways when they are not rewriting Mark; their reports cannot be reconciled to each other. Hard historical evidence is sparse.”
38
38
I have challenged believers to provide a simple non-contradictory chronological narrative of the events between Easter Sunday and the ascension, without omitting a single biblical detail. Some have tried but, without misinterpreting words or drastically rearranging passages, no one has given a coherent account. Some have offered “harmonies” (apparently not wondering why the work of a perfect deity should have to be harmonized), but none have met the reasonable request to simply tell the story.
C. S. Lewis and Christian apologist Josh McDowell offer three choices in urging us to consider who Jesus was: “Liar, Lunatic, or Lord.”
39
But this completely ignores a fourth option: Legend. If the Jesus character is a literary creation—whether partially or completely—then it was others who put words in his mouth, and it is grossly simplistic to take these words at face value.
39
But this completely ignores a fourth option: Legend. If the Jesus character is a literary creation—whether partially or completely—then it was others who put words in his mouth, and it is grossly simplistic to take these words at face value.
A legend begins with a basic story (true or false) that grows into something more embellished and exaggerated as the years pass. When we look at the documents of the resurrection of Jesus, we see that the earliest accounts are very simple, later retellings are more complex and the latest tales are fantastic. In other words, it looks exactly like a legend.
The documents that contain a resurrection story
40
are usually dated like this: Paul: 50-55 (I Cor. 15:3-8); Mark: 70 (Mark 16); Matthew: 80 (Matthew 28); Luke: 85 (Luke 24); Gospel of Peter: 85-90 (Fragment); John: 95 (John 20-21). This is the general dating agreed upon by most scholars, including scholars at the Westar Institute. Some conservative scholars prefer to date them earlier, and others have moved some of them later, but this would not change the
order
of the writing
41
, which is more important than the actual dates when considering legendary growth. Shifting the dates changes the shape but not the fact of the growth curve.
40
are usually dated like this: Paul: 50-55 (I Cor. 15:3-8); Mark: 70 (Mark 16); Matthew: 80 (Matthew 28); Luke: 85 (Luke 24); Gospel of Peter: 85-90 (Fragment); John: 95 (John 20-21). This is the general dating agreed upon by most scholars, including scholars at the Westar Institute. Some conservative scholars prefer to date them earlier, and others have moved some of them later, but this would not change the
order
of the writing
41
, which is more important than the actual dates when considering legendary growth. Shifting the dates changes the shape but not the fact of the growth curve.
I made a list of things I consider “extraordinary” (natural and supernatural) in the stories between the crucifixion and ascension of Jesus. These include: earthquakes, angel(s), rolling stone, dead bodies crawling from Jerusalem graves (“Halloween”
42
), Jesus appearing out of thin air (now you see him) and disappearing (now you don’t), the “fish story” miracle,
43
Peter’s noncanonical “extravaganza” exit from the tomb (see below), a giant Jesus with head in the clouds, a talking cross and a bodily ascension into heaven.
42
), Jesus appearing out of thin air (now you see him) and disappearing (now you don’t), the “fish story” miracle,
43
Peter’s noncanonical “extravaganza” exit from the tomb (see below), a giant Jesus with head in the clouds, a talking cross and a bodily ascension into heaven.
Perhaps others would choose a slightly different list, but I’m certain it would include most of the same events. I do not consider events that are surprising to be extraordinary. For example, seeing a man whom you thought was dead is indeed surprising, but not extraordinary. Neither is it extraordinary to have a vision of a person who is dead or presumed dead. (My dad heard the voice of my mother for a long time after she died, and though it seemed quite real and “spooky,” he knew it was just in his mind. After a period of time those hallucinations abated. That is not extraordinary.) Then I counted the number of extraordinary events that appear in each resurrection account. In the order in which the accounts were written, Paul has zero, Mark has one, Matthew has four, Luke has five, Peter has six and John has at least six. (John wrote, “And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book.” 20:30) Putting these on a time graph produces a curve that goes up as the years pass. The later resurrection reports contain more extraordinary events than the earlier ones, so it is clear that the story, at least in the telling, has evolved and expanded over time.
In finer detail, we can count the number of messengers at the tomb, which also grows over time, as well as the certainty of the claim that they were angels. Paul: 0 angels. Mark: 1 young man sitting. Matthew: 1 angel sitting. Luke: 2 men standing. Peter: 2 men/angels walking. John: 2 angels sitting. Other items fit the pattern. Bodily appearances are absent from the first two accounts, but show up in the last four accounts, starting in the year 80 C.E. The bodily ascension is absent from the first three stories, but appears in the last three starting in the year 85 C.E. This ballooning of details reveals the footprints of legend.
The mistake many modern Christians make is to view 30 C.E. backward through the distorted lens of 80-100 C.E., more than a half century later. They forcibly superimpose the extraordinary tales of the late Gospels anachronistically upon the plainer views of the first Christians, pretending naively that all Christians believed exactly the same thing across the entire first century.
How can we say that Paul reported no extraordinary events? Doesn’t his account include an empty tomb and appearances of a dead man? Here is what Paul said in I Corinthians 15:3-8, around the year 55 C.E., the earliest written account of the resurrection:
“For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also
received, how that
Christ died for our sins
in accordance with the Scriptures,
and was buried. [
etaphe
]
And he was raised [
egeiro
] on the third day
in accordance with the Scriptures
and he appeared [
ophthe
] to Cephas [Peter]
and then to the twelve.
Afterward, he appeared to more than 500 brethren,
most of whom are still alive,
though some have fallen asleep.
Afterward he appeared to James,
and then to all the missionaries [apostles].
Last of all, as to one untimely born,
he appeared also to me.”
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