For
The Tomb
McDowell starts by stating that
Wilbur M. Smith observes that "the word for tomb or sepulchre occurs
thirty-two times in these four Gospel records of the resurrection." Smith,
IFET, 38.
He then quotes W.J.
Sparrow-Simpson who notes that it was a Roman practice to leave the victim of
crucifixion hanging on the cross to become the prey of birds and beasts. The
author then quotes exceptions to that practice from Josephus [Autobiography ch.
75; Wars of Jews, IV, v.2] where Josephus himself induced the Emperor
Titus to take down from the cross three crucified persons while still alive.
Simpson concludes by saying that it was therefore not strange for Joseph of
Arimathea to make a similar request to Pilate (Sparrow Simpson, RCF,21-22)
McDowell then quotes Henry
Latham in The Risen Master who provides Eusebius’ description of the
Sepulchre of Jesus when it was supposed to have been discovered by the Empress
Helena from an account in Theophania.
To refute claims by Professor
Guinebert, who claimed that Jesus' body must have been thrown into the pit for
the executed, McDowell asks the following questions:
1. Why are the gospel accounts
given if the body was not actually taken by Joseph of Arimathea?
2. What about the accounts for
the preparations? Why are these accounts recorded if no such preparations took
place?
3. What of the women who watched
while Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus prepared and entombed Jesus' body in
Luke 23:55, Matt 27:61 and Mark 15:47? These women surely knew there was a
tomb. The records make this point very clear.
4. How can one ignore the
observations recorded concerning the tomb itself (i.e. hewn out of the rock)?
5. Why did the Jews ask Pilate
to place a guard at Christ’s tomb, if no such sepulchre existed?
He concludes by saying the
evidence speaks for itself.
Repeating a claim does not transform it to evidence. It’s
the claims made in the Bible that are being examined for veracity and
factuality. To use them as evidence in a self-referencing manner defeats the
purpose of the whole exercise. We might as well not consider what early
historians said concerning the matter if the evangelists had monopoly over the
truth about what happened.
In any case, the gist of the
matter is whether or not Jesus resurrected, not whether the tomb existed or
whether Joseph of Arimathea was real or fictitious.
Concerning Sparrow Simpson’s
argument that it was a Roman practice to leave victims of crucifixion hanging
on the cross to be eaten by birds and beasts, but that there were exceptions
and that therefore, Jesus was treated as an exception; that argument is fine
but is weakened by the lack of the consideration for the cultural traditions
and practices related to burial then.
Jeffery Jay Lowder, in Historical
Evidence and the Empty Tomb Story A Reply to William Lane Craig says:
“There
are some important differences between Jesus’ scenario and the general scenario
for Roman and Jewish burial customs for executed criminals. Although there are documented exceptions to
Roman practice, it’s not clear that those exceptions are even relevant to
Jesus. The sources from antiquity that
document instances of Roman crucifixion victims being buried suggest two
scenarios in which a victim of crucifixion might be allowed burial: the
approach of a Roman holiday, and a request from a friend of the Roman
governor. While it is certainly
conceivable that the Romans may have also made an exception for a Jewish festival,
there is no evidence (independent of the NT accounts of Jesus’ burial) that
they did. Thus, the prior probability
that Jesus was given a burial of any sort is low or non existent.”
“Rabbinic law specifies that criminals may
not be buried in tombs (Tosefta Sanhedrin 9:8; Mishnah Sanhedrin
6:5-7); rather, it instructs Jews to bury criminals in a common grave. But
would the Jews have considered Jesus a criminal? Jesus was, after all, executed by the Romans for the political
crime of being the King of the Jews, not for the theological charge of
blasphemy. On this basis, David Daube
has suggested that the Jews may not have considered Jesus a criminal (David
Daube, The New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism p. 311). And if the Jews
believed that Jesus had been crucified for an act that did not violate divine
law, then there is historical precedent for believing they would have given
Jesus an honorable burial. However, this is all moot given that the Sanhedrin
found Jesus guilty of blasphemy. Under Jewish law, such a crime was punishable
by death by stoning as indicated in Leviticus 24:16.”
If the tomb existed wouldn’t it
be a venerated place? Jeffrey Jay Lowder, explains:
“if the
empty tomb story were true, early Christians would still have a reason to
venerate the site, namely, that the grave was the alleged location of the
Resurrection itself. As Wedderburn (Wedderburn, The Resurrection of Jesus:
History, Experience, Theology, 1999, p. 64) asks, "Was that not in
itself reason enough to note and remember and cherish the site, regardless of
whether it contained Jesus’ remains or not"? Let's divide Christians into
two groups, the 'earliest' Christians and 'later' Christians. The earliest
Christians are those who had known Jesus before his death and who thought they
had "seen" Jesus risen from the dead. 'Later' Christians, on the other hand, had not known Jesus before
his death and had not "seen" him risen from the dead. It seems to me that even the earliest
disciples would have venerated the site as a shrine, once Jesus was no longer
physically present. But even if none of
the earliest Christians had venerated the tomb as a shrine, later Christians
would have done so, as demonstrated by veneration of the Holy Sepulchre Church,
centuries after the Jewish War. (John M. G. Barclay, "The Resurrection
in Contemporary New Testament Scholarship Resurrection Reconsidered)
Moreover, since everyone that Paul converted would have been a 'later'
Christian, that puts an interest in veneration to within three years' of Jesus'
death.”
There is
clear evidence that none of the evangelists knew the exact location of the
tomb. Not even Paul bothers to visit the place where his “Lord” and savior was
buried. Is that to be expected?
The lack
of veneration of Jesus’ grave supports the idea that the empty tomb story is
not historical than the assumption that Jesus was (ultimately) buried in a
common grave (since he died as a criminal).
Richard
Carrier in Why
I Don't Buy the Resurrection Story (2000) says:
“…the lack
of veneration is incredible--it can most logically be explained by the fact
that no one knew where the tomb or body was. If, on the other hand, it was
possible that it could be known but no one cared, this would just as easily fit
the belief that Jesus was resurrected spiritually--such that the body was
simply an empty husk, of no importance in the face of the Great Truth--this
fits just as easily (or just as poorly) as the belief that the tomb was empty.
It is also possible that the tomb was venerated, but that its location
was lost after the Jewish War (66-70 A.D.) and its veneration forgotten to
history.”
Paul treated Jesus as someone who got buried and
resurrected. He did not mention the tomb. In I Corinthians 15:3-8 he says:
"Christ died for our sins in accordance with the
Scriptures,
and was buried. And he
was raised on the third day
in accordance with the Scriptures and he appeared to Cephas, which is Peter,
and then to the twelve." (notice that Jesus couldn’t have appeared to
the twelve as Paul is saying because Judas was already dead)
Paul’s
lack of belief in an empty tomb is clear in the above phrase; because he talks
about a buried man, not an entombed man i.e. according to the scriptures –
not according to history. Just the way Moses died he was buried as
indicated in Deuteronomy:
34:5: So Moses, servant of the Lord, died
there in the land of Moab as the Lord had said. 34:6 He buried him in the land
of Moab near Beth Peor, but no one knows his burial place to this very day
Dan
Baker, in Did
Jesus Really Rise From The Dead? Explains:
“But we
do not assume therefore that there must have been an empty tomb of Moses. In
Matthew 17, Peter goes up into the mountain with Jesus, James, and John, and
Jesus was transfigured, and suddenly they saw Moses and Elijah. Are we to
assume that there is an empty tomb of Moses because Peter saw Moses up there?
Paul did not believe in the empty tomb story either. In summary, Paul did not
believe in a physical resurrection, but an allegorical/ spiritual one. Paul’s
idea of the resurrection is addressed at the postscript.”
But that aside, even if we were
to give McDowell latitude and admitted that the narratives are well written in
a coherent and straightforward manner (which they are not), and that the tomb
actually exists, is that proof that the resurrection took place?
The answer is NO. We have well
written narratives by Athenian author Philostratus (c.170-c.245 C.E.)
describing the charismatic teacher and miracle worker Apollonius of Tyana who
lived in the first century A.D. It describes the sage of Tyana as a superhuman,
neo-Pythagorean philosopher who tried to reform cultic practices in modern
Greece, Turkey and Syria. We learn that he had several disciples, travelled
extensively, met important Roman officials (e.g. the emperors Vespasian, Titus,
and Domitian), and discussed with several other philosophers and even raised
people from the dead.
Is the beauty and coherence of
the narrative evidence of the truthfulness of its content?
Mark
15:46: And having bought a linen cloth and having taken Him down, he wrapped
Him in the linen cloth and laid Him in a tomb which had been cut out of rock.
And he rolled a stone against [or, upon] the entrance of the tomb.
But is that historically
correct?
Richard Carrier, in Craig's
Empty Tomb and Habermas on the Post-Resurrection Appearances of Jesus
says:
“…the
tomb blocking stone is treated as round in the Gospels, but that would not have
been the case in the time of Jesus, yet it was often the case after 70 C.E.,
just when the gospels were being written. Amos Kloner, in "Did a
Rolling Stone Close Jesus' Tomb?" (Biblical Archaeology Review
25:5, Sep/Oct 1999, pp. 23-29, 76), discusses the archaeological evidence of
Jewish tomb burial practices in antiquity. He observes that "more than 98
percent of the Jewish tombs from this period, called the Second Temple period
(c. first century B.C.E. to 70 C.E.), were closed with square blocking stones”,
and only four round stones are known prior to the Jewish War, all of them
blocking entrances to elaborate tomb complexes of the extremely rich (such as
the tomb complex of Herod the Great and his ancestors and descendants).
However, "the Second Temple period...ended with the Roman destruction of
Jerusalem in 70 C.E. In later periods the situation changed, and round blocking
stones became much more common"
The fact that the evangelists
claimed that the stone that blocked Jesus tomb was round while the Jewish tombs
at that time were closed with square stones further casts a shadow of doubt
about the authenticity and veracity of the testimonies of the evangelists.
Appealing to the empty tomb as
evidence of the resurrection is like using the absence of something as evidence
of theft, which is not valid. In any case, a resurrection does not necessarily
entail an empty tomb or grave. Paul, for instance believed in the resurrection
but not in an empty tomb.
The empty tomb is evidence of an
empty tomb. Not evidence of a resurrection.
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