A close look at how this is quite different from mere resuscitation of a dead body, and how it’s the crucial evidence for Christianity being “the true myth.”
For millennia, we humans have been making myths: stories of heroes, villains, tests-of-character, conflicts, rescue missions, and more. It’s a distinctly human trait, and the foundation for the many world religions that we’ve constructed. One recurring theme is that of the dying-rising god. In last week’s episode, we looked closely at the claim that “Christianity is the one true myth,” the fulfillment of the deepest yearnings of the human heart, expressed in all those other myths, and distinguished from all of them by a preposterous sign: the resurrection of Jesus.
If there’s any truth to that sign, that puts a very powerful spotlight on a very unique story that actually took place on the world-stage, in real-time, in full view for close inspection and rational inquiry!
So we had to investigate this claim of the resurrection of Jesus. What kind of evidence is there for it? Are there alternative explanations? Why did so many claim this, even upon the threat of martyrdom, and why do so many believe it today. What are the main skeptical arguments against the claim?
A methodical, logical approach says there are only two possible outcomes: it either did not happen, or it did.
We started with the first of those two outcomes: why so many people at the scene claimed it happened, when in fact it never did. And we found only two explanations that are popular among skeptics: either those early believers hallucinated it, or they lied about it. And we saw how neither of those explanations are consistent with the historical data at hand.
Another possibility would be that they did see a living, breathing Jesus … but there was no resurrection because, in fact, Jesus never died in the first place. Either he recovered from the execution done at the hands of trained and expert executioners, or the living, breathing “Jesus” was in fact an exact twin brother that those early believers and the opponents to their preposterous claim didn’t know about. Once again, neither of those explanations are consistent with the historical data at hand.
That leaves only one outcome for us to consider: that Jesus of Nazareth was executed, killed, and … resurrected. As Sherlock Holmes famously said: “When you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” One can still choose to reject that claim, but is the underlying reason for doing so more of a philosophical/emotional one than a rational one?
Near the end of our discussion, we needed to clarify what we mean by “resurrection.” Is it simply making a dead body start living again? That would sound miraculous at first; a violation of the Laws of Nature. Until one starts to realize that even we humans are already starting to learn how to do that … millions have been brought back to life using CPR, cardio-electric shock, adrenaline infusions, cryopreservation, and more. We’re even starting to use genetics to revive species which went completely extinct a long time ago! But in all those cases, the revived body goes on to grow old, get sick again, and eventually die. This was also what happened to everyone in the Bible who was supposedly brought back to life: Lazarus … Jairus’s daughter … Tabitha/Dorcas … Eutychus … and several others in the Old Testament. Except, some claimed (even at great personal risk), for one other person: Jesus of Nazareth.
But their claim wasn’t that Jesus was simply resuscitated. Instead, that he was resurrected. Transformed into something completely different. Into a whole new way of being human. A good analogy for resurrection is the transformation of a caterpillar into a butterfly, or a tadpole into a frog. If caterpillar’s could speak, they would all shout adamantly that: “Caterpillars just don’t fly! No caterpillar in all of history has ever been able to fly!”
And those caterpillars would be right.
And yet, so very wrong!?
So when skeptics reject the Resurrection on the basis that: “dead bodies don’t just come back to life again … that just doesn’t happen,” they would be mostly right. Usually, that does not happen.
And they would be partly wrong: sometimes even we humans can bring people back from the dead, and we’re getting better at it all the time.
And … it needs to be said … those skeptics would also be barking up the completely wrong tree: in the case of Jesus, we’re not talking about resuscitation, but about resurrection.
I think this topic deserves much more than a casual glance followed by a disgruntled rejection.
As always, tell us what you think …
To find more about our interview guest Dr. Mike Licona, go to his faculty page and his website.
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