andrewcriddle

If people are interested in pursuing this I strongly suggest that they read the original article.

I don't think the notes properly represent the details of the original argument.

Andrew Criddle

Johnny Skeptic

Actually, some people have stated that they became Christians only after evaluating scientific and/or historical evidence.

The New Testament shows that some people would not accept Jesus based solely upon his words, and only accepted him after they saw him perform miracles.

Johnny Skeptic

By the same token, Deism does not go by secular rules.

This is the Biblical Criticism and History Forum. If you wish to discuss theology instead of history, a better place would be the Abrahamic Religions forum. Unless you have some historical evidence that Jesus' body was put in Joseph of Arimathaea's tomb, there is no reason to discuss that issue any more.

schriverja

There's a thread going on this topic at http://www.freeratio.org/showthread.php?t=284385.

Toto

It appears that this is a chapter in Warranted Christian Belief (or via: amazon.co.uk) (parts available on google books.)

The notes appear to be a collection of quotes related to the argument, not necessarily a summary.

OAO

Right, but they had a prior belief in God. They believe because of the miracles full-stop; rather, the prior belief enables them to interpret the events as miraculous in the first place. Similar, I think, with the NT.

I can't think of a single scholar who denies the resurrection appearances, including atheists. I'm less familiar with scholarly opinion on the empty tomb, but it satisfies the criterion of dissimilarity (the inclusion of Joseph of Arimathea and women are not likely inventions of the early Church), the criterion of multiple attestation, and the criterion of embarrassment. Seems pretty solid to me.

As for Jewish context - no first-century Jew would have thought of a resurrection as being possible while a body remained in the tomb. The entire Jewish notion of resurrection was of the very same body rising from death; it seems likely, then, that Paul was making use of this notion. Moreover, the way he describes the process of acquiring a spiritual body is one of transformation. If the body remains in the tomb, then no transformation could have taken place: the spiritual body would just be a new body altogether.

show_no_mercy

What dissimilarity? The women at the tomb fit the narrative of Mark perfectly. All throughout Mark's gospel only the reader, demons, and unnamed people know that Jesus is the messiah. All of the unnamed people have the correct response. The women at the tomb, just like everyone else that Mark gives a name to, have terrible reactions to Jesus and his messiah-hood. They do the opposite of what all of the unnamed people do.

The women at the tomb, instead of recognizing what happened, run away scared and don't tell anyone. Perfect Markan irony, and what we would expect given Mark's narrative history of what people he gives names to do.

Joseph of Arimathea is the more obvious deus ex machina in the whole story. He has only one role in Mark, and after his role is fulfilled he disappears.

There is no "multiple attestation". Asserting multiple attestation completely undermines the entire premise behind a "synoptic problem" and Markan priority. Because the synoptics share huge swaths of word-for-word similarities, there's a documentary (as opposed to oral) relationship between these texts. Meaning that we had one student who wrote the main point and some other students plagiarized him. No university would consider the type of textual relationship between the synoptics to be three different students who just so happened to write similar scenes word for word - they would be called on their copying immediately.

Since followers of Joseph Smith would have thought it was embarrassing for JS to have received magical sunglasses to translate ancient texts in a hat, therefore the angel Moroni really did give JS magical sunglasses and he really did translate texts in a hat. No one would invent such an embarrassing story!

Why do we think that Paul represents the standard of what first century Jews thought? Did first century Jews think that the laws of Moses were the ministry of death written in stone? Would first century Jews consider "circumcision of the heart" a valid way to enter YHWH's covenant?

Toto

But interpretations vary, from mistake to hallucination
.
Well, no. Joseph of Arimathea is undoubtedly an invention of the early church. Christians have argued that women's testimony was inadmissible, so no one would invent them as the first witnesses, but in fact women were allowed as witnesses in Roman courts, and even argued their own cases. There is no multiple attestation - there is only Mark, and sources that derived from that gospel. (In addition, there are differing early sources. Paul does not mention an empty tomb, and his list of those to whom Jesus appeared does not include any women, and does not match the gospels.) And how can you argue embarrassment?

The Empty Tomb: Jesus Beyond the Grave (or via: amazon.co.uk) contains some differing opinions.

Johnny Skeptic

I am not aware of one single skeptic scholar who believes that anyone saw a tangible, physical, risen Jesus after he rose from the dead, and left the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea.

What evidence do you have that Jesus was buried in Joseph of Arimathea's tomb?

Why aren't mention of Joseph of Arimathea and women likely inventions of the early Church? Do you have any extra-biblical evidence about Joseph of Arimathea?

Regarding the issue of women at the tomb, Dr. Richard Carrier discusses it in an article at http://www.infidels.org/library/mode...ble/women.html. Richard adequately shows that the issue of women at the tomb does not help Chrisitian apologists.

Regarding multiple attestation, it is well-known that Matthew and Luke borrowed a good deal from Mark, that the Gospel writers rarely claimed to be eyewitnesses, and that the Gospel writers rarely revealed who their sources were.

What non-bibilical, non-Christian, first century evidence do you have that Jesus performed miracles?

Surely the criteria for reasonably verifying supernatural events require more evidence than secular claims do.

Johnny Skeptic

If Jesus did not rise from the dead, that explains why most Jews rejected belief in Christianity in the first century.