Freethought & Rationalism Archive

TedM · 04-29-2006, 12:03 AM

This may be a non-issue, but it seems to me that the tradition that Jesus was raised on the 3rd day is problematic to the mythicist position in the following ways:

1. The only OT support for the concept of a resurrection after 3 days that I know of is found in Hosea 6:2

Quote:

After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him.

If Jesus never existed would this passage have been used to apply to a mythical Christ? Was it considered Messianic prior to Christ? To my knowledge no NT writer references it.

2. In the Gospels Jesus was raised up something like 36 hours after his death.

If Jesus never existed, would it have made sense in those days to raise him up 36 hours after his death, and refer to it as happening on the 3rd day?

ted

sunspark · 04-29-2006, 12:25 AM

There is reference to Jonah by Christ.

The answer to point #2, I remember hearing somewhere that you could say it was 3 days, not literally but in the sense that you include the day of death and day of resurrection, as part of those days he was dead. Whether that's an accurate description to how people thought in those days, I have no idea. Don't even remember where I heard it, but maybe someone else knows.

TedM · 04-29-2006, 12:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sunspark

There is reference to Jonah by Christ.

The answer to point #2, I remember hearing somewhere that you could say it was 3 days, not literally but in the sense that you include the day of death and day of resurrection, as part of those days he was dead. Whether that's an accurate description to how people thought in those days, I have no idea. Don't even remember where I heard it, but maybe someone else knows.

Thanks for the Jonah reference. I wonder if that is strong enough to be considered an OT inspiration for invention? I see that Mark (considered the first gospel usually) doesn't include the reference.

As to #2, I'd heard that also, so maybe there is no criteria of embarrassment here.

Vorkosigan · 04-29-2006, 01:31 AM

1. Three days was the period that was normally required before a corpse was considered dead. Both Crossan and Carrier have pointed this out. Crossan notes:

"Those who spoke of Jesus’ resurrection insisted that it was “after three days” or “on the third day.”15 That was when, in Jewish tradition, it was customary to visit the tomb not just for mourning but to make sure the person was definitely dead. That, of course, is why Jesus waited until, Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days” (John 11:17), until, that is, he was securely and definitely dead. When Christian Jews spoke of Jesus’resurrection after or on the third day, therefore, they were insisting that he had been really and truly dead. "

2. Three days in a tomb is a motif found in Hellenistic fiction of the period. See the magic flute sequence in the cave at the end of Luekippe and Kleitophon.

3. Of course Josephus hides in a cave for three days, was found by women, and eventually wound up at the right hand of the God Vespasian, as Cliff Carrington poins out.

No problem here at all.

Vorkosigan

darstec · 04-29-2006, 08:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TedM

This may be a non-issue, but it seems to me that the tradition that Jesus was raised on the 3rd day is problematic to the mythicist position in the following ways:

1. The only OT support for the concept of a resurrection after 3 days that I know of is found in Hosea 6:2

If Jesus never existed would this passage have been used to apply to a mythical Christ? Was it considered Messianic prior to Christ? To my knowledge no NT writer references it.

2. In the Gospels Jesus was raised up something like 36 hours after his death.

If Jesus never existed, would it have made sense in those days to raise him up 36 hours after his death, and refer to it as happening on the 3rd day?

ted

Remember that the Gospels have Jesus say he would be in the earth for three days AND THREE NIGHTS just like Jonah. In fact the Greek phrase is exactly the same in both instances.

I'm afraid there is nothing there but a fiction drawn from scripture. And more importantly, Jesus did not fulfill his own prediction about his resurrection.

TedM · 04-29-2006, 09:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vorkosigan

1. Three days was the period that was normally required before a corpse was considered dead.

This seems ludicrous. I'd like some evidence. The Crossan quote isn't clear evidence to me.

Quote:

2. Three days in a tomb is a motif found in Hellenistic fiction of the period. See the magic flute sequence in the cave at the end of Luekippe and Kleitophon.

I can't find this, so can't comment. Wouldn't we need a list of ALL references to time in a tomb to know whether 3 days was special or not?

Quote:

3. Of course Josephus hides in a cave for three days, was found by women, and eventually wound up at the right hand of the God Vespasian, as Cliff Carrington poins out.

Don't get me worked up now..

Should I assume you reject the idea that 'according to the scriptures' in 1 Cor 15 is referring to the 3 days, and is instead just referring to the 'being raised' part?

It appears to me that 1 Cor 15 really is saying that the Scriptures say he will be raised after 3 days. IF this creed pre-dates the gospels, we are back to asking why the belief in 3 days would have come from the Scriptures when they so weakly support it? I doubt that it would have, and if we are missing an invented Gospel, either we have your suggestion that 3 days was necessary to prove death, or we have SOMETHING really historical happening on the third day.

ted

TedM · 04-29-2006, 09:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by darstec

Remember that the Gospels have Jesus say he would be in the earth for three days AND THREE NIGHTS just like Jonah. In fact the Greek phrase is exactly the same in both instances.

I'm afraid there is nothing there but a fiction drawn from scripture. And more importantly, Jesus did not fulfill his own prediction about his resurrection. Remember that the Gospels have Jesus say he would be in the earth for three days AND THREE NIGHTS just like Jonah. In fact the Greek phrase is exactly the same in both instances.

I'm afraid there is nothing there but a fiction drawn from scripture. And more importantly, Jesus did not fulfill his own prediction about his resurrection.

Holding writes http://www.tektonics.org/af/bucknerj01.html#days :

Quote:

This is actually an instance in which we need to understand Jewish idiom, which understood "a day and a night" to include even the smallest part of a day and night. A Jewish source from after the time of the New Testament puts it this way: "A day and a night are an Onah ['a portion of time'] and the portion of an Onah is as the whole of it" [J.Talmud, Shabbath 9.3 and b.Talmud, Pesahim 4a] Other examples of this kind of usage can be found throughout the Bible (Gen. 42:16, 1Kings 20:29, Esth. 4:16, Matt. 27:63). Jesus was in the tomb for only a small part of Friday and Sunday, but that counts according to Jewish idiom for the entire "day and night" for each of those days.

So, maybe the time scheme of the gospels isn't inconsistent with '3 days and 3 nights'. Even so, why choose 3 days at all, if it is made up? Vork provides a possible answer. Seems odd to create this time period for the resurrection of the Messiah by relying on Jonah. The language regarding Jonah seems more appropriate as an explanation for the already established time period, than a reason to invent 3 days. Note again that Mark doesn't have this language.

Unless Vorkosigan is right about the need for 3 days to establish that a person was truly dead, to me it makes more sense for an invented resurrection story to have an INSTANTANEOUS resurrection, only DISCOVERED at the time people went to visit the tomb. Yet, that is NOT how it is presented.

ted

Amaleq13 · 04-29-2006, 10:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TedM

This seems ludicrous. I'd like some evidence. The Crossan quote isn't clear evidence to me.

Did you read Carrier's article?

Quote:

Finally, several passages in the Midrash Rabbah, which tie into the Mishnah, suggest a third-day motif could have been latent throughout a Jewish understanding of the dead. These laws are especially relevant to the passion narrative of Jesus, possibly inspiring the very idea that he was raised "on the third day." The key passage is as follows, based on Job 14:22:

Bar Kappara taught: Until three days [after death] the soul keeps on returning to the grave, thinking that it will go back [into the body]; but when it sees that the facial features have become disfigured, it departs and abandons it [the body]. (Genesis [C:7 (994)])

This is corroborated by the repeated principle that the identity of a corpse could only legally be established by the corpse's "countenance" within three days, after which it became too disfigured for identification by that means. The law stated that "You cannot testify to [the identity of a corpse] save by the facial features together with the nose, even if there are marks of identification in his body and garments: again, you can testify only within three days [of death]."[22] And in the Midrash, these two ideas were clearly linked:

For three days [after death] the soul hovers over the body, intending to re-enter it, but as soon as it sees its appearance change, it departs, as it is written (Job 14:22), "When his flesh that is on him is distorted, his soul will mourn over him." Bar Kappara said: The full force of mourning lasts for three days. Why? Because [for that length of time] the shape of the face is recognizable, even as we have learnt in the Mishnah: Evidence [to prove a man's death] is admissible only in respect of the full face, with the nose, and only [by one who has seen the corpse] within three days [after death]. (Leviticus [XVIII:1 (225-226)])

The idea that the soul rests three days in the grave before departing is also casually assumed in the Midrash Rabbah on Ruth [III:3 (43-44)] and Ecclesiastes [I:34 (41-42)]. Confirming this belief is a passage in the Semahot, which says:

One may go out to the cemetery for three days to inspect the dead for a sign of life, without fear that this smacks of heathen practice. For it happened that a man was inspected after three days, and he went on to live twenty-five years; still another went on to have five children and died later. (8.1)

Thus, it was considered possible for a soul to reunite with its body within three days, but no more, for sometime on the third day the soul realized the body was rotting, and then departed.[23] Thus, a resurrection on the third day reverses the expectations of the Jews: to physicalists, instead of departing, the soul of Jesus reunites with his body and rises; to spiritualists, instead of departing, the soul of Jesus is exalted by God, raised to his right side, thence to appear in visions to the faithful. Either way, a resurrection before the third day might not be a true resurrection, but a mere revival, or the ghost of a not-yet-departed soul, but a resurrection on the third day is true evidence that death was in either sense defeated. This "third day" tradition in Jewish law may in fact be very ancient, possibly lying behind the prophecy of Hosea, "He will revive us after two days, He will raise us up on the third day, that we may live before him" (6.2), and no doubt had something to do with Paul's conviction that Jesus "was raised on the third day according to the scriptures" (1 Corinthians 15:4).

andrewcriddle · 04-29-2006, 10:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vorkosigan

1. Three days was the period that was normally required before a corpse was considered dead. Both Crossan and Carrier have pointed this out. Crossan notes:

"Those who spoke of Jesus’ resurrection insisted that it was “after three days” or “on the third day.”15 That was when, in Jewish tradition, it was customary to visit the tomb not just for mourning but to make sure the person was definitely dead. That, of course, is why Jesus waited until, Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days” (John 11:17), until, that is, he was securely and definitely dead. When Christian Jews spoke of Jesus’resurrection after or on the third day, therefore, they were insisting that he had been really and truly dead. "

The only early relevant Jewish tradition known to me is Mishnah Yebamot 16:2

Quote:

They give testimony [about the identity of a corpse] only during a period of three days

ie after more than three days after death a corpse has decayed sufficiently to cause problems of identification.

This seems a somewhat different idea from the later tradition in the Midrash although there may be a common underlying belief that for three days the soul lingers around the corpse preventing decay and making resuscitation theoretically possible.

Andrew Criddle

TedM · 04-29-2006, 10:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amaleq13

Did you read ................

No I hadn't seen it. Thanks Amaleq. Interesting stuff. If those do reflect ancient traditions, it would be enough for pure invention--the main question here, though of course it could also have been incorporated into actual events.--ie Jesus died and upon checking after 3 days the tomb was empty, or Jesus died and sometime later appeared in visions--so it was assumed that he was raised after 3 days.

ted

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04-29-2006, 12:25 AM	#2
sunspark Regular Member Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Canada Posts: 260	There is reference to Jonah by Christ. The answer to point #2, I remember hearing somewhere that you could say it was 3 days, not literally but in the sense that you include the day of death and day of resurrection, as part of those days he was dead. Whether that's an accurate description to how people thought in those days, I have no idea. Don't even remember where I heard it, but maybe someone else knows.

04-29-2006, 01:31 AM	#4
Vorkosigan Contributor Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Barrayar Posts: 11,866	1. Three days was the period that was normally required before a corpse was considered dead. Both Crossan and Carrier have pointed this out. Crossan notes: "Those who spoke of Jesus’ resurrection insisted that it was “after three days” or “on the third day.”15 That was when, in Jewish tradition, it was customary to visit the tomb not just for mourning but to make sure the person was definitely dead. That, of course, is why Jesus waited until, Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days” (John 11:17), until, that is, he was securely and definitely dead. When Christian Jews spoke of Jesus’resurrection after or on the third day, therefore, they were insisting that he had been really and truly dead. " 2. Three days in a tomb is a motif found in Hellenistic fiction of the period. See the magic flute sequence in the cave at the end of Luekippe and Kleitophon. 3. Of course Josephus hides in a cave for three days, was found by women, and eventually wound up at the right hand of the God Vespasian, as Cliff Carrington poins out. No problem here at all. Vorkosigan

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