Peter Kirby

Well, it has been over two years since I wrote it, but I don't recall ever offering this essay up for criticism here. It is probably the most significant item that I have composed, yet the only response so far (that I know about) has been a brief school paper that someone e-mailed to me. The essay is unique in providing the most comprehensive argument for the non-historicity of the empty tomb, and this positive portion of the article has been condensed to make an essay "The Case Against the Empty Tomb" to be published by Prometheus in Jesus is Dead, edited by Robert Price. But the fuller argument has been available online since about January 2001. Here it is:

The Historicity of the Empty Tomb Evaluated

I would be interested in any comments from atheists or theists.

best,
Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan

Yes....it's time, Peter. Time to write that book I know you are secretly thinking about....The Thinking Person's Guide to the Historical Jesus. Toto and I will provide the introduction.

Vorkosigan

Sauron

I haven't read the paper yet - I'm sure it's top notch material, Peter. But I'm surprised that William Lane Craig hasn't posted a response to it. It seems to be something that would be a topic of interest to him, and I think he's already done a debate with someone on this very same topic.

Do you know if he's aware that your paper exists?

Thank you.

Peter Kirby

I believe that Bill Craig has debated Lüdemann, Crossan, and Ellegård on the Jesus topic, besides bringing it up in many theist-atheist debates.

But I have no idea if he's heard of the work linked above. I didn't even think of e-mailing him when I wrote it. The "paper" is longer than an average size book (~450kb), so I won't blame someone if they haven't read through it.

I have a feeling that if Craig is going to be interested in any kind of response to me, I will have to get a Ph.D. first . . . and I wonder if that applies ex post facto.

By the way, J. J. Lowder wrote an excellent rebuttal to Craig's empty tomb apologetic entirely independent of mine, also published on Infidels in 2001, and so far as I know, there's been no response from Craig to that one either. (We became aware of each other's work in the late stages, and there is one footnote in each to the other.) There is something on Glenn Miller's site.

best,
Peter Kirby

RED DAVE

Peter, I just finished reading your document. Your ability to handle vast amounts of historical material is amazing.

Thanx,

RED DAVE

Bede

Peter,

While this is a useful paper, you seem to have adopted skewed standards in your summary.

Let me expand:

First, you give Paul's testamony nil for historisity despite 1 Cor 15:4. You cannot seriously then give the non-historicist a point on Paul's testamony.

Second, to give the historicist no credit for the lack of other traditions and then give credit for silence about the empty tomb is skewed.

Third, the beloved disciple's testamony is certainly valuable. See Robin Lane Fox on this.

Fourth, the Philo passage about the governor handing bodies over for burial by their families and Josephus being able to get crucifixion victims cut down early are both points for the historicists.

I appreciate the non-existence empty tomb is an article of faith for liberal scholars, but it is supported not so much by sources as by clever handwaving. The fact is we have no sources whatsoever for Jesus either staying on the cross or being thrown into a pit. Nothing. Zilch. Your giving 3 points to 'no know early interest in tomb' which is simply an argument from silence is bizarre when you reject the silence about alternative traditions!

On the other hand, we have Paul, Mark and John independently saying Jesus was buried and Mark and John independently saying the tomb was empty. John is probably based on a primary source. This is actually all we need unless you have documentary evidence to the contrary. I've never seen it - just academics getting thoroughly confused over allowing their theories to overthrow the sources. That Mark and John say the empty tomb existed doesn't get a credit in your table is a dreadful methodological slip up. It shows you are disregarding all the evidence a priori and then expecting the historicist case to do without it. Both Mark and John deserve a 4 or 5 as evidence for the empty tomb they actually state positively that the tomb existed while you have nothing saying it didn't.

I don't mean to belittle the work you've done but it is not good historical methodology you are showing here. You can't disregard the documents just because one side (the non-historicists) don't have any.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

joedad

Peter,

Great article. While reading it I thought I'd discovered your having been plagiarized. After some Googling I realized that I'd been reading the same article.

Not necessarily relevant, but whenever I see a Christian crucifixion depicted, I notice how "wrong" it is relative to the historical record. I turned up this link

http://www.uncc.edu/jdtabor/crucifixion.html

while investigating the subject and found it quite interesting.

Ted Hoffman

I cant wait

Peter Kirby

Vork, shouldn't I get a degree first, before writing a book? Preferrably in a relevant field? You know how savage the attacks are on G. A. Wells because he's trained as a professor of German--despite the fact that Wells has obviously read widely in NT literature (including, oddly enough, literature in German!).

best,
Peter Kirby

Ted Hoffman

So, you are planning on getting one?