The Son Rises: Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus

THE FACT OF THE RESURRECTION APPEARANCES

1. The testimony of Paul demonstrates that the disciples saw appearances of Jesus. As noted in chapter 3, in 1 Corinthians 15 Paul quotes an old Christian saying and then lists witnesses to the appearances of Jesus after His resurrection:

He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that he appeared to more than five hundred bethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles; and last of all, as it were to one untimely born, He appeared to me also. [1 Corinthians 15:5-8].

The connective words “then . . . then . . . then . . . last of all” show that the list of appearances is chronological in order. It is interesting that Paul does not mention the appearance of Jesus to the women, which is related in the gospels (Matthew 28:9-10; John 20:11-18). That is probably because women were not qualified to be legal witnesses, and therefore their presence in the list would not only be worthless, but even counterproductive. Paul’s concern is not to list all the appearances of Jesus, but the most important witnesses of the appearances. Let us briefly consider each appearance mentioned by Paul.

a) The appearance to Peter. First, he appeared to Cephas, which is Aramaic for Peter. It is very odd that this appearance to the chief disciple is not related in detail in the gospel stories. Nevertheless, virtually all New Testament critics acknowledge that the event really happened. For not only is this appearance mentioned in the very old saying from the early Christian fellowship in Jerusalem, but Paul himself, who personally visited and spoke with Peter, vouches for the accuracy of the saying by quoting it. In addition, the appearance is referred to by Luke in his gospel: “They . . . found gathered together the eleven and those who were with them, saying, ‘The Lord has really risen, and has appeared to Simon’” (Luke 24:33-34). According to Luke, the appearance to Peter took place after Peter had returned from the empty tomb and while he was alone. Luke apparently did not have a detailed story of this appearance, so rather than make up one (which, by the way, speaks for his honesty as a historian), he contents himself with this brief mention of the appearance to Simon Peter. Some scholars, drawing attention to the linguistic peculiarities of Luke’s statement, have even argued that this, too, is an old Christian saying that may be as old as that quoted by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:3-5.

Thus, the evidence for an appearance to Peter is good. The saying quoted by Paul refers to it, and so does Luke, whose source may be as old as Paul’s. Moreover, Paul himself, who spoke with Peter in Jerusalem six years after the event, assures us that Jesus appeared to Peter. At the very least, we must say that Peter experienced something, which he referred to as Jesus’ appearing to him. It is futile to try to dismiss this as legend. The question is, What did Peter see?

b) The appearance to the Twelve. The second appearance listed is the appearance to the Twelve. This appearance to the twelve disciples is the best supported appearance of Jesus. It is referred to here in the old Christian saying and is confirmed by Paul, who had personal contact with the twelve disciples. Furthermore, we have stories of this event in both Luke and John:

Luke 24:36-43, Phillips*

John 20:19-20, Phillips

And while they were still talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them and said, “Peace be with you all!”

But they shrank back in terror, for they thought they were seeing a ghost.

“Why are you so worried?” said Jesus, “and why do doubts arise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet—it is really I myself! Feel me and see; ghosts have no flesh or bones as you can see that I have.”

But while they still could not believe it through sheer joy and were quite be wildered, Jesus said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?”

They gave him a piece of broiled fish, which he took and ate before their eyes.

In the evening of that first day of the week, the disciples had met together with the doors locked for fear of the Jews. Jesus came and stood right in the middle of them and said, “Peace be with you!”

Then he showed them his hands and his side, and when they saw the Lord the disciples were overjoyed.

We have here two independent accounts of the same incident; their remarkable agreement lends weight to their historical credibility. They agree that on the evening of the day on which the empty tomb was discovered, Jesus suddenly appeared in the midst of the disciples in a room in Jerusalem, greeted them, and displayed His wounds to them. The disciples were then filled with joy. Jesus’ showing the disciples the crucifixion scars is a striking feature of this appearance. The purpose was to show that the appearance was physical and that the same Jesus who appeared was the one who had been killed. So we have here independent claims that the appearance to the Twelve, mentioned in the Christian saying and referred to by Paul, was a physical appearance of Jesus to the disciples. That claim will merit further examination later.

c) The appearance to the five hundred. Here there is a break in the saying quoted by Paul, and a new sentence begins. This may indicate that the saying ended here and that Paul now begins to list additional witnesses known to him. It does not mean that these appearances are any less reliable, for Paul still received the information about them from the earliest witnesses, probably during his Jerusalem visit.

The next appearance listed by Paul is remarkable: Jesus appeared to over five hundred people at once. This appearance is not mentioned anywhere else in the New Testament, and therefore one is inclined at first to be somewhat skeptical about its occurrence. Yet the source of information for the appearance goes back to the earliest Christian fellowship in Jerusalem, and Paul, who had ample opportunity to confirm whether it occurred or not, refers confidently to the event. To make the situation even more amazing, Paul adds his own personal comment that most of these people are still alive, though some have died. This shows that he had personal knowledge of the people present at this appearance and that the appearance was not just a meaningless number on a list for him. Thus, despite first impressions, one cannot dismiss this appearance as a mere legend, for Paul personally knew of people who had been at the appearance and could give first-hand testimony about it. C. H. Dodd observes, “There can hardly be any purpose in mentioning the fact that most of the five hundred are still alive, unless Paul is saying, in effect, ‘the witnesses are there to be questioned.’”1 Paul could never have said that if the event had not actually occurred. Therefore, it is nearly indisputable that this appearance took place.

The event is not related in the gospels, I believe, because it took place in Galilee after the disciples had returned from Jerusalem. Galilee is a region of Israel far to the north of Jerusalem, by the Sea of Galilee, where some of the disciples had been fishermen. As one puts together the various strands of historical information in the gospels, it seems that the disciples, having seen Jesus in Jerusalem, went according to His command back to Galilee, where He again appeared to them. Although Luke does not relate any of the appearances in Galilee, he tells us that Jesus appeared to His disciples for forty days (Acts 1:3). Then the disciples returned to Jerusalem for the feast of Pentecost, where Jesus appeared to them a final time, commanding them not to leave the city until they were given God’s Spirit. The appearance to the five hundred probably occurred during the period of Galilean appearances. A meeting of five hundred persons would have to be in the open air, perhaps on a hillside. It was in Galilee that thousands had flocked to hear Jesus teach, and hence a gathering of five hundred believers is not impossible. Although we are apt to picture Galilee as a rural land of sleepy, little villages, according to the contemporary Jewish historian Josephus, there were many towns in Galilee, the least of which possessed fifteen thousand inhabitants.2 In the vicinity of such a village a meeting of five hundred people is quite conceivable. In any case, wherever the appearance took place, the evidence of Paul indicates firmly that such an event did in fact occur and that hundreds of people still living could tell what happened.

d) The appearance to James. The fourth appearance is another remarkable surprise: He appeared to James, who was, according to information elsewhere in the New Testament, Jesus’ own earthly brother. Unfortunately, the gospels do not tell the story of this appearance. But Paul states that during his two-week visit to Jerusalem, he personally met James, the Lord’s brother (Galatians 1:19). Thus, the information about this appearance no doubt came from James himself. There can be little doubt that James did see an appearance of Jesus.

What is really amazing about this is that none of Jesus’ younger brothers, including James, believed in Jesus during His lifetime (Mark 3:21, 31-35; John 7:1-10). John tells a rather ugly story of how Jesus’ brothers tried to goad Him into a death trap by showing Himself publicly at the feast of Tabernacles in Jerusalem when the authorities were looking for Him. We do not hear much more about them until to our surprise they are found in the Christian fellowship in Jerusalem shortly after the resurrection (Acts 1:14)! There is no further mention of them until Acts 12:17, which records Peter’s deliverance from prison. James seems to have gained a place of prominence among the believers, for Peter says, “Report these things to James.” Paul also reports that when he visited Jerusalem three years after his conversion, he “did not see any other of the apostles except James, the Lord’s brother” (Galatians 1:19), which seems to imply that James was also being reckoned as an apostle. Later when Paul and Barnabas returned from their missionary work among the pagans, it was James who decided how pagan converts should be treated (Acts 15:13). Paul says that fourteen years after his first visit, he went to Jerusalem to see the “pillars” of the Jerusalem fellowship: Peter, John, and James (Galatians 2:9). It is interesting that when some time later a delegation from the Jerusalem fellowship came to Antioch, where Paul was working, he referred to them as “men . . . from James” (Galatians 2:12). Finally in Acts 21:18, James appears to be the sole head of the Jerusalem fellowship and of the council of elders. We hear no more about James in the New Testament, but the Jewish historian Josephus records that the Jews illegally and brutally stoned James to death for his faith in Jesus Christ sometime around A.D. 60.3

Not only James, but Jesus’ other brothers became believers as well. Paul mentions them in 1 Corinthians 9:5: “Do we not have the right to be accompanied by a wife, as the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?” (RSV). Here Jesus’ brothers are ranked with the apostles as ministers in the early Christian movement. The ancient historian Eusebius records the church tradition that the brothers of Jesus carried out missionary work in Galilee and Syria.4 Thus, Jesus’ other brothers also experienced a remarkable change in their lives.

How is that to be explained? It is historically well-founded that James and his brothers were not believers in Jesus during His lifetime. Not only do we have independent sources attesting to that fact, which is quite plausible in itself, but more important, it is highly improbable that, had Jesus’ brothers been loyal believers in Him all along, the early Christian fellowship in which they served would have invented such vicious and wholly fictional stories about them in the gospels. But if it is certain that Jesus’ brothers were unbelievers during His lifetime, it is equally certain that they became fervent believers after His death. How can that be? Though their brother’s crucifixion might pierce their hearts, it certainly could not have caused them to worship Him as Messiah and Lord, as the early Christians did. When I think about this, I sometimes shake my head in amazement. Many of us have brothers. What would it take for you to die for the belief that your brother is the Lord, as James did? Even Hans Grass exclaims that one of the surest proofs of Jesus’ resurrection is that His own brothers came to believe in Him.5 This remarkable transformation cannot be explained, except by the fact that, as Paul says, “then he appeared to James.”

e) The appearance to all the apostles. Finally, Paul reports, He appeared to all the apostles. It is not clear exactly what group Paul refers to here. It probably does not mean the twelve disciples, for that would be a duplication of the earlier appearance to the Twelve. According to both Luke and John, to be an apostle one must have been with Jesus from the beginning of His earthly ministry (Acts 1:21-22; John 15:27). The apostles were thus a limited group, somewhat broader than the Twelve. In time, the concept of who could be an apostle broadened to include nearly all those sent out to preach the gospel. But the appearance was probably to the limited group. Since this is the last appearance listed by Paul, it could be the same as Jesus’ final appearance in Jerusalem (Luke 24:50-51; Acts 1:2, 6-11). Be this as it may, this appearance is also guaranteed historically by Paul’s personal contact with the apostles.

f) The appearance to Paul. Having listed witnesses to the appearances of Jesus, Paul then adds his own name to the list as the last of all. The story of Jesus’ appearance to Paul is related three times in the book of Acts (Acts 9:1-19; 22:3-16; 26:9-23). Here is the version as Luke first tells it:

Now Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest, and asked for letters from him to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, both men and women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. And it came about that as he journeyed, he was approaching Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him; and he fell to the ground, and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me?” And he said, “Who art Thou, Lord?” And He said, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting, but rise, and enter the city, and it shall be told you what you must do.” And the men who traveled with him stood speechless, hearing the voice but seeing no one. And Saul got up from the ground, and though his eyes were open, he could see nothing; and leading him by the hand, they brought him into Damascus. And he was three days without sight, and neither ate nor drank. [Acts 9:1-9]

That is really quite a remarkable story. Paul—or Saul, as he was called in his pre-Christian days—was one of the Jewish authorities and the chief persecutor of the Christian movement. As an extremely devout rabbi, he hated the Christian heresy and the schism it threatened to bring to Judaism. He was doing all he could to stamp it out, and, according to Luke, he even persecuted to death men and women who believed in Jesus (Acts 22:4). Then came the amazing incident on the way to Damascus.

That the event really occurred is established beyond doubt by references to it in Paul’s own letters. He tells us that he was a Pharisee, extremely zealous for Judaism and perfectly obedient to the law of Moses (Galatians 1:14; Philippians 3:5-6). As a result of this earnestness, he was involved in persecuting the Christian movement, and he carried out his task with a terrible vengeance (1 Corinthians 15:9; Galatians 1:13; Philippians 3:6). As he was near or in Damascus (Galatians 1:17), Christ appeared to him (1 Corinthians 9:1; 15:8; Galatians 1:15-16) and commissioned him to preach the gospel (Galatians 1:16; Colossians 1:25). After that event, which Paul considered his conversion (1 Corinthians 15:8; Philippians 3:7), he remained in Damascus three years before setting out as a gospel preacher in foreign lands (Galatians 1:17-21). The story in Acts mainly adds details.

Jesus’ appearance to Paul changed the course of his entire life. He began to travel around the Roman Empire preaching the gospel. He gave up the prestige and comfort of being a respected rabbi and took on the life of an itinerant preacher, a life full of toil, sacrifice, pressure, and unimaginable suffering. From references in Paul’s letters, we know that he was whipped five different times by the Jews, thirty-nine lashes each time (a triple-thonged whip was used to deliver twenty-six lashes to the back and thirteen to the chest). The Romans whipped him on three occasions. Once he was stoned (according to Luke he was left for dead; Acts 14:19). He was in constant danger during his travels. Three times he was shipwrecked, and once he was afloat in the water for twenty-four hours. Robbers were always a threat, as were both Jewish and pagan adversaries, who sought to kill him. He experienced great hardship, often going without sleep and sometimes without food. He was sometimes poorly dressed and had no place to stay. And of course, every day was passed under the mental pressure of Paul’s intense care for the churches he founded, that they would stay true to the faith and not be led astray by false teachers and heretics. Eventually he made the ultimate sacrifice and was executed for his faith in Rome.

Without a doubt, Paul, whose letters make up much of what we call the New Testament, was one of the most remarkable men who ever lived. And it all began because outside Damascus in A.D. 33 he had an experience that absolutely shattered his former life and outlook and turned him to an unquenchable faith in Jesus. His conversion is just as remarkable as the conversion of James. And Paul tells us the reason for that change: he had seen Jesus the Lord.

All the above goes to prove that the early believers did have experiences that they called appearances of Jesus. We may try to dismiss those experiences as hallucinations if we choose, but we cannot deny that they occurred. I think we sometimes fail to appreciate exactly what we have in terms of historical evidence in Paul’s letters. For think of it: here is an indisputably authentic letter from a man who knew personally Jesus’ own younger brother and chief disciple as well as many other early disciples, all of whom, he says, saw Jesus alive from the dead. Why, that is astounding! We may try to explain away those experiences, but it would be futile to say they never happened.6 Paul’s list of witnesses makes it certain that on separate occasions different individuals and groups saw appearances of Jesus. This fact is virtually indisputable.

2. The gospel accounts of the resurrection appearances are fundamentally reliable historically. Three basic reasons support this conclusion.

a) There was insufficient time for legend to arise. Ever since D. F. Strauss first propounded his theory that the gospel accounts of the resurrection are mere legends, the greatest difficulty for this theory has been that the time between the events and the writing of the gospels was too short to allow legend to substantially accrue. Julius Müller’s critique of Strauss has never been answered:

Most decidedly must a considerable interval of time be required for such a complete transformation of a whole history by popular tradition, when the series of legends are formed in the same territory where the heroes actually lived and wrought. Here one cannot imagine how such a series of legends could arise in an historical age, obtain universal respect, and supplant the historical recollection of the true character and connexion of their heroes’ lives in the minds of the community, if eyewitnesses were still at hand, who could be questioned respecting the truth of the recorded marvels. Hence, legendary fiction, as it likes not the clear present time, but prefers the mysterious gloom of grey antiquity, is wont to seek a remoteness of age, along with that of space, and to remove its boldest and more rare and wonderful creations into a very remote and unknown land.7

A. N. Sherwin-White has urged the same consideration.8 Professor Sherwin-White is an eminent historian of Roman times, the era contemporaneous with Jesus. He is not a theologian; he is a professional historian. He chides New Testament critics for not realizing what invaluable historical documents the New Testament books are, especially in comparison with the sources for Roman history with which he must work. He states that the sources for Roman and Greek history are usually biased and removed at least one or two generations or even centuries from the events they relate. Yet, he says, historians are still able to reconstruct with confidence what really happened. When Professor Sherwin-White turns to the gospels, he comments that for these stories to be legends, the rate of legendary accumulation would have to be “unbelievable”; more generations are needed.9 The writings of the Greek historian Herodotus enable us to test the rate at which legend accumulates; the tests show that even the span of two generations is too short to allow legendary tendencies to wipe out the hard core of historical fact.10 Müller challenged scholars of his day to find even one historical example where in thirty years a great series of legends, the most prominent elements of which are fictitious, have accumulated around an important historical individual and become firmly fixed in general belief.11 His challenge has never been met. The time span necessary for significant accrual of legend concerning the events of the gospels would place us in the second century A.D., just the time in fact when the legendary apocryphal gospels were born. These are the legendary accounts sought by the critics.

This would be enough to insure the basic historical reliability of the gospel accounts, but we can go still further. Although most New Testament critics claim that the gospels were written after A.D. 70, that assertion, states Cambridge University’s John A. T. Robinson, is largely the result of scholarly laziness, the tyranny of unexamined presuppositions, and almost willful blindness on the part of the critics.12 Most critics date the writing of Mark around A.D. 70 because the Christian theology in it is quite developed and Jesus’ predictions of the destruction of Jerusalem (Mark 13) show that the event was at hand. Luke must have been written after A.D. 70 because he probably used Mark’s gospel as one of his sources and Jesus’ “predictions” of Jerusalem’s destruction look back on that event. The value of those arguments, however, hinges on certain assumptions:

(1) With regard to Mark, the first argument assumes that “the Christian theology” was not in fact Jesus’ own. To say it is “developed” assumes that it was once “primitive.” Actually the argument cuts both ways: one could argue that because Mark was written early, the theology is not “developed,” but truly characteristic of what Jesus taught.

(2) The second argument assumes that Jesus did not have divine power to predict the future as the gospels state He did. In other words, the argument assumes in advance that Jesus was merely human. But if He really was the Son of God, as the gospels state, then He could have prophesied the future.

(3) With regard to the arguments for a post-70 date for Luke, the first assumes Mark was not written before A.D. 70. But that assumption is itself founded on mere assumptions. The whole thing is like a house of cards. At face value, it makes more sense to say Mark was written before A.D. 70, for it seems unbelievable that Mark (whom critics agree was the John Mark mentioned in Acts) would wait thirty to forty years to write down his gospel. Is it really plausible to think that Mark would wait decades before writing his brief gospel, which would be so valuable in sharing and leaving with newly established churches as the gospel preachers went about teaching and preaching?

(4) The second argument against an early date for Luke assumes again that Jesus did not have supernatural power to foresee the future. And really, even on a purely humanistic account of the matter, there is no reason those predictions could not have been given before A.D. 70.13 Prophets often predicted Jerusalem’s destruction as a sign of God’s judgment, and Jesus’ predictions may have concerned its destruction at the end of the world, not A.D. 70. As a matter of fact, Jesus’ prophecies are actually evidence that the gospels were written before A.D. 70, for Luke never casts the Romans in the role of enemies in his writings. In the predictions, Jerusalem is destroyed by her enemies. Since Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans in A.D. 70, Luke must have written before that event. If he wrote afterwards, he could not have portrayed the Romans only as friends. Besides that, we have Josephus’s descriptions of the sacking of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, and many of the striking peculiarities of the city’s destruction are absent from the prophecies. But if the “prophecies” had been written after the event, then those peculiarities would surely have been included. So really the argument from Jesus’ predictions supports a pre-70 dating of the gospels.

In any case, it is very apparent that the arguments for a post-70 date of the gospels hang together on certain unproved assumptions. If one goes, they all go. No wonder Robinson can compare the current arguments for the dating of the gospels to a line of drunks reeling arm in arm down the street.14

Actually several lines of solid evidence point to a date for Luke-Acts before A.D. 64.15

(a) There is no mention of events that happened between A.D. 60 and 70. Luke centers much attention on the events that took place in Jerusalem, but he mentions nowhere in Acts the destruction of the city in A.D. 70. That is quite significant, considering what a catastrophe the destruction of the holy city was for both Jews and Christians at that time. A second event noticeably absent is the Roman Emperor Nero’s terrible persecution of the Christians in Rome. From the Roman historian Tacitus we learn that Nero covered the Christians with tar, crucified them, and used them as torches to light up Rome at night. Others were clothed in skins of wild animals and thrown to starving dogs. It is unbelievable that Luke could gloss over that horrible persecution in silence. Still a third event not mentioned is the murder of Jesus’ brother James, who was leader of the Christians in Jerusalem at the time. Since Luke records the martyrdom of Stephen and the martyrdom of James the son of Zebedee, it is unlikely that he would fail to relate the death of James, the brother of Jesus, who was much more prominent.

(b) There is no mention of the death of the apostle Paul. Paul was executed in Rome about A.D. 64, but at the end of Acts he is still alive in Rome awaiting his trial. The most plausible reason that Acts ends where it does, leaving us hanging, is that it was written before Paul finally came to trial and was executed.

(c) The subject matter of Acts deals with concerns important to Christianity before the destruction of Jerusalem. For example, one of the burning issues in Acts is the relationship between Christians who had been converted from Judaism and Christians who had been converted from paganism. The problem was whether the pagan converts should be required to submit themselves to all the Jewish laws and customs in order to be Christians. That was a great difficulty for early Christianity. After the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, it ceased to be a problem, since Jewish Christianity was all but wiped out in that disastrous event. The subject matter of the book suggests that Acts was written when that issue was still current.

(d) Acts uses expressions that faded from use early in the history of Christianity. For example, Jesus is called “the Son of Man” and “the Servant of God,” titles that soon faded into obscurity. Also Christians are still referred to as “disciples” and the Jewish nation as “the people.” Sunday is called “the first day of the week,” another early expression. The most natural explanation for the occurrence of those expressions is that Acts was written early enough to be in touch with the climate of the early days of the Christian Way.

(e) The attitude of the Romans toward Christianity is positive in Acts. The Romans never appear as enemies in Luke-Acts; they are at best friendly or at worst indifferent. Such a portrayal of the Romans would have been possible before Nero’s persecution in A.D. 64, but afterwards it would have been an obvious and cruel misrepresentation.

(f) There is no real acquaintance with Paul’s letters in the book of Acts. The author of Acts does not refer to or seem to be well acquainted with Paul’s many letters. Thus Acts must have been written before Paul’s letters became widely circulated. That favors a date as early as possible for Acts, since the later it is dated, the harder it becomes to explain why the author does not know of Paul’s letters.

These six lines of evidence combine to present a powerful case that Acts was written before A.D. 64. Since Luke wrote his gospel before he wrote Acts (Acts is a continuation of the gospel), the gospel of Luke must have been written around A.D. 57 or the very early sixties. This is a conclusion of tremendous importance, for it means the gospel of Luke was written just about the same time as Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians (A.D. 55). Luke therefore ought to be regarded just as historically reliable as Paul.

“But wait a minute,” someone will say. “Granted that Luke and Paul wrote about the same time, still Paul had earlier sayings and sources to go on.” But so did Luke. He specifically states that his information concerning the events of the gospel was “delivered to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word” (Luke 1:2). Luke therefore also had personal contact with the people who saw and heard what he reports in his gospel. Luke was probably a traveling companion of Paul’s (Acts 16:10-17; 20:5—21:18; 27:1—28:16) and spent time in Jerusalem, where he could gather information firsthand from those who had been with Jesus and had witnessed the resurrection appearances. Therefore, Luke’s information should be regarded as reliable as Paul’s.

But more than that: since one of the sources used by Luke in writing his gospel was probably Mark’s gospel, this means Mark was written even earlier than Luke. Robinson suggests a date of A.D. 45 for Mark. And of course, Mark’s sources then go even further back.

When we remember that Jesus died in A.D. 30, we begin to see how hopeless the legend hypothesis is. According to Professor Sherwin-White, generations are required for legends to prevail over historical facts. But we are talking about less than fifteen to thirty years. Remember, we are not talking about deliberate lies; we are talking about legends. It is unreasonable to charge Luke or his sources with being liars.

The question is, Could legends build up around the appearances of Jesus at such a rate that by the time Luke wrote, the facts had been lost and only unhistorical, legendary fictions were left? As we have seen, the rate for such accumulation would be unbelievable and completely unparalleled in history. The development of legends requires too long for us to be able to dismiss the gospel accounts in that way. Historical experience concerning the process of legend formation thus provides the decisive answer to this question: No.

b) The controlling presence of living eyewitnesses would prevent significant accrual of legend. When the gospel accounts were formed, eyewitnesses to what did and did not happen were still alive. Their presence would act as a check on any legends that might begin to arise. The respected commentator on Mark, Vincent Taylor, has twitted New Testament critics for their neglect of this factor. Taylor remarks that if some critics were right, then the disciples “must all have been translated into heaven immediately after the Resurrection.”16 Those who had seen Jesus after the resurrection would soon become “marked men,” who knew firsthand what had happened. Their testimony would act as a safeguard against unhistorical legends. In the same way, if persons like Mary Magdalene and the women did not see Jesus, as the gospels say they did, then it is very difficult indeed to explain how those stories could arise that they did, since Mary and the others were right there in the Christian fellowship in Jerusalem where the legends supposedly originated.

Legends do not arise significantly until the generation of eyewitnesses dies off. Hence, legends are given no ground for growth as long as witnesses are alive who remember the facts. In the case of the resurrection narratives, the continued presence of the twelve disciples, the women, and the others who saw Jesus alive from the dead would prevent legend from significantly accruing.

c) The authoritative control of the apostles would have kept legendary tendencies in check. The apostles who had been with Jesus were, so to speak, the guardians of the information of His life and teachings. It is simply unbelievable that fictitious stories of Jesus’ appearances to them could arise and flourish so long as they were living and active, much less that wholly false stories could replace the true. Walther Künneth states:

It is extremely difficult to see how the Gospel accounts of the resurrection could arise in opposition to the original apostolic preaching and that of Paul. . . . The authority of the apostolic eye-witnesses was extraordinarily strong. It would be inconceivable how there should have arisen in opposition to the authoritative witness of the original apostles a harmonious tradition telling of an event that has no basis in the message of the eye-witnesses.17

Invention of stories by Christians, says Künneth, would have been “sharply contradicted by the apostles or their pupils.”18 Discrepancies might exist in secondary details, the gospel writers might select or emphasize different aspects of the stories, but the basic stories themselves could not be legendary so long as the authoritative control of the apostles was being exercised. Once again, it is instructive to observe that the legendary apocryphal gospels did not arise until all the apostles had died, and even then they were universally rejected by the early church.

These three factors—the insufficient time, the controlling presence of living eyewitnesses, and the authoritative control of the apostles—preclude the significant rise and accumulation of legend, and thus go to establish the fundamental, historical reliability of the gospel accounts of the resurrection.

3. The resurrection appearances were physical, bodily appearances. Most New Testament critics are prepared to admit that the disciples did see appearances of Jesus, but many assert that those appearances were visions, not physical appearances. I now wish to examine the evidence specifically for the physical, bodily nature of the appearances.

a) Paul implies that the appearances were physical. Critics who wish to reduce the resurrection appearances to mere visions usually try to drive a wedge between Paul and the gospels. They admit that the appearances in the gospel stories are plainly physical, but they assert that Paul thought the appearances were only visionary. Because those critics inevitably date the gospels after A.D. 70, they say Paul is more reliable, since his letters are earlier.

We have already established that the crucial assumption of that reasoning, namely, that the gospels were written after A.D. 70, is wrong. Since a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, the argument fails. But let us be gracious and overlook that for now. What is the evidence that Paul thought Jesus’ appearances were visionary? The critics usually give two arguments: the appearance to Paul was visionary, so the others must have been so as well; and Paul did not believe that Jesus rose from the dead with a physical body, but with a spiritual body. Let us examine each argument in greater detail.

(1) It is certainly true that as Luke describes it, the appearance to Paul had visionary elements. For Jesus appeared as a light and voice from heaven, not as a man walking along the road. But we must be very careful not to reduce Paul’s experience to just a vision. For what is a vision? A vision is a projection of the mind of the beholder; there is nothing “out there” in the real world that corresponds to what he “sees.” A person may be caused to see a vision by either internal or external causes, but in either case what he sees is, so to speak, “all in his mind” and has no counterpart in reality. But it is clear that Paul’s experience was not just a vision. For as Luke describes it, the appearance was certainly “out there,” not all in Paul’s mind. Paul’s traveling companions also experienced the light and the voice, though for them these were not the means of an encounter with Jesus, as they were for Paul. It is interesting to compare Stephen’s vision of Christ (Acts 7:54-58) with Jesus’ appearance to Paul. Stephen saw a vision of Christ at the right hand of God, but no one around him saw anything. That was a true vision. But on the Damascus road the light and the voice were really “out there” in the real world, and Paul’s fellow travelers experienced them, too. If Luke’s information about Paul’s experience lacked the objective elements, then we would have had a story similar to that of Stephen’s vision.

But in any case, even if Paul’s experience were visionary, what ground is there for asserting that all the other appearances were just like it? Here the critics do not have a leg to stand on. All they can say is that Paul adds his experience to the list of appearances in 1 Corinthians 15, so they must have all been alike. But this reasoning is very weak. In adding himself to the list, Paul is not, so to speak, trying to bring the other appearances down to the level of his own; rather he is trying to raise the appearance to him up to the level of objectivity and reality of the others. Paul’s experience occurred about three years after the other appearances, and we know from Paul’s letters that some people were suspicious about whether Paul was a true apostle. Therefore, in adding himself to the list, Paul is saying, “Look, my experience was just as much a real appearance of Jesus as those of the other apostles.” Thus, in no way does he imply that all the appearances were visions.

According to Luke, the appearance to Paul was in fact different from the others because Paul’s was a post-ascension encounter. That is to say, after appearing to His disciples and others for some forty days, Jesus physically left this universe or dimension. He will come again at the end of history. Meanwhile, the Holy Spirit acts in His place. Therefore, the appearance to Paul could not have been physical like the others; it had to be in some sense visionary. But it was not merely visionary, for it had real manifestations in the world “out there,” namely, the light and the voice. Paul in his letters gives us no reason to doubt that this is a fair account of the matter. Paul also thought the appearance to him was unusual, and he was concerned to raise it up to the objectivity of the others.

(2) Many theologians have thoroughly misunderstood Paul’s teaching on the spiritual resurrection body (1 Corinthians 15:35-57). According to Paul, there are four essential differences between the present body and the future resurrection body:

Present Body

Resurrection Body

mortal

immortal

dishonorable

glorious

weak

powerful

physical

spiritual

The last contrast, physical/spiritual, makes it appear that whereas the present body is physical and tangible, the resurrection body will be immaterial and intangible. This, however, is a misunderstanding of the words used by Paul. The word translated “physical” literally means “soul-ish.” Now obviously, in saying the present body is soul-ish, Paul does not mean our bodies are made of soul. What then does he mean? Well, elsewhere in the New Testament, the word soul-ish always has a negative ring to it and means “pertaining to human nature in contrast to God.” It does not mean physical; rather it means natural, or belonging to human nature and self.

In a similar way, when Paul says the resurrection body will be spiritual, he does not mean a body made out of spirit. That would really be a contradiction in terms, for a spirit is precisely the absence of body. Rather, biblical commentators agree that Paul means “pertaining to God’s Spirit.” It does not mean spiritual in the sense of “nonphysical”; rather it means spiritual in the sense that we say, “Paul was a spiritual man,” or “The Bible is a spiritual book.” Being spiritual in this sense in no way implies being nonphysical or intangible.

That this is so is quite clear from Paul’s use of these same terms in 1 Corinthians 2:14-15 (RSV): “The natural [soul-ish] man does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of God; for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual man judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one.” Now obviously by “natural man” Paul does not mean “physical man,” nor by “spiritual man” does he mean “immaterial, intangible man.” The spiritual man is every bit as material and tangible as the natural man. The difference is not in their physical substance, but in their life-orientation. The natural man is dominated and directed by the sinful human self, whereas the spiritual man is directed and empowered by God’s Spirit.

Similarly, the resurrection body does not differ from the present body in that it is immaterial and intangible, but in that it is completely freed from the effects of sin (such as disease, death, and decay) and is fully in tune with the direction and power of God’s Spirit. Thus, the translation of the word in question as “spiritual” is bound to create more misunderstandings than it is worth. Since the word is used as the opposite of “natural body,” I would agree with the French commentator Jean Héring and translate it “supernatural body.”19 The legitimacy of this translation is shown by the fact that the Revised Standard Version translators so render this word in 1 Corinthians 10:3-4 in describing the miraculous manna and water that God supplied the Israelites in the Sinai desert: they “all ate the same supernatural food and all drank the same supernatural drink.” Obviously, the word once again does not mean “immaterial, intangible bread and water.” So I think “supernatural body” is less apt to create misunderstanding and better conveys Paul’s thought than “spiritual body,” which sounds like a contradiction in terms.

Most scholars who have studied Paul’s teaching on the resurrection body agree that he is not talking about a body made of spirit. But many theologians persist in talking this way. There seems to be a great gap here between biblical studies and theology.

In any case, everyone agrees that Paul did not teach immortality of the soul alone, but the resurrection of the body. I challenge any theologian to explain the difference between an immaterial, intangible, “spiritual” body and the immortality of the soul. To say Paul did not teach the latter but did teach the former is theological double-talk.

Therefore, the arguments used by critics to drive a wedge between Paul and the gospels have not only failed, but actually have led to the opposite conclusion. We see that Paul did believe in a physical resurrection body and that he did not regard the other appearances as being necessarily the same type of experience as his own on the Damascus road.

But we can go further. There is positive evidence that Paul also regarded the appearances of Jesus as actual physical appearances.

(a) Paul (and indeed all of the New Testament) makes a sharp distinction between an appearance of Jesus and a vision of Jesus. The appearances of Jesus were confined to a brief period at the beginning of the Christian Way; they soon ceased and were never repeated. Visions, however, continued and were repeated. Paul himself had visions (2 Corinthians 12:1-7), but what he saw on the Damascus road was no mere vision. That is very interesting, for it shows that the appearances seen by the disciples were essentially different from visions, with which they were familiar.

Visions, even ones caused by God, were exclusively in the mind of the beholder, whereas an appearance involved the actual appearance of something “out there” in the real world. That conclusion seems to me to be nearly inescapable. The resistance of many modern critics to it is mainly due to a bias against the physical resurrection. But if one rejects that conclusion, then how can we explain the difference between an appearance and a vision as drawn by the early church? Grass answers that only in an appearance was the glorified Christ seen.20 But that is patently false, for there were visions of the glorified Christ, too, in the early Christian fellowship (Acts 7:55-56; 2 Corinthians 12:1; Revelation 1:10-11). I challenge any critic to explain how early believers distinguished between a vision and an appearance, if it was not that a vision was purely mental whereas an appearance was physical.

If this is so, then in listing the appearances of Christ, Paul is stating implicitly that these were not visions, but actually occurred in the real world. This was true even of the appearance to Paul, which was semivisionary in character. Thus, Paul can include it in the list with good conscience. Paul held then that the appearances were not visions, but occurred in the physical realm.

But we can go further. Given Paul’s doctrine of the resurrection body, it is probable that he thought of the other appearances as bodily appearances. For Paul held that our resurrection bodies would be patterned after that of Jesus. Since Paul believed in a physical resurrection body, it follows that when he states that Jesus was raised and appeared, he probably means appeared bodily, just as He was raised bodily. He could make no mistake about that, since he had spoken with Peter and James about what they did see.

Therefore, Paul’s testimony certainly implies, even if it does not conclusively prove, that the appearances of Jesus which he listed were bodily appearances. We may say certainly that they were not visions, but actually occurred in the real world. If the stories in the gospels are reliable (as we have seen that they are), then we may be confident that Paul also held that these were bodily appearances.

(b) A second indication that Paul held to physical resurrection appearances of Jesus may be seen by looking at the reverse side of the coin. Suppose there were originally no physical appearances, but only visions. In that case, it becomes very difficult to explain how Paul’s teaching on the resurrection could have developed as it did. He could not have taught that we shall have physical resurrection bodies patterned after Jesus’ body, for Jesus apparently had no body. Indeed, as we shall see below, it is doubtful that Paul would have used the idea of “resurrection” at all to explain such events. Mere visions of Jesus after His death, in other words, are not sufficient to explain the direction and development of Paul’s teaching on the resurrection body. That confirms what we have already seen—that the original resurrection appearances were probably both physical and bodily.

b) The gospels prove that the appearances were physical and bodily. The gospels testify unanimously that Jesus appeared physically and bodily to the disciples. Critics who object to the physical resurrection usually say that the physicalism of the gospels was invented to counteract Docetism. Docetism was a heresy that held that matter is evil, and that therefore God could not really have become incarnate in Jesus. Docetists held that either Jesus’ body only appeared to be physical, but really was not, or else that God’s Spirit took control of the man Jesus, but left Him at the cross. Against the Docetists John wrote, “For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist” (2 John 7; compare 1 John 4:1-3). Some critics say that the physical nature of the resurrection appearances was invented to counteract Docetism by emphasizing that Jesus rose physically.

That objection, however, cannot be sustained:

(1) Docetism was the reaction to the physicalism of the gospels, not the other way around. We have seen that for a Jew, “resurrection” meant physical, bodily resurrection of the dead man from the tomb. A “spiritual” resurrection would have been nonsense. Therefore, when the early believers said Jesus was raised from the dead, they meant “physically.” Docetism was the later reaction of philosophical speculation to the original physicalism of the Christian believers. Ellis points out that the gospels did not materialize the appearances; rather the heretics dematerialized them.21 Thus, the critics have gotten the true situation backwards.

(2) Docetism denied the physical incarnation, not the physical resurrection. Docetists denied that God ever became flesh; it was not the physical resurrection to which they objected. In fact, some Docetists held that the divine Spirit deserted the human Jesus on the cross and that the human Jesus then died and was raised physically.22 Thus, it would be pointless for the gospels to invent physical appearances of Jesus to counteract Docetism, since Docetists did not deny the physical resurrection.

(3) The gospels’ sources existed before the rise of Docetism. All the gospels’ sources of information concerning Jesus’ appearances tell of physical appearances. But Docetism arose much later and is probably referred to in the letters of John, which most scholars date A.D. 90-100. Hence, the physicalism could not be a response to Docetism, which was a later theological development.

(4) The appearance stories themselves do not have the rigorousness of a defense against Docetism. The physicalism of the gospel appearance stories is not a point trying to be scored; rather it is just naturally assumed and is found in the incidental details of the stories: Jesus’ breaking bread, the women’s holding his feet in worship, His coming to the disciples on the hilltop. Even in Luke’s and John’s accounts of Jesus’ showing His wounds, it is not said that the disciples actually touched Jesus. As Schnackenburg has said, if this were a defense against Docetism, then more would have been done than Jesus’ merely showing His wounds.23 The physicalism of the appearances was taken for granted, and no defense against Docetism is here in view.

(5) If visionary “appearances” had been original, then physical appearances would never have developed. For, in the first place, Docetism would not be a threat. Christians and Docetists might argue over whether Jesus was physical during His life, but both could agree that He did not appear physically after His death. Thus, Docetism would not bring forth the counterreaction of physical appearances, if the appearances were originally visionary. In the second place, physical appearances would have been offensive to potential converts in both Judaism and paganism. Jews would tend to reject Jesus’ physical resurrection appearances because they held only to a physical resurrection at the end of history. Pagans would tend to reject a physical resurrection because they held to the immortality of the soul alone. Thus, had the appearances been originally visionary, the Christians would never have invented physical appearances, but would have held onto the original visionary experiences.

The considerations demonstrate that the physicalism of the gospel appearance stories is not a conscious defense against Docetism, but rather just a natural part of the stories. But we can go further than this, for there are positive reasons to accept the historical reliability of the gospel stories of Jesus’ physical, bodily appearances.

(1) Every resurrection appearance narrated in the gospels is a physical, bodily appearance. The unanimity of the gospels on that score is very impressive when one remembers that the appearance stories were originally more or less separate, independent stories, which the different gospel writers collected and arranged in order. All their separate sources of information agree that Jesus appeared physically and bodily to the disciples and other witnesses. There is no trace of nonphysical appearances in the sources, a remarkable fact if all the appearances were really visionary, as some critics would have us believe. That strongly suggests that the appearances were not in fact visions, but actual, bodily appearances. The fact that all the separate gospel stories agree on that point, and that no trace of visionary “appearances” is to be found, weighs strongly in favor of the gospels’ historical credibility in this matter.

(2) The really decisive consideration in favor of the physical, bodily appearances of Jesus as narrated in the gospels is that, as we have seen, the gospel accounts are fundamentally reliable historically. We have seen that the time was too short for legends of Jesus’ physical appearances to accumulate, that the presence of the living eyewitnesses to the appearances would have served as a control against false accounts of what happened, and that the authoritative control of the apostles would have served to preserve the accurate accounts. If the appearances were originally only visions, then those three factors would have prevented them from being perverted to physical appearances. It is inexplicable how a series of mere visions could be so thoroughly materialized and corrupted into the unanimous physicalism of the gospel appearance stories in so short a time, in the presence of the very witnesses to those appearances themselves, and under the eyes of the apostles responsible for preventing such corruption. This shows decisively that the appearances of Jesus were physical, bodily appearances, as the gospels report.

Thus, the gospels demonstrate that the appearances of Jesus were physical, bodily appearances. At the same time, however, it should be emphasized that Jesus’ resurrection body possessed superhuman capabilities, according to the gospel accounts, such as the ability to appear and disappear at will, without regard to spatial distances. It was as though He could, so to speak, step out of this dimension into another, then back into this one at any place He wished. Paul’s description of the resurrection body as immortal, glorious, powerful, and supernatural well describes the resurrection body of Jesus as portrayed in the gospels.

Both Paul and the gospels, then, combine to provide solid evidence for the physical, bodily resurrection of Jesus. Paul and the entire New Testament make a clear distinction between an appearance and a vision of Jesus. This distinction is understandable only if appearances were physical events. Taken together with his teaching on the resurrection body, this strongly suggests that Paul took the appearances of Jesus to be physical and bodily. Confirmation of that comes from the fact that if the original appearances had been visionary, the development of Paul’s teaching on the resurrection body is very difficult to explain. For their part, the gospels provide unanimous, independent testimony for physical appearances and show no trace of visionary “appearances.” The evidence for the fundamental historical reliability of the gospel accounts proves that the physicalism of the accounts is historically well-founded. Thus, amazing as it may seem, the evidence solidly supports the fact that Jesus physically and bodily rose from the dead and appeared to His disciples.

4. Specific considerations make individual gospel appearance stories historically probable.

a) The appearance to the women is historical. That women and not men should be the first to see Jesus risen lends credibility to this account. It would be pointless for early believers to manufacture a story of an appearance to legally unqualified women. In fact they are probably not mentioned in Paul’s list because of that very fact. So why have such a story at all? Any conceivable purpose for this appearance story would have been much better served by having Jesus appear to Peter at the tomb. Hence, the story is probably reliable. Confirmation of that comes from the fact that fictions could not be invented about persons who would be well-known in the Christian fellowship in Jerusalem.

b) The appearance to Peter is historical. Since this appearance is mentioned by Paul, who spoke with Peter, as well as by Luke, it is historically certain. It probably occurred in Jerusalem after Peter’s visit to the empty tomb and before the appearance to the Twelve.

c) The appearance to the Twelve is historical. Also referred to by Paul, this appearance also certainly took place. Since the disciple whom Jesus loved was present, John’s account must be accurate. The appearance took place Sunday evening in Jerusalem.

d) The appearance by the Lake of Galilee is historical. Since the disciple whom Jesus loved was also present there, this appearance must also be historical. It shows clearly that after Jesus appeared to the disciples in Jerusalem, they returned to Galilee, where they saw Him again.

e) The appearance in Galilee mentioned by Mark is historical. Since this appearance was probably part of Mark’s source material, it is a very old and therefore no doubt reliable piece of information. It also shows that Jesus appeared to the disciples in Galilee.

The individual considerations go to confirm the point that has been demonstrated repeatedly: that Jesus appeared alive on various occasions to various persons after His death.