I often watch Rabbi Tovia Singer, also Jews for Judaism on YouTube, because they do a great job of tearing down christian doctrine, & debunking the claims that jesus was prophesied in the old testament.
Whenever you debate a christian on the resurrection, most of them will come up with the argument of "well how do you explain the empty tomb"?
Of course there are many explanations you can come up with for a supposed empty tomb, ranging from the story is pure mythology so nothing to explain, or the body was moved or stolen, or that the body was left hanging on the cross & never buried in the 1st place, or the body was spirited away by aliens, among many other explanations you COULD think of. However none of these explanations are likely to convince the vast majority of christians.
However the following explanation by Rabbi Tovia Singer is one of the best I have heard for making the case that the empty tomb is a purely mythical story, & I think it could cause SOME christians who are sincerely seeking to really think about the story:
Let me know what you think.
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ilovechloe
Another explanation for the empty tomb is that Jesus regained consciousness and walked away. He was only the cross for a few hours. In his report about the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70, Josephus says that he found three of his friends being crucified and asked Titus to spare them. Titus agreed and they were taken down. Two died of their injuries but one survived. It took a lot longer for a fit young man to die on the cross, and usually the victims were left nailed up to "encourage the others".
@Algebe
That is another possible explanation, however I think that somebody who had been hung on a cross for several hours would be unlikely to walk out of the tomb unaided, given that nails are usually driven through the ankles. I think they would be very weak & unlikely to survive without immediate care, as their body would most likely be in severe shock.
I personally think that the Rabbi's explanation is the most believable explanation, & the one most likely to convince a christian. Most christians have probably already heard most of the other explanations given by non-believers, & already rejected them. Of course most christians are going to reject this explanation as well, however I believe that the many christians are already wrestling with the believability of their faith. You never know what the final nail in the coffin of their belief is going to be.
The Rabbi's explanation was the 1st time I had heard it, & I find it very elegant & convincing. Of course I am already coming from a position of non-belief, & I already think it likely that the entire jesus story is a myth, so this explanation is confirming what I already believe.
@Al
Was not the testimonium flavanium mentioning cheeseass, debunked as not original, and a christian interpolation/alteration? There are many distinctly different scribe techniques and wording identified as alteration, not only in book 18, but throughout the Antiquities of the Jews...injecting christianity after the fact. The simple fact that many people were crucified...many people named cheeseass...and that there is zero clear objective evidence that cheeseass ever existed in reality...leads me personally to believe the cheese man, is a myth...using rational convention.
@doG Was not the testimonium flavanium mentioning cheeseass
I was talking about the fall of Jerusalem in AD70, when the Romans crucified large numbers of people. From what I've heard, any reference to JC in Josephus was a later forgery.
@Algebe
"He was only the cross for a few hours".
From what I understand of crucifixion, there is no such thing as 'only'. A crucified person could easily have asphyxiated within a few hours. Had been taken alive from the cross, it's unlikely he would have been able to walk.
After reading Bart Ehrman, I think a simple explanation may be best: Accepting Jesus existed ,for the sake of argument. From what I've read about Pilate, it's unlikely he would have allowed Jesus' body to be taken from the cross.The body would have stayed on the cross until it decayed and was eaten by scavengers.
There are four accounts of Jesus' resurrection. Each is different from the others, even contradictory. The differences are stark. The gospels were written from 50 years after the death of Jesus. Unlikely any first hand witnesses were still alive.To me that accounts of the resurrection are simply fantasy, one set of myths which form part of the mythology of the New Testament.
@Cranky47: From what I understand of crucifixion, there is no such thing as 'only'.
My understanding is that it could take 1-2 days for a young man. If the Romans were feeling merciful or just wanted to go home, they'd break the legs of the victim to stop them pushing up to get breaths. Then they'd suffocate fairly quickly.
You're right about him probably being unable to walk after being nailed through the feet, but I still think it survival would have been possible after a few hours.
@Algebe
"---but I still think it survival would have been possible after a few hours."
Possible, yes, the norm, no. It was not uncommon for a person to die within a few hours. How long a person survived depended on the method of crucifixion. There was no one set method.A person crucified the way Jesus is alleged to have been would probably have asphyxiated in a few hours. I've alway been skeptical about claims of Jesus surviving crucifixion, although I think it was possible. . There ARE accounts of people having survived crucifixion, but I gather that was rare.
It's moot, no one knows, so I go with Occam's razor; IMO the simplest and most likely scenario is that Jesu sdied on the cross and his body was left there to rot and be eaten by scavengers, as was the custom.
MateI'm not even entirely convinced of the historicity of Jesus. --My Position remains: That AT BEST there MAY have been a first century Judean rabbi called something like Yeshua/Yoshua bar Yusuff . He MAY have founded a small Jewish sect, and MAY have been crucified by the Romans for sedition , a not uncommon fate for a Jew in that place and time. That the religion we call christianity has little if anything to do with a poor little rabbi crucified by the Romans . As such, I think the scenario I described is the most likely one. Imo the New Testament is the mythology of Christianity and quite unreliable as a history book .
The four contradicting gospel accounts of the resurrection I think lend credence to my opinion that the event is myth.
I think I've exhausted my interest in this topic. Have the last word by all means
The earliest 'christians" ( followers of a Messianic cult and predominantly Jewish) did not believe in a physical resurrection. Instead they believed the adopted son of god (because of his strict judaic principles and rectitude) was spiritually ascended to heaven.
'Paul' does not mention a physical resurrection or a virgin birth and he is the earliest writer we have.
It can safely be concluded that a physical resurrection of a jesus figure as described in the gospels is just another, much later, fabrication.
@ The Thread
Christians usually forget that all the stories they devoutly believe in are originally Jewish ones, a fact they have tended to ignore over the centuries, because of cultural bias, which more often than not clouds their understanding of the gospels and the bible.
Another reason an empty tomb was necessary was the early belief that the resurrection Jesus taught to his disciples was supposed to be a physical one. If the resurrection had been purely spiritual it would not have mattered if the tomb, had there been a tomb, was occupied with a corpse or not. To advance this idea, Thomas was encouraged to probe Jesus's wounds sometime later.
Of interest, Nicodemus is said to have used one "hundred pounds" of spices.
John 19:39 Nicodemus, (a high ranking Pharisee priest) who had at first come to Jesus by night (to ask about "being born again" and also reminded the Sanhedrin to observe the Law and allow Jesus to defend himself before they judged and sentenced him), also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a hundred pounds (my emphasis not John's). 40 They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews.
This might seems like overkill, but the 'pound' referred to here was adopted from the Latin 'litra' (a corruption of 'libra' meaning pound), which was borrowed by the Jews from the Romans, with whom they traded, and replaced their original name of the measure called 'mina', which was the equivalent weight of 60 shekels, which weighed about 359 grams. So the "100 pounds" weighs in at about 40 kilos which still seems a large enough amount to embalm someone much less than just deodorise them.
In any case even 40 kilos of spices couldn't cover the smell of the empty tomb myth. And it didn't cover John's attempt to cover the synoptic gospel 'plot device' of the women bringing spices to the tomb just so they could find it empty, because of Nicodemus's evidently sufficient work right after the removal of the body from the crucifix.
The bible is the claim, not the evidence. No one knows who wrote the stories in the gospels and that's all they are, stories. From Paul's vague assertions and no mention of the empty tomb to the gospels, each book in its place making the resurrection story more outrageous and more of a fantasy story. We have no eye witnesses, we have stories and nothing more.
Whilst I see your point, as an atheist I am under no obligation to explain this at all. Even if they were able to establish as fact that a tomb that contained Jesus's body was found empty with no rational explanation, so what? Not having an explanation validates nothing, this is something theists get wrong again and again. It is an appeal to ignorance fallacy, a god of the gaps polemic, nothing more, and this applies to all claims for miracles. The burden of proof lies with the claim, not with those who choose to disbelieve it.
My favorite Empty Tomb Story...
Whence the Giant Jesus and his Talking Cross? The Resurrection in Gospel of Peter 10.39–42 as Prophetic Fulfilment of LXX Psalm 18
"[35] But in the night in which the Lord’s day dawned, when the soldiers were safeguarding it two by two in every watch, there was a loud voice in heaven; [36] and they saw that the heavens were opened and that two males who had much radiance had come down from there and come near the sepulcher. [37] But that stone which had been thrust against the door, having rolled by itself, went a distance off the side; and the sepulcher opened, and both the young men entered. [38] And so those soldiers, having seen, awakened the centurion and the elders (for they too were present, safeguarding). [39] And while they were relating what they had seen, again they see three males who have come out from they sepulcher, with the two supporting the other one, and a cross following them, [40] and the head of the two reaching unto heaven, but that of the one being led out by a hand by them going beyond the heavens. [41] And they were hearing a voice from the heavens saying, ‘Have you made proclamation to the fallen-asleep?’ [42] And an obeisance was heard from the cross, ‘Yes.'
160 AD. Gospel of Peter.
So it was written after John, the latest gospel and true to form, it's story is the most fanciful of all.
The fact that Paul never spoke of an empty tomb speaks volumes to me
@ The Thread
My point is that if you are trying to convince a christian that what they are claiming is false, the best way to do this is to use the bible against them. I agree that if this jesus character actually existed, & he was crucified, the most likely fate would have been that his body was left on the cross to serve as a warning to others. I also agree with another poster that the burden of proof is not on us, it is on the person making the claim.
However most christians don't think logically the way that we do, so the only way to challenge them is to use their own bible against them.
If you point out to them that according to the gospel of john, jesus body had already been anointed with spices by nicodemus, & then ask them what was the purpose of the 2 marys anointing jesus again when he had already been buried, they have to stop & think. If you also point out to them the reason for the anointing in the 1st place is to stop the body from stinking BEFORE the body was buried, then there is no possible justification to anoint the body after it was already buried, so the story cannot be true.
I think that this is a more powerful way of arguing the point, than simply saying that they have to provide the evidence, because of course they cant, so they will always duck & weave around the issue. Just my 2 cents worth!
@Grinseed
Interesting point.
I'm currently reading "The Gnostic Gospels" by Elaine Pagels. Seems the gnostics believed that the resurrection was purely spiritual AND that one need not die to have the experience .
In the last couple of years I've been stunned at the level of wilful ignorance and bare faced lying from Christians as an ilk about the history of their faith-------
The reality of 'christianity' as THE faith not existing before the fourth century is flatly denied. So too the disgusting Christian practice of murdering any oppositions and destroying all dissenting books they could find. They tend to deny or ignore the fact that christianity has always been violently intolerant.That the catholics and later the protestants continued murdering dissenters for about 1000 years. The practice only ceased when christians stopped being a power unto themselves.
There is no doubt in my mind that at least some Christians would gleefully burn alive an array of sinners if they could. EG heretics, fornicators, gays, adulterers and any who performed or had an abortion. Possibly televised (on cable) at half time at the football.
Why yes, I do kind of despise certain kinds of Christians, why do you ask?
@ Cranky, "why do you ask?"
I think its the way you part your hair.
Grinseed
"I think it's the way you part your hair.'
My what ? I stopped parting my hair about 25 year ago after it fell out. The rest of my body is quite hirsute, I even have hair on my back.
I've never bothered combing the razor wire hair because it breaks combs. I have what could be called 'the fly blown look'
Excellent book Cranky, also get the Origins of Satan. She is a very good writer.
@ Ilovechloe
Using the bible is my preferred method.
Very few people of any ilk can follow my interests in history and science.
No Christian I know personally even shows the least interest. Its ironic how many suddenly get the idea they can use their misconceptions about both history and science to prove their god.
The truth is that few Christians actually know whats in the bible their god wrote. They don't read it. I blame guided bible study programs and products which seem to suggest they can supply 'all you need to know' about your faith without actually having to digest the entire bible.
Frankly I don't care what people believe in, but I do believe for their own good they should understand and not only experience what it is they think they believe.
I particularly like watching you tube rabbis dismantle Christianity.