I wrote this list out, and did not just copy and paste from a website! It shows that Jesus fulfils the 'suffering servant' prophecies in the greatest of detail. It means that either the writers of the NT tried to fit Jesus' life to the prophecies, or the prophecies were fulfilled in the life of Jesus. If you believe the former of these two possibilities, then you have to show that the writers were able to ensure the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem, and ensure his death by crucifixion on the eve of Passover. They would also have to steal his body from a tomb and then dispose of it somewhere undetected. They would then have to whip up some great belief in the disciples to make them think they were being baptised in the Holy Spirit, promised by Jesus before he died.
If you can pull off this little deception, in front of thousands of witnesses, then it's just the beginning of a movement to deceive the rest of the world.
Anyone who gives this a little thought, will realise that creating a deception is actually very difficult, especilly amongst a people, the Jews, who were suspicious of false Messiahs.
What establishes Christianity in Asia is not just words but POWER. The Acts of the Apostles shows that belief spread quickly in Asia Minor because the word was preached and signs and wonders followed. The same is true of revival today.
Since the gospels were written later, some embellishing could have taken place. Only two writers tell of the birth of Jesus and they both tell the story slightly differently. Since they weren't eyewitnesses who was their source? Mary? The Holy Spirit? If they had the same source, then why are the stories different?
The stories of casting out demons and turning water into wine and walking on water... with one version including Peter walking on water too. Could those stories be added in embellishments based on legends and oral traditions?
Then people rising from the dead. Could be embellishments? But what about the people coming out of their graves and walking around Jerusalem? That should have been witnessed by lots of people, even the Jews and Romans. Any reports of this from them? Then Jesus himself. If he came out of the tomb and the body was not there, then that old body transformed into a "glorified" body that could appear and disappear and float off into the sky? Or, since it is so unbelievable, could it be made up stories? Again, since it was written years later.
It's hard to believe that such things could have really happened. But it is also hard to believe, like you say, that the disciples could have pulled off such a hoax. Some of the things, where there were a lot of witnesses, I think those could easily have been added in embellishments. Pulling off the resurrection? Even if all it they did is steal the body and make up the appearances, getting away with taking the body seems like it would have been very difficult to do. And if the body was still in the tomb, then even if the resurrection story isn't written until years later, the body could still be produced to prove the gospels wrong.
So, the resurrection is hard to believe and hard to discount. But the rest of those miracles, including and especially the dead people getting out of their graves, I think would be easy to just write into the story. And, if the gospel writers did, that would be enough to raise doubts about the whole story and for some of us, enough not to trust the gospel stories.
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