Burden of Proof is on Atheists

[leroy]

But the stories report different events. Mark, for example, doesn't report an empty tomb. He reports it occupied by a young man in a white robe.

Irrelevant, all 6 sources coincide with the claim that Jesus was not in his tomb. // even if the rest of the story is science fiction, the empty tomb is likelly to be a historical fact

Promotion of their religious doctrine.

Who wanted to promote their religious doctrine? The apostoles? The authors of the gospels? The catholic church? Paul?

Stop sending random and conspiranoic comments, and elaborate an actual argument, who invented the empty tomb? What was his agenda? Why? Etc ...... elaborate an actual argument

I mean reports from disinterested parties, or doctrinal opponents.

Jews or"Doctrinal oponents" as you call them , accused the apostoles for steeling the body of Jesus. (Implying that the tomb was indeed empty)

So we do have evidence from the oponents accepting the empty tomb.

Reed more

The Historicity of the Empty Tomb of Jesus | Reasonable Faith

(Reed point 8)

 

[leroy]

Only if one can't read and understand a simple word definition.



I can explain my own reasoning thank you, I don't need any of your facile straw man analogies. Like your ludicrous elephant analogy. We are dealing specifically with your claim that an unevidenced supernatural claim is the most probable explanations for a hearsay occurrence, rather than an unknown natural explanation.



There is only logic, no one has their own, if you are going to assert logical flaws in my rationale then present your evidence or argument, and stop assigning bs straw men to me.



I already explained we don't know there was an empty tomb, or if there was why it might have been empty, that is entirely the point. You asked for hypothetical alternatives to your claim an unevidenced supernatural resurrection was the most probable "explanation" for this alleged empty tomb. So I have no idea where you're shifting the goal posts to now, or why.

Alternative hypothetical explanations for an alleged empty tomb, that are more probable than an unevidenced supernatural resurrection.

1. The tomb was not empty, someone made it all up.
2. The body was never in the tomb.
3. Someone took the body for reasons unknown.
4. The body was in the tomb and someone again made up the claim.



Given this whole debate is predicated on your claim that a supernatural resurrection is the most probable explanation for hearsay events, this is a rather pointless assertion. Why would I accept unevidenced hearsay at all, let a lone for unevidenced magic? There are not 4 facts, and this whole debate is predicated on your assertion that an unevidenced supernatural resurrection is "the best "explanation" for this alleged empty tomb. Which is nonsense of course, as has been explained.

This is long boring and tedious

1 if you think that the tomb was not empty then elaborate your hypothesis and explain why is that hypothesis better than "the tomb was empty hypothesis "

2 if you accept that "more likely than not" the tomb was empty then we can simply agree shake hands and move to a different subtopic


And just for the record
Explanations that are known to be possible are not necessarily better than explanations that are not known to be possible.....agree?

 

[leroy]

You don't have multiple independent accounts, you have second or third hand hearsay, the number of times this hearsay is repeated in the bible doesn't magically change it from being hearsay. The unevidenced narratives of the gospels are from unknown authors, and none of the stories are contemporary, the earliest written accounts dating decades after the event, and many centuries later, written in a foreign language.

They cannot be substantiated independently, thus by definition they are hearsay. Only the existence of an historical Jesus and the crucifixion are held as likely true by a scholarly consensus. The rest is hearsay, and even those two claims are not held as true to "a high degree of certainty" as you claimed.

You're simply repeating the same spurious claims over and over.

That us because once again you are dishonesty changing the definition of hearsay.

If 2 or more (let alone 6) independent sources report the same event (like the empty tomb), then the event is likely to be historical and not just a rumor (rumor was your original definition of hearsay)

The unevidenced narratives of the gospels are from unknown authors, and none of the stories are contemporary, the earliest written accounts dating decades after the event

Irrelevant hearsay (as originally defined) has nothing to do with the date or the authorship.

Hearsay means rumor (in your original definition) something can be contemporary and written by known authors and still be a rumor (hearsay) ...... and something could be written by an anonimous man 4000 years ago and not be hearsay.


Now i dont whant to play semantics, if you whant to claim that hearsay means "written by unknown authors " i will accept your definition for the purpose of this debate, but just make it clear and do not change the definition over and over again.

 

[leroy]

There aren't 6 independent sources, no matter how many toes you repeat this lie.

Will you support your assertion that these 6 sources are not independent? Or is it an other case of "they are not independent because i say so"

Most scholars since the late 19th century have accepted. the Gospel of Mark was the first of the three synoptic gospels to be written, and was used as a source by the other two (Matthew and Luke). The Egypt Exploration Society has recently published a Greek papyrus that is likely the earliest fragment of the Gospel of Mark, dating it from between A.D. 150–250.

Aja

...so whats your point ?

Making the same hearsay claim, broadly speaking, though these hearsay stories differ in various parts of the narrative of course.

The fact that they differ is aditional evidence that the sources are independent.

 

[leroy]

Ding ding ding, we have a winner....it is also pretty silly to try and claim anything is an independent account, when you don't know who wrote it.

"If the authors are unknown we cant know if the sources are independent " do you really afirm this nonsense?

 

[Tinker Grey]

I will repeat what I often say: Unless someone can demonstrate miracles NOW, then any explanation for past "miracles" is better than they actually happened.

Go ahead, Christians, demonstrate: John 14:12. Don't just point to some story, do it yourself? Use your powers to tell me my wife's IRL middle name. You have 1/2 hour.

 

[Trailblazer]

In the end, only Truth remains. So, it matters not what we, all humans, believe to be true.
Our beliefs don’t make or change the truth. And since truth is absolute, there can be only one.

And what is that One Truth?

 

[Sheldon]

the empty tomb is likelly to be a historical fact

Nope, still nothing more than unevidenced hearsay from largely unknown authors.

 

[Sheldon]

Who wanted to promote their religious doctrine? The apostoles? The authors of the gospels? The catholic church? Paul?

Yes.

 

[Sheldon]

who invented the empty tomb? What was his agenda? Why? Etc ...... elaborate an actual argument

It doesn't matter, you claimed it was "known to a high degree of certainty", when in fact it is naught but unevidenced hearsay.

 

[Sheldon]

Reed more

The Historicity of the Empty Tomb of Jesus | Reasonable Faith

(Reed point 8)

Hahahhahahhahahahha, William Lane Craig, irony?

 

[Sheldon]

This is long boring and tedious

Not to mention thankless, but sadly you seem impervious to reason.

1 if you think that the tomb was not empty then elaborate your hypothesis and explain why is that hypothesis better than "the tomb was empty hypothesis "

I am dealing with your claim that the empty tomb was known to a high degree of certainty, when in fact it is naught but second and third hand hearsay. I need make no counter claim, you are again trying to reverse the burden of proof using an argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacy.

2 if you accept that "more likely than not" the tomb was empty then we can simply agree shake hands and move to a different subtopic

Why would I accept that, based solely on second and third hand hearsay?

Explanations that are known to be possible are not necessarily better than explanations that are not known to be possible.....agree?

Your dodgy memory is plying tricks on you again, so lets just recap: You claimed that an unevidenced supernatural resurrection based on inexplicable magic was the most probable explanation, for the alleged hearsay of an empty tomb.

I don't agree, since a claim for a miracle has no explanatory powers, and is by definition an appeal to mystery, and you cannot demonstrate any evidence that any supernatural event is even possible. Whereas I, and several others have offered hypothetical explanations that are all possible, ipso facto they are more probable.

 

[Sheldon]

That us because once again you are dishonesty changing the definition of hearsay.

Hearsay
noun

1. information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

I have never deviated from that definition, despite your relentless sophistry on this.

If 2 or more (let alone 6) independent sources report the same event (like the empty tomb), then the event is likely to be historical and not just a rumor (rumor was your original definition of hearsay)

You don't have any independent sources, and the narratives you have are all unevidenced hearsay.

Hearsay
noun

1. information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Irrelevant hearsay (as originally defined) has nothing to do with the date or the authorship.

Of course it does:

Hearsay
noun

1. information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Thus the date of the records are a salient fact, since the records are "received from other people", and they cannot be substantiated, ipso fact they are hearsay.

Hearsay means

I know what it means thanks.

Now i dont whant to play semantics,

You absolutely do, but your command of language is clearly not up to the task.

if you whant to claim that hearsay means

It means what the dictionary says:
noun

1. information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Thus what the narratives for an empty tomb are hearsay.

i will accept your definition for the purpose of this debate, but just make it clear and do not change the definition over and over again.

Same as before, here a a few so you can drop one in each time in future and save asking the same idiotic question over and over:

Hearsay
noun

1. 
   
   information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Hearsay
noun

1. 
   
   information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Hearsay
noun

1. 
   
   information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Hearsay
noun

1. 
   
   information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Hearsay
noun

1. 
   
   information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Hearsay
noun

1. 
   
   information received from other people which cannot be substantiated; rumour.

Hope this helps you out.

 

[Sheldon]

Will you support your assertion that these 6 sources are not independent? Or is it an other case of "they are not independent because i say so"

There is not one source independent of your religion or the bible.

Quod erat demonstrandum
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

leroy said: ↑
written within 1 generation

Most scholars since the late 19th century have accepted. the Gospel of Mark was the first of the three synoptic gospels to be written, and was used as a source by the other two (Matthew and Luke). The Egypt Exploration Society has recently published a Greek papyrus that is likely the earliest fragment of the Gospel of Mark, dating it from between A.D. 150–250.

...so whats your point ?

The fact that they differ is aditional evidence that the sources are independent.

No it isn't, "quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur."

 

[Sheldon]

"If the authors are unknown we cant know if the sources are independent " do you really afirm this nonsense?

Is that a joke? You seriously think you can rationally assert accounts are independent, when you don't know where they came from? I can't tell if you're joking, but nonetheless there is no account to substantiate the claims outside of the bible or Christian religion.

 

[joelr]

Who wanted to promote their religious doctrine? The apostoles? The authors of the gospels? The catholic church? Paul?

Stop sending random and conspiranoic comments, and elaborate an actual argument, who invented the empty tomb? What was his agenda? Why? Etc ...... elaborate an actual argument

You are calling people out for sending what you think are random conspiracy. theories yet in the same post your source is WLC? A fundamentalist apologist with no training in history?
Who's been caught telling lies in his lectures?

Jews or"Doctrinal oponents" as you call them , accused the apostoles for steeling the body of Jesus. (Implying that the tomb was indeed empty)

So we do have evidence from the oponents accepting the empty tomb.

Reed more

The Historicity of the Empty Tomb of Jesus | Reasonable Faith

(Reed point 8)

1. Paul's testimony implies the historicity of the empty tomb.

Uh, does Joe Smiths testimony imply the historicity of the angel moroni giving updates to Christianity, or Muhammud getting updates from Gabrielle? Is that "implied" to be historical as well?
Paul is claiming to be speaking to a ghost Jesus. He mentions a demigod as part of a myth that is already known and happening in at least 6 other local religions. In all 6 cases the savior is a fictional character.
Pauls testimony implies the Jews are now forming a savior demigod myth to update the religion for several reasons.
In fact - "the absence of any reference to the story of Jesus' empty tomb in the Pauline epistles and the Easter kerygma (preaching or proclamation) of the earliest church, originating perhaps in the Christian community of Antioch in the 30s and preserved in 1 Corinthians,[44] has led some scholars to suggest that Mark invented it. "
Thomas Peter Rausch SJ is the T. Marie Chilton Professor of Catholic Theology and professor of theological studies at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles,
Yet another Wiki article explaining some scholars do not accept this story.
Last time I demonstrated scholarship is divided between 4 groups on empty tomb.
ONY ONE GROUP supports your idea.
Leroy, your claim about all scholars and the empty tomb is not correct. At this point is is a boldface lie.


and

"But even if we conclude (despite having no evidence of it) that Paul knew (rather than simply assumed) Jesus was buried—and in a tomb no less—that still wouldn’t mean Paul had ever heard of that tomb being found empty. Paul never says, so we can’t presume to know. What Paul does say is that the body that is buried, is not the body that rises; that God makes a new one for us, and stores it in heaven for us to occupy later (1 Corinthians 15:37; 2 Corinthians 5:1-4; The Empty Tomb, pp. 105-55). So Paul would have been content with Jesus leaving the old body of flesh behind in the grave, like a discarded shell, and taking up residence in his new supernatural body. No empty tomb required." Dr Carrier

Actually this is correct. If you read Paul the resurrected body is incomprehensible, and not flesh and blood. Jesus did away with his flesh body. It easily could have stayed in the grave according to Paul.
Now your theology also doesn't agree with you.



2. The presence of the empty tomb pericope in the pre-Markan passion story supports its historicity. The empty tomb story was part of, perhaps the close of, the pre-Markan passion story. According to Pesch, [78]

Here WLC uses this Pesch as his reference to demonstrate historicity. Except Pesh is a theologian. That's it. A Theologian. He decided that the Passion is historical. Have you maybe noticed a trend of theologians taking text that historians have completely dismantled as complete crank and saying stuff like "well I fell that the evidence is good that this work is blah blah...." That's usually the entire argument. When Mike Licona debated Dr Carrier it was Carrier explaining historical consensus and why and Licona saying "well I don't think so so let's just move on..."
You are not ready for what is actually true. Maybe someday.



Also Mark said there were no sources? "In fact, in contrast to Matthew’s ridiculous account, Mark—Matthew’s only known source, whom Matthew copies verbatim, and adds and alters freely—not only lacks all those absurdities, but explicitly says there were no sources for the story. That’s right. Mark outright says the only witnesses never told anyone(Mark 16:8;")?

3. The use of 'the first day of the week' instead of 'on the third day' points to the primitiveness of the tradition. The tradition of the discovery of the empty tomb must be very old and very primitive because it lacks altogether the third day motif prominent in the kerygma,

No WLC, it's because Mark was quoting a different source
"That Mark is drawing on Psalm 24 for his empty tomb narrative is indicated by the very same method employed for Psalm 22: he adapts and inserts a peculiar phrase from the Septuagint (or Greek) version of the Psalm. Breaking with the Pauline phrase “on the third day” that most characterizes the Gospel, Mark instead employs the strange Hebraic formula “on the first from the Sabbaths” (mia tôn sabbatôn) meaning “on the first day of the week,” i.e. the first day after each Sabbath (Mark 16:2). This phrase appears in only one place in the entire Old Testament in Greek: Psalm 24, in the title verse, “A Psalm for David during the First Day of the Week” (tês mias sabbatôn; this heading is not present in the Hebrew from which modern English translations derive; also note the Psalms are numbered differently in the Septuagint, these being Psalms 21, 22, and 23 there, but I will continue using the standard numbers). The obvious narrative role of Psalms 22 and 23 for Mark, combined with this peculiar phrase as an overt marker, confirms that he is calling the reader to reflect on Psalm 24 and to ‘interpret’ his empty tomb narrative in light of it. And in so doing, we see the tomb as a symbol of the gates of death that Christ has flung open."

Rising on the third day goes back to Innana and several other resurrecting savior gods. WLC refuses to accept this (as many apologists do). I'm sure he's aware but he's putting on a front for his followers who are not going to read historical books and engage with scholars. They will assume his words are true and he remains their go-to apologist. It's also why he lies about cosmology, even after several cosmologists emailed him and told him he was using concepts wrong, he continues to use them in a way that supports his narrative.

4. The nature of the narrative itself is theologically unadorned and nonapologetic.

And it's not supported by any historians at all.


"There is no quality extant evidence for any Passion Narrative before GMark. The evidence we have favors GMark as the original Passion Narrative:

• 
  
  
  • 1) It tests high for fiction indicating there was no historical source and therefore no historical witness.
    
    2) We don't see the signs of editing (inconsistency/ambiguity) that we see in subsequent Gospels.
    
    3) Subsequent Gospels use it as a base indicating there was no other source.
    
    4) Unlike GMark, which wanted to discredit supposed historical witness, Subsequents wanted to credit historical witness, yet were apparently forced to use a narrative with the opposite objective. Because there was nothing else.

 

[joelr]

5. The discovery of the tomb by women is highly probable.

Here WLC pretends Mark is not a highly trained fiction writer, on par with Tolkien. He wants this to be writings by low class just recording history. The women find the tomb because Mark has reversal of expectation throughout his narrative.
Finally, an empty tomb serves Mark’s thematic agenda of ‘reversal of expectation’, which structures much of his Gospel. Indeed Mark clearly sought to “reverse” the reader’s expectations throughout his narrative. As just a few examples: James and John, who ask to sit at the right and left of Jesus in his glory (10:35-40), are replaced by two criminals at his crucifixion (15:27); Simon Peter, Christ’s right-hand man who was told he had to “deny himself and take up his cross and follow” (8:34), is replaced by Simon of Cyrene (a foreigner, from the opposite side of Egypt, that symbol of death again) when it comes time to truly bear that cross (15:21); instead of his family as would be expected, his enemies come to bury him (15:43); Pilate’s expectation that Jesus should still be alive is confounded (15:44); contrary to all expectation, Christ’s own people, the Jews, mock their own savior (15:29-32), while it is a Gentile officer of Rome who recognizes his divinity (15:39); likewise, the very disciples are the ones who abandon Christ (14:50 and 66-72 vs. 14:31), while it is mere lowly women who attend his death and burial, who truly ‘followed him’, and continue to seek him thereafter (15:40-41, 15:47, 16:1), fulfilling Christ’s word (the very theme of reversal itself) that ‘the least shall be first’ (9:35, 10:31); and, the mother of all reversals, Mark ends his Gospel with the women fleeing in fear and silence, and not delivering the good news (16:8), the exact opposite of the “good news” of the “voice crying out” of the “messenger who will prepare our way” with which Mark began his Gospel (1:1-3). I present other examples in my section on Markan mythology in Historicity.
The parables of Jesus are also full of the reversal of expectation theme (Mark 4:30-32, 7:15, 8:35, 10:29-30, 10:44, 12:1-11), and as I already noted, Mark explicitly agrees with the program of concealing the truth behind parables (Mark 4:11-12, 33-34). And so, the empty tomb story is probably itself a parable (just as John Dominic Crossan argues Mark’s entire Gospel is in The Power of Parable), which accordingly employs reversal of expectation as its theme. The tomb has to be empty, in order to confound the expectations of the reader, just as a foreign Simon must carry the cross, a Sanhedrist must bury the body, and women (not men) must be the first to hear the Good News.



6. The investigation of the empty tomb by the disciples is historically probable.

This isn't even a point? Krishna advising Prince Arjuna on the battlefield is historically probable. There, Hinduism is real. Yay.

7. It would have been impossible for the disciples to proclaim the resurrection in Jerusalem had the tomb not been empty

Uh, this happened (supposedly) around 30 C.E ? People claiming an earthly resurrection first happened in a story around 70 C.E.? Imagine a made up story came out in 1990 about something that happened in1970, then a story was written about it in 2022. No one was actually there. You could say anything you wanted. Mark did just that.



8. The Jewish polemic presupposes the empty tomb.

In Matthew 28:11-15, Jews claimed disciples stole the body. Obviously when Mark made this up he didn't foresee this would happen and people would say "hey how do you know the body wasn't just stolen?". So Matthew wrote about it and added a guard so people couldn't say the body was stolen. This doesn't confirm there was a body or a Jesus? It's a STORY? This proves fake elements were added to deal with criticism. In the tale Jews say the body was stolen. NOT IN REAL LIFE? Jesus as an actual person was not mentioned by Jewish people until Josephus which is another matter.
The Jews were NOT like "yeah, where is that Jesus guy? what happened to his body?" That was in a myth.

"the polemic that the body was stolen (in the Gospel of Matthew) only arose after the Gospel of Mark told a story about the body turning up missing. Which is pretty good proof that no such story had existed before. Otherwise, that polemic would have been rampant by the time Mark wrote, requiring his rebuttal"

Together these 8. considerations furnish ZERO evidence that this myth actually happened. Instead, like ALL MYTHS, it is fiction.

 

[joelr]

who invented the empty tomb? What was his agenda? Why? Etc ...... elaborate an actual argument

Yes, Mark Probably Made It Up
It [should] seem blindingly obvious that people invent stories and the sifting of fact from fiction or fiction from fact has been one of the most notable features in the history of critical biblical scholarship. . . . [So] if we are going to take Christianity seriously in its Jewish and pagan contexts then we must expect the Gospel writers to make up stories just as Jews and pagans did. Historically speaking it is extremely unlikely that the Christians behind the Gospel traditions were immune to this standard practice.

JAMES CROSSLEY, “AGAINST THE HISTORICAL PLAUSIBILITY OF THE EMPTY TOMB STORY AND THE BODILY RESURRECTION OF JESUS,” JOURNAL FOR THE STUDY OF THE HISTORICAL JESUS 3 (JUNE 2005)

Crossley is quite correct. In fact, our conclusion must be even stronger than this: for when we look at all faith literature together, most of it by far was fabricated to a great extent, and most was fabricated in its entirety. This leaves us with a very high prior probability that Christian literature will be the same. And we can confirm this to be the case. If we exclude devotional and analytical literature (e.g. apologies, commentaries, instructionals, hymnals) and only focus on purported “primary source documents” relating to earliest Christianity, we find that most Christian faith literature in its first three centuries is fabricated—indeed, most by far (the quantity of agreed Christian fabrication, including hundreds of “Epistles” and dozens of “Gospels” and half a dozen “Acts” is staggering: see Element 44 in Chapter 5 of Historicity). So we need good reason to trust any particular example is not more of the same. And yet there simply is no evidence any part of Mark’s empty tomb story preceded his publication of it a lifetime after the religion began, in a foreign land and language, vetted by no one so far as we can honestly tell. It beggars belief any rational person would think otherwise.

And yet it’s worse than that even. We actually have evidence that Mark fabricated the story; not just a complete lack of evidence that he didn’t. Finding a tomb empty is conspicuously absent from Paul’s account of how the resurrection came to be believed (1 Corinthians 15:1-8). And of course Mark himself gives us a clue that he is fabricating when he conveniently lets slip that no one witness to it ever reported it—evidently, “until now” (see Mark 16:1-8). Always grounds for suspicion. But Matthew’s stated excuse for introducing guards into the story of the empty tomb narrative reveals a rhetoric that apparently only appeared after the publication of Mark’s account of an empty tomb, and this exposes the whole tale as an invention. For Mark shows no awareness of the problem Matthew was trying to solve (and with yet further fabrication—in his case borrowing ideas for this from the book of Daniel, as I show in Empty Tomb and, more briefly, Proving History; likewise, Matthew adds earthquakes to align the tale with the prophecy of Zechariah 14:5, and so on; Luke and John embellish the narrative yet further, though dropping nearly everything Matthew added: Historicity, p. 500-04; Empty Tomb, pp. 165-67).

It clearly hadn’t occurred to Mark when composing the empty tomb story that it would invite accusations the Christians stole the body—much less that any such accusations were already flying! Which should be evidence enough that Matthew invented that story, as otherwise surely that retort would have been a constant drum beat for decades already, powerfully motivating Mark to answer or resolve it—if his sources already hadn’t, and they most likely would have, and therefore so would he. If he was using sources at all. There can therefore have been no such accusation of theft by the time Mark wrote. The full weight of every probability is against it. Mark simply didn’t anticipate how his enemies would respond to his story. But this also means Mark must have invented the whole empty tomb story—precisely because no polemic against it had arisen by the time Mark published it. That a polemic against the tale only arose after Mark published it, evinces the fact that Mark is the first to have told it.

On top of that, is the fact that the earliest Christian history shows no knowledge of there having been any empty tomb story at any point in the religion’s first three decades. Though claiming the body was gone would peg Christians as suspects in a capital crime of grave robbery, an obvious boon their enemies would not fail to exploit, and though the book of Acts records case after case of Christians being interrogated at trial before both Jews and Romans on other offenses (e.g. Acts 4, 5, 6–7, 18, 23, 24, 25, 26), never once in this entire history of the church are they ever suspected of or questioned about grave robbery. It’s as if there was no missing body to investigate; no empty tomb known to the authorities. Which means the Christians can’t really have been pointing to one. If they had, they would have been questioned about it—and possibly convicted for it, innocent or not. Yet Acts shows there were no disputes at all regarding what happened to the body, not even false accusations of theft, or even questions or expressions of amazement.

Worse than that, the Romans would have had an even more urgent worry than body-snatching: the Christians were supposedly preaching that Jesus had escaped his execution, was seen rallying his followers, and then disappeared. Pilate and the Sanhedrin would not likely believe claims of his resurrection or ascension (and there is no evidence they did), but if the tomb was empty and Christ’s followers were reporting that he had continued preaching to them and was still at large, Pilate would be compelled to assume an escape had occurred, and would have to haul every Christian in and interrogate every possible witness in a massive manhunt for what could only be to his mind an escaped convict—who was not only guilty of treason against Rome for claiming to be God and king, as all the Gospels allege (Mark 15:26; Matthew 27:37; Luke. 23:38; John 19:19-22), but now also guilty of escaping justice and continuing to lead a rebellion! And the Sanhedrin would feel the equally compelling need to finish what they had evidently failed to accomplish the first time: finding and killing Jesus.

Yet none of this happens. No one asks where Jesus is hiding or who aided him. No one is at all concerned that there may be an escaped convict, pretender to the throne, thwarter of Roman law and judgment, dire threat to Jewish authority, alive and well somewhere, and still giving orders to his followers. Why would no one care that the Christians were claiming they took him in, hid him from the authorities and fed him after his escape from justice (as Acts 1 pretends), unless in fact they weren’t really claiming any such thing back then? Harboring fugitives would have been accounted a crime. Why were they never charged with it? Think about it.

So either Acts deliberately suppresses the truth about what happened to the body and what was really being argued, said, and done about it (which eliminates Acts as being of any historical value, and supports every suspicion you might have had that the real story was actually embarrassing to Christians, not corroborative), or there was no missing body and no one was claiming there was. The latter is the most inherently probable, being the simplest of explanations, and the most consistent with all the other evidence. So there simply was no empty tomb. Mark made it up.

Against this conclusion, no evidence exists. So we move on.

 

[joelr]

What was his agenda? Why? Etc ...... elaborate an actual argument

Whence the Idea?


Where did Mark get the idea of an empty tomb, and what did he intend his empty tomb narrative to mean? The answers lie in Mark’s own thematic agenda, and his surrounding literary and cultural milieu. Mark may have had some inspiration from Homer. Dennis MacDonald made a good case in “Rescued Corpses” (pp. 154-61) and “Tombs at Dawn” (pp. 162-68) in The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark (Yale 2000). Mark was transvaluing Greek “scriptures,” creating a superior Judeo-Christian analog meant to replace them, and in the process criticizing their messaging by contrast with his. That’s why he wrote in Greek, to a Gentile audience. It’s telling that only such an audience was first to hear the empty tomb tale.

But Mark needn’t have had so specific an inspiration. Lots of saviors and heroes got empty tomb stories. So of course Jesus should have been given his too. We see many examples from ascension mythology (Pagan and Jewish) that would have been well known to Mark, wherein the absence of a hero’s body is taken as evidence of his ascension to heaven and concomitant deification. Empedocles being a famous example (Diogenes Laertius, Lives 8.67-69, quoting the pre-Christian writer Heraclides), and something akin was claimed of the Roman King Numa. But even some legends about Moses involved a disappearing body as evidence of his ascension (e.g. Josephus, Antiquities 4.8.48).

These and many more examples are collected in the famous work of Charles Talbert’s What Is a Gospel? in 1977 (pp. 27-31, with p. 52 n. 108). Plutarch alone relates four examples (and says there were many more) in his Life of Romulus 27-28. A great many more have since been collected and analyzed by modern expert Richard C. Miller, in “Mark’s Empty Tomb and Other Translation Fables in Classical Antiquity,” Journal of Biblical Literature 129 (2010), and his subsequent book, Resurrection and Reception in Early Christianity (Routledge 2014). And of course, most resurrection stories entail an empty tomb even if the story of its discovery hasn’t been transmitted to us—and there were a lot of pagan and even Jewish resurrection stories (and I mean a lot, even predating Christianity): see Chapter 3 of Not the Impossible Faith (and my summary article on Dying and Rising Gods).

But Mark’s most likely inspiration were the Psalms, Mark’s penchant for reversing the reader’s expectations, and the ‘body as tomb’ concept-cluster, which I demonstrate in The Empty Tomb had deep connections in Paul. And as we know, Mark is riffing on Paul, transforming his Epistles into a narrative story about Jesus (see my recent article, Mark’s Use of Paul’s Epistles). Any one or several of these ideas may have been at play in Mark’s mind, but we can divide all influences into two possible directions: If Mark was a true Pauline Christian, then the tomb represents the corpse of Jesus. If not, then the tomb represents the ascension of Jesus.

There would surely be overlap: a Pauline would find double-meaning in the tomb as symbol of ascension and the earthly tabernacle, while a “sarcicist” (someone convinced, unlike Paul, that Jesus rose in the same body he died in) would find double-meaning in the tomb as symbol of ascension and escape from death. So we should survey the three most likely sources of inspiration Mark drew upon, which his more educated readers would have understood (and which ‘mature’ initiates may even have been secretly told).

 

[joelr]

make an argument for the Empty tomb.

there are 5 more parts to this discussion By Dr Carrier. He has spent 7 years applying his PhD to a historicity study of Jesus and is familiar with all lines of evidence.

The Psalmic Origins

The Women

The Orphic Background

Reversal of Expectation

Conclusion