Responding to Science, Evidence, and the Resurrection

 This is a response to an article, Science, Evidence, and the Resurrection, by S. Joshua Swamidass.

https://peacefulscience.org/prints/excerpts/science-evidence-resurrection/

He is a scientist, but nevertheless starts by making a poke at science.

Science is full of trust-like faith. We believe grand, counterintuitive things because we trust the accounts of trustworthy sources.

Okay, sure, science does rely on trust. So does sitting on a chair; you are trusting that chair to take your wait. So does driving; you are trusting your fellow drives to stick to their side of the road.

What it comes down to is whether that trust is warranted. I think it is in these examples. Swamidass wants us to think we can trust that the resurrection happened with a similar degree of confidence, and I really do not think that is the case.

What is the evidence from which grew my trust? A brief and incomplete outline is included here. This evidence is not an answer, but it raises the question. All we need is curiosity.

So in fact he is not even claiming his evidence is good enough to give that sort of confidence, but merely good enough to wonder if it is true!

So what evidence does he have?

1

Without the physical resurrection, two thousand years of history are left begging for explanation, like a movie missing a key scene. 

It does not take a resurrection to do that, only a belief in a resurrection. Swamidass points out:

During just the first few centuries, it spread without political or military power, prevailing against the ruthless efforts of dedicated, organized, and violent opposition.

But how many of those involved actually claimed they had seen the risen Jesus? Very few of them. The vast majority acted on the belief, and not their own experiences.

2

With dates established by radiometric analysis, prophecies from centuries before Jesus’ birth predict his life, death, and resurrection.

This is primarily about Isaiuah 53, but that passage is a Christian quote-mine. It is about the nation of Israel, as the surrounded verses make explicitly clear.

There are plenty of verses in the OT that pre-date Jesus and seem to predict him, but the reality is that they have either been twisted to refer to Jesus, or Jesus' story has been twisted to match the prophecy.

The OT predicts a messiah who would defeat Assyria.

Micah 5:4 He will stand and shepherd his flock

    in the strength of the Lord,

    in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God.

And they will live securely, for then his greatness

    will reach to the ends of the earth.

5 And he will be our peace

    when the Assyrians invade our land

    and march through our fortresses.

We will raise against them seven shepherds,

    even eight commanders,

6 who will rule[c] the land of Assyria with the sword,

    the land of Nimrod with drawn sword.[d]

He will deliver us from the Assyrians

    when they invade our land

    and march across our borders.

 Prophesy failed! But Christians just ignore that one.

3

Jesus was a real person in history who died.

He was, but this is hardly evidence he was resurrected. It is a good basis for a legend to develop from though.

4

The early accounts of the resurrection and prophecies predicting it were reliably transmitted through history. As of 2014, more than 66,000 early manuscripts are known, orders of magnitude more than other ancient texts. Many are carbon dated to before Jesus’ time on earth and the first few centuries after. We see accounts nearly unaltered in the earliest manuscripts.

There are two parts to this - the prophecies about Jesus and the accounts of Jesus' life. The former is the same as number 2, and has been dealt with.

The latter is almost the same as 1, though not quite. But it is worth noting a few things.

Firstly the reason more manuscripts are around is because the church carefully preserved Christian works, and in many cases destroyed non-Christian texts. That does not prove the texts are true, only that the church was powerful.

Secondly the number of manuscripts from Jesus time is about zero. The oldest fragment, as far as I know, is Rylands Library Papyrus P52, dated to middle of the second century, and a very small fragment at that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rylands_Library_Papyrus_P52

Thirdly, we really do not know how much the text changed up to that time, though the Bible hints at a fair amount. The Gospel of Luke tells us there were many accounts circulating at one time:

Luke 1:1 Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us,

And the relationship between Matthew, Mark and Luke suggests Matthew and Luke are heavily redacted versions of Mark. We can see how the resurrection story has suffered embellishment in that timeframe

Further, it was forty years after the event that the earliest extant gospel was written, plenty of time for the story to evolve.

5

Accounts of the resurrection include inconvenient and unflattering details, which make most sense as attempts to reliably record what had happened, free from embellishment. They do not fit expectations of a fabricated account. For example, women are the first witnesses of the resurrection. In a culture that did not admit the testimony of a woman as valid evidence in court, this detail is surprising. Likewise, all the disciples, the leaders of the early Church, flee as cowards when Jesus is taken.

The reason for all this is the authors had to work with what they had. The disciples fled Jerusalem when Jesus was arrested, and given they risked getting crucified too, I think that is understandable. But that meant the authors had to include that because, at least when Mark was written, some of the disciples would have still been alive.

The first witnesses were women because the author had to account for why there were no stories of an empty tomb at the time. The real reason was that the empty tom was made up, but the author f Mark would have us believe it was because the women who fond it told no one.

Mark 16:8 Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.

Later authors were stuck with women finding the empty tomb, but the story developed over the next few decades until John, where they merely find the tomb open, and discovering it is empty is left to the disciples.

6

After Jesus’ violent death, his followers were frightened and scattered. Then, something happened that grew a strong, bold, and confident belief that resisted sustained, murderous opposition.

Something yes. Something that made them believe Jesus was risen, but that is not the same as Jesus actually risen.

Remember that the sightings we read in the Bible were all made up later. The earliest account in Mark has Jesus seen in Galilee.

Mark 16:7 But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’”

We do not know what they saw in Galilee, but it could have been just a bright light, as Paul reported.

Unlike other movements with executed leaders, once the disciples came back together, they did not replace Jesus with one of his family members.

I am not sure movements he is thinking of. Surely you cannot just replace your messiah with his brother? Likely the the movement just died when Jesus was arrested, whcih is the normal when a leader is executed, I suspect. It was revived when they thought they saw the risen Jesus.

That said, Jesus' brother did lead the movement later...

7

More than just a fact about our past, the resurrection creates a connection to God that is perceived by people from all times, cultures, socioeconomic statuses, personalities, and metal capacities, across the last two thousand years of history.

Well, a lot of people think it is true. But a lot of people think Islam is true, or Hinduism. Does not make it so.

So, we are left with an invitation. Will we too believe? Will we be curious? Will we respond with trust?

No. You are going to need to provide more evidence than that!