One thing we can say with relative certainty (even though most people – including lots of scholars!) have never thought about this or realized it, is that no one came to think Jesus was raised from the dead because three days later they went to the tomb and found it was empty. It is striking that Paul, our first author who talks about Jesus’ resurrection, never mentions the discovery of the empty tomb and does not use an empty tomb as some kind of “proof” that the body of Jesus had been raised.Moreover, whenever the Gospels tell their later stories about the tomb, it never, ever leads anyone came to believe in the resurrection. The reason is pretty obvious. If you buried a friend who had recently died, and three days later you went back and found the body was no longer there, would your reaction be “Oh, he’s been exalted to heaven to sit at the right hand of God”? Of course not. Your reaction would be: “Grave robbers!” Or, “Hey, I’m at the wrong tomb!”
Depends on who my friend is. If my friend is God Incarnate, if my friend performed astounding miracles at will–including the ability to raise the dead–if my friend predicted his death and resurrection, if Isaiah predicted messiah's death and resurrection (Isa 53:7-12), then the first reaction, the most logical reaction, to the empty tomb shouldn't be “Grave robbers!” Or, “Hey, I’m at the wrong tomb!”
...no one came to think Jesus was raised from the dead because three days later they went to the tomb and found it was empty.
ReplyDeleteYeah, because the disciples didn't believe Jesus was resurrected because of an empty tomb, but because they SAW and INTERACTED with the risen Lord.
It is striking that Paul, our first author who talks about Jesus’ resurrection, never mentions the discovery of the empty tomb and does not use an empty tomb as some kind of “proof” that the body of Jesus had been raised.
Because he and the other disciples had better proof than a merely empty tomb. Namely, encounters with the risen Christ. Also, given Paul's purposes of writing, there were no necessary reasons to bring up the tombs being empty. That's already assumed in his Jewish use of the concept of resurrection.
Moreover, whenever the Gospels tell their later stories about the tomb, it never, ever leads anyone came to believe in the resurrection.
Again, it's because they encountered the resurrected Jesus. In the same way that a better proof that a baby has just been born is to actually see the baby, instead of focusing on the exhausted mother who had given it birth.