Happy Easter 2019!

I recently learned about a grad student at Michigan State, who leaning towards Buddhism, wrote a dissertation that radically altered how scholars of ancient history and the Bible – both secular and religious – view the historicity of the Resurrection.

Hello friends and family! We have all received Christmas letters. But this is an Easter Letter, a first for me, and likely for you too. However it is not news about our family, but about some things I have learned since the last Easter that I believe are very interesting and significant – and relevant to Easter and all of us.

The spark for this letter originated in meetings with friends last year; first with a banker last May in NYC, and then with a computer scientist last August in Si Valley. Both individuals expressed keen interest in the Bible, but very strongly denied that Jesus ever existed. 

The “Mythic Jesus” concept

One sent me a book to read that “proves Jesus never existed”. The ironic thing is this is exactly the kind of book I wanted to write while an undergrad at Berkeley, when I thought Christianity was a cruel hoax, an opiate of the people, etc. That paradigm changed at Cornell in grad school. 

Over Christmas 2018, I read up on this “mythic Jesus” concept (i.e., that an actual Jesus of Nazareth never existed) and learned it was advanced by some scholars in the late-1800’s and subsequently put to rest by the academic community shortly thereafter – resolving that Jesus really did exist. (There was and is debate as to whether he actually was God, performed miracles and rose from the dead – more on that below).

I discovered it was surprising, not only to me, but also to today’s broad academic community (i.e., the experts who focus their careers on ancient Palestine and environs) when this mythic concept rose its head again ~10 years ago or so. It was advanced almost entirely by people who do not publish research in biblical studies, or religion or ancient history, though often well credentialed in other fields like English, physics or biology.

History and the Resurrection

The bodily resurrection of Christ is a miracle that has been widely accepted as an historical fact by lay Christians and clergy of all denominations for 2000 years; though among scholars in recent times, it was primarily only accepted as a fact by evangelical academics. However, in the last 30 years, acceptance of a bodily resurrection has broadened to even non-Christian scholars, stemming as far as I can tell from a PhD thesis at Michigan State University by Gary Habermas in 1976. I had never heard of this work until a few months ago, stumbling across it in my mythic Jesus reading. 

In a nutshell, Habermas recounts in this excellent lecture at UCSB that he approached the resurrection as an historian using both the tools and ancient documents accepted broadly by the academy as “reliable” – meaning that scholars agree that multiple sources attest to the authenticity of the author, the text, and the date of writing. He relied heavily upon some passages in the New Testament that meet those criteria in addition to extra-biblical documents. His 350-page dissertation was approved by Michigan State University, and advanced what has since become known as the “minimal facts” thesis – meaning there are some basic facts that even non-Christian scholars would agree are indeed true. 

The “minimal facts” are:

1) that Jesus died by crucifixion; 

2) that very soon afterwards, his followers had real experiences that they thought were actual appearances of the risen Jesus; 

3) that their lives were transformed as a result, even to the point of being willing to die specifically for their faith in the resurrection message; 

4) that these things were taught very early, by a creedal/oral tradition soon after the crucifixion (within a few months)

5) that James, Jesus’ unbelieving brother, became a Christian due to his own experience that he thought was the resurrected Christ; and 

6) that Paul (the Christian persecutor known formerly as Saul of Tarsus) also became a believer after a similar experience. 

By the way, Paul is a fascinating person to scholars of all walks, in that he was a scholar himself, a rabbi, trained in the classics, philosophy, and of course Judaism under the top teacher Gamaliel. Also, he knew eyewitnesses of the pre-crucifixion ministry and post-resurrection appearances of Christ, including the apostles Peter and James (the half brother of Jesus, who came to be the leader of the church in Jerusalem). 

What are we to do with these facts?  Did his followers lie or hallucinate about the appearances, or did it really happen?  The notion of common mass hallucinations at different times and by different groups of people is not very credible, at least not to me. And why would Paul, a talented and prominent Jewish rabbi and the chief persecutor/hunter of these followers, suddenly convert to Christianity? He became the most prominent and hence most hunted Christian of his time, and like the others, lived a life of poverty, betrayals, imprisonment and beatings. Eventually he and the others were brutally murdered for their faith.

Why is the Resurrection Important?

I was surprised to learn as a new Christian at Cornell that the Bible says that a resurrection-less Christianity is of no value at all, because if Christ did not rise, mankind would not be saved and reconciled to God. We would still be waiting for the real messiah.

Furthermore, Jesus would have to be a lunatic or liar, because during his brief 3-year ministry he pledged a number of times that he would die and rise again – as noted in the archetypal Easter account below. (Moreover, in my opinion, an insane or lying Jesus would have no credibility as a moral teacher).

“Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ Then they remembered his words.” – Book of Luke, chapter 22.

I believe that the risen Jesus is alive today and reaches out to me and you, to reconcile us to God, and offer a new and abundant life with him that will last forever. The apostle John records Christ’s words to us “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.” 

Happy Easter!