This article will address the very important question, “Did Jesus rise from the dead, thereby proving His deity?” Up until now, the series has offered evidence that Jesus lived, died, and that his body disappeared. Now, we will turn to the research of Dr. Mike Licona, who, like me, believes that the reason Jesus’ body disappeared is that He rose from the dead. Dr. Licona approaches this slightly differently from what I’ve seen before: via Paul. In this way, his work further substantiates the assertion: Jesus is God and the Gospel message is true. For more from him, check out his website.
Saul was a highly-educated Pharisee
Saul of Tarsus was born as a Roman citizen at about the same time as Jesus and features prominently in the New Testament Scriptures. He was an extremely educated and passionate Jew, both by heritage and by faith. So much so that he spent his time hunting down those who claimed Jesus was the Messiah, even approving their deaths.
Scripture records that Saul dramatically changed his tune after a remarkable encounter with the risen Jesus (Ac 9:1-19). Thereafter Saul, now usually called Paul, traveled around explaining the Gospel (good news of Jesus), being beaten, stoned, and thrown in jail for his efforts, experiencing a few shipwrecks, writing letters, and finally dying as a martyr. In his day Paul went on five missionary journeys, covering Israel, Syria, Turkey, Greece, Lebanon, Malta, Cyprus, Italy, Macedonia, and Crete—truly amazing without a car.
Paul existed and wrote letters that Jesus’s eye-witnesses read
The thing about Paul is that no reputable scholar doubts that he existed. They also accept that, initially, Paul was a Pharisee zealously persecuting Christians, but that He eventually became a key apostle. We still have 14 letters attributed to Paul that explain his views. Scholars tend to agree that Paul wrote at least 13 of these and no one disputes that he authored 7 of them. In fact, Paul’s letters explaining the Gospel and written between 50 and 67 AD, are now included as Holy Scripture.
One might ask how we know when the letters were written. After all, the oldest physical copy we have (Papyrus 46) is from 175-225 AD. It does contain most of the nine letters. Scholars have several methods for determining when the original of a copy was written: language forms change over the years, historical events occur, individual author writing style, the names of the people mentioned, and more. In this case, we can be confident that the original letters were written before 70 AD because that is when the temple was destroyed, a catastrophic event that Jesus predicted (Mt 24:1; Mk 13:2). If it had already happened, it would definitely have been mentioned! For more about how to evaluate the authenticity of old documents, check out: https://bible.org/article/did-original-new-testament-manuscripts-still-exist-second-century.
Does it matter when Paul wrote the letters? Yes! Because they were written before 70 AD, many of the disciples and eyewitnesses of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection were still around and could read or hear them. If Paul had his facts or the theology wrong, more than one of them would have shouted. Because Paul used to be a persecutor, one could expect that his letters might undergo intense scrutiny. But, none of the disciples appear to have challenged Paul’s theology. In fact, St Peter’s disciple, Clement, a contemporary of Paul’s, and St. John’s disciple, Polycarp, seemed to agree: Paul’s letters were authoritative and true.
Paul wrote that Jesus rose and appeared
So, what did Paul say? Now we return to the subject of a prior article. Paul said that Jesus rose from the dead and appeared first to Cephas (Peter), then to the apostles, then to 500 people at once, then to his brother James, then again to the apostles, and finally to Paul (1Co 15:1-8). At the time when the letter was written and sent, Peter and John were still living, as were many of the 500 witnesses. We do not have any records of them protesting this outlandish claim. And, again, no one produced the body.
Paul also masterfully showed how Jesus was the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. After all, as a Pharisee, he knew what the Scripture said. As an accepted apostle (Ac 14:14), Paul wrote that Jesus’ death set us free from sin, we are saved by grace, and that, by trusting in Jesus, we can be assured of eternal life. The disciples who had lived with Jesus knew what Paul was teaching (he checked it with them) and none of them disagreed. No one said, “Hey, what’s all this about a bodily resurrection? We know it was in spirit only!” Judging by how important the disciples felt the Gospel message was and how little they trusted Paul at first if Paul had been wrong in 1 Co 15, they would have called him on it. They didn’t.
From this, we can infer that the Good News of Jesus’ resurrection is not a legend that developed over time. It appears in writing and undisputed by the apostles only 20 years after Jesus died. The belief in the resurrection was there at the beginning. It is not the result of a mass hallucination—scientists know that there is no such thing. It is not even a grief hallucination, which can occur in ~50% of those who experience a death. After all, when on the road to Damascus, Saul was not grieving Jesus’ death! He rejoiced in it and was searching out Jesus’ followers to kill them. And, yet, his entire life changed after seeing the risen Lord. Paul’s actions and writing have impacted millions, and his letters are included as Scripture. The same happened to all the other disciples (except Judas). Why? Given all the evidence, only one rational explanation springs to my mind. It is true.
1. Jesus lived. 2. Jesus died. 3. The grave was empty. 4. Jesus rose. Therefore, Jesus is who He claims to be. He is God.
That is if the Scriptures are true to the originals. But, how can we be sure that what we have even resembles what Matthew, Luke, John, or Mark wrote? It’s been 2000 years! Are the Muslims right? Did the scribes add to, take away from, and miscopy the documents? That is what we will overview next time.