Posted: Jul 29, 2017 4:51 am
The idea that the "empty tomb" is some kind of uncontested historical fact is not even supported by scripture, let alone the historical record.
If the tomb of an executed criminal was found empty and his followers were running about saying that the criminal had risen from the dead and was wandering the countryside, the Romans would quite clearly have had two possible responses:
1. This criminal quite clearly survived his execution and is at large, continuing to commit the crimes for which he was sentenced to death.
2. This criminal's followers likely stole the body (a capital offence at the time) in order to perpetrate a macabre hoax to continue his treasonous legacy.
Either way, the Roman authorities would be very fucking interested indeed in any person claiming to be in contact with the "resurrected" Jesus. Yet this is not the attitude recorded in the scriptures. The scriptures depict the Romans as completely uninterested in the followers of this alleged Messiah, viewing the whole phenomenon as just a theological squabble within the Jewish community. Roman persecution doesn't appear to be a thing (even in the Gospels) until Christianity picks up steam and the extreme pacifist views of the early Church present a threat to the administration of the empire.
It goes without saying that there's no historical record of either a manhunt for the survivor of a crucifixion or a manhunt for a bunch of seditious graverobbers.
If the tomb of an executed criminal was found empty and his followers were running about saying that the criminal had risen from the dead and was wandering the countryside, the Romans would quite clearly have had two possible responses:
1. This criminal quite clearly survived his execution and is at large, continuing to commit the crimes for which he was sentenced to death.
2. This criminal's followers likely stole the body (a capital offence at the time) in order to perpetrate a macabre hoax to continue his treasonous legacy.
Either way, the Roman authorities would be very fucking interested indeed in any person claiming to be in contact with the "resurrected" Jesus. Yet this is not the attitude recorded in the scriptures. The scriptures depict the Romans as completely uninterested in the followers of this alleged Messiah, viewing the whole phenomenon as just a theological squabble within the Jewish community. Roman persecution doesn't appear to be a thing (even in the Gospels) until Christianity picks up steam and the extreme pacifist views of the early Church present a threat to the administration of the empire.
It goes without saying that there's no historical record of either a manhunt for the survivor of a crucifixion or a manhunt for a bunch of seditious graverobbers.