People die for a faith for one of two reasons: 1. they think it is true, or 2. the faith was only a proxy for what they were really dying for (i.e, the money/fame/respect) they get through that faith. J. Smith died in a gun fight "defending the faith." In fact, he was becoming very rich off his little scam. Mohammed became quite the king as well. Jesus' death isn't particularly difficult think ask about, historically speaking. A guy who honestly thinks he is the Messiah is a danger to the Roman authorities. He's one step away from either starting a revolt or else having one started in His name. If you're a Roman, you kill such people. The only assumption in this story is that Jesus thought and/or told people He was that Messiah. Take that assumption away, and it is very difficult to come up with a reason for why the Romans would have executed Him.
The deaths of countless Christians in the first couple of centuries isn't hard, either. They all thought that Jesus really is God, so they were dying for their Savior. The historical problem is the death of men like Paul, Peter, and the other people who knew Jesus first hand. Immediately, we might want to exclude Paul from that list because he didn't meet Jesus. But it's clear that he thinks he did. And he convinced those who knew Jesus personally that he did. Paul is an interesting case because you have to wonder what makes a person who was so anti-Christian, who was actually having them executed, become the faith's primary defender. What happened, historically speaking, to cause that mutation? Paul's own answer was that he finally met Jesus face to face. I'll let those who think he didn't really meet Jesus propose their own ideas, and we can analyze them.
The other apostles, though. That's the real rub. People die for a faith because they think that it is true (or because they are making money on the scam). The apostles certainly didn't make any money on the scam. On the contrary, they lost everything. They lost their homes, their possessions, their families. They were beaten and tortured. They died horrendous deaths. Some were boiled in oil. Some were sawed in half. Some were stoned. Some were decapitated. Crucified upside down. And what did they get that they thought was worth that sort of suffering? Again, martyrdom isn't difficult to understand. People die for things they believe in all the time. But the moment you give Paul and Peter the status of martyrs, you have a HUGE historical problem.
They BELIEVED that Jesus was and is God. They BELIEVED that Jesus had physically risen from the dead. How did THEY come to that belief? Audie's explanation of legendary development doesn't cut it. These people knew Jesus personally. They are the ones who told those stories. I mean, this is a massively important point for historians. And across the board, historians grant that the first apostles really believed that Jesus physically rose from the dead. Let me just give two bits of historical data to prove that:
- For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve
That's from 1 Cor 15:3-5. It is a creed of the early church. The letter itself was penned in the 60s (which, by itself, is waaaaaaaaaaaaay to early to be a legendary embellishment). But further this creed recites what Paul taught that church when he founded that church, and we know he founded that church in the 50s. But that means that the creed preexisted the church's founding. Now, there is solid reason to think that it goes all the way back to 33-36 AD (since Paul says he received the creed, not that he made it up), but let's just date it to the late 40s. The point is, the creed is being taught within the first 20 years of Jesus' death, and within the living memory of those who knew Jesus, most importantly, within the living memory of the apostles themselves. This is even before the writing of Mark, which is usually considered the first gospel written (although I happen to think that an aramaic version of Matthew came first, but I'm in a tiny minority here).
The second bit comes out of 1 Clement 24:1. The text says:
- Let us understand, dearly beloved, how the Master continually showeth unto us the resurrection that shall be hereafter; whereof He made the Lord Jesus Christ the firstfruit, when He raised Him from the dead.
Again we have a reference to Jesus' resurrection. This was written between 80 and 140 AD. The important thing here is that the author knew several of the disciples of Christ Himself, and his letter shows that belief in Jesus' physical resurrection was a standard--not a new--piece of Christian theology. So where does that piece of Christian theology come from? It comes from its very origins. Which means it is not a legendary development (there's not enough time for that). Perhaps Clement can die for his faith since he is basing his belief on the testimony of Peter and Paul. But that only highlights the historical problem I'm raising here.
How do we account for the belief of Peter and Paul? There is absolutely NO question that those men truly believed that Jesus had physically raised from the dead. That means they couldn't have stolen the body. It means that they knew Jesus died. It means that they saw the empty tomb. It means that they believed that they saw Him in the flesh. So how do we account for that? It's easy to account for their belief in Jesus' death. Pilate crucified him. But what about the empty tomb? Where did the body go? Who took it? And what do we do with their seeing him alive after the fact?
I could say a LOT more. This really is only a tiny tip of the iceberg. Jewish theologian Pinchas Lapide looked at the historical evidence and wrote a book concluding that Jesus physically rose from the dead. He said it was the only plausible historical explanation. He, though, rejected Jesus as Messiah because he thought that Jesus didn't do what the Messiah is promised to do (deliver Israel from Gentile domination). It just goes to show, for me, that people who appeal to legendary development to explain away Jesus just haven't looked at the evidence. In a word, they don't know what they are talking about.
