Also, again, you are being WAY too literal in your understanding of the “man” of Mark 16. It’s a man dressed in a white robe. Luke says they were men in “dazzling” white clothes. Is it only descriptive and only correct to say the word “angelos”? I think this is an argument from sheer skepticism. This is how this argument plays out.

a. Angels often appeared as men.
b. Angels often were robed in white in their appearances in the Bible.
c. Mark and Luke describes the beings at the tomb as “men in white robes.”
d. There’s NO WAY they could have been talking about angels because they didn’t use the word “angel(s).”

Like I said, this argument is just sheer skepticism. I think even if they were to use the word angels you wouldn’t believe. Instead, you would find another reason, probably that they all say angels, and they wouldn’t all say the same word unless they copied and colluded with one another.

Also, another thing to consider: Mark was probably written around 50 AD. Matthew and Luke were both on paper by at least 65 AD, because otherwise the prophecies of the temple being destroyed would surely have been mentioned as being fulfilled as a shot at credibility, as well as the fact that at the end of Acts, Paul is still in prison the first time. We know Paul was set free by 64 AD, and martyred around 68 AD. So, three gospels, all written by 70 AD at the earliest. Do you really think, for one second, that if this Jesus guy were still dead, the Jewish leadership would not have dragged his carcass out for the whole world to see? Do you really think that if this hadn’t happened, the disciples would willingly get their heads chopped off, or be crucified, or flayed alive? Yeah, I know terrorists don’t mind strapping a bomb on themselves and running into a building, but they do that for what they believe themselves to be true. What idiot, what stupid, asinine fool, knowing that Jesus was still dead, would willingly die for a lie that they themselves made up? That’s just stupid. To offer support that this could possibly happen is to reach at logical straws that just aren’t there.

And how have I not done justice to Matthew? How is it not possible to understand that the correct rendering in this text is “an earthquake had occurred,” thus placing the earthquake itself in the relatively distant past in regards to the women coming to the tomb? The women weren’t onstage for the whole thing! Yes, Matthew starts the account with them going to the tomb and explains it from an experiential standpoint. The women were going to the tomb, and an earthquake had occurred. So, the correct sequence is earthquake, women finding the stone rolled away.

As far as Jesus telling some folks to tell others and some not to tell, again, I don’t see why this is difficult. In some instances, it was because the person healed was a gentile, and while He had compassion on Gentiles, His mission was to minister to the Jews first. Therefore, He didn’t want large crowds of Gentiles following. Another instance was right after He told a crowd of Pharisees that a “wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign, but none will be given.” Do you think that possibly casting a demon out of a young man, or healing leprosy could possibly construed as a sign? At this point, Jesus did no more signs or miracles for these men.

For your last example, it is entertaining, but not really convincing, and here is why. The evidence itself does not point to the helicopter being the source of the fatal ammunition. The fact is, the disciples and Paul consistently left themselves open for testing. Paul volunteered over 500 witnesses. Come on, you don’t mention 500 witnesses to a churchful of people unless you are saying “look, dude, go ASK these people. They SAW Him!”

I understand logical skepticism, but I also believe that at some point, skepticism is no longer logical but rather desirable. Sometimes I wish that God had left undisputed proof of His existence, not for me, but for skeptics. The reason is that I feel like many people, even with evidence, would still choose not to believe, because of the implications in their own life. I don’t know where you are at, my friend. I enjoy talking to you, and I feel like you are a reasonable, rational, logical person. I feel like, from the people you follow on your blog, you probably are agnostic at worst, and at least would not dispute the existence of Jesus. If this is at least the case, I will pray that you come further into a knowledge of the truth, and at least be open to the ideas that the gospels provide the truth of Jesus Christ.

I can respect your loyalty here, but not the overall belief. Look at the ending of Mark 16. All of the oldest versions end at verse 8. You’ll have a difficult time purchasing a recent translation that doesn’t acknowledge somewhere in the user helps that the book of Mark originally ended with Mark 16:8.

The overwhelming majority of Biblical scholars believe that Mark was the first of The Big Four gospels to be written. (There were other Gospels, but the early church fathers drew the line at four. Do a bit of Googling on the subject of Iraeneus, the four Gospels, and the four winds. This made perfect sense to everyone at the time.)

So if you accept my reasoning so far, the earliest account is very simple. Three women approach the tomb, they see that the stone has been rolled away, there’s a non-supernatural young man who tells them that Jesus is risen, and he orders them to tell everyone about it. They tell no one, because they are afraid. There is nothing miraculous, and there are no post-resurrection appearances. There isn’t an earthquake. No angels. No men at the tomb. The first pope isn’t present.

Did I leave anything out? Ok. The End.

But by the time John was written, decades later, there were men claiming to have been at the empty tomb (kinda like the millions of people who now claim to have seen one of Nolan Ryan’s no-hitters) and Jesus was running around walking through walls and making appearances for weeks.

Which explanation seems more likeley: the hodgepodge we’ve been discussing for the last week was divinely inspired by God, with angels, the funeral party, the soldiers, and Jesus all having to run on and offstage, to avoid seeing something they shouldn’t, like characters in a bad sitcom? (And you still haven’t done justice to Matthew’s account of the women, earthquake, angel and guards happening in sequence with the women onstage for the whole thing.)

Or:

These four stories don’t line up very well because the story started evolving from its first telling through the last telling, and consistency wasn’t a priority.

One other thing….Look at how many places in the Gospels Jesus instructs his disciples to not tell anyone about a certain teaching, or look at how often Jesus heals someone and then instructs the patient to tell no one about it. It’s very similar to Mark’s women not telling about the resurrection “for they were afraid”. Once you notice this tendency for the first time, you see it throughout the Gospels. And remember, Mark wasn’t an eyewitness to any of this.

Forty-five years ago, some friends of mine were in Dallas when Kennedy was assassinated. The told me that the shots which killed Kennedy came from a black helicopter that was following the parade route.

They didn’t tell anyone but me about it, because they were very afraid. They can’t be questioned further, because they’re dead.

Do you believe me?

Another issue I have with your reading is that you make it sound as if I have angels popping up everywhere. That is simply untrue. The angels come down to the guards and enter into the tomb, waiting for the women. Mark says they simply saw them, Luke says they appeared. However you want to look at it, maybe the women simply didn’t notice them until they looked to the right, so that they “appeared.” I just find it funny because if they all said “the women looked to the right and saw two angels in gleaming white attire” every skeptic on earth would accuse the gospels of being plagiarized. Yet another example of how we allow our preconceived decisions to taint our reaction to evidence before us.

As for the earthquake, two things. One, it wasn’t necessarily an earthquake. The Greek word used there is a term to describe a torrent of wind, a gail, a storm, OR a shaking. Ironically enough, the same word was used of the soldiers, so am I to assume that they experienced a tiny earthquake in their tummies? Maybe they were hungry! Second, the Greek tense used there for the verb describing the entire chain of events supports the translation “had occurred,” meaning it had happened previously to the events happening at that point in time in the Gospel of Matthew. So I didn’t rearrange the story, I just wrote from the standpoint that the original Greek text supports.

If the Gospel accounts were presented as eyewitness accounts in a courtroom to people who had the ability to truly think critically and not address every matter of textual criticism from a sheerly wooden and rote viewpoint, then yes, I believe they would come up with the explanation I just gave, or something somewhat similar.

The simplest explanation is that these four stories were eyewitness accounts or compilations of eyewitness accounts that survived the test of time because they have been tried and found to be sufficient.

I do want to say, however, that I read your post and thought it was hilarious. I know exactly how skeptics feel about the bible text because from the outside looking in, it is utterly stupid. I was a hard-boiled skeptic for a long time because I felt the same way intellectually. It wasn’t until I realized that my skepticism wasn’t born out of my intellect, but out of my desire to be my own boss. I feel Christianity is true because I know for sure that when I found it, it wasn’t because I went looking for it. I was totally skeptical. Stupidest thing ever, a guy rising from the dead. In the end, the amount of evidence, and the lack of evidence for alternative explanations, led me here.

I am saying all of that to let you know that I appreciate the fact that you are sincerely a thinking person who doesn’t agree with the Bible. My hope is that whatever destiny you have in store for you, it is a bright one and that God will smile upon you and be gracious to you.

Let’s assume the events around the tomb happened exactly as you desctibed them. People running around for no good reason, angels morphing into people and becoming visible to some, but not others, localized earthquakes, etc.

Then turn your account into a movie.

Let people watch the movie.

If someone watched your movie and then read, say, the book of Mark, would they even think they were reading about the same event? The two stories have almost nothing in common.

Next, do you honestly believe that God gave us four radically different accounts of angels fading away, appearing in different combinations and places and forms to different combinations of the same eyewitnesses to the same event?

Look at the earthquake in Matthew. It makes no sense to state that the earthquake happened before the women arrived at the tomb. No one can read Matthew and not think the women came to the tomb, experienced the earthquake, saw the stone rolled away and had the conversation with the angel. If Matthew wanted us to believe otherwise, he would’ve written something different. He would’ve put the events in a different order. You’ve had to re-write Matthew to get your story to work out.

Earthquakes (especially in the middle east) are fairly unusual events. Are we supposed to believe that something as rare as a middle east earthquake could happen in a local area and not be reported in the other three gospels?

If the four Gospel accounts were presented as eyewitness accounts in a courtroom, can you possibly imagine an impartial jury coming up with the explanation you’ve written above?
Or would the jury conclude that the stories had some contradictions?

The simpler explanation is that these four stories were written decades after the fact, by people who were not eyewitnesses to the events they are trying to describe. Therefore you have irreconcilable differences in the stories.

http://thewhitedsepulchre.blogspot.com/2008/11/resurrection-adapted-for-stage.html