The claim of Christianity is not that a good man died. It is that a dead man came back. The apostle Paul says as much: “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile” (1 Cor 15:17). Every other claim of the faith depends on this one. So this page treats it the way it deserves to be treated — as a historical question.
The Claim, Stated Precisely
The claim is that the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, in which the body of Jesus was laid on Friday afternoon, was found empty on Sunday morning by a group of women; that over the following weeks Jesus appeared alive to specific named individuals and groups; and that the disciples, who had scattered in fear, became public proclaimers of this within weeks, in the same city, and never recanted — even when threatened with death.
The Earliest Evidence: 1 Corinthians 15:3–7
The single most important piece of evidence for the resurrection is not the empty tomb narrative or the appearance stories in the Gospels. It is a creed that Paul quotes in 1 Corinthians, written in the mid-50s AD, which he says he received and passed on — language that refers to formal, memorized tradition.
1 Corinthians 15:3–7
“For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures: And that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve: After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep. After that, he was seen of James; then of all the apostles.” 1 Corinthians 15:3–7
Most scholars, including sceptics such as Gerd Lüdemann and Bart Ehrman, date this creed to AD 31–36 — within three to five years of the crucifixion. Gary Habermas has catalogued more than 1,400 scholarly publications affirming this early dating.
Three features of this creed matter for the historical question:
First, the list of witnesses is specific and public. Peter is named. The Twelve. Five hundred at once. James. Paul himself. It is not the language of myth; it is the language of legal testimony.
Second, the creed includes the burial. It does not just claim a resurrection — it claims a specific body was placed in a specific tomb. If the tomb were not in fact empty, this claim would have been trivially refuted by the Jewish and Roman authorities who had every reason to do so.
Third, the creed is far too early for legend to have replaced the original story. Legends take generations to develop. This one was written down within a decade of the events, and it quotes a formula that predates even that.
The Witness of the Women
All four Gospels name women as the first to find the empty tomb and the first to see the risen Christ. Matthew names Mary Magdalene and the other Mary. Mark names Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome. Luke names Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and others. John names Mary Magdalene alone in the garden scene.
This is historically significant for one reason: in first-century Jewish and Roman courts, women’s testimony was not accepted as legal evidence. If the Gospel writers were inventing a story designed to persuade, they would have placed Peter or John at the tomb first. Instead, they place women there — women whose testimony would not stand in court — and then they record that the male disciples did not believe them (Luke 24:11). This is the sort of detail no one invents.
The Change in the Disciples
Before the resurrection, the disciples were scattered, terrified, and hidden. Peter had denied Christ three times. All of them had fled the garden. They were not brave men, and they had no reason to expect a crucified Messiah to rise — the idea was foreign to every Jewish expectation of the time.
After the resurrection, the same men preached publicly in Jerusalem, in the same city, within weeks. Peter’s sermon at Pentecost (Acts 2) accused the crowd of having crucified the Messiah, and three thousand people converted. Within thirty years, the Christian movement had spread to the capital of the empire.
It is Sunday morning, early. The sky is barely grey. Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome are walking the short distance from the upper room to the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, carrying spices to anoint a body that has already been buried for a day and a half.
They are wondering who will roll the stone away.
When they arrive, the stone has already been rolled back. The tomb is open. They go in. A young man in a white robe is sitting on the right side. He tells them not to be afraid, that Jesus of Nazareth is risen, that he is not here, and that they are to tell the disciples — and Peter — to meet him in Galilee.
They run.
The Conversion of the Hostile Witnesses
Two men with every reason to reject the resurrection changed their lives because of it.
The first was James, the brother of Jesus. During Jesus’ ministry, his own family did not believe in him (John 7:5). Paul records in 1 Corinthians 15:7 that the risen Christ appeared to James specifically. James went on to lead the church in Jerusalem for thirty years and to be executed by stoning in 62 AD. Josephus records the execution, and his account is universally accepted as authentic.
The second was Paul of Tarsus, a Pharisee who approved of the stoning of Stephen and travelled from city to city arresting Christians. On the road to Damascus, around AD 35, he encountered the risen Christ. He later wrote that he gave up everything for the sake of this claim (Philippians 3:7–8), and he was eventually executed under Nero.
Hostile witnesses who become advocates are the second-best evidence in history. They cannot be accused of credulity, because they started out as enemies.
The Hostile Sources
Three pagan and Jewish sources, none of them Christian, mention the events surrounding the crucifixion and its aftermath. Each is worth reading in full.
Tacitus, Annals 15.44 (c. 116 AD)
“Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilate, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome.” Tacitus, Annals 15.44
Tacitus is hostile to Christianity. He calls it a “mischievous superstition.” But he confirms the execution of Christ under Pilate and the rapid spread of the movement afterward.
Josephus, Antiquities 18.63–64 (c. 93 AD)
“Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man; for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was [the] Christ. And when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day.” Josephus, Antiquities 18.63–64
This passage, the Testimonium Flavianum, is partially interpolated. Most scholars (Meier, Vermes, Dunn, Ehrman) accept the core as authentic — including the execution under Pilate and the survival of the movement — and identify a few phrases as later Christian additions. Josephus was not a Christian.
Mara bar Serapion, c. 1st century AD
“What advantage did the Jews gain from executing their wise King? It was just after that that their kingdom was abolished.” Mara bar Serapion, British Museum MS. Add. 14,658
Mara was a Stoic philosopher writing in Aramaic from a Roman prison. He has no sympathy for Christianity. He mentions the execution of the “wise King” of the Jews only in passing, as an illustration of the futility of revenge.
The Sceptical Hypotheses
A serious historical treatment must present the strongest version of the sceptical case. Five hypotheses have been proposed to explain the evidence without a resurrection. Each has serious problems.
The Five Alternatives
What We Know and What We Don’t
The honest historian does not claim absolute certainty. What can be said with confidence, using the minimal facts approach used by both Christian and sceptical scholars, is this:
The Minimal Facts
Why the Resurrection Matters for Everything Else
Every other claim of the Christian faith is downstream of this one. If Jesus was raised, the rest of the New Testament is a coherent account of what that means. If he was not, the apostles were lying or deluded, the church has been built on a falsehood for two thousand years, and the moral teaching of Jesus stands or falls with every other moral teacher who ever lived.
Paul, who had more to lose than anyone, put it in the starkest terms available:
And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ.
1 Corinthians 15:14–15, KJV
The reader is invited to test the claim. The sources are in front of him. The hostile witnesses are named. The sceptical arguments are presented at full strength. This is the way the question has been asked for two thousand years, and it is the way it deserves to be asked now.
