One of the techniques historians use to determine if something occurred in the past is knowing the source of the information and determining if that source is reliable. In the case of determining facts about an individual person, ideally the source should be a contemporary or near contemporary of the individual in question. We have this in the case of someone like Socrates. Xenophon, Plato, and Aristophanes were all contemporaries of Socrates who gave various depictions of what Socrates was like. Aristotle, who was a near contemporary of Socrates, also gave an account of him. We do not have reliable sources in regards to Jesus. The gospels are anonymous which means historians cannot determine anything about the possible motivations of the writers. Moreover the gospels are not likely written by contemporary sources. The biblical account places Jesus death sometime around 33 CE whereas the first of the gospels are not believed to be written until around 67 CE. That is a 34 year gap in time which decreases the likelihood that it was written by someone who personally knew Jesus though it doesn’t completely eliminate the possibility.
Another guideline historians use to determine the reliability of an account is the principle of non-contradiction; if an account contradicts itself, archaeological evidence, or other sources of historical information, then it is less likely to be accurate than an account free of such flaws. In the case of the resurrection, the five accounts we have contradict each other. According to Acts 1.3 Jesus appeared to the Jews for 40 days after his resurrection, but according to Luke 24.51 Jesus arose to heaven the same day as the resurrection. According to Matthew, when Jesus died an earthquake in Jerusalem resulted in the dead arising from their graves to walk among the living. Though not exactly a contradiction, it is surprising that all other accounts of the resurrection lack any reference to the walking dead. Unless, that is, one includes Jesus Christ in that category. According to Mark, three women came to Jesus’s grave Easter morning, Matthew says it was two women and John says it was one woman. According to Mathew and Mark, Jesus told his disciples to meet him in Galilee. According to Luke and Acts, their meeting spot was Jerusalem. The gospels also give three different accounts of what Jesus’s last words were. And these are just a few of the contradictions found in the biblical accounts of the resurrection.
In addition to the problem of poor sources and inherent contradictions, one must also consider alternative theories for how the resurrection account came into existence. Josephus mentions the names of several Jews who declared themselves to be messiahs, some of whom were then killed by the Romans. These Jews were Simon of Peraea, Anthronges, Menahem ben Judah, John of Giscala, Judas of Galilee, Simeon bar Giora and Theudas. Another Jew that could be included in that group is John the Baptist whom Herod is said to have killed. We also know from biblical sources that the Jews of that era believed in resurrection. In Mark 6:14 and Matthew 14:2 it is stated that Herod believed that Jesus was the resurrected form of John the Baptist. And in Luke 9:18-19, Jesus’s disciples tell him that the people believe that he is John the Baptist, Elijah, or an ancient prophet raised from the dead. Thus another explanation for the resurrection account found in the Bible is that it is based off other dying and resurrected messiahs such as John the Baptist.
Another alternative theory that should be taken into account was developed by Dennis Macdonald who argued that the original gospel story was a transvaluative hypertext. A hypertext is any work that somehow relies on a written antecedent, or hypotext. For example, the book, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is a hypertext of the book, Pride and Prejudice. Hypertexts were very popular in Roman times, particularly hypertexts of the Iliad and the Odyssey. The most famous of these hypertexts is the Aeneid by Virgil, but there were others such as the Argonautica, the Posthomerica, and the Dionysiaca. There were even Jewish examples such as On the Jews by Theodotus and the book of Tobit. In his book the Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark, Macdonald contends that the original gospel story was another example of a hypertext of the Homeric epics. According to this theory, the original gospel story was not an historical account at all. Rather it was a work of literature. Macdonald has several examples of textual evidence to support this conclusion. For example, he cites several similarities between the brothers Castor and Polydeuces and the brothers James and John. The following is a list of comparisons he uses to prove his point.
| Castor and Polydeuces | James and John |
| Sons of Tyndareus | Sons of Zebedee |
| Also known as Dioscouri, lads of Zeus | Also known as Boanerges, sons of Thunder |
| Argonauts | Fisherman |
| Castor died a violent death | James died a violent death |
| Polydeuces could have lived forever | John was thought to live until the parousia (second coming of Christ) |
| Polydeuces asked Zeus if he and Castor could share a single immortality | The brothers asked to sit at Jesus's right and left hand in his glory |
| Zeus consented | Jesus refused |
This is but one example Macdonald uses as textual evidence. And his arguments, taken together, are quite compelling. In the case of the resurrection story, Macdonald argues the last supper was modeled after the feast with Circe found in Odyssey 10, Jesus’s suffering death and burial was modeled after Hector’s suffering death and burial, and the rolling of the stone to gain access to Jesus tomb is modeled after the stone that prevented Odysseus and his companions from escaping the Cyclops’s lair.
One more factor to consider in regards to the resurrection account has to do with its supernatural character. Usually when someone is said to do something that is supernatural historians attribute this something as being mythical. For example, we have written accounts of Asclepius curing the blind, the lame, the mute, and raising the dead. Historians regard these as myths even though Asclepius may have been an historical personage at one point in time. Another example is King Sargon, an Ancient Akkadian king who is believed to have conquered the Sumerian city states. We have access to texts which describe how King Sargon was placed in a reed basket when he was an infant and then was placed in a river. This account is believed to be mythical by historians even though the existence of King Sargon is not in doubt. There is more reluctance for historians to take the same approach to the Gospels, but, if one is to be truly objective, then one must follow Thomas Jefferson’s example and cut out everything that appears mythical. And that includes the resurrection account.
In summation, the resurrection is not based in strong historical evidence because the gospels are written anonymously; the accounts of Mark, Luke, and Matthew contradict each other; alternative theories can account for the resurrection such as the idea that it is based off of beliefs about John the Baptist’s resurrection or Hector’s death and burial; and the supernatural character of the account lends credence to the belief that it is mythical.
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