[Read Acts 17:24-31, 1 Cor. 15:3-8, 12-22]

Evidence of the Resurrection:

  1. The New Covenant documents are the best maintained documents of the ancient world. (See Manuscript Evidence)
  2. The accounts given are eyewitness accounts. Luke talks to eye witnesses to have a detailed account. All of the disciples saw and felt and touched.
  3. Criterion of Embarrassment – embarrassing details of the hero’s are left out.
    1. Why put the failings and unbelief of the disciples in the story?
    2. Why put the evidence in the mouths of women? Especially in a culture where women’s testimony would not have held up in court. The disciples were not ready for this kind of primary source.
  4. Outside sources – There are Greek, Roman and Jewish sources that all attest to the same essential truths.
  5. To start a movement with the criminal death of the hero was foolish to the Greco-Roman mind. It was also a stumbling block for the Jewish mind. If it was all untrue, why do it this way? 1 Cor. 1:18-25
  6. If it was a myth, why would the disciples die for it? Eleven out of twelve of the disciples died for the message that the resurrection was factually true, and they all died separately (Thomas Aquinas).
    1. All the eye witnesses were convinced for the rest of their lives, changed from fear to martyrdom. They saw they felt they touched, and they proclaimed His resurrection in Jerusalem, where it all happened.empty-tomb2tn
    2. Swoon Theory – does not hold up to Roman execution practice.
    3. Hallucination Theory – hallucinations are individual experiences, not group experiences, and NOT 500 hallucinating at the same time.
    4. Stolen Body Theory – does not account for the Roman Seal and Roman Guard and the mental state of the disciples.
    5. The Fraud Theory – this would have been disproven by simply producing the body, yet there was no conflicting evidence. The tomb was empty and the Sanhedrin could not produce the body.
  7. The prophetic word. How is it accomplished that:
    1. The Messiah would be rejected by his own people. ( 53:1-5)
    2. Received by the gentiles. ( 65:1-2)
    3. Die before the destruction of the 2nd temple ( 9:24-26)
  8. Even sceptics believed the claim of Yeshua rising from the Dead:
    1. James the brother of Yeshua (See James Ossuary).
    2. Saul of Tarsus – a well-known Pharisees and an oppressor of the disciples.
  9. The explosive growth of the early believers along with their claim that Yeshua rose from the dead.
[Read  Luke 24]