Resurrection

This is an edited informal presentation that [James Tabor] did for Bart Ehrman’s Biblical Studies Academy that was followed by a lengthy Q&A session. For the entire program see this website–it is one of [his] “Ask Tabor Anything Sessions,” : https://jamestabor.com/EhrmanBSA. For Easter 2025.

This video presents his overall beliefs and views, citing scriptures that he argues show that the physical body was not important to Paul–the first and only witness to the resurrection–and the writer of Mark.

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How Faith in Jesus’ Resurrection Originated and Developed: A New/Old Hypothesis – A great article. Extracts are italicized below.
By Dr. James Tabor,  Posted January 1, 2016

Jump Here to the Mark Goodacre lesson handout from his course at BSA.

I [JDT] want to return to my beginning question—what happened following the death of Jesus? Now that we have Paul as our master key, when we attempt to analyze the four New Testament gospels with their narratives of the empty tomb, an entirely different perspective opens up. Getting Paul right turns out to be fundamental to understanding what really happened, and the central affirmation of Paul’s message and apostleship—that he had “seen” Jesus had been raised from the dead—can be placed in its proper historical light.…

These dichotomies are quite striking: where: Galilee or Jerusalem; when: immediately on the day the tomb was discovered or weeks thereafter; and, what: visionary-like experiences or resuscitation of a physical corpse? The internal evidence is decidedly in favor of the Mark/Matthew tradition. To even imagine that the kinds of stories that Luke and John relate, set in Jerusalem, were circulating when Mark wrote his gospel is highly improbable. That Mark could publish the first gospel in Christian history, and include no appearances of Jesus, with the focus on Galilee, not Jerusalem, pushes our evidence decidedly in favor of the Galilee option. It is also hard to imagine a text like the ending of the Gospel of Peter even existing unless it was related to a strong tradition of remembering the despair and sorrow of the disciples following Jesus’ death, as they returned to their vocations in Galilee, giving up hope. It is not an edifying story, but it is a realistic one, and it fits our earlier evidence.

Paul is a decisive witness for this reason. He does claim, firsthand, to have seen something, and he equates his “sighting” experiences, with those of Peter, James, and the rest of the apostles, based on his personal acquaintance with them. Given his view of resurrection of the dead, as being re-clothed in a glorious heavenly body, he would have found the emphasis on flesh and bones quite meaningless. When Paul says Jesus was “buried” he is indicating that he knows the tradition of Jesus’ body being put in a tomb (1 Corinthians 15:4). His point is to emphasize that Jesus truly was dead and buried, entering the Hadean realm. What was then “raised on the third day,” just as in the Gabriel Revelation, [my link] was not the perishable mortal body but a new spiritual body, no longer “flesh and blood,” having shed the old body like discarded clothing (1 Corinthians 15:42-50; 52-54).

Jesus’ own teaching about resurrection, preserved in the Q source, emphasizes an angelic like transformation in which even the sexual distinctions between male and female are obsolete (Luke 20:34-36). This parallels precisely Paul’s view of resurrection.

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Extracts from James Tabor’s post here.

The gospel of John offers an alternative empty tomb story that is not based on Mark. It has a credible ring to it and merits careful examination … I have become convinced that this core story, embedded in John, found in the the first 10 verses of chapter 20, are likely the first and earliest account of the “empty tomb,” that has now been elaborated by the editors and authors of the Gospel of John to harmonize with the notion of Jesus appearing physically in Jerusalem, wounds and all, that I think develops later for apologetic reasons–to assert to doubters that the resurrection of Jesus could not be a ghost or hallucination.

Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, and the face cloth, which had been on his head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples went back to their homes. (John 20:1-10)

John, of course, gives other stories following his account of the empty tomb in which Jesus appears to Mary Magdalene and to the disciples as a group, including Thomas, the famous doubter. But this passage of John, relating how the empty tomb came to be discovered, seems to offer us a less theological version of the story, with details added that historians have found credible.

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My outline of Tabor’s discussion in an interview titled How Habermas Arguments for Jesus’ Resurrection Contradict our Earliest Testimony! Part 1 & 2. The outline contains text from the interview’s transcript and my paraphrasing. Tabor was asked his opinion of Gary Habermas’ points as listed further down this page. Tabor said:

1. Start with our earliest sources and work them chronologically because you see an embellishment and a development.
2. In the 50s CE, a full 20 years before the destruction of Jerusalem, we’ve got an eyewitness testimony. If you accept the letters of Paul, even one letter, 1 Corinthians, he says, I’ve seen the Lord in chapter 9, obviously after Jesus’ death.
3. In 1 Corinthians 15, he says, and last of all, he appeared to me. Paul equates his sighting with those that he lists, that would be Peter and James and the 12 and all the apostles and 500 brethren at once. 500 at once, Sounds like they’re looking up, they’re seeing something. If you go by the book of Acts, it’s probably something like an intense light. But I think a voice is very important. He’s conversational with Jesus.
4. Further evidence of this is when he discusses resurrection in Romans 8, and what has happened to Jesus. He says that he’s the firstborn of a family of beings called Sons of God, or children, let’s be generic, children of God, offspring of God. So, whatever he is, we, he would say, are to become, and he’s the first of this new genus of beings in the universe. And then he says, and you will be above angels, and you will have the same glory as Jesus, but he’s the pioneer or the first in a cosmic process.
5. Q: Where did this idea emerge then of the risen Jesus and there actually being a physical body? How did that come into play? [James Tabor] With that, we have to go to the texts that begin to talk about that, and I would take them pretty much in chronological order.
6. Start with Mark 16:1-8. [Most of us as academics are convinced that Mark ends with the women visiting the tomb and it being found empty and they rush off and say nothing to anyone. There are three endings that are later appended to Mark.
7. How would you write a gospel and end it at the tomb? Because they’re not told by an angel, there is no earthquake, nobody’s rolling back the stone, no great mighty angel coming down, no soldiers dropping dead. Those are Matthew’s embellishments that come later.
8. Here I would bring in the Gospel of Peter [see Wikipedia here]. It’s modeled on Mark. Many of us think it’s independent of Mark but maybe knows Mark and I’ve got a little passage I want to read you. Unfortunately, it breaks off, I wish it didn’t. But the women found the sepulcher, very similar to Mark, and they look and he’s gone. And then the next verse, this is verse 58 of the Gospel of Peter. This is not a gospel in the New Testament. Listen to this. It’s amazing. It was the final day of unleavened bread. Now many don’t know this but you have Passover. Jesus, depending on whether you think he died before Passover or after, we won’t get into that, but he’s crucified either on or after Passover. So what do we know? We know about the Jewish festival that Jesus eats a meal, whether it’s the Passover meal or not, and then the next day he’s crucified. All the accounts agree with that. Okay, then there’s the seven days of unleavened bread. So after the women visit the tomb and are told he’s risen and gone away, it says the final day of unleavened bread. This is a week later. Eight days later.
9. You don’t leave Jerusalem until the end of the days of unleavened bread. Then the feast’s over. You don’t leave early. So what are they doing during this eight-day period according to this text? Weeping and sorrowful. But the women had said, go to the Galilee and you will see him as he said.
10. Matthew picks up on that. They go to the Galilee. They’re on a mountain that Jesus told them to go to. And it sounds so much in Mark like the Mount of Transfiguration. That’s Mark 9, where they had a proleptic experience of the glorified Christ that we’re talking about with Moses and Elijah. In Mark, Jesus says, some of you standing here will not die till you’ve seen the kingdom come with power. Next verse. And eight days later they went on a mountain and had this vision. They see him, but some doubted. Very interesting that Matthew would say that, but some doubted. So what are they seeing? Are they touching a body? Are they sitting and having a meal together? There’s nothing like that reported.
11. My teacher Norman Perrin used to say, he taught me Mark, it could be that Mark 9 is a resurrection story, but it’s proleptic. You know, you’re gonna see him as he said.
12. Go to Luke. Nobody’s going to the Galilee—they’re told not to go to the Galilee. And what do they do? Meet him, eat meals with him. Acts says for 40 days they’re meeting him and seeing him regularly, eating meals with him.
    • What Luke is trying to do is to argue polemically against this idea that somehow resurrection was getting taken right to heaven and appearing as a glorious; i.e. visionary.
    • Because if it’s visionary, you could say what Celsus says to Origen. “Well, who cares what a bunch of crazy women saw? A bunch of deluded disciples, grief-stricken. That doesn’t prove resurrection.” Luke is writing later where you need proof. So Jesus has to be bodily resurrected in Luke and even in Matthew. [See Matthew 28:1-10] but not in Mark.
13. Go on to The Gospel of John
    • Now, on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, that emergency tomb. While it was still dark and saw the stone had been taken away from the tomb. So she ran to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said, they’ve taken the Lord out of the tomb and we don’t know where they laid him.
    • They’ve taken him away. Who’s they? The people in charge of the burial. It’s pretty obvious. Joseph and the burial party took him away Saturday night.
    • What do you mean? Somebody took him? So they run and check. And notice, they did not yet know that he must rise from the dead. Now John leads to that in the next chapter. And that’s when they go to the Galilee, remember. And they see him when they’re fishing.
    • So that fits in with Mark. But John also has some sightings in Jerusalem. He has two.
14. Appearances in Jerusalem are now flesh and bones. He eats.
15. That a resuscitated corpse came out and went around eating with people for 40 days proved resurrection. For Paul, that wouldn’t prove anything. That would prove that a guy was resuscitated and ate afterwards and taught some things. That’s not the transformed cosmic Christ that Paul saw.

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Gary Habermas‘ Minimal Facts Argument lays out a series of points per the interviewer:

1. That Jesus died of crucifixion,
2. That the disciples had experiences that they thought were appearances of the risen Jesus.
3. They proclaimed this event at an early date, in fact, right away.
4. Their lives were utterly transformed by it.
5. James became a believer after the crucifixion because of his experiences, and
6. that Paul also became a Christian after he had an experience of the resurrected Jesus.

Tabor’s rundown as stated during the interview like Gary Hamermas’.

1. Jesus comes to Jerusalem at Passover week. He spends a week in and out of the temple. He causes a lot of controversy and a lot of trouble.
2. He ends up getting arrested and crucified, and Joseph of Arimathea takes charge of the burial. He’s on the Sanhedrin. He has connections. He can go to Herod’s Palace and ask for the rights of burial. He might have made an argument to Pilate, like the last thing you want to do is leave that body on the cross or discard it in a ditch, because many of us honor this person and revere him.
3. He was arrested by Jewish enemies, and taken to the Romans. The Romans at least agreed to crucify him, so I would always say the Romans killed Jesus. [Also, Jews were not allowed to kill especially by crucifixion.]
4. He is given an honorable burial, probably because of his followers and the fact that people would be pretty upset at a corpse desecration of that type.

Pilate has a history of causing some disturbances by being a little heavy-handed, so it’s not like he’s merciful. He’s just afraid of Tiberius and Sejanus [Confidant of the Roman Emperor Tiberius and prefect of the Roman imperial Praetorian Guard (20 BC – AD 31)]. Tiberius is living on Capri, and Sejanus is running the empire. He is the Praetorian guard captain or general or whatever—he’s in charge of it. And you don’t want to deal with him. He’s pretty rough.

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Below are links to a paper by Tabor that explains his position and a review (that Tabor commended) of his paper by another scholar, Michael Heiser.

Why People Are Confused About the Earliest Christian View of Resurrection of the Dead, By Dr. James Tabor

The question I get asked most regarding The Jesus Discovery and the Talpiot tomb is how could one believe that the followers of Jesus were running around Jerusalem three days after Jesus died claiming he had been raised from the dead if his body was in a tomb was just two miles to the south of the Old City. Here is the answer and when one understands this everything falls into place.

James Tabor’s Essay on Early Christianity’s View of Resurrection: A Review, by Dr. Michael Heiser, April 19, 2012.

Heiser does not follow Tabor’s thinking as he says it is problematic in “terms of coherence”. He offers several items for consideration.

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From Tabor’s Blog – Have I Not Seen Jesus our Lord? What Did Paul Claim to Have Seen? CHRISTIAN ORIGINS.   Extract follows.

I can hear some of my critics saying–but wait, Jesus was first raised in the “same body,” and for forty days lived among the disciples–and only then ascended to heaven and attained the transformed body that Paul experienced. Unfortunately, that will just not work. First, it is an invention of the author of Luke-Acts. Mark and Matthew say nothing of Jesus being taken to heaven after a period of being in his “earthly” body. And in John, Jesus is a “man from heaven” from the beginning, a descending and ascending Savior figure, which is an entirely different Christology. We need to go to Paul to be clear on the earliest view of Jesus’ resurrection and there is no ambiguity:

“What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a physical body, it is raise a spiritual body.” (1 Corinthians 15:42-44).

1 Corinthians 15, 35-58; The Resurrection Body

³⁵ But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?” ³⁶ Fool! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. ³⁷ And as for what you sow, you do not sow the body that is to be but a bare seed, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain. ³⁸ But God gives it a body as he has chosen and to each kind of seed its own body. ³⁹ Not all flesh is alike, but there is one flesh for humans, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish. ⁴⁰ There are both heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is one thing, and that of the earthly is another. ⁴¹ There is one glory of the sun and another glory of the moon and another glory of the stars; indeed, star differs from star in glory.

⁴² So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable; what is raised is imperishable. ⁴³ It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. ⁴⁴ It is sown a physical body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body. ⁴⁵ Thus it is written, “The first man, Adam, became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit. ⁴⁶ But it is not the spiritual that is first but the physical and then the spiritual. ⁴⁷ The first man was from the earth, made of dust; the second man is^[f] from heaven. ⁴⁸ As one of dust, so are those who are of the dust, and as one of heaven, so are those who are of heaven. ⁴⁹ Just as we have borne the image of the one of dust, we will^[g] also bear the image of the one of heaven.

⁵⁰ What I am saying, brothers and sisters, is this: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. ⁵¹ Look, I will tell you a mystery! We will not all die,^[h] but we will all be changed, ⁵² in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. ⁵³ For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality. ⁵⁴ When this perishable body puts on imperishability and this mortal body puts on immortality, then the saying that is written will be fulfilled:

“Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
⁵⁵ “Where, O death, is your victory?
    Where, O death, is your sting?”

⁵⁶ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. ⁵⁷ But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁵⁸ Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always excelling in the work of the Lord because you know that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.

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From OpenAI. (2024). ChatGPT [Large language model]. https://chatgpt.com

The resurrection stories in the New Testament are found in the four Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—and each has unique details and perspectives. Below are the key differences and similarities among them:

1. Who Visits the Tomb?

• Matthew (28:1-10): Mary Magdalene and “the other Mary” go to the tomb.
• Mark (16:1-8): Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome visit.
• Luke (24:1-12): A group of women, including Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and others.
• John (20:1-18): Only Mary Magdalene is mentioned initially. She later informs Peter and the “other disciple.”

2. What Do They Find?

• Matthew: The women witness an earthquake, and an angel rolls back the stone, sitting on it. The guards are present but become like “dead men.”
• Mark: The stone is already rolled away when they arrive. A young man in white (an angel) is sitting inside the tomb.
• Luke: The stone is rolled away, and two men in dazzling clothes appear.
• John: The stone is rolled away, but Mary Magdalene initially finds the tomb empty and runs to tell Peter. Later, she sees two angels and then Jesus himself.

3. Who Announces the Resurrection?

• Matthew: An angel announces that Jesus has risen.
• Mark: A young man (angel) tells the women that Jesus has risen.
• Luke: Two men (angels) proclaim the resurrection.
• John: Jesus himself speaks to Mary Magdalene after she sees two angels in the tomb.

4. The Women’s Reaction and Instructions

• Matthew: The women are filled with fear and joy. They encounter Jesus, who tells them to inform the disciples to go to Galilee.
• Mark: The women flee the tomb, trembling and afraid, and initially say nothing to anyone (later manuscripts add that they did tell the disciples).
• Luke: The women report everything to the eleven disciples and others, but the disciples don’t believe them at first.
• John: Mary Magdalene runs to Peter and the “other disciple” (likely John). She later sees Jesus and is told not to cling to him but to go and tell the disciples.

5. Jesus’ Appearances

• Matthew: Jesus appears to the women as they leave the tomb and later to the disciples in Galilee.
• Mark: The earliest manuscripts end with the women fleeing, but later additions describe appearances to Mary Magdalene, two disciples on the road, and the eleven disciples.
• Luke: Jesus appears to two disciples on the road to Emmaus and later to the disciples in Jerusalem.
• John: Jesus appears to Mary Magdalene, then to the disciples (without Thomas), later to all the disciples including Thomas, and finally by the Sea of Galilee.

6. Location of the Appearances

• Matthew: Jesus tells his disciples to go to Galilee, where he appears to them.
• Mark: The angel instructs the women to tell the disciples that Jesus will meet them in Galilee (in later additions, he appears to the disciples in various locations).
• Luke: The appearances occur in and around Jerusalem.
• John: The initial appearances are in Jerusalem, but later, Jesus appears by the Sea of Galilee.

Summary

• Matthew emphasizes an angelic announcement and an encounter with Jesus on the road.
• Mark (earliest version) ends abruptly, focusing on the empty tomb and the women’s fear.
• Luke highlights the two disciples on the road to Emmaus and the gathering of disciples in Jerusalem.
• John provides a more personal account with Mary Magdalene and multiple appearances, including one by the Sea of Galilee.

Despite the differences, all accounts agree on the core message: the tomb was found empty, and Jesus appeared alive after his death.

End ChatGPT

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Mark Goodacre’s Lesson 10 handout from his course in the Fall of 2024 at BSA