Maybe the disciples stole Jesus’ body to make it look like a resurrection?

     This is a common question often asked to explain away the empty tomb. Let’s consider the following:

  • Some medical doctors have examined the evidence of the flogging by Roman soldiers and what crucifixion does to the human body. They concluded that Jesus was dead, medically speaking. Click C:\Users\Dave\Documents\Teaching website\Real Easter Story\Crucixition of Jesus.jpg to read why they said that…
  • They put Jesus in a tomb. The tomb had a cold rock slab for Him to lay on. You don’t put a person who had the wounds that Jesus had in a small room with no fresh air on a cold slab of rock to revive Him. How do you feel on a summer day when you lie down on the grass? After a few minutes, the Earth sucks almost all of a person’s body heat out of him. Hence, you get even colder.
  • The ladies prepared Jesus’ body for burial by putting 75 lbs. of myrrh and aloes on it. Myrrh is pretty pungent. It is not something you’d want to breathe in constantly. They put it on with strips of cloth. It covers the mouth and nose, so you can’t breathe. After a while, it forms a soft cast over your body.

                                                                                                         

 

  • A Roman guard is placed on His tomb, consisting of 4-16 heavily armed soldiers. A Roman seal is placed over His tomb. The penalty for anyone breaking this seal is death. The penalty for sleeping on guard duty is death.
  • A large circular stone, weighing about 200 lbs. is rolled into a groove, cutting off entrance to His tomb. It would take several men to roll it away.
  • His disciples were cowards. All but one didn’t have the courage to show up at His crucifixion. Peter denied knowing Jesus three times. They had to be convinced His tomb was empty.

                                                                     

 

  • The Roman guards were humiliated when they had to go to the Jewish leaders to plead for their lives because they knew going to their superiors would result in death. They lost the body of the person they were guarding and the Roman seal had been broken on their watch.
  • The Jewish leaders paid the Roman guards a lot of money to say that His body was stolen. They also convinced their superiors not to kill them.
  • How else do you explain 11 cowards turning into a force that nobody could stop in just 3 days? Legends take years to grow, not 3 days.

      •  The arrest, trial, flogging, crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus is found in Matthew
26:31-28:20 & Mark 14:27-16:20 & Luke 22:31-24:53 & John 18:1-21:25.

 

     •   Nothing in all of 1st century Palestine literature says anything about the tomb being
anything but empty. The only debatable point was why it was empty.

 

   •   There are just too many things working against the ‘Disciples stole the body”
argument.
•   The only rational explanation, after 20 centuries of investigations, is that Jesus was raised from the
dead.

   •   A more detailed explanation is given in the course, “The Real Easter Story”, especially
weeks 2-4. This is at
https://www.bsssb-llc.com/video-courses-overview/the-real-easter-story/.

 

For His Kingdom,
Dave Maynard
https:bsssb-llc.com