One question is at the heart of the Christian faith. Is the Resurrection of Jesus true? If He did, then the foundation of the Christian faith is true. Some doctrines would still be up for discussion, but the most important part of the Christian faith would still be truth. But if Christ did not rise from the dead, then the whole Christian faith is based on a lie. This question puts the lives of billions of people at risk. The discussion about the Resurrection might have the most important issues in the world.

When people try to figure out if the Resurrection of Jesus really happened, the Christian Bible is often thrown out as a reliable source of proof. It is true that the New Testament cannot be the only source used to decide if Christ rose from the dead, but it is still a valid source, just like any other old book. History buffs wouldn’t know where to start looking for proof that the Resurrection happened or didn’t happen without the Bible. People’s names, times, and places can be found in the Bible, which can be used as proof. After that, the history record can be looked at to see if there are signs that Christ rose from the dead or not. Thankfully for Christians, history tends to support their faith.

6 Historical Proofs Supporting the Resurrection of Jesus.

1. The records show He died after being put on a cross.

For someone to rise from the dead, they had to be dead first. Some doubters say that Christ never really died, so the Resurrection of Jesus was just Jesus getting better or coming out of hiding. But it’s almost impossible to stick to this idea. Outside of Christianity, there was a man named Jesus who lived in Nazareth and was thought to be the Christ by those who followed Him. After that, Pontius Pilate killed this man in Judea. The Jewish writer Josephus and the Roman senator Tacitus are two of these sources. They are both thought to be some of the most accurate accounts of events in the first century. Josephus and Tacitus were both alive around the same time or not more than a hundred years after Christ. The letters that were sent between the Roman governor Pliny and Emperor Trajan also prove that the early Church existed and that early Christians were very religious.

It has also been shown over and over again in texts and writings found by researchers that Pontius Pilate existed, even though some doubters say he wasn’t a real person. Over the years, historians and experts have also found enough information to piece together what happened during a Roman crucifixion. There is almost universal agreement among historians, scholars, and medical professionals: no one could have survived a full Roman execution. Many people died during the scourging and never even made it to the cross because the way they were put to death was so cruel. Records also show that crucifixions happened a lot in Israel in the first century. Israel had been a hotbed of revolt and a constant source of trouble for Rome. Rome could not have kept a possible Messiah living. He was too dangerous. In fact, the uprising that Rome was so worried about happened only 30 years after Christ’s death.

2. He was buried, and His tomb was empty.

From the beginning, the Christian faith has been based on the idea that Christ rose from the dead in the same way that Jews believed, which was that he really rose from the dead. It would have been very easy for Roman and Jewish leaders to rubbish the Resurrection assuming it was a lie. It would have been enough to just show Christ’s body on the fourth day after he died to kill the Christian faith in its crib.

The killing of Christ was seen by many people. Lots of people knew He had died, and records from both Christians and Jews show that both Christ’s disciples and enemies knew where His tomb was. There is also evidence that the tomb was not full. Again, it would have been easy to end the Christian movement if Christ’s body had been in the tomb. It grew well, which proves that the tomb was empty. Some sceptics claim that the women in the New Testament just went to the wrong tomb. If this were true, it would have been easy for officials to lead Christians to the right tomb. In the early days of the Jewish opposition to the new Christian faith, people also said that the Apostles stole the body, which meant that the tomb was empty.

Some doubters say that Christ would never have been given a tomb because he was a sinner who was being put to death. The bodies of many murderers who were put to death on crosses were left to rot as a message to everyone who saw them. But this wasn’t always the case. The bones of a hanged man were found in a Jewish ossuary from about one hundred years before Christ’s death. In fact, one of the nails from the execution was still stuck in his heel bone. There were pieces of olive wood stuck to the nail itself. No matter who the man was, he was buried in a Jewish way even though he had been killed. There’s no reason why Christ wouldn’t have been treated the same, especially when Joseph of Arimathea, a high-ranking Jew in the Sanhedrin, asked for Jesus’ body.

3. Women were the first witnesses.

In the first century, Israel was mostly ruled by men. In every part of government, social, and religious life, men were in charge. Women were not treated as important as men. Even though they may have been treated better in Israel than in many other places in the old world, that doesn’t mean they were ever treated equally. Even so, women were the first ones to hear about the Resurrection. This is something that all four Gospels agree on. Long before the male followers did, the women saw the risen Christ or heard from an angel that He had risen from the dead. From the point of view of the first century, this is very embarrassing. Men not only turned their backs on their God, but He didn’t even see them first when He came back. The women had to tell the men about it instead.

There is a good chance that someone who had worked hard to become mayor, met all the requirements, and had spent years working in politics would be passed over in favour of the illiterate and brain-damaged idiot who put their name in the hat three days before the election. In short, the fact that the women found out first makes things look very bad for the followers, and no one likes stories that make them look bad. What if the Gospels were lies written by the Apostles? They wouldn’t have told us that unless they were being threatened with death. Even back then, they might have chosen that a quick death was better than the shame of being passed over for women.

4. The Gospels agree on the core story but disagree on secondary details. 

Skeptics love to make a big deal out of the fact that the Gospels don’t all agree on the details of the Resurrection. Three different gospels all say that the women went to the tomb early in the morning. John says it was dark out. Matthew says that there were two women. Luke says there were more than three. Mark says that there was one angel at the tomb. John says two of them.

There are ways to make up for many of the gaps between the stories of the resurrection. Matthew doesn’t say for sure that there were only two women, and it’s usually still very dark outside right before dawn. Christians should be able to put the Gospels together, but the small differences between them actually make them more true. People would naturally be wary if four witnesses to a crime told the exact same story in court, down to the colour of the accused’s shoes. It’s possible that the witnesses worked together to come up with this story before the trial. There are real differences in what people see and remember. That’s why the four Gospels have slightly different stories about Jesus. This means that they were not all pulled from the same source, but rather were written separately. This means that there isn’t just one source that says the Resurrection happened; there are four sources that say pretty much the same thing. Most people believe four witnesses who say that a man killed someone, even if they don’t all agree on what colour shirt he was wearing. Why shouldn’t all four stories about Christ’s return be true?

5. The Bible mentions specific, still-living people by name. 

The Bible talks about more than 3,200 different people by name. It’s clear that the people who wrote the Bible didn’t mind using names, and many of the people mentioned in the New Testament were still alive when it was written. Names were given to people who had seen the risen Christ. Those who had been with Him at the execution were named. The people who wrote the Gospels and other letters were almost daring readers to check out their stories. In the same way that the empty tomb could have ended the Christian movement, people who said they saw Jesus could have denied seeing anything at all. That being said, it would have been a lot harder for a Greek reader to talk to an eyewitness in Jerusalem at that time than it is now. That doesn’t mean it was impossible to check stories though. Phoebe went more than 700 miles to get one of Paul’s letters to Rome. A very sceptical person could have gone from Samaria to Jerusalem to talk to someone who said they had talked to the risen Christ.

Folklore and tradition scholars all agree on this point: the Gospels were written too early to be legendary. Before a legend can really start to spread, all the people who saw it must have died. Otherwise, too many people will be able to and will dispute the more strange facts. In fact, this can be seen in later fictional books that add more details about the Resurrection of Christ that are more like stories. In them, angels come down and Christ comes out of the tomb bathed in light and appears to those who sentenced Him in all His glory. The official Gospels, on the other hand, don’t go into too much detail. The women went to the tomb and saw that it was empty. An angel in the form of a man told them that Christ had risen from the dead. If someone had made up a story, the most important scene in all of human history would have been a little more exciting.

6. Christians suffered and died rather than recant.

Early Christians quickly developed a reputation for being so devoted that it was almost scary. Jews, who were very religious, attacked other people during the Maccabean Revolt and the First Jewish-Roman War. However, early Christians were perceived as approaching extremes. Despite knowing they would face torture or death, they persisted, believing that a man from a small town in a corrupt country had risen from the dead and saved the world. The Romans thought the story was crazy, but it spread very quickly and scared people. People who believed it became known for not giving up on their views, even when the government threatened to punish them. While some Christians surrendered to torture, an alarming number of Christians continued to insist that a Galilean carpenter facing execution was God.

Many Christians today think that early Christians were only poor and unwanted, but that’s not true. A lot of the early Christians were what we would today call the middle or upper class. These Christians were able to help pay for the disciples’ journeys and keep the churches in the past running smoothly.Back in those days, Paul would have been a wealthy guy. He was a Roman citizen, a Pharisee, and the student of a very well-known Jewish philosopher. The amount of money he had to lose by becoming a Christian was huge. Although his conversion to Christianity cost him his life, Paul never gave up. A lot of other early Christians also didn’t do that. It was possible for Gentiles to lose their homes, their lives, and their families. Jews gave up on customs that had helped them weather many attacks and at least two exiles. Christians from all walks of life held on to their faith even when the Romans tortured them the worst. People don’t do such bad things when they know or think something is false. There may be one person who would keep up a lie to trick the Romans even after they were dead, but there are too many Christian victims for this to be accurate.

The question has been thrown down by sceptics for hundreds of years. People who believe and people who don’t believe know that the world’s biggest religion is based on a single event that happened more than 2,000 years ago. Demonstrating the Resurrection’s falsity would lead to the disintegration of the Christian faith. Because of this, both sceptics and Christians have excavated history like crazy to find proof for their side of the argument. Believers and sceptics are still arguing about whether or not Christ really rose from the dead. Sceptics are having a harder time of it. History definitely points to the idea that Jesus Christ did rise from the dead and leave behind a tomb that was empty, a funeral cloth, and a group of people who really believed.