Free God's Not Dead: Evidence for God in an Age of Uncertainty by Rice Broocks

the ordeal. The certainty of Jesus’ death has been confirmed in an article by the Journal of the American Medical Association :
    Clearly the weight of historical and medical evidence indicates that Jesus was dead before the wound to His side was inflicted and supports the traditional view that the spear, thrust between His right ribs, probably perforated not only the right lung, but also the pericardium and heart and thereby ensured His death. Accordingly, interpretations based on the assumption that Jesus did not die on the cross appear to be at odds with modern medical knowledge . 22
    2. E MPTY T OMB
    After Jesus’ death He was buried in a tomb owned by Joseph of Arimathea , a leader of the Jewish people. The burial of Jesus was called by the late John A. T. Robinson of Cambridge University , “one of the best attested facts we have about the historical Jesus.” 23
    Not only was He buried, but His tomb was empty after three days. The fact that there was a rumor that exists to this day that His disciples stole the body gives further evidence that the tomb was empty. “I think we need have no doubt that given Jesus’ execution by Roman crucifixion he was truly dead and that his temporary place of burial was discovered to be empty shortly thereafter.” 24 Since the disciples proclaimed the resurrection in the very city of the crucifixion and burial, the Romans easily could have produced the body if it had not vanished. The first witnesses to the empty tomb were women, something the disciples never would have fabricated since the testimony of women was not considered reliable.
    3. E YEWITNESSES
    The strongest historical evidence for the resurrection is the eyewitness testimonies of the disciples and more than five hundred other witnesses, which later would include the apostle Paul.
    For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared tomore than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. (1 Corinthians 15:3–8 NIV )
    The transformation in these early disciples was so great that even skeptical New Testament scholars acknowledge that the disciples really believed they encountered the risen Christ. For instance, the famed New Testament scholars and skeptics E. P. Sanders and Bart Ehrman acknowledge this fact:
    That Jesus’ followers (and later Paul) had resurrection experiences is, in my judgment, a fact. What the reality was that gave rise to the experiences I do not know. 25
    It is a historical fact that some of Jesus’ followers came to believe that he had been raised from the dead soon after his execution. We know some of these believers by name; one of them, the apostle Paul, claims quite plainly to have seen Jesus alive after his death. Thus, for the historian, Christianity begins after the death of Jesus, not with the resurrection itself, but with the belief in the resurrection. 26
    One of the most striking features of the eyewitness testimony, as stated previously, is that the first witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection were women. The early church never would have made this up because, during that time, the testimony of women was not considered valid or admissible as evidence.
    4. E ARLY R ECORDS
    The accounts of the resurrection originate from the time period immediately after the crucifixion event. John Dominic Crossan, New Testament scholar and skeptic, wrote with Jonathan Reed,
    Paul wrote to the Corinthians from Ephesus in the early 50s C.E. [Common Era, or another way to say AD]. But he says in 1 Corinthians 15:3 that “I handed on to you as of first importance which I in turn received.” The