JESUS CHRIST: GOD-MAN - Vital Christianity

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The Resurrection Narratives The most obvious evidence to begin with is the
resurrection narratives themselves. There are four accounts of the resurrection found in each
of the four Gospels. While they are independent for the most part, they are harmonious and thus
give evidence for reliability.
Their independence is seen in the variation of detail in the accounts. This does not mean
that there was no overlap since any given incident may have circulated throughout the Christian
church when these books were being written. There is no evidence that the four biographers sat
down and conspired to make up the story of Jesus' resurrection. If they would have, there would
have been much greater agreement between the details of the accounts. Instead we find many
small, but apparent, contradictions. Yet at the same time there is amazing agreement in the
accounts. This would be highly unlikely in a fabricated account by four different writers. These
resurrection narratives have "the ring of truth" that would be expected of separate accounts
prepared by eyewitnesses.14
One example would be the variety of statements about the moment at which the women
first arrived at the tomb. While Matthew says that it took place "toward the dawn of the first day
of the week" (Mt 28:1), Mark claims that it was "very early on the first day of the week . . . when
the sun had risen" (Mk 16:2), Luke says that it was "at early dawn" (Lk 24:1), and John claims
that "it was still dark" (Jn 20:1). These kinds of phrases are the kind of thing the authors would
have standardized if they had been working on their accounts together. Does this mean these are
contradictions. Not necessarily. Although John says that it was "still dark," he does not
necessarily intend to mean that it was pitch black. The next phrase says that Mary Magdalene
"saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb." The women may have started out while
it was yet dark but by the time they arrived at the garden the day was breaking.
It is the characteristic of the resurrection narratives (e.g. the number of women who made
the first visit to the garden—Mt 28:1; Mk 16:1; Lk 24:10; Jn 20:1, the disciples failure to
recognize Jesus when he appeared to them—Jn 20:14; Lk 24:16; Mt 28:17, or Christ's statement
to Mary that she was not to touch Him because He was "not yet ascended to the Father"—Jn
20:17 vs. the account given by Matthew—Mt 28:9) that they leave the problems of the
"conflicting" accounts for the reader that would have been eliminated were they fictitious. The
details given in the resurrection accounts simply do not make sense if persuasion is the goal. The
reason why the seeming contradictions are included in the narratives is that they are, in fact, the
way the story happened. Thus they give evidence that these are honest accounts of what the
biographers believed took place.
The Extreme Reserve of the Narrative Accounts.
The resurrection narratives are reported with extreme reserve. By comparing these
biblical narratives with the reports in the apocryphal literature of the second century is seen the
radical difference. The Apocrypha gives detailed explanations about how the resurrection took
place with the Gospel of Peter reporting a cross coming out of the tomb after Jesus and Jesus