Empty tomb - A Tippling Philosopher

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Empty tomb

A collection of 16 posts

Answering Dan Barker’s Easter Challenge

With Easter not far away, I thought it would be instructional to examine the Easter story in some detail, and how the four Gospels seem to contradict one another on crucial details, and whether the different accounts can be harmonized. This situation inspired Dan Barker, a former evangelical Christian preacher,

Why Matthew's guards at Jesus' tomb are so important

I've written before on why the guards at the tomb of Jesus, included only in the Gospel of Matthew, are almost certainly invented by the author of that Gospel. Today I will tell you how they fit into a larger narrative construction of the Jesus story, and that

The “Empty Tomb” & The “Minimal Facts” argument

Here is another guest piece by the inimitable David Austin, this time on the topic of the Empty Tomb. The “Empty Tomb” & The “Minimal Facts” argument The “Empty Tomb” claim has been the mainstay of Christian apologists’ arguments for a long time. The apologists love to say, whenever the

Biblical Exegesis

Is the “Empty Tomb” Narrative Historical?

In the closing stages of writing my latest book, The Resurrection: A Critical Examination of the Easter Story [UK] (please grab yourself a copy!), I had a few test readers. One was David Austin, down in Australia, who has provided a few guest articles for your delectation. Here is another

Biblical Exegesis

The Door to the Empty Tomb

Here is a short little section regarding the tomb itself, that Jesus supposedly rose from death from, that I am working on for my book on the Resurrection: Before I go on, I would like to quickly discuss the tomb itself. Or, more pertinently, the stone that supposedly enclosed it.

Motivated Reasoning and the Resurrection

Luke Breuer reminded me of the old canard of motivated reasoning today (on Bert's piece on freethought), and it's a thing that is utterly foundational to beliefs and worldviews. At the end of the day, we are thoroughly psychological creatures. As you may know, I am

Biblical Exegesis

The Huge Importance of the Empty Tomb to Christians

We know from Paul's writings and from pretty much every other mainstream Christian that the Resurrection is massively important to anyone professing faith in Christianity. Without belief in the death and rising of Jesus, you get no atonement and no real point to Jesus living, and therefore to

The Resurrection Debunked: Naturalistic Explanations

As mentioned in my previous posts, it is that time of year that the historicity of the Easter accounts gets analysed by us skeptics. And found wanting. Very wanting. [caption id="attachment_6627" align="alignright" width="216"] Tintoretto [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons[/caption]

Easter Doubt: Why Was Jesus' Tomb Not Venerated?

To follow on from my Matthew's guards post, here is another problematic scenario for the Easter story. Thinking about the tomb, in the context of the last post, it is incredibly suspect that the place of the greatest spiritual and religious significance in the whole world seems not

Biblical Exegesis

Easter Doubt: Matthew and the Guards at the Tomb

In this post, I am going to look at the resurrection account given by Matthew, in particular his addition found in no other Gospel account, that there were guards stationed at the tomb. According to Matthew, the chief priests were worried that the disciples might steal Jesus’ body to fake

Easter Doubt: On the Skepticism of the Resurrection (part 4) – naturalistic explanations

As mentioned in my previous posts, it is that time of year that the historicity of the Easter accounts gets analysed by us skeptics. And found wanting. Very wanting. [caption id="attachment_6627" align="alignright" width="216"] Tintoretto [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons[/caption]

Why was Jesus' tomb not venerated?

To follow on from my Matthew's guards post, here is another problematic scenario for the Easter story. Thinking about the tomb, in the context of the last post, it is incredibly suspect that the place of the greatest spiritual and religious significance in the whole world seems not

On the Skepticism of the Resurrection (part 4) - naturalistic explanations

As mentioned in my previous posts, it is that time of year that the historicity of the Easter accounts gets analysed by us skeptics. And found wanting. Very wanting. [caption id="attachment_6627" align="alignright" width="216"] Tintoretto [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons[/caption]

Tintoretto [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

On the Skepticism of the Resurrection (part 4) - naturalistic explanations

As mentioned in my previous posts, someone in Malawi is about to have a debate on national TV with a Christian about the Resurrection accounts and I have been asked to help provide some ideas for the debate, so here goes. There are three aspects to the debunking of the Resurrection: 1) The Gospe

Tintoretto [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Biblical Exegesis

On the Skepticism of the Resurrection (part 3)

Having looked at points 1) and 2) it is time to see if there is a more plausible explanation for the data from a naturalistic perspective than the Christian claims. Before setting out the positive case, I want to spend a little time going over some of the data from the Gospels and how they are probl

Biblical Exegesis

On the Skepticism of the Resurrection (part 2)

As mentioned in my previous post, someone in Malawi is about to have a debate on national TV with a Christian about the Resurrection accounts and I have been asked to help provide some ideas for the debate, so here goes.