Anglican autodidact Jonathan Sheffield is back and we will this time be debating whether the Romans should have disproved the resurrection of Jesus—and thus, their not having done so proves Jesus really did rise from the dead. Last time we had an extended serialized debate over whether the long ending of Mark (verses 16:9-20) was in the original draft and not an interpolation. This time we will do just opening statements and one set of rebuttals on my blog here, and then follow up with an open discussion live at Modern-Day Debate (scheduled for 5pm Pacific on Friday, June 26).

Sheffield himself has again funded this exchange and we will share full non-exclusive rights to its content. Sheffield will begin with an opening statement, which is now provided below. Tomorrow I will publish my reply. His and my sole rebuttals will come in future weeks. All entries will be limited to 2000 words (not counting citations). The video discussion we hope to have available by the end of June but no later than July. Links to all the above will be added here as they arise.

Comments on each of the entries in this debate series are open to anyone who submits polite and relevant remarks. Patreon and PayPal patrons retain the privilege of their comments publishing immediately. Everyone else’s will wait in a moderation queue that I will have to check and clear every few days. Jonathan Sheffield specially asks that atheists engage with this debate. So do feel free to comment. But please make your remarks polite, relevant, and informed.

After this opening is my rebuttal, Sheffield’s response, and my closing statement. We then continued on Modern Day Debate.


Why Weren’t the Rulers of the Roman Empire Able to Falsify the Resurrection of Jesus?

by Jonathan Sheffield

Why weren’t the rulers of the Roman Empire able to falsify the resurrection of Jesus? It surely wasn’t for a lack of effort; because Eusebius records in his histories that forged memoranda of Pilate and Jesus were published under Emperor Maximin II around 311 A.D., and sent to every district under his command (see Williamson’s 1965 translation of Eusebius, History of the Church, pg. 361 [9.5.1]). He announced in edicts that they were to be publicly displayed and should be given to the school children by their teachers instead of lessons to study (Ibid.).

As emperor, why would Maximin need to publish a forged memorandum of Pilate, when he would have had access to the official records of the empire? According to Cicero, the prefect of Judea was obligated to deposit two copies of his account in the two chief cities of his province and place one in the archives of the Acrariuni (see Lynn H. Wood, “Can the Acts of Pilate, as published in “The Political and Legal History of the Trial of Jesus” (William Overton Clough, Indianapolis, 1895), be accepted as authentic?” The Ministry 12.1 (January 1939)).

Justin Martyr in 150 A.D. appeals for the release of these Acts, in his published Defense of Christianity to the Emperor Antoninus, which he believed would substantiate the Gospels Account affirming: “these things did happen as you can ascertain from the Acts of Pontius Pilate” (see Justin Martyr, First Apology 35). The response Justin received was not the publication of the official records refuting his claims, but martyrdom.

It’s interesting that Tacitus, one of the greatest historians of the Roman Empire, who wrote specifically on the period in question, referring to the extreme penalty Jesus suffered at the hands of Pilate, and the early Christians in Rome (Tacitus, Annals 15.44) did not provide a historiographic narrative falsifying the resurrection event. In a similar fashion, Josephus’s histories provides valuable insight into first century Judaism (see Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews), background of early Christianity, and an account of Jesus’s brother James (Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 20.9.1); yet no tome refuting a resurrection hoax, even though such a tome would have served Josephus well at the court of the Flavian emperors.

Remember that years prior, according to the published Acts of the Apostles (Acts 25-26), the apostle Paul defended the Gospel account as he stood before Festus, the Prefect of Judea, and Agrippa, the King of Galilee (the area where Jesus grew up and the events surrounding his ministry mainly occurred). For when Festus accused Paul of being beside himself, and claimed that too much learning had made Paul mad (Acts 26:24), Paul responded to Festus by stating:

I speak forth the words of truth and soberness, For the king knoweth of these things, before whom also I speak freely: for I am persuaded that none of these things are hidden from him; for this thing was not done in a corner.

(Acts 26:25-26)

Several Key points are established here in Paul’s statement:

  • First, as King, Agrippa was well aware of the events that transpired in his kingdom and could have easily refuted what Paul was saying if a naturalistic explanation for the resurrection of Jesus was available that could have then been published against the Christians and copied throughout the empire.
  • Secondly, Festus, the Prefect of Judea, had access to the official records in Judea that could have been used against Paul, if information was available to falsify the resurrection account from Pilate’s memoranda.
  • Lastly, Paul demonstrates that the account of Jesus’ resurrection provides falsifiable criteria that is subject to a proper investigation by the rulers of the Roman Empire to uncover.
  • And it’s this falsifiable event, i.e, the resurrection, that marks the distinction with Christianity as opposed to other religions like Islam and Buddhism.

Unless the NSA has video surveillance of Muhammad’s conversation with the Angel Gabriel from the 7th century, or we can download the satellite images of the monkey that threw down the fruit of the bo tree onto Buddha’s head that caused him to see the light, we don’t have standard criteria to falsify those inner experiences. This is why we have Karl Popper’s Criterion of Falsifiability; so we can evaluate the inherent testability of any hypothesis or statement; and a hypothesis is genuinely scientific only if it is possible in principle to establish that it’s false.

Therefore, let’s be scientific in our approach, and follow in the footsteps of the Amazing Randi, whose dealings with the supernatural claims of the psychic community wasn’t just an array of allegations that they were fake, and that he didn’t believe it; instead, he felt the need to demonstrate under scientific, testable conditions how it was done. By putting Karl Popper’s maxim into practice, James Randi was able to achieve similar results to those of the psychic community through naturalistic means, thereby falsifying their supernatural claims.

Therefore, in Christianity, all that is needed to falsify the resurrection of Jesus, is to either:

  • Produce the body;
  • Provide a credible tome from the ancient world with a naturalistic explanation of what had happened;
  • Or uncover the true identities of the Gospel authors, if they weren’t the disciples of Jesus, and expose their myth, regardless of when the documents were published.

Are we suggesting that these assignments were not well within the means of the Roman rulers to investigate and uncover? For I am aware of the a priori assertion that Jesus picked a time and a process that cannot be properly subject to investigation (see Matt Dillahunty’s statement during his debate with Mike Winger, on the topic of “Is Belief in the Resurrection Unreasonable?” at the 35:30-39 mark). Shouldn’t we first understand how the Romans conducted investigations of religious cults before drawing that conclusion?

Fortunately for us, the Roman Historian Livy, who wrote the histories of Rome up until the glorious reign of Caesar Augustus, chronicles how the Romans investigated the Religious Cult of the god Bacchus (see Livy 39.8-19, Penguin translation by H. Bettenson, “The Bacchic ‘Conspiracy’ of 186 BCE”), which can be used as a baseline indicator of how Romans conducted investigations against other religious cults, like Christianity. Remember that during the time of the Republic and the Empire, Rome operated as a well-organized police state, and as such, Livy reported that the Romans were monitoring the religious cult Bacchus closely, and gathering intelligence from witnesses on their activities (Livy 39.12).

Now, pay close attention, as it provides clarity and insight into the thorough, serious, and careful nature of their investigative process. First, a high official is used (the Council in this case) to conduct the interrogation of a former cult member, to corroborate against intelligence the council had received (Livy 39.8). Second, Livy informs us that the witness Hispela was summoned to appear and nearly fainted when she saw the lictors in the vestibule, the consul’s entourage, and the consul himself (Livy 39.12). Livy further reports, the Council informed the witness, that if she could bring herself to tell him the facts, she had no cause for alarm, and she should reveal to them the ceremonies that were habitually performed in the nocturnal rites of the Bacchanalia (Ibid.). Upon hearing this from the council, “the woman was panic-stricken, and such trembling seized every part of her body that for a long time she could not open her mouth” (Ibid.).

Even after her full confession, Livy tells us, “the Council went on to warn her that if she were proved to be lying by the evidence of another witness, she could not expect the same forgiveness or indulgence as she would receive if she made a voluntary confession.” He added that “the man who had heard the story from her had given him a full account of the facts” (Ibid.). The significance of Livy’s details on Rome’s investigation of the Bacchi cannot be overstated. There isn’t anything in Livy’s account, which leaves us with any doubt that the council of Rome was not going to gather the intelligence he needed from this witness, or others, to expose the conspiracy of the Bacchi—for that was the power of Rome (Livy 39.14).

The parallels of this case to Rome’s investigation of another religious cult, Christianity, are clear: Rome is again entrusting the gathering of intelligence to high Roman officials; in fact, those seated at the court of the emperor to expose the movement of Christianity. This is why Prefects such as Felix, Festus, and Pilate were interrogating Paul and Jesus (John 18:28-40; Matthew 27; Mark 15; Luke 23; Acts 24, 25, 26). The empire was very concerned about insurrection (see S. Dyson, “Native Revolts in the Roman Empire,” Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte, 20.2/3 (1971), 239-274). And Felix, according to Josephus, had also suppressed the messianic movement of the Egyptian prophet ( see Flavius Josephus, Jewish War 2.261-262) and ordered the assassination of the high priest Jonathan (see Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 20.8.5). So, it comes as no surprise why the Prefect Felix interrogated Paul on two separate occasions (Acts of the Apostles 25-26).

Hegesippus chronicles that the emperor Domitian dreaded the advent of Christ as Herod had, and had his spies locate the grandsons of Jude who were of the family of Jesus in order to interrogate them (see Williamson’s 1965 translation of Eusebius, History of the Church, pg. 126 [3.19-20]); the same modus operandi is evinced in Livy’s investigation of the Bacchi (Livy 39.8-19, Penguin translation by H. Bettenson, Ibid.). Remember, in each and every one of these interrogations, the witness could be turned over to torture, or put to death at any time. Recall, this is why Hispela reeked of fear at the sight of the consul (Livy 39.12). Pilate emphasized this reality to Jesus when he said, “Do You not know that I have authority to release You and authority to crucify You?” (John 19:10-18).

Pliny had established procedures for interrogating Christians and judged it necessary to find out what the truth was by torturing two female Christian deaconesses, as we learn in his letter to Emperor Trajan (Pliny, Letters 10.96-97). All that was needed to falsify the Resurrection was just one credible witness, whose testimony could be corroborated if it was a hoax; which was all within the means of the Rome Empire to uncover (Livy 39.8-19, Penguin translation by H. Bettenson, Ibid.). Yet despite all this immense power, and endless amount of resources, the rulers of the Roman Empire failed to produce a credible tome establishing that the resurrection or the Gospels were a hoax in its investigation of Christianity.

For when we turn to the positive empirical evidence, we find throughout the Roman Empire, in all the Apostolic Churches, the same four gospels, in Aramaic, Greek, Copic and Vetus (Old) Latin, naming the same four authors of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John (see Williamson’s 1965 translation of Eusebius, History of the Church, pg. 134 [3.24-25]), unlike the Gnostics who had different Gospels, naming different authors (Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.2). To paraphrase John Chrysostom:

If there be four that write, not at the same times, nor in the same places, neither after having met together, and conversed one with another, and then they speak all things as it were out of one mouth, this becomes a very great demonstration of the truth. Although the contrary, it may be said, has come to pass, for in many places they disagree. Or rather, this very thing is a very great evidence of their truth. For if they had agreed in all things exactly even to time, and place, and to the very words, it would be evidence of collusion (St. John Chrysostom Homilies on Matthew, Homily 1, §15-16).

In any normal court of law, independent witnesses that basically agree, that have not colluded on their testimony would be conclusive. As I said, we do know that throughout the Roman Empire, conversions to Christianity were occurring all over the place. It is obvious the Roman Empire had found the truth; that is, the Gospel Truth.

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See Richard Carrier’s response.

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