Alive: 21 Reasons to Believe in the Resurrection of Jesus ChristSample

Reason 19: Jesus’ resurrection defies any potential alternative explanation

The earliest explanation to disprove Jesus’ resurrection was that the body was stolen – which could not have happened with Roman soldiers guarding the body, and still does not explain how the dead body came back to life. Other explanations over the years include that Jesus swooned on the cross, which is impossible without a beating heart, or that everyone who saw Him “alive” suffered from a group hallucination which is impossible because those are private events for one person and not public events for up to five hundred people at a time. Thomas Arnold, former professor of Modern History at Oxford, says, ““No one fact in the history of mankind . . . is proved by better and fuller evidence of every sort” than the fact that “Christ died and rose from the dead.”

What arguments have you heard or believed against the resurrection? How has this plan formed your views?

Thomas Arnold, “Christian Life, Its Hopes, Its Fears, and Its Close: Sermons Preached Mostly ...” 15–16.