A Mass of Variant Views, part 1

On page 177 of Jesus Interrupted, Dr. Ehrman says that “the earliest reference to Jesus’ tomb being empty is in the Gospel of Mark, written forty years later by someone living is a different country who had heard that it was empty.”

This is not true and I believe that Dr. Ehrman knows that the statement is not true.   Dr. Ehrman knows that Paul wrote much earlier than Mark.  He dealt extensively with the resurrection data and yet he did not mention Paul’s documentation in I Corinthians.  That documentation is the most important documentation because it is much earlier than Mark and for other reasons.

The Apostle Paul writes about the resurrected Jesus in I Corinthians and perhaps in other letters also.  The I Corinthians documentation is especially important because Paul is not the source of the evidence. Followers of Jesus early on, within 10 years, developed a creed which they repeated to one another and perhaps in worship services.  This creed summarized specific data about the life of Jesus Christ that they wanted to remember.  Here are the statements in that creed from one of the latest English translations based on the largest body of manuscripts available today.

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 to more 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

The first generation Jesus followers were quoting this creed to one another with a few years after Jesus ascended.  That this is a creed from these followers is well documented.  And the text of I Corinthians 15 indicates that:  “for I delivered to you as of first importance what I also receive.”  Paul said this primary statement he received from other believers, probably through his visits to Jerusalem, and passed it on to the Corinthians just as he had received it from the early Jesus followers.

This creed documents several essential beliefs about Jesus.  Jesus died for the sins of humanity. Jesus was buried in a grave by Joseph of Arimethea.  He was then raised from the dead three days after he was put in the grave in fulfillment of His own prophesy and of Old Testament prophesies.   He made several appearances after His resurrection. The most phenomenal appearance was to a group of 500 hundred believer/followers at one point.  According to Paul, most of those 500 were still alive as eyewitnesses to the life and post-resurrection appearance of Jesus.  The point that can be made here is that these 500 people could be contacted because they were still alive to get first hand information about Jesus’ appearance.

So this was a significant omission from the book and I can only conclude that it was omitted because it does not support Dr. Ehrman’s theses.