Could AD 30 Jerusalem Jews know where Jesus's corpse was placed after crucifixion?
-
Our Question
Jesus was crucified in c. AD 30, and was reportedly buried. Soonafter, people were saying Jesus was raised from the dead. Admist the confusion, did Jewish critics in Jerusalem know where the corpse of Jesus was interred? Could they identify its location if they desired?
This question affects larger questions like:
-
They had every ability to learn its location
With even a modicum of desire, these Jews would not have failed to learn where Jesus was buried.1 This is relevant because soonafter Easter, the Jerusalem Jews strongly desired to learn where Jesus was placed. After all, on/after Easter, they wanted to establish that Jesus's body had not actually resurrected.)
- We know this for three reasons:
• First, it was easy for them to learn Jesus's grave location, simply by the testimony of Jesus's buriers/corpse-handlers, who were plenty accessible.
• Second, it was easy for them to learn Jesus's grave location, simply by the testimony of the Jerusalem church, which knew where Jesus was laid.
• Third, in one of Acts speeches (which are based on very old material), Peter procalims:“Brethren, I may confidently say to you regarding the patriarch David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. (Acts 2:29) This is relevant because, Murray Harris (NT professor at TIU, Cambridge): “His point… is that anyone who chooses may inspect the traditional site of his [David's] burial in the city. The same is true, Peter implies, of the actual tomb of Jesus in the same city.” [From Grave to Glory (Zondervan, 1990), 113.] Peter is issuing a challenge to his contemporaries. Ernest Hermitage Day (c. 1946): “The facts of the Passion, the report of the Resurrection, were known to all the Jews of Jerusalem.” [On the Evidence for the Resurrection (Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1906), 29.]
- We know this for three reasons:
-
They claimed to know it's location
By AD 40, the Jerusalem Jews had already been publicly maintaining that “We learned Jesus' grave-location back in AD 30.”1
- We know this because their public stance was that “body-theft explains the empty tomb”, specifically, they maintained that the guards reported this from the get-go. Now, some critics may charge that the Jews were lying, but among other problems, there is no clear reason why they would spin such a lie. Alternatively, a critic might say their belief was simply unwarranted. However, there are two problems with this.
• First, if Jesus's body was not gone from the tomb, then those Jews would have known that it was not gone; they would have seen it with their own eyes.
• Second, if Jesus's body was not gone from the tomb, then those Jews would have had no persuasive reason to believe it was.
- We know this because their public stance was that “body-theft explains the empty tomb”, specifically, they maintained that the guards reported this from the get-go. Now, some critics may charge that the Jews were lying, but among other problems, there is no clear reason why they would spin such a lie. Alternatively, a critic might say their belief was simply unwarranted. However, there are two problems with this.