The Resurrection of Jesus Christ​—No Myth

COULD the Bible’s account of the resurrection of Jesus be a mere fabrication? Recently the International Herald Tribune reported on an investigation done by a Jewish writer named Pinchas Lapide. His conclusion? The resurrection was no myth.

Several things led Lapide to this conclusion. For one thing, the Gospel accounts relate that three women visited Jesus’ tomb and saw that it was empty. But in ancient times, women were “considered incapable of valid testimony,” says the Tribune’s report. Indeed, Jesus’ own disciples did not believe the women! It is thus most unlikely that such a story would have been deliberately fabricated.

Lapide also cites the galvanizing effect that Jesus’ resurrection had upon His disciples. From a group of men so timid that they abandoned Jesus at his arrest, they were “changed overnight into a confident mission society, convinced of salvation.” Reports the Tribune on Lapide’s reasoning: “No vision or hallucination is sufficient to explain such a revolutionary transformation.”

Finally, there is the charge that Jesus’ disciples merely stole his body. To this, Mr. Lapide replies: “Can swindlers let themselves be tortured and persecuted in the name of an illusion, up to joyful martyrdom?” While Mr. Lapide still does not profess faith in Jesus as the Messiah, he has little doubt that what an angel announced two thousand years ago was true: ‘Christ was raised up.’​—Matthew 28:6.