A simple way for the Jewish leaders to discredit the Christian movement would have been to produce the corpse of Jesus.  Why was the corpse never produced?  I am unable to believe that no serious attempts were made to find the body.

It requires strong feelings to engineer the execution of a human being in the way it was done to Jesus.  The Jewish leadership despised the man and everything he said.  As they saw Jesus hanging on the Roman cross, they must have felt the human emotion of fulfilled revenge.  They exulted in his agony and no doubt relished their victory.  This was an event filled with passions of hate, revenge and self-righteous superiority.  Jesus was an abomination to these men, and they would have done everything in their power to disprove any claims made about a resurrection.

The reality of a resurrection would prove that Jesus might have been who he claimed to be:  God in human flesh!  The fear of a resurrection was present in the minds of the Jewish leaders because Jesus had predicted that he would be executed, but would rise from the dead.  As he was dying on the Roman cross, witnesses jeered and challenged him to miraculously save himself.

The fear of a resurrection claim was real among them, because it was the Jewish leadership that petitioned the Roman Governor to post a contingent of guards at the tomb to prevent anyone from stealing the body.  So, when reports of the resurrection began to surface on the third day following his execution, Jesus’  enemies no doubt made an immediate response.  The first thing on their agenda was probably an inspection of the tomb where Jesus’ body had been placed.

Upon arrival at the tomb of Jesus, the realization that it was in fact empty would not immediately prompt an assumption of resurrection from the dead.  The argument of impossibility was probably as valid for them as it is for the modern Bible critic.  And if they believed it was impossible, their first suspicion would be that the body was taken by his followers.  This question soon becomes a matter of how.

Let’s Steal the Body

The tomb was hewn from solid rock, and had been surrounded by Roman guards.  The entrance had been sealed with a huge stone.  Such a theft would have required some ingenious planning on the part of the body-snatchers and problems of how to subdue the guards and how to move the stone are the first that come to mind.

I have always enjoyed a good challenge, and I tried to construct a plan which would allow me and a few friends, in the dark of the night, to sneak up on a contingent of Roman soldiers, move a boulder, steal a body, and hide it forever.  I kept in mind that we only had two days to conceive, plan and execute the entire mission, as well as come up with a reason for the disappearance of the body.  It was also clear that if there was one mistake in my plan, my friends and I would either be executed on the spot, or crucified the following day.

While attempting to construct my plan, it became apparent I would have to overcome some significant strategic problems:  To subdue the Roman guards would require a method of rendering all of the guards unconscious simultaneously, without warning.  Furthermore, when they awoke, they would have to be unaware that they had been unconsciousness, and all of them would have to be suffering from the same hallucination:  that the stone was moved supernaturally.

It soon became obvious that chemically induced, undetected, simultaneous unconsciousness, resulting in identical hallucinations would require drugs and a delivery system not available in the first century, much less our own.  However, for my plan to succeed, I would have to think of some way to accomplish all of this.

.  If I found a way to zap the guards, I would be faced with the problem of moving the huge stone that sealed the entrance of the tomb.  Because the stone was large, moving it would require several men, some equipment, some time, and making some unavoidable noise in the middle of the night.

Avoiding panic among my friends would also be difficult.  I would have to convince everyone that body-snatching under the nose of Rome would be no big deal.

If we overcame those obstacles and managed to get our hands on the body, we would then be faced with the problem of disposal.  While making my plan, I had to consider that the tomb was near the gates of Jerusalem and the time of year was Passover, when there are thousands of visiting Jews in the city, moving around at all hours of the day and night.  Robbing a grave and transporting a corpse unnoticed would be no small problem, and finding a place to hide it would be even more difficult because of the stench of decay.  If anyone saw us in circumstances that even appeared to be suspicious, the entire plan would be defeated and the hoax exposed.

To cap the entire puzzle, permanent success would require all participants in the operation to keep their mouth shut forever about what we had done.  To me, that seemed to be the most insurmountable obstacle.  Virtually every conspiracy in recorded history has eventually been exposed by the people who participated in them.  The nature of people incorporates a strong need to share their secrets with someone, and once a leak occurs, conspiracies are exposed.

No doubt, a television writer for Mission Impossible might dream up a plan to steal the body, if they could employ the use of sophisticated electronic equipment and a number of other modern aids.  But, even with all the electronic assistance available today, it would still be incredibly difficult.  The biggest single factor working against any attempt to steal the body was the factor of time, coupled with basic human nature and fear.

The Disciples Were Not Commandos

The disciples of Jesus were not professionally trained commandos.  They were simple fishermen and the entire scenario of Jesus’ arrest, trial, and crucifixion had terrified them.  The speed of the way it was done no doubt overwhelmed them.  Jesus was abruptly arrested in the middle of the night and by the next morning he was hanging on the cross.

Only one of the disciples was reported to have witnessed the execution.  All of the rest scattered and hid.  Am I expected to believe these terrified, simple men could have regrouped physically and emotionally, and concocted a perfect body-snatching plan within forty-eight hours?  If I have any correct understanding of human nature, to believe the disciples could accomplish such a feat is unthinkable.  Yet, on the morning of the third day, there was an empty tomb.  Shortly thereafter, these disciples were claiming a literal, bodily resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

Lying in the Name of God

Obviously, if there was no resurrection the disciples knew it, and their subsequent testimony was a lie.  When people lie, there is generally a motive for the deception.  Since these men were faithful, orthodox Jews, we must first see and understand they would have been lying in the name of God.  The motivation for the lie may have been to establish a foundation for something they wanted to do or accomplish.  Well, what did they do?

The remainder of their lives were dedicated to spreading a message.  Here was the message:  God loves you so much He came to die for you that you might have life.  God wants you to be with Him forever, and He wants you to know peace.  God wants you to love each other as He has loved you.  God wants you to forgive others as He has forgiven you.  God wants you to be in a personal, loving relationship with Him and to walk with Him in the truth.  Essentially, that was their message.  If the disciples lied they did so to spread love and the knowledge of God.

How About Some Money?

Another motive for the lie may have involved some hope of financial gain, or high position of honor.  The actual conditions enjoyed by these Apostles are clearly stated by the Apostle Paul in the following description:

“For it seems to me that God has put us apostles on display at the end of the procession, like men condemned to die in the arena.  We have been made a spectacle to the whole universe, to angels as well as to men…To this very hour we go hungry and thirsty, we are in rags, we are brutally treated, we are homeless.  We work hard with our own hands.  When we are cursed, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure it; when we are slandered, we answer kindly.  Up to this moment we have become the scum of the earth, the refuse of the world.” (1 Corinthians 4:9-13)

From this description, it is becoming more and more difficult to identify a motive for the lie.  Are we to believe they concocted this story of resurrection for the privilege of preaching love and forgiveness, and the experience of being treated like human garbage?

Eventually, all the apostles, save one, were executed for their belief in Jesus.  They never stopped telling the resurrection story.  The only logical explanation is this:  They were telling the truth.

Based on the testimony of these disciples, thousands of Jews were converted, and the followers of Jesus Christ steadily increased.  The movement grew based on the credibility of the resurrection claim, and the reality of the spiritual relationship produced by conversion in Christ.  The sincerity of the faith of these believers was ultimately tested in martyred deaths and persecution that culminated in the spectacles of carnage at the Roman games.  There is no question the resurrection was accepted as an historical event, based on the personal testimony of the eye witnesses.  People do not give up their lives for a hunch, or a fanciful myth.