Yesterday, I posted about the agreed facts surrounding the resurrection. I listed 15 basic facts that the overwhelming majority of serious New Testament scholars and historians agree upon concerning the resurrection of Jesus. These are not just Christian scholars, but secular and sceptical scholars too. I also highlighted the three ‘minimum facts’ that all scholars agree from which it is possible to make a credible case for the resurrection of Jesus. You can read that post here.

However, it seems worth following up by asking, how do we assess these facts? What criteria do we use to assess their authenticity? What questions do we ask about them to credibly assess them and understand what actually happened?

The standard marks of authenticity are as a follows:

1. Multiple attestation: Are the facts presented in the gospels affirmed by multiple sources? More independent sources means more credibility.
2. Dissimilarity: Are the gospels simply lifted from an earlier tradition or source? More dissimilarity means more credibility.
3. Embarrassment: Do the gospels contain embarrassing of awkward details for their claims? Inclusion of more embarrassing details makes it less likely the information was made up. Such an account is more likely reporting facts as they happened even if inconvenient to them.
4. Expectation: Do the gospel accounts simply peddle claims that serve popular expectations of the time? Bucking popular expectations in a made up account would be unhelpful for growing a following. An account bucking expectations is more likely reporting facts as they happened.
5. Semitic traces: No semitic traces would suggest the gospel accounts weren’t written by anybody familiar with the place and time about which they claim to be eyewitnesses.
6. Effect: Is there an adequate cause for an established effect? Do the established facts adequately explain the effects of Paul’s conversion, the early Jewish claims of a stolen body and the disciples transformation after the crucifixion?
7. Coherence: Do the established facts cohere with the historicity of the resurrection event? Do the established facts cohere with each other?
8. Historical congruence: Do the established facts and the wider gospel accounts tally with what we know historically from other sources? For example, do the gospel accounts harmonise with extra-biblical details we know about ancient Jewish burial practices?

Once we have established the authenticity and historical veracity of the gospel accounts, we can begin to assess both the resurrection hypothesis and its rival hypotheses. To do this, we can apply seven criteria for assessing a historical hypothesis:

1. The hypothesis must imply further statements describing present, observable data: For example, the hypothesis that Jesus rose from the dead implies that there will be an empty tomb which can be readily observed.
2. The hypothesis must have greater explanatory scope than rival hypotheses: For example, the ‘displaced body hypothesis’ provides an explanation for the empty tomb but does not explain the transformation in the disciples, the post-mortem appearances nor the inability of the authorities to point to the real tomb. Which hypothesis can explain all of the agreed facts?
3. The hypothesis must have greater explanatory power than rival hypotheses: This is not simply asking which hypothesis can account for all the established facts, but which hypothesis offers a more convincing explanation of all the agreed facts. For example, the ‘apparent death hypothesis’ makes the established facts seem very improbable.
4. The hypothesis must be more plausible than rival hypotheses: If we are willing not to dismiss the resurrection hypothesis out of hand because of a philosophical prejudice against miracles, the probability that God would raise his own son from the dead is no more implausible than rival hypotheses.
5. The hypothesis must be less ad hoc than rival hypotheses: This criteria asks how many new suppositions the hypothesis makes that are not implied by existing knowledge.
6. The hypothesis must be disconfirmed by fewer accepted beliefs than rival hypotheses: This criteria asks which hypothesis fits with our wider set of accepted beliefs most easily.
7. The hypothesis must so exceed its rivals in fulfilling conditions 2-6 that there is little chance of a rival hypothesis exceeding it in meeting these conditions: I can do little better than quote William Lane Craig here: ‘The stupefication of of contemporary scholarship when confronted with the facts of the empty tomb, the resurrection appearances, and the origin of the Christian faith suggests that no better rival is anywhere on the horizon. Once one gives up prejudice against miracles, it’s hard to deny the resurrection of Jesus is the best explanation of the facts.’ (Reasonable Faith, Wheaton, Illinois, 2008, p.399)