The corner stone of Christianity is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He got that right, and it ends there. As usual Gauvin next finds three more ways to say the same thing, so we skip to:

The doctrine of the resurrection from the dead is far older than Christianity. Thousands of years before the preaching peasant of Palestine was born, India, Egypt, Babylonia-all the ancient countries, indeed--knew the story of the resurrection, False. "Resurrection" as a concept (see here was unknown to anyone else other than Zoroastrians. Gauvin falsely defines "resurrection" as any sort of reversal of death. These countries, whose religions were of great antiquity, had numerous gods. They had virgin-born saviors who were the sons of their gods. These saviors, while they lived, preached and worked miracles, and after their death, they arose again and ascended into heaven. Uh huh. See our series here naming "saviors" and showing Gauvin in error. We'll also link to specific names.

All the doctrines of Christianity are far older than Christ; and all that can be said in favor of the resurrection of Christ can be said in favor of the resurrection of a dozen other saviors. Let us consider for a moment the resurrection of some of these pagan gods.

 

About twelve centuries before Christ was born -- and there is no certainty at all that he ever was born -- Chrishna, the crucified Hindu savior, rose from the dead and ascended into heaven. Attended by celestial spirits, amid the wondrous illumination of heaven and earth, Chrishna, the savior of men, slowly rose from earth to Paradise, while witnesses exclaimed with joy: "Lo, Chrishna's soul ascends its native skies." False on all counts. See here.

Five centuries before Christ, the great Buddha, the founder of Buddhism--a religion that now embraces one-third of the human race-lay dead in India. From heaven's supreme God came the command: "Rise, Holy Love!" Then the shroud of Buddha unrolled itself; by divine power the lid of his coffin was removed; and Buddha, the Enlightened One, the savior of mankind, released from the grip of death, rose to heaven's glory. Uh huh. The scene described dates to a painting from 1100 AD! 1100 years too late!

 

Ancient Egypt worshipped the risen Osiris. Mr. Bonwick, in his "Egyptian Belief," says: "It is astonishing to find that, at least five thousand years ago, men trusted in Osiris as the 'risen savior and confidently hoped to rise, as he arose, from the grave.'' False. See here. As an aside Bonwick's book was written in 1878, and Bonwick was no Egyptologist but an eclectic non-expert who wrote such books as Irish Druids and Old Irish Religions and Romance of the Wool Trade. His specialty subject was Tasmania, not ancient Egypt. among the Greeks, Aesculapius, the son of God, the savior, the divine healer, he who was called the "Great Physician" -- after being put to death, rose in triumph from the grave. In the following manner, the poet Ovid makes the mother of Aesculapius ten in prophetic form, the story of the life, death and resurrection of her divine child:

 

     "Once, as the sacred infant she surveyed,
      The god was kindled in the raving maid;
      And thus she uttered her prophetic tale:
      Hail, great Physician of the world! all hail!
      Hail, mighty infant, who in years to come
      Shall heal the nations, and defraud the tomb!
      Swift be thy growth, thy triumphs unconfined,
      Make kingdoms thicker, and increase mankind,
      Thy daring art shall animate the dead,
      And draw the thunder on thy guilty head;
      Then shalt thou die, but from the dark abode
      Shalt rise victorious, and be twice a god." Um hm. Check the full text of this passage here. You'll notice that this is just a small part of a long poem that sounds nothing like Jesus at all.

 

The resurrection of gods was a fundamental idea in the religions of all the nations by which the Jews were surrounded, With these religions the Jews were familiar, and from them they borrowed many ideas. For example, the worship of Adonis, the virgin-born savior, of the Syrians, was well known to the Jews long before the time of Christ. Nope. See here. The Jews themselves worshipped Adonis. This was a part of the idolatry into which they were continually lapsing. In the Hebrew, the word "Adonis," means "Our Lord"; and this god had an altar in the very temple of Jehovah at Jerusalem. Funny how Geza Vermes and E. P. Sanders missed this factoid. Gauvin is confusing "Adonis" with "Adonai." The resurrection of Adonis was annually celebrated in Judea -- in Bethlehem, indeed even as late as 386 A.D. St. Jerome says: "Over Bethlehem (in the year 386 after Christ) the grove of Tammuz, that is, of Adonis, was casting its shadow! and in the grotto where formerly the infant anointed (i.e., Christ Jesus) cried, the lover of Venus was being mourned." Oops. What Gauvin neglects to mention is that Jerome says that pagans did this, and for a reason: "The original persecutors, indeed, supposed that by polluting our holy places they would deprive us of our faith in the passion and in the resurrection." Not a thing to do with Jews here. Gauvin re-repeats this issue 5 different ways as usual, but note this at the end of the next paragraph:

 

How could the clergy preach about the uniqueness of Christ if their congregations were familiar with Kersey Graves' learned work, '' The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors?'' WHAT! Graves, whose work on infidels.org is prefaced with a comment warning of its unreliability! Gauvin goes on to appeal again to Osiris and Buddha again; we skip to:

 

But let us suppose that God did die. Let us suppose that the creator of the universe threw his life away, and allowed the crucifixion to reduce him to the cold, pathetic stillness of death. God was dead! They buried him! God lay dead in the tomb! Well, how did he come to life again? Who, or what, resurrected him? A dead God becomes a living God--by what means? on and in, for about 6 million lines. Let's cut to the chase: 1) Gauvin has no conception between "God" as a proper name used today versus as an abstract noun in the NT; 2) he has no concept of Jesus as a hypostasis of deity; 3) he thinks we think "dead" is a problem, as if a problem for the spirit of one dead. Now to:

 

There is another point I wish to bring before you. Suppose there was a Jewish reformer named Jesus two thousand years ago; suppose his enemies succeeded in bringing him to the cross; how can it be known that he died in the crucifixion? Yes, that's how wildly desperate Gauvin was. See here, which also addresses the medically unworthy claim Gauvin quotes about there being no possible wound that would produce "blood and water". There is more of this conspiracy theory Gauvin goes on about; since it is addressed already in the article linked, we skip to:

 

But there is something else to be said in connection with the guard. Who went to Pilate and asked him to set a guard at the sepulcher? The Chief priests and Pharisees--the Jewish Sanhedrin. Why did they ask for a guard? Matthew says they said to Pilate: "Lest his disciples come by night and steal him away, and say unto the people, he is risen from the dead." Mark well this fact--the day after the crucifixion of Christ, the idea of his being stolen from the grave was, according to Matthew, in the minds of the Jewish leaders. Is not that significant? In assuring us that the Jews feared that the body of Jesus would be stolen, the "inspired" writer unwittingly suggests the solution of the empty tomb! The "stolen body" idea is also addressed in the link above.

 

But was there really a guard at the sepulcher? Matthew alone says there was. The testimony of the other Gospels proves that there was not. It does? Silence "proves" nothing. See relevant item here. That testimony is negative, positive and conclusive;--  negative, in that neither Mark, nor Luke, nor John knows anything whatever of the guard -- positive, in that according to Mark and Luke the women brought spices to anoint the body of Jesus, which they would not have done had they known that Roman soldiers stood sentinel at his grave, And why should the women have known what Pilate and the Sanhedrin had done, exactly? -- conclusive, in that the women on reaching the tomb, said among themselves: "Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulcher?" The women saw no soldiers at the tomb, either to guard it or to roll from its portal the closing stone, because there were none there.  Again, how should they have been privy to Pilate's counsel?

 

That the story of the watch is a myth is further proved by Matthew's statement that the Jewish priests bribed the soldiers to say that, "His disciples came by night, and stole him away while we slept." The Roman soldier's devotion to duty has never been surpassed in the military annals of the world. Moreover, under the inflexible discipline of Roman militarism, the soldier who slept on duty was unceremoniously executed. Which is precisely what makes the apologetic so strong. But Matthew would have us believe that for a bribe, Roman soldiers not only sold out their honor, but exposed themselves to the certainty of immediate and ignominious death! This is not only a libel alike on the integrity and sanity of the martial character of Rome: it is an insult to the common sense of the world. I'm sure Rome was upset as all get out. On the other hand, Gauvin misses the obvious point that if the guards really were left with an empty tomb they could not explain, and they were headed for trouble anyway, how much worse will they actually be off if they take the chance ot save themselves with the bribe offer?

 

If yet further testimony be required to prove that there was no watch at the tomb, it is found in the fact that, according to the Gospels, nobody felt the need of one. Why? Because the disciples believed that Christ was dead, and that he would remain dead -- because they knew nothing of his resurrection, and were not looking for it. Luke says that when the women told the disciples of the resurrection, "their words seemed to them (the disciples) as idle tales, and they believed them not." Why did the disciples refuse to believe? Let John answer: "For as yet they knew not the Scripture that he must rise again from the dead." To whom is John referring particularly? To Peter and "the disciple whom Jesus loved," and with them all the disciples. See that one refuted here. Gauvin repeats this as usual; we go to:

 

But the sleeping sentries suiciding for priestly gold to spread the rumor that a grave was vacated, not by a risen God but by a stolen corpse, is but one of the fond fancies of "The Gospel According to St. Matthew." In his exuberant imagination the writer of this pious piece assures us that when Christ was crucified many unusual phenomena occurred. An earthquake rent the veil of the temple in twain; tore rocks asunder, and opened the graves of sleeping saints. Thereupon, these saints "arose," and standing upright or sitting in their tombs politely waited until Christ had risen from the dead, when they left their graves, "and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many." The resurrection of these "saints" born from death into life in the shattering rumble of an earthquake, stands on precisely the same authority as the resurrection of Christ. So there was not one resurrection only; there were many. "Fancies" here only seems to be argued by Gauvin's presumed naturalism. More serious contextual study may be found here. Gauvin also asks the "so what" questions of what these people did later, apparently taken from Paine who asked the same pointless questions. Gauvin also asks why more was not written on them, a concept addressed in principle here. Which writer left to us did Gauvin think would mention what to most if not all of these would have been a credulous Jewish folk tale? We move to:

 

Let me say here, that in assuming that the Gospels were written by the men whose names they bear, I do so merely for convenience. As a matter of fact, nobody knows who wrote a line of any of the Gospels. He'll say it 5 different ways, but the answer is here. Next:

 

The story of Christ's resurrection is proved to be hopelessly false by the clamoring tongues of its many contradictions. Righto. See series here. Was Christ embalmed before he was buried? John tells us that he was. According to John, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus embalmed him with a mixture of "myrrh and aloes of about a hundred pounds weight" -- enough to embalm a dozen bodies! Hmm, where'd Gauvin get any knowledge of ancient burial practices? It's actually 75 pounds, and see comments here. According to Matthew he was not embalmed; and Luke's story plainly shows that there was no embalmment. Luke says he was wrapped in linen and laid in the sepulcher, and that the women who saw him so laid away, returned to prepare spices and ointments which they brought to the tomb later. It says no such thing. It simply does not reach the level of obsessive detail that a low-context person like Gauvin requires. The linen wrap by itself implies embalming; for Matthew, the very burial Jewish style does. But why should the women who, according to Luke, saw the body laid away, prepare spices to embalm it if they knew that it was already embalmed as elaborately as John describes? Gee, why should anyone bring a few flowers when the grave already has wreaths around it? According to Luke the women prepared the embalming spices before the Sabbath began before sunset on Friday; according to Mark they did not buy them till after the Sabbath had ended - after sunset on Saturday. Surely no one will ever accuse the Scriptures of monotonous harmony! Surely no one will accuse Gauvin of contextual literary study. After this he offers the usually laundry list of alleged problems; see the link above. We move to --

 

As we are considering what is called the evidence for the resurrection, let me tell you something about evidence in general. It is a rule in the logic of evidence that the more unusual, the more important, is the fact sought to be established, the greater in amount, the more precise and conclusive in character, must be the evidence required to establish it. It is? No, Gauvin just made this up. Keep in mind he was an airplane mechanic, not a lawyer or a logician. It's said five more different ways, and we're once again riddled about the differences in the rez narratives, then we move to:

 

When the disciples saw Christ, were they agreed that it was he? They were not. Matthew tells us that some doubted. Bad reading. See here. Gauvin says it three more ways, then:

 

There are Christians who contend that Christ did not rise in his physical body. They believe that he arose in spirit form only. But the Gospels teach that he arose in his body of flesh and blood. According to Luke he said to his disciples: "Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself, handle me and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have." And did he not, according to John, invite doubting Thomas to feel his several wounds? And does not Luke insist that he ate some broiled fish and honey-comb just before his ascension? To argue after all this that the resurrection was spiritual only is to turn the Gospels into a wild burlesque. This much he actually got right. See here.

 

There remains the testimony of St. Paul.

 

Paul tells us that Christ's first appearance was to Cephas, that is, Peter. This is contradicted by all the Gospels. No, Gauvin just doesn't get 1 Cor. 15 as a creedal statement designed to merely attest that Jesus was seen by the leaders of the church, and the church at large -- not to give an exhaustive statement of all appearances. His second appearance, according to Paul, was to the twelve disciples. But there were at that time; only eleven disciples--Judas had hanged himself. See here. Of the treachery and suicide of Judas, Paul is utterly ignorant. Oh? What of 1 Cor. 11:23, which is a mirror of that report in Luke? Paul says that Christ's third appearance was to "above five hundred brethren at once." But not one of these gentlemen has anywhere testified that he saw the resurrected Jesus; and of this appearance to the multitude the Gospels are wholly silent. Like it is required otherwise. Those 500 were required to make the movemnet work. To certify that Paul is quite mistaken here we may observe that there were not five hundred Christian brethren in the world at that time. Oh! Where did Gauvin get the head count from, since none of those 500 left anything behind? He just made it up is where, or else is mistaking the 120 in Acts as "all" there was, which is said nowhere. Skipping more, Gauvin asks this question I last heard from dealing with Mormons, but in reverse: