2. Jesus lived in the first century
A second problem proceeds from this discussion. Wells admits that his position depends on the assertion that Christianity could have started without a historical Jesus who had lived recently. He suggests that, for Paul, Jesus may have lived long before “and attracted no followers until he began, in Paul’s own day, to make resurrection appearances.”8 But this is one place where Wells’ thesis is the weakest. We have said that Paul bases his entire message on the facticity of this gospel data, presenting the reports of eyewitnesses to Jesus’ appearances, persons that he knew personally, in order to further corroborate these recent events. That this creed is also very early and close to the actual events further assists in substantiating the testimony. Other portions of Paul’s writings confirm this conclusion, in opposition to Wells.
Paul is also aware of the fact that Jesus lived recently. Paul refers to Jesus’ contemporaries: Cephas and the twelve (1 Cor. 15:5); the apostles, brothers of Christ, and Cephas (1 Cor. 9:5); James, the brother of the Lord, and the apostle Peter (Gal. 1:18-19); the apostles Peter, James, and John (Gal. 2:8-9); Peter alone (Gal. 2:11). The best explanation for the phrase “the third day” (1 Cor. 15:3-4) is that Paul had temporal interests in mind, and that these witnesses began to see Jesus three days after he was raised from the dead.9 Further, Paul points out that most of the 500 people who saw the resurrected Jesus at one time were still alive when he wrote the book of 1 Corinthians, about AD 55–57. In the evaluation in our next section, we will list other problems of this nature.
Wells’ explanation of these texts is insufficient, as well as being faulty.10 For instance, he actually suggests, in describing James as the Lord’s brother, that Paul is referring not to an actual brother (in the sense of a blood relation) but to a group of individuals in the early church called the brethren of the Lord!
Perhaps almost needless to say, several decisive problems plague this supposition. This is far from the most normal way of understanding Paul, either in Galatians 1:19 or 1 Corinthians 9:5. Further, all four Gospel writers did not hesitate to speak of Jesus’ brothers in the clear context of his physical family.11 Whether these four volumes were written later or not, they all agree against Wells’ position. Additionally, the ancient historian Josephus calls James “the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ.”12 This is certainly not a reference to any Jerusalem faction of believers (see discussion below)! Lastly, there is no ancient evidence at all that supports Wells’ position, not to mention the sense one gets of special pleading.
Wells’ explanation is a good example of the informal logical fallacy known as “pettifogging,” where one raises a smoke screen instead of dealing directly with the material. But this is not the same as explaining these historical references to the earthly ministry of Jesus. We may not like what the texts state, but we cannot thereby cause Jesus and his contemporaries to disappear from recent history simply by this type of reductio ad absurdum.
For reasons such as these, New Testament scholars, with virtually no exceptions, recognize the clear meaning of the texts that indicate that Jesus was a contemporary of Paul and the other apostles, having lived recently. While Paul’s epistles do not contain myriads of details about the life of Jesus, there is no reason to claim that he was largely uninterested, either. An impressive compilation of facts concerning Jesus and his ministry, learned from persons who knew him best, can be built from the epistles of Paul alone.13 Since Wells recognizes Paul’s major epistles as the earliest and most crucial material here, this information militates against his skeptical position.
3. Ancient mystery religions
The third major problem with Wells’ approach concerns his usage of the ancient mystery religions to explain the early Christian worship of Jesus. Such a reliance on the development of legends was a popular thesis late last century, but has been dismissed today by the majority of researchers, and for good reasons.
The basis for two serious problems with the legend theory has already been mentioned above. Paul’s use of the creed in 1 Corinthians 15:3ff. reveals that the proclamation of Jesus’ death and resurrection was both early and dependent on the reports of eyewitness testimony. Thus an adequate account must be made of the report of reliable witnesses that they actually saw Jesus alive after his death. Pannenberg concludes:
Under such circumstances it is an idle venture to make parallels in the history of religions responsible for the emergence of the primitive Christian message about Jesus’ resurrection.14
In other words, that it was Paul and the other apostles who had these actual experiences rules out legend as the cause for the resurrection, since the original teaching concerning Jesus’ appearances is based on real eyewitness experiences of something that was seen and not on later legends. These experiences require an adequate explanation.
Even Otto Pfleiderer, an advocate of the mythical thesis almost one hundred years ago, agrees here. He points out that myths cannot provide the direct cause for the resurrection appearances to the disciples, for these occurrences were real experiences linked to historical facts and not legendary parallels.15
Other problems also abound with this legendary thesis, examples of which can only be briefly mentioned here. It is common for the similarities with the mystery religions to be reported without also noting the great differences between them and the origins of Christianity. Again, Pfleiderer acknowledges the validity of this concern.16 For example, Wells notes the pagan mythical deities who were said to have returned to life on the third day, without mentioning those believed to have regained life on the first, second, or fourth days.17
Even more persuasively, there is no known case of a mythical deity in the mystery religions where we have both clear and early evidence that a resurrection was taught prior to the late second century AD, obviously much later than the Christian message. Whether or not the mystery religions borrowed this aspect from Christianity is not the issue. Rather, it would appear fruitless to charge that the earliest believers were inspired by such later teachings.18
Further, the mystery gods were not even historical persons. This is certainly in contrast to the early Christian insistence that its beliefs have solid, factual underpinnings.
Lastly, scholars now realize that there was very little influence from the mystery religions in first century Palestine. Michael Grant notes that this is a major problem with Wells’ thesis: “Judaism was a milieu to which doctrines of the deaths and rebirths of mythical gods seems so entirely foreign that the emergence of such a fabrication from its midst is very hard to credit.”19 Other scholars agree with this assessment.20
4. Late-dating of the Gospels
A fourth major problem in Wells’ thesis is his late-dating of the Gospels, in conjunction with his belief that no New Testament source prior to AD 90 links the death of Jesus with Pilate. Such dates for the Gospels may have been popular in the nineteenth century, but are abandoned today by the vast majority of critical scholars, and for good reason. Although it is not in the scope of this book to take an in-depth look at the dates of the Gospels, most critical scholars date Mark about AD 65–70, and Matthew and Luke about AD 80–90, which is about twenty to twenty-five years earlier than Wells’ dates. John is usually dated at the end of the first century (AD 90-100) rather than in the second century. Some even accept dates earlier than these, but the vast majority of critical scholars differ with Wells’ conclusions.21 Even historians such as Michael Grant accept the earlier dates, again contrary to Wells’ view.22