“Shall we say that Jesus was not really dead, and reviving from the swoon, himself crept from the tomb? This was the hypothesis of Schleiermacher. But not only is it in direct contradiction with the eye-witness testimony (1 Cor. xv. 3; 2 Cor. v. 15; Rom. xiv. 9, et saepe [and often]), which is explicit that Christ died; but it has been felt by all the leaders of skeptical thought to be inadequate as an explanation.”

Early in his career, Warfield produced an essay entitled “The Resurrection of Christ:  A Historical Fact.”  It was written for the The Journal of Christian Philosophy, vol. III., 1884, 305-318.

Here are some of the points raised by Warfield which focus upon the empty tomb—an essential fact of Christianity.  Did the disciples forget where Jesus was buried and went to the wrong tomb?  Where did the body go?  Was it stolen?  Although I’ve addressed Warfield’s comments about the empty tomb, the essay is well-worth reading in its entirety since Warfield also deals with the eyewitness accounts and historical circumstances surrounding the death and resurrection of Jesus.  What follows are selections from Warfield’s response to well-known critical biblical scholars of his day, David Strauss (1808-1874) of the Tübingen School, Friedrich Schleiermacher (1786-1834), the father of Protestant liberalism,and Ernest Renan (1823-1892) who, among other pursuits, was interested in the early development of Christianity.  All three were well-known resurrection skeptics.

Warfield addresses Strauss’s “sorry hypothesis” that the disciples couldn’t remember where Jesus had been buried. 

Is the admitted fact that Christ’s earliest followers were all convinced that he rose from the dead, adequately explained by the supposition that they were the victims of a delusion?  We must remember that the testimony of eye-witnesses declares that Christ rose on the third day; and that we have thus to account for immediate faith.  But, then, there is the dead body of Jesus lying in the grave!  How could the whole body of those men be so deceived in so momentous a matter with the means of testing its truth ready at their hand?  Hence, it is commonly admitted that the grave was now empty.  Strauss alone resorts to the sorry hypothesis that the appearances of the risen Christ were all in Galilee, and that before the forty days which intervened before the disciples returned to Jerusalem had passed, the site of the grave (or dunghill) had been wholly forgotten by friend and foe alike.

Strauss’s argument is easily parried by one simple question.  How was it that Christ’s grave was empty the first Easter?

But, there is that unimpeachable testimony of eye-witnesses that the appearances began on the third day; and the equally assured fact (Rom. vi. 4; 1 Cor. xv. 4), that the body was not thrown on a dunghill but that there was a veritable grave.

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