Was Jesus Burried?: A response to Robert B. Stewart's Response to John Dominic Crossan and Bart Ehrman
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John Dominic Crossan, an Irish scholar and historian, in his book Who Killed Jesus? argues that Jesus was not buried but eaten by dogs. This opinion was and is very unpopular but has somewhat recently been adopted (to an extent) by the historian Bart Ehrman in his book How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation Of A Jewish Preacher From Galilee. Ehrman holds based on Roman crucifixion accounts that Jesus was likely not buried, but rather remained on the cross. This article will not make the positive case for Ehrman or Crossan's view. Rather this article will address a third work written by Robert B. Stewart, a theologian and philosopher. In the book New Testament Texts and the Roman World: A Festschrift in Honor of Gerald L. Stevens for His Life and Work as Professor of New Testament and Greek, and Minister of the Gospel, Dr. Stewart writes the chapter, “Was Jesus Buried? A Response to John Dominic Crossan and Bart Ehrman” which is available on Google Books here
This isn’t Dr. Stewart and Dr. Ehrman’s first “rumble” with Bart Ehrman. Dr. Stewart wrote the introduction to the book When Did Jesus Become God?: A Christological Debate and the book Can We Trust the Bible on the Historical Jesus?. Both are transcriptions of Dr. Ehrman’s debates with Christian scholars (Michael F. Bird, and Craig Evans respectively). I have only read the former book. Stewart’s introduction does a good job of laying the groundwork for debate.
In this chapter, Dr. Stewart isn’t just laying the groundwork but rather going on the attack. He will go against both Dr. Crossan and Ehrman to prove Jesus wasn’t buried (with an emphasis on the arguments of Ehrman). However, in my view, Dr. Stewart’s arguments don’t hold up. This article will go through why
First, though, I wanna acknowledge that a weird tone is taken by Dr. Stewart. There are some cheap shots taken against the persons of Dr. Ehrman and Dr. Crossan that do not benefit Dr. Stewart’s arguments at all. On page 19 Stewart attacks Crossan’s religiosity calling Crossan:
“A very unusual Catholic (which means he denies - or redefines - almost every Orthodox Catholic belief_”
Dr. Stewart goes out of his way to attack Crossan’s religiosity despite it having nothing to do with Crossan’s argument. He makes a similar comment against Dr. Ehrman.
“ Ehrman is a master of making red herrings appear to be crucial issues. The burial of Jesus serves as an example. The historian has data for multiple sources (So satisfying the criterion of multiple attestation) That Jesus was buried, But Ehrman wants his readers to think that what those multiple sources testify to is not true unless Paul mentions Joseph or the women in the Creed we find in 1 Cor. 15”
Painting Ehrman as some deceptive master although not as bad as attacking someone's religiosity is strange to do. It's especially strange because aside from a note this is the last paragraph in this chapter. Instead of concluding with the case made, Stewart decides to conclude with an insult.
In terms of the historical arguments, Dr. Stewart starts his article by discussing an argument Dr. Ehrman makes relating to a Creed in 1 Corinthians. To understand why I disagree with Dr. Stewart's argument you have to first understand Dr. Ehrman's argument and to understand that you have to understand a bit about Paul’s literary style.
Paul was not the first Christian, but rather just the first Christian whose writings we have. Therefore when Paul began to write there were already some Christian ideas in circulation. We see in Paul that he draws on some of these. Specifically, Paul draws on pre-literary hymns and creeds. These have a more structured formula, unlike the rest of Paul’s writings. We see this in 1 Cor. 15:
“that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures and that he was buried and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures and that he appeared to Cephas,”
The format of each stanza is as follows: a. Jesus did an action, b. clarification on that action, c. in accordance with the scriptures and d. Action related to the first. But Ehrman notes that stanza 2 seems to have an extra clause stating someone associated with the second action. This asymmetry could be fixed by adding a reference to Joseph of Arimithea but Paul doesn’t do this, nor does the hymn/creeds author. Ehrman takes this as evidence Paul didn’t know of Joseph of Arimithea and therefore was not aware of an in-depth burial account.
Stewart first notes that creeds by their nature are short and don’t include all details. This is true. However, creeds by their nature are also poetic. If their sole goal was to be short lines like “in accordance with the scriptures” wouldn’t be repeated.
Stewart then appeals to the purpose of this creed, to show Paul’s gospel is the same as others and state the essentials of the gospels. However, who buried Jesus has no bearing on this. Therefore it makes sense for Paul to leave Joseph out.
This argument doesn’t hold water though. If Paul was leaving out things that didn’t help his case or weren’t essential he wouldn’t need to mention the resurrection at all he would leave out the fact that Jesus was buried to begin with. Stewart writes:
“Ehrman notes the ease with which Paul could have mentioned Joseph and asks rhetorically why he does not. The issue, however, is not how easy it would have been for Paul to include Joseph but rather the reason that he would need to include Joseph. How would it make his case stronger? Nobody in Corinth doubted that Jesus had been buried, whether they knew who buried him or not (they very well may not have known”
The answer is the reason Paul would need to include Joseph is to make the format work. And as to “How would it make his case stronger?” it wouldn’t, but Paul can say things for other reasons than making his case wrong. Stewart even admits leaving out Joseph creates a literary issue.
“There is a literary question as to why the creed seems asymmetrical, but that is a separate issue from what the gospel is.“
However while Ehrman gives an answer to this literary issue, Stewart tries to sidestep it by appealing to other matters. This issue affects the burial question because it casts doubt on the extent to which Paul can truly act as a source of the burial account.
Ehrman’s next issue relates to an apparent contradiction in the burial story. It’s written that the whole Jewish council condemned Jesus to death, however suddenly Joseph, a member of the Jewish council, suddenly wants to get the body of Jesus. Stewart replies that the original claim about the Jewish council is hyperbole. I can buy this idea. Stewart also says that Joseph went to get the body of Jesus because of Jewish law requiring that one is not left unburied. I can’t buy this argument. The burial of Jesus already defies Jewish execution practices. Under Jewish law, execution can only be done through stoning, burning, choking, or swords. Therefore if Joseph of Arimithea was trying to follow Jewish law he would’ve also had to stop the crucifixion. Stewart brings a proof from the Mishnah in Sanhedrin that Jews must not allow a body. However, this defense would only work if it was Jewish law dictating the crucifixion. However, it was Roman law in control.
Ehrman’s next two arguments relate to the character of Pontius Pilate (since Pilate was so cruel, he would never give over the body of Christ), and to the character of crucifixion (since crucifixion was so cruel, it would almost never give over the bodies of its victims). Stewart holds that Romans only would burry if they wanted to scare people off from continuing crime. I would argue Romans would want to use the crucifixion of Jesus to scare people. This is because I view Jesus as part of the wider rebellious trend of Jewish apocalypticism. Stewart likely does not. However, it still makes sense that the Romans would want to terrify with the death of Jesus. Surely they would need to scare off the followers of Jesus. However, this is already assuming Stewart’s premise, that Romans only avoided burial if they needed to. But, what is the evidence for this?
Firstly Stewart appeals to archeology mentioning cases like Yohanan Ben Hagkol, a man who appears to be crucified and was buried. The issue is that we do not know when Yohanan Ben Hagkol was buried relative to his crucifixion. It’s possible he was left on the cross for a month (perhaps even many months) and then buried. The same is true for all other archeological examples.
Stewart brings historical and legal examples. Firstly the Digesta, a sixth-century text which claims that victims of death sentences should not be denied to families. Even if they are burned to death, The Digesta requires collecting the ashes. First, note that this doesn’t comment on crucifixion, which was not meant to be your average punishment. Crucifixion was a specifically cruel punishment. Further, The Digesta came far later than the events of the gospel. This is after Christianity became the state religion of Rome. Stewart mentions that this is a compilation of legal practices but that doesn’t mean it is correct about 1st century law. Further, even if we assume the Digesta comments are contemporaneous to Jesus, Stewart gives no reason to prefer his evidence over Ehrman’s evidence. His simply stating another source that contradicts isn’t enough to assume that source is true.
He also mentions Josephus (in his Jewish War) and Philo (in against Flaccus). Neither are applicable. Josephus is comparing the Idumeans in war who don’t bury their victims to the Jews who do. But he does not comment Roman crucifixion. Philo mentions that on the eve of a Roman festival such as the birthday of an emperor, families would receive crucifixion victims. Note that this is an exception and not the rule. Also, note that as Jesus wasn’t killed on the night of a Roman festival so this exception isn’t applicable to our case. Lastly, the proof from Philo actually acts as proof for Ehrman and Crossan’s argument. Philo is saying that the norm is for people to not be buried. The bodies being returned on the eve of a festival is only noteworthy if on other days bodies weren’t returned.
Stewart also brings other prooftexts to show Jews wanted to bury their dead. He brings proof from the scrolls of Qumran, but this is a red herring. What the Jews of Qumran would do has no bearing on what the Roman officials of Jerusalem would do.
Stewart also responds to the idea that Pontius Pilate was too cruel to allow a proper burial. He brings a case where Pilate changed practice because of the Jews's petition. However, this only happened because they petitioned the emperor. It’s not enough proof to show Pilate would defy Roman practices for Joseph of Arimathea.
Thus Stewart’s response as a whole does not hold up. His evidence is non-applicable and even if it was applicable Stewart does not address any of the sources brought by Ehrman or Crossan to show that Romans didn’t bury crucifixion victims.
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