The People v.
The Claims of Matthew 28:6
The research shows that this passage raises real questions. The court will hear the strongest reasonable challenge first. Then the defense will answer it. No verdict will be handed to you.
← RETURN TO THE EVIDENCE ROOMWhat must be examined?
1Jesus was no longer in the tomb where he had been buried.
2Jesus had been raised from the dead.
3The resurrection fulfilled what Jesus had earlier said would happen.
4The empty burial place was presented as something the women could inspect.
The Prosecution
The strongest reasonable challenges are presented first. The purpose is to give the opposing case a fair hearing.
Historical Critic
Matthew was written decades after the time of Jesus. The prosecution can argue that the account reflects the faith of later Christians as well as memories of earlier events. The Gospel gives us an ancient claim about the resurrection, but it is not a modern eyewitness transcript.
Comparative Gospel Scholar
All four Gospels report the resurrection, but they differ in details such as who arrives at the tomb, how many heavenly messengers appear, and the order of later appearances. A critic can argue that these differences make it harder to reconstruct every event with certainty.
Historical Method Witness
A resurrection is a supernatural claim. Historians can examine the death of Jesus, the early belief that he rose, the empty-tomb traditions, and reported appearances. Historical methods alone cannot repeat the event or test it in the same way as an ordinary physical event.
Alternative-Explanation Witness
A critic can ask whether grief experiences, mistaken conclusions, story development, removal of the body, or other natural explanations could account for some of the evidence. Each alternative has its own questions, but the prosecution does not have to accept a miracle as the only possible explanation.
The Defense
The defense now answers those challenges using the strongest support the available evidence reasonably allows.
Early-Christian-History Witness
Belief in Jesus' resurrection appears very early in Christian sources. Paul's first letter to the Corinthians was written before the Gospels and preserves a tradition that Jesus died, was buried, was raised, and appeared to followers. The defense argues that the resurrection belief was not invented centuries later.
Multiple-Tradition Witness
The four Gospels and Paul's letters come from more than one stream of early Christian tradition. Their details are not identical, but all place Jesus' death and the claim that he was alive again at the center of the story. The defense argues that this agreement needs an explanation.
Textual-Manuscript Witness
Fourth-century manuscripts such as Vaticanus and Sinaiticus preserve Matthew 28, and the central wording of verse 6 is clear. Textual differences at the end of the verse do not erase the statement that Jesus had been raised. This supports the stability of the written claim, though it does not by itself prove the event.
Narrative-Evidence Witness
Matthew does not merely say that followers felt inspired after Jesus died. It presents a tomb that can be inspected, women who receive the announcement, opponents who offer another explanation, and later appearances. The defense argues that the Gospel intends to make a claim about an event, not only a symbol or private spiritual experience.
The Evidence Is Yours.
Matthew 28:6 places a direct claim before the reader: Jesus had been buried, the tomb was found without his body there, and he had been raised. The surviving manuscripts show that this claim is an ancient part of Matthew's Gospel. Other early Christian sources show that resurrection belief began early. At the same time, the Gospel was written decades after the event, the accounts differ in some details, and the central claim involves a miracle. The evidence can establish what early Christians said and believed with much greater confidence than it can force a conclusion about what caused those beliefs. That final judgment belongs to the reader.
The witnesses have been heard.
The arguments have been made.
Faith on Trial does not hand you the verdict.