I No Longer Believe in Jesus’ Resurrection

The evidence presented by Christians is not convincing to me anymore

I was a Christian for more than twenty years. I even went into ministry because I felt God called me into it. I studied my Bible, learned Greek and Hebrew, and all the books on apologetics. I was so sure and convinced that my Christian faith was true, that Jesus indeed rose from the dead.

I believed in Christianity because I thought there was sufficient evidence pointing to the existence of God and Jesus’ resurrection. I thought I was a truth seeker, and I was rationally justified to believe in Jesus. Of course, the act of belief still requires a leap of faith, but I thought Christianity was qualitatively different from other religions, which I considered to be superstitious for lack of evidence.

Now I consider all religions (the major ones anyway) to be superstitious since none of them actually provides solid evidence as grounds for belief. I am still a truth seeker. In fact, it is my persistence in finding out what is true that led to my deconversion.

I used to believe in Jesus’ resurrection because it made sense to me. Now it longer makes sense to me. If there were any changes in me throughout this process, I would say I learned more information over the years.

Christians are usually uncomfortable with the idea of changing their minds. I used to be like that too. I thought holding on to my faith no matter what was a virtue, but my desire to pursue truth eventually superseded that mentality. Now I realize that it is normal, and even normative, that people change their minds when new information comes in.

In a sense, it is arrogant to think that I can get it right the first time I commit to a certain idea. If I can make mistakes that force me to correct myself in other areas of my life, it follows that my decision to get baptized into the Christian faith could also be misguided.

My turning point

The main reason why I started doubting the historicity of Jesus’s resurrection is the realization that I was not treating other religions with the same standard.

Previously, when I assessed other religions’ supernatural claims or doctrines, I would always say there were alternative explanations. People remembering their previous life (confirming reincarnation)? It could be a false memory. They could have read a novel or a book on a historical figure and that memory got twisted. Tens of thousands of people witnessing the Virgin Mary performing the Miracle of the Sun? It could be due to the eye strain from looking at the sun directly for too long. Fortune tellers predicting the future and mediums claiming to be able to communicate with the dead? They are probably just very good at reading people’s body language and familiar with psychology in general.

I did not feel the need to presuppose that the underlying supernatural phenomena involved in those claims were true. I never said to myself, “If reincarnation is true, it is possible people would remember their past lives” or “If dead people are really capable of communication, then some people might be able to talk to them.”

But when I considered miracle claims made by Christianity, I used a different approach. Claiming “if God exists …” was so natural that I did not see anything wrong with it. That magical word “if” gave me the right to think that miracles are normal occurrences so should not be taken as improbable.

One day I thought to myself, “Why don’t I apply the same standard to Christianity?” In the beginning, I refused to accept the inevitable conclusion, but eventually, I had to face it: All the evidence for Jesus’ resurrection is either trivial or irrelevant, if not downright foolish.

Evidence of Jesus’ resurrection falls apart once God’s existence is not presupposed

The apostles (supposed witnesses of resurrected Jesus) were willing to die for their belief? Let’s say that is true (the actual evidence is pretty slim). So what? They could have been tricked by others or by their minds into believing Jesus came back to life. They also could have been lying (and stole the body of Jesus to justify their lies).

Sure, it is rare that people would die for their lies. But it is definitely rarer that people come back to life after they are dead for three days! Furthermore, people lying does not defy the laws of nature. After all, there are a lot of people doing nonsensical things. Just read the newspaper. But resurrection requires breaking the laws of nature. When was the last time an incident like that was scientifically verified? Why should we entertain the idea that miracles did happen when there are alternative naturalistic explanations?

The tomb was empty? So what? Which is more improbable? 1. For some reason, Jesus’ body was never put in the tomb, was retrieved by someone after placement in the tomb, was lost in transportation, or any of the other naturalistic possibilities that could have happened without requiring the laws of nature to be twisted. 2. Jesus defied the laws of nature and rose from the dead. Not only that, he ascended to heaven in a way that his physical body vanished in this physical world. Christians claim that the first option is more improbable. I no longer agree with that assessment. I now think the second option is far more improbable.

I can keep going, dissecting other pieces of supposed evidence, but you get the idea.

The problem with appealing to faith

At the very least, there are uncertainties involved in the events surrounding Jesus’ death. Sure, even if there are naturalistic explanations available, the supernatural explanation could still be the correct one. But we just can’t be sure. If we can’t be sure, why commit to one particular explanation by faith?

Many Christians happily admit that there is no sufficient evidence for Jesus’ resurrection; therefore, they believe it happened out of faith.

In that case, how is the Christian faith different from other forms of superstition?

If that approach is legitimate, how about Muslims using the same approach to claim that Allah is the real God? After all, Muslims also have lots of “insufficient” evidence to hold on to. Would Christians admit that Muslims are also justified to believe in Allah and His prophet Muhammad? No! Christians would say people from other religions have misguided faith. But how can they be sure? Because of their faith in Jesus? That’s a weak argument, to say the least.

Circular reasoning

Some Christians might still ask, “What’s so wrong with using the conditional clause ‘If God exists …’?” It’s because the whole argument of “if God exists, resurrection is possible” commits the fallacy of begging the question. If the whole point of Christians discussing Jesus’ resurrection is to show that their God is real, they should not presuppose that conclusion in their premises. The conditional clause “if God is real” is itself controversial, and must be shown to be true BEFORE one can use it to increase the likelihood that resurrection happens.

If you don’t get it, just consider what is wrong with the statement: “If reincarnation is true, then there is nothing extraordinary about people remembering their previous life, so the alternative explanations such as memory playing tricks on them are less probable.”

I am not suggesting that we presuppose that God does not exist. I am suggesting that we do away with any conditional clause and evaluate miracle claims using what we know as facts. Whether God exists or not, people rising from the dead is so rare that none has been verified scientifically. That’s a fact.

Takeaway

This story discusses one aspect of my mental journey from belief in Jesus’ resurrection to disbelief. If you are a Christian, you don’t have to be convinced by any of the arguments presented here, but if there is one thing I wish you can think about, it is this: Can you really be sure that you made the absolutely right decision years ago when you were converted to Christianity, such that you are comfortable leaving yourself no room to reconsider?

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