Evidence for Jesus's Resurrection

 David Wood, PhD, is a Christian apologist and critical expert on Islam.  Prior to his entertaining channel on YouTube, the only accessible critical source of information on Islam was theReligionOfPeace.com. 

Although in the past Wood spoke mostly about Islam (in order to defend Christianity), he does sometimes speak about Christianity, more so as time goes on.  His most doubtful assertion is that the Resurrection is the best documented historical event.  There is only a single non-Christian contemporary mention of the crucifixion:  by Tacitus.  “Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of ... Pontius Pilatus”.  Tacitus, however, does not say where he learned of this.  Was it from Roman records, or from Christians?   There is no indication that the Romans kept records of their crucifixions.  

Since it is a given that the Resurrection is a Christian belief, then one might think that Wood’s claim could only be true if there was not a single piece of evidence of any other historical event of antiquity.  But he regards the Christian Biblical accounts as evidential.  

Wood does have some reasoning for this, however.  Since up to eleven of the apostles were martyrs, they would not have willingly gone to their deaths for the sake of something they knew to be a lie.

But there are many problems with this.  The logic only holds if the apostles were given the option at the point of the sword to renounce specifically their belief in the resurrection of Jesus.  There is no evidence that this was the case.  

Worthy of note is that there are many other accounts of people being resurrected in the Bible, both in the Old and New Testaments.  

Christians place a lot of emphasis on the Resurrection, even claiming that theirs is the only religion in which it could happen.  The Buddha lived 500 years before Jesus. Listed in the Tipitika (the Three Baskets, the Buddhist bible) are the powers that the Buddha had.  One of the powers he had, that he taught to his advanced students, was the ability to make copies of himself, that is, to appear in more than one place at the same time. Suppose Jesus developed this power by going to India in the missing 18 years in the Bible. (Ages 12 - 29)   They could then crucify a copy, leaving the original intact.  

In the Buddha’s teachings, the Dhamma, however, importance is given to seeing the reality of impermanence.  So such a stunt would have served no purpose to him.