Evidence Category 3: The Empty Tomb
Skeptic claim:
“The empty tomb story was invented by early Christians.”
Opening Columbo Probe:
“If the disciples invented the empty tomb story, why did their Jewish opponents never once dispute it?”
Why this works
This puts the skeptic in an impossible position. Matthew 28 records that the Jewish authorities bribed soldiers and told them to say the disciples stole the body — which concedes the tomb was empty. You are asking the skeptic to explain silence where there should have been refutation.
Follow-Up Steering Questions
| “Matthew 28:11–15 records that the Jewish leaders’ response to the resurrection was to say the disciples stole the body. What does it tell you that they didn’t say ‘the tomb was never empty’?” |
| “We have six independent attestations of the empty tomb — Mark, Matthew’s M source, Luke’s L source, John, the 1 Corinthians 15 creed, and Acts. Historians consider two or three independent sources unimpeachable. How do you account for six?” |
| “The first witnesses to the empty tomb were women. In first-century Jewish culture, women had no legal standing as witnesses. If you were inventing a story to be believed, why would you choose women as your lead witnesses?” |
| “N.T. Wright points out that in the ancient world, ‘resurrection’ meant one thing — a dead body returning to physical life. Why would the disciples proclaim resurrection if they knew the body was still in the tomb?” |
| “Roman and Jewish authorities had every possible motive to produce Jesus’s body and end the movement immediately. Jerusalem was a small city. The tomb’s location was known. What’s your explanation for why they never produced it?” |
Sample Dialogue
Skeptic: The empty tomb is just something Christians made up to support their belief.
You: That’s worth examining. Here’s something that puzzles me though — if the disciples made up the empty tomb, why did their Jewish opponents never dispute it? The earliest counter-claim we have, in Matthew 28, is that the disciples stole the body. Why say that instead of ‘the tomb was never empty’?
Skeptic: Maybe they didn’t know what to say.
You: But the authorities had every reason to go find the body and produce it. They were in the same city. Joseph of Arimathea — a Sanhedrin member — had provided the tomb. Why would they invent a complicated story about bribery instead of just pointing to the body?
Apologetics Payoff
The enemy concession in Matthew 28 is one of the strongest arguments for the empty tomb — hostile witnesses don’t concede what didn’t happen. The tomb was empty; the only question is why.