Empty Tombs?

[lemonpie]

I've been wondering about this. Were all of the righteous believers who lived before the time of Christ resurrected when Christ was? If so does that mean that any time we find an old skeleton predating the life of Christ we can be sure that that person was not a faithful member of the church? Interesting to me.

[Nevo]

I've been wondering about this. Were all of the righteous believers who lived before the time of Christ resurrected when Christ was?

That seems doubtful. As the New Testament scholar Dale Allison notes, Matthew 27:52-53 is unlikely to be historical:

"This astounding series of prodigies left no trace in the other Gospels or Acts or Paul or, for that matter, Josephus; and if such marvels really had some basis in fact, they would instantly have become the bedrock of Christian apologetics, especially as the text speaks of many graves and many witnesses. But all we have is Matthew's two and a half verses, written sixty years or so after the crucifixion. Surely, then, if anything in the New Testament is haggadic fiction, this is it."

â?? Dale C. Allison, Jr.,

The Historical Christ and the Theological Jesus

(Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2009), 21.

[LifeOnaPlate]

Perhaps a select few others were raised in contrast with what the account claims. Or perhaps not.

[CV75]

I've been wondering about this. Were all of the righteous believers who lived before the time of Christ resurrected when Christ was? If so does that mean that any time we find an old skeleton predating the life of Christ we can be sure that that person was not a faithful member of the church? Interesting to me.

Only "many" arose: Matt. 27: 52

[Sevenbak]

Only "many" arose: Matt. 27: 52

That's a very good question.

We know the doctrine was important enough that Christ admonished the Nephites for not including the prophecies from Samuel into their record, which they corrected.

What ever happened to the bones of Joseph, which the Isrealites carried out of Egypt? We can only assume they were entered into Joseph's tomb which was later built, but when did the bones disappear? They are certainly not there now.

On a related note, John had his head back when he gave Joseph and Oliver the Priesthood.

[volgadon]

And I would assume that it was those righteous who believed in Christ.

[lemonpie]

Thanks for the great replies. I don't remember where I was taught that "all" of the righteous before Christ were resurrected at that time. 3 Nephi 23:9 is definitely similar to the Matthew verses, so even if the Matthew is not authentic it still seems that there were "many saints who should arise". I suppose if I saw 20 people that had risen that would seem like "many" to me so I'm not sure what to think about it.

That is interesting about Joseph's tomb.

[Jigglysaint]

This video should explain everything:

Edit: Whoops, got my "e's" and "b's" mixed up.

[Nevo]

I would just point out that if Matthew 27:52-53 is not historical, then neither are 3 Nephi 23:9 and Helaman 14:25 likely to be historical.

The spectacle of "many" dead Saints appearing to "many" people in Jerusalemâ??having had their tombs broken open in the earthquake at Jesus' death and then having waited in their tombs, or at least outside of Jerusalem, until Easter Sundayâ??presumably would have left some trace in historical sources apart from Matthew's Gospel.

[lemonpie]

Jigglysaint - I always loved Castlevania.

Nevo - My opinion is that the occurrence in the Book of Mormon adds credibility to the Matthew account.

[Sevenbak]

Jigglysaint - I always loved Castlevania.

Nevo - My opinion is that the occurrence in the Book of Mormon adds credibility to the Matthew account.

Agreed. Jesus was fulfilling the law of witnesses when he told Nephi to include it.

[Nevo]

Nevo - My opinion is that the occurrence in the Book of Mormon adds credibility to the Matthew account.

My opinion is that the Book of Mormon accounts are based on the Matthew account, which is "a theological interpretation of the import of the death of Jesus . . . in the language and imagery of apocalyptic" (R. E. Brown, The Death of the Messiah, 1133). As historicized apocalyptic, it was not meant to be understood literally. To do so (as the Book of Mormon does) is to misunderstand the symbolism of Matthew's imagery and the literary genre from which it is derived.

Fortunately we LDS don't have a dogmatic view of the inerrancy of the Book of Mormon, which (as Urloony aptly observed on another thread) "seriously hampers any honest view of ancient text and culture."

[volgadon]

But the BoM writers did not have access to Matthew's account, so if its accounts are based on Matthew's, that would point to it being fake.

[Nevo]