For what it's worth, I've always worked on the simple solution that he was seen as a trouble maker, which he was to the pharisees, stitched up by them, & Pontius Pilate had him executed to shut them up.
Straightforward stuff.
As for resurrection, surely the simplest explanation would be that he was taken down from the cross before he was dead, maybe in a coma (not an uncommon phenomenon. No shortage of people in the past who appeared to die but recovered. They didnt have the benefit of modern medical science, and any way who would have been checking he was actually dead?), recovered, stuck around for a few days & made himself known to the disciples, then scarpered, quite probably with Mary Magdalene, before the authorities twigged that they'd botched the execution & came looking for him.
All that is perfectly credible without having to resort to miracles, explains what could very easily have happened, and explains stories of his having survived and disappeared overseas with MM.
Why bother with all the miracles stuff & indepth arguments about why was he dying for our sins when there's a perfectly logical explanation? It never occurred to me before until reading your excellent summary that all the talk about him dying for our sins is really rather stupid
Excellent as ever, Tanner.
For what it's worth, I've always worked on the simple solution that he was seen as a trouble maker, which he was to the pharisees, stitched up by them, & Pontius Pilate had him executed to shut them up.
Straightforward stuff.
As for resurrection, surely the simplest explanation would be that he was taken down from the cross before he was dead, maybe in a coma (not an uncommon phenomenon. No shortage of people in the past who appeared to die but recovered. They didnt have the benefit of modern medical science, and any way who would have been checking he was actually dead?), recovered, stuck around for a few days & made himself known to the disciples, then scarpered, quite probably with Mary Magdalene, before the authorities twigged that they'd botched the execution & came looking for him.
All that is perfectly credible without having to resort to miracles, explains what could very easily have happened, and explains stories of his having survived and disappeared overseas with MM.
Why bother with all the miracles stuff & indepth arguments about why was he dying for our sins when there's a perfectly logical explanation? It never occurred to me before until reading your excellent summary that all the talk about him dying for our sins is really rather stupid