Episode Transcript
Welcome to faith and science. I'm Doctor John Ashton. One of the interesting things is when we look at the different faiths around the world, the founders of these faiths usually have important burial places.
For example, Muhammad is buried in Saudi Arabia. We know that Buddha was cremated and his ashes are believed to be in several places. But with Jesus, the founder of the christian faith, there's no grave for him.
And the reason for that, of course, is the Bible records that he was resurrected. He spoke to who was resurrected after dying, after being crucified. Now, this is very interesting because, again, the miracle of the resurrection is powerful evidence for the other miracles of the Bible.
And we have a lot of evidence for the resurrection. We have the testimony of many people that saw Jesus afterwards. So one of the arguments against that is that maybe Jesus didn't really die on the cross.
So I'd like to just look at this quickly at some of the medical science behind crucifixion. It's very interesting. So one of the things is that we need to understand that there are probably three major points to consider with regard to crucifixion.
That Jesus had been considerably weakened before being crucified by a number of things that happened. The spikes in Jesus hands and feet weren't what killed Jesus, but there's a quantity of medical literature explaining why it is virtually impossible for him to have survived, to have merely swooned, or as some cynics suggest. So there are a number of events that cause Jesus to be weaker on that day.
Is crucifixion weaker than perhaps the other thieves and the other people had hung with him. And so the other thing is that historians note that Jesus died relatively quickly once nailed to the wood. But this was probably because of blood loss and possibly shock.
And so there's several factors that exacerbated the blood loss. There's the fragile skin following his prayers in the garden of Gethsemane and a particularly furious flogging that he would have received from the, from the roman soldiers. Now, it's interesting.
A forensic reconstruction of Jesus crucifixion indicates that he probably potentially was suffering from hematotrosis. And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly and his sweat was like drops of blood. Now, many readers of the Bible believe that this is either an exaggeration or a supernatural phenomenon.
Hematidrosis is medically explained as the excretion of blood or blood pigments in the sweat as a result of severe anxiety triggered by fear. So it's a medically observed phenomena that occurs and of course, Jesus knew what was coming with all the agony of being and of all the agony of being scourged and tormented on the cross and being forsaken for God, Jesus knew ahead of time that that was before him. And so as a result of this, Jesus skin would have become extremely tender and fragile, which would have made the floggings and so forth, that he subsequently endured even more devastating on his body.
So his skin would have torn more easily once the flogging began, and that would have increased potentially more blood loss than normal, too. And also this stress would have placed a lot of strain on Christ's heart at this time with the, again, convocations there. So we know historically that Jesus would have been struck with a whip made of braided leather thongs with little metal balls woven into them, plus pieces of sharp bone.
And the sufferers, the person being whipped, usually their veins were laid bare and muscles, sinews, and these were all laid open to exposure. And so the objective was not to kill person, but to bring them very, very close to death as possible without killing them. But of course, some people did die from this kind of event.
And so it's not as if Jesus back would have just had some red welts and the skin not merely bleeding, but his flesh was torn. And sometimes the victim's back was so shredded that part of the spine was exposed to these deep cuts. So it was a pretty horrendous thing.
We actually don't know how many lashes Jesus endured. I mean, the jewish limit was 39. But of course, whether or not the roman soldiers followed that law were worried about it, we don't know.
But of course, they were very efficient and effective at doing their job. They were professionals. Another aspect of Christ's experience with being mocked as the king of the Jews would have added to the pain and blood loss was he was made to wear a crown of thorns that cut into his now fragile skin and would have caused more bleeding around the scalp.
He was struck several times on the head, which would have driven the thorns in, further increasing both the bloodshed and pain, of course. And it's interesting that we know from the experience in the emergency room that where doctors often see a lot of bleeding from head wounds, this can lead to excessive, excessive bleeding. The headrooms, from the profuse vasculinity of the sail scalp, we've got so many little blood vessels there.
So from this point of view, we can estimate that even small lacerations, or we know that even small lacerations can cause small lacerations to the head. Can cause considerable bleeding leading to hypothalamo. That's sort of overall blood loss within body or fluid loss within the body, which begin to causes that will cause different organs to shut down.
And then, of course, hypotension, low blood pressure, and of course, these can lead to death. Now, it's interesting that some of the wounds on Jesus back perhaps would have begun to clot already. And so while.
And when he put the robe on him, the blood would have soaked into this. And then, of course, when that was torn off him, would have reopened those rooms again and sort of like carelessly removing a bandage. You know what that's like.
So it was quite horrific, the suffering, but would have all exasperated excessive blood loss. This is one of the important things that we have now, as well as dehydration, the blood loss, the dehydration would have sent Jesus body into shock before, even before the nails were hammered into his wrists. And this additional pain, of course, and shock again reduces the fluid volume in the body.
And so this again exacerbates the trauma that Jesus was going through, these processes. So the shock itself would have added to his pain by causing pericarditis, the inflammation of the sac around the heart that would have caused stabbing pains in the chest. And of course, having gone through all this experience, we now, Jesus was then, we know he was too weak to carry the cross.
So another person carried the cross for him. He was then sort of would have been laid on the cross, you know, pretty rough wood. His back's all open.
Then the nails driven through to his wrists and feet. And the positioning of the person on the cross was designed to create discomfort, of course, with the hand stretched out on a. And the side of the angle of the knees and hips.
And of course, you've got to push against the feet in order to breathe. And so he would have had a lot of trouble breathing, you know, and forcing himself. I understand we have to lift himself up in part of the breeding cycle.
Of course. Later on, of course, a spear was thrust from below, through Christ's organs. They released fluid and blood in.
If he was still alive at that point, which is highly doubtful, the spear would have killed him. And so because we know he would have been barely alive before being hoisted on the cross. So Christ didn't live that long on the cross.
The few hours that he was there, there would have been a lot of information, fluid buildup in his organs and so forth. They could not function properly without proper blood waste removal. So a whole lot of confidence and so eventually, Christ's system shut down.
He would have had cardiac and respiratory arrests due to hypovolomemic and traumatic shock of the crucifixion. So there's powerful medical evidence that Jesus died on the cross. He was definitely dead.
But it's interesting that, it's interesting the gospels don't depict a weak, ailing Jesus displaying jagged, oozing wounds. So they could have recovered on the third day? Not at all. The common complications of hemorrhagic shock include kidney damage, other organ damage, and possibly even gangrene.
And it's interesting before, it's interesting after the cross, that Jesus, the disciples, saw Christ in good health, had holes visible but healed, and he had energy to continue his ministry. And so quite clearly, this was a supernatural miracle that occurred very, very clear there. And there's a lot of evidence for the resurrection as well.
Some people find incredible that christians believe in a risen Lord, but the evidence for his resurrection is substantial and actually is consistent with reason. And this is a very important point. For starters, if we believe that God is the creator, and there's powerful evidence, as I've talked about before, and I explain in my book, for example, evolution, impossible.
There's powerful evidence backed by science that for creation and that evolution is impossible. And these really long ages that we ascribe to things just don't fit the data. Population growth, erosion rates, let alone genomic decay.
So powerful evidence for creation. And so if we believe in a creator, then the idea of the resurrection of a miracle becomes reasonable. The God who created the universe and then life on earth certainly had the power if he chose to resurrect Jesus.
The existence of God doesn't make the resurrection of Jesus inevitable, but only reasonable. But also, the tomb was definitely empty. Even atheist historians accept that fact.
If it were not, the claim about his resurrection would fail from the start, because the existence of his body would be there to destroy any claims. Having risen next, the explanation that his disciples stole the body does not work. The disciples surely couldn't have gotten past the guards.
And even if they had done so and got his body, why were the disciples never arrested for stealing it? Matter of fact, all the opposition Jews had to do was to find the body and force the disciples to release it, and that would have been the end of that. Also, the disciples themselves didn't believe that Jesus was going to be resurrected. They were prepared to bury him.
So it was a total shock that he was resurrected. Also, numerous people testified that they saw the risen Christ. Many, including the disciples, did not believe at first.
And one very solid enemy, of course, was Paul. And he not only claims to have seen the risen Lord, but that this experience changed the whole trajectory of his life. And also, it's a very, very powerful explanation for the rise of the christian church, which was founded by people who claim to have seen the risen Lord.
Why would these people have been willing to die for what they knew? For a lie? Their consistent testimony, both right after his death, as in the book of acts, chapter three, verse 15, for example, and years later, in one Peter, one three provides powerful evidence for his resurrection. When we think of that, Christianity is based on powerful evidence, evidence of hundreds of witnesses at the time that saw the risen Jesus, the disciples and other members of the public. And as well, this is scientific evidence that Jesus must have died at that time.
You've been listening to faith and science, and if you want to re listen to this programme, remember you can google 3ABN Australia and click on the radio button. I'm Doctor John Ashton. Have a great day.
You've been listening to a production of 3ABN Australia radio.
