The Miracle Claims of the Apostles

According to 1 Corinthians 15:11, Paul wrote, “I preach what they [the other apostles] preach” (Jerusalem Bible). If we’re going by that translation, it makes it sound like all of the other apostles would agree with what Paul had written. On the other hand, he didn’t apparently say, “They preach what I preach”. There’s a difference, but it probably doesn’t matter. Does preaching by itself constitute evidence for the miraculous? Concerning miracles, Bart Ehrman observed that “these Christian apologists almost never consider the ‘evidence’ for other miracles from the past that have comparable—or even better—evidence to support them: for example, dozens of Roman senators claimed that King Romulus was snatched up into heaven from their midst; and many thousands of committed Roman Catholics can attest that the Blessed Virgin Mary has appeared to them, alive” (How Jesus Became God, HarperOne, 2015, 143 & 144). If we’re dealing with a miracle, one has to wonder why the strongest contenders couldn’t get even a mention in any other New Testament document. The appearance to the twelve sounds pretty miraculous, but it’s not actually mentioned anywhere else. As Willi Marxsen explained, “It is worth noticing that Paul speaks of the twelve, although according to the Gospels it can only have been the eleven” (The Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth, Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970, 82). Because Paul only mentioned “the twelve” once, we don’t actually know who they are. You may think we at least know that Peter was one of them, but consider the following: “It is a much discussed question (and one on which there is still no consensus of opinion) whether the group of the twelve goes back to the lifetime of Jesus or whether it only came into being in the early church” (Ibid, 93). The appearance to all of the apostles seems to be reporting a group appearance, but Marxsen could still ask, “were there individual appearances which have been added together, so to speak, and so described as the appearance to all the apostles?” (Ibid, 94). If we are dealing with extraordinary claims, then why are later Christians so oblivious about them? It’s a mystery: “if they were known, were they thought to have been later appearances? But Luke, at least, would surely have mentioned them in the Acts of the Apostles. For the time being we are unable to account for the silence” (Ibid, 82). Peter also was evidently preaching verse 3 – 8 since he was an apostle (Galatians 1:18 & 19). In fact, the appearance to Peter is the only tradition that almost certainly is not late. The other traditions were all being preached by 55 A.D. The Christian church existed at least three years before Paul met Peter (Galatians 1:18). It could’ve existed for seven years, according to a somewhat conservative scholar (C. H. Dodd, The Founder of Christianity, New York: MacMillan, 1970, 168). Regardless, Paul was saying that the other appearances happened before the appearance to him. The traditions, however, don’t necessarily have to be early, and, as mentioned, the documents we have are hard to explain if we assume that all of the appearance traditions are early. All other things being equal, late claims are not as trustworthy as ones made immediately after the events.