Don't Be Intimidated by Michael Alter's Book on the Resurrection

In 2015, Jewish autodidact Michael J. Alter published a 900+ page "scholarly" critique of the resurrection. Alter explains that the book was the result of many years of research on Jesus' resurrection, sparked by a challenge from a unitarian to investigate the matter. It cites hundreds if not thousands of sources and takes a very skeptical stance on the resurrection. It has been met with glowing reviews, even from Christians, asserting that the book represents the definitive critique of the resurrection. The back cover claims that it "refutes Jesus' purported physical, bodily resurrection". From the size, scope, and scholarly veneer of the text, one might reasonably assume that it succeeds in its task, or at least presents a strong case against the foundation of the Christian faith. In this post, I will argue that this is not the case. I won't offer a full critique of Alter's text but rather a discussion of some of the consistent problems that plague the book. I will also provide a few examples of bewildering takes and the ease with which they can be refuted.

Full disclosure: I have only read half of the book, but the consistency of the terrible argumentation has led me to doubt that the second half of the book suddenly delivers the promised refutation of Jesus' resurrection. I may continue to read it in the future, at which point I may write a follow-up post or add some material in the comments section here.

And of course, I mean no disrespect toward Alter as a person. From what I've seen, he seems like a nice individual. Nevertheless, his work is quite poor, and needs to be called out as such.

Some Preliminary Remarks

The main portion of the book is structured around 113 "issues", each dealing with a specific aspect of Jesus' crucifixion, burial, resurrection, or appearances that Alter deems suspect. Each of these issues is divided into various "contradictions" and "speculations". For example, Issue 2, "The Last Supper as a Passover Meal" contains two contradictions and thirteen speculations, numbered continuously from the beginning of the text. In total, 120 contradictions are asserted. This immediately encourages a healthy skepticism that Alter was able to identify this many disagreements between four versions of just a few chapters of text. This skepticism is confirmed, in fact, upon closer inspection of the contradictions, but that will be discussed later.

My first complaint is the lack of proper editing. Many sentences are worded improperly, containing such lackluster phrasing as, for example, three consecutive synonyms, and sounding more like a grade school paper unimaginatively meeting rhetorical requirements than the work of a competent scholar. While this is not a problem for the quality of the arguments, it does make it harder to take the text seriously.

Throughout the book, Alter relies on unreasonable standards of historiography. He frequently remarks that we don't have "incontrovertible evidentiary proof", or something similar, for a specific proposal, and chalks up any apologetic response to his arguments as "mere speculation", ignoring the difference between blind speculation and plausible conjecture. Furthermore, he gives too much weight to obsolete objections from many decades ago that don't hold up to any scrutiny, and have thus been dropped from modern discourse, such as the claim that Jerusalem lacked palm trees (see here). Similar examples will be given later.

I don't mean to imply that the book is without merit, as there are reasonable objections presented that need to be thoughtfully considered. The value of the book will be discussed near the end of this post. Before that, there are three categories of argumentation of which I want to provide examples: terrible takes, arguments that sound convincing to the casual reader but are easy to refute, and robust arguments that are more compelling than the others, even if they aren't ultimately successful.

Example: Terrible Takes

Many, many of these "terrible takes" can be found throughout the book. I don't want to waste time on the numerous small issues, like when Alter calls William Lane Craig a "fundamentalist". Rather, I want to highlight some larger "contradictions" or "speculations" proposed by Alter that should convince no one. 

For example, in discussion of the Johannine burial account, Alter comments, "Perhaps the author of John wrote part or all of his burial account based on Gamaliel, that is, a copycat attempting one upmanship. The similarities are striking: ..." The similarities (listed in Table 23) are as follows: both Jesus and Gamaliel were "A Jewish leader", "A rabbi (teacher)", buried with 100 (per the KJV, Alter's perplexing translation choice) and 86 pounds of spices, respectively, and they "died during a time under Roman rule." This is a ridiculous parallelism. We have four broad parallels, all of which are already plausible in burial accounts. And the problem is compounded when we note that Jesus being a Jewish "leader", a rabbi, and dying under Roman rule can be established historically on independent grounds. Thus, the only relevant similarity is that both individuals were buried with spices (a common practice), and the amounts of spices don't line up. To claim that this is sufficient evidence to show literary dependence between the accounts is absurd.

Another example from Alter's discussion of the burial accounts is where he suggests that Luke and Acts might have different authors. The following excerpt is found in Contradiction #42. 

"The burial narrative of the writer of the Gospel of Luke is assumed also to be the author of Acts [sic], yet he records conflicting accounts. Luke 23:52-53 declares that Joseph alone buried Jesus: 'This man went unto Pilate and begged the body of Jesus. And he took it down, and wrapped it in linen, and laid it in a sepulchre that was hewn in stone, wherein never man before was laid.'... 

"To the contrary, Acts 13:29 records the word they (plural), referring to those who had culpability, who had participated in Jesus' guilty verdict and execution and who had also assisted in his burial: 'And when they had fulfilled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree, and laid him in a sepulchre.' In his preface, Luke claims to have investigated all the sources of his day. Yet the narrative in Acts contradicts Luke. How then could these works be by the same person?"

Where does Luke say that only Joseph of Arimathea took place in the burial? He doesn't. It's as simple as that. The Gospel of John records that Nicodemus helped, and there may have been others. Reading contradictions into the text where there are none is a frequent tendency throughout the book.

But more can be said. Let's look at the context in Acts 13.27-29: "For those who live in Jerusalem, and their rulers, recognizing neither Him nor the declarations of the prophets which are read every Sabbath, fulfilled these by condemning Him. And though they found no grounds for putting Him to death, they asked Pilate that He be executed. When they had carried out everything that was written concerning Him, they took Him down from the cross and laid Him in a tomb."

If we adopt Alter's hyper-literalism, we must conclude that Luke thinks everyone who lives in Jerusalem participated in the burial of Jesus, as well as in removing him from the cross. More likely, Luke is probably using the law of agency, and referring to "those who live in Jerusalem", specifically the Jews who wanted to crucify Jesus, as the group responsible for everything. Thus, everything accomplished by them or through their agency, such as the burial of Jesus, is attributed to them. The only way you get a contradiction here is to employ a ridiculous hermeneutic.

By employing this hermeneutic, Alter ends up suggesting that Luke and Acts may have different authors, which is extremely unlikely. The radical skepticism required to assert that two volumes with the same writing style, addressed to the same person, with the second referring to the first as "the first volume" and continuing its story, were written by different authors, would render unknowable most of ancient history.

I wish I could say that these strange takes were the exception, but unfortunately, they are extremely prevalent throughout the book. A good editor could have removed them and made the book far shorter than it is now.

Example: Sounds Convincing but Doesn't Hold Up

The next category of objections in Alter's book are those that sound convincing when first reading them but quickly unravel under minimal scrutiny. This is often due to misrepresenting or cherry-picking different Bible verses. It serves as a reminder that whenever anyone, Christian or not, cites source material, it is always worth looking it up. It's easy to note, mindlessly, that a scholar has a few references to support their case, and thereby assume that they've sufficiently established their thesis. This is far from the truth.

This specific example is from the beginning of the book, under Topic 10. Alter claims "When read chronologically, the gospel narratives exemplify continual enhancement." He gives two examples; the first of which, pertaining to the women watching Jesus' crucifixion and burial, will be discussed here. Here are the relevant texts for ease of reference:

Mark:

Mark 15.40-41: "There were also women watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joses, and Salome. In Galilee these women followed him and took care of him. Many other women had come up with him to Jerusalem."

Mark 15.46-47: "After he bought some linen cloth, Joseph took him down and wrapped him in the linen. Then he laid him in a tomb cut out of the rock and rolled a stone against the entrance to the tomb. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses were watching where he was laid."

Matthew:

Matthew 27.55-56: "Many women who had followed Jesus from Galilee and looked after him were there, watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of Zebedee’s sons."

Matthew 27.59-61: "So Joseph took the body, wrapped it in clean, fine linen, and placed it in his new tomb, which he had cut into the rock. He left after rolling a great stone against the entrance of the tomb. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were seated there, facing the tomb."

Luke:

Luke 23.49: "But all who knew him, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things."

Luke 23.55: "The women who had come with him from Galilee followed along and observed the tomb and how his body was placed. Then they returned and prepared spices and perfumes. And they rested on the Sabbath according to the commandment."

John:

John 19.25-27 "Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple he loved standing there, he said to his mother, 'Woman, here is your son.' Then he said to the disciple, 'Here is your mother.' And from that hour the disciple took her into his home."

Alter notes that Mark merely says the women were watching, Matthew reports this as well as that they were facing the tomb, and Luke reports these in addition to saying that the women beheld "how his body was placed". John adds in the scene with Mary at the foot of the cross. This is supposed to demonstrate a legendary development. However, it's remarkably easy to make anything look like a developing legend by cherry-picking details (Bart Ehrman does this too. See Lydia McGrew's discussion here). Reading the entire texts gives a much fuller picture:

Mark:

• Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the younger and Joses and Salome see the crucifixion. Mark spends slightly more time discussing them than later accounts; only he mentions Jerusalem.
• Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses see the burial.
• The women see where Jesus was laid.

Matthew:

• "Many women", including Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of Zebedee’s sons see the crucifixion. A few less words are written about it than Mark. No mention of Jerusalem.
• Mary Magdalene and the other Mary see the burial.
• The women are said to be seated there, facing the tomb. No mention of what they see.

Luke:

• A group of unnamed women see the crucifixion. Even less time is spent discussing them (progressive exaggeration is going backwards!).
• A group of unnamed women see the burial.
• They see his tomb and how the body was placed. There is no mention of where they are in relation to the tomb.
• The women obtain spices.

John:

• Longer conversation with the women at the cross (Jesus' mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.)
• No mention of women observing the burial.

When all the accounts are lined up, we have instances of both exaggeration and contraction. Some notable examples of contraction are that the women in Luke's accounts are unnamed: this is unexpected on the hypothesis of progressive exaggeration. Also in Luke, we aren't told how close the women are in relation to the tomb, though this information is supplied in the previous accounts. In John's Gospel, the women drop completely out of the burial account. Any other examples of apparent exaggeration can be accounted for by mere coincidence—with enough details distributed randomly across four accounts, some will invariably line up randomly as if to suggest progressive exaggeration.

An individual merely reading through Alter's summary of the accounts could well be convinced that progressive exaggeration exists across them all. All it takes is a glance at the source material to defuse the objection.

The Better Objections

Gasping for breath beneath the weight of all the filler are stronger objections that should be taken seriously. This is not to say such objections are insurmountable but rather that responses to them require more thought to devise. Dr. Timothy McGrew responds to three such objections here, here, and here. Another example is the timing of the crucifixion in John's Gospel, an objection which I have discussed here.

The Value of the Book

Despite the poor quality of much of the book, it is not without value. Alter has done a herculean feat in compiling so many skeptical objections into one place, providing a great reference work for looking up various objections, good and bad, to the passion and resurrection narratives. The book is meticulously sourced and is thus a good starting point for further research. It raises many issues that are worth thinking about. Thus, I am not saying you shouldn't read the book—I'm merely saying that you shouldn't be intimidated by it. Despite its hundreds of pages and thousands of footnotes, The Resurrection: A Critical Inquiry is no insuperable challenge to the Christian faith.