Proving The Resurrection By the Minimal Facts Approach

[Randy Carson]

Modern biologists know more about biology, but they aren't any more capable of recognizing a dead body when they see one than Jesus' contemporaries were. In fact, come to think of it, there is one fact recorded in the gospel of John that your modern science can explain...and that proves John was actually telling the truth.

When the Roman soldier pierced Jesus' side, John records:

31 Now it was the day of Preparation, and the next day was to be a special Sabbath. Because the Jewish leaders did not want the bodies left on the crosses during the Sabbath, they asked Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies taken down. 32 The soldiers therefore came and broke the legs of the first man who had been crucified with Jesus, and then those of the other. 33 But when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. 34 Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. 35 The man who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, and he testifies so that you also may believe. 36 These things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled: “Not one of his bones will be broken,” 37 and, as another scripture says, “They will look on the one they have pierced.”

It turns out, this little detail which would have made NO SENSE to John or his readers, is very factual. People in Jesus' day would not have been able to explain why "blood and water" flowed from Jesus' side, but modern medical experts can. Can you?

So, modern science can tell us why that happened to a crucified body...
Could the person relating that detail be drawing from one of the multiple such crucifixions he witnessed?
The killing of a criminal was seen as a sort of a sport, so everyone would go out to see it.... This practice went on until the 1700's, or even 1800's, in Europe.

John was a youth...a teenager. Why would you automatically assume that John saw lots of crucifixions? But more importantly, Jesus' crucifixion was unique. It was more common for the Romans to break the legs so that the person could not raise and lower himself to breathe if they wanted to speed things along. In the absence of this (which was a mercy), crucifixions lasted for days. And that was what made crucifixion such a powerful motivational punishment. But death was by asphyxiation...not by a lance wound.

Jesus was beaten so badly prior to crucifixion (because Pilate did not expect Barrabas to be released), that he was already in very bad shape before reaching Calvary. He died quickly, his legs were not broken, but his side WAS pierced.

Why would John have ever seen this before?