The tomb was empty. Jesus’ body was not inside the tomb.
Before we ask where Jesus’ body goes to, we will have to seriously think about it: was the tomb really empty?
All the four gospels in the Bible tell us that the tomb was empty after Saturday. In fact, the whole New Testament of the Bible affirms that the tomb was empty. The Resurrection of Jesus is in the heart of what early and modern Christians believe. If Jesus’ body is inside the tomb, then there has been no resurrection, and the Christian faith would be “futile”.
Even the enemies of early Christians never doubted that the tomb was empty! In the gospel of Matthew, it was said that the priests and the elders of the Jews gave the guards of the tomb a lot of money and asked them to tell people that Jesus’ disciples stole Jesus’ body at night while they slept. Disregard of whether the disciples really stole Jesus’ body, everyone in the story, whether the priests or the elders, did not question if the tomb was really empty or not. All that they wanted was to cover up the fact that Jesus’ body was not inside the tomb. They agreed that Jesus’ body was not inside the tomb.
No one would argue that there was a huge Christian movement right inside Jerusalem soon after Jesus was crucified at Jerusalem. That is where Christianity started. Jesus’ disciples, in particular Peter, proclaimed bravely that God raised Jesus from the dead as we can read in the book of Acts of the Bible. It is obvious that the priests and the officials of the Jews would not be happy about it. They just killed Jesus’ through the hand of the Romans, now Jesus’ disciples wanted to continue the disturbance. No doubt they wanted to suppress them. The book of Acts record lots of prosecution on Christian from them.
But wait! There is no need to prosecute Jesus’ disciples! Just show everyone Jesus’ dead body in the tomb! Once people saw the body, all rumors about the Resurrection would be gone, and the fire of Christianity would be put off permanently!
No. The priests, the elders, all the high officials in Jerusalem did not do that. There is not the slightest trace of historical records that any persons ever tried to question if Jesus’ tomb was empty or not (at least in the first few centuries A.D.) or show Jesus’ dead body to the public. No one even raise the question of whether Jesus’ tomb was occupied by a dead body or not.
In fact, no one even faked to have found Jesus’ dead body inside the tomb and discredited the preaching of the apostles. Why? I think the best answer is that almost everyone in Jerusalem already knew that the tomb was empty very early on. Any attempt to fake it could not be successful as everyone already knew: the tomb was empty.
Actually, the fact that Jesus’ tomb was empty has been accepted by most people, including critics of Christianity. However, there could be other reasons to explain why the tomb was empty. Perhaps…
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