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Acts 

After Jesus’ death, the disciples were transformed to the point where they endured persecution and even martyrdom. This indicates more than just a claim, they didn’t say it to gain some personal benefit. The comparison can be made before and after his death and their emotional journey. They followed but never really got it, they denied and abandoned him. However, After the resurrection they willingly endangered themselves by publicly proclaiming the risen Christ. We have multiple early sources within the New Testament and from outside of it and the Book of Acts has multiple references to this life change and of their sufferings. We all know at one point Peter, denied his Lord three times, then after Pentecost was willing to be jailed, tortured and beaten. We see this, and the journey of other disciplines in the book of Acts.

Clement of Rome

Clement of Rome also reports such lifestyle change and their sufferings.

Because of envy and jealousy, the greatest and most righteous pillars have been persecuted and contended unto death. Let us set the good apostles before our eyes. Peter. Who because of unrighteous envy endured, not one or two, but many afflictions, and having borne witness went to the due glorious place. Because of envy and rivalries, steadfast Paul pointed to the prize. Seven times chained, exiled, stoned, having become a preacher both in the East and the West, he received honour fitting of his faith, having taught righteousness to the whole world, unto the boundary on which the sun sets; having testified in the presence of the leaders. Thus he was freed from the world and went to the holy place. He became a great example of steadfastness

Clement of Rome, 1st century church leader

Polycarp

In a letter to the church in Philippi, mentioned the “unlimited endurance” the church had seen in Ignatius, Zosimus, Rufus, the apostle Paul, and the rest of the apostles, among others. He added, “

They are in the place due them with the Lord, in association with him also they suffered together. For they did not love the present age. . . .

Polycarp, 1st – 2nd century church leader

Through Polycarp, we know that Paul, other apostles, and other believers suffered for their faith. Polycarp himself would follow their example of strength and conviction in the face of martyrdom. 

Ignatius

He was bishop of the church in Antioch in Syria. While en route to his martyrdom in Rome, about 110 AD, he wrote seven letters, six to churches and one to his friend and colleague, Polycarp. Since the apostles trained Polycarp, Ignatius is certain to have been well acquainted with apostolic teachings. Ignatius recorded the willingness of the disciples to suffer for their beliefs. In his letter to the church in Smyrna where Polycarp was bishop he wrote,

And when [Jesus] came to those with Peter, he said to them: ‘Take, handle me and see that I am not a bodiless demon.’ And immediately they handled him and believed, having known his flesh and blood. Because of this they also despised death; but beyond death they were found.”

Ignatius, 2nd century Church leader

Ignatius said that, having seen the risen Jesus, the disciples were so encouraged that “they also despised death” as had their Master. The Greek word for “despised” is better translated “cared nothing for” or “disregarded.” Not only did they act in a manner that they thought little of dying, but Ignatius adds that “beyond death they were found,” most likely referring to their attitude toward death being proved or demonstrated by their own boldness when the moment of execution actually came. 

Tertullian

He reports the martyrdoms of Peter and Paul: 

That Paul is beheaded has been written in their own blood. And if a heretic wishes his confidence to rest upon a public record, the archives of the empire will speak, as would the stones of Jerusalem. We read the lives of the Caesars: At Rome Nero was the first who stained with blood the rising faith. Then is Peter girt by another, when he is made fast to the cross. Then does Paul obtain a birth suited to Roman citizenship, when in Rome he springs to life again ennobled by martyrdom. 

Tertullian, 2nd – 3rd century church leader

Tertullian states, if you didn’t want to believe him concerning the martyrdoms of some of the apostles, they could find the information in the public records, namely “the lives of the Caesars.” Tertullian says that Peter was crucified and Paul was beheaded under Nero, who was the first emperor to execute Christians. Since Nero was emperor between A.D. 54 and 68, we know that Peter and Paul must have been martyred within that period. It is even more probable that their martyrdoms occurred in 64. In that year, Rome was burned. According to the early second-century Roman historian Tacitus, when the people blamed Nero for the fire, Nero turned the blame on Christians and began a horrible persecution, killing them brutally. 

Believing something is true

The sceptic might object to the disciples honest testimony, “Followers of other religions and causes have willingly suffered and died for their beliefs. Even atheists have willingly died for the cause of communism. This does not mean that their beliefs were true or worthy.” Agreed, but this misses the point: The disciples’ willingness to suffer and die for their beliefs indicates that they certainly regarded those beliefs as true. The case is strong that they did not willfully lie about the appearances of the risen Jesus. Liars make poor martyrs. 

No one questions the sincerity of the Muslim terrorist who blows himself up in a public place or the Buddhist monk who burns himself alive as a political protest. Extreme acts do not validate the truth of their beliefs, but willingness to die indicates that they regarded their beliefs as true. 

Moreover, there is an important difference between the apostle martyrs and those who die for their beliefs today. Modern martyrs act solely out of their trust in beliefs that others have taught them (they inherit, they don’t know them to be true). The apostles died for holding to their own testimony that they had personally seen the risen Jesus (Something they could know whether true or not). Contemporary martyrs die for what they believe to be true. The disciples of Jesus died for what they knew to be either true or false. 

Robert Jenkin in the 17th century illustrated in one of his works the definition of martyrs:

Martyrs are witnesses,… no other religion was ever propagated by witnesses, who had seen, and heard, and been every way conversant in what they witnessed concerning the principles of their Religion; no Religion besides was ever preach’d by men, who, after unalterable Constancy under all Kinds of sufferings, at last died for asserting it, when they must of necessity have known, whether it were true or false, and therefore certainly knew it to be true, or else they would never have suffer’d and died in that manner for it.

Robert Jenkin, Professor

So there’s an important distinction, martyrs who are primary witnesses or there are, like us, receivers of that testimony. The two are not the same, no other religion is propagated by primary witnesses, never mind having a Risen Lord they knew, saw and watched die and then rise again.

Adopted moral codes

It wasn’t just their willingness to suffer, they also took on new codes of conduct. Christianity flourished first amongst the Jews. They abandoned the animal sacrifice system they’ve always known, the binding authority of the Law of Moses that presided over Jerusalem and the Jewish world and most critically a belief in a conquering Messiah who would defeat the Romans. Three example pillars of Jewish life. 

What they adopted was Sunday as their day or gathering, which was traditionally a work day. Some of them continued to observe Sabbath as well. Anytime spent worshipping was time not spent earning money. Losing a workday made an impact, imagine what being paid 4 days a week would do for you overnight to your monthly salary, you’d notice it.  Another adaptive trait of Christianity was Baptism as a new sign of a new covenant. They took this sign of the new covenant which came to supplant the place of circumcision in the Jewish economy. Then there’s communion as an act of remembering of Christ’s death. Every sunday, The Lord’s day, they would celebrate communion with the bread and the wine. You wouldn’t do this unless something astonishing happened, especially as this was formerly a day of work for the Jews. One of the great legal minds of our time Associate Justice of the Supreme Court Antonin Scalia states with these fine words:

It is not irrational to accept the testimony of an eyewitness who had nothing to gain… the [worldly] wise do not believe in the resurrection of the dead. So everything from Easter morning to the ascension had to be made up by the grovelling enthusiasts as part of their plan to get themselves martyred.

Antonin Scalia, Lawyer, Supreme Court

The disciples certainly believed it to be true if they were additionally willing to bring upon themselves a moral code that no one of that era (and many today) would ever dream of.

How do we know they willingly died?

A sceptic may reply, “How do you know that they willingly died for their beliefs? What if they were arrested and executed against their will and perhaps even recanted under torture before they died?” This is a fair question. 

From the early martyrdoms of Stephen and James the brother of John as well as the imprisonments and sufferings of Peter, Paul, and others, the disciples became well aware that publicly proclaiming Jesus as the risen Lord in certain times and places made suffering and, perhaps, martyrdom inevitable. 

Therefore, to continue on this path, fully aware of the probable outcome, was to demonstrate a willingness to endure suffering and martyrdom, regardless of whether these were actually experienced. 

Furthermore, the primary purpose of getting someone to recant under torture is to gain evidence by which to discourage others publicly. Recantation under torture would not necessarily indicate a change in the victim’s mind. Nevertheless, there is no evidence of a recantation being announced. Instead, all the reports testify to steadfast courage during suffering. 

If the news spread that several of the original disciples had recanted, we would expect that Christianity would have been dealt a severe blow. If those in management of a publicly traded company are bailing out, the workers are not going to dump their life savings into company stock. And yet we find early Christians willingly suffering and dying for their beliefs. 

Charles Colson, involved in the watergate scandal in America said of the disciples when comparing: “

I know the resurrection is a fact, and Watergate proved it to me. How? Because 12 men testified they had seen Jesus raised from the dead, then they proclaimed that truth for 40 years, never once denying it. Everyone was beaten, tortured, stoned and put in prison. They would not have endured that if it weren’t true. Watergate embroiled 12 of the most powerful men in the world-and they couldn’t keep a lie for three weeks. You’re telling me 12 apostles could keep a lie for 40 years? Absolutely impossible.”

Charles Colson, Special Counsel, President Nixon

In all, at least seven early sources testify that the original disciples willingly suffered in defense of their beliefs. If we include the sufferings and martyrdoms of Paul and James the brother of Jesus, we have eleven sources.  Our 7 early sources are: Luke; Clement of Rome; Polycarp; Ignatius; Dionysius of Corinth; Tertullian; and Origen. In addition to the seven, there is also Paul, Josephus, Hegesippus, and Clement of Alexandria. 

If the direct witnesses really believed that he rose from the dead, we can dismiss contentions that they stole the body and made up the story. In fact, virtually all scholars agree on that point, whatever their own theological positions.

Scholars on the disciples

After Jesus’ death, the disciples endured persecution, and a number of them experienced martyrdom. The strength of their conviction indicates that they were not just claiming Jesus had appeared to them after rising from the dead. They really believed it. They willingly endangered themselves by publicly proclaiming the risen Christ.

Mike Licona, New testament scholar

Critical agnostic/atheist and media darling Bart Ehrman states on the matter

I don’t doubt at all that some disciples claimed this…Paul, writing about 25 years later, indicates that this is what they claimed, and I don’t think he is making it up.

Bart Ehrman, Textual Critic

It is an “equally secure fact” that Jesus’ disciples “saw him (in what sense is uncertain) after his death…. Thereafter his followers saw him.

E.P. Sanders, Atheist, New Testament scholar,
The Historical Figure of Jesus, p13

Even the highly critical New Testament scholar Rudolf Bultmann agreed that historical criticism can establish

The fact that the first disciples came to believe in the resurrection” and that they thought they had seen the risen Jesus. 

Rudolf Bultmann, Liberal Theologian

It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus’ death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ.

Gerd Lüdemann, Atheist, New Testament scholar

I know in their own terms what they saw was the raised Jesus. That’s what they say and then all the historic evidence we have afterwards attest to their conviction that that’s what they saw. I’m not saying that they really did see the raised Jesus. I wasn’t there. I don’t know what they saw. But I do know that as a historian that they must have seen something.

Paula Fredriksen, Atheist, American Historian

The reason so many say this is due to multiple attestation in the sources mentions and there’s no way to explain the rise of Christianity if this did not happen (regardless of their views on the authors, they are confident they are early documents). Something had to happen to start those who had barely anything creating the world’s largest religion. 

Gary Habermas completed a survey of 1,400 sources published on the resurrection since 1975. Some of the results of the study. There were these conclusions:

1. The disciples really saw something
2. Critics may claim hallucinations but don’t deny that they experienced something they couldn’t explain.

Since the original disciples are making the clam of the resurrection we know this is not the result of myth-making that happens when something is written further away from the original event. The story from the original sources does not change over time. If we have the eyewitness testimonies from the original disciples, we can dismiss the stolen body theory, in fact nearly every single scholar agrees with this fact regardless of their theological position.

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Sources and notes on ‘Disciples saw and believed’

• Sources extracted from Gary Habermas & Michael Licona’s ‘Case for the Resurrection of Jesus’
• ​To the Smyrnaeans 3:2 (author’s translation). 
• ​To the Smyrnaeans, 3:4. 
• ​Kittel and Friedrich, eds., Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, 3:631 – 32. Colin Brown, gen. ed., The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, 4 vols. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1975), 1:461 –62. See also Hebrews 12:2. 
• ​Scorpiace, 15, in Roberts, Donaldson, and Coxe, eds. and trans., The Ante-Nicene Fathers. 
• ​It is uncertain whether “the lives of the Caesars” is the title or the subject matter of a book. This book has either been lost, or Tertullian is referring to the work of Tacitus and is only using it in reference to Nero’s campaign to kill Christians (The Twelve Caesars 15.44). 
• ​Origen, Contra Celsum, 2.56 in Roberts, Donaldson, and Coxe, eds. and trans., The Ante-Nicene Fathers. 
• ​Ibid., 2.77. 
• Origen’s commentary on Genesis, volume 3. This work has been lost but is cited by Eusebius in Ecclesiastical History 3.1. Crucifying victims upside down or in positions other than upright is mentioned by Seneca (Dialogue 6, 20.3) and Josephus (Jewish War 5.449–51). A recent study by a critical historian concluded with the likelihood that Peter was executed between 64 and 68 by Nero. See Michael Grant, Saint Peter: A Biography (New York: Scribner’s, 1994), ch. 13. 
• ​Ecclesiastical History 2.25.8; 3.1. Ben Witherington III sees the manner of Peter’s death reported in John’s gospel (21:18–19): “In the reference to the stretching out of his hands, which is a common metaphor for crucifixion, it is likely that we are being told not only how Peter would die but how Peter did die, some twenty-five to thirty years before this Gospel was published, at least in its present form” (Ben Witherington III, John’s Wisdom: A Commentary on the Fourth Gospel [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1995], 356). 
• ​Ecclesiastical History 2.23. 
• Habermas, Gary R.. The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus (pp. 272-278). Kregel Publications. Kindle Edition. 

Sources on ‘Believing something to be true & willingness’

• Robert Kenkin, Evidence and Certainty of the Christian Religion (1734)
• Charles Colson, “The Paradox of Power,” Power to Change, 
• First Clement 5. From Acts 12 on, a theme of the Acts account is the fortitude of Peter, Paul and others in the midst of persecution and suffering.
• Antonin Scalia, Address to the Mississippi College School of Law, April 9, 1996
• Recantation: Any recantation by the disciples would have provided much ammunition for Christian opponents like Celsus, who wrote strongly against the church in the third quarter of the second century (around 170). Celsus’s work has since been lost, but he is cited frequently and Origen in particular wrote to answer his charges in Contra Celsum (200). Likewise, it would also have provided some powerful arguments for Pliny the Younger, Tacitus, Suetonius, Lucian, first-century Jewish scholars and many others who were critical of Christian claims. For details on these writers and their complaints against Christianity, see Habermas, Historical Jesus, chapter 9.
• Willingness to suffer: There are many statements on the Christians’ willingness to suffer martyrdom that are made by friends and enemies. A selection of these sources might include Shepherd of Hermas (parable 9, section 28; vision 3, section 1, verse 9–2:1; 5:2); Melito of Sardis (cited by Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 4.26.3); Dionysius of Corinth (cited by Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.25.8); Hegesippus (cited by Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 3.32.3; 2.23.18; 4.22.4); Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.25; 5.2.2–3; Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, in his letter to Victor of Rome; Josephus, Antiquities 20.200; and the correspondence of Pliny (10.96–97). The New Testament notes the martyrdoms of Stephen (Acts 7:59–60), James the brother of John (12:2), and Antipas (Rev. 2:13).
• Many sources extracted from “The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, Gary Habermas & Michael Licona,  chapter 3 sources 16-70

Sources on ‘Scholars on the disciples’

• Michael Licona, The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach(Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2010), 366.
• Bart Ehrman, The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the early Christian Writings, p301
• E.P. Sanders, The Historical Figure of Jesus, p13
• Rudolf Bultmann, “New Testament and Mythology,” Mythology,” in Kerygma and Myth, Hans Werner Bartsch, ed.; Reginald H. Fuller, trans. (New York: Harper and Row, 1961), 42; cf. 39. 68.​
• Gerd Lüdemann, What Really Happened to Jesus? A Historical Approach to the Resurrection, John Bowden, trans. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1995), 80. 
• Paula Fredriksen: In an interview by Peter Jennings in The Search for Jesus (American Broadcasting Corp. [ABC], July 2000).
• Gary Habermas survey: See details in Gary R. Habermas, “Resurrection Research from 1975 to the Present: What Are Critical Scholars Saying?” Philosophia Christi, forthcoming.
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