With Easter fast approaching, the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus is on the minds of many Christians.

While it has been a linchpin in Christian theology since the formation of the religion,

Christians, both early and modern, disagree on how it happened, why it happened, and the implications it has for human life after death.

Today, Dr. Bart Ehrman elucidates us all on early debates around the resurrection,

why these debates happened, and what pagan authors thought about the whole thing.

Welcome to Misquoting Jesus with Bart Ehrman,

the only show for a six-time New York York Times bestselling author and world-renowned Bible scholar,

uncovers the many fascinating, little-known facts about the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the rise of Christianity.

I'm your host, Megan Lewis. Let's begin.

Hello everyone and welcome back to misquoting Jesus.

As I said in the introduction, today we are talking about the resurrection of Jesus

and different views in early Christian communities about what it was and what it meant.

We also have details coming up on a new course and about an AMA

with Dan McClellan on his new book. But before all of that, how are you doing today?

Yep, doing pretty well today. We have gorgeous sunshine here in North Carolina and, you know,

this can be a gorgeous part of the world. It's spring and so I'm very much enjoying it. People who have allergies are not enjoying it nearly as much. Lovely. It's cold here. Maryland has this weird thing where you have a warm snap for two weeks and then it just goes right back to winter again. So we're in the middle of second winter.

But the daffodils are out, which is lovely. Oh, very nice. Yeah, no, that's always a good start. And then, you know, it's always fun because the trees bud at different times. And it's just, you know, if you're in a place where you've got trees and flowers, it's fantastic. Oh, it's a good thing. It's a very good thing. Now, for today's topic, like I said, talking about the resurrection. What exactly does resurrection mean in an ancient context?

Scholars often differentiate between resurrection as a category and what we might call is resuscitation.

And so when Christians and Jews before them talk about resurrection,

they were referring to a phenomenon that would happen after a person dies

when they would be brought back to life permanently.

And so a resurrection was not a near-death experience or a resuscitation where somebody's dead,

...