James Fodor’s RHBS Hypothesis is a naturalistic framework designed to explain the historical data surrounding the origins of Christianity without appealing to a supernatural resurrection. The acronym stands for Removal (of the body), Hallucinations, Bias (cognitive), and Socialization.
The following is a structured rebuttal to this hypothesis, drawing from common arguments in historical apologetics (e.g., by scholars like Gary Habermas, William Lane Craig, and N.T. Wright).
1. Critique of Removal - The Empty TombThe "Removal" step posits that Jesus' body was not resurrected but simply moved from the tomb—likely by Joseph of Arimathea—to a secondary, permanent burial site. Critics argue this explanation fails on several historical and practical grounds.
A. The Implausibility of Joseph's MotiveThe primary candidate for moving the body in Fodor's theory is Joseph of Arimathea. However, this creates a psychological contradiction:
Pious Jew vs. Sabbath Breaker: Joseph is described as a pious, law-abiding member of the Sanhedrin. Jewish law strictly prohibited handling dead bodies on the Sabbath (which began Friday at sundown). To move the body after the initial burial would require him to either violate the Sabbath or wait until Saturday night/Sunday morning—precisely when the women arrived.
Why Move It? If Joseph gave Jesus an honorable burial in his own new tomb (as the Gospels state), why move him later? The "criminal's graveyard" theory suggests Jesus shouldn't have been in a "honorable" tomb, but if Joseph already took the risk to ask Pilate for the body and bury him honorably, moving him to a shameful pit later makes little sense. It undoes his own act of charity.
If the body was moved by a human agent (Joseph or the Romans), the location of the body would be known to at least one key group.
The Logic of Self-Preservation: The Jewish authorities in Jerusalem were desperate to stop the spread of Christianity, which accused them of murdering the Messiah. If Joseph (a colleague of theirs) had moved the body, he could simply have said, "I moved him to the trench graves south of the city."
The Failure to Exhume: The easiest way to crush the "Resurrection" message would be to produce the corpse. The fact that the High Priest and Sanhedrin never produced a body - and instead resorted to claiming the disciples stole it - strongly implies they did not know where it was.
The Gospel of Matthew (28:11-15) records that the authorities bribed soldiers to say, "His disciples came by night and stole Him away while we slept."
Admission of the Empty Tomb: Apologists argue this lie is historically significant because it contains an implicit admission: The tomb was empty. If the body were still there (or known to be elsewhere), they wouldn't need to invent a theft story.
Inconsistent with Removal: If the authorities (or Joseph) had moved the body officially, the "official story" would simply be "We moved him." The need to invent a theft conspiracy suggests they were genuinely baffled by the missing body.
Moving the body wasn't just a matter of picking it up; it involved significant physical obstacles.
The Stone: Archaeological evidence suggests rolling stones for tombs were massive (often 1-2 tons). Moving one would be noisy and require multiple men, making a "secret" removal highly difficult in a crowded city during Passover.
The Grave Clothes: The Gospel of John (20:6-7) reports the linen wrappings were left lying in the tomb, with the face cloth folded separately. A grave robber or someone moving a body would essentially never unwrap a bloody, spiced corpse before carrying it. They would take the body and the wrappings. The presence of the abandoned linens suggests the body passed through them, not that it was carried out of them.
First-century Jewish burial customs often involved a two-step process: (1) Flesh decays in a tomb, (2) Bones are collected into an ossuary (bone box) a year later.
Too Soon for Ossuaries: Fodor's "Removal" requires an immediate secondary burial (within hours or days). This contradicts Jewish custom. The body would need to decompose for a year before being moved to an ossuary.
No Venerated Tomb: If the disciples secretly knew where the "real" body was (or if Joseph did), that site would likely become a secret shrine. Yet, there is zero historical trace of any tomb of Jesus being venerated other than the empty one.
For the "Removal" theory to work, Joseph of Arimathea (a pious man) must have broken Jewish law to move a body he just honored, hidden it so well that neither the disciples nor his own Sanhedrin colleagues could find it, and then remained silent while a massive religious movement based on a "lie" exploded in his own city - a movement that eventually led to the persecution and death of people he likely knew. Critics find this chain of events psychologically and historically implausible.
2. Critique of Hallucinations - The AppearancesThe "Hallucinations" step of the RHBS hypothesis suggests that the disciples’ belief in the resurrection was sparked by grief-induced hallucinations, which they mistook for the actual presence of Jesus. Critics argue this explanation contradicts both clinical understanding of hallucinations and the specific historical claims of the Gospels.
A. The Implausibility of Shared HallucinationsThe most significant hurdle for the hallucination theory is the claim that groups of people saw Jesus simultaneously.
Hallucinations are Individual: Clinical psychology defines hallucinations as "individual, internal experiences," comparable to dreams. They happen in the mind of a single person.
The Group Dream Analogy: Just as it is impossible for multiple people to fall asleep and share the exact same dream, it is astronomically low for multiple individuals (such as Peter, the Twelve, or the 500) to simultaneously project the same hallucination of Jesus. To explain the group appearances reported in the Gospels, Fodor must posit a mass delusion event that lacks clinical precedent.
The specific nature of the interactions recorded in the Gospels is incompatible with visual or auditory hallucinations.
Multi-Sensory Evidence: The disciples did not just "see" Jesus; the text points out that they reported eating with him, touching his wounds, and holding long conversations. Hallucinations generally do not allow for this kind of sustained, tangible interaction (e.g., watching a figure eat food).
The Legend Defense: To maintain the hallucination theory, Fodor is forced to argue that these specific physical details (like Thomas touching the wounds) are later "legendary embellishments" rather than historical facts. Critics argue this is a circular dismissal of the primary source documents simply because they contradict the naturalistic hypothesis.
While mass hysteria or social delusions can occur, they typically require a specific, highly charged environment. The resurrection appearances do not fit this mold.
No Uniform Pattern: The text highlights that the appearances occurred in widely varying contexts: to different people, both indoors and outdoors, and at different times of day.
Lack of Hysteria Markers: This variance lacks the "uniformity usually seen in contagious social hysteria or shared delusions". A shared delusion typically happens in a controlled, high-pressure setting (like a religious frenzy), not sporadically to different groups in calm settings (like eating breakfast by a lake).
For the Hallucinations theory to work, one must accept a medical anomaly: that multiple people projected the exact same complex hallucination simultaneously, repeatedly, and in diverse settings. Furthermore, one must assume that the specific details of physical contact and conversation in the historical records are fabrications. Critics argue it is more rational to believe the accounts reflect a physical reality than a never document, before or since, series of matching mental projections.
3. Critique of Bias - Cognitive DistortionThe Bias step of the RHBS hypothesis argues that cognitive biases—specifically confirmation bias (seeing what you expect to see) and cognitive dissonance (mental stress from conflicting beliefs)—led the disciples to "reframe" their grief into a belief in the resurrection. Critics argue that this psychological explanation fails when applied to key individuals and the cultural context of the time.
A. The Problem of Hostile Witnesses (Paul)The "Bias" theory assumes that the witnesses had a predisposition to believe Jesus was the Messiah. While this might apply to Peter or John, it completely fails to explain Paul (Saul of Tarsus).
Negative Bias: Paul was not a grieving follower; he was a zealous Pharisee and a violent persecutor of the early church. His "bias" was strongly anti-Christian. He believed Jesus was a false teacher and a heretic cursed by God (Deuteronomy 21:23).
Conversion Against Interest: Confirmation bias reinforces existing beliefs; it does not typically cause a sudden, radical 180-degree turn in a hostile opponent. For Paul to convert, he had to overcome his deep-seated theological training and social standing. The Bias theory cannot account for why a happy, successful persecutor would hallucinate the very person he hated and then dedicate his life to him.
Similar to Paul, James (the brother of Jesus) presents a hurdle for the bias hypothesis.
Prior Skepticism: The Gospels report that during Jesus' ministry, his brothers did not believe in him. In ancient collectivist cultures, it was shameful for a family to reject the eldest son's claims, yet James remained a skeptic.
No "Grief" Motive: Unlike the twelve disciples, James was not a devoted follower who had "left everything" for Jesus. He didn't have the same level of cognitive dissonance (the need to justify a wasted life) that Peter might have had.
Radical Transformation: After the crucifixion, James suddenly becomes a leader of the church and is eventually martyred for his belief in his brother's resurrection. Critics argue the most parsimonious explanation for this change is the one Paul cites in 1 Corinthians 15:7: "Then he appeared to James".
Fodor’s argument relies on the idea that the disciples "invented" the idea of resurrection to cope with Jesus' death. However, this assumes they had the theological categories to do so. Historians argue they did not.
Resurrection was End Times Only: First-century Jews believed in a resurrection, but only as a general event for everyone at the end of history (Daniel 12:2). They had no concept of a single Messiah dying and rising individually in the middle of history.
The Martyr Option: If the disciples were suffering from cognitive dissonance, the culturally natural way to resolve it would be to conclude that Jesus was a martyr (like the Maccabean martyrs) or that his spirit had been vindicated by God.
Alien Theology: To invent the idea that "the Messiah has resurrected bodily now" was to invent a completely new theological category. Critics argue that hallucinations and biases generally project images from one's own culture; they do not create complex new theologies that contradict cultural upbringing. If they were hallucinating, they should have seen Jesus "in heaven" or "in Abraham's bosom" - not walking around on earth with a physical body.
The Bias theory works best for people who already want to believe. However, it crumbles when applied to enemies (Paul) and skeptics (James) who had no desire for the resurrection to be true. Furthermore, it fails to explain why Jewish disciples would hallucinate a type of resurrection (individual, bodily, pre-End Times) that their religion and culture taught them was impossible.
4. Critique of Socialization - Legendary DevelopmentThe "Socialization" step of the RHBS hypothesis argues that after the initial hallucinations, the group dynamics of the early disciples worked to suppress doubt and standardize the resurrection story. Fodor suggests that through conversation and social reinforcement, a messy, confused memory was polished into a consistent narrative of a physical resurrection. Critics argue that the historical timeline and the pressure of persecution make this "legendary development" impossible.
A. The Timeline is Too Short (The Early Creed)The "Socialization" theory relies on the idea that stories change and grow over time (like a game of "telephone"). However, historical evidence suggests the core resurrection narrative was fixed almost immediately.
The 1 Corinthians 15 Creed: The text points to the creed found in 1 Corinthians 15:3-7, which Paul recites. Scholars across the spectrum, including skeptics like Gerd Lüdemann, date this creed to within 3–5 years of the crucifixion.
No Time for Legend: Legends typically require generations to develop, as eyewitnesses must die off before invented details can replace historical memory. The fact that a formalized creed listing specific appearances (to Cephas, the Twelve, the 500) existed almost immediately suggests the story was "locked in" from the start, leaving no window for the gradual "socialization" Fodor describes.
Fodor argues that social reinforcement (the desire to fit in and agree with the group) kept the disciples from questioning the story. Critics argue this ignores the brutal reality of their situation.
Social Reinforcement has Limits: Social pressure is effective in comfortable, insular groups (like modern cults) where agreeing with the leader brings status and safety. It is far less effective when agreeing with the group brings imprisonment, beatings, and death.
The Break Point: If the resurrection were merely a "socially constructed lie" or a fragile exaggeration, the intense pressure of persecution would have cracked it. In high-stakes interrogations or under the threat of execution, "noble lies" usually crumble as individuals seek to save themselves. The fact that none of the key leaders "broke" or confessed that they were making it up suggests they were convinced by a reality they could not deny, rather than a social agreement they felt pressured to uphold.
The Socialization theory assumes the disciples could freely invent or modify the story to make it sound better. However, they were preaching in Jerusalem, where the events happened, surrounded by people who were there.
Correcting the Narrative: The text implies that "historical memory" was still active. If a small group tried to "socialize" a story that Jesus ate fish with them or appeared to 500 people, the living eyewitnesses (both friendly and hostile) served as a check. You cannot "socially reinforce" a fiction when the community around you has the knowledge to falsify it.
For the "Socialization" theory to work, one must believe that a group of frightened people invented a complex theology, formalized it into a creed within months, and then unanimously held to that "social construct" even as they were tortured and killed for it. Critics argue that the Resurrection Hypothesis is the only explanation strong enough to account for this immediate, unshakeable, and life-altering conviction.
Summary: The Perfect Storm ObjectionThe primary weakness of the RHBS hypothesis is that it requires a "conspiracy of unlikely events." For RHBS to work, you need:
Joseph to move the body secretly.
AND multiple disciples to independently hallucinate.
AND a hostile persecutor (Paul) to hallucinate the same figure.
AND a skeptical brother (James) to hallucinate the same figure.
AND a social group to unanimously agree on a theology (bodily resurrection) that contradicted their cultural upbringing.
Here is an expanded analysis of why critics view the RHBS hypothesis as a "conspiracy of unlikely events."
The core argument here is statistical and probabilistic: while a skeptic might argue that one of these events is possible (e.g., a hallucination), the odds of all five occurring in the exact sequence necessary to launch Christianity are vanishingly small.
A. The Improbability of the Secret RemovalFor the first step to work, Joseph of Arimathea (or a similar figure) must act completely out of character.
The Contradiction: He must be pious enough to request the body for proper burial, yet impious enough to violate Sabbath laws and Jewish custom to move it later.
The Perfect Silence: He then has to maintain this secret perfectly, even as the city erupts in chaos. He must be willing to let the disciples (whom he knows are wrong) be persecuted and killed for a lie he could expose with a single sentence. Critics argue that human nature rarely holds secrets this tight when lives are at stake.
The second "storm" factor is the medical impossibility of the disciples' experiences.
Defying Clinical Definitions: Hallucinations are individual mental events, like dreams. For Peter, the Twelve, and the 500 to see the same thing is as unlikely as a whole room of people having the exact same dream at the same time.
Multi-Sensory Coincidence: They didn't just see a figure; they claimed to touch wounds and eat fish. For the RHBS theory to hold, the group must have collectively hallucinated these specific, tangible details simultaneously.
The third factor requires a hostile witness to experience a confirmation bias for a belief he hated.
The Anti-Bias Problem: Paul was a happy, successful persecutor. He had no grief, no cognitive dissonance, and no desire to join the church. It contradicts everything known about how psychology and bias work.
The fourth factor involves James, the skeptical brother of Jesus.
Family Skepticism: James rejected Jesus during his life. He wasn't a follower. Yet, he suddenly became the leader of the church and died for the belief that his brother was God.
The Missing Link: RHBS offers no clear reason for this change. The "Perfect Storm" objection notes that we have to simply assume James had a similar breakdown/hallucination as the disciples, despite having a completely different starting mindset.
Finally, the group had to agree on a theological explanation that made no sense to them culturally.
Inventing a New Category: First-century Jews did not believe in an individual, bodily resurrection before the end of time. If they were hallucinating, they should have seen Jesus as a ghost or a spirit in heaven.
Unanimous Agreement: Instead, this disparate group—fishermen, tax collectors, former enemies, and skeptics—all agreed on a heretical new idea: that the Messiah had bodily risen now. Critics argue that without a physical reality to force this conclusion, the group would have fractured into different interpretations (some saying he was a ghost, others saying he was an angel) rather than holding to a unified, dangerous creed.
The "Perfect Storm" objection essentially appeals to Occam's Razor: Entities should not be multiplied without necessity.
RHBS Hypothesis: Requires five separate, highly improbable psychological and physical anomalies to happen by chance in quick succession.
Resurrection Hypothesis: Posits one single cause (Jesus rose from the dead) that explains all five data points instantly (the tomb was empty because he left; they saw him because he was there; Paul and James converted because they met him).
Critics of Fodor's RHBS Hypothesis conclude that a historical Resurrection is the simpler explanation because it doesn't rely on a chain of increasingly unlikely coincidences. Additionally, it accounts for all these data points (the empty tomb, the conversion of enemies, the origin of the belief) with a single causal agent, rather than relying on a string of unrelated psychological and physical anomalies.
