First-Century Judaism and Polyphasic Culture: The Resurrection of Jesus

The physical resurrection of Jesus is one of the primary tenets of Christianity. In modern times this doctrine has been questioned with a variety of different approaches. One of those approaches is the assertion that because the Jews in Palestine during the first century were part of a polyphasic culture, the resurrection was only a culturally-approved conceptualization of visionary experiences outside of time and space. This article discusses this position and explains the complications of such an assertion. This includes first defining and elucidating the characteristics of a polyphasic culture and then examining first-century Judaism within that framework. This paper will further argue that the Jews in first-century Palestine distinguished between different types of extraordinary experiences and exhibited high degrees of skepticism when warranted, especially in regards to the resurrection of Christ.