Were the Apostles of Jesus All Martyred?

Episode Outline:
0:00 Did the apostles really die as martyrs?
0:49 Bart and Megan catch up on exams, grading, and Sumerian grammar
3:00 Why martyrdom matters for Christian apologetics
4:32 What “martyr” originally meant
5:53 Jewish martyrdom before Christianity and the Maccabean background
8:48 Why Christians came into conflict with Roman authorities
11:20 How common was Christian martyrdom, really?
13:43 Did some Christians actually seek out martyrdom?
16:53 What sources we have for the fates of the apostles
19:41 What do we actually know about how the apostles died?
24:10 How the tradition grew that all the apostles were martyred
25:42 Peter upside down: legend, symbolism, and what the story really says
32:39 Bart’s Weekly Update: traveling light and sketching a new book
34:09 Listener Q&A: Lucifer, Mary Magdalene, Nero, Mark, and Daniel
48:42 Final summary: martyrdom, legend, and historical uncertainty

Episode Description
One of the claims consistently made by Christian apologists is that the apostles who declared that they themselves had seen Jesus after he had been raised from the dead MUST have been telling the truth -- since they all died for their belief. Someone may die for the truth, but who would die for a lie? And ALL of them? That seems completely implausible. Therefore the disciples really were witnesses to the resurrection. In this episode we consider this claim by examining its unquestioned assumption: is it actually true that the apostles were all martyred for their faith? How do we know? How could we know? In fact, what do we know about martyrdom within Christianity at all in the first two centuries? How often did it occur? And were Christians martyred for saying that Jesus was raised from the dead? In this episode Bart discusses what we can know about early Christian martyrdom -- what sources of information we have and whether they are reliable, issues never even broached by the apologists who raise the issue in the first place.

Also watch these episodes:
Were Peter & Paul Really Martyred? History vs. Legend
Were Peter & Paul Really Martyred? History vs. Legend

Did Jesus Even Exist?
Did Jesus Even Exist?

Did Jesus Predict his Own Death?
Did Jesus Predict his Own Death?

In this episode, Megan asks Bart:

-Why is martyrdom in the history of early Christianity an important topic?

-What do we mean when we talk about someone being martyred? Where does the word come from?

-Were early Jewish martyrs martyred for their faith, or because they wouldn’t follow the laws of the communities they were living in?

-In the Christian tradition, are the early martyrs we see being martyred for their religious customs, or for their personal beliefs?

-How often were people actually martyred?

-Did people ever try to provoke their own martyrdom?

-What sources do we have for the lives of the apostles after the crucifixion of Jesus, and how reliable are they?

-Do we know how any of the apostles died?

-How did this idea of all of them being martyred for their faith come into being?

-Was Peter actually crucified upside down?