How many apostles saw the risen Jesus: ten, eleven, or the twelve?

‘The twelve’ and ‘the eleven’ were names for the apostolic group, not head-counts of who was in the room, and the Gospels themselves use them that way. Writing of a time after Judas had gone, John still calls Thomas “one of the twelve” (John 20:24). Luke does the same with ‘the eleven’: on Easter evening the Emmaus disciples “found the eleven gathered together” (Luke 24:33), yet John tells us that Thomas was not there, so only ten were present. The longer ending of Mark (16:9–20), which the two oldest complete Greek manuscripts lack, likewise speaks of ‘the eleven’ at a meal (16:14), probably the same gathering.

Paul uses the older title. ‘The twelve’ was what the apostles had been called since Jesus chose them (Mark 3:14), and the name stayed with the group, much as a council keeps its name when a seat is empty or a member is away. Gill and Barnes both explain the names this way. Paul is not claiming that Judas saw the risen Lord, nor that every member was present at every appearance.

Matthias

Some think Paul may include Matthias, who was chosen to replace Judas because he had been with the disciples from the beginning and was a witness of the resurrection (Acts 1:21–26). He could have been present at some of the appearances during the forty days.

‘The eleven’ in some copies

Some early copyists felt the difficulty: the Latin Vulgate and the Greek–Latin Codex Claromontanus read ‘the eleven’ in 1 Corinthians 15:5, as Gill notes. Nearly all Greek manuscripts read ‘the twelve’, which is what Paul wrote.