Þú skalt ekki dæma

Það er oft gripið til frasans "þú skalt ekki dæma" þegar einhverjum finnst það henta sjálfum sér. Lætur stundum eins og hann eða hún er að vísa í orð Krists og fái þannig aukið vægi. 

En þegar maður grípur til þessa frasa í dæmum eins og þessum þá birtist vonandi fáránleiki þeirra. Meigum við ekki kveða upp þann dóm að þetta var rangt?  Það hljóta allir að sjá að það væri bara ógeðslegt að segja "þú skalt ekki dæma" þegar einhver segir að þetta hafi verið hrottaleg árás.

Kennir kannski Biblían að kristnir eiga ekki að dæma?  Að þeir mega ekki segja að eitthvað er rétt eða að eitthvað er rangt?

Fyrra Korintubréf 6
¹Hvernig getur nokkur ykkar, sem á sökótt við annan, fengið af sér að fara með málið fyrir dóm ranglátra en ekki heilagra? ²Eða vitið þið ekki að heilagir eiga að dæma heiminn? Og ef þið eigið að dæma heiminn eruð þið þá óverðugir að dæma í hinum minnstu málum? ³Vitið þið eigi að við eigum að dæma engla? Hvað þá heldur hversdagsleg efni!

Hérna kemur skýrt fram að kristnir eiga að dæma; til hvers annars var Guð að gefa þeim t.d. boðorðin tíu?

Á öðrum stað segir:

Jóhannesarguðspjall 7
²⁴Dæmið ekki eftir útliti, dæmið réttlátan dóm.“ 

En segir Kristur ekki að maður á ekki dæma?  Skoðum aðeins orð Hans í samhengi til að átta okkur á þessu.

Matteusarguðspjall 7
¹Dæmið ekki svo að þér verðið ekki dæmd. ²Því að með þeim dómi, sem þér dæmið, munuð þér dæmd verða og með þeim mæli, sem þér mælið, mun yður mælt verða. ³Hví sér þú flísina í auga bróður þíns en tekur ekki eftir bjálkanum í auga þínu? ⁴Eða hvernig fær þú sagt við bróður þinn: Lát mig draga flísina úr auga þér? Og þó er bjálki í auga þínu. ⁵Hræsnari, drag fyrst bjálkann úr auga þér og þá sérðu glöggt til að draga flísina úr auga bróður þíns.
⁶Gefið ekki hundum það sem heilagt er og kastið eigi perlum yðar fyrir svín. Þau mundu troða þær undir fótum og þeir snúa sér við og rífa yður í sig

⁷Biðjið og yður mun gefast, leitið og þér munuð finna, knýið á og fyrir yður mun upp lokið verða. ⁸Því að hver sá öðlast sem biður, sá finnur sem leitar, og fyrir þeim sem á knýr mun upp lokið verða

Tökum eftir því að það á samt að fjarlægja flísina í auga bróðursins en aðal vandamálið er bjálkin í auga þess sem er að reyna að fjarlægja flísina. Kristur er hérna ekki að tala um hvort að kristnir mega ekki segja hvað er rétt og hvað er rangt; hvað er í samræmi við Biblíuna og hvað er ekki í samræmi við Biblíuna. Hann er að benda á að ef þú ert að dæma þá mun fólk dæma þig á sama hátt. Ef þú ert sekur þá sér fólk þig sem hræsnara og þá ertu eins og maðar með bjálka í auganu að reyna að hjálpa einhverjum sem er með flís í auganu. 

Einn predikari setti þetta í samhengi við sjöunda vers og benti á að Kristur er þarna að benda á betri leið til að nálgast fólk. Í staðinn fyrir að nálgast það með dómi að nálgast það með beiðni. Í staðinn fyrir að segja við maka sinn að hann er svo latur og nennir aldrei að vaska upp, segja þá frekar "viltu vaska upp fyrir mig".  

Þessi frasi "þú skalt ekki dæma"  er því miður misnotaður. Sumir kristnir nota hann t.d. þegar annar kristinn bendir á hvað Biblían segir um einhver málefni. Hið fyndna er að þegar viðkomandi segir að það er rangt að dæma aðra þá er hann sjálfur að fella dóm svo þetta er augljós rökvilla.

Nei, Biblían er skýr að við eigum að halda á lofti þeim sannleika sem Biblían boðar. Maður á ekki að vera að dæma einstaklinga heldur að dæma kenningar og verk samkvæmt orði Guðs.

Jakobsbréfið 5
¹⁹Bræður mínir og systur ef einhver meðal ykkar villist frá sannleikanum og einhver snýr honum aftur, ²⁰þá viti hann að hver sem snýr syndara frá villu vegar hans mun frelsa sálu hans frá dauða og bæta fyrir fjölda synda. 

Í ljósi þessa þá fordæmi ég þessa árás en ásamt því vona að þessar stelpur finni alvöru iðrun og geri þetta aldrei aftur; biðji um fyrirgefningu og finni eilíft líf. 

 

Fjölskyldan er í sjokki

Dawkins vs Lennox

Langar að benda á rökræður milli John Lennox og Richard Dawkins sem báðir eru prófessorar við Oxford.  Myndband af þessum rökræðum er að finna hérna: http://www.dawkinslennoxdebate.com/

Það sem þeir fara í gegnum eru eftirfarandi atriði sem Richard Dawkins kemur með í bók sinni "The God delusion". 

1. Hvort að trú er blind og án röksemda og gagna en vísindi byggjast á gögnum og rökum.
2. Hvort að vísindi og trú eru á sama sviði; hvort að vísindi glímir við raunveruleikan en trú glímir við allt hitt.
3. Hvort að vísindi styðji guðleysi eða hvort að vísindi styðji tilvist Guðs.
4. Hönnun er dauð því annars þarftu að útskýra hver hannaði hönnuðinn.
5. Trú er hættuleg. Eins og Dawkins segir "Ímyndið ykkur enga talibana að sprengja upp fornar styttur, enga ofsatrúa hópa taka af lífi fólk fyrir guðlast..."  
6. Enginn þarf á Guði að halda til að hafa gott siðferði.
7. Gagnrýni á umfjöllun Dawkins á Biblíunni.

Sérhver kristinn einstaklingur eða guðleysingi ætti að horfa á því það er heilmikið hægt að læra af því að hlusta á þessa fróðu menn rökræða þessa hluti.

 

Shrek og Vitræn hönnun

Höfundur Shreks var maður að nafni William Steig  og gerði hann nokkrar fleiri bækur sem urðu frægar eins og Sylvester and the Magic Pebble og The Amazing Bone.  Það sem færri vita er að hann gerði líka barna bók um Vitræna hönnun sem heitir Yellow & Pink.  Hún fjallar ekki um Vitræna hönnun að því leiti að hún er ekki að fjalla um vísindalegu hliðar Vitrænnar hönnunar eins og "specified complexity" eða "irreducible complexity" heldur aðeins spurninguna hvort eitthvað við vorum hönnuð eða hvort að náttúrulegir ferlar bjuggu okkur til.  

Fjallað er um þá spurningu með sögu um félagana Yellow og Pink, þar sem þeir rökræða hver það var sem bjó þá til en þeir eru báðir dúkkur.

Ég hef ekki lesið þessa bók en hefði gaman af því að komast yfir eintak.  Mæli með því að kristnir foreldrar kaupi sér eintak þar sem það er virkilegur skortur á bókum sem kynna þetta efni fyrir krökkum. Krakkar eru þegar að kafna í guðleysis darwiniskum áróðri, bæði í sjónvarpinu og skólanum og ef kristnir berjast ekkert á móti þá hverfa börnin þeirra úr kirkjunni; eitthvað sem er þegar faraldur í kirkjunni í dag.

 

Máluðu sig græn fyrir brúðkaupið

Hönd Guðs

Alveg magnað að þessir vísindamenn telji að ef þeir finna plánetu sem uppfylli skilyrði til lífs að þá séu einhverjar líkur á því að það sé líf þar að finna.  Líkurnar á því að finna eitt prótein þar eru engar, hvað þá DNA og hvað þá prótein vélar sem skilja DNA, eitthvað sem við getum ekki. 

En, að öðru miklu skemmtilegra en það er þessi frétt hérna: NASA photos show giant 'cosmic hand'

NASA tók þessa mynd og er hún eins og hendi Guðs og úr fingrunum kemur eldur.

Biblían sannarlega segir rétt frá þegar hún segir:

Sálmarnir 19
²Himnarnir segja frá Guðs dýrð, festingin kunngjörir verkin hans handa.
³Hver dagur kennir öðrum
og hver nótt boðar annarri speki.
⁴Engin ræða, engin orð,
ekki heyrist raust þeirra.
⁵Þó berst boðskapur þeirra um alla jörð
og orð þeirra ná til endimarka heims.

 Síðan hef ég alltaf haft gaman af þessu versi hérna:

Jesaja 40
¹² Hver hefir mælt vötnin í lófa sínum og stikað himininn með spönn sinni, innilukt duft jarðarinnar í mælikeri og vegið fjöllin á reislu og hálsana á metaskálum?
...
 ²⁶Hefjið upp augu yðar til hæða og litist um: Hver hefir skapað stjörnurnar? Hann, sem leiðir út her þeirra með tölu og kallar þær allar með nafni. Sökum mikilleiks kraftar hans og af því að hann er voldugur að afli verður einskis þeirra vant.

 

Vísindamenn fundu plánetu sem er álíka stór og jörðin

Örkin hans Nóa í fullri stærð í Hong Kong

Mig langar að benda á frétt í The Wall Street Journal um eftirlíkingu af Örkini hans Nóa, sjá: Hong Kong Christens an Ark of Biblical Proportions

Það sem er merkilegt við þessa örk er að hún er samkvæmt þeirri stærð sem Biblían talar um en hingað til hefur enginn lagt í að gera jafn stóra örk og Biblían lýsir. Ég gerði t.d. grein um örk í Hollandi sem var ekki nærri því eins stór og alvöru örkin en ég held að flestir sjái að hún er mjög stór, sjá: Örkin hans Nóa í Hollandi

Hérna er fróðleg grein um mynd sem fjallar um örkina, sjá: Is Noah's ark a myth?

 

The Money Masters

Einn vinur minn benti mér á þessa mynd og mér fannst margt mjög áhugavert í henni, sérstaklega í ljósi "heimskreppunnar" sem ég tel vera manngerða, knúna af græðgi.

Svört spá frá IMF

Hvaða lag viltu að verði spilað við þína jarðaför?

Maður gat ekki annað en hlegið yfir sumum af þessum lögum eins og "skoðaðu í kistuna mína" fær allt aðra merkingu.

Einhvern tíman þá þurfti ég að horfast í augu við það að sumt af því sem ég var að hlusta á var í hrópandi andstöðu við það sem ég trúði og þá kvaddi ég nokkur lög eins og t.d. "Highway to Hell". 

En að spurningunni, hvaða lag myndir þú vilja að yrði spilað við þína jarðaför?

Einn vinur minn stakk upp á "The roof is on fire" við hans jarðaför; í smá stund efaðist ég um hvort viðkomandi væri kristinn í raun og veru en eftir að ímynda mér þetta lag spilað á orgel í jarðaför þá sá ég húmorinn í þessu hjá honum þó kolsvartur sé. 

Ég get ekki sagt að ég er búinn að ákveða neitt ákveðið lag en núna hallast ég mest að þessu lagi hérna:

Á leið til heljar um hraðbraut

Já, Jesús reis virkilega upp frá dauðum

Þar sem Vantrú var með grein eftir Dan Barker þar sem hann færir rök fyrir því af hverju hann efast um upprisu Krists þá vil ég endilega benda á grein þar sem nokkrum af rökum Dan Barkers er svarað.  Þetta er ekki svar við greininni á Vantrú en hún verðskuldar alveg sér svar.

Fyrir utan þá grein þá langar mig að benda á: The Resurrection of Jesus, Hin sögulega krossfesting Jesú, Ástæður til að treysta Nýja Testamentinu, Handrit Nýja Testamentisins, Er vitnisburður Nýja Testamentisins trúverðugur?, Hver er þjónninn sem Jesaja 53 talar um?

En hérna er greinin; kannski mun ég einhvern tíman finna tíma til að þýða greinina yfir á íslensku.

A Critical Look at "Losing Faith in Faith"

James Patrick Holding

A few years ago, this author took an excursion down a little-known skeptical side street. I ordered, via interlibrary loan, a copy of Dan Barker's Losing Faith in Faith.[Bark.LFIF]

I'm glad I did. Naturally, I had to consult it to do a more comprehensive job on our contra-Barker contradictions piece; but more than that, it gave me the occasion to see how yet another high-level skeptic operates - and as has continued to be the case, I find myself more persuaded than ever that the rejection/renunciation of Christian faith is never the result of forthright intellectual doubts.

We will begin with a couple of general and personal observations before migrating into specifics.

• First, I once said here that we shall not here be providing a full refutation to Barker's material, for Barker's squalling "village atheism" is more likely to put off prospective converts (on all sides) than it is to make any real difference in the present dialogue. Not only so, but most of what Barker brings up is "old hat." That he thinks that the "who caused God" reply is sufficient to the First Cause argument for theism tells us how far behind the philosophical eight-ball he actually is! But now, I will offer a complete commentary on those parts of Losing Faith in Faith that touch upon alleged Biblical errors and issues. See comments by chapter number. (Those parts that contain Barker's biographical data, and other parts, will not be fully addressed.)

   

   

• Now for my general "psychological" observation on the subject. Barker repeatedly stresses that asking questions about his motives and psychology in becoming an atheist are simply ad hominem - we cannot ask whether he became an atheist for emotional and psychological reasons, and we are assured that his conversion to atheism was the end result of a careful and logical process.

  The evidence, however, points in precisely the opposite direction. Barker's guilt and shame over having once believed is as evident and intrusive as a herd of elephants grazing in your living room. However, rather than dwell on this, and rather than engage what Barker would simply term further ad hominem (instead of actually addressing the question of his motives), I will only pose a question to the reader, following a brief discourse.

  Barker openly admits that he spent several months pretending to be a faithful Christian during his "deconversion" process from a less faithful Christian to an atheist. During this time he put on a face to others - pretending to be a genuine believer, to the point of leading religious services, when in truth his heart was elsewhere. He admits this openly, along with admitting the shame, guilt, and embarrassment he felt (and apparently continues to feel) at ever having believed as he did.

  The question I have is this: If Barker so willingly and willfully deceived others in this fashion, for several months no less, what reason is there for taking his word on the matter of his conversion to atheism being the product of a sincere and well-intentioned search and analysis? Why should we take his word about his own honesty and searching now?

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Making It Tick

In terms of Barker's personal motivations, ultimately we can do no more than speculate. However, there are two lines of direct evidence that, I daresay prove that Barker's professed objectivity is a sham.

The first reason is this. By and large, Barker (to say nothing of countless other skeptics) relies on what I have called "argument by outrage" to make his points. That is, he uses arguments that are based not on logic, but on his personal outrage at the contents of the Biblical record. These consist of all the familiar strains, of course: The slaughter of the Canaanites; the stoning of the man who picked up sticks on the Sabbath...and, of course, the biggest and sorest point of all, eternal punishment. Compared to the extermination of the Canaanites, this one is a gorilla; all other objections pale beside this one. So, to this we go as an example of Barker's methodology of "argument by outrage."

Early in his work, Barker tells us of a relevant story of a discussion he had on the matter of eternal punishment [42], which occurred sometime after his declaration of disbelief. While meeting with some Christian friends in a restaurant, he posed the following to them:

I'm not a bad person. I'm honest. If I walk out of this restaurant and get killed by a truck, will I go straight to hell?

The declaration of being "honest" is a peculiar one, in light of the fact that Barker has at this point already explained how he lied to himself and to others by playing a farce as a "false believer" for months! Nevertheless, note the reaction he records by his friends: They squirmed uncomfortably, and finally said, yes, he would go to hell. At this Barker comments:

I wanted to make the brutality of Christianity clear to them. I knew it would be hard for them to imagine their God punishing someone like me.

To which I might reply, that Barker's friends might well have had something of a lack of imagination! The point, however, is this: Whatever the truth about God and eternity may be, the above is NOT an argument, but rather a shame-faced appeal to the emotions. It is an "argument by outrage" - and these sorts of arguments form the core of most of Barker's objections.

We will not endeavor here to provide answers to these sorts of charges. There is no need: Simply stating outrage is not a sufficient form of argument; it is merely a substitute for true argument, with the intention to win over the prospective convert by means of tugging on their heartstrings like an orchestral harp. If the reader finds the God of the Bible cruel, unjust, bloodthirsty, etc., as Barker does, then that is their own personal problem. What must be done -- but I have seldom seen done -- is an analysis proving that a given action/directive by God was indeed unfair and/or cruel. (Don't expect skeptics to offer an analysis of this kind, and certainly not one informed by the complex of social factors involved in each situation. Those seeking an exploration of such specifics are invited to use the Encyclopedia's Scripture indices; we provide links to several items by Glenn Miller, who has done much of the necessary work in this regard.)

Of course, Barker would say of this position, "Why, you're a barbarian! How can you be so analytical when people are being killed, how can you say such an outrageous, etc. etc. blah blah blah." Well, fine: That's just another "argument by outrage." The questions that remain unanswered are: 1) Does this God exist? 2) Is what the Bible says true, whether in whole or in part? 3) Is God's judgment just, and if you think it isn't, what reason can you give for saying so, other than that you don't like it?

Even then, of course, we still have no sufficiently-based answer as to whether the God of the Bible is a just and fair one in His treatment of us. I say that He is. Barker says that He is not. Also, what can Barker offer as proof, other than his own personal point of view? It is terminally amusing to examine Barker's grievances about the inequity of the God of the Bible, and offering his own standards as proof. Is Barker (or any skeptic) really informed enough about the social situation of the ANE to make such judgments? In no place does Barker give us adequate reason to prefer his personal morality over any other. Simply offering shocked outrage, and dealing with the moral (and other) arguments for the existence of God in ham-handed fashion, is not enough.

So we conclude, in summary fashion, our overview of the first reason why we should not take the texts of Dan Barker seriously. Now to the second and more obvious reason to suspect that Barker is not the objective skeptic he professes to be - and that is a reason that deserves a section of its own.

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Sham Scholarship

To be fair, all of Barker's efforts at "argument by outrage" might carry some weight if Barker could actually provide some sort of logical or factual reasons to doubt Christianity. However, it is precisely at such points that Barker's presentation is weakest, and where his rampant "village atheism" stands out most sorely. To be quite blunt, it is plain that Barker should have paid much more attention to what was going on in his seminary classes while he had the chance.

This is not to say that Barker is totally uneducated in his subject matter. We have alluded to seminary classes: He attended Azusa Pacific College and took a number of relevant courses. By his own admission, however, he "coasted through college" [22] and retained little that was useful - for his heart was with evangelism, and he "believed that (his) education was secondary to (his) calling." I think that the significance of this admission will become obvious as we explore some of Barker's errors.

Generally, Barker touches upon a number of areas that we and Glenn Miller have discussed elsewhere, and as we progress with a full critique, we will provide more specifics; generally, we have: the matter of the Quirinian census; the supposed "anonymity" of the Gospels; the alleged bias of the NT writers (with the gratuitous quote of John 20:31 included); the standard bit about Isaiah 7:14; the association of Christianity with Mithraism (a position NOT held Mithraist scholars at this date; see here for more) - and most painfully of all, in what ought to be a profound embarrassment to skeptics everywhere, Barker gives space to the idea that Jesus did not even exist at all, dealing with the secular evidence for the existence of Jesus in a way that makes Arthur Drews seem brilliant and reasonable by comparison!

There is no indication that Barker has consulted the works of Josephan, Tacitean, or Greco-Roman scholars, or of any professional historians. His cited sources (on those rare occasions where he DOES provide them!) include three or four "gems," but gems which are badly scratched by an overwhelming number of landfill items: J. M. Allegro's The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Christian Myth; Baigent and Leigh's Dead Sea Scrolls Deception; Dennis McKinsey's Biblical Errancy newsletter; Gordon Stein's response to Josh McDowell; Skepitc X's Skeptical Review; and of course, several works by G. A. Wells! What sort of intellectual discipline does the use and implied recommendation of these sources suggest?

There were a few gross errors of scholarship that caught my eye particularly, and which we can consider briefly:

• We find the typical skeptical sin of overreading to make one's point: Repeating the usual litany against the miraculous, Barker categorizes as "outrageous" the story of the "resurrection of thousands of dead bodies on Good Friday." [377] Where did that "thousands" come from? Matthew gives no number; he simply says that "many" were resurrected. Given that ANY number of people resurrected is unusual, there could have been only five or ten to account for the description of "many." (Of course, Barker would quarrel with THAT also; the point is that he has performed eisegesis for the purpose of scoring points.)

• Barker spends a few paragraphs criticizing the Golden Rule [347-8]. He first points out that the rule is paralleled in other cultures. "The Golden Rule is not unique to Jesus, nor did it start with Christianity." No one with any knowledge ever claimed that it was, or did. This is the same straw man that we have dealt with elsewhere.

  Now it has been noted, of course, that the superiority of the Golden Rule lies in that it is stated positively rather than negatively, as are the parallels. It pointedly directs the doing of good deeds. Barker is aware of this. But then he scribbleth upon the restroom wall:

  But the positive version is ambiguous; the negative version is useful. What if you are a masochist? Should you 'do unto others' what you would like to have done unto yourself?

  And so on - such manipulation would be funny were it not so tragic; but ANY complex rule could be thus manipulated. One of the negative parallels cited by Barker from Buddhism reads: "Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful." A splendid sentiment: May the masochist then feel free to hurt people in ways that he does not find hurtful himself?

  Either way Barker's manipulations fail. The masochist could not use the Golden Rule in his favor, because what specific action is taken is overruled by the intent and purpose behind it, and the results. The masochist wishes to be hurt because it gives him pleasure. He would therefore be required to do things to others that give them pleasure, if they so desired - and applying the same sort of masochistic treatment that he enjoys to another person would not cause them pleasure. My own manipulation of the Buddhist parallel could be answered similarly.

• Barker devotes an entire chapter (21) to the question of context, as he hands out a series of advisories on what to do when a "fundamentalist" charges the skeptic with quoting a verse out of context to make a point.

   

  Regarding Isaiah 45:7 (and this also applies to Lam. 3:38 and Jer. 18:11), Barker quotes as follows:

  When Isaiah quotes the Lord as saying, 'I create evil [ra]' (Isaiah 45:7), does it really mean 'evil' or is it simply 'calamity' as some apologists assert? (Though that wouldn't seem to solve much.) Looking through the rest of the book of Isaiah we find that the Hebrew word ra indeed means 'evil' in a moral sense.

  Barker follows with examples of this usage of ra = evil from Is. 7:16, 13:11, and from Genesis. He closes:

  To say that 'God created evil' is not to take things out of context at all. (All you need to do this yourself is an inexpensive English concordance, such as Strong's or Young's that indicates the original Hebrew and Greek for each word.

  With due respect to Strong's (which I own) and Young's, which are indeed highly useful tools, I would advise the reader that one would "need" a lot more than just these books to do proper research - college courses, properly attended, might be particularly helpful; it might also be a good idea to check some commentaries by people who know Hebrew or are professional OT scholars - and that would include plenty of folks who are not fundamentalists or inerrantists. But let's attend to this particular from the OT, using better information from our sources. See here.

  For an answer on Luke 14:26, see here.

For a response to Chapter 13 on the matter of prayer, see here.

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Barker Am God: Chapter 19

Barker has a habit of thinking he can address in a few pages and sound bites issues that have been discussed seriously by the intelligent for years. How bad is this ego trip? Bad enough that in this chapter, Barker takes the role of God. And not the God we know, but one asking questions of a theologian.

Barker may be trying to be funny in some of these passages -- it is hard to tell. When he has "God" say, "Jesus sometimes calls me 'Father,' and that feels good, but since he and I are the same age and have the same powers, it doesn't mean much" [138] -- I cannot tell if he is making a joke, or if he is indeed this uninformed of the nature of the relationship between Jesus and the Father (see here).

In that light, I have for this chapter just a few directive comments.

Where did I come from? -- As noted before, Barker is so far behind the intellectual and philosophical eight-ball that he thinks that "Who created God?" is an end-all answer to the First Cause argument. Bertrand Russell thought this too, and that's probably where Barker drew this from, but sophisticated atheists have realized that First Cause is more sophisticated than this. Barker does not even address the problem of an infinite regression of causes; instead he is content to fill his God's mouth with wistful questions like, "If you need a designer, then why don't I?" This is said about ten different ways to Sunday, but it simply doesn't address the issue; it is no more than a sound bite. Barker would be unable to rebut a Plantinga or a Craig.

What's it all about? -- The operative question here is, "Why did God create us?" Barker knows the standard answer -- which is correct -- that our purpose is to serve God and to please Him. Barker first throws in another version of the "Who created God?" argument by asking, "What is God's purpose?" Elsewhere I see that Barker has little grasp of the concept of God's timelessness -- as he says here, "Am I consigned for eternity to sit here and amuse myself...?" "I'm just sort of hanging out, I guess." Purpose is sought out of need to address the experience of duration. An eternal being does not experience time or duration, and hence has no need to find a "purpose".

For more related to this section, see here.

Deciding Right and Wrong -- some answers may be found here and here.

This section on morality and its relation to God is one in which Barker's "God" has some moral confusion. "How am I supposed to choose what is moral? Since I can't consult any authority, the thing to do, it appears, is to pick randomly...If I whimsically say that you should not make any graven or molten images...then that is that. If I decide that murder is right and compassion is wrong, you have to accept it." [146]

To use the graven images example, there is nothing "whimsical" about this command. Elsewhere he shows that he thinks it is a command against art; in fact it is a command against idolatry, as we show here. Would it be moral for God to allow us to worship a false god, and to deceive ourselves? If God is the source of eternal life, would it be moral for Him to allow us to be distracted and risk losing it?

The further questions are often posed in this way: "If God told you to commit rape, would you do it?" This is posed often as a dilemma by skeptics, but let's put this in perspective. One would be hard pressed to imagine a case where a rape or a murder would be a "greater good", but no one could deny such a theoretical possibility. If I were ordered by God to kill an innocent baby, and there was no question that the directive came from God, would I do it? In return I ask: What if that innocent baby was Adolf Hitler, and killing him was the one way to prevent the deaths of millions within the next 40-60 years, to prevent the plunging of the world into war leading to the deaths and misery of millions more? The argument offered here simply doesn't allow for thinking in more than two dimensions; it merely reacts to the immediate experience and goes no further. I consider it a non-dilemma. God possesses all knowledge and knows what the greater good is. We do not, and Barker does not.

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No Context: Chapter 21

In this chapter Barker really (as Weird Al Yankovic would say) dives headfirst into the exegetical swimming pool of double-edged razor blades, and tries to demonstrate his hermeneutical sufficiency with the Biblical text. Here are answers to what is found in this chapter:

• Psalm 14:1 vs. Matthew 5:22
• Matthew 19:12 and Origen
• Anonymity of the Gospels, Dates of the Gospels -- see link above
• John 20:31 and "bias" in the NT
• Isaiah 7:14
• Is. 45:7 -- we find especially ironic Barker's advice to buy a concordance and flounder around in it!
• Barker hints that the Golden Rule was borrowed from Hillel, "who may have got it from the Brahmans", who may have taken it from Confucius or the Zoroastrians...well, at least we aren't the only ones accused of morality theft. Do not expect any tangible proof from Barker of such borrowing (i.e., evidence that Hillel had Brahman works in his possession); there is none. Moreover, it is hardly as though different people could not come up with the same moral ideas on their own, or that there is any actual problem if Jesus cited a recognized moral teaching and thereby endorsed it.
• Micah 5:2 and related matters
• A general endorsement of the "pagan copycat" thesis -- no specifics are given here, so no answer can be provided, but we shall see elsewhere that Barker endorses some rather absurd notions in this context
• Luke 14:26
• Slavery in the Bible
• Ephesians 5:22 "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord." Barker asks, "Can Christian husbands be blamed for thinking that this verse allows them to lord it over their wives?" Yes, they can, for those who do so miss verse 25: "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it..." I know of no Christian man who could read this and in good conscience play the part of Archie Bunker.
• Leviticus 24:16 "And he that blasphemeth the name of the LORD, he shall surely be put to death, and all the congregation shall certainly stone him..." Barker asks: "Why shouldn't a fundamentalist Christian believe that the Ayatollah was morally right to sentence author Salman Rushdie to death?" [159] This is yet another "Barker Begged Question" -- Barker believes neither Christians nor Muslims are right, so it is proper to treat them as equally in error. But if Christians (and Jews) are right, Lev, 24:16 served a righteous purpose, and Rushdie was sentenced to death for no good reason; whereas if Muslims are right, Rushdie was sentenced justly.
• Proverbs 23:13 and 20:30 -- "Can Christian parents be faulted for beating their kids?" Actually, yes -- these verses were written to a society that constantly was on the brink of anarchy. Those who need perspective should read Crenshaw's Education in Ancient Israel.

Material in Chapters 22 and 23 is answered in various places on this page, notably here; consult the Encyclopedia scripture index for citations. Chapter 24 is dealt with here. For Chapter 25, see the links for Is. 7:14 and Micah 5:2 above, plus here, plus Longenecker's Biblical Exegesis in the Apostolic Period. See here on Tyre.

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All Crossed Up

Chapter 26 of Barker's book is entitled, "Cross Examination." Barker includes in this chapter a few salient points about the trivialization of the cross as a symbol of Christianity (i.e., its use as jewelry or as a social symbol). These are things that any serious Christian would find agreeable. Where Barker's inadequate investigation of his subject comes to the fore is in his treatment of two particular issues related to the fact of the cross of Christ itself.

After a few mild complaints about having to see the cross of a church outside his office windows, Barker begins with a form of "argument by outrage" - one that does more to reveal an aspect of his personal squeamishness than it does effect any serious argument against Christian faith. He writes [202]:

A cross is not beautiful. It is an emblem of humiliation, agony and death. It represents a public execution, like a gallows, guillotine, or gas chamber. Approaching a cross is like walking into a firing squad. Try to picture a steeple supporting an electric chair; or imagine people wearing noose jewelry!

And after a few complaints of similar nature from one of his cohorts, he continues:

Suppose someone saved your life by blocking a terrorist's attack, but died from the bullets. Would you hang little gold machine guns on your ears?

Barker closes this aspect of his "argument by outrage" with citations from a few hymns about the blood of Jesus. Is this not offensive, he asks?

Aside from the admittedly excellent points about the trivialization of the cross, Barker here has missed the point badly - and would not have, had he consulted the excellent work of Martin Hengel [Heng.Cx] on this subject. The shame of the cross, so to speak, was just as much a problem in the first century as it is today from Barker's perspective. (See on this subject also our reply to Earl Doherty.) Hengel, whose work is recognized as the premier work on the subject of crucifixion in the ancient world, observes that "crucifixion was an utterly offensive affair, 'obscene' in the original sense of the word." (22) The process was so offensive that the Gospels turn out to be our most detailed description of a crucifixion from ancient times - the pagan authors were too revolted by the subject to give equally comprehensive descriptions!

This being the case, we may fairly ask why Christianity succeeded at all. The ignominy of a crucified savior was as much a deterrent to Christian belief as it is today - indeed, it was far, far more so! Why, then, were there any Christians at all? There can be only one good explanation: Because from the cross came victory, and after death came resurrection! The shame of the cross turns out to be one of Christianity's most incontrovertible proofs! Fair enough to say that the cross has been misused as a symbol: But had a person in an electric chair been executed unrighteously, and risen from the dead after dying for our eternal salvation, well might some house of worship place an empty chair upon their steeple - with the clasps undone, to proclaim the victory over the conquered instrument of death!

Now to the second issue, one more connected to technical details, and quite astonishing in its baldness. Barker writes:

There is no cross in Christianity. No cross at all!

The enduring emblem of atonement is an impostor. There is no cross anywhere in the Bible...The words which have been translated 'cross' and 'crucify' in the New Testament are (Greek word) (pronounced 'stau-ross' or 'stav-ross') and (Greek word) ('stav-ro-oh'). All translators, even fundamentalists, agree that a (Greek word) is not a cross.

Barker goes on to cite Vine's and a couple of other works indicating that the word we translate "cross" actually means an upright pale or stake. He adds, citing another source, that a stauros was never in the shape of a cross or a T. He continues:

There is no cross in early Christian art before the middle of the fifth century, where it (probably) appears on a coin in a painting. The first clear crucifix appears in the late seventh century.

Any Bible that contains the word 'cross' or 'crucify' is dishonest...

We may ask, of course: What scholarly works has Barker consulted to arrive at these conclusions, which run against the grain of the conclusions of literally thousands of Biblical scholars and historians of all persuasions? Raymond Brown's magisterial commentary, The Death of the Messiah, [Brow.DMh] perhaps? Hengel's comprehensive monograph on crucifixion in the ancient world, already alluded to?

Hardly. In fact, the one source that Barker lists, other than the original Greek texts of the NT and related translation aids like Vine's, is Herbert Cutner's, Jesus: God, Man or Myth! Had Barker consulted the works of Hengel, Brown, and perhaps a few others of a more academic bent, he would have discovered that his objections are way, way off base! (Cutner himself inspires little confidence: His only stated qualification is that he is "one of England's leading Freethought writers," and he is said to be the author of a book on sex worship (!). His work is a mix of badly outdated information [even in 1950 when he wrote!], focusing mainly on the ideas that Jesus did not exist and that pagan influence created Christianity. His own treatment of the evidence is scarcely more impressive than Barker's, and earned him an article of his own.)

True enough: The word stauros does refer to an upright stake. But stauros was used in the Gospels by synecdoche to refer to the entirety of the cross! [ibid., 913] This was a known literary practice when describing a crucifixion, and perhaps a signal of how revolting it was thought to be: Single parts of the cross, like the crossbar (patibulum), could be referred to as a "cross," and the entire cross could be referred to by the names of individual pieces like the stauros - as was the case with the Gospels. (Brown cites parallels to this practice in the works of Seneca and Tacitus.) This bit of information, along with information from Plautus indicating standard practice for crucifixion, tells us what we know today: That what Jesus carried was the crossbeam, and the actual stauros was embedded at the site of the crucifixion. (The stauros itself, Brown adds, could refer to a stake which "people could be attached to in various ways: Impaling, hanging, nailing, and tying." To this we can also add Josephus' confirmation of Jesus' fate, although Barker considers those references to be interpolations.)

So there is no foundation here for Barker's stauros argument; what about the rest? Again, not digging further than Cutner and a few base reference works makes for some poor judgments: Brown reports that the cross symbol itself appears in catacombs in the third century, and becomes common by the fourth. There are also about a half-dozen depictions of the crucified Jesus dated between the second and fifth century.

Also, what of the actual shape of the historical cross? The descriptions we have, indicating that Jesus carried a crossbeam, mean that the cross was either shaped like a capital T or a lower case t. The latter was favored by Ireneaus and Tertullian, and was supposed from Matt. 27:37, which indicates room for the printed charge against Jesus above his head. The former was favored by Justin (though for reasons of supposed prophetic fulfillment) and is indicated by Barnabas 9:8, an apocryphal work from near the end of the first century.

So what does it boil down to? Barker's objections are not the product of serious scholarship. They are, rather, the product of his own personal squeamishness over the shed blood of Christ (one hopes that Barker does not cut himself while shaving), and his personal animosity towards a church steeple and cross that he happens to find annoying. Here, then, is quite incontrovertible proof that Barker was no objective convert to atheism. His appeals are reflective only of an axe to grind.

Tekton research assistant "Punkish" adds some thoughts:

...from Vine's Complete Expository dictionary of Old and New Testament words p138

CROSS, CRUCIFY A. Noun stauros (4716 Strong's #) denotes, primarily, "an upright pale or stake." On such malefactors were nailed for execution. Both the noun and the verb stauroo, "to fasten to a stake or pale," are originally to be distinguished from the ecclesiastical form of a two beamed "cross". The shape of the latter had its origin in ancient Chaldea, and was used as the symbol of the god Tammuz (being the shape of the mystic Tau, the initial of his name) in that country and in adjacent lands, including Egypt. By the middle of the 3rd cent. A.D. the churches had either departed from, or had travestied, certain doctrines of the Christian faith. In order to increase the prestige of the apostate ecclesiastical system pagans were received into the churches apart from regeneration by faith, and were permitted largely to retain their pagan signs and symbols. Hence the Tau or T, in its most frequent form, with the crosspiece lowered, was adopted to stand for the "cross" of Christ.

I note that my full quote from Vine's refutes Barker's misquote, in which he removes key phrases like "apostate ecclesiastical system" and that pagans were received into churches "apart from regeneration"! Here's another: he misses out a phrase in Cutner, who actually notes a social piece of data (that tells you how close to the mark Barker is in historical study!) The phrase is "..it was used in the cruelest fashion to execute criminals and other persons obnoxious to the governing classes" (JGMM, 60)

As for the Chi, or X, which Constantine declared he had seen in a vision leading him to champion the Christian faith, the letter was the initial of the word "Christ" and had nothing to do with "the Cross" (for xulon, "a timber beam, a tree" as used for the stauros, see under TREE)

I'm a little frustrated to see that no references are given to support the claims of ecclesiastical compromise, but in any case Tertullian answers that one:

His hands and feet were fastened with nails to the cross-beam and stake (Tertullian, "Adv. Judæos," 10) (Tertullian definitely being prior to mid 3rd century contra Vine's claim)

...From the Epistle of Barnabas 12:2, "The Spirit saith to the heart of Moses, that he should make a type of the cross and of Him that was to suffer, that unless, saith he, they shall set their hope on Him, war shall be waged against them for ever. Moses therefore pileth arms one upon another in the midst of the encounter, and standing on higher ground than any he stretched out his hands, and so Israel was again victorious." This passage from Exodus (17:11) is also cited by Tertullian (Against Marcion III.18) while discussing crucifixion. Also Clarke's commentary on this verse tells us that the Church fathers considered this a figure of Christ on the cross. So I think Vine's is incorrect over the introduction of a cross-beam in the church and its date (and therefore Barker for using this source), while respecting the man's training and status as a scholar.

Schaff history vol 2 sect.77 "The cross was despised by the heathen Romans on account of the crucifixion, the disgraceful punishment of slaves and the worst criminals; but the Apologists reminded them of the unconscious recognition of the salutary sign in the form of their standards and triumphal symbols, and of the analogies in nature, as the form of man with the outstretched arm, the flying bird, and the sailing ship..."

Justin Martyr - dialogue with Trypho chap 91 (before 165 AD) After quoting Joseph's blessings in Genesis (mentions a unicorn?) then says the cross is a like-figure, giving the following description: "For the one beam is placed upright, from which the highest extremity is raised up into a horn, when the other beam is fitted on to it, and the ends appear on both sides as horns joined on to the one horn. And the part which is fixed in the centre, on which are suspended those who are crucified, also stands out like a horn; and it also looks like a horn conjoined and fixed with the other horns." Now I don't really know what is meant by "unicorn" here, whether it means the mythical horse of not, but you surely cannot say that the two-beamed cross was unknown ...Barker says "There is no cross in early Christian art before the middle of the fifth century, where it (probably) appears on a coin in a painting. The first clear crucifix appears in the late seventh century." Having read Schaff's history of the Church on crucifixion I now realise what he's on about. The above paragraph refers to the crafted figure of Jesus on a cross (note the ref to "art"!) rather than the empty two-beamed execution implement. Schaff says this is as late as Barker relates, but ALSO that the empty cross (in terms of execution) gets mentioned much earlier in church history. Schaff also says: "The CRUCIFIX, that is the sculptured or carved representation of our Saviour attached to the cross, is of much later date, and cannot be clearly traced beyond the middle of the sixth century. It is not mentioned by any writer of the Nicene and Chalcedonian age. One of the oldest known crucifixes, if not the very oldest, is found in a richly illuminated Syrian copy of the Gospels in Florence from the year 586.475 Gregory of Tours (d. 595) describes a crucifix in the church of St. Genesius, in Narbonne, which presented the crucified One almost entirely naked.476 But this gave offence, and was veiled, by order of the bishop, with a curtain, and only at times exposed to the people. The Venerable Bede relates that a crucifix, bearing on one side the Crucified, on the other the serpent lifted up by Moses, was brought from Rome to the British cloister of Weremouth in 686.

See here for Chapter 27.

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Hardly Charitable

In Chapter 37, "Age of Unaccountability," Barker addresses the matter of charitable giving. Again we willingly concede that in certain places Barker makes salient points, regarding misuse of funds and the need for accountability. However, as before, the force of these salient points is lost on the fact that they are bookended by personal anecdotes from Barker's own life (which hardly reflect on anything, other than of course his own personal and familial issues), and by what can only "charitably" be called outright misrepresentation.

Let's begin with the most blatant error. Seeking to answer his own question, "(H)ow much does the average church actually contribute to the needy?", Barker cites an article by George Gallup, Jr. and Jim Castelli that records the results of a 1988 study of almost 300,000 churches - indicating "the percentage of all congregations that have selected charity services." [Bark.LFIF, 257] Statistics are given for the percent of such churches that selected services for homeless shelters, meal services, and the environment, with churches being in the categories of liberal, moderate, conservative, and very conservative. In each case, the liberals score the best, in the 40th percent rank, and the numbers get lower as we get more "conservative." Barker then notes similar numbers for other areas: "family planning, day care, civil rights, and the arts". [ibid.] He concludes that "This shows that considerably less than half of all churches are involved in any kind of charity." [ibid., 258]

There are several problems with this analysis:

• First, one wonders why there is no "very liberal" category!

   

• Second, while we may observe that shelters and meals are certainly part of a church's mission, and day care and environment might be, since when is a church obliged to contribute to "family planning" (which many find objectionable, especially when the words are a euphemism for "abortion") and "the arts"????? How many starving children has that ballet troupe fed today?

   

• Third, and the most important point of all: The study does NOT tell how many churches are involved in ANY kind of charity. It tells how many have SELECTED CHARITY SERVICES! (In this regard it is not surprising to see that liberal churches, generally associated also with liberal politics and the "government solves all" mentality, prefer to use some sort of organization for their charity!) This says NOTHING about the level of charity that individual churches are involved in, or the personal contributions that individual members make privately; it says nothing about churches that fund their own soup kitchens, or give within their own membership to members in need, or about contributions that churchgoers make outside of their church, but because of their religious beliefs. Nor does it make any distinction for people who have little or no money to give in the first place (many of whom are in religiously conservative, poor, and rural areas - whereas the liberal churches tend to be attended by wealthy urbanites who prefer the lack of demand for personal commitment)! In fact, what does the mere selection of a charity service say about amounts and percentages of income actually given to charity? NOTHING! This reflects an extremely unscientific use of data by Barker!

   

He does seem aware of this incongruity, for he does address private giving - anecdotally! "Well, sure. A few churches feed the poor," he writes, and "Some churches (I remember) once or twice a year will pass a plastic 'Bread for the Hungry' loaf-bank around Sunday school classes..." [257-8] What's this? To prove that churches are not involved in charity, we get precise statistics; but where is this same precision when it comes to contributions made on a lower level? Are Barker's memories the same level of data as George Gallup's polls?

Thus, Barker relies on misrepresentation to make his points. This is simply his way of stumping for what he really wants: Direct taxation of churches. (If Barker had really wanted to reduce the federal deficit, he should have checked into cutting spending on wasteful government projects! The suggestion to tax churches sounds more like sour grapes than sound economic sense!)

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Moral Miscues: Chapter 50

In this chapter, Barker lays out his hill of beans on morality. Much of this chapter is merely preaching to the humanist choir; to wit, "We humans deserve respect," blah blah blah. Our concern will only be with the section in which Barker accuses God of being immoral, since we, unlike Barker, recognize that this is a subject that isn't dealt with in a mere 10-15 pages by someone who is merely copying what he has read from writers like Ingersoll. Here are responses to some specific charges (other than general "argument by outrage, no punishment is ever deserved" complaints):

• 1 Samuel 25
• Numbers 25:16-17, 31
• Exodus 34:6-7
• 2 Kings 2:23-4
• Judges 11:29-40
• 2 Samuel 21:1-14 and Leviticus 27:28-29
• Exodus 21; Luke 12:47-8
• Leviticus 21:18-23
• 2 Thess. 2:11 and Ezekiel 14:9
• Malachi 2:3, Ezekiel 4:12, 1 Kings 14:10, Nahum 3:5-6, Isaiah 3:17
• Isaiah 45:7
• Exodus 20:5
• Mark 14:3-9 -- Barker asks, "Where were the social programs that would eliminate poverty?" Is Barker so lacking in knowledge of the workings of the ancient world to think that proposing and implementing such programs would have been possible for someone in Jesus' social position?
• Mark 2:23
• Matthew 21
• Jesus and women
• Matthew 21:18-9, Mark 11:13-4
• Matthew 10:34//Luke 22:36
• Matthew 15:22-28
• Matthew 19:12
• On the "humble Jesus" -- that Barker "heard a lot" about this is his own lack. A view of Jesus as "humble" as in "not admitting his identity" is not Biblical.
• Matthew 6:19-20, 34; John 6:27 -- Luke 12:33 is advice to only one person, for whom money was obviously a barrier to salvation; the same may be said for sexual urges in Matthew 5:28 -- so does Barker think it's all right to lust after women? Does his wife agree?
• Luke 14:26
• Luke 6:30//Matthew 5:40-2

On the Ten Commandments: Most of Barker's complaints simply beg the question of God's existence and authority (i.e., the third commandment violates free speech!). Otherwise: On the Sabbath; not killing, the alleged second version; and on these and the Beatitudes, an attitude like Michael Martin's.

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Conclusion

Dan Barker should not be taken seriously. His arguments are more shock than substance, and there is almost no depth to his research. If you have read his book and been bothered by it, fear not - it's Bark is worse than its bite!

1. Bark.LFIF - Barker, Dan. Losing Faith In Faith: From Preacher To Atheist. Madison WI: Freedom From Religion Foundation, Inc., 1992

Sources

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The Resurrection of Jesus

Mig langar í tilefni dagsins að benda á grein eftir William Lane Craig um upprisu Krist. 

The Resurrection of Jesus

William Lane Craig

 

I spoke recently at a major Canadian university on the existence of God.  After my talk, one slightly irate co-ed wrote on her comment card, “I was with you until you got to the stuff about Jesus.  God is not the Christian God!”

This attitude is all too typical today.  Most people are happy to agree that God exists; but in our pluralistic society it has become politically incorrect to claim that God has revealed Himself decisively in Jesus.  What justification can Christians offer, in contrast to Hindus, Jews, and Muslims, for thinking that the Christian God is real?

The answer of the New Testament is:  the resurrection of Jesus.  “God will judge the world with justice by the man He has appointed.  He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead” (Acts 17.31).  The resurrection is God’s vindication of Jesus’ radical personal claims to divine authority.

So how do we know that Jesus is risen from the dead?   The Easter hymnwriter says, “You ask me how I know he lives?  He lives within my heart!”   This answer is perfectly appropriate on an individual level.  But when Christians engage unbelievers in the public square—such as in “Letters to the Editor” of a local newspaper, on call-in programs on talk-radio, at PTA meetings, or even just in conversation with co-workers—, then it’s crucial that we be able to present objective evidence in support of our beliefs.  Otherwise our claims hold no more water than the assertions of anyone else claiming to have a private experience of God. 

Fortunately, Christianity, as a religion rooted in history, makes claims that can in important measure be investigated historically.  Suppose, then, that we approach the New Testament writings, not as inspired Scripture, but merely as a collection of Greek documents coming down to us out of the first century, without any assumption as to their reliability other than the way we normally regard other sources of ancient history.  We may be surprised to learn that the majority of New Testament critics investigating the gospels in this way accept the central facts undergirding the resurrection of Jesus.   I want to emphasize that I am not talking about evangelical or conservative scholars only, but about the broad spectrum of New Testament critics who teach at secular universities and non-evangelical seminaries.  Amazing as it may seem, most of them have come to regard as historical the basic facts which support the resurrection of Jesus.  These facts are as follows:

FACT  #1:  After his crucifixion, Jesus was buried in a tomb by Joseph of Arimathea.  This fact is highly significant because it means, contrary to radical critics like John Dominic Crossan of the Jesus Seminar, that the location of Jesus’  burial site was known to Jew and Christian alike.  In that case, the disciples could never have proclaimed his resurrection in Jerusalem if the tomb had not been empty.  New Testament researchers have established this first fact on the basis of evidence such as the following:

1.  Jesus’ burial is attested in the very old tradition quoted by Paul in I Cor. 15.3-5:

     For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received:
           
            . . . that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures,
            and that he was buried,
            and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,
            and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve.

Paul not only uses the typical rabbinical terms “received” and “delivered” with regard to the information he is passing on to the Corinthians, but vv. 3-5 are a highly stylized four-line formula filled with non-Pauline characteristics.  This has convinced all scholars that Paul is, as he says, quoting from an old tradition which he himself received after becoming a Christian.  This tradition probably goes back at least to Paul’s fact-finding visit to Jerusalem around AD 36, when he spent two weeks with Cephas and James (Gal. 1.18).   It thus dates to within five years after Jesus’ death.  So short a time span and such personal contact make it idle to talk of legend in this case.

 

2. The burial story is part of very old source material used by Mark in writing his gospel.  The gospels tend to consist of brief snapshots of Jesus’ life which are loosely connected and not always chronologically arranged.  But when we come to the passion story we do have one, smooth, continuously-running narrative.  This suggests that the passion story was one of Mark’s sources of information in writing his gospel.  Now most scholars think Mark is already the earliest gospel, and Mark’s source for Jesus’ passion is, of course, even older.  Comparison of the narratives of the four gospels shows that their accounts do not diverge from one another until after the burial.  This implies that the burial account was part of the passion story.  Again, its great age militates against its being legendary.

 

3.  As a member of the Jewish court that condemned Jesus, Joseph of Arimathea is unlikely to be a Christian invention.  There was strong resentment against the Jewish leadership for their role in the condemnation of Jesus (I Thess. 2.15).  It is therefore highly improbable that Christians would invent a member of the court that condemned Jesus who honors Jesus by giving him a proper burial instead of allowing him to be dispatched as a common criminal.

 

4. No other competing burial story exists.  If the burial by Joseph were fictitious, then we would expect to find either some historical trace of what actually happened to Jesus’ corpse or at least some competing legends.  But all our sources are unanimous on Jesus’ honorable interment by Joseph.

For these and other reasons, the majority of New Testament critics concur that Jesus was buried in a tomb by Joseph of Arimathea.  According to the late John A. T. Robinson of Cambridge University, the burial of Jesus in the tomb is “one of the earliest and best-attested facts about Jesus.”1

FACT #2:  On the Sunday following the crucifixion, Jesus’ tomb was found empty by a group of his women followers.  Among the reasons which have led most scholars to this conclusion are the following:

1.  The empty tomb story is also part of the old passion source used by Mark.  The passion source used by Mark did not end in death and defeat, but with the empty tomb story, which is grammatically of one piece with the burial story.

2.  The old tradition cited by Paul in I Cor. 15.3-5 implies the fact of the empty tomb.  For any first century Jew, to say that of a dead man “that he was buried and that he was raised” is to imply that a vacant grave was left behind.  Moreover, the expression “on the third day” probably derives from the women’s visit to the tomb on the third day, in Jewish reckoning, after the crucifixion.  The four-line tradition cited by Paul summarizes both the gospel accounts and the early apostolic preaching (Acts 13. 28-31); significantly, the third line of the tradition corresponds to the empty tomb story.

3.  The story is simple and lacks signs of legendary embellishment.  All one has to do to appreciate this point is to compare Mark’s account with the wild legendary stories found in the second-century apocryphal gospels, in which Jesus is seen coming out of the tomb with his head reaching up above the clouds and followed by a talking cross!

4.  The fact that women’s testimony was discounted in first century Palestine stands in favor of the women’s role in discovering the empty tomb.  According to Josephus, the testimony of women was regarded as so worthless that it could not even be admitted into a Jewish court of law.  Any later legendary story would certainly have made male disciples discover the empty tomb.

5.  The earliest Jewish allegation that the disciples had stolen Jesus’ body (Matt. 28.15) shows that the body was in fact missing from the tomb.  The earliest  Jewish response to the disciples’ proclamation, “He is risen from the dead!” was not to point to his occupied tomb and to laugh them off as fanatics, but to claim that they had taken away Jesus’ body.  Thus, we have evidence of the empty tomb from the very opponents of the early Christians.

One could go on, but I think that enough has been said to indicate why, in the words of Jacob Kremer, an Austrian specialist in the resurrection,  “By far most exegetes hold firmly to the reliability of the biblical statements concerning the empty tomb.”2

FACT #3:  On multiple occasions and under various circumstances, different individuals and groups of people experienced appearances of Jesus alive from the dead. 

This is a fact which is almost universally acknowledged among New Testament scholars, for the following reasons:

1.  The list of eyewitnesses to Jesus’ resurrection appearances which is quoted by Paul in I Cor. 15. 5-7 guarantees that such appearances occurred.  These included appearances to Peter (Cephas), the Twelve, the 500 brethren, and James.

2.  The appearance traditions in the gospels provide multiple, independent attestation of these appearances.  This is one of the most important marks of historicity.  The appearance to Peter is independently attested by Luke, and the appearance to the Twelve by Luke and John.  We also have independent witness to Galilean appearances in Mark, Matthew, and John, as well as to the women in Matthew and John.

3. Certain appearances have earmarks of historicity.  For example, we have good evidence from the gospels that neither James nor any of Jesus’ younger brothers believed in him during his lifetime.  There is no reason to think that the early church would generate fictitious stories concerning the unbelief of Jesus’ family had they been faithful followers all along.  But it is indisputable that James and his brothers did become active Christian believers following Jesus’ death.  James was considered an apostle and eventually rose to the position of leadership of the Jerusalem church.  According to the first century Jewish historian Josephus, James was martyred for his faith in Christ in the late AD 60s.  Now most of us have brothers.  What would it take to convince you that your brother is the Lord, such that you would be ready to die for that belief?  Can there be any doubt that this remarkable transformation in Jesus’ younger brother took place because, in Paul’s words, “then he appeared to James”?

Even Gert  Lüdemann, the leading German critic of the resurrection, himself admits, “It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus’ death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ.”3

FACT #4:  The original disciples believed that Jesus was risen from the dead despite their having every predisposition to the contrary.  Think of the situation the disciples faced after Jesus’ crucifixion:

1.  Their leader was dead.  And Jews had no belief in a dying, much less rising, Messiah.  The Messiah was supposed to throw off Israel’s enemies (= Rome) and re-establish a Davidic reign—not suffer the ignominious death of criminal.

2.  According to Jewish law, Jesus’ execution as a criminal showed him out to be a heretic, a man literally under the curse of God (Deut. 21.23).  The catastrophe of the crucifixion for the disciples was not simply that their Master was gone, but that the crucifixion showed, in effect, that the Pharisees had been right all along, that for three years they had been following a heretic, a man accursed by God!

3.  Jewish beliefs about the afterlife precluded anyone’s rising from the dead to glory and immortality before the general resurrection at the end of the world.  All the disciples could do was to preserve their Master’s tomb as a shrine where his bones could reside until that day when all of Israel’s righteous dead would be raised by God to glory.

Despite all this, the original disciples believed in and were willing to go to their deaths for the fact of Jesus’ resurrection. Luke Johnson, a New Testament scholar from Emory University, muses, “some sort of powerful, transformative experience is required to generate the sort of movement earliest Christianity was . . . .”4  N. T. Wright, an eminent British scholar, concludes, “that is why, as a historian, I cannot explain the rise of early Christianity unless Jesus rose again, leaving an empty tomb behind him.”5

In summary, there are four facts agreed upon by the majority of scholars who have written on these subjects which any adequate historical hypothesis must account for:  Jesus’ entombment by Joseph of Arimathea, the discovery of his empty tomb, his post-mortem appearances, and the origin of the disciples’ belief in his resurrection.

Now the question is:  what is the best explanation of these four facts?  Most sholars probably remain agnostic about this question.  But the Christian can maintain that the hypothesis that best explains these facts is “God raised Jesus from the dead.”

In his book Justifying Historical Descriptions, historian C. B. McCullagh lists six tests which historians use in determining what is the best explanation for given historical facts.6  The hypothesis “God raised Jesus from the dead” passes all these tests:

1.  It has great explanatory scope:   it explains why the tomb was found empty, why the disciples saw post-mortem appearances of Jesus, and why the Christian faith came into being.

2.  It has great explanatory power:   it explains why the body of Jesus was gone, why people repeatedly saw Jesus alive despite his earlier public execution, and so forth.

3.  It is plausible:   given the historical context  of Jesus’ own unparalleled life and claims, the resurrection serves as divine confirmation of those radical claims.

4.  It is not ad hoc or contrived:   it requires only one additional hypothesis:  that God exists.  And even that needn’t be an additional hypothesis if one already believes that  God exists.

5.  It is in accord with accepted beliefs.  The hypothesis:  “God raised Jesus from the dead” doesn’t in any way conflict with the accepted belief that people don’t rise naturally from the dead.  The Christian accepts that belief as wholeheartedly as he accepts the hypothesis that God raised Jesus from the dead.

6.  It far outstrips any of its rival hypotheses in meeting conditions (1)-(5).  Down through history various alternative explanations of the facts have been offered, for example, the conspiracy hypothesis, the apparent death hypothesis, the hallucination hypothesis, and so forth.  Such hypotheses have been almost universally rejected by contemporary scholarship.  None of these naturalistic hypotheses succeeds in meeting the conditions as well as the resurrection hypothesis.

Now this puts the sceptical critic in a rather desperate situation.  A few years ago I participated in a debate on the resurrection of Jesus with a professor at the University of California, Irvine.  He had written his doctoral dissertation on the resurrection, and he was thoroughly familiar with the evidence.  He could not deny the facts of Jesus’ honorable burial, empty tomb, post-mortem appearances, and the origin of the disciples’ belief in the resurrection.  So his only recourse was to come up with some alternate explanation of those facts.  And so he argued that Jesus of Nazareth had an unknown, identical twin brother, who was separated from him as an infant and grew up independently, but who came back to Jerusalem at the time of the crucifixion, stole Jesus’ body out of the tomb, and presented himself to the disciples, who mistakenly inferred that Jesus was risen from the dead!  Now I won’t bother to go into how I went about refuting this theory.  But I think the example is illustrative of the desperate lengths to which scepticism must go in order to refute the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus.  Indeed, the evidence is so powerful that one of the world’s leading Jewish theologians, the late Pinchas Lapide, who taught at Hebrew University in Israel, declared himself convinced on the basis of the evidence that the God of Israel raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead!7

The significance of the resurrection of Jesus lies in the fact that it is not just any old Joe Blow who has been raised from the dead, but Jesus of Nazareth, whose crucifixion was instigated by the Jewish leadership because of his blasphemous claims to divine authority.  If this man has been raised from the dead, then the God whom he allegedly blasphemed has clearly vindicated his claims.  Thus, in an age of religious relativism and pluralism, the resurrection of Jesus constitutes a solid rock on which Christians can take their stand for God’s decisive self-revelation in Jesus.

1 John A. T. Robinson, The Human Face of God (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1973), p. 131.

2 Jacob Kremer, Die Osterevangelien—Geschichten um Geschichte (Stuttgart:  Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1977), pp. 49-50.

3 Gerd Lüdemann, What Really Happened to Jesus?, trans. John Bowden (Louisville, Kent.:  Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), p. 80.

4 Luke Timothy Johnson, The Real Jesus (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1996), p. 136.

5 N. T. Wright, “The New Unimproved Jesus,” Christianity Today (September 13, 1993), p. 26.

6 C. Behan McCullagh, Justifying Historical Descriptions  (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 1984), p. 19.

7 Pinchas Lapide, The Resurrection of Jesus, trans. Wilhelm C. Linss (London:  SPCK, 1983)