Science and Religion
Wherein I look at the argument in the comments of the last post and go off in a slightly different direction. This post might be easier to understand if you read those comments first. The italicized text in the following comes from JCHFleetguy’s contributions to the discussion.
Science has given good evidence that a first homo sapien indeed did exist and all of humanity is [descended] from him and his mate.
That's not what the article you linked to said. Well, you're half right. There was a breeding couple whose children are the ancestors of all contemporary humans, that much is in there. You're exactly wrong about science showing that there was a first homo sapiens, (that's the singular form, I think) at least in this article. The research, accepting currently practiced scientific methodology, suggests that "Adam" and "Eve" were part of a community of about 2000 breeding individuals.
Notice in the article that scientists conjectured (or guessed, or argued from ignorance) that probably 2000 mating pairs existed but that the progeny of only one pair survived. They know this how? Because otherwise their understanding of genetic diversity in the beginning of species gets trashed.
Brian Cubbage had already answered this question, I think, before JCHFleetguy wrote this comment, but it must have been missed. Unfortunately, the study that discusses the problem isn't cited in the NYT piece, but we can probably guess how the researchers came to this conclusion. The long and short of it, I bet, is that there are differences in Mitochondrial DNA in the ancestral parents that led the researchers to conclude that they were part of a group of about 2000 breeders. Anyway, it's no fair to attack a study because the one sentence description of the study in the New York Times leaves a few questions unanswered.
I may have read wrongly (and I am not a genetic scientist) but [mitochondrial] DNA is only passed on female-female as such isn't it?
No. This is where your mistake occurs. Read it again.
Dr. Wallace's tree is based on mitochondrial DNA, tiny rings of genetic material that are bequeathed only by the egg cell and thus through the maternal line.
Men and women both come from eggs in the women's body. We all have x Chromosomes, too. Mothers pass on mDNA to all their children. They couldn't have isolated a single male ancestor, "Adam," if they couldn't isolate the mDNA of males, eh? The problem with your holding this study up as circumstantial evidence for the Genesis creation story is that the same reasoning that leads forensic genetics to positing the existence of a distinct set of common ancestors for all of us also leads us to conclude that they were part of a larger community of the same species.
-----------
I'm making this into a new post, though, because we are touching on a deeper issue. John from Oregon is more than willing to trot out scientific evidence if he thinks it supports his position, but denies that "science" can legitimately challenge his belief structure. I think that, if I were in his shoes, the latter would restrict me from bothering with the former.
Here's what I mean. Science, at the end of the day, is to explain the natural causes of stuff happening. As it is currently practiced, science assumes no supernatural intervention occurred in making things how they are. It makes sense. No serious scientist in recorded history has observed someone rise from the dead or turn water into wine. Things that we, as Christians, take as important are automatically ruled out of bounds by science.
Now, we turn to Christianity for a moment. As Christians, I think you'll agree, we're commanded to put God in front of all else. From a Christian standpoint, science, in seeking to explain the world in entirely natural theories, is impossibly wrongheaded from the start.
But you try to show that science can't show the impossibility of a real Adam and Eve, and that's where the problem shows up. You are giving too much credit to science, and challenging the authority that I think you'd like to save for revelation. Of course it's possible for science to show that there wasn't a first couple! Science could even prove that there's no God! Science is a fallen discipline!
I sense, in the way you use science here, and in the way the ID movement operates, too, an attempt to use science to show science its errors. I think this is bound to fail. If science asks “What is the most likely natural cause or set of causes that leads to this state of affairs,” it could never reach the conclusion “There is no possible natural cause that could support this state of affairs.”
Even if you want science to ask “What is the most likely explanation, natural, supernatural or anything else, of the current state of affairs?” I don’t think it will help. This understanding of science will always seek, in part, the best possible natural explanation to compare with the theistic one, and, again, no one in the age of scientific observation has ever witness the kind of divine miracle Christians claim. The natural explanation will always be the more likely, and, from a naturalist viewpoint, we must accept that explanation.
Now, for the past couple weeks I’ve been reading Schubert Ogden, (I’m reading something else now, can you tell?) who argues that a metaphysical analysis, using rules of logic that are universally acceptable, can demonstrate that there is a being without which our existence as humans is impossible. What’s more, this being corresponds quite well with that disclosed in a particular reading of the Christian witness. How can this be possible if we accept the traditional Christian understanding of the fall? Any universally acceptable means of demonstrating God’s existence is bound to fail. Foolishness to the wise and all that, right? Christianity tells us that the only universal human trait is our fallenness, doesn’t it?
Now, I’m not sure I really believe in the inherent fallenness of our secular wisdom the way Paul tells me to, but if you do, in fighting specific battles where science’s conclusions appear to contradict or support Christian claims, you are conceding the war itself. Science must be rejected outright as misguided. Advances in genetic engineering that have resulted in very convincing technologies and arguments can be only lucky guesses since the understandings that lead to them are fatally flawed. This shouldn’t be a surprise, especially since the same arguments and technologies lead to the conclusion that Adam and Eve were two among two thousand of the same species and just got lucky.
This post is already too long. If I’m onto something, though, there are lots of implications that cut across both ‘liberal’ theologies like Ogden’s (and, honestly, mine) and conservative ones, like JCHFleetguy’s natural law theory and Christian apologetics in general. Someone might want to make the argument, though, that fallen human reason, rather that inherently leading us in the wrong direction, can lead us, asymptotically, towards the truth. That is to say, we can get closer and closer to an understanding of ultimate reality using our SELF-POWERED reason but only a sort of divine SWELL (Other-power!) can bring us to the level of the formless goodness of God, and we can only know the nature of the Goodness of God after we’ve been brought into it in spite of our own limitations.
Science has given good evidence that a first homo sapien indeed did exist and all of humanity is [descended] from him and his mate.
That's not what the article you linked to said. Well, you're half right. There was a breeding couple whose children are the ancestors of all contemporary humans, that much is in there. You're exactly wrong about science showing that there was a first homo sapiens, (that's the singular form, I think) at least in this article. The research, accepting currently practiced scientific methodology, suggests that "Adam" and "Eve" were part of a community of about 2000 breeding individuals.
Notice in the article that scientists conjectured (or guessed, or argued from ignorance) that probably 2000 mating pairs existed but that the progeny of only one pair survived. They know this how? Because otherwise their understanding of genetic diversity in the beginning of species gets trashed.
Brian Cubbage had already answered this question, I think, before JCHFleetguy wrote this comment, but it must have been missed. Unfortunately, the study that discusses the problem isn't cited in the NYT piece, but we can probably guess how the researchers came to this conclusion. The long and short of it, I bet, is that there are differences in Mitochondrial DNA in the ancestral parents that led the researchers to conclude that they were part of a group of about 2000 breeders. Anyway, it's no fair to attack a study because the one sentence description of the study in the New York Times leaves a few questions unanswered.
I may have read wrongly (and I am not a genetic scientist) but [mitochondrial] DNA is only passed on female-female as such isn't it?
No. This is where your mistake occurs. Read it again.
Dr. Wallace's tree is based on mitochondrial DNA, tiny rings of genetic material that are bequeathed only by the egg cell and thus through the maternal line.
Men and women both come from eggs in the women's body. We all have x Chromosomes, too. Mothers pass on mDNA to all their children. They couldn't have isolated a single male ancestor, "Adam," if they couldn't isolate the mDNA of males, eh? The problem with your holding this study up as circumstantial evidence for the Genesis creation story is that the same reasoning that leads forensic genetics to positing the existence of a distinct set of common ancestors for all of us also leads us to conclude that they were part of a larger community of the same species.
-----------
I'm making this into a new post, though, because we are touching on a deeper issue. John from Oregon is more than willing to trot out scientific evidence if he thinks it supports his position, but denies that "science" can legitimately challenge his belief structure. I think that, if I were in his shoes, the latter would restrict me from bothering with the former.
Here's what I mean. Science, at the end of the day, is to explain the natural causes of stuff happening. As it is currently practiced, science assumes no supernatural intervention occurred in making things how they are. It makes sense. No serious scientist in recorded history has observed someone rise from the dead or turn water into wine. Things that we, as Christians, take as important are automatically ruled out of bounds by science.
Now, we turn to Christianity for a moment. As Christians, I think you'll agree, we're commanded to put God in front of all else. From a Christian standpoint, science, in seeking to explain the world in entirely natural theories, is impossibly wrongheaded from the start.
But you try to show that science can't show the impossibility of a real Adam and Eve, and that's where the problem shows up. You are giving too much credit to science, and challenging the authority that I think you'd like to save for revelation. Of course it's possible for science to show that there wasn't a first couple! Science could even prove that there's no God! Science is a fallen discipline!
I sense, in the way you use science here, and in the way the ID movement operates, too, an attempt to use science to show science its errors. I think this is bound to fail. If science asks “What is the most likely natural cause or set of causes that leads to this state of affairs,” it could never reach the conclusion “There is no possible natural cause that could support this state of affairs.”
Even if you want science to ask “What is the most likely explanation, natural, supernatural or anything else, of the current state of affairs?” I don’t think it will help. This understanding of science will always seek, in part, the best possible natural explanation to compare with the theistic one, and, again, no one in the age of scientific observation has ever witness the kind of divine miracle Christians claim. The natural explanation will always be the more likely, and, from a naturalist viewpoint, we must accept that explanation.
Now, for the past couple weeks I’ve been reading Schubert Ogden, (I’m reading something else now, can you tell?) who argues that a metaphysical analysis, using rules of logic that are universally acceptable, can demonstrate that there is a being without which our existence as humans is impossible. What’s more, this being corresponds quite well with that disclosed in a particular reading of the Christian witness. How can this be possible if we accept the traditional Christian understanding of the fall? Any universally acceptable means of demonstrating God’s existence is bound to fail. Foolishness to the wise and all that, right? Christianity tells us that the only universal human trait is our fallenness, doesn’t it?
Now, I’m not sure I really believe in the inherent fallenness of our secular wisdom the way Paul tells me to, but if you do, in fighting specific battles where science’s conclusions appear to contradict or support Christian claims, you are conceding the war itself. Science must be rejected outright as misguided. Advances in genetic engineering that have resulted in very convincing technologies and arguments can be only lucky guesses since the understandings that lead to them are fatally flawed. This shouldn’t be a surprise, especially since the same arguments and technologies lead to the conclusion that Adam and Eve were two among two thousand of the same species and just got lucky.
This post is already too long. If I’m onto something, though, there are lots of implications that cut across both ‘liberal’ theologies like Ogden’s (and, honestly, mine) and conservative ones, like JCHFleetguy’s natural law theory and Christian apologetics in general. Someone might want to make the argument, though, that fallen human reason, rather that inherently leading us in the wrong direction, can lead us, asymptotically, towards the truth. That is to say, we can get closer and closer to an understanding of ultimate reality using our SELF-POWERED reason but only a sort of divine SWELL (Other-power!) can bring us to the level of the formless goodness of God, and we can only know the nature of the Goodness of God after we’ve been brought into it in spite of our own limitations.
thus sayeth Tyler Simons on Monday, March 06, 2006
79 Comments:
The wisdom of humanity is more foolish than the wisdom of God, to be sure. But, the wisdom of humanity is certainly more wise than the foolishness of humanity. When we reject the ability of the scientific method to provide us with accurate (though admitedly even and especially by scientists, limited) information about the natural realm (which is the concern of science) then we become, in this chain of wisdoms, the most foolish of natural fools.
We can bracket off supernatural claims as outside the concern of science without calling science itself a fallen discipline and writing off everything that it has to say.
The concern of science is primarily physical, not (excepting theoretical astrophysics and other such disciplines) metaphysical. When our metaphysical claims bump up against the insights of science and the scientific method into the natural, physical realm, we would be a great deal less foolish if we would bracket those claims off as outside the concern of science without calling all of science into question and/or writing off the times in which science agrees with us (so it must be right, but how?) as lucky guesses.
Every time you go to the doctor, your health is in the hands of that bugaboo science, the supposed advesary of our faith. And thanks to science your health is in much better hands than it was when it rested in the hands of superstition and religious ritual.
Typing on your keyboard you place your faith in that nasty beast science to communicate these religious ideas across the world to everyone else who, trusting science, can retrieve them off the Internet.
There are literally hundreds of thousands of examples of how we (even those who us who do not trust science in the least), by living in our culture, depend on science daily. And, while science is limited (for its limitations see my post-modern critique of science in my post on the movie Contact) it has thus far not betrayed our daily unconscious faith in it.
More later, I think.
Here's the more I threatened you with:
I have a friend who has cancer. In her ordeal I see the interaction between faith and science, in that inher I see botha faith in science (though her beliefs are not really impacted by scientific insights into the natural realm - she is a conservative evangelical) she has both faith in her religion/God, and she has faith in the medical professionals treating her. These two faith work in concert.
What I mean by this is that she:
1. Complies with the terms of her treatment, and also consents to new forms of treatment, thus giving evidence to a kind of faith in science to accurately describe and treat what is going on in her body.
2. Solicits and receives a great many prayers. Her response to these prayers indicates that she has faith in the power of prayer, and believes that prayers made to God on her behalf are doing her some good.
I imagine that if she thought this discussion were worthwhile (she doens't usually entertain discussions like this - that is in the perview of her husband, a Methodist minister and one of my closests friends) she would argue that without the prayers made on her behalf, the best efforts of the doctors treating her (the representative of science) would be for naught. But she would also probably argue that without the effort of the doctors, who though representing science are to her ministers of God's grace to her since God is working through their efforts, all of the prayers in the world wouldn't save her body. This is because, in the usual way, God is here working through natural means.
In her situation we see God and science working together to save the life of my dear friend, who by complying with her treatment while also asking for and receiving a great many prayers, gives evidence to her faith in both.
I argue from this that it is necessary in the natursal world to have faith in both God and science, who are not necessarily in opposition to each other.
Tyler
The article specifically said that while all living humans came from one pair of parents - scientists believed there were up to 2000 pairs but the progeny of all the other pairs had died out.
That is a flight of fancy boss. Smoke and mirrors. A rabbit and a hat. You cannot trace the whole human race to one couple and then just wave your hand, without evidence from the very study you have conducted, to create another 1999 couples because it aligns better with your previous theory. Very good science slandered by a foolish conclusion.
----------
John from Oregon is more than willing to trot out scientific evidence if he thinks it supports his position, but denies that "science" can legitimately challenge his belief structure. I think that, if I were in his shoes, the latter would restrict me from bothering with the former.
Do not make me come to Chicago. I am very consistant, and always have been, that science will never find anything contradictory to God. I think we could have an interesting discussion about even truly contradictory to scripture. I am very much in the mold of the original scientists that believed God was rational, and created a rational universe, and that He gave us our scientific curiosity and abilities in order that we might pursue and understand His profound order.
As opposed to what I believe is your implication, few discoveries of science since I have been alive have not gone toward God existing: the "eve" study quoted, the big bang, homo erectus not being the precursor to homo sapien genetically (I think that precursor is still missing), and a few more.
So I do not believe science "cannot" challenge my belief structure - I believe science "will not" challenge my belief structure - ever. Period. So, I like science and am not in the least bit worried about what they will find vis a vis my belief structure. Experiment on brothers.
As it is currently practiced, science assumes no supernatural intervention occurred in making things how they are. It makes sense. No serious scientist in recorded history has observed someone rise from the dead or turn water into wine.
I think your two examples are on different planes entirely. Jesus was dead, Jesus was placed in a tomb, Jesus was not in the tomb, and over 500 people saw Him walking around afterward. That is actually a pretty scientific treatise - all based on observation. I am sure many, many Jewish officials tried pretty hard to figure out how those cultists pulled this trick off. They didn't - although Mohammad's method got high points for originality. At least he explained the facts, as to others who simply wish to ignore them.
The water to wine is a good example. No scientist would say that water "couldn't" be turned to wine (or the dead reanimate) - they might say they couldn't verify the accuracy of the report because they were not there to observe it; no samples were tested of the water and the wine; and/or the chain of evidence was broken. They would also note that no natural chemical reaction "in the literature" could account for the change. Other than "scientists" like Dawkins, real scientists usually do not say that things they - or others - haven't tested and observed "couldn't" have happened. You are too used to people with an atheist axe to grind posing as scientists. Scientists are actually open to where the data leads them. Real scientists are very careful to make scientific claims without scientific evidence. That is why Richard Dawkins long-ago gave up being a scientist.
Of course it's possible for science to show that there wasn't a first couple! Science could even prove that there's no God!
Are you talking about making up a good story - a "myth" perhaps - without adequate proof - as they have up to now with Darwinian macro-evolutionary mechanisms; or actually proving something? Because, since God does exist - science will never "prove" He doesn't. Nor, do I believe in the end, that science will ever prove that random mutation and natural selection led to more than variation within species - and not speciation. That later issue is going to be up to genetic scientists, and not God, however. It is a scientific, and not a religious question. As to the former, good luck to them.
----------
I do not believe that science, as such, is "fallen". The fallenness shows in the Dawkin's of the world attempting to stretch natural selection into a "blind watchmaker" as a substitute for God - our "selfish genes" as creator. It shows in genetic scientists, surprised by one mating pair "surmising" there "were probably" up to 2000. It shows in us buying those little bits of "smoke and mirrors" as scientific, rather than faith-based, statements.
The fallenness of man shows in us wanting to substitute things for God when those things do not, and will never, substitute for Him.
Sandalstraps
We agree on this.
Consider these two concepts in light of both "religion" and "science":
given and taken
Try to distinguish carefully. If you can...
That is a flight of fancy boss. Smoke and mirrors. A rabbit and a hat. You cannot trace the whole human race to one couple and then just wave your hand, without evidence from the very study you have conducted, to create another 1999 couples because it aligns better with your previous theory. Very good science slandered by a foolish conclusion.
You aren't even trying to understand how the researchers think that they have reached the conclusion that there were 2000 humans in the initial population from which our common ancestors came. The researchers were, as you demand, using evidence from the very study that concluded that there was an "Adam" and an "Eve." Differences between the mDNA of the two (and differences in mDNA is how they isolated the two in the first place) suggest that they were part of a larger community that had existed for a number of generations. You are ignoring this way of looking at the situation. I have a guess as to why.
Jesus was not in the tomb, and over 500 people saw Him walking around afterward.
Did you just make up that 500 number?
That is actually a pretty scientific treatise - all based on observation.
No. That's not what a scientific treatise is; don't you realize? My dining room has red walls. That's a claim based on observation, but it's sure as hell not a scientific treatise.
Because, since God does exist - science will never "prove" He doesn't.
My original point is that this claim indicates that you believe that "science" and Christianity are two different, non-contradictory means of arriving at the truth, and both of them have a claim on your allegiances. Like Sandalstraps, I agree that it is impossible to live in our day and age without a certain faith in secular modes of reasoning. The claim that they are mutually compatible, though, is an open question.
By claiming, as you do, a belief that science will never prove that God doesn't exist or that Jesus couldn't have been risen from the dead or that even if he were, it is unreasonable for us to believe that he was, you imply that your faith in science is as strongly held as your Christian beliefs. If science can't ever disprove Christian claims, it is necessarily another, equally valid, means of getting to the truth. Do you not see how this is a problem in light of Paul's claims about the nature of God's truth?
John, you should think twice about agreeing with the Strapper on this one. I, like both of you, admit that Christianity and secular reasoning both have claims on my fidelity. Sandalstraps denies the inherent contradictions between the two, but his acceptance of secular thought has led him to some religious claims that you wouldn't go along with, I think.
Now my central claim is that 'orthodox' Christians (and I wouldn't really include myself or Sandalstraps in that category) can't accept science as a valid means of reaching the truth without an inherent self-contradiction. Basically, doesn't the bible claim that God is the only path to truth?
I'm assuming that people don't want to make self-contradictory claims. It might even be impossible to avoid self-contradiction. Now, there're people who don't worry about this, or who refuse to think about how their claims about the nature of things might be inherently contradictory. Sandalstraps' sick friend is a good example -- she doesn't enter conversations like this because it's too easy for someone to tell her that medical studies on the power of prayer in the healing process have been rejected by the medical community.
(Here's another place where biological science contradicts Christian belief -- studies on the benefits of prayer indicate that there are none.)
Now, this doesn't mean that studies show that we should never pray for our sick friends, but it does suggest that science and Christianity make very different claims about who we are and where we come from. Again, forensic genetics have led to the theory that there is a specific couple to which every living human can trace her lineage, but this primordial couple was one of one thousand in a population of the same species. According to the current genetic theory of "Adam" and "Eve," their story can't possibly be very much like the genesis account. (Thanks for linking to that article, John)
Secular reason and experience is something that we can't live without. Today, even the most devout Christian, as Sandalstraps correctly argued above, has accepted that to a certain extent, even if he won't admit it. As Langdon Gilkey writes, we need to think theologically about that. Is it really possible for a Christian to accept the importance of science and logic but to deny that science and logic have any place challenging religious claims?
Usedtobeanepistemologist,
If you really want anyone to understand what the hell you're saying, you're going to have to elaborate.
Consider these two concepts in light of both "religion" and "science": ...given and taken
Are you saying that religion is given and science is taken? That there are aspects of givenness and takenness to each of them? What does this mean? How does this connect to the conversation we're having here? Do you think that I'm mistaking the claims that science gives us and taking science to be inherently anti-Orthodoxy? Or, is religion given to us by God, and science that which we take from the natural world by means of our sinful nature?
I'm guessing that you're an Evangelical Christian and you're inclined toward the latter. That means I actually think you agree with my central argument of the post. I'm going to go on thinking that until you actually join the conversation instead of taking enigmatic potshots at those who are seriously struggling with these important issues.
JCHFleetguy,
We both agree on the value of science, and we both agree that science (insofar as it is concerned with that which is true of the natural world) will never contradict God (insofar as God is the ground of all being, including the natural realm).
That said, you would do well to make a sharp distinction between God and your beliefs about God. Science can certainly challenge your belief structure, as your belief structure is that which you believe about God, rather than God or even a set of statements about God which happen to be true.
To that end, in the theory of evolution by natural selection science has very effectively challenged your belief structure. In doing so, however, science has not challenged God since, if that theory is an accurate description of the natural realm (and there is good reason to hold that it is thus far the most accurate description of the natural realm, and also has powerful predictive properties) then it describes the mechanism by which God is still involved in the continual process of creation.
Tyler,
When someone comes in and presents us with a modern Zen koan I doubt we can make any safe assumptions.
Dude (usedtobeanepistemologist), being cryptic is a nice mask to hide behind. I might want to try it sometime. In the meantime, unless you're a Zen or Taoist master, advance some sort of theory. It is dangerous to assume that everyone operates with the same understanding of language, particularly at a theology forum!
In other words, "taken" and "given" have many meanings to many people. You tell me how you're using those words, and I'll tell you how they apply to this discussion.
If, however, this is a koan, I'll skip past the rational understanding and move straight to the insight meditation.
Strappy,
I appreciate the point about attachment to our understantings about God that underlies this claim:
That said, you would do well to make a sharp distinction between God and your beliefs about God
However, doesn't this also suggest that one should avoid attachment to the very idea of the existence of God, or, better, to the idea that God is an understandable concept by which we can understand something about reality? That is to say, doesn't non-attachment to one's idea of God preclude metaphysical arguments establishing God's reality as the ground of being?
Boy, I had no idea that my post yesterday morning would set off a whole hullabaloo. I've spent all of my free time since then grading papers and giving exams, so this is the first time I've come back to take a look.
JCHFleetguy, it appears to me that, as often happens, our agreements outweigh our disagreements. Due to the brevity of your post that prompted my original response, I felt that I had to extrapolate the ultimate upshot of your point. It's good to hear your position more fully.
Tyler-- your point that natural science is not simply a set of observation statements is much more important to the issues we're discussing here than you seem to realize. Since at least Newton, theory has more often than not outpaced observation. This doesn't make science into just another kind of faith, though, as advocates of intelligent design (among others) seem to believe. I might say more about this later, but for now, I need to go home-- my office is freezing cold for some reason, and my fingernails are literally turning blue.
Ooh, now I'm really curious. Damn cold office! I demand unceasing debate!
Tyler
My dining room has red walls. That's a claim based on observation, but it's sure as hell not a scientific treatise.
I might have used the wrong word - but of course this is. All science starts with observation. If someone wants to prove that you are perhaps color-blind they can come and take a paint sample and subject it to color analyis - but science every day would just stop at: "Upon pouring this chemical into that chemical a red powder was formed" without really questioning the "red" or the "powder" part of the observation.
Perhaps hypothesis is a better word. Whatever.
Did you just make up that 500 number?
Huh? 1 Corinthians 15:1 Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, 2 by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. 3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6 After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; 7 then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles; 8 and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also.
Considered by many theologians to amount to a catechism of the early church taught to Paul before this. [Are we going to have some "blah, blah" about eyewitness testimony not being acceptable if the source is the Bible?] So, not only does Paul list the appearances, he invites the reader to check it for themselves with the "most of whom remain until now". If this is truly a catechism, then other Christians were inviting others to do the same: "boatloads of folk saw Him, go find one (or more) if you do not believe me".
My original point is that this claim indicates that you believe that "science" and Christianity are two different, non-contradictory means of arriving at the truth, and both of them have a claim on your allegiances
No, it doesn't mean that at all. I draw no line between "science" and "religion" - there is no exclusive "spiritual" vs "physical" realities that are separate and untouching. It means that God created the universe and controls it - and that universe reflects Him and will never not point to Him. Only our foolishness fails to see Him in the physical universe He created. The "data" will never prove He doesn't exist. It is finding our "wise" explanations of the data outside of God that Paul is talking about.
I, like both of you, admit that Christianity and secular reasoning both have claims on my fidelity. Sandalstraps denies the inherent contradictions between the two, but his acceptance of secular thought has led him to some religious claims that you wouldn't go along with, I think.
Maybe this is our problem: I do not equate "science" and "secular reasoning". Secular reasoning wishes to try to use science to bludgeon theistic reasoning (see Richard Dawkins). Science is the process of studying something through the scientific method and arriving at a theory about what it is. This has nothing to do with secular or theistic reasoning: it just is what it is.
An example: even if Darwinian macro-evolutionary mechanisms could be proven - how can they ever know the mutations are "random" and uncontrolled? If they could show some were, how could they prove all were? They can never know this. Ever. Never. If they create their own mutations, this is only proof God could have. Can we do something He cannot: we can give chickens teeth but he can't? And, if we do it, aren't we His instruments to accomplish His purposes? Aren't our scientific gifts from God? My system of belief is pretty resiliant :-)
Now my central claim is that 'orthodox' Christians (and I wouldn't really include myself or Sandalstraps in that category) can't accept science as a valid means of reaching the truth without an inherent self-contradiction. Basically, doesn't the bible claim that God is the only path to truth?
I assume I am "orthodox" enough for you. True science doesn't make "truth" claims, it makes "fact" claims. Quacks make truth claims based on science facts. It is Dawkins and his ilk who think that "truth" claims can come from "just the facts ma'am". It is a fact that modern scientists have never witnessed a dead person getting out of the grave and walking around for 40 days before ascending to heaven. Is it truth that therefore this could not have occurred at any time in history?
If truth cannot stand the facts, it needs to get out of the kitchen.
Tyler,
One should not become attached to an idea of God, that is true. But one can speak of one's experience of God.
This distinction is one reason why Tillich (who posits God as the ground of being) does not claim that God exists. There is no such thing as God. But there is God, who is not a thing, nor an idea, nor anything else. But God is. You cannot complete that sentence, because it is already complete. There is no such thing as God, but God is.
That is a difficult position to understand. Even more difficult to communicate. This is because it rests in a mystical experience of everything as being grounded in God.
Once this understanding, however, is brought into conversation with other understandings, problems emerge. First and foremost is that omnipresent problem of conflicting experiences. If my metaphysical claims about God, which rest on an experience of God, conflict with the metaphysical claims that someone else makes about God which rest in their experience of God, whose experience do we trust? Whose description is best? How do we mediate between competeing claims made from experience, especially if we cannot bring others into our experience?
Tough nut to uncrack. But that it is such a tough nut speaks to our need to not become attached to any description of God, even one which says we should not become attached.
This appears to be a paradox, but it is not. The non-attachment in it is the consistency. So when I say "do not become attached" I mean "do not become attached" even to the statement "do not become attached." It is attachment to an idea rather than the idea which creates the problems.
Many, many people, including JCHFleetguy (though he is in good company here) attach themselves to a description of God, and cling to that description long after it has proved to be in some way faulty. It should not surprise us that our description of God is faulty, since it is only our description of God. My description of God is also faulty, and if I attach myself to it then I will have problems too, and I will cling to it long after it has created more problems than it solves.
This is not the way in which most people wish to be religious, because there is no certainty in it. But it is a way of great faith, because there is faith in God which is sufficient enough to survive the loss of cherished ideas about God.
But I can only invite you to have an experience. I long ago gave up trying to rationally prove the validity of my ideas about God. I can argue that they are relatively sound by answering objections to them, and by presenting objections to other ideas. But my own ideas - even the idea that God exists at all - are only relatively good, not absolutely good. I cannot prove that they are true because they - like all other human ideas - are not comprhensively true.
They are not comprhensively true in two important ways:
1. Each aspect of them fails to be entirely true. Parts may be true, parts may be false, and parts may be both true and false (true in one sense, false in another).
2. Even the true aspects (if there are any) fail to exhaust the truth of the subject. If by some cosmic accident I describe something about God that turns out to be true, I still have described only part of God, not God.
I am certain that to the modernists and the absolutists this seems like fuzzy jibberish. I have been a modernist, and I have been an absolutist. I have called similar notions "jibberish" many, many times. But, as Calvin observed, when we speak of God we speak in jibberish, even if we are God.
That is to say that while Calvin (and I am by no means a Calvinist) saw the Bible as God's divine self-disclosure, it is also the heavenly equivalent of jibberish, baby talk. This is because, even with God doing the revealing about God, humans are still incapable of understanding God.
When we speak of God we speak in such fuzzy jibberish.
Sandalstraps,
I do not disagree with any of that per se - as long as we know that God has indeed revealed some of Himself to us - and it is the other extreme of foolishness to deny what we know instead of thinking we know all.
JCHFleetguy,
You're damn right that "eyewitness testimony" isn't acceptable if the testimony is the Bible, since the Bible isn't eyewitness testimony. The earliest scriptural texts we have are from the apostle Paul, who was never an eyewitness concerning anything about Jesus. The Gospels were written long after the eyewitnesses in question would have been alive.
Even given the earliest possible dates for the composition of the Gospels, it is highly unlikely that any of Jesus' original followers would have been alive. And, if they were alive (highly improbable) it is unreasonable to
a.) connect them to the Gospel texts, or
b.) expect their "eyewitness testimony" to be reliable.
Of course that doesn't mean that the stories in the Gospels (or in the Pauline epistles) do not reflect authenitic memories of the resurrection of Jesus. But surely you have to understand that for them to be convincing accounts one has to start with something like your assumptions.
Also, by the way you define science you seem to be saying
If science agrees with me, then good. If science disagrees with me, then it isn't science.
You seem to totally misunderstand evolution. Its power is found in its predictive properties. Without the theory of evolution by natural selection, for instance, we would not know that we have to adjust our vaccines for the influenza virus each flu season, because it mutates and changes. A previous vaccine will not work on a new strand, because that strand (by means of natural selection) evolved.
On this level scientists in fact observe random genetic mutations all the time. And these observations form the basis of modern medicine.
What is true of viruses is also true of bacteria, which is why so many antibiotics are suddenly ineffective. The bacterial microbes (which incidentally make us quite ill, thus necessitating the development of antibiotics) evolve in an anti-biotic sturated environment. As such properties which incidentally make a particular microbe resistant to the antibiotic in question are evolutionarily adventageous, and so are "naturally" selected. That is to say, they survive and are passed on, because the microbes with those traits are the ones that live to reproduce.
There is no reason to suppose here that that which is true of viruses, bacteria, and other asexually reproducing forms of life is, absent any disconfirming data and in the presense of confirming data, untrue of other forms of life.
Finally, people who have the audacity to disagree with you are not (by virtue of their having disagreed with you) "quacks" or even frauds or enemies of the faith. In fact, in most cases they are people who have devoted their entire lives to an area of study in which you merely dabble.
This appears to be a paradox, but it is not. The non-attachment in it is the consistency. So when I say "do not become attached" I mean "do not become attached" even to the statement "do not become attached." It is attachment to an idea rather than the idea which creates the problems.
That's fantastic. Thank you.
But I can only invite you to have an experience.
Oh, I've had a few of 'em. That's why I am where I am. I'm still trying to figure out what they mean.
*Tom sits at the computer, imaginig himself a deity. SMITE button clearly position next to the keyboard. It tempts his hair-trigger-finger. The imaginary God Tom gives in to his inclination, and presses the button mercylessly.*
There, now you are all ash. Seriously, good conversation, but I think it's time to give up the ghost.
*Tom sighs, wishing he were a deity.*
God's revelation is all around us, and is not limited to a set of writings which happened to be compiled and turned into the book we call the Bible (literally the book). But just because God revealed something doesn't mean that we understood that revelation.
Tom,
Thank God you're not God. If you were I would have long been dead.
Please don't SMITE me again less I don my divine rob and SMITE you back!
We Gods are at war!
Ash doesn't speak.
Sandalstraps
Just when I thought we were getting along. Given "the earliest possible dates":
Matthew was an eyewitness
John was an eyewitness
Luke (Mark? I always switch them) hung with Peter - an eyewitness.
Paul was accepted by the other eyewitnesses as an eyewitness to Christ alive on a road to Damascus.
Paul wrote 1 Corinthians when Peter and a chunk of the Apostles were still alive. Thirty or forty years didn't kill off 500 witnesses or more. And again, this section of 1 Corinthians has a catechistic feel - meaning it had been taught in the church for a while.
----------
Again, be careful what you read into what I am saying. I explicitly believe natural selection works. In fact, I believe viruses have self-evolved their genome in the face of a direct threat in order to survive (not a Darwinian concept by a long sight).
First, how do you know the mutation was "random"?
Second, I said that those who would argue the "truth" of the lack of God from the "fact" of natural selection are quacks - at least scientifically. There is no truth about the existence, or lack thereof, that can be drawn from the fact of natural selection.
The scientists who watched "random" mutation may have watched the power of God in action; and missed the truth right before their nose.
Hm. JCHFleetguy, I might have spoken too soon when I said above that we agree about more than we disagree.
"An example: even if Darwinian macro-evolutionary mechanisms could be proven - how can they ever know the mutations are "random" and uncontrolled?"
How could we ever be sure, you're asking, that behind all of the physical phenomena accessible to observation and experiment, there isn't an unseen hand guiding the whole process? The simple answer is, of course we can't know that for sure, since by definition the hand guiding and controlling the process would be unseen and hence itself inaccessible to observation or experiment. But once again, all this seems to be saying is that there is no amount of evidence that could be brought to bear on the question one way or the other. Being unable to prove a claim false does not make it true, for the same reason that an inability to prove a claim is true does not make it false. It seems to me that you and Richard Dawkins are making the same mistake, just in opposite ways. Dawkins and the like argue that since theistic claims fall short of scientific proof, we should judge them automatically false; you seem to be saying that since science cannot conclusively disprove theistic claims, we should judge them true.
"If they could show some were, how could they prove all were? They can never know this. Ever. Never."
Here you seem to be bringing up what philosophers of science call the problem of induction. Basically, the problem is this: Since induction (the model of reasoning characterized here) always involves making a "leap" past the available evidence, it is only as reliable as whatever assumptions one tacitly makes in order to build a bridge from the evidence to the conclusion one draws from it. These assumptions are not, as a rule, immune from being falsified, so it turns out that all inductively derived conclusions could turn out to be false.
But when the problem's put this way, it's not a special problem faced by the theory of evolution; it's endemic to all inductive reasoning, whether scientific or not. For example, I believe that, absent any observable sequence of causes, the sun will rise tomorrow morning. (A catastrophic astronomical event could destroy the sun overnight, but that's observable, at least in principle.) But my belief that the sun will rise tomorrow (absent extraordinary natural circumstances) is premised on my assumption that the future will resemble the past in just those respects relevant to knowing that the sun will come up. But that assumption could turn out to be false; all of my evidence for it appeals to my past experience, not to the future directly. So tomorrow morning, the sun could, for all I know, simply fail to be there for no discernible reason.
So if we are able to exploit the problem of induction to inject alternative explanations into the phenomena to which evolutionary biologists appeal in seeking confirmation of their theory, that licenses using it to upset any inductively derived conclusion on whatever grounds we want.
I submit that exploiting the problem of induction this way is about like trying to swat a fly with a bazooka-- it's just too much firepower than necessary, and will destroy much more than the fly. It detracts from the fact that induction is fallible, but extremely reliable; science, as a sophisticated body of inductively generated conclusions, has demonstrated time and again that it has both explanatory and predictive power.
The problem with theories like intelligent design that exploit this same problem of induction for their own purposes is that their theories lack explanatory and predictive power. The hypothesis of an intelligent designer in a way explains everything, but by not explaining any one thing in particular; one can always adjust the theory to encompass any body of evidence, by saying "That's just part of the inscrutable design." For the same reasons, it can't make predictions; assuming that an intelligent designer would be free, the only one who could predict what an intelligent designer will do is by hypothesis the designer him-, her-, or itself.
You sound closer to the ID folks than you might realize, then, when you state that "My system of belief is pretty resiliant :-)." You just do things a bit differently; you demarcate "facts," which are scientific, from "truths," which are not. But your way of defining truths makes them the sort of thing for which no scientific reasons can ultimately be given. You can't turn around, then, and avail yourself of scientific "facts" when they coincide with your "truths." You can't appeal to facts only when the facts are convenient; either we leave facts behind entirely, take certain "truths" as basic, and then draw deductive conclusions from them, or we take the facts as a whole and, with them, the knowledge that any conclusion derived from them could turn out to be false.
Fleetster:
Perhaps hypothesis is a better word [to use with regard to the events of the Christian story than "scientific treatise"]. Whatever.
Well, there's a big difference between hypotheses and scientific treatises, isn't there? You're right about that being a hypothesis. Scientific treatises, I think, do include hypotheses. They also include, however, actual or potential methods for testing the veracity of these hypotheses.
I do not equate "science" and "secular reasoning". Secular reasoning wishes to try to use science to bludgeon theistic reasoning (see Richard Dawkins). Science is the process of studying something through the scientific method and arriving at a theory about what it is. This has nothing to do with secular or theistic reasoning: it just is what it is.
Okay, we're talking past each other here. I'm using Ogden's understanding of the term "secularity," as opposed to "secularism." He puts it this way:
It is one thing to affirm the validity of the scientific method and to insist on its complete autonomy within the field where it alone logically applies. But it is clearly something different to affirm that this method is the only valid means to knowldege we have, because it circumscribes the limits of the whole cognitive sphere. The first affirmation, I hold is entirely of a piece with the legitimate secularity of modern culture. The second, on the other hand, is an integral element in that secularism which appears to have become ever more widely prevalent among contemporary Western [people.] (Emphasis in original)
I was thinking of what Ogden calls "secularity" when I wrote "secular reasoning," not what he calls "secularism," the ideology that Dawkins (and Daniel Dennett and a lot of other smart people) holds and which pisses me off. I call it scientism sometimes. I don't think you appreciate this distinction. It is quite possible that secularity can arrive at conclusions that, as Strapper put it, challenge specific aspects of your vision of God and the World. "Secular reasoning wishes to try to use science to bludgeon theistic reasoning," you wrote. At some level, as I've indicated, I agree with you. It is not true that any time secularity challenges or rejects a theistic claim or a Biblical inerrantist, or a creedal Christian one, (all three referring to different sets of claims) it is engaging in secularistic "bludgeoning."
The scientific method can't tell us that the scientific method is the only viable means whatsoever of arriving at truth. It would be ridiculous to claim that it does. That is the problem with Dennett and Dawkins -- they can't even admit the possibility of God because they think their way of looking at the world is the only legitimate one.
Many religious folks, in that light, are quite similar, though, and might want to think about glass houses and stuff.
I draw no line between "science" and "religion" - there is no exclusive "spiritual" vs "physical" realities that are separate and untouching.
I'm not arguing for a dualistic cosmology, John. I'm arguing that Christianity and secularity are different grammar systems that people can engage in. I'm fully acknowledging that the realities described by each overlap on many issues. My point is that the statements that are appropriate to the grammar of secularity might come into direct conflict with those acceptible to 'the' 'Christian' 'Grammar' (bracketing, for the time being, the questions begged by the idea of "the Christian Grammar.")
As far as the 500 witnesses to the resurrection go, you definately have a better grasp of the trivialities of scripture than I, John, but this doesn't help your case. What we have in 1 Corinthians isn't 500 instances of firsthand evidence. It is one instance of hearsay testimony. By your logic my telling you, "500 people have seen my girlfriend's cat Mehitabel and each one agrees that she is posessed by Satan, you can ask the seven of them who are still alive, and they'll tell you." Is not only my testimony to the fact that I live with the devil-cat, but 500 eyewitness accounts supporting my account. There's a reason hearsay isn't accepted in legal testimony. People can make mistakes and lie and stuff.
Leave it to Tyler and Sandalstraps to make all of my points far more succinctly and less pedantically while I type my post. Jeez, no wonder my students look so bored...
Coming back to the issue I was talking about before my fingers started turning blue back in my office (I'm in my nice warm house now, and my fingers are safely pink again):
Rather than hearing me yammering on about it, simply Google the phrases "Duhem-Quine thesis" and "confirmation holism" at the same time.
Seriously.
No intention to take potshots & no disrespect intended. Yes these are - and always have been important issues. Discussing them in the hope of arriving somewhere is undoubtebly far better than what I am doing: being drunk.
I merely hoped to nudge the discussion towards the idea that perhaps the science/religion dichotomy is misleading here.
What does the bible give to the believer/what does the believer take from the bible? How do you tell the difference?
What does nature give to the scientist/what does the scientist take from nature?
The latin for "given" is data. The german for observation is "wahrnehmung" - to take for true.
If you're looking at these comments in the same screen as I am, it's hard to see that the last commentors screen name of the moment is "neither zen master nor evangelical actually toying with the idea of referring to self as pragmatic mystic."
Thanks for commenting, dude. I'm intrigued with the idea of pragmatic mysticism, actually, and hope to hear more about it. Feel free to tell us more, we're interested in hearing what you have to say. You still haven't said much; we're not going to go in the direction you want until you make it clearer what that direction is and how you think givenness and takenness apply to these issues.
Surely pragmatic mysticism must include reporting the results of mystical revelations to others, no?
I'll no doubt read more about this, but it won't be for a few hours. This blog has eaten my whole day and it won't eat my night.
Brian
It seems to me that you and Richard Dawkins are making the same mistake, just in opposite ways. Dawkins and the like argue that since theistic claims fall short of scientific proof, we should judge them automatically false; you seem to be saying that since science cannot conclusively disprove theistic claims, we should judge them true.
I am not saying Dawkins is "making a mistake" - I am saying he is not a scientist. He is a materialist philosopher attempting to use the "facts" of science to prove the "truth" of materialism. If I fault him, it is in that he pretends science itself can take this position. So, I actually think science does nothing for either of our claims. However, neither of us can ignore the "facts" science can discern.
----------
Induction is a great scientific tool. We can deduce after a few million years that gravity will hold us down (yet scientists are still not sure what it is or how it works) and we can deduce things from its actions in space. It doesn't mean we understand the "truth" of gravity - only the "fact" of it.
----------
Do not think that because I am a Christian (and of course believe in "Intelligent Design") that I believe science will ever see God's "fingerprint" in biological evolution. Since mutations are "random" anyway, how do you predict? If you create a mutation, you are the Intelligent Designer? Anyway, I think ID science is a deadend, intelligent designer or not
It is too soon to deal with ID science be able to predict - they admit themselves they are at an observational stage with no coherent theory to tie those observations together. It would be like expecting Galileo to be able to predict the exact orbital path of Mars in order to survive the Inquisition Court.
----------
No, science (as CS Lewis points out) will never answer the questions of "Why it all happened?" and "What it all means?". It can tell us what, who, where, but not why or even necessarily how.
In this sense, I closely relate to ID scientists - but I do not think they can ever produce an evidence of God's hand scientifically. There can always be another "why" or "how" raised.
----------
You would be hard-pressed to find an example when I have rejected a "fact" because it challenged my "truth". You have my permission to roast me if I do. Just as long as you do not try to draw any "why" or quite a few "how" conclusions from your facts.
Tyler
It is always nice to be back here for a good ole fashion discussion.
My inability to separate secularity from scientism (I like that word better) is that while I agree with Ogden's point - it is pretty irrelevant to my life.
I grant that secular society only need look at the scientific method in regards to an area of science; but I do not believe the scientific method will even describe all aspects of that area of science fully because it will ignore the metaphysical staring it in the face - as it probably should. I will not.
----------
You do not get the 500 point. If I say to you that I saw "this" (Paul did - he was one eyewitness) and there are about 500 other eyewitnesses if you need them - I am offering you the choice to pursue the witnesses if you do not believe me.
Paul, and the others for whom this was catechistic, was not writing this to us (as you are often times fond of pointing out). He was writing it to people capable of "checking the other witnesses" if Paul's eyewitness testimony was not enough.
1 Corinthians I think was written in 55-56 AD. The crucifixtion was in 30-33 AD. This puts this letter in the 22-26 year range after Jesus's appearance to the 500 plus. Do you really think that all but 7 died in 25 years?
These folks would be the elders in probably every church in Isreal - and because of the diaspora due to Jewish persecution, every church in the region.
It is really silly to expect the Bible writers to go out and get 500 sworn affadavits to include as an appendix to the word of God in order for you to accept this. The church spread and survived in spite of brutal repression probably because these 500 plus witnesses kept telling the story and knew the truth of their own witness to the point of being willing to die not to turn away and denounce it.
I am not saying Dawkins is "making a mistake."
John, Brian and I are saying that Dawkins is making a mistake. You are making it, too.
I can't wait until Strappy's reply to your comment about the eyewitness nature of the apostolic accounts of Jesus. He and Kyle are the two best people I know at pointing out how stupid what you just said is.
I await my beating.
However, do you think their foolishness pretending to be wisdom will matter. You either accept that the Apostles and Paul saw Jesus, or you do not - not to mention the 500.
If the "why would 500 something people go to their death over a lie?" question has no impact on you, what will? Ostracism, torture, death, etc faced these folk for saying they saw Jesus alive - and holding to that "stubborn superstition" as Tactius (?) called it.
So, bring on the beating. The Biblical testimony with the extra-Biblical support is plenty for those who want to believe. Dawkins could be Thomas with his hands in the holes on Jesus's hand and not believe.
The standard of proof for ancient documents has been met here.
Tyler,
There is a difference between stupid and ignorant. Someone who is ignorant is missing a piece of information. Someone who is stupid is incapable of grasping the information presented to them. We'll see eventually which of these best describes our JCHFleetguy.
JCHFleetguy,
To your comment about the authorship of the Gospels, you assume that they were written by the men for whom they are named, who correspond to certain disciples of Jesus. This is a common (among laity, at least) but faulty assumption.
The authorship of the Gospels is unknown, but they date to far later than it could be expected for a member of Jesus' inner circle to survive. Additionally there is neither internal (the texts themselves do not say who wrote them) nor external (nowehere outside the texts is there a record of their authorship) evidence of the authorship of those Gospels.
Church tradition eventually ascribed authorship to the men whose names have come to be associated with those texts in the same way that Jewish tradition ascribed authorship of the five books of the Torah to Moses. In both cases, while we do not know who wrote the texts, we do know who did not. The men to whom tradition has ascribed authorship simply did not, according to all Biblical scholars write them. It is a simple matter of historical impossibility.
I know that you hold out the hope of impossible things. But unless you are prepared to claim
a.) with regard to the Torah, that Moses came back from the dead hundreds of years after his time (bearing in mind, too, the fact that most Biblical scholars see the figure of Moses as a composite of many different leaders over a period of several generations compiled as a literary devise into a single character in the Torah) to write a work which does not claim him as its author; or
b.) with respect to the Gospels, that four men came back from the dead more than a generation after their time to write works which do not claim them as their authors
you should drop your belief in this impossible thing. While the authorship of the canonical Gospels is in question, there is no question that they were not written by first generation disciples of Jesus of Nazareth.
That
a.) these works were eventually credited to four men by the names of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John; and that
b.) it is certain that these men, whoever they were, did not write these works
does not undermine, in and of itself, the credibilty of these works. Nor does the fact that Paul most likely did not write several of the epistles which bear his name discredit those epistles. This was a common practice in ancient times. Authorship was not that important.
Whenever anyone wrote a work which circulated among a particular community, they wrote it in the name of an influential member - usually long dead - of that community. They did this for (at least) two reasons:
1. To get their work read. A work bearing the name of an unknown is less likely tobe noticed than a work bearing the name of a famous prophet.
2. To connect their work to the legacy of the figure in whose name they were writing.
Per our understanding this, of course, would be a form of fraud. But in the time in which the Gospels were written (though, since the Gospels do not bear the name of any author much of this does not directly apply to them, but rather to the culture in which their authorship was attributed to early disciples) this was a common practice and not any sort of ethical violation. In fact it could even be a sign of respect to the person to whom authorship of the work is attributed.
JCHFleetguy,
As best I can tell no one is arguing that there was no resurrection of Jesus. We are simply arguing that the scriptures were not written by eyewitnesses.
Our faith has not been harmed by a little bit of study, though we have been disillusioned of some of our faulty conclusions.
Anyway, with your pride I doubt you would notice a beating.
Sandalstraps,
You act as if the Divinity school in Chicago is the center of Biblical knowledge.
There are plenty of non-ignorant stupid people who do not buy this liberal scholarship - and its contradiction of the witness of the church from before 100 AD on.
I will not argue the dates of the books with you because we will not agree. I will stick simply with the main one: the catechism in 1 Corinthians written 25 years after Jesus's death - when Peter was still alive (as was John - I can not attest to Matthew other than by his authorship). You cannot prove otherwise, and even liberal scholars do not argue Paul's authorship or the essential date of this letter. He was accepted by the other Apostles (expressly by Peter and John) as an Apostle - someone who met Jesus on that road to Damascus.
These authors were accepted by folks who quoted these books and attested to studying under the Apostles directly.
I will stand with Apostolic authorship of most of the books of the New Testament. Believe what you want - it is your right to be stupid also.
Oh,
The writing of a letter under apostolic name was explicitly examined, and rejected, by the canon builders. They believed each and every book had actual apostolic authorship (except Hebrews)
So, this practice while widespread was rejected in building the canon.
JCHFleetguy,
To be ignorant is one thing, to be proud of ignorance another.
I could not possibly act like a divinity school in Chicago is the center of Biblical knowledge since I've never been there. But, of course, if you'd bothered to do any research at all you'd know that, since my bio clearly states that I'm from Kentucky.
I went to Indiana University Southeast, and earned a BA in Philosophy with an emphasis in religious studies. I graduated from that institution with High Distinction, and was named the outstanding student in the philosophy department. From there I studied at Louisville Presbyterian Seminary, though I dropped out after withdrawing from professional ministry because I got sick and tired of asses like yourself.
If you choose not to trust those who have dedicated their entire lives to the study of a book which evidently you only dust off every once in a while to make sure God still agrees with you then I cannot be bothered by your proud, arrogant, willful, stubborn ignorance any longer.
Damn, Chris. You found your SMITE button, too. I like yours better than mine.
You assume I never read any theology or any discussion over the age and/or authorship of the Bible - and you call me arrogant?
OK
No, he's assuming that you've never read (or at least internalized) any of the stuff written by responsible scholars. You've yet to prove him wrong.
You can't just refer to anynonymous "canon builders." Who were these canon builders? What were their arguments? In your reliance on their authority rather than their arguments, you are saying that God was speaking through them just as much as he was speaking through the authors of the scriptural text.
Chris (el Straparino) was calling you arrogant because you refuse to understand his arguments, (which, for the record, is stupid rather than ignorant) but you think that you've defeated them. He called you arrogant because you continuously refuse to question your own assumptions and obfuscate when they are challenged for you. He called you arrogant because you were leveling unsupported, woefully innaccurate accusations about his character. You owe him an apology.
Don't worry, though. I have all the time in the world for your proud, arrogant, willful, stubborn ignorance. I love you and forgive you in spite of all that and hope that some day you will listen to the truth. Jesus tells me to.
(See, Tom, I have a smite button, too.)
Sorry to interrupt your flame war, but I had to note that, whether or not we have proof of Adam and Eve, we certainly have proof of the primacy and normativity of the male:
Science has given good evidence that a first homo sapien indeed did exist and all of humanity is [descended] from him and his mate.
I'm sorry, but something in me just develops a nervous twitch reading this, and I'm not talking about the 'science' part. From him? The first has to be male, I see? How lucky that his 'mate' got to play a (however passive) role!!
And to think that sometimes I think we don't need feminism anymore...
he said nothing except that his conception of dating is by "responsible" scholars - and mine is read through the dust on a Bible I barely read.
To repeat: 1 Corinthians written approx 5 years after Paul's trip to Corinth - which is dated by the reference in Acts 18:12 to Gallio as proconsul - who reigned according to an inscription from 51-52 AD.
David Mallick gives this list as the external evidence:
1. Clement of Rome (c. 95-97)
2. Polycarp (c. 110-150)
3. The Shepherd of Hermas [Mandate 3:6 (1 Cor. 7:11); 4:4.1 (1 Cor. 7:38-40)] (c. 115-140)
4. Didache [10:6 (1 Cor. 16:22); 13:1-2 (1 Cor. 9:13-14); and 16:6 (1 Cor. 15:22)] (c. 120-150)
5. Irenaeus (c. 130-202)
6. Justin Martyr (c. 150-155)
7. Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215)
8. Tertullian (c. 150-220)
9. Origen (c. 185-254)
10. Cyril of Jerusalem (c. 315-386)
11. Eusebius (c. 325-240)
12. Jerome (c. 340-420)
13. Augustine (c. 400)
This gives an unbroken chain of belief in Paul's authorship. At least in church tradition, Clement of Rome knew both Paul and Peter in Rome before their martyrdom; and picked up on Paul's ministry with his letters to the Corinthians.
Mallick adds this external evidence:
1. Paul identifies himself as the author in 1 Corinthians 1:1; 16:21
2. Paul refers to himself within the epistle (1:12,13; 3:4,5,6,22)
[Mallick's bibliography is here].
I take Paul as an Apostle who saw the risen Christ by his own testimony; his blinding on the road; and the acceptance of this by the other Apostles. Whether you trust his eyewitness account or not, he claims to be one.
The catechism, which he must have learned earlier than this letter, indicates the other eyewitnesses. All of this occurred, then, within 25 years of Jesus's death. John and Peter (at least) among the Apostles were alive at this time.
So, want a scholarly discussion - start here.
Lisa
All of this discussion started because of Paul's discussion of Christ as the second Adam. Sorry not to make Eve first.
Lisa: Sorry. I totally should have noticed that at some point. The article itself makes a bigger deal about the proto-woman, if I remember right
John: No one is arguing that Paul didn't write Corinthians. If you want to dig up your sources for your claim that it has been shown that Mark wrote Mark, John wrote John, etc, feel free. That's what we're challenging. The Boy with the Sandal Strap was arguing that the Gospels couldn't possibly have been written by the men for which they're named. You have yet to back up your assertion that this is wrong.
I take Paul as an Apostle who saw the risen Christ by his own testimony.
I will totally agree that Paul thought he saw the risen Christ. Even the most devout secularist would agree with this, from that perspective, Paul is a total nut and one would believe him if he said that he met Plato and beat him at arm wrestling.
That gets you to the level of one eyewitness account (and under remarkable spiritual circumstances, no less.) So, you've got one eyewitness of dubious credibility and his hearsay testimony that there were 500 more. Remember, though, that he's writing this letter to the Church at Corinth, thousands of miles away from the home of the other apostles. Isn't it equally likely that Paul was cynically saying to the Corinthians,
"Go ahead! Find out for yourself! You only have to walk 2000 miles or sail 1000 to finds someone else who's actually seen the risen Christ. Hurry up, though, they'll all be martyred soon!"
How likely is it that Paul really thinks the church members at Corinth might travel all the way to Jerusalem to find out for themselves?
Yes, Tyler, I see you have a smite button. But mine is all caps, see [SMITE]. I can see what you all are trying to do here, but I feel that fighting the power of ignorance one jackass at a time really isn't working here. Perhaps it's time to move on.
Tyler,
That statement is generally seen as a catechism. In other words, Paul was taught this by the church. Was Paul (actually probably in Ephesus) the only one teaching this? I think, and I am not the only stupid person that does, is that this reflects general church teaching. If not the Corinthians, then some other group capable of finding one of the five hundred would be around. And, as a consummate organizer and evangelist, do you essentially challenge a church to go after other information if you know it doesn't exist. What if someone does? There was trade after all. What if someone asks a merchant on their way to Judea to inquire and bring back their information when they return? Finally, as the church spread outward (driven from Judea by the Jews starting in Chapter 11 of Acts) from Jerusalem and Judea - you do not think some of the 500 spread with it? Wouldn't some of these earliest disciples be its elders and leaders? Certainly closer than Palestine, and certainly in Ephesus where Paul was.
Paul was the earliest writer in the new Testament; and gives us a clear view (as in Corinthians) about the beliefs and gospel of the church within 20 years of Jesus's death. So, why go for Mark and John? Oh well.
So, John (more important than Mark even though Mark is probably the first synoptic.) - or perhaps parallel with John as link supports strongly. In fact, I will go with the 60's date for the gospel and not the 90's.
I will start with the responsible critics who thought it was "surely" pseudoepigramic (sp) written around 200 AD until a piece of papyrus (P52) with a few verses of John was found in Egypt and dated in the 110-125 (within 50-60 years of the autograph) range (and it wasn't an original and had to travel). Also, papyrus Egerton 2 with a date of about 100 AD employed both the synoptics and John in the same document.
Tradition has John dying in about 105 AD, so if the book was written by someone else it was written in John's lifetime and circulated while he was still alive to people who knew him personally and learned at his feet. Tough sell already brother.
I think the linked article makes a very strong argument both for Johannine authorship and for a pre - 66 AD date. The conclusion of section A: . . . although John’s Gospel is, as one author put it, “a maverick gospel,” the traditional view of Johannine authorship is still the most reasonable hypothesis. The four strongest reasons, it seems, are (1) the strong external evidence, (2) the most plausible identification of the beloved disciple (coupled with the absence of John’s name in this gospel), (3) the authoritative independence from the synoptic tradition, and (4) the amazing pre-70 topographical accuracy. Perhaps the reasons for fighting so hard against authenticity have to do with the theological import that must be wrestled with if this gospel is indeed a historically reliable document.
I will leave Mark off for now. And Matthew. Look however in the P52 link above for the earliest papyrus fragment dates for Mark and Matthew.
Oh, the "nutcase" snark. The other Apostles were "stupid" enough to buy that Paul saw Christ too.
Go figure. They must have been sucked in by the blindness thing and his rapid "conversion" for no good reason by the side of a road.
"It is too soon to deal with ID science be able to predict - they admit themselves they are at an observational stage with no coherent theory to tie those observations together. It would be like expecting Galileo to be able to predict the exact orbital path of Mars in order to survive the Inquisition Court."
But by the time Galileo faced the Inquisition, he had already derived a prediction from his preferred theory-- Copernicus' heliocentric theory-- to the effect that Jupiter should have satellites (moons). He had invented the telescope, discovered the moons, and published his results.
The best explanation for this is that heliocentric theory is a progressive research program, and ID isn't.
I will stay out of the biblical studies controversies and let the rest of you who know more weigh in.
[weighing in again against my better judgement]:
My comments are based on such a wide range on mainstream scholarship and are so unquestioned that they are even in every single study Bible which I own, even the ones published by more conservative organiztions (but not fundamentalists, as they do not represent the manistream, particularly in terms of Biblical scholarship).
My comments are taught in every reputable seminary, even in a bastion of conservative evangelicalism like Asbury Theological Seminary. That position is also taught in every mainstream college's religious studies program, in both religious and secular institutions.
Again, if you'd like to say that the mainstream of a discipline of study has been on the wrong track for generations you are welcome to do that. You in fact do say that about science, and you seem to be saying that about Biblical studies. That's your business. But if I were you (and I'm not, of course) I would think twice before placing myself above the mainstream conclusions of an academic discipline just because they disagree with me, particularly when, again, there's nothing at stake.
What if the Gospels were not written by the men tradition assumes wrote them? What have we lost? We canstill (if we are so inclined) hold to even the most ridiculous literalist position, since the Gospels themselves make no claim to authoriship.
Most the conclusions we draw from a passage of scripture do not depend on who wrote that scripture. But you are willing to fight to the end defending a long lost cause which was never important.
Brian
Galileo believed in circular, not elliptical, orbits. One of the reasons he was unable to convince scientists at the time who were open was that his theory could not be verified by observation. Like ID now, his theory could not predict events; and he could not prove it to other scientists satisfaction (because it was, well, wrong)
It was, what, 100-200 years later before a coherant theory based on elliptical orbits was put forward.
sandalstraps
Gee, well "every" study bible I have says the opposite. One of us needs a different bookstore.
All and none are a couple of pretty near unsupportable words. I linked an (unreputable I guess) seminary at Dallas with a view that matches the view of the patristic fathers who wrote early in the 2nd and late in the 1st - some of whom studied under John and said he wrote the Gospel.
Frankly, that kind of "yeah, he was a buddy of mine and he wrote it" testimony needs iron-clad text criticism to refute it. There was no doubt on the part of the late 1st and early 2nd century churches on who wrote John - none. They accepted that John wrote through a secretary (as they knew him to do); but a secretary is not a pseudo-authorship. It is work checked over and vetted by the "boss" to which he attaches his authority.
I have linked extensive Dallas Theological articles on John and I Corinthians. Two eyewitnesses who wrote books of the Bible. Even Tyler doesn't question the authorship of I cor. If you want to call Paul a liar, and the Apostles who believed him fools, you may. That is not valid argument.
The most important thing about 1 Cor 15 is that Paul says that "For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received". It means he was taught this list of eyewitnesses prior to 56 AD - from the church leadership. The 1 Corinthians catechism, rather than being obscure minutiae, is probably one of the most important early writings in the Bible.
You have offered nothing but your opinion about what "everyone" believes. Take up the Tyler Challenge as I have. Take apart the articles. The ball is in your court.
I, of course, have more "unreputable" sources waiting in rebuttal
JCH Fleetguy,
I think it's time you started adressing what is actually being said to you. NO ONE has argued I Corinthians' authorship but you. The point here is that you are staking entirely too much on an argument that has no merit. Get over it. Get over yourself. If you have to have the last word, so be it. He who argues the loudest is not right, just an ass.
Tom,
I think I made it clear that at least Tyler wasn't arguing - although he really did argue over whether Paul can be considered a real eyewitness.
Since the argument is about whether there is eyewitness testimony in the Bible to Christ's resurrection - the creedal statement in 1 Corinthians is important for what the church taught (and had to defend against critics) within 20 years of Jesus's death. This is especially true since Paul may have heard this creed as early as 35 AD when he met with the Apostles in Jerusalem.
And you are not mentioning John - which is highly in dispute here. It was primarily John that I expect sandalstraps (or someone) to deal with and not 1 Corinthians.
We haven't even gotten to Matthew yet. It was undisputed by the early church fathers - at least John had the confusion of Papias to deal with to get canonized.
So, the statement is that no New Testament book was written by an eyewitness and that all were written "generations" after the fact by unknown pseudoepigramic authors. Nothing by Peter, Matthew, or John is written by them; and John Mark wasn't reflecting Peter directly in his gospel. Luke and Paul of course wouldn't count
This statement runs against the understanding of church fathers who knew these men and learned from them directly; as expressed in quotations and writings running from before 100 AD and on into the future.
I think I have the right to ask a little more evidence (considering what I have given) than "all mainstream theologians (fundamentalists not being mainstream of course) have believed this for the last 30 (or whatever) years."
It is not about me getting "over myself" - it is about having some real evidence before you unanchor scripture from the authority of Apostolic authorship against the belief of the church for 1800 years.
JCHFleetguy,
The authorship of I Corinthians is not and never has been in question. Unless you can demonstrate that anyone here at any point said anything other than that Paul wrote I Corinthians (the overwhelming scholarly opinion) then it is a red herring which keeps flying for some inexplicable reason.
The overwhelming scholarly consensus remains that a John who was a diciple of Jesus did not write the Gospel. There has been a tradition going back to the 2nd century that a disciple named John wrote it, as you mention. However that is a far cry removed from the time of Jesus, and is not considered reliable by most scholars.
As I've mentioned many times before, the text itself makes no claim to authorship. The tradition which gave rise to John's authoriship was one which of necessity ascribed authoriship of Gospels which had been accepted by a particular community to disciples of Jesus. This occured so far removed from the time of Jesus that, in light of the facts that:
a.) the text makes no internal claims of authorship, and
b.) the text dates to at least 50 and almost certainly 60 or more years after the death of Jesus
it is reasonable to assume, given the life expectancy of people in 1st Century Palestine, not one who was with Jesus during his life could have written that text.
There is the tradition which you cite as saying that John live until 105 CE, which is at best an improbable claim. For John to have been a child (much less an adult follower of Jesus) during Jesus' adult ministry, and then live until 105 CE, he would have had to have lived well beyond extreme old age. Bear in mind that the average 1st Century Palestinian lived into their mid 30's. John would have had to have lived more than 75 years after Jesus' death to make it to the year in which tradition has him dying. That is certainly an improbable claim.
The tradition arises from a realization that the text of John was relatively recent, which creates real problems for a group who needs it to have been written by an eyewitness (your term). As such a story is constructed.
Yes, this is induction, rather than deduction. But it is a fair amount more probable than the claim that a man lived twice as long as he could have reasonably been expected to, then (with his wits still intact?) wrote a book which never claims him as its author.
Additionally, you need this claim because you overvalue eyewitness testimony. Studies have long indicated that eyewitness testimony, empirically speaking, is the least reliable form of testimony. It is our tendency to overvalue eyewitness testimony which has resulted in DNA evidence freeing convicted felons who had been wrongly convicted on it.
You have constructed a highly improbable hypothesis (that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John wrote the Gospels which tradition ascribed to them after the fact) as part of an argument which rests on the flawed assumption that eyewitness testimony is the best way to arrive at the truth of an event.
You cling to this because you don't understand that it isn't needed. The best argument for the resurrection of Jesus is that throughout the life of the church we (like the earliest Christians) have had a non-empirical experience of the resurrection. It is experiential truth which does not rest on the authorship of the Gospels.
This is particularly comforting in light of the nearly universally acknowledge (among scholars) fact that the men who you supposes wrote the Gospels could not have done it.
Paul comes into our discussion - and through Paul's entrance you somehow supposed (on the basis of absolutely nothing that was actually written here) that the authorship of I Corinthians was in question - by your claim that Paul was an eyewitness to the resurrection.
By that you certainly can't be claiming that Paul witnessed the resurrection event himself, since scripture never makes any such claim. No Gospel (all of which were written after the time of Paul) places Paul at the resurrection, nor do any of the Pauline epistles, nor does Acts. Each of these in fact place Paul outside the Jesus movement still after the resurrection experience.
Acts has Paul encountering a non-bodily form of the resurrected Jesus on the road to Damascus. Paul himself tell no such story, but does relay a mystical experience of being caught up into a kind of heaven. Paul never explains what he means by that, but he does connect that experience with the resurrected Jesus.
It is then clear that Paul does have a form of resurrection experience. But that experience is not the historical resurrection of Jesus which took place three days after his death. As such he cannot be seen as an eyewitness to that event. And your claim about needing eyewitnesses for an event seems to rest on having some relay that.
I do not doubt the resurrection experience of the earliest Christians. I cannot account for the unique survival of the Jesus movement post-crucifixion without saying that Christians had and continue to have an experience of our resurrected Lord.
But you cannot say on the basis of scripture that Paul witnessed the literal resurrection of Jesus. In fact, you can't say on the basis of scripture that anyone witnessed the event itself. They had experienced of the resurrected Christ, but not of the resurrection itself.
The historicity of the event does not depend on either eyewitnesses (even if there were some, they may have misunderstood, remember faultily, or simply misrepresented what they saw) or the apostolic authorship of the Gospels (in serious question given both the lack of references to authorship within the texts themselves, and relationship between the timeframe of the composition of the Gospels and the life expectancy of 1st Century Palestinians). So nothing rests on this argument accept you unwillingness to concede anything to the mainstream opinion of scholars when it disagrees with your own.
JCHFleetguy,
Not 30 years, but over 200 years. That is how long textual criticism has been around. Textual criticism is now the dominant approach, and it is the framework from which I am approaching the scriptures. You are welcome to attack it, but first you should study it.
I suggest you start with Brt D. Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus, as it is a book on textual criticism designed for non-academics.
In it Ehrman, the Chair of the Deaprtment of Religious Studies at UNC Chapel Hill addresses the fundamental problem that people like me have when conversing with people like you, which is that while textual criticism has been popular among academics and mainline clergy (and is the dominant view at most seminaries and universities) it has not been well presented to the laity.
As the book is a bestseller, you should have no trouble finding it at your local library. Read it, and when you fail to like what you read in it, look in the notes at the back of the book for more scholarly articles to read on the subject. You should eventually, if you actually read up on textual criticism from the critics themselves rather than the strawman ("strawman is a logical fallacy in which someone creates an argument against a flawed version of their opponents argument rather than the argument as it was actually presented) arguments which your ghettoized fundamentalist scholars (here I use "ghettoized" to say that fundamentalist scholars have isolated themselves from mainstream academics, particularly on this issue, and so do not dialogue very well on the subject) understand what textual criticism is all about, and how the claim that the Gospels were written by disciples of Jesus sounds even more ludicrous to scholars than I have made it sound here.
You would then be free to, having understood textual criticism, reject it. But do not doubt that it is the dominant approach of scholars to the study of the Bible. And also do not doubt that each of your claims here so far, while usual in a church setting, are extremely novel when discussion the conclusions of the scholars.
Typo alert:
Brt = Bart
A few more things about John (the gospel, of course) -- I was looking through one of my NT textbooks, (New Testament: History, Literature and Social Context Duling, ed.) and here are some more problems with the authorship of the text:
There was no doubt on the part of the late 1st and early 2nd century churches on who wrote John - none.
That's straight-up wrong. (First of all, the earliest manuscript fragment of John extant is from about 125. There is no first century mention of his Gospel) Here's Duling:
First, the notion that John wrote the Fourth Gospel was from the early times questioned. The Alogoi, who opposed the ideas of the Logos prologue-hymn in John 1:1-18, said that this gospel was written by the Gnostic Cerinthus. Although the Alogoi's view could have been prejudicial [one could say the same about Irenaeus, for that matter - tcs] -- John was indeed a favorite gospel of the Gnostics -- the Cerinthus identification was also held by the Roman presbyter Gaius in the early third century. In any case the tradition about John as author was not unanimous.
I'll post some more of Dulings research if you want. You should keep in mind, though, that regardless of who wrote the original text, it is highly unlikely (impossible, actually) that this individual wrote the whole text. My favorite story in John -- the adulteress in the temple and the writing in the dust and stuff -- does not appear in the early manuscripts of John. We are forced to conclude that this passage was added later, and this suggests a Johannine school existed and built on the original text over time and there is no single author of the gospel as we know it. This makes a lot of sense when you look at the 21st chapter, a sort of epilogue. The gospel seems to end with chapter 20, but then there's more! The language changes, the "Sons of Zebedee" suddenly show up -- where were they in the first 20 chapters? Instead of being in Jerusalem, (like John 1-20 and the synoptics) everything's supposedly happening in Galilee.
In short, we know that the beginning of John 8 wasn't written by the dude who wrote most of the rest of the story. It is reasonable to infer that, since the text is so different from the rest, the final chapter wasn't written by "John," either. At the very least there is a question about that, and as a result, John 21:20-24, on which you're leaning pretty hard for internal evidence as to the authorship of the text, is less sure footing than it needs to be for this claim.
Amen to that!
Additionally, because the Logos hymn uses language which is in use nowhere else in the Gospel of John, and because it very closely resembles a hymn which was used liturgically outside the Gospel of John, most scholars think that it is not original to John, but was added by clerics who thought that it fit well with John's Christology.
Textual criticism at work. Some may not like it, but it is the direction of mainstream scholarship, and has been for 200 years or so. Don't knock the conclusions until you understand the methods. Don't claim to understand the methods just because you Googled it an arrived at the website of a marginalzed scholar with an axe to grind. Study the work of textual critics and see for yourself whether or not it holds up. But bear also in mind that the brightest scholars, having spent their whole adult lives studying the scriptures, have long accepted this method.
It ain't just a Chicago or Louisville (for the car salesman from Oregon who didn't bother to see who he was insulting) thing. It started in Germany, and is entrenched everywhere that scholarship is valued.
sandalstraps
I do know what text criticism is. Since every new translation (new living, new american standard, new revised standard, etc) is based on going back to the oldest manuscripts and attempting, through textual criticism, to figure out which particular variations are to be considered the correct variation and which not.
A leader in that is Bruce Metzger; who wrote "The Text Of The New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, And Restoration" along with Ehrman. He believes John the Apostle wrote John. In fact, he supports the reliability of all the gospels
----------
Daniel B. Wallace, who wrote the John article I linked:
has taught Greek and New Testament courses on a graduate school level since 1979. He has a Ph.D. from Dallas Theological Seminary, and is currently professor of New Testament Studies at his alma mater. His Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics: An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament (Zondervan, 1996) has become a standard textbook in colleges and seminaries. He is the senior New Testament editor of the NET Bible.
Just as a bonus: here is Wallace criticizing Ehrman on Ehrman's text criticism of John 1:18
----------
The major benefit of textual criticism is its use as a tool to distinguish between variants of scripture - for instance in chosing between textus receptus and Nestle-Aland as the best overall New Testament greek text; and for sorting out the best translation when more than one logical one is available.
Textual criticism has its limits. Baur and his German collegues - who started the ball rolling in the 1800's on the unreliability of John, placed it at 160 AD - and then got blasted out of the water by the papyrus discoveries.
It is one thing to say it was written in 160 AD by a pseudo-author; and another to have to place it before 100 AD written by a pseudo-author: John was most likely still alive at its publication, and his friends and students were certainly its audience whether he was alive or not.
It is really the sheerist of modern arrogance to think that Clement of Rome's and Polycarp's citation of John (whom they knew) as author coupled with its obvious dating during his lifetime can "simply" be overcome because now we now use text-criticism. Text criticism cannot be isolated from the external support for the author of a text in the early church.
It is also fairly arrogant to think that our understanding of Greek manuscripts is better than Clement's and company - who probably saw a first or second generation copy of the autograph; and wrote and spoke in Koine Greek as a primary and not scholastic language. I would guess Clement could teach the current scholars just a little bit about John's use of Greek.
So, what I would appreciate is your view of the analysis of the text criticisms as dealt with by Wallace; and not a reference to a book to read so I can understand real scholarship. Perhaps start here:
(2) Non-Johannine theories abound. Most such theories maintain pseudonymity. However, if so, this is a singularly poor job, because the author nowhere identifies himself as John. Others argue for a “school of St. John”—an equally unpalpable view since we have zero evidence that communities ever wrote a single document. Individuals write single documents. A more plausible view is that a later redactor took over some primitive material which the apostle had begun, reshaped it, and published it. Raymond Brown’s well-known five-stage theory of composition is the pinnacle of this approach. However, two fundamental problems with this approach are: (a) it only becomes necessary if a date for the gospel outside the lifespan of the apostle is true; and (b) only the final form would have been published because, as the Alands have recently argued, any editions, rearranging, revisions, etc. which this gospel underwent would have to have taken place before the first published form because the textual evidence is more solid for John’s Gospel than for any other book of the NT.
----------
Tyler,
I knew you loved that story - I didn't want to break your heart.
I agree that with the possibility of both those redactions - car saleman or not. Removing both sections does not overcome the internal evidence - in fact the "sons of Zebedee" reference has been a problem - why would he talk about himself and his brother that way. The one of the strongest internal evidences cited is that John didn't mention himself - and mentions all the other possible inner circle in ways that make it clear they didn't write it. If an apostle wrote John, it had to be John. The prostitute one has always been used as an example of the "real, loving Jesus" - a softening of the gospel really. I would hate to see it removed even if it is redacted.
The central author is not affected by use of an amanuensis to explain the Hellenistic ideas; or the insertion of those two areas at a later date. Of course, the Alands would have to be wrong about the first published form being the final form (and I think they are a little well-known in text criticism circles)
The prologue hymn: Here is a silly exegetical analysis by a marooned evangelical.
More on Hellenism in John: as the Wallace article points out:
All the vogue until the discovery of the Qumran MSS, the attribution of hellenistic thought to the writer of the fourth gospel seemed to nail the coffin shut on Johannine authorship. However, with the absolute dualism found in Qumran which parallels both Hellenism and John, scholarly opinion has swung very far in the other direction: this gospel is very Jewish! Still, full weight must be given to F. C. Grant’s warning that the relative amount of parallels with Qumran vs. “the vast array of parallels” with Hellenism cannot be used to deny a strong hellenistic influence. The real issue, therefore, is simple: Would a Galilean fisherman ever be able to gain such an acquaintance with Hellenism? In response, it need only be mentioned that (a) hellenistic thought pervaded Galilee in the first century; (b) John , as son of a fishing magnate, would probably have received a decent education, exposing him to much Hellenism; (c) the targeted audience, being Gentiles, might well have prompted the author to shape his material with a hellenistic strain which they could comprehend and appreciate; and (d) John could well have employed an amanuensis (as early patristic writers seem to hint at) for the writing of this gospel—a person who could have easily packaged the material with a hellenistic hue at John’s beckoning. Thus, though I am not nearly as optimistic as many today who want to pour all of John’s dualism into a first-century Jewish mold, neither would I argue that a hellenistic coloring denies Johannine authorship. Indeed, the hellenistic overtones, in my view, argue strongly for Johannine authorship, when coupled with date and occasion of writing.
Oh, a little more scholarship from the car salesman:
Here is the "Background to the Study of John" that led into the exegesis of the prologue above.
Dr. J.A.T. Robinson (NOT the conservative evangelical) believed that the whole New Testament was finished by 70 AD. Wiki says:
Specifically, Dr Robinson examined the New Testament's reliability, because he believed that very little original research had been completed in the field during the period between 1900 and the mid 1970s. Concluding his research, he wrote in his work, Redating the New Testament that past scholarship was based on a "tyranny of unexamined assumptions" and an "almost willful blindness".
JCHFleetguy,
Are you arguing here that you believe that the entire New Testament was completed by 70A.D., of just trying to discredit your own source?
JCHFleetguy,
Those are novel claims which call into question the basis for all modern Biblical scholarship. Not being a Biblical scholar I will leave it to the scholars to dispute these things among themselves.
My point is that in general it is best, absent some compelling reason, to side with the consensus of scholarship. What you have presented in no way consitutes a compelling reason, which is why is has been adopted by so few scholars.
Your own best source acknowledges that the author nowhere identifies himself as John.
Additionally, that John was (or, at least parts of John, which is what we're really talking about since no early manuscript contains the entirity of any book) written before 160 CE does not mean that it was written within the lifetime of anyone associated with Jesus. The date I gave as being the consensus of modern scholars was in the 80's CE at the earliest, and probably after 90 CE. Even given the earliest possible date the associates of Jesus would have almost certainly all have been dead, since being alive at that point would have meant they lived more than twice the average life expectancy.
As for dating the whole of the New Testament to 70 CE, that is a novel claim indeed. I know that you are willing to accept novel claims, as is particularly evidenced by your willingness to consistently fly in the face of accepted science while advancing your theories as though they were superior to the generally accepted views. But I am not.
You have selected which scholars to trust based on whether or not they share your conclusions, rather than based on the merit of their work as judged by their peers. This sort of conclusion shopping is not a good way for those of us who do not have PhD's in any field to arrive at what is most likely true of that field.
I hereby declare that we are at an impass. You do not respect the method I use to arrive at what is most likely true (to seek out the broad consensus of the best scholars), and I do not respect yours (to seek out fringe scholars who hold your religious beliefs, and render those beliefs in the language of scholarship).
We can continue baiting each until the end of time, but two things are certain:
1. I will not give in to spurious scholarship which is contradicted by the overwhelming consensus of scholars in the field, and
2. You will never accept scholarship which contradicts your understanding of the "truth of God" while there are still a few people with PhD's from institutions which share your ideology to defend your views from the demon of secualism.
As such this conversation should mercifully end. Have the last word, if you must. Believe what you will about me and others who hold that it is safest to trust the consensus of scholarship on an issue.
But remember that there is still NOTHING riding on this. If each of the Gospels were written by the men tradtion ascribes them to, that has no impact on their validity. If each of the Gospels were written by unknown authors, that also has no impact on their validity.
You brought this nonsense up because you need eyewitness testimony to demonstrate that Jesus rose from the dead. But we don't need such testimony to credibly make that claim, and even if we had it (which I and others still say we don't) it wouldn't make our claim any stronger given the spurious nature of eyewitness testimony.
Or to put it another way, you just wasted (how much?) time and effort to fly in the face of scholarly consensus to make a point which isn't necessary and doesn't help your argument!
You may now have the last word.
Ok,
These "fringe" folk just spent 10 years "doing text criticism" to complete a new translation of the Bible. Check it out
I have given you pieces of that because I thought you were trained enough to process it and comment. I was wrong. Perhaps Kyle, who has the Greek background and has always appeared more open to new ideas, will.
If I only slowed down your "all evangelicals are ignorant savages" meme a little I will have accomplished enough. If those reading our thread have simply realized that Robinson might have been right (and the Alands, and Metzger) and text criticism in the 20th century was about parroting ideas without real vision - then again I have done enough.
The history gives us two choices: John martyred at the time of James; or John dying of old age in his 90's. Your "nobody lived that long then" isn't analysis or history.
It has been, despite your continued bitch slaps at me, fun.
God bless.
Oh, I guess I shouldn't let this particular silly meme of yours go uncommented:
I do not "need" eyewitness testimony - I "have" eyewitness testimony. Huge difference.
And in no court of law in the world would "your honor, my client couldn't have killed him - 500 people saw him alive afterwards" be discounted.
As to the seriousness of this discussion, look at Tyler taking the obvious next step to "couldn't they have just told people what they thought they needed to hear"
Of course the Apostles seeing Jesus actually alive is important; and the authority of scripture to present that is important.
JCHFleetguy,
Time and time again, you never cease to amaze me with your ignorant (not stupid, Tyler - as in this case it is a lack of knowledge, albeit arguably a willful one) assumptions about the people with whom you are debating. Surely, with the slightest effort, you could have discovered that Sandalstraps identifies himself as an evangelical, and therefore does not need to be convinced by you that all evangelicals are not ignorant savages, as I am sure that he believes himself to be neither ignorant, nor a savage.
You continually show no understanding of some of the most basic statements made to you, and yet have the audacity to accuse those you debate of that trait. Your argument that you "have" eyewitness testimony does not address that you need to have it, and also fails to grasp how unnecessary, and also unreliable and improvable that "eyewitness" testimony really is.
Wow, the debate continues.
For the record, it doesn't matter much to me that my favorite Johannine story wasn't written by the same guy as the rest of the text. Since I don't give much truck to the whole eyewitness thing, this doesn't bother me much. It's the Bible, still. Since your theology depends on the whole eyewitness thing shouldn't you be ignoring the redacted passages?
Here are some of the problems with the "Background to the study of John" that you shared with us:
However, this presupposes that Irenaeus’ only source of information was Polycarp. But Irenaeus mentions another anonynmous Presbyter (bishop), whom most think was his predecessor as Bishop of Lyons, Pothinus, a man born well before the end of the 1st century. (He died in AD 177 at well over 90 years old.) Also, Irenaeus was in close touch with Rome, and must have known the traditions there.
Harris doesn't mention whether or not Irenaeus claimed that any of his information about the authorship of John came from this anonymous presbyter or other Christians in Rome. I haven't read Irenaeus yet, but the reason people jump on his relationship with Polycarp, I think, it because that's the cited source for his info. on John. I might be wrong, Irenaeus might have said that he also learned about John from these other guys, let me know. Unless he did, though, Harris' speculation fails; we are not justified in believing that I. was right about John because he spoke with a lot of Christians besides the one who he says gave him the information about John.
Interestingly, Harris neglects to mention that Eusebius, whom he does discuss, "says that Irenaeus was not always a reliable witness." (Duling)
(Emphases in Duling)
For example, Irenaeus said that Papias was a "hearer of John," [as he did Polycarp] but, according to Eusebius, Papias said only that he had questioned the followers of the presbyters, who in turn were respected disciples of the first disciples, including John... One of those presbyters was also named John. To complicate matters, it will be recalled that the author of 2 John and 3 John identifies himself simply as "the Presbyter." If Irenaeus misconstrued what Papias, whom he apparently did not know said about a certain presbyter/elder John, it is also possible that Irenaeus' evidence about Polycarp's information about John was innacurate. (Eusebius Ecclesiastical History 3.39.1-7 Harris quotes, later in the essay, one of Eusebius' verses about Papias. I wonder why he leaves out the other six...)
Harris again:
All writers subsequent to Irenaeus assume the apostolic authorship of the Gospel without question (Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen). If they were merely reporting Irenaeus’ opinion, they must have considered it worth reporting—without suspicion.
That's not saying much at all. Maybe if Harris pointed out how these Church Fathers did challenge some of Irenaeus' other claims but left this one alone this would lend a little credence to Irenaeus' position on the authorship of John. As it stands, Tertullian, Clement and Origen are just as likely to be repeating Irenaeus' error as they are backing up the truth of his claim. In fact, if, as Harris writes, they "assume the apostolic authorship of the Gospel without question," it is more likely the former, as they are adding nothing new to strengthen Irenaeus' dubious claim.
Notice I didn't mention the "early martyrdom of John." This isn't because I don't believe that the prophecies written in the Gospels were written specifically to conform to events that happened between the actual events and the writing of the Gospel, but because you don't. Once you accept the general thrust of modern biblical scholarship, though, this is a pretty convincing case. These arguments aren't reasons to accept modern biblical scholarship -- Irenaeus' playing fast and loose with the truth is a much better reason to do that.
Later on in Harris' outline, (It's not really much of an essay, is it?) in the Internal Evidence section that lays out E.F. Westcott's argument, there's a nutty section called "The author of the Fourth Gospel was an eyewitness of the events he describes." This section is particularly dumb. Westcott does prove that "John" goes into minute detail about the events in the Gospel -- details about persons, time, number and manner or circumstance. It is ridiculous to claim that this is evidence that the author was an eyewitness to the events, though. If we were going to do that, we would have to independently show that all the details contained in the Gospel of John were true. No one is denying that "John" was very specific in what he wrote. We are saying that he wasn't there and made a lot of this stuff up to give narrative form to the convictions his community already held. Harris says that Westcott's arguments " have never really been refuted, merely ignored." There you go. I'd say that his argument for the eyewitness account of the author of John is so dumb that it doesn't even deserve to be engaged. Come on!
Harris' study is seriously flawed, also, in that it contains no reference at all to the three synoptic gospels. As Ben said in another thread, the most glaring deficiencies in John's Gospel are the places where it directly contradicts the accounts of the synoptics. Did, as John writes, Jesus attack the moneychangers at the beginning of his ministry, or at the end, as everyone else says? Why did John put the crucifixion at an entirely different time of year as the others? Did he just forget when it happened? How the hell is that possible? Harris ignores these questions and doesn't refute them.
(this was typed before Tyler's last comment, which I haven't read yet):
Final thought:
Having looked at JCHFleetguys links, I find it interesting how quickly conservatives forget their own arguments.
Honest to God was the most famous book by the scholar whom JCHFleetguy cites (John A,T. Robinson, a figure who should be most interesting to Anglicans). In it Robinson argued for a dramatic reimaging of God, which expressly rules out the possibility of any sort of supernatural divine intervention in the natural world.
This book was, among other things, extremely influential on a young Episcopal minister, John Shelby Spong, who read it in the summer of 1965. It shaped the course of him work, and led him to eventually write, among other books, A New Christianity for a New World.
When it serves their purposes conservatives attack the scholarship of both Spong and Robinson, as it has led them to reimage God in a way that calls into question the entire Christian tradition. However, when such a usually "shoddy scholar" as Robinson (for he must be a “shoddy scholar” since his work leads to the conclusion that God has never intervened in the course of history, and never will) agrees with them, that work must be trumpeted.
See, the conservative says, even your own Dr. So and So agrees with me. Now surely you must.
I do not know much Greek, and am not a student of the original languages of the Bible. But I do know English, and read in that language a great deal. I know the controversies surrounding Robinson's work, and am surprirsed that JCHFleetgut has resorted to such a disputed figure.
My contention remains that the comments made thus far concerning the dating of the Gospels are novel comments made by marginalized (in the case of Robinson even by those now selectively quoting him) scholars who do not reflect the mainstream consensus.
Also, and finally, as I know English (and logic) let me break down the meaning of a sentence in English for you.
The truth-value of the statement "You need to have eyewitnesses" does not depend on the truth-value of the statement "You have eyewitnesses." They are independent claims. One may be true or false, and its truth or falsehood does not impact the other.
So to say I do not "need" eyewitness testimony - I "have" eyewitness testimony. Huge difference, is to make a nonsensical claim. The terms "need" and "have" are unrelated to each other.
Of course, as through the course of this argument you have made countless fallacious arguments, demonstrating that you do not understand the logical structure of arguments (now we're getting closer to my field!) I'm sure that you don't care that you just made another one.
If I were felling particularly petty I would go through those fallacies one by one, but as I am in a mood to finally really exit this, I will limit myself to a single trivial fallacy:
Sandalstraps:
If you choose not to trust those who have dedicated their entire lives to the study of a book which evidently you only dust off every once in a while to make sure God still agrees with you then I cannot be bothered by your proud, arrogant, willful, stubborn ignorance any longer.
JCHFleetguy:
You assume I never read any theology or any discussion over the age and/or authorship of the Bible - and you call me arrogant?
OK
This is a particular kind of fallacy lumper into the category of Argumentum ad hominem, argument against the person. This kind of ad hominem fallacy is called to quoque, or "you too."
Before I detail this particular fallacy I should note that not all instances of Argumentum ad hominem are fallacious. There are times when it is relevant to point out something about the person making the argument in the midst of dealing with that argument.
For instance, when you are arguing against a pathalogical liar, it might be relevant to mention that when an aspect of their argument depends on the reliability of their statements, which is uncertain. It is likely that a pathalogical liar will lie, so if such a person makes a claim which cannot be verified (or refuted), then it would be relevant to point out that the person making the claim has been demonstarted to be a pathalogical liar.
However, it is never relevant to make this particular form, tu quoque Why it is never relevant will become obvious in this case.
We can break down the major claims here as such:
1. You are arrogant.
2. Arrogance is bad.
The truth value of either of these claims is independent of the counter-claim, an Argumentum ad hominem tu quoque:
1. Well, you are too!
We can't make anything from this claim. Whether or not it is the case that I am also arrogant (and it is almost certainly the case!), the claims remain:
1. You are arrogant, and
2. arrogance is bad.
The best example of this sort of fallacy is found in an argument made by a woman who went to my church. It goes something like:
P1. My doctor says that smoking is bad for you.
P2. Because of this, my doctor says I shouldn't smoke.
P3. But my doctor smokes, therefore:
C. Smoking must not be bad for you after all, so I ought to keep smoking.
That the doctor smokes has no bearing on the truth-value of the claims:
1. Smoking is bad for you, and
2. You ought to stop smoking.
It is completely irrelevant to the argument, and is brought in to distract from the real argument.
This is relevant to our discussion because we have to have a good understanding of the operations of logic in order to understand what conclusions we can draw from the evidence presented to us. JCHFleetguy has consistently shown himself incapable of understanding simple rules of induction, drawing wild conclusions from limited evidence.
I do not know much Greek, and certainly not enough Greek to be able to weigh in on disputes between textual critics when they are discussing matters which require a mastery of Greek. But I do understand how to induce conclusions from presented evidence, as I understand the logical structure of arguments, and how to spot shoddy argumentation.
We have here seen a great deal of shoddy argumentation from someone who for ideological reasons needs the conclusions to be a certain way.
Typo alert:
"lumper", as in "This is a particular kind of fallacy lumper into the category of Argumentum ad hominem" = "lumped"
I guess I'll have to fire my secretary. (note to literalists: that was a joke)
Oh, sorry, you wanted me to deal with Wallace. I can't find the link to the article that contains this passage, so I'm responding to what you copied. Could you post that link again? I'm puzzled by the "textual evidence" bit.
Non-Johannine theories abound. Most such theories maintain pseudonymity. However, if so, this is a singularly poor job, because the author nowhere identifies himself as John.
Let's get this straight. Wallace is arguing that, since the author never mentions that his name is John, we are to believe the Gospel is written by John. O-kay. Just to clear things up, we're not arguing that the Gospel was written by someone pretending to be John, we're arguing that it was written by someone other than the apostle John. Irenaeus is the only one who actually says that the disciple named John wrote the text, and he's quite possibly wrong, for reasons stated earlier.
Others argue for a “school of St. John”—an equally unpalpable view since we have zero evidence that communities ever wrote a single document. Individuals write single documents.
Oh! He got me! I guess I have to say that it was a member of the "Johannine" community who wrote it. Keep in mind that the Johannine community is so named because they assumedly reflect the views of this gospel, not specifically because they were organized around the beliefs of the disciple of Jesus named John. That might help clear up some confusion.
A more plausible view is that a later redactor took over some primitive material which the apostle had begun, reshaped it, and published it.
Well, JCH, you agreed that there was an active redactor working over earlier material, so I guess you're with us and not Wallace on this one. You should probably agree with the following comments of mine, then.
Raymond Brown’s well-known five-stage theory of composition is the pinnacle of this approach. However, two fundamental problems with this approach are: (a) it only becomes necessary if a date for the gospel outside the lifespan of the apostle is true;
Well, we've established pretty confidently that there were redactions to the Gospel. Does this suggest, according to Wallace's logic, that it definately was redacted after John's death?
(b) only the final form would have been published because, as the Alands have recently argued, any editions, rearranging, revisions, etc. which this gospel underwent would have to have taken place before the first published form because the textual evidence is more solid for John’s Gospel than for any other book of the NT.
I don't know what this means, especially with regard to the solidness of the "texual evidence" of "John's Gospel," but Wallace seems to have a deceptively modern understanding of the "first published form" of the text. There weren't printing presses in first century Palestine, as you might know. Every single copy of John's gospel, until the 15th century was copied out by hand by scribes. Wallace seems to be saying that it is impossible for, say, the adulteress in the temple or John 21 or John 1:1-18 to have been added after the "publishing" (doesn't this term not sound completely anachronistic to you?) of the text. I thought you agreed that textual evidence shows that John didn't write that last chapter. Or, maybe Wallace is arguing that all of the text had to be included in the first published edition except for the stuff that was added after the first published edition. Should we, then, use redaction criticism and eliminate permanantly from scripture everything that wasn't written by "the apostle John?"
We can't make anything from this claim. Whether or not it is the case that I am also arrogant (and it is almost certainly the case!)
That'll be a nominee for comment of the month.
John, sticking around here as all this is heaped down on you is a truly heroic thing. While I cringe at some of the impossible things your untenable position on the nature of scripture forces you to say, your refusal to give up on us is nothing but admirable. This truly echoes the love and truth that God in Christ extends to each of Her children, even the most wayward, and I, for one, thank you for it. I worry sometimes that you're not really listening to what we have to say, but I have to trust you on that. May God open your ears to the ways that Her creatures and Her world reflect Her truth if not.
However, Sandalstraps rightly argues that obeying the rules of logic is important, even for you. He rightly points out a few (glaring, I might add) logical errors evident in your analysis. This is something you should take very seriously and think hard about. It's not just me saying this, though. You yourself wrote on your blog (and then copied in another thread here) this:
The message of God - the Bible, the Cross, the blood of Christ, salvation - is logical. It is reasonable. It is coherent. It is consistent. It is sound.
How are we to interpret this statement of yours if you have shown a repeated tendency to ignore the simplest rules of logic? I'm not saying that I know much formal logic, as la Straparacha, but I don't claim the same status for my assertions that you do.
That said, and in spite of my distaste for adding to this piling on, here we go. Take this as an example of the logical errors that Sandy and I are talking about.
The history gives us two choices: John martyred at the time of James; or John dying of old age in his 90's. Your "nobody lived that long then" isn't analysis or history.
NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! THAT'S JUST NOT TRUE! John could very well have not been martyred at the time of James (although I think he may well have been) and still not have written the gospel attributed to him. He might have died at 50 or 60 or 70. We don't know.
Far be it from me to give anyone a lesson in logic, but here we go.
If x (John was martyred at about the age of 40) is true, y (John wrote the fourth gospel at about 90) is necessarily false.
It does not follow that if x is false, y is true, or that if x is false, y is more likely than not to be true. Joe Carter, I'm sure, could tell you exactly what this error is called, you might want to ask. If you going to argue that the disciple John actually wrote the fourth gospel, you must show that all arguments that purport to show how this is impossible are false. You seem to be assuming that those who believe that the disciple John didn’t write the gospel need to show how each one of the arguments against Johannine authorship is true. This is incorrect. Only one of the arguments needs be true for our position to hold. Only one of them needs to hold for your position to be untenable.
In the end, though, establishing eyewitness accounts to the Christ event (even if this were possible) gets you nowhere, John, if you're trying to make a logical, historical case for the complete and inerrant truth of Scriptural testimony. It will always be more reasonable for us to believe that 7 or 8 NT authors or 12 apostles or Paul’s 500 were deluding themselves somehow than to believe the miraculous events testified to in the Gospels. If you are willing to play by the rules of logic, Hume’s chapter “On Miracles” from his Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding will make a pretty airtight case. Kierkegaard, repeating Luther, in his Philosophical Fragments shows how faith in what reason tells us is impossible is the very essence of the Christian faith. These are two very important texts in the history of this debate, and I highly suggest you check them out.
Again, John, please tell me whether or not the redacted passages in John are authoritative in the same way as the agreed upon original text and why.
(Proving that the word “final” and all variations of it is to me as flexible as the word “sex” and all variations of it – including “sexual relations” – is to Bill Clinton):
Clarifying the lack of correlation between “need” and “have” (as argued for earlier):
“Need” refers to necessity; “have” refers to possession. To “need” something, in this cases, means that the object of need is necessary rather than in want. It in no way relates to possession or the lack of possession.
That you lack eyewitness testimony does not speak to whether or not such testimony is necessary. That you think you have such testimony also fails to speak to the issue of necessity.
Clarifying my comments on JCHFleetguy's inability to draw reasonable conclusions from the data available to him:
Let us consider a couple of assumptions which he made about my person on the basis of limited data:
I. JCHFleetguys says: You act as if the Divinity school in Chicago is the center of Biblical knowledge, indicating that he assumes that I am a student there.
To bolster this assumption he has a few pieces of confirming data:
1. This Sandalstraps figure with whom he is disputing is commenting on a blog run by students from the school in question.
2. This Sandalstraps figure echos a few of the claims made by people known to be students at that school.
From these pieces of data it might be reasonable, absent any disconfirming evidence, to tentatively make such an assumption while actively seeking out disconfirming evidence.
And where might JCHFleetguy go to obtain potentially disconfirming evidence? He might click on the link to Sandalstraps' blogger profile. But no need to do that, because JCHFleetguy already has two whole pieces of confirming evidence!
II. JCHFleetguy says: If I only slowed down your If I only slowed down your "all evangelicals are ignorant savages" meme a little I will have accomplished enough, indicating that he assumes I am arguing that "all evangelicals are ignorant savages."
Pieces of confirming evidence for this assumption:
1. JCHFleetguy is an evangelical.
2. Sandalstraps is arguing that JCHFleetguy, for reasons of ideaology, makes reckless claims on the basis of flawed evidence.
3. Sandalstraps is also arguing that even when the evidence is good, JCHFleetguy, failing to understand the rules of induction, reaches bad conclusions which are not warrented by the evidence.
From these pieces of evidence it is a real stretch to ever make the assumption that I am arguing that "all evangelicals are ignorant savages." This is particularly true absent any claim like this in any comment.
However, even assuming that some tentative assumption like that is warrented, it would again not be too difficult to obtain disconfirming information.
I regularly claim to be an evangelical, albeit a liberal one. Additionally, not only is it common knowledge here that I am a Methodist, and that Methodists by and large are evangelicals (Methodism in fact lies at the roots of the evangelical movement in America); but you could also see that I am a Methodist (and also a self-proclaimed evangelical; so you don't need to rest on the claim that most Methodists are evangelicals to reach the claim that I am an evangelical).
I routinely mention some personal facts about JCHFleetguy, such as
1. his name is John
2. he lives in Oregon
3. he is a car salesman
4. he regularly quotes CS Lewis
not to discredit him, but to chastise him with just how easy it is to research the person with whom you are disputing.
It is clear from this that JCHFleetguy's standard method of arriving at conclusions is to seek out confirming evidence, and having found some to consider the quest for truth over without seeking out any disconfirming evidence with which to challenge his own assumptions.
In addition to this he also shows some other disquieting traits. Having been caught in making such unjustified (and false!) assumptions about my person, he has issued no retraction. Even on such a simple matter he seems incapable of making an error. Even with nothing riding on it, he cannot admit a reckless and easily avoided error.
This speaks directly to the methods with which he formulates his theories. Having made reckless assumptions on undisputed issues (no one disputes that I have nothing to do with any school in Chicago, nor do they dispute that I cannot be attacking all evangelicals since I claim to be an evangelical) and having been caught in doing so, he acts as though it never happened!
He also demonstrates little understanding of necessary or sufficient conditions. To wit:
1. Eyewitness testimony is not a necessary condition to demonstrate the truth or falsehood of a claim. The claim, for instance, that Jesus was raised from the dead, does not rest on eyewitness testimony.
2. Eyewitness testimony is also not sufficient to demonstrate a claim. That people claim to have seen Jesus rise from the dead, even if true, does not in and of itself demonstrate that Jesus rose from the dead. Other conditions must also be met, such as securing that the people in question are not delusional, or that they did not misunderstand what they claim to see. Or even that they are not pathalogical liars.
Speaking of sufficient conditions, having the testimony of a few scholars - particularly when such testimony contradicts the bulk of scholarship on an issue - is not sufficient to demonstrate the truth of one's claims.
We cannot build our claims on limited data without seeking out disconfirmin evidence. We cannot build reckless claims poorly induced from the data we have. But we can with a reasonable degree of certainty say that someone who uses such methods when the truth-value of their claims is
a.) easy to determine (for instance, one can easily discover that I have not connected to any insitution in Chicago, just as one can easily determine that I claim to be an evangelical), and
b.) totally irrelevant to the broader argument
also employs such methods when discussing other matters. This is particularly evident when that person chooses to acknowledge only the work of the handful of scholars who agree with them.
Tyler,
While we're on the subject of logic, I have to (gasp!) defend JCHFleetguy from your attack on his logic. Let us consider the claim:
The history gives us two choices: John martyred at the time of James; or John dying of old age in his 90's. Your "nobody lived that long then" isn't analysis or history.
You argue that this is a logical error, and you may be right. But, if so, you have misidentified the error. Your misidentification comes from what in symbolic logic is called a translation error.
If I undersand your argument, you are translating the statement "The history gives us two choices: John martyred at the time of James; or John dying of old age in his 90's" into a series of "if, then" statements.
Let us take your terms x and y and capitalize them, because later I'll need them to be a bit larger and I don't know how to do that with the html.
Let X = "John was martyred in the time of Jesus", and
Let Y = "John died of old age in his nineties."
You, then, translate JCHFleetguy as arguing, in the terms of truth-value logic:
If X = true, then Y = false; and
if X = false, then Y = true.
This would be a logical error, because, as you point out, the claim
if X = false, then Y = true
does not necessarily follow from the claim
if X = true, then Y = false.
But he is not making a series of "if, then" statements. He is making an "either, or" statement. In such a statement the true value of the statement depends on the truth value of each half of the statement being opposed to the other half.
In symbolic logic such a claim is rendered
X v Y
This means either X or Y, but not both.
If X is true then, for the pair to be true, Y must be false. If X is false, then for the pair to be true Y must be true.
Or, to put it another way:
X v Y = T under these conditions:
X = T, and Y = F, so you'd have
T v F = T, or
X = F, and Y = T, so you'd have
F v T = T.
If both sides have the same truth value, then the truth value of the statement as a whole must be false.
In other words:
X v Y = F under these conditions:
X = T and Y = T, so you'd have
T v T = F, or
X = F and Y = F, so you'd have
F v F = F.
Deductively we can rule out the first scenario. It cannot be the case, in JCHFleetguy's statement
The history gives us two choices: John martyred at the time of James; or John dying of old age in his 90's. Your "nobody lived that long then" isn't analysis or history.
That both X ("John was martyred in the time of Jesus") and Y ("John died of old age in his nineties") are both true. So we have ruled out the first possible error.
But what about the second error. Could it be the case that neither X nor Y is true. Could we have, in this statement, a case of
F v F = F?
That is a question for history to answer.
But, while the statement passes (for now) the test of deductive logic, I think that it fails to pass the test of inductive logic. In terms of inductive logic, if I am right, JCHFleetguy, in making his claim
The history gives us two choices: John martyred at the time of James; or John dying of old age in his 90's
has almost certainly committed a fallacy called false dichotomy. That is to say, he has set up a dichotomy (X v Y) when there are more than just two reasonable options. If there are more than two options, then his conclusion (that either X or Y must be true) does not follow.
He also errs when he follows that up with the claim
Your "nobody lived that long then" isn't analysis or history.
This error is a deductive error. His argument can be rendered thusly:
Let A = "It is not the case that the claim nobody lived that long is analysis," and
Let B = "It is not the case that nobody lived that long is history."
(And let us bracket off whether or not he has accurately described my argument)
His claim, then, is
Both A (that his version of my argument is not analysis) and B (that his version of my argument is not history) are true, or for our purposes we'll render it
A * B = T
This kind of statement is only true when both halves are true. In other words, for the claim
A * B = T
to work, the following conditions must be met.
A = T, and B = T.
The you'd have
T * T = T
If you have any of these
T * F, F * T, or F * F, then the truth value must be F. In other words
T * F = F
F * T = F, and
F * F = F.
But it is obvious that A = F. Why? For A to be true, it must be the case that pointing out the discrepency between John's legendary age and the average lifespan in 1st Century Palestine is in fact not analysis. But it is analysis, as it provides information through which to view the situation.
As such JCHFleetguy's statement is logically dubious.
So, Tyler, there are errors where you found them, but you in your haste to find errors accidently found the wrong ones.
Wow. Thanks
Logic isn't my subject so I will not wade through that - but I will deal with two things I actually consider on point.
1. I was asked why I "needed" eyewitness testimony to be true. I do not "need" it to be true - for my faith or my belief. If we wish to say I misunderstood the connotation behind the use of "need" in this question you may; and I will apologize.
The second half of the sentence doesn't need to be connected to the first. The first was an objection to the author placing some "neediness" in my heart that doesn't exist - and a denial that that neediness existed. The second part was a statement about what I consider to be the case that should be made from scripture on an intellectual level.
Sandal started this with: Additionally, you need this claim because you overvalue eyewitness testimony . . . part of an argument which rests on the flawed assumption that eyewitness testimony is the best way to arrive at the truth of an event. Both of those arguments assume things not in evidence. I said I believe the Bible contains eyewitness evidence ("I have it") and never anything about how I weigh its importance ("I need it")
2. In this I have to apologize and clarify. Evangelical was the wrong word to use - fundamentalist or orthodox was not. I perhaps also should have been criticizing Tyler instead of sandalstraps.
Tyler: 'orthodox' Christians (and I wouldn't really include myself or Sandalstraps in that category) He set me up :-) . . . he's assuming that you've never read (or at least internalized) any of the stuff written by responsible scholars. You've yet to prove him wrong [Nope, just irresponsible scholars] . . . As far as the 500 witnesses to the resurrection go, you definately have a better grasp of the trivialities of scripture than I I loved this one. A major point of theological study is how, and when, the Christology of the early church developed. This very, very early, and important, creedal statement now becomes a triviality . . . Chris (el Straparino) was calling you arrogant because you refuse to understand his arguments, I have never shown a lack of understanding of his arguments - I have read them and heard them before. I disagree with his arguments and believe them to be based on faulty, even if mainstream, scholarship. His arrogance, or maybe just yours here, is thinking that my disagreeing implies I do not understand; as if it is so "right" that only ignorance could ignore it.
sandalstraps: This [belief gospels written by those historically said to write them] is a common (among laity, at least) but faulty assumption. No non-lay people? Or just a few? . . . The men to whom tradition has ascribed authorship simply did not, according to all Biblical scholars, write them [so if they believe John wrote John they are not a scholar?] . . . While the authorship of the canonical Gospels is in question, there is no question [Richardson, Metzger, others?] that they were not written by first generation disciples of Jesus of Nazareth. . . . My comments are taught in every reputable seminary Dallas and Denver disreputable? . . . Our faith has not been harmed by a little bit of study So, of course, anyone who disagrees with you hasn't done even a little bit of study . . . If you choose not to trust those who have dedicated their entire lives to the study of a book which evidently you only dust off every once in a while to make sure God still agrees with you Meaning, of course, I should just trust those who spent their whole life coming to your conclusions rather than their whole life coming to others . . . I do not know where to start quoting in his long patient and exceedingly condescending explanation to me about textual criticism . . . And I left out that fundamentalist (well I cant call them scholars can I) have "ghettoized" themselves on this issue by not agreeing with the mainstream.
Again, I apologize for using the word "evangelical". The general sentiment I saw you expressing toward anyone who disagreed with the "mainstream" was exactly accurate.
misc.
sandalstraps: with respect to the Gospels, that four men came back from the dead more than a generation after their time to write works which do not claim them as their authors This seems to be based on a "no one in that time lived over 30" kind of argument. Support that Peter (factual source of Mark), Matthew, John, and Paul (source of Luke) all died before, say, 60 AD.
sandlestraps: This was a common practice in ancient times. Authorship was not that important Except that since this was true, the early church fathers made the issue of pseudoepigraphy a major issue when discussing the canonizations of books of the Bible.
Tyler: Remember, though, that he's writing this letter to the Church at Corinth, thousands of miles away from the home of the other apostles. Isn't it equally likely that Paul was cynically saying to the Corinthians, Completely ignoring the "creedal" nature of the statement - and therefore the likelihood it was being spoken by all church leaders everywhere - even in Judea. Remember Peter's speech in Acts where he tells the crowd that they "know" of the miracles Jesus performed? Which is of course what sandalstraps did here right after you: The authorship of I Corinthians is not and never has been in question. Unless you can demonstrate that anyone here at any point said anything other than that Paul wrote I Corinthians (the overwhelming scholarly opinion) then it is a red herring which keeps flying for some inexplicable reason. I brought it up because it is a very early example of the public teaching of the Church while its enemies could still bring evidence against them from the mouths of living opponents. Sandal blew right by the stated purpose (ignoring the nature of the creed itself and its early date as well as its implications) and went right to the red herring counter. Smells fishy.
JCHFleetguy: I'm riding a hobbyhorse here at this point, so I will just make one more remark and let it go:
Sure, Galileo's theory was wrong in the sense that major portions of it are at variance with what later proved to be the best theory. But the notion that Galileo's theory made no predictions is just blatantly false, and irresponsible to say. The example I gave is one of the standard examples in the history of science of a theory (partially incorrect as it may have been) making a prediction.
Why did it fail to persuade the entire scientific community? Well, ruling out the Aristotelians (as you do) who refuse to admit any of the evidence Galileo takes as decisive, a big reason why the others had questions was because the sixteenth century lacked a body of optical theory that the entire scientific theory found satisfactory. So they found it difficult to accept Galileo's evidence for the moons of Jupiter because they had little reason to trust the evidence Galileo presented for it, which was obtained by the telescope. (Of course, Galileo ended up having the right side of that debate.)
So your statement to the effect that "One of the reasons he was unable to convince scientists at the time who were open was that his theory could not be verified by observation" is half-true, but not for the reasons you are implying. You are implying that his theory could not be verified because it is literally false; but this presupposes the benefit of hindsight, doesn't it? It's not as if Galileo's contemporaries were sitting on the sidelines, smugly confident that Galileo would fail because they knew that Kepler and Newton's heliocentric system with elliptical orbits was just around the corner.
Contrary to certain statements you have made, science is not just a digest of natural facts. Science involves theories, and their relationship to the evidence is a far more tangled affair than you're implying in your remarks here. Part of the consequence of that is that it's only with the benefit of hindsight that anyone gets to say of a theory that it failed because the world just isn't that way; if we had that option open to us, there'd be no need for science in the first place, since we would already know how the world is without benefit of science. So in the case of ID, holding out the possibility that it just might turn out to be right as a reason for hanging on to it as a research program is neither here nor there; any number of theories could be right. All theories, including ID, could be grossly wrong. The real question is whether, given the available evidence, a particular theory answers to some genuinely scientific difficulty. And ID currently fails that test.
I have no problem with teleological arguments as philosophical arguments. But the only motivation for trying to introduce them as scientific hypotheses, given the current state of science, is to try and break science's back, not to advance it. In their less guarded moments, the ID folks admit as much; take a look at the essays on the website of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, especially the ones by Stephen Meyer.
Brian,
Other than missing the stress on the word "one" I put in my comment on Galileo - we hardly disagree.
There were scientists who were open to what Galileo, and Copernicus, thought. They allowed Galileo to publish and discuss in scientific circles - as they had with Copernicus before him.
The problem came because Galileo published his theory in the common language; and distributed it among "the masses" - and then took a shot at the Pope in the published work to top it off. All of this without really being able to give the scientists who were at least listening real proof of his theory.
As to ID as a current science, I have expressed in a number of ways above that they are unlikely ever to find proof of an "intelligent designer's" fingerprint that anyone will accept - or even that can be considered proof.
They have succeeded in pointing out how really devastating DNA/RNA and some other complex structures are to Darwin's theory of small incremental steps over time by random mutation and selection. Darwin's own comment about "find something that couldn't have come about this way and my theory is dead" has really been achieved in my opinion - as little as that is worth.
So, we will see 30 or 40 years from now, in brilliant hindsight, what the state of our knowledge of evolution is - and how well Darwinian macro-evolutionary mechanisms have held up.
Since my whole point about "truth" and "fact" in science was to distinguish whether the "truth" of God could ever be proven or disproven by any "fact" science could ever discern - do you believe science will, or could ever, prove God does (or doesn't) exist? If my terminology offends, tell me the right words to substitute.
Let us honestly consider why we should bring skepticism to claims made in what JCHFleetguy calls the historical record. But first we should consider this exchange, as it sets up the immediate need (abridged and paraphrased for length and clarity):
I argue to the effect that the Gospels in general and John in particular could not have been written by the men to whom tradition and JCHFleetguy's "historical record" ascribe authorship because of the distance between the average life expectancy in 1st Century Palestine and the best dating for the composition of those works.
Simply put, it is not reasonable to expect that someone lived more than twice the life expectancy before they wrote such a work.
JCHFleetguy makes two counter claims:
1. On the basis of particularly but not exclusively the work of John Robinson, the formation of the New Testament texts can be brought to 70 CE.
2. At a relatively early point in history we have a written record of John being declared the author of the Gospel of John.
I have already responded to the first counter-claim, but I will do so again here in an abridged form.
The work of John Robinson in dating the texts of the New Testament has been refuted strongly by the overwhelming consensus of scholars in that field.
Additionally the crux of John Robinson's approach and theology have been discredited by many of the same people who quote him on the website to which JCHFleetguy directed me.
He has long been a marginal figure, despised by the very people who champion this single conclusion of his. To me it is disingenuous to hail someone as a great scholar when he agrees with you, while simultaneously reviling his scholarship when it disagrees with you.
It is possible that even if John Robinson is declared by those who quote him here to be a very poor scholar in the bulk of his work, they can still hold that he accidently got this one right. But that seems flimsy grounds on which to overturn the overwhelming consensus of scholars on the matter.
So we are left with the overwhelming probability that the Gospels were written far outside the normal life expectancy of the disciples of Jesus. This does not, in and of itself, sink JCHFleetguy's argument. After all, he has also argued that at a very early point we have a written record of Johnannine authorship.
This is why from here on out I will discuss why we should bring a degree of skepticism to claims outside the realm of probability but which are still grounded in a written record. Consistency demands it.
In the Taoist tradition there is a long written record of unusual longevity brought about by a technique which, translated into English, is usually rendered "internal alchemy."
Taoists have long claimed that their techiniques of internal alchemy have caused people to livetwo to three times the average life expectancy by slowing the natural aging process.
In defense of this, there are many Taoist stories, which have long been recorded. One such story concerns a character known as the Bat Immortal of Huashan mountain temple. Immortal is the term for the men who elongated their lives through internal alchemy. These characters took on names based on the animals on whom they modelled their styles of meditation and martial arts. So the Bat Immortal was an Immortal who resembled a bat.
The Bat Immortal is said to have lived several hundred years on Huashan mountain because of his Extreme Yin practice. What are we to make of such a claim? It is similar to the claim that John lived significantly more than twice the life expectancy of his time. And it is, after all, grounded both in tradition and a written record.
The earliest recorded stories of the life of the Buddha include several impossible claims which are nonetheless rooted in both tradition and a written record. The Buddha, it is both said and written, was born not in the usual way, but through his mother's armpit. He was born in a garden, and upon hitting the ground he immediately began to walk and speak in complete sentences. What are we to make of this? After all, it is part of the tradition, and part of the earliest available written record.
On what grounds do we affirm, based on tradition and the written record, the impossible claims of our tradition, while denying the impossible claims of another tradition with equal supporting evidence?
JCHFleetguy,
Are you prepared to suspend your disbelief for the impossible claims (rooted in tradition and the written record) of all religions, or only Christianity?
If not, then we are really talking about the dating of the Gospels here, and not the claim that John lived past the point to which is Gospel has thus far been dated by mainstream scholars.
I suspect in this point we will never reach agreement, because we accept different authorities. I go with the ones who have been broadly accepted by the academic community, you go with the ones who support the position of your religious tradition.
Sandalstraps
Lets leave this off. The underlying basis of your argument seems to be that John couldn't have lived to the age of 90 which better than half the historical record believes because "nobody then did". There is no scholarship or analysis in your position - and you admit to leaving this to others to fight over so you can follow the majority in the end. Great.
I have no problem with an 80-something John using a secretary to write the Gospel - and it explains the Hellenistic flavor - and even this is only necessary if it wasn't written in the 60's.
The 60's date deals with the question of why the author of John (John or not) wouldn't have made sure that his facts matched the available synoptics. This is especially true I think of a non-John author: he wouldn't endanger his work by willfully ignoring the contradictions with the synoptics if available. A 60's date would mean it was written parallel to Mark and Matthew - and didn't have Mark to draw on and check against. Again, real John or not this is a better explanation. It gives a more rational gap between the autograph and its being quoted in "Egerton 2" dated at 100 AD. And, of course, it fits in better with your "they didn't live that long" generalization. Finally, it fits even if John was martyred with James.
----------
He has long been a marginal figure, despised by the very people who champion this single conclusion of his. To me it is disingenuous to hail someone as a great scholar when he agrees with you, while simultaneously reviling his scholarship when it disagrees with you.
This is what is bad with your whole approach. I have never read the works that Spong considered wonderful (and I certainly after this whole thread do not trust your analysis of Robinson's theology); and I tend not to believe what opponents of someone say unless I hear at least what seems like a balanced look at what they say.
You seem to figure that if I do not like Robinson's view on one issue I must reject everything he says on any issue. It is surprising that someone so interested in critical thinking would even say stuff like this; because this is hardly critical or thinking.
Nor does your "everybody rejects" or "he was a fringe thinker" show that you have ever actually critically studied the research yourself to find out if the majority might be wrong.
----------
Of course, the life of Buddha wasn't written for 500 years after his death - not 30. Those who study such things would say 30 years is way to short a time for legend to form in a story - while 500 is enough. However, there are many stories (Julius Caeser, Alexander) that were written long after 50 or 100 years that we still consider historically accurate.
So, a little closer example would be nice. However, no, I would not reject out of hand, as you seem too (and modern text criticism seems too) what you consider "impossible" or miraculous claims by other religions or Christianity.
Incidentally (again) [ducking the latest bitch slap] my position is that it takes iron-clad text critical proof (and not a lame "no one lives that long" argument) to counteract the witness of people who either directly interacted with the Apostles; or were one step removed from that. I have seen nothing that meets that burden of proof nor have you shown any sign that you really understand this argument - only that you understand what the "mainstream" believes.
Such "proof" from modern text criticism of the "mainstream" school usually starts at least partially with the "tyrannical pre-suppostion" that "impossible" events could not have actually have occurred: for instance that the prophecy of the temple destruction in Mark must have been written after the fact - so therefore Mark must be written in the 80's. There is "willful blindness" in that position to the power of God.
One last 60's strength: It explains why the author of John (John or not) discusses the temple in tense and tone in a way that indicates it still exists. Also, if written in the 90's (within 20 years of the destruction of temple and the dispora that followed) it is hard to imagine John or any other author not dealing with the history attached to that event.
JCHFleetguy,
It does seem odd to me that you would criticize a supposed "tyrannical presupposition that impossible events could not have occurred" when the primary scholar you champion here to bolster your position (Robinson) holds the position that God has never intervened supernaturally throughout the entire course of history.
You are certainly a brave man.
Also, the credibility of a source is of supreme importance when that source contradicts the overwhelming majority view. I believe this has been sufficiently explained to you. I would also, were I you, use caution when lauding the credibility of Dr. Robinson on this issue. I do not think that you will find him to be agreeable with your positions on most other issues.
But if you're OK with that...
Tom
I think I just explanined that.
Nobody has said, even his critics theologically, that he isn't an important scholar.
And his analysis of the dates of the Bible have nothing to do with his position on divine involvement in human affairs. Text criticism as such prides itself on this critical detachment from the subject being analyzed. Finally, I haven't read the book on dating; nor is the analysis I am quoting quoted from that book. I put Richardson in to show that even some (at least one) liberal Christian scholars accept early dates. I am trying to point out that this is a real ongoing debate among scholars of all sorts and not a settled issue as sandalstraps tries to present. The primary scholars I am "promoting" are the ones I linked. I would think somebody interested in Biblical dating might try to find his book in the library and read it. I will.
Also, I doubt he believes God never was involved in human history ever. I would have to read his book to and see what he actually said before I bought that.
I suppose the first question: he really believes Christ was man, only man; performed zero miracles; zero prophecies; and did not raise from the dead? Just a dude with a great line?
I think you have some research to do.
Post a Comment
<< Home