Now would be appropriate to turn once again to the "parallels" Ehrman gave to the foundation of Christianity. I think specifically of when he said Muslims saw Mary sometimes -- people "who were not Christians, obviously." (1) Ehrman says a Christian claim that "mass hallucinations do not happen" is false. "...most people at the end of the day believe that mass hallucinations are not only possible, but that they really can happen," (2) illustrated by non-Catholic views towards reports of seeing Mary.
I find it satisfying that Craig once said "collective hallucinations do rarely occur," but it is "the diversity of all these different sorts of appearances that taxes the explanatory strength of the Hallucination Hypothesis." (3) Gary Habermas commonly cites Gary R. Collins, who gained a doctorate in psychology from Purdue University, and is an excellent scholar of psychology. He reported:
"Hallucinations are individual occurrences. By their very nature only one person can see a given hallucination at a time. They certainly aren't something which can be seen by a group of people. Neither is it possible that one person could somehow induce an hallucination in somebody else. Since an hallucination exists only in this subjective, personal sense, it is obvious others cannot witness it." (4)
This makes sense, doesn't it? There are no strings tied between people's heads, forcing them both to experience the subjective. However, what skeptics would argue is that the power of suggestion, appealing to whatever someone is currently experiencing mentally, is what can lead to other hallucinations and/or delusions.
Therefore, no dedicated Muslim could buy into a Christian vision (their book avidly denies that God can have a son!). I have about as much good reason to think that this was an actual, verified non-legendary report as I have to think that crucified Jews wouldn't get buried. (If you skipped fact #3 part 2 because it wasn't that necessary, suffice it to say there is a popular archeologically discovered crucifixion victim along with Jewish authors confirming such practice.) If this was ever reported, maybe legend just slipped into a Catholic's account over time. And even supposing that some Muslims had seen something, what did they do about it? Did they convert? I doubt they did, or Ehrman would have mentioned that. Or did they think they could explain it away, like perhaps people mistook an actual normal person for Mary?
Ehrman definitely is not Catholic, like Muslims definitely aren't Christian, yet he indicates that they would have a great piece of evidence. In the same spirit, Michael Goulder tried to present the possibility of hallucinations following an initial report with examples such as this: "Hundreds of Irish Catholics--perfectly sober, sensible people--will testify that they have seen the head move on the Virgin's statue at Knock." (5)
See, I mention this because I doubt such skeptics would even bring this up if they didn't have reason to explain it away. Remember, Goulder is even an expert in trying to do that. (Also I wish to point out, who was Ehrman kidding? If there is no reasonable naturalistic explanation as to what happened, then Protestantism would be false, but Catholicism would be true! They both have the resurrection! For I am not trying to disprove Catholicism, as I said before, but rather prove the resurrection. So if you are Catholic please don't get that false idea which could be easy to come across.)
Crossan's Challenge
John Dominic Crossan, former co-chair of the Jesus Seminar, debated William Lane Craig. Like the debate with Gerd Ludemann, Craig had used a list of verified facts -- the minimal facts approach -- very similar to mine. And in his first rebuttal Crossan said:
"I think it's the job of a scholar to take on the majority every now and then. And if everyone laughs, and if a hundred years from now they're still laughing, then I guess the scholar was wrong." (6)
Here is a test case for the ability to objectively have ammo which could possibly prove the resurrection. And listen to this quote from Habermas:
"The third nail is that each of the naturalistic hypotheses advocated by nineteenth-century liberal scholars was also disproved by these scholars. They refuted each other's theories, thereby leaving no viable alternatives. For example, we have already explained how David Strauss delivered the historical death blow to the swoon theory held by Karl Venturini, Heinrich Paulus, and others. On the other hand, while Strauss popularized the hallucination theory, Friedrich Schleiermacher and Paulus pointed out errors in it. The major decimation of the hallucination theory came later in the century at the hand sof Theodor Keim. The fraud theories had long before been dismissed by liberal scholars, while legend theories, popular later in the century, were disproved by later critical research. So these scholars demolished each other's theories, thereby burying the major naturalistic attempts to account for Jesus' resurrection by the late 1800s." (7)
The only objection in there that I haven't dealt with yet is also the only long quote from them I can get my hands on. The swoon theory has been so discredited that I didn't bother, and will just include this, from David Strauss:
"It is impossible that a being who had stolen half-dead out of the sepulcher, who crept about weak and ill, wanting medical treatment, who required bandaging, strengthening and indulgence, and who still at last yielded to his sufferings, could have given to the disciples the impression that he was a Conqueror over death and the grave, the Prince of Life, an impression which lay at the bottom of their future ministry. Such a resuscitation could only have weakened the impression which He had made upon them in life and in death..." (8)
Habermas went on to say that twentieth century scholars -- 21- years ago -- across the spectrum of theologians and historians, "generally" have realized the problems and abandoned them as well(9). He cites Karl Barth and Raymond Brown, who are both Christians but would know(10). They write among scholars.
You can tell I wish I had more information about this. Who even is Theodor Keim and Karl Venturini? I don't know, but scholars like Habermas, Brown, and Barth do.
Pinchas Lapide was included in the diverse list of theologians who decided not to accept natural explanations for the resurrection. Of course, considering he was an orthodox Jew who believed God raised Jesus from the dead because of the evidence.
This perhaps could fit into when Ehrman painted a picture of bias in New Testament scholarship. "Most New Testament scholars are themselves Christian and they naturally tend to take the Christian view of the matter[.]" (11) I don't know if that's true or not, but I am aware that Ehrman has had at least a bit of a habit of presenting the skeptical side as the best scholarship. When I commented on this in the introduction post, I said: "I found this intriguing: elsewhere [Did Jesus Exist? p. 143] he talks about 'consensus scholarship' in a book confirming Jesus's existence, but it still 'offends people on both ends of the spectrum.'" Non-Christian scholars definitely exist. Ehrman points out "some prominent New Testament scholars" confidently argue against the resurrection, and includes Ludemann and Goulder(12). Why do they stand out so much? I think this is because a lot of non-Christian scholars didn't bother, since they viewed such things as discredited.
Indeed, just because some do, doesn't mean literally everyone will. Habermas once wrote, that "the minimally accepted historical facts that even agnostic scholars almost always accept" means "this approach fails to account adequately for the body of recognized facts that even they generally accept themselves.
"By pulling up short and failing to investigate their own data, they bypass the very information that establishes the Resurrection appearance as the most likely explanation. Fuller [remember him? a prominent critical scholar] states well that the factual situation 'therefore requires that the historian postulate some other event' in order to account for the disciples' faith. There must be a 'cause of the Easter faith ... outside of their belief." (13)
When Habermas used the minimal facts approach against former atheist Antony Flew the second time, the year was 2000, well over 100 years after critical scholars attacked each others theories. Crossan's challenge was met long before he made it.
What does the evidence really say?
And don't think I've come across any better alternatives. There are no good parallels to Jesus's resurrection as a religious claim. So what if a Jesuit priest converted on the basis of hearing Catholics say they saw Mary, or Catholics of high intellectual professions believe they saw her? Robert H. Gundry, in the Craig-Ludemann debate, pointed out: "Visions of the Virgin Mary, which Ludemann himself appeals, have not generated belief in her resurrection so much as the reverse: belief in her assumption to heaven (sometimes understood as entailing resurrection) has generated visions of her." (14) Ehrman's entire argument can be summed up as this: "Yes, people have visions all the time," (15) especially those experiencing religious fervor, bereavement, and moreover guilt during bereavement. As I said before, he doesn't invoke the actual scenario the Disciples were in, which is supported by his own information. It is not plausible that they would have any good amount of bereavement, guilt, or fervor to hallucinate. I think specifically of the crucifixion, where I cited information from Did Jesus Exist? But he said the same thing in How Jesus Became God that I, and Goulder, and Craig, and so many people know:
"Ancient Jews had no expectation--zero expectation--that the future messiah would die and rise from the dead. That was not what the messiah was supposed to do. Whatever specific idea any Jew had about the messiah (as cosmic judge, mighty priest, powerful warrior), what they all thought was that he would be a figure of grandeur and power who would be a mighty ruler of Israel.
...
"During his life, Jesus raised hopes and expectations that he might be the messiah. His disciples expected great things from him. Possibly he would raise an army. Possibly he would call down the wrath of God on the enemy. But he would do something and would be the future ruler of Israel. The crucifixion completely disconfirmed this idea and showed the disciples just how wrong they were. Jesus was killed by his enemies, so he wasn't the messiah after all." (16)
No wonder Collins concluded his message on group hallucinations with: "For anyone to prove [that the disciples saw hallucinations of the risen Jesus] they would have to go against much of the current psychiatric and psychological data about the nature of hallucinations." (17)
Moreover, I don't remember Ehrman ever offering an explanation for Paul, and definitely not James because he didn't think that was even verified. Rather, the argument was on "that Jesus's tomb was empty and that his disciples claimed to see him afterward." (18) He did mention the 500, though. But what I have been doing in this argument is ignore the 500 and all the apostles as a group. Goulder's idea of "secondary visions" are avoidable since the case is only on first Mary, who didn't influence the Disciples, and then them, who we can identify as not in the mood to have visions (to borrow common lingo). The only logical and evidential basis is that mass hallucinations could have occurred to some sort of Jesus followers (they really thought He was ended) after the Disciples. Then it's Paul and James, two very different people not in the Christian culture. Christian apologists -- especially Gary Habermas -- use significantly more than two pieces of data!
As a matter of fact, what so impressed Habermas, and Pinchas Lapide, is that no other religion has started like this. There are no parallels to the origin of the Christian faith! There is no other belief system comparable to one with the original eyewitnesses claiming to have seen an anti-cultural "resurrected crucified Messiah," right after despair and disbelief, in the face of persecution.
"When the life history of Jesus ends, the history of Christianity begins. But this is not enough. The death of a martyr can indeed cause admiration and emulation, but it never has had a religious meaning in itself -- least of all in Judaism which puts such a positive value on life and has never glorified suffering and death." (19)
"When alternative explanations fail to explain the known data, the impressive evidences that establish the disciples' experiences as firmly as anything in the New Testament now become impressive evidences for the Resurrection appearances themselves." (20) Indeed, the more non-Christian arguments I read from New Testament scholars, the more confident I can become in my belief in the risen Christ.
Citations:
1. Bart D. Ehrman, How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee (HarperOne: 2014), 199.
2. Ibid., 202.
3. Paul Copan and Ronald K. Tacelli, Jesus' Resurrection: Fact or Figment? A Debate Between William Lane Craig and Gerd Ludemann (InterVarsity Press: Downers Grove, IL. 2000), 191-92.
4. Lee Strobel, The Case for Christ: A Journalist's Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus (Zondervan: Grand Rapids, MI. 2016), 260.
5. Copan and Tacelli, Jesus' Resurrection, 96.
6. Paul Copan, Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up? A Debate Between William Lane Craig and John Dominic Crossan (Baker Books: Grand Rapids, MI. 1998), 46.
7. Gary R. Habermas and J.P. Moreland, Beyond Death: Exploring the Evidence for Immortality (Wipf and Stock: Eugene, OR. 1998), 125. Cited is a plethora of sources:
Friedrich Schleirmacher, The Christian Faith, eds. H. R. Mackintosh and J. S. Stewart (New York: Harper & Row, 1963), vol. 2, p. 420; Schweitzer, The Quest of the Historical Jesus, pp. 211-214.
A description of Keim's three-volume life of Jesus from 1867-1872 is in Schweitzer, The Quest of the Historical Jesus, pp. 211-214. The impact of Keim's critique is presented in James Orr's 1908 The Resurrection of Jesus, p. 219. A detailed discussion of these and other related information is in the 1911 study by W.I. Sparrow-Simpson, The Resurrection and the Christian Faith (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1965), pp. 110-120.
Schweitzer lists no proponents of the fraud story since Reimarus in 1778, Quest, pp. 21-22.
Other skeptical self-criticisms are in: Otto Pfleiderer, Early Christian Conception of Christ (London: Williams and Norgate, 1905), pp. 153-159; Fuller, The Formation of the Resurrection Narratives, pp. 46-49; Bornkamm, Jesus of Nazareth, p. 185; Lapide, The Resurrection of Jesus: A Jewish Perspective, pp. 120-22; Pannenberg, Jesus: God and Man, p. 91.
8. David Friederick Strauss, The Life of Jesus for the People (London: Williams and Norgate, 1879): 1: 412. Cited in Josh McDowell and Sean McDowell, More Than a Carpenter (Tyndale: 2009), 132. For an extensive treatment of the brutality of crucifixion, see Alexander Metherell quoted in Strobel, The Case for Christ, 207-221; cf. more research, including the March 21, 1986 Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA) cited in Gary R. Habermas and Micheal R. Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus (Kregel Publications: Grand Rapids, MI. 2004), 99-103.
9. Also cited was Paul Tillich, Gunther Bornkamm, Joachim Jeremias, John A. T. Robinson, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Ulrich Wilckens, Pinchas Lapide, and A.M. Hunter.
10. Karl Barth said "today we rightly turn up our nose at this" because "these explanations ... have now gone out of currency." Karl Barth, The Doctrine of Reconciliation, vol. 4, part 1 of Church Dogmatics, eds. G. W. Bromiley and T. F. Torrance (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1956), p. 340; cf. Rayond Brown, "The Resurrection and Biblical Criticism," Commonweal (24 Nov. 1967), especially p. 233.
11. Ehrman, How Jesus Became God, 187-88.
12. Ibid., 188.
13. Gary R. Habermas and Antony Flew, Resurrected? An Atheist and Theist in Dialogue, John F. Ankerberg edition (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, inc: 2005), 93. He cites Reginald Fuller, The Formation of the Resurrection Narratives (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1980), pp. 169, 181.
14. Copan and Tacelli, Jesus' Resurrection, 108-109.
16. Ehrman, How Jesus Became God, 116-17.
17. Gary Habermas and Antony G. N. Flew, Did Jesus Rise from the Dead? The Resurrection Debate, edited by Terry L. Miethe (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1987), 51.
18. Ehrman, How Jesus Became God, 173.
19. Pinchas Lapide, The Resurrection of Jesus: A Jewish Perspective (Augsburg Fortress Publishing House, 1982), 145; cf. Gary R. Habermas, "Resurrection Claims in Non-Christian Religions," Religious Studies, vol. 25 (1988), pp. 167-77.
20. Habermas and Flew, Resurrected?, 93.
Comments
Post a Comment
I regret to say that comments have to be turned off. I encourage everyone to use this blogs resources in constructive, thoughtful discussion and research.