2021-02-12T14:22:58-04:00

Last updated on: February 12, 2021 at 2:22 pm   By

Atheist anti-theist Jonathan M. S. Pearce is the main writer on the blog, A Tippling Philosopher. His “About” page states: “Pearce is a philosopher, author, blogger, public speaker and teacher from Hampshire in the UK. He specialises in philosophy of religion, but likes to turn his hand to science, psychology, politics and anything involved in investigating reality.” 

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I am replying to Jonathan’s paper, “Paul Justifies Lying” (2-11-21). His words will be in blue.

In writing my forthcoming book on the Resurrection of Jesus, it has been important to look at Jesus’ earliest source, Paul. Paul is famous for not actually telling us much about Jesus at all. [repetitive typo corrected]

Right. Paul basically engages in systematic Christian theology (which is, of course, in the end, all about Jesus: He being God). In doing that, several things are presupposed. We have four Gospels that tell us plenty about Jesus, in terms of His life. They don’t do systematic theology. Paul does.

Apparently, Jonathan thinks that Paul should in effect be a fifth Gospel writer. Four’s not enough. In my edition of RSV, the Gospels take up 145 pages. Paul’s epistles take up about 87 pages. But Jonathan: the Great Bible Judge, opines that Paul needs to write in the same style or format as the Gospels and can’t do anything different, on pain of being accused of not knowing anything about / not teaching enough about Jesus. Makes total sense, doesn’t it?

There are some genuinely quite problematic Pauline verses that should raise some eyebrows concerning his agenda and methodology for converting others and evangelising:

I’m trembling in my boots. Jonathan is gonna expose Paul as a moral relativist who thinks lying is fine and dandy! What will I do now??!! I’ve put all my eggs in the basket of defending Christianity and the Bible, including this scumbag, Paul. Now I will have no career and at least 2,500 of my 3,200 articles will be null and void: fit only for the trash heap! Well, I can always be a Bible-bashing anti-theist atheist like Jonathan! Or I can simply take scissors to my Bible and cut out Paul (just as Thomas Jefferson — knowing better than God and 1800 years of Christianity — removed all of Jesus’ miracles). So hope springs eternal . . .

[ . . . ] There seem to be various instances of Paul justifying any means to get across the “truth” of Jesus, that he could be justifying lying for Jesus. There is a divergence of historical, veridical truth of events, and theological truth.

Well, we shall see about that. Atheist “exegesis” always has the depth of a half-evaporated, one millimeter thick puddle of water on the sidewalk. Jonathan does none here (perhaps he does in his book). He just throws out three Pauline passages, as if they self-evidently justify lying.

But as I mention in this and my Nativity book, with reference to the Nativity of Jesus and the work of Catholic exegete Raymond Brown, if there are no historical foundations, then what is the Christian hanging their theological truth on? We agree! So not only is there a silence from Paul, as I discuss in the book, but what there is could be, by his own admission, “fake news” to serve a religious purpose.

I see. Paul admits to serving up “fake news.” He was the CNN and MSDNC of his day. Gotcha, Jonathan. Now let’s examine the actual “incriminating” passages in St. Paul:

Romans 3:7-8  

7 But if through my lie the truth of God abounded to His glory, why am I also still being judged as a sinner? 8 And why not say (as we are slanderously reported and as some claim that we say), “Let us do evil that good may come”? Their condemnation is just.

Jonathan doesn’t say which translation he is using. It is NASB (1995 edition). I use RSV:

But if through my falsehood God’s truthfulness abounds to his glory, why am I still being condemned as a sinner? [8] And why not do evil that good may come? — as some people slanderously charge us with saying. Their condemnation is just.

In context, this is obviously a rhetorical section (not uncommon in Paul): not to be taken literally as all his own opinion. As such, it is (so it seems) far too subtle for the average anti-theist atheist to correctly comprehend (such atheists are rendered unable to do so by extreme bias and hostility). Many atheists, having formerly been fundamentalists, interpret the Bible hyper-literally and have no inkling of the rich diversity of literary and even philosophical styles and senses of Scripture (which reach their apogee in Paul).

They simply repeat their old tired, silly errors: now as atheists. And this is precisely what Jonathan (whether he used to be a fundamentalist or not) does. He interprets it as Paul justifying lying, in an “anything goes” / “any immoral means for the sake of a good end” sense. This is absurd. Context is crucially important to understand what Paul is driving at, and to grasp that he is employing non-literal rhetoric:

Romans 3:1-6 Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision? [2] Much in every way. To begin with, the Jews are entrusted with the oracles of God. [3] What if some were unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God? [4] By no means! Let God be true though every man be false, as it is written, “That thou mayest be justified in thy words, and prevail when thou art judged.” [5] But if our wickedness serves to show the justice of God, what shall we say? That God is unjust to inflict wrath on us? (I speak in a human way.) [6] By no means! For then how could God judge the world?

So what is Paul arguing? Admittedly, there is much nuance and subtlety, as always in Paul (the big “intellectual” of the New Testament). No one is saying he is always easy to understand. There is “deep theology” here that many Christians don’t grasp; let alone a hostile, theologically grossly unequipped atheist). On the other hand, there is no basis for a hostile atheist to immediately come to the conclusion that Paul is flat-out justifying lying. Joel Watts explains the particular rhetorical device that Paul is employing:

Previously, I posted Quintilian’s boundaries for the use of prosopopoeia, a literary device that allows a speaker to create a fictional dialogue partner. It has been long recognized that Paul employs such a method in Romans 2-4 in dealing with Jewish resentment to Gentile salvation. . . .

I note that Paul was writing to the Church in Rome, which would have had accesses to the numerous philosophical, rhetorical, and oratory schools which abounded in the city. As Christians left these places for the Church, they would have brought their knowledge of these highly refined skills for use in the local congregation. With Paul being a supremely educated Roman citizen, he too would have known of these skills, at least in part. Paul could have used prosopopoeia as a rhetorical device to communicate a lot of information to his audience and use a relatively short space in doing so. (“Paul’s Use of Prosopopoeia in his Epistle to the Romans”, Unsettled Christianity, 1-21-10)

Thomas H. Tobin SJ wrote an entire 469-page book about these aspects of Paul’s writing (Paul’s Rhetoric in Its Contexts: The Argument of Romans; Peabody, Massachusetts: Hendrickson Publishers, 2004). He explains, regarding another passage in Romans where Paul uses the same technique:

It is another example of the rhetorical technique speech-in-character (prosopopoeia) which was seen earlier in 7:7-25. . . . This use . . . in connection with virtues and vices is a rhetorical technique again found in popular philosophical discourse of the period and one that Paul now employs in 10:6-8 [Hermogenes, Prog. 9.4-6; Rhet. Her. 4-6; Cicero, Inv. 1.99-100; Quintilian, Inst.,  9.2.31]. It is part of the diatribe style Paul’s Roman Christian audience would have been familiar with, and so they would have understood his use of it here. (p. 343)

Wikipedia describes this literary device:

A prosopopoeia (Greek: προσωποποιία, /prɒsoʊpoʊˈpiːə/) is a rhetorical device in which a speaker or writer communicates to the audience by speaking as another person or object. . . . Prosopopoeiae are used mostly to give another perspective on the action being described. For example, in Cicero’s Pro Caelio, Cicero speaks as Appius Claudius Caecus, a stern old man. This serves to give the “ancient” perspective on the actions of the plaintiff.

Prosopopoeiae can also be used to take some of the load off the communicator by placing an unfavorable point of view on the shoulders of an imaginary stereotype. The audience’s reactions are predisposed to go towards this figment rather than the communicator himself.

Fernand Prat SJ, in his two-volume set, The Theology of St. Paul (Westminster, Maryland, The Newman Bookshop, 1952), comments on Romans 3:

[T]he argument formed by this series of texts, which recalls the rabbinical method of the haraz, is sufficient for the Apostle’s present design. . . . Paul here [Rom 3:1-9] confronts an objector, whose five objections he demolishes one by one; or rather he talks to himself and replies to himself in order to instruct the reader. (vol. I, pp. 203-204)

Philippians 1:18

18 What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed; and in this I rejoice.  Yes, and I will rejoice…

Philippians 1:18 What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed; and in that I rejoice.

The meaning here is made abundantly clear in context (that evil wicked word in the ears of atheist eisegetes):

Philippians 1:15-17 Some indeed preach Christ from envy and rivalry, but others from good will. [16] The latter do it out of love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel; [17] the former proclaim Christ out of partisanship, not sincerely but thinking to afflict me in my imprisonment.

The meaning is pretty clear and straightforward. This is not rhetoric. Paul is writing literally and engaging in “straight talk” in this instance, noting that there are preachers of the gospel who don’t have entirely pure motives in preaching. They fall into envy and rivalry and partisanship and insincerity. Others have the proper motivations: good will and love. So Paul expresses the notion that he is happy that the gospel is proclaimed, even if often imperfectly, through less than stellar vessels. He’s not endorsing the “pretense”; only the fact that “Christ is proclaimed”: which, in and of itself, is always a good thing or a “net gain” so to speak.  We do the same thing all the time in everyday life:

“I don’t like the way that Susie goes about sharing the pro-life message, but at least she is getting that message out.”

“Joe has a rather off-putting and abrasive manner, but I do appreciate the fact that he is out there every weekend feeding the hungry.”

“My wife nags me all the time, but despite that, she also says she loves me constantly, and shows it in acts of love.”

A score of similar examples are easily imagined. It’s the imperfect person (as we all are, in the final analysis) doing the right thing, in the midst of wrong things also present. And that’s all Paul is doing here (and I dare say, rather obviously so).

1 Corinthians 9:21-23

21 to those who are without the Law, I became as one without the Law, though not being without the law of God but under the law of Christ, so that I might gain those who are without the Law. 22 To the weak I became weak, that I might gain the weak; I have become all things to all people, so that I may by all means save some. 23 I do all things for the sake of the gospel, so that I may become a fellow partaker of it.

1 Corinthians 9:19-23 For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, that I might win the more. [20] To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews; to those under the law I became as one under the law — though not being myself under the law — that I might win those under the law. [21] To those outside the law I became as one outside the law — not being without law toward God but under the law of Christ — that I might win those outside the law. [22] To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. [23] I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

This (one of my favorite passages in Paul and a model for me in my own apostolate of apologetics and evangelism) is simply Paul meeting his hearers where they are at (as we say today). In any successful persuasion, it’s supremely important to enter into the mindset of the other and to do one’s best to relate truths to them in ways that they can understand. That’s what Paul does. If he is talking to an observant Jew; an adherent of Judaism, he argues within that paradigm, in ways that they can understand. After all, he used to be a Pharisee (in fact, still called himself that twice in the book of Acts), so it was not difficult for him to do.

I do the same thing all the time, in trying to persuade Protestants to become Catholics. I know how they think and go about things; what their premises are (having held them myself from 1977-1990), so I argue in modes that they will understand and accept. So, for example, I never cite popes, as if their authority means anything to a Protestant. I cite biblical passages, since that is what we hold in common as God’s inspired revelation. I wrote several entire books along those lines: “biblical evidence” etc. 

This involves no duplicity or equivocation or deception. It’s simply techniques and methods of arguing. That’s what Paul refers to. Jonathan italicizes “became” as if to imply that Paul is saying that he is pretending to be these things. He completely misses the point. In the context, two verses before, which he chose to omit, Paul says “I have made myself a slave to all.”

He didn’t say, “I became all”: as if he was saying, “I deceptively pretended to be all”. What he “became” is “as a Jew” or “as one outside the law”; in other words, he argues like people in those groups, in terms they can understand, and uses methodologies that make sense to them. It’s simply the practical and clever use of a technique that every junior high debating team is taught before anything else: know your opponent’s views as well as they do, or even better. Cicero stated:

The man who can hold forth on every matter under debate in two contradictory ways of pleading, or can argue for and against every proposition that can be laid down – such a man is the true, the complete, and the only orator.

And John Stuart Mill opined:

He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that.

MacLaren’s Expositions provides an excellent commentary on this passage:

The great principle incumbent on all Christians, with a view to the salvation of others, is to go as far as one can without untruthfulness in the direction of finding points of resemblance and contact with those to whom we would commend the Gospel. There is a base counterfeit of this apostolic example, which slurs over distinctive beliefs, and weakly tries to please everybody by differing from nobody. That trimming to catch all winds never gains any. Mr. Facing-both-ways is not a powerful evangelist. The motive of becoming all things to all men must be plainly disinterested, and the assimilation must have love for the souls concerned and eagerness to bring the truth to them, and them to the truth, legibly stamped upon it, or it will be regarded, and rightly so, as mere cowardice or dishonesty. And there must be no stretching the assimilation to the length of either concealing truth or fraternising in evil. Love to my neighbour can never lead to my joining him in wrongdoing.

But, while the limits of this assumption of the colour of our surroundings are plainly marked, there is ample space within these for the exercise of this eminently Christian grace. We must get near people if we would help them. Especially must we identify ourselves with them in sympathy, and seek to multiply points of assimilation, if we would draw them to Jesus Christ. He Himself had to become man that He might gain men, and His servants have to do likewise, in their degree. The old story of the Christian teacher who voluntarily became a slave, that he might tell of Christ to slaves, has in spirit to be repeated by us all.

We can do no good by standing aloof on a height and flinging down the Gospel to the people below. They must feel that we enter into their circumstances, prejudices, ways of thinking, and the like, if our words are to have power. That is true about all Christian teachers, whether of old or young. You must be a boy among boys, and try to show that you enter into the boy’s nature, or you may lecture till doomsday and do no good.

Conclusion: none of these passage remotely establishes a scenario whereby St. Paul endorses lying or “any means to an end.” But it shows that Jonathan MS Pearce is lying: since he is spreading falsehood about the Apostle Paul. People think the word “lie” must include within it deliberate intent. But that’s not what dictionaries inform us. Merriam-Webster defines “lying” as “marked by or containing untrue statements : FALSE.” 

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Photo credit: St. Paul Preaching in Athens (1515), by Raphael (1483-1520) [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]

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2021-02-10T14:52:17-04:00

Last updated on: February 10, 2021 at 2:52 pm   By

“The Gospel According to Saint Matthew” was written by atheist Vexen Crabtree in 2016. I will examine his “anti-biblical” arguments to see if they can withstand criticism. Vexen’s words will be in blue.

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The Gospel of Matthew is a later copy of the Gospel of Mark, using 92% of its text.

It’s grossly inaccurate to call Matthew simply a “copy” of Mark. Sure, it draws heavily from Mark, as almost all Christians would agree (though likely not it only), but it’s a different book. Probably the majority of biblical scholars today hold to the “two source hypothesis”: that is, the view that both Matthew and Luke independently drew from both Mark and “Q”: a lost collection of Jesus’ sayings. Mr. Crabtree recognizes this in writing, later: “historians are sure that a common source document was used for all of them. They call it ‘Q’ after the German word for ‘source’ “.

One Introduction to the New Testament summarizes the Synoptic situation:

[W]hat makes the synoptic problem particularly knotty is the fact that, alongside such exact agreements, there are so many puzzling differences. . . .

Each evangelist . . . omits material found in the other two, each contains unique incidents, and some of the events that are found in one or both of the others are put in a different order. (by D. A. Carson, Douglas J. Moo, and Leon Morris, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 1992, pp. 26-27)

Nor are the three Synoptic Gospels to be seen as merely redundant testimony. Each provides its own slant, together providing a kind of stereoscopic depth that would otherwise be almost entirely missing. (Ibid., p. 84)

The same source refers to the “combination of exact agreement and wide divergence that characterizes the first three gospels” (p. 27). In any event, this reference book explains that the “wholesale takeover, without acknowledgment, of someone else’s literary work, with or without changes, was a common practice in the ancient world, and no opprobrium was connected with it” (p. 73).

Of course, anti-theist atheists routinely throw out the accusation of “dishonesty” and “lying” and fiction-creation by the biblical writers, but they show no real basis for such hostile conclusions, and almost invariably don’t understand key aspects of the culture of the time (such as this one about the practices of ancient writers utilizing existing materials).

It is anonymous and it wasn’t until about 150 CE that the author “Matthew” was assigned.

Carson et al stated that “we have no evidence that  these gospels ever circulated without an appropriate designation . . .” (p. 66). And they add:

[T]he argument that Matthew was understood to be the author of the first gospel long before Papias wrote his difficult words affirming such a connection seems very strong, even if not unassailable. (Ibid., p. 67)

Atheists simply throw out these dates because by then the books were widely known by certain titles. It doesn’t follow, however, that they were not before. They may have been, and more recent scholarship has trended in the direction of earlier use of titles than was previously supposed by the beloved omniscient “higher critics”.

Matthew [was] not written by an eye-witness of Jesus. We know this because it is a copy of Mark. No eye witness of such an important person would have needed, or wanted, to simply copy someone-else’s memories about him.

Well, we deny the premise that Matthew was only “plagiarism of Mark with a few details added.” That just doesn’t fly, upon close analysis. As to eye-witness testimony, J. Warner Wallace observed:

I’m sometimes surprised skeptics resist the claim (at least) that the gospels are written as eyewitness accounts. We can argue about whether or not the gospels are pure fiction, or whether or not they are accurate. But the idea that the gospels can be read as eyewitness accounts is rather unremarkable to me. The gospels record events from the perspective of writers who either saw the events themselves or had access to those who did. The author of John’s gospel describes a meeting between Jesus and his disciples. This meeting appears to include the author and he makes the following claim:

“This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and wrote these things, and we know that his testimony is true.” (John 21:24)

It certainly appears that the author considers himself to be both a participant in the narrative and a reporter (eyewitness) of the event. That seems rather unremarkable to me. Even if the author is someone other than John, the claim (at the very least) that the author is an eyewitness seems plain. In addition, the author of Luke’s gospel describes himself as a historian who had access to the eyewitnesses:

“Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word…” [Lk 1:1-2]

Even if the author of Luke was not himself an eyewitness, it does appear that he believed he was recording true history as delivered to him from eyewitnesses. Once again, this seems unremarkable. (“Can the Gospels be Defended as Eyewitness Accounts?”, Cold-Case Christianity, 1-26-15)

It is written in Greek and not in the native tongues of anyone who met and followed Jesus,

What difference does it make what language it was written in? As  a Jew in Palestine in the first century, Matthew would have spoken Aramaic. As a tax collector, he would also have known Greek and Hebrew.  It’s said that his style of Greek (less elegant than the Gentile Luke’s) is as if it has a strong Aramaic “accent.”

and it was written too late to reasonably be the memóires of an eye-witness.

It’s not too late at all insofar as it is a personal account, and/or well within range to consult many who were eyewitnesses or earwitnesses to the events. Oral traditions were much stronger in those times and information was routinely preserved in this manner with remarkable accuracy. Encyclopaedia Britannica (“Oral tradition”) explains this notion (very foreign to modern persons in developed and highly literate societies):

In the 1930s, for example, two American scholars, Milman Parry and Albert Lord, conducted extensive fieldwork on oral tradition in the former Yugoslavia. They recorded more than 1,500 orally performed epic poems in an effort to determine how stories that often reached thousands of lines in length could be recalled and performed by individuals who could neither read nor write. What they found was that these poets employed a highly systematic form of expression, a special oral language of formulaic phrases, typical scenes, and story patterns that enabled their mnemonic and artistic activities. With this information in hand, Parry and Lord were able to draw a meaningful analogy to the ancient Greek Iliad and Odyssey, which derived from oral tradition and obey many of the same rules of composition. The mystery of the archaic Homeric poems—simply put, “Who was Homer and what relation did he have to the surviving texts?”—was solved by modern comparative investigation. Whoever Homer was, whether a legend or an actual individual, the poems attributed to him ultimately derive from an ancient and long-standing oral tradition.

Other familiar works with deep roots in oral tradition include the Judeo-Christian Bible, the Mesopotamian Epic of Gilgamesh, and the medieval English Beowulf. The famous “begats” genealogy of the Bible’s book of Genesis and corresponding elements found in the four Gospels of the New Testament provide examples of how flexible oral-traditional systems can produce different but related products over many generations. Similarly, what survives in the fragmentary record of Gilgamesh is evidence of a broadly distributed tale in the ancient Middle East, one that passed easily from culture to culture and language to language before being inscribed on tablets. Beowulf, whose unique manuscript dates to the 10th century CE, circulated in oral tradition for centuries before Irish missionaries introduced the new technology of inked letters on parchment.

Bottom line? Even Mr. Crabtree holds that Matthew was written between 70-100 AD. That’s “nothing” in terms of an oral tradition being preserved with minute accuracy. No problem at all. And it’s early enough to be either from a direct witness (Matthew) or reported by same.

Matthew specifically set out to correct many mistakes in Mark’s gospel, especially regarding comments on Jewish customs and practices. 

Well, that was Mr. Crabtree’s goal: to show this. I think I systematically dismantled his case in my previous two papers along these lines:

Pearce’s Potshots #15: Gospel of Matthew vs. Gospel of Mark? [2-7-21]

Groundless Gospel of Mark Bashing Systematically Refuted (vs. Vexen Crabtree) [2-9-21]

In many cases he found a text, and because he did not know Jesus, felt free to invent details in order to make the Old Testament text he was reading appear as a prophecy.

Mr. Crabtree acts as if what Matthew did (i.e., what he actually did; not atheist caricatures of it) is unethical or dishonest. It wasn’t. On this question, see:

“Matthew’s Use of the Old Testament: A Preliminary Analysis” (Lee Campbell Ph.D., Xenos Christian Fellowship)

“New Testament use of the Old Testament” (Theopedia)

2.1. There Was No Virgin Birth

The Prophecy of the Virgin Birth appears in Matthew 1:22-23. Matthew wrote this seventy years after Jesus Christ was born (35-40 years after he died). Up until that point no other text mentions Jesus’ virgin birth. He quotes Isaiah 7:14 which was written 700 years before Jesus was born – thus claiming it was a sign, a prediction of the messiah’s virgin birth.

Yes, it was.

But there is a serious problem. Matthew states that, due to prophecy, it is true that Jesus was a male line descendant of King David, and presents a genealogy at the beginning of his gospel tracing Jesus’ lineage through Joseph. Matthew, apparently, like Luke and Paul and the rest of the early Christians, did not believe in a virgin birth. There are two theories that explain how this contradiction occurred. (1) A Septuagint mistranslation of the word “virgin” instead of “young woman” caused the discrepancy. The original prophecy is not that someone called Immanuel will be born of a virgin, but merely that someone called Immanuel will be born. In the original context of the story, this makes a lot of sense. (2) Matthew, writing for a Roman gentile audience in Greek, included popular myths surrounding sons of gods, who in Roman mythology were frequently said to be born of virgins. In either case, it is clear that Matthew’s prophecy of a virgin birth was a mistake, and modern Bible’s actually include a footnote in Matthew pointing out that the virgin birth is a Septuagint mistranslation. . . . 

It is only a later Greek mistranslation that makes Matthew say “called Immanuel, born of a virgin”, rather than “of a young woman”.

I’ve addressed these matters at great length:

Dual Fulfillment of Prophecy & the Virgin Birth (vs. JMS Pearce) [12-18-20]

Other Christians and Previous Christians Did Not Believe in the Virgin Birth

  • 50ce : The writer(s) of the gospel of Q were unaware of the virgin birth.
  • 64ce : Paul died without writing of the virgin birth.
  • 70ce : The writer of the Gospel of Mark does not mention it.

Not mentioning something is not the same as a denial. This should be self-evident to anyone. It’s a simple matter of logic. The Gospel of John and all of Paul’s epistles in the Bible never mention camels, either. Does it follow that both men denied their existence?

But a case can be made that Paul did allude to it. J. Warner Wallace contended:

Galatians 4:4-5 But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.

Paul says that Jesus was “born of a woman” and not “born of a virgin”. Critics have argued that this is proof that Paul was unaware of the virgin conception. But this is not necessarily the case. Many scholars have observed that the expression, “born of a woman, born under the Law” implies that Jesus had no earthly father because Paul curiously chose to omit any mention of Joseph in this passage. It was part of the Hebrew culture and tradition to cite the father alone when describing any genealogy, yet Paul ignored Joseph and cited Mary alone, as if to indicate that Joseph was not Jesus’ father. (“Why Didn’t Paul Mention the Virgin Conception?”, Cold-Case Christianity, 12-14-18)

2.2. The Guiding Star

One of Matthew’s plotlines is the three visitors from the East who visit the newborn Jesus. They say that a star came up in the East, however no other people in the story appear to notice this. It must have been a relatively unnoticeable event, a fairly faint star, only noticed by people who study the stars. The three visitors are called “Star Readers” in Matthew 2:1. However no other astrologers across the world at that time document this phenomenon. It appears Matthew made it up.

It so happens that I did a great deal of study on the star of Bethlehem last December:

Star of Bethlehem, Astronomy, Wise Men, & Josephus (Amazing Astronomically Verified Data in Relation to the Journey of the Wise Men  & Jesus’ Birth & Infancy) [12-14-20]

Star of Bethlehem: Refuting Silly Atheist Objections [12-26-20]

Star of Bethlehem: More Silly Atheist “Objections” [12-29-20]

2.3. Matthew 21:1-7 – The Prophecy of the 2 Donkeys

Mark wrote that Jesus rode triumphantly into Jerusalem on a donkey. Luke and John both stuck to this. Matthew was in the habit of “correcting” Mark’s errors and on this point of Jesus’ riding into Jerusalem, Matthew felt he should have been riding on two donkeys at the same time.

On all three times Matthew mentions this part (Matthew 21:1-7) he says the same thing, so it was not a transcription error. Why does Matthew alter the text in such a bizarre way? It seems he misread Zechariah 9:9: “mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey”. We have already seen from Matthew’s misinterpretation of the difference between the Hebrew word “Almah” and “Betulah” that he has a poor understanding of Hebrew. This passage also was misunderstood by Matthew.

“In Hebrew an emphasis is expressed by the doubling of a word or a phrase, like “and David’s enemies were dead, and yes, very dead,” so the original phrase does not mean two animals at all (as is also clearly shown by Jewish comments on the passage).”

Once again Matthew changed the meaning of the text to reflect what he thought it should say in order to make a prophecy come true, a conscious act of fraud in order to make the text fits his own personal opinion of the facts.

This is hogwash, I have dealt with this charge already:

David Madison vs. the Gospel of Mark #10: Chapter 11 (Two Donkeys? / Fig Tree / Moneychangers) [8-20-19]

2.4. Matthew 2:16-18 – King Herod: The Killing of Every Male Baby

Chapter two of Matthew tells us of King Herod’s anger at the three wise men and then of the killing of every child. Surely, the slaughter of every male child (Matthew 2:16-18) in Bethlehem, Ramah, and the surrounding area would have got mentioned in many places, such as Josephus’ detailed accounts of the times, in fact it would likely cause the downfall of such an immoral, monstrous leader who issued such orders!

Catholic apologist Trent Horn offers a superb rebuttal of this standard playbook accusation from atheists:

Such an act of cruelty perfectly corresponds with Herod’s paranoid and merciless character, which bolsters the argument for its historicity. Josephus records that Herod was quick to execute anyone he perceived to threaten his rule, including his wife and children (Antiquities 15.7.5–6 and 16.11.7). Two Jewish scholars have made the case that Herod suffered from “Paranoid Personality Disorder,” and Caesar Augustus even said that it was safer to be Herod’s pig than his son.

In addition, first-century Bethlehem was a small village that would have included, at most, a dozen males under the age of two. Josephus, if he even knew about the massacre, probably did not think an isolated event like the killings at Bethlehem needed to be recorded, especially since infanticide in the Roman Empire was not a moral abomination as it is in our modern Western world.

[prominent archaeologist William F. Albright estimated the population of Bethlehem at the time of Jesus’ birth to be about 300 people]

Herod’s massacre would also not have been the first historical event Josephus failed to record.

We know from Suetonius and from the book of Acts that the Emperor Claudius expelled the Jews from Rome in A.D. 49, but neither Josephus nor the second century Roman historian Tacitus record this event (Acts 18). Josephus also failed to record Pontius Pilate’s decision to install blasphemous golden shields in Jerusalem, which drove the Jews to petition the emperor for their removal. The Alexandrian philosopher Philo was the only person to record this event.

Sometimes historians choose not to record an event, and their reasons cannot always be determined. In the nineteenth century Pope Leo XIII noted the double standard in critics for whom “a profane book or ancient document is accepted without hesitation, whilst the Scripture, if they only find in it a suspicion of error, is set down with the slightest possible discussion as quite untrustworthy” (Providentissimus Deus, 20).

We should call out this double standard when critics demand that every event recorded in Scripture, including the massacre of the Holy Innocents, be corroborated in other non-biblical accounts before they can be considered to be historical. (“Is the Massacre of the Holy Innocents Historical?”, Catholic Answers, 12-26-19)

Many other myths, including more ancient Roman ones, had an event where all the male children were killed, and the famous Romulus and Remus story is (once again) a good, famous example. The story of Moses also contains a period of time when all Jewish male children are being killed by the King of the time, when Moses escapes in a basket pushed down a river by his mother. The princess who picked him out of the water called him Moses, which means “picked out”. . . . 

Matthew appears to have included, as part of Jesus’ history, the same story that accompanies many other myths in history. That of the darkening of the sun when an important person dies. . . . 

Graves continues to partially list major myths of the time that included such a darkening of the sun: The ancient pagan demigod Senerus, the Indian God Chrishna, the Egyptian Osiris, Prometheus, Romulus, even Caesar and Alexander the Great.

If we removed from Matthew all the stories about Jesus that were to be found to be part of Roman popular culture about sons-of-gods, then, we find that there is very little left! Some people theorize that all stories about Jesus are copies of other stories because Jesus himself never existed!

So what! How would this “logic” work? Let’s see: “if ever in history an event, x, occurred [Christians and Jews think the story of Moses is historical], which included in it sub-event y, then it follows that y can never ever happen again, since it already happened!” Huh? This would be scornfully laughed out of any course on logic anytime, anywhere.

By this logic, because President Lincoln was shot and killed by a pistol, it follows that Presidents Garfield and McKinley could not have been. Makes sense, huh? But Mr. Crabtree is actually being even more ridiculous than that. He is also arguing, “if in non-historical mythology, an event, x is described, which included in it sub-event y, then it follows that y can never ever happen in real life.”

Therefore, by his “reasoning” because the wicked witch was burned to death in her own oven, in the German fairy tale Hansel and Gretel, no one could ever actually be burned to death in an oven. The existence of the fairy tale / myth precludes the possibility of it ever occurring in real life.

Anti-theist atheists engage in this sort of logical ludicrosity time and again: apparently never stopping to think that it is perfectly absurd. Or if they know it’s logically absurd, they use it anyway if they perceive that it “works” in order to further their goal of painting Christianity and the Bible as worthy only of loathing and mockery.

2.5. The End of the World is Imminent

Jesus in the Christian Bible proclaimed many times that the world was about to end: judgement was about to come and he specifically said that this would happen in the same generation that he first appeared in. Obviously, there has been a delay. St Paul taught the same message, preaching the urgent admission of sins, because of the imminent end. The rest of the New Testament, especially the Book of Revelations, provides many more cryptic clues about when this will occur. This is what has spurred the endless stream of historical proclamations by studious Christians that the end is near. Matthew 24:27-44 is a lengthy commentary on when the Son of Man comes to end the world, but various hints and comments are scattered throughout the rest of New Testament. Some of the relevant comments in Matthew are:
  • The imminent end of the world will be obvious to all (Matthew 24:27). Jesus quotes Isaiah 13:10, 34:4, saying that the sun will go out and the stars will fall from the sky (Matthew 24:29, copied from Mark 13:20-26). The Son of Man will arrive in the clouds with great power and trumpets (24:30-31 copied from Mark 13:27). There will be signs just before the end although no-one knows in advance at what hour the end-times will come (Matthew 24:32-39, copied from Mark 13:28-33). The end of the world starts with the rapture, when approximately one in two men and one in two women will be raptured and taken into heaven, suddenly, by God (Matthew 24:40-41).
  • It is imminent: Jesus warns clearly that “this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. This world will pass away…” (Matthew 16:28, 24:34-35, Mark 9:1, 13:30 and Luke 9:26-27). In Matthew 10:23 Jesus warns his disciples to preach very rapidly in town after town, fleeing at the first sign of persecution, because they will not have enough time to go through all the towns of Israel before the end of the world occurs. In 1 Corinthians 7:27-31 St Paul says that time is so short, people should no longer bother getting married, mourn or bother with possessions: “Those who have wives should live as if they had none; … those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away”. Matthew 8:22 dismisses niceties of funeral arrangements “let the dead bury their own dead” because followers must join Jesus immediately, before it is too late!

I had dealt with this issue three times:

Debate with an Agnostic on the Meaning of “Last Days” and Whether the Author of Hebrews Was a False Prophet (9-13-06)

“The Last Days”: Meaning in Hebrew, Biblical Thought [12-5-08]

Dr. David Madison vs. Jesus #3: Nature & Time of 2nd Coming [8-3-19]

Then I was made aware of an online copy of a master’s thesis on this topic by a friend of mine, David Palm, entitled “The Signs of His Coming”: for Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Deerfield, Illinois (1993). He wrote it as an evangelical Protestant, later became a Catholic, and recently noted that he would change nothing in it. I summarized his arguments in this paper:

Seidensticker Folly #58: Jesus Erred on Time of 2nd Coming? (with David Palm) [10-7-20]

Matthew contributed some very unlikely events to the Biblical account of the crucifixion and resurrection.

Whether an event is “unlikely” or not is irrelevant to whether it actually happened. Lots of “strange” things have happened throughout history.

For example, the Guards on the Tomb,

How is that “very unlikely”? Atheists have bandied about the story of the supposed stolen body of Jesus, in order to explain away the resurrection, for centuries. If they can “reason” like that, then it follows that the people of the time could have as well. The very prevalence of this skeptical motif renders it likely and plausible.

the empty Tomb,

Yeah, it’s very unlikely. But it didn’t mean it didn’t happen.

the Angel,

In the Bible there are such things as angels! We understand that atheists disbelieve in them. Again, mere disbelief is not proof of the non-existence of angels, anymore than it is for God’s existence.

the Earthquake

Now there is scientific evidence that an earthquake did indeed occur around the time of the crucifixion of Jesus. See:

The Christ Quake (documentary)

Crucifixion Quake (documentary)

and the 3 hours darkness at Jesus’ death

If this wasn’t a natural event (a lunar eclipse or a storm with very dark cloud cover, which can happen), then it could have been a supernatural darkness. If God exists and if indeed He is omnipotent, then this is entirely possible.

are all very likely to be wrong.

On what basis? Bald assertion is neither argument nor evidence.

Matthew exaggerates elements when copying Mark to the point of making it up, for example the young-boy who at Jesus’ tomb becomes a radiant angel who scares off the guards (Matthew 28).

Angels are often called men in Scripture. But there could easily have been more than one angel involved. The Gospels taken together, show that this is the case. Deliberate lying or deception is not a plausible or provable hypothesis.

These side-stories, although not essential to the idea of the resurrection, reinforce the feeling that Matthew was writing anything he could to make Jesus out to have existed, whether such things were true or not.

Mr. Crabtree has not cast serious doubt on these things; not by these arguments. That Jesus exists is the consensus of virtually all serious scholars. See: Seidensticker Folly #4: Jesus Never Existed, Huh? [8-14-18].

Mr. Crabtree then cites atheist Richard Carrier at length. His words will be in green:

Doesn’t the fact that the tomb was guarded make escape unlikely, even if Jesus survived?

Not if Jesus was resurrected, and if He was God (as Christians believe). A mere stone would then be irrelevant as to His “escape.”

Although one gospel accuses the Jews of making up the theft story, it is only that same gospel, after all, which mentions a guard on the tomb, and the authors have the same motive to make that up as the Jews would have had to make up the theft story: by inventing guards on the tomb the authors create a rhetorical means of putting the theft story into question, especially for the majority of converts who did not live in Palestine.

I already answered this above:

Atheists have bandied about the story of the supposed stolen body of Jesus, in order to explain away the resurrection, for centuries. If they can “reason” like that, then it follows that the people of the time could have as well. The very prevalence of this skeptical motif renders it likely and plausible.

I think atheists and the Jewish opponents of Jesus making such a story up is at least as plausible as the Gospel writers doing so.

An additional reason to reject Matthew’s story is that it contradicts all other accounts and is illogical: if the tomb was sealed until the angel came and moved the stone before the women and the guards, how did Jesus leave the tomb undetected? Did he teleport? For he wasn’t in the tomb: it was already empty. Even if he want to imagine that he did teleport, all the other Gospels record that the stone had already been moved when the women arrived (Mark 16:4, Luke 24:2, John 20:1). Thus, Matthew’s account is contradicted three times, even by an earlier source (Mark), and does not make a lot of sense. That is further ground for rejecting it: for Matthew alone must have the angel open the tomb when the women are present in order to silence the guards that he alone has put there.

I just got through writing an exhaustive two-part refutation of numerous anti-resurrection claims:

Pearce’s Potshots #13: Resurrection “Contradictions” (?) [2-2-21]

Pearce’s Potshots #14: Resurrection “Contradictions” #2 [2-4-21]

And I had done some before, too:

Silly Atheist Arguments vs. the Resurrection & Miracles [2002]

Dialogue w Atheist on Post-Resurrection “Contradictions” [1-26-11]

Seidensticker Folly #18: Resurrection “Contradictions”? [9-17-18]

Jesus’ Resurrection: Scholarly Defenses of its Historicity [4-12-20]

 

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Photo credit: The evangelist Matthew and the angel (1661), by Rembrandt (1606-1669) [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]

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2025-05-17T16:28:20-04:00

Last updated on: May 17, 2025 at 4:28 pm   By

Atheist and anti-theist Bob Seidensticker runs the influential Cross Examined blog. He asked me there, on 8-11-18: “I’ve got 1000+ posts here attacking your worldview. You just going to let that stand? Or could you present a helpful new perspective that I’ve ignored on one or two of those posts?” He added in June 2017 in a combox: “If I’ve misunderstood the Christian position or Christian arguments, point that out. Show me where I’ve mischaracterized them.” Delighted to oblige his wishes . . .

Bob (for the record) virtually begged and pleaded with me to dialogue with him in May 2018, via email. But by 10-3-18, following massive, childish name-calling attacks against me,  encouraged by Bob on his blog, he banned me from commenting there. I also banned him for violation of my rules for discussion, but (unlike him) provided detailed reasons for why it was justified.

Bob’s cowardly hypocrisy knows no bounds. On 6-30-19, he was chiding someone for something very much like his own behavior: “Spoken like a true weasel trying to run away from a previous argument. You know, you could just say, ‘Let me retract my previous statement of X’ or something like that.” Yeah, Bob could!  He still hasn’t yet uttered one peep in reply to — now — 70 of my critiques of his atrocious reasoning.

Bible-Basher Bob reiterated and rationalized his intellectual cowardice yet again on 12-21-20: “I love people who can make cogent arguments against mine or point out data I hadn’t considered before. What I dislike (and ban) are $#&*%@s who . . . refuse to learn/adapt . . . ignore compelling arguments against their position, and so on.”

Bible-Basher Bob’s words will be in blue. To find these posts, follow this link: “Seidensticker Folly #” or see all of them linked under his own section on my Atheism page.

*****

In his post, Defending 10 Atheist Arguments (4 of 5) (2-1-21), Bob opines:

*

7. What is God made of?

Atheist argument: “There is no evidence that spiritual energy exists, so we can conclude that psychics, ghosts, and gods are non-existent. Otherwise, God has nothing to be made of.”

Christian response: “Not this again. An immaterial being, by definition, is not made of material.”

My response: Not this again. You can’t just magic something into existence with a definition. Do you think “God is an immaterial being” is a spell that will create such a being?

Don’t waste our time with, “Well, God might exist” or “You haven’t proven he doesn’t exist.” God’s existence is the topic here, and you need to show it. Yes, I realize that the atheist is making the argument and you’re responding, but responses need evidence, too. Your response is no more compelling than “Because I said so.”

“I’m not going too quickly here, am I? God is not made of anything. God is spirit. God is spirit, but he’s not made of spiritual energy. He’s immaterial, so this is a straw man.”

God is not made of anything, least of all spiritual energy, but he’s made of spirit? Or he is spirit? Or something?

“Not made of anything”—that sounds like your rhetorical weapons. And it sounds like they’re loaded with not-evidence. This is the problem with just handwaving stuff into existence. Your embarrassing ad hoc arguments will mean you’ll no longer be able to sit at the adult table.

So God is not made of matter or (heaven forbid!) spiritual energy . . . but he’s made of something, right? You’re the expert—if not “spiritual energy,” then what? Don’t play Simon Says, just tell us. And whatever you say God is made of, show us that it exists. One atheist responded, “Can someone tell me what the word ‘spirit’ means without saying what it is not?”

How intensely ironic (the last sentence)! It’s our beloved atheist critics who are constantly informing us lowly, ignorant Christians that atheism itself is, alas, not a formulated position, but only the absence of a position (belief in God). It’s not a worldview, etc. I wish I had a dime for every time I’ve heard that. It’s not true (see just one reason of many, why I think it isn’t), but we hear it all the time.

Yet lo and behold, now we are immensely privileged enough to witness an atheist complain that we can’t define spirit in a way other than what it is not (matter). It’s precious and a double standard for the ages, for sure. We are “embarrassing” and can’t “sit at the adult table”: so sez Bible-Basher Bob (ever the charitable and fair-minded one), but atheists making the exact same sorts of arguments somehow are not. Maybe one day, some kind atheist will deign to explain to me what the profound logical difference is. Or some logically consistent one can save my sanity and patience alike by conceding that these “arguments” (i.e., actually, bald assertions) are dead wrong.

It’s one thing to challenge theists with producing arguments in favor of the existence of God (we’ve produced dozens; none are ever good enough for hard-core atheists); quite another to make the “argument” that a spiritual being (the very category or notion or hypothetical) is absurd. The latter is what is taking place above, but Bob, logically clueless as usual, couldn’t resist inappropriately mixing in a little of the first question, too (“You can’t just magic something into existence with a definition” / “God’s existence is the topic here” / “And whatever you say God is made of, show us that it exists”). The initial argument, that Bob himself framed (see above), had the following logical structure:

1) Spiritual energy is nonexistent.

2) Gods as well as ghosts consist of such spiritual energy.

3) Therefore, God cannot exist, since he is said to consist of a thing which itself doesn’t exist.

Or, more broadly, as a purely logical thought-experiment:

1) X is non-existent.

2) Y is allegedly entirely composed of X.

3) Therefore Y doesn’t exist.

One thing at a time . . . I am dealing with the question of spirit and the above formulation of Bob’s, not God’s existence per se. He may not be able to comprehend the difference, but I trust that the vast bulk of my readers can. I won’t play the game of bouncing back-and-forth between entirely distinct topics. That’s child’s play and not serious philosophical / theological / scientific discussion.

As usual, the atheist is merely assuming that certain things aren’t true; can’t possibly be true. They habitually do this with miracles and the supernatural. But this is blind faith and not reason. They also do it with the question of whether there is something other than matter. They are philosophical materialists and physicalists, as opposed to dualists. Well, most of them are. Some atheists (and in my opinion, the sharper and more thoughtful ones) are actually dualists. I always mention the brilliant atheist philosopher David Chalmers (four books with Oxford University Press and one with MIT) — who looks like he ought to be the lead singer of a rock band — as one prominent example. His Wikipedia page states about him:

Chalmers argues for an “explanatory gap” from the objective to the subjective, and criticizes physicalist explanations of mental experience, making him a dualist. Chalmers characterizes his view as “naturalistic dualism”: naturalistic because he believes mental states supervene “naturally” on physical systems (such as brains); dualist because he believes mental states are ontologically distinct from and not reducible to physical systems.

But now to the heart of my objection. I shall turn the table by using a scientific analogy (I love doing both things in my apologetics, so I’m having a grand ol’ time). Bob had a field day mocking Christians for believing that God is a spirit, immaterial, composed of spirit, which isn’t a physical thing (with atoms, etc.). Once again, Christians are made out to be anti-scientific ignoramuses, dummies, and imbeciles. It’s Bob’s constant methodology and what motivates him (and his legions of rah-rahing sycophants in his ranting, pathetic comboxes) to get out of bed every morning. I hope he had his fun. Now we shall have ours.

Please keep the above in mind as I make my argument now (as my entire argument is an analogy). Scientists are currently quite excited about new phenomena called dark energy and dark matter. The very notions have only made their appearance over the last 25-30 years or so. The term dark energy was coined by cosmologist Michael Turner in 1998: which is more recent than the life of this blog (1997). But — recent or not — it’s now widely accepted and represents the cutting edge and most fascinating field of study in cosmology and astronomy (superseding black holes). A NASA web page comments upon it as follows:

What Is Dark Energy? More is unknown than is known. We know how much dark energy there is because we know how it affects the universe’s expansion. Other than that, it is a complete mystery. But it is an important mystery. It turns out that roughly 68% of the universe is dark energy. Dark matter makes up about 27%. The rest – everything on Earth, everything ever observed with all of our instruments, all normal matter – adds up to less than 5% of the universe. Come to think of it, maybe it shouldn’t be called “normal” matter at all, since it is such a small fraction of the universe.

One explanation for dark energy is that it is a property of space. Albert Einstein was the first person to realize that empty space is not nothing. Space has amazing properties, many of which are just beginning to be understood. The first property that Einstein discovered is that it is possible for more space to come into existence. Then one version of Einstein’s gravity theory, the version that contains a cosmological constant, makes a second prediction: “empty space” can possess its own energy. Because this energy is a property of space itself, it would not be diluted as space expands. As more space comes into existence, more of this energy-of-space would appear. . . .

Another explanation for how space acquires energy comes from the quantum theory of matter. In this theory, “empty space” is actually full of temporary (“virtual”) particles that continually form and then disappear. . . .

Another explanation for dark energy is that it is a new kind of dynamical energy fluid or field, something that fills all of space but something whose effect on the expansion of the universe is the opposite of that of matter and normal energy. Some theorists have named this “quintessence,” after the fifth element of the Greek philosophers. But, if quintessence is the answer, we still don’t know what it is like, what it interacts with, or why it exists. So the mystery continues. (“Dark Energy, Dark Matter”, no date)

A similar National Geographic page adds in befuddlement:

Now that we see the expansion of the universe is accelerating, adding in dark energy as a cosmological constant could neatly explain how space-time is being stretched apart. But that explanation still leaves scientists clueless as to why the strange force exists in the first place.

So it’s considered to be 68% of the universe, yet it is almost a complete “mystery” and scientists are “clueless” about its origin. And “everything on Earth, everything ever observed with all of our instruments, all normal matter – adds up to less than 5% of the universe.” So if this is true, it turns out that science in all its glory (the atheist’s epistemological “god” and religion) has been dealing with a mere 1/20th of all that there is in the universe.

Likewise, dark matter (thought to make up 27% of the universe) is “completely invisible to light and other forms of electromagnetic radiation, making dark matter impossible to detect with current instruments” (National Geographic). The EarthSky site adds to the collection of “duh!” comments from science on dark energy:

In this case, dark means unknown rather than literally dark, as is the case with dark matter. . . . Dark energy is one of the great unsolved mysteries of cosmology. . . . Dark energy does behave like Einstein’s anti-gravity force, but its nature and origin remain unknown. One of its greatest mysteries is why dark energy started to dominate the rate of expansion of the universe at a particular point in time billions of years after the Big Bang. If it exists now, why wasn’t it there all along?

And yet science is to be regarded as our final appeal, authority-wise? Some think dark energy is “a property of space.” Others think space is “full of temporary (‘virtual’) particles that continually form and then disappear.” Some appeal to Greek philosophy and call the mystery “quintessence.” How interesting. So we have this phenomenon, and it is serious science (which I am not doubting at all; sure, bring it on!). The admitted ignorance is extraordinary.

Yet all that is fine and dandy, while Christians are mocked and derided and considered simpletons simply because we have believed all along that God is an eternal spirit, Who created the world? What is the difference? I’d love for some atheist to tell me and come dialogue, but I know they are very averse to that: having just been banned again from Debunking Christianity because I had the gall to ask someone in the combox if Dr. David Madison (the big cheese on that site, along with John Loftus, who has ignored 23 of my critiques) should or would make any attempt to answer my 44 critiques of his anti-theist bilge, posing as supposed “arguments.”

Moreover, we see that Bob Seidensticker — after directly challenging me to make them — has ignored 70 (yes: seventy!) of my counter-replies, and that Jonathan MS Pearce has just decided to start ignoring my critiques (five or six unanswered now) as well, whereas just a few weeks ago he was gung-ho in debating me. How the mighty have fallen . . .  All four of these men are very prominent, influential, and “vocal” anti-theist atheists online. So any serious, point-by-point reply to this paper is highly unlikely, but it would be nice to engage in serious interaction on a matter like this (pun half-intended).

Lastly: if there is any reply at all, we’ll almost certainly be told that “dark energy is just now being investigated by science. Give it time; science always discovers and explains things in due course.” I don’t disagree all that much. Science does do that: though not as completely as the average atheist would make out (it being his or her religion and idol and [usually] sole epistemological guide).

But even if dark energy and dark matter are adequately, plausibly explained and much better understood by science in the near future, it makes no difference at all as to my present argument. The fact remains that conventionally understood matter makes up only 5% of the universe: so they tell us. Science has had up till very recently, literally nothing to tell us about 95% of the universe: all of which is other (spirit? energy?) than what we have known up till now as “matter”: with protons and neutrons and the whole nine yards.

And yet Christians (along with many reputable philosophers through the centuries, and virtually all religious views) are faulted for having believed that there is such a thing as a non-material Spirit-Creator, for 2000 years: following the ancient Israelites, who believed it for some 18 or more centuries before we did? Obviously, non-material entities or whatever we call them, have been a far more important aspect of the universe than we (least of all materialist atheists) had ever imagined.

And so God fits into this “new” schema very well, just as He fit into Big Bang cosmology, and even quantum mechanics, examined more closely, as well as something like irreducible complexity. Present-day scientific consensus is perfectly consistent with the biblical teaching of creation out of nothing too.  I think the Bible and Christianity are doing pretty darn good, in terms of being consistent with science, as the latter advances. It seems that Christianity understood things (derived from revelation, communicated by God) for 2000 years that science has only recently come to figure out.

Albert Einstein and most scientists in the 1940s believed in an eternal universe (steady state). Einstein initially opposed the findings of the originator of the Big Bang theory: a Catholic priest. Now virtually no scientist denies that the present universe had a beginning (although some posit prior universes, with no hard evidence). Christians had said that the universe came into existence (by God) from nothing all along. And now science seems to be confirming that non-material spirit or “energy” is awfully important in the scheme of the universe as well: to the tune of 68% of all that exists. Better late than never . . .

In closing, I’ll mention another debate that was going on long before dark energy was posited: the nature of light: is it a particle or a wave? This has to do with the question of possible non-physical entities as well (the very thing that Bob mercilessly mocked above). And so a scientific web page dealt with this question, throwing out several competing theories as to what light even is (all bolding in original):

Answer 1

[ . . .]

I’m not sure if I would call light matter or not, however. Certainly it can do some of the things you would think only traditional matter can do – like carry momentum and transfer it in a collision. But it certainly has some properties that are fundamentally different than the stuff that makes up traditional matter (things that are made of atoms).

Answer 2 Light is not matter. Light is just light — it has its own qualities. Light is made up of “things” called photons, and these photons can possess some of the properties of matter. For example, they are always moving, and when they move, they can exert a (usually very small) force on an object (just like moving matter can). But most of the time, light is just light. It is not matter as much as it is energy.

[Dave: how is this a whit different from Christians saying, “God is not matter. God is just God — He has His own qualities”?]

Answer 3

Light is a form of energy, not matter. Matter is made up of atoms. Light is actually electromagnetic radiation. . . .

Answer 4

This is a fun question. There are two main theories of thought about light. The first is that light is a photon and the second is that light is a wave. Neither theory has been proven wrong. It would seem that photons would be matter whereas the waves wouldn’t. It turns out that for both theories light isn’t matter. A photon is not matter because it has no mass. This is different from matter such as electrons and neutrons which have masses. I hope this helps.

Yep. Light ain’t matter, it seems pretty clear. Nor is 95% of the universe matter as we have known and loved it from our chemistry and physics classes (me, I had a chemistry set when I was 12). So the notion of a merely spiritual, immaterial God seems all the more possible and even likely, doesn’t it?: just based on what science tells us: before we even get to philosophy and religion.

Why then is Bob prattling on as if matter (good old-fashioned matter before we get to dark matter and dark energy) is all there is? He needs to crack open any scientific textbook written since Einstein and get up to speed before embarrassing himself (and atheists along with him) further. Who’s against science? Christians have nothing to fear from it at all. It has always confirmed — or has at least been harmonious with — our views, and today it is doing so more than ever.

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Photo credit: AnandKz (8-11-17) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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2021-01-15T17:13:44-04:00

Last updated on: January 15, 2021 at 5:13 pm   By

Plus Further Related Exchanges with Aaron and a Few Others in an Atheist Combox

Aaron Adair is an atheist physicist, who wrote the book, The Star of Bethlehem: A Skeptical View (2013). He initially wrote me a cordial letter after seeing a few of my recent posts on that topic, and I responded in kind, at considerable length. But — sadly — it quickly descended to the usual anti-theist atheist insults. My reply below under an absolutely atrocious, abominable put-down post from him against me (or rather, a gross caricature of what I am and what I have argued), was posted underneath it at Jonathan Pearce’s blog, A Tippling Philosopher.  Aaron’s words will be in blue.

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As Aaron alluded to, we had been engaging in private correspondence, which quickly went sour due to his relentless insults. It was perfectly cordial in the first round till Jonathan publicly reported that Aaron [not named but later verified] called one of my articles — behind my back as it were –, a bunch of “hot air”. Then it quickly went downhill after that (to my immense disappointment: but I should have known better). One gets a flavor of what happened privately, above: “he’s a poor researcher, searching for any tidbit that seems to favor his theories and blind to any contrary evidence.”

What else is new with anti-theist atheists? If even well-known Christian debaters and philosophers like William Lane Craig and Alvin Plantinga get the same treatment (they’re all idiots and blowhards, so we are endlessly reminded), who am I (a mere lowly, despised lay apologist) to think it would be any different and that respectful dialogue could actually be attained? Heaven help me from my hopeless idealism . . .

Whatever my merits or demerits, abilities or lack thereof, clueless idiot or not, at least I was willing to enter into a full-fledged point-by-point debate, with both sides comprehensively presented on my blog (and his — + this one — , if he wanted) but Aaron flatly refused. So instead we have him systematically caricaturing my side of the argument. Very impressive, but par for the usual course. Rather than a fair exchange of two sides, we have one side cynically caricaturing what the other argued, with massive misrepresentation: trashing supposedly lousy research and then exhibiting the same for one and all to see. It’s pathetic and pitiful: all the more so from an academic (a physicist).

If anyone wants to read how I actually argue the thing, see my nine articles on the star:

Star of Bethlehem, Astronomy, Wise Men, & Josephus (Amazing Astronomically Verified Data in Relation to the Journey of the Wise Men  & Jesus’ Birth & Infancy) [12-14-20]

Timeline: Star of Bethlehem, Herod’s Death, & Jesus’ Birth (Chronology of Harmonious Data from History, Archaeology, the Bible, and Astronomy) [12-15-20]

Conjunctions, the Star of Bethlehem and Astronomy [National Catholic Register, 12-21-20]

Star of Bethlehem: Refuting Silly Atheist Objections [12-26-20]

Star of Bethlehem: More Silly Atheist “Objections” [12-29-20]

Astronomy, Exegesis and the Star of Bethlehem [National Catholic Register, 12-31-20]

Pearce’s Potshots #12: Supernatural Star of Bethlehem? (Biblical View of Astronomy, Laws of Nature, and the Natural World) [1-11-21]

Star of Bethlehem: Natural or Supernatural? [1-13-21]

Bible Commentaries & Matthew 2:9 (Star of Bethlehem) [1-13-21]

I ain’t gonna take on every misrepresentation and/or noncomprehension of my arguments presented above. It would be a complete waste of time. I’ve already dealt with all this. Jonathan blew it off, refused to discuss it, and so I presented it in a new paper yesterday, and added another just about biblical commentators and their views. Most atheists will simply believe their fellow atheist no matter what. There is little interest in actual dialogue. Aaron had none.

Fair-mindedness and giving someone even a minimal benefit of the doubt that they have honest, thought-out differences seem to be regarded around here and in virtually all atheist echo chamber venues, as quaint and naive remnants of a remote past. So I’ll just pick one thing where Aaron has made a mountain out of a molehill: the issue of what the Greek word hou means.

I explained to him what happened there, and it was an exceedingly minor point, but to no avail. I never called it a “noun.” I simply said that it was translated as “place” in English translations (which will be documented below). It’s true I modified this section, because if Aaron could misunderstand what I wrote this badly, chances are others could, as well. In modifying, I took the opportunity to make my argument presented there far stronger (which is what I absolutely love about challenges: however ill thought out, as this one was), and Aaron hasn’t touched it: being too caught up in his goal of making me look like an idiot allegedly way over my head, special pleader, and dishonest researcher.

Here is my fuller / modified argument from the word hou, in one of my replies to Jonathan that he, too, has decided not to reply to thus far (though he has done so with several of my articles in the past, and recent past). Make up your own minds (since Aaron has flat-out refused to discuss these things in the depth they deserve):

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Matthew 2:9 . . . the star which they had seen in the East went before them, till it came to rest over the place where the child was.

This passage refers only to the six-mile journey between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, and I have contended that all it means is that a bright star (I believe, Jupiter, in my scenario, backed up by astronomical charts of what was in the sky and where) was at the time in the direction of Bethlehem (that is, over it) from Jerusalem. It would not have “moved” in the perception of the wise men, over a journey of six miles, just as we could say we were traveling west, following the setting sun. It would always “go before us” as we traveled.

It’s phenomenological language, which is habitually used by Bible writers. We use it even to this day by referring to the “sun rising” or “sun going down” etc. Literally (as we understand) it is the earth rotating, thus making the sun appear to move. But we still refer to it in the non-literal way. So does the Bible, about a lot of things.

The other aspect is the clause “it came to rest over the place where the child was.” First of all, the text does not say that this means it shone specifically onto a “house.” Matthew 2:11 (i.e., two verses later) simply says they went “into a house”: not that the star was shining on it, identifying it. We have to get it straight: what exactly any given text under consideration actually asserts and does not assert.

Let’s examine the actual biblical text a little more closely. The Greek “adverb of place” in Matthew 2:9 is hou (Strong’s word #3757). In RSV hou is translated by “the place where” (in KJV, simply “where”). It applies to a wide range of meanings beyond something as specific as a house. In other passages in RSV it refers to a mountain (Mt 28:16), Nazareth (Lk 4:16), a village (Lk 24:28), the land of Midian (Acts 7:29), Puteoli (Pozzuoli): a sizeable city in Italy (Acts 28:14), and the vast wilderness that Moses and the Hebrews traveled through (Heb 3:9). Thus it can easily, plausibly refer to “Bethlehem” in Matthew 2:9.

In RSV (Mt 2:9), hou is translated by the italicized words: “it came to rest over the place where the child was.” So the question is: what does it mean by “place” in this instance? What is the star said to be “over”? And then I noted other uses of the same word, which referred to a variety of larger areas. The text does not specifically say that “it stood over a house.” Yet Jonathan (and many able and sincere, but in my opinion mistaken, Christian commentators) seem to think it does.

This is an important point because it goes to the issue of supernatural or natural. A “star” (whatever it is) shining a beam down on one house would be (I agree) supernatural; not any kind of “star” we know of in the natural world. But a star shining on an area; in the direction of an area (which a bright Jupiter was to Bethlehem in my scenario: at 68 degrees in the sky) can be a perfectly natural event.

Matthew 2:9 is similar to how we say in English: “where I was, I could see the conjunction very well.” “Where” obviously refers to a place. And one’s place is many things simultaneously. Thus, when I saw the “star of Bethlehem”-like conjunction in December [2020], I was in a field, near my house (in my neighborhood), in my town (Tecumseh), in my county (Lenawee), in my state (Michigan), and in my country (United States). This is my point about “place” in Matthew 2:9. It can mean larger areas, beyond just “house.” If the text doesn’t say specifically, “the star shone on the house” then we can’t say for sure that this is what the text meant.

I never claimed that hou was a “noun” in my original wording. I was noting that it was referring to place: as indeed it did in Matthew 2:9, since the translation of it in RSV is “the place where.” Therefore “place” is a translation of hou in this instance.

I have found 18 other English Bible translations of Matthew 2:9 that also have “the place where” (Weymouth, Moffatt, Confraternity, Knox, NEB, REB, NRSV, Lamsa, Amplified, Phillips, TEV, NIV, Jerusalem, Williams, Beck, NAB, Kleist & Lilly, and Goodspeed). In all these cases, they are translating hou: literally meaning “where” but at the same time implying place (which is the “where” referred to). The Living Bible (a very modern paraphrase) has “standing over Bethlehem”: which of course, bolsters my argument as well (because it didn’t say “house”).

All these things being understood, all the text in question plausibly meant is that the bright star was shining down on Bethlehem, just as we have all seen the moon or some bright star shining on a mountain in the distance or tall building or some other landmark. A man might see the light from the harvest moon romantically shining on his girlfriend or wife’s face. It need not necessarily mean that this is all they are shining on. It simply looks that way from our particular vantage-point.

All of this is in my opinion, more plausible and straightforward and in line with biblical thinking than positing a supernatural “star.” It’s true that many reputable and observant Christian biblical commentators exist who do argue for that interpretation, and I don’t disparage them. Theirs are honest efforts just as this paper is. Reasonable people can and do disagree. I can only present the reasons for why I hold to my opinion, and for why Jonathan’s assertions of a necessary or exclusively plausible supernatural nature of the star of Bethlehem are less reasonable and likely than my scenario.

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Carstonio (henceforth in green) Any point of light in the sky that would have been capable of spotlighting a small area on the ground certainly wouldn’t have been a star or a planet – perhaps only a few hundred feet in the air. The originators of the nativity legend wouldn’t have made that kind of distinction, given the knowledge of cosmology at the time. Based on the text, the behavior sounds more like the Deluminator in the last Harry Potter novel.

Again, the text doesn’t specify a “small area” being illuminated, or even a larger one, as I have explained over and over. All the actual text says is “the star which they had seen in the East went before them, till it came to rest over the place where the child was” (Matthew 2:9, RSV). And as I have shown, all that has to mean, given the use of the word hou in the New Testament is: “the star stood over Bethlehem”: particularly from the vantage point of the journey south from Jerusalem to Bethlehem.

It had to be [in this scenario] in the direction of Bethlehem (south). In my scheme it (Jupiter) is that in December 2 BC: 68 degrees up in the sky too, according to the astronomical charts. That’s known; the only question is if it lines up with the date of Jesus’ birth, which is a whole different question, of course.

This business of “spotlighting a small area” is simply not in this text, and I think many people get the idea from 1) Christmas cards and other prevalent images of the Nativity, and 2) the passage in Luke regarding the angels and shepherds, where almost all Christian commentators (including myself) hold that the light is supernatural and what is called shekinah, or the light of “God’s [or angels’] glory.”

Geoff Benson (henceforth in brown)

“ them, till it came to rest over the place where the child was”

Two points. Firstly how could it ‘rest’? It is a very slow moving (our perception) celestial body so it could never just stop from the viewpoint of the Magi. They didn’t see it actually moving so they didn’t see it stop. Secondly, it’s several hundred million miles away. At any considered point it can’t be regarded as direction to any individual point. The Magi would have needed to move only a few yards and the indicated target would have been entirely different, even assuming it was sufficiently low on the horizon to give meaningful guidance. The very simple geometry problems are massive.

My broader point still holds – a light that behaved that way would have had to be in the troposphere.

Your presupposition as to how it supposedly behaved isn’t in the text, so it has no support.

The text says the star went before them, till it came to rest over the place where the child was. That’s a description of a light that’s moving in the sky at the traveling speed of the three men, independent of the stars, and that would require a fairly low height compared with celestial objects.

It is if it’s taken literally. I don’t take it absolutely literally, but rather, view it as one of many biblical examples of phenomenological language: the language of appearance.

Isn’t this an excellent example of why the ‘star’ should be regarded as supernatural, and not a natural phenomenon [?]

No, at least not in my opinion. But there are a lot of good Christians who think it’s supernatural. We have no problem allowing a diversity of explanations. The important thing was that it existed and was a sign to the wise men. All Christians fully agree on that, which is the essence of it, after all.

And plenty of other Christians don’t read the stories literally either. But some do and they demand that everyone else accept them as irrefutable fact. Because of that demand, the literal readings deserve to be scrutinized and challenged, or at least categorized as originating with legend.

I’m not demanding anything about the star (other than that it was an actual historical occurrence per my belief in the veracity of the Bible). Equally good Christians take all kinds of positions. I’m opposing Jonathan and Aaron’s “dogmatic supernaturalism” regarding the star.

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Two quick things:

1. Since you translated hou as ‘place’, and ‘place’ is a noun, you therefore said hou is a noun. This is just basic transitive logic: if A=B, and B=C, then A=C. Please don’t tell me I misunderstood your argument when you clearly don’t understand your own.

2. I don’t have reason to go point-for-point because you literally just ignored the entirety of my article, not to mention my book on the subject. Why go into details when you don’t even know what the details of the argument are, while also showing you don’t know anything about the underlying text and need help with the most basic points?

Oh, so you are Aaron [I didn’t realize this at first, given the usual ridiculous nickname: a thing I have loathed online since 1996], and now you’ve worked up the gumption to actually interact with my specific arguments: here with all your buddies to support and cheerlead, while I’m all by myself? That’s cute.

I didn’t translate anything, so your premise is wrong. I don’t know Greek. 19 Bible translations (produced by many hundreds of Greek linguists) decided to translate the clause in Matthew 2:9 as “the place where” [Jesus was]. Go take it up with them. I merely reported what they did.

I have explained its relationship (it’s described by grammarians as an “adverb of place” after all) to what is indeed a noun: “place” (to no avail). Both you and Jonathan refused to address this. It can function very much like a noun in English usage, as I have noted recently. We say, for example, “where we were, was an excellent vantage-point to view the conjunction.” It obviously inexorably implies “place” (noun): which is why some Bible translations (e.g., KJV) simply use “where” for hou at Matthew 2:9, and additionally why 19 that I have found render it “the place where.”

So all this hogwash about me saying hou was a noun, which I never did, and ignoring this aspect which I have now explained more than once, is obscurantism and obfuscation; sophistry. It’s yet another case where atheists can’t admit that a Christian can be right about anything.

What’s actually relevant is what “place” in this sense refers to in biblical koine Greek, and as I have shown, it refers to larger areas: not just one house, as you and Jonathan appear to think.

Yes, I will ignore most of your idiotic “reply” to me because it’s aimed at things I don’t believe in the first place. You’ve forfeited the opportunity to have a serious, constructive discussion with a Christian about this (as your first letter seemed to be) by acting like a pompous ass and academic snob. That was your choice. I’m simply clarifying a few key things here since you have decided to attack me all the more and try to make me look like a pretentious fool.

It can function like a noun? Congrats, you’re just making things up. Adverbs are not nouns, and they don’t function as nouns. As for its relationship, uh all words have relationships! Don’t try to make a linguistic argument, it’s just embarrassing.

Please also note, I never said the translation ‘the place where’ was wrong. Not once. What I did say was that you said hou meant place, which it does not. Everything else you have tried to come up with is the same sort of hot air I complained about: sound and fury signifying nothing.

Additionally, I never said hou only refers to small areas or just houses. Not once. Instead, what did I say? Look up, and you’ll find that I said the meaning of such general words get their meaning from context. And you ignored every other word in the verse. You are literally taking the word out of context, and somehow say that proves its meaning in context.

Try addressing my actual arguments. You’ll learn a thing of two.

Hou is translated as “the place where” in 19 Bible translations. Take it up with them. I might get some finer grammatical points wrong (I freely confess) — I hated grammar in school, though I got A’s in English and wound up as an author and writer — , but this basic fact stands. You can’t (and don’t, above) deny that the word was rendered “the place where” by these many hundreds of linguists.

I did nothing wrong in noting that fact. The “sound and fury signifying nothing” is all from your end.

Looks like you’re reading skills are failing you, as are grammar skills. I never said the translation ‘the place where’ was wrong. Not on[c]e. I said that you were wrong when you said hou meant place. You can’t even begin to address my actual arguments if you don’t even know what I’ve said. Actually address what’s there, not the phantasm you imagine.

I know that feeling well! I’m not interested any longer in any discussion with you. When you first wrote, I was very interested. But I lose all interest once someone takes a hostile stance and starts misrepresenting my views. It’s only because you did the latter here that I replied, since I have a right to defend myself (and Jonathan is nice enough to not ban me like Seidensticker does).

But I’ve done about all I can do here. There’s very little genuine dialogue between Christians and atheists anywhere.

In other words, you can’t address any point I’ve made. I’ve already shown that your arguments are fundamentally flawed, you don’t even show an awareness of what my arguments are, and you copy-paste over and over what is not even relevant and misrepresent what anyone has said, all because you were shown to be wrong even on trivial basics.

If you want dialogue, actually address the arguments. If you can’t, then move on to something you can defend. If you don’t know Greek, don’t try declaring you know what the Greek means. If you don’t know astronomy, don’t make astronomical arguments. If you don’t know much of anything about the theories of the Star of Bethlehem, don’t argue with an expert on the subject as if you know anything and then cry all over the Internet that your feelings were hurt.

And most importantly, don’t lie about things. That’ll really get you in trouble.

And don’t be a pompous ass and an academic snob. It gives a bad name to atheists, who already are widely perceived among Christians as irrationally angry, relentlessly hostile and insulting, and impossible to interact with in any constructive manner. If you want to foster that perception, knock yourself out.

This could have been a great and enjoyable dialogue. There was no need to descend to rank insult as you have done. It impresses no one except atheists who want to push the notion that all Christians are idiots and anti-science, anti-reason. I’m not a liar and I’m not an idiot (agree or disagree with me on whatever). I don’t think all atheists are immoral people who will automatically go to hell (never have). I’ve had great dialogues with several atheists (one of which is my very favorite among my 1000+ posted online).

I haven’t pretended that I know more about anything (be it astronomy or Greek) than I do. I’m citing others who do know about those things. I simply have an honest disagreement on this issue with you.

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Matt Brooker (Syncretocrat)

These attempts to make Bible stories fit with scientific fact strike me as odd for two reasons:

1) If you already accept miracles, what’s implausible about god creating a moving light in the sky that looks like a star? If critics don’t like miracles, just accuse them of “anti-supernatural bias.” That seems more congruent with theism than trying to shoehorn Bible stories into scientific fact.

2) Doesn’t the whole enterprise of making the Bible fit with science show that science is the greater authority?

No. It shows that Christians respect science just as everyone else does, and that we take it into consideration in biblical exegesis, which has changed as a result of scientific discovery. In one of my papers on the star I noted five areas where this has happened.

We believe in scientific knowledge and discovery and also theological knowledge (from revelation and reason). Both things are true. Many Christians were wrong about heliocentrism in the 16th century, but so also were Copernicus and Galileo (both Catholics, of course), since the sun ain’t the center of the universe, either. And Galileo and Kepler were neck-deep into astrology, and Newton into occultism and alchemy. We all learn stuff all the time.

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eric

But how did you decide that that phenomena was not a miracle? You’re drawing from RSV Matthew 2. Okay, in that same section, in verse 13, an angel appears to Joseph in a dream. Was that also a natural phenomenon?

If not, how did you come to the conclusion that 2:9 does not describe a miracle, but 2:13 does? It seems quite arbitrary.

One has to look at each case. There are obviously lots of miracles in the Bible, and I believe them, as an orthodox Catholic who believes in biblical inspiration. I happen to think (for many reasons that I detail in my papers) that it’s more plausible to hold that the star of Bethlehem was a natural occurrence (actually a combination of two different celestial events). Likewise, natural occurrences coincided with Jesus’ crucifixion (an eclipse and an earthquake: both also able to be verified from scientific and literary records).

Many Christian commentators (and most before the 19th century, as Aaron likes to point out) have thought the star was supernatural, too. We have a diversity of opinion on the matter, but Jonathan and Aaron want to be dogmatic (how ironic, huh?) and act as if only the supernatural version can be held by any rational, sentient being. It’s poppycock.

While “all miracles” or “no miracles” might be dogmatic, having a consistent method for deciding which is which is, in my opinion, not. While personal reasoning may be fine for individual believers (like you), once someone decides they want to try and convince others, having a system that an outsider like me cannot apply independently means your system is not convincing. It may be valid, but without being able to communicate it, I cannot determine that.

But let’s leave this aside. I’d rather we continued to discuss your Jupiter explanation above, than spend more time on this.

I think most cases are obvious. The star is a bit more subtle than most (which is why it’s really fascinating for a Bible student and apologist like me to ponder, because it’s not hard and fast). I have provided many reasons for why I think the natural explanation is more plausible. It would have been fun to discuss and debate those point-by-point with Aaron, if he had remained congenial, but he decided not to.

Most biblical miracles can hardly be deemed as natural events (though many have tried: particularly more theologically liberal commentators). One famous one is the ridiculous slop about the “Reed Sea” that was only a few inches deep. Moses “parted” that and the Hebrews slogged through it. The standard joke about this is that the real miracle would have been the Egyptian army drowning in two inches of water. LOL

Most biblical miracles (assuming, of course, that they actually happened as reported) could only be miraculous. Jesus raised the dead, healed the sick, raised Himself, fed the 4000 and 5000 by multiplying available food, walked on water, stilled the storm, ascended to heaven. No one could say these were “natural” events. Elijah went to heaven in a fiery chariot. Manna came down from heaven, donkeys talked, weird plagues came upon Egypt. People talked in languages they themselves didn’t know, on the day of Pentecost. God became a man. Baptism regenerates us and does all sorts of wonderful things. Wicked sinners can be redeemed and exhibit radically changed lives. All miraculous . . .

One thing that can be natural was Jonah and the whale. It’s now been proven that men could be swallowed like that and actually survive (actual cases). If it wasn’t miraculous for them then it likely wasn’t for Jonah, either.

I noted in one of my papers that when I wrote about Joshua and the “sun standing still” I took a miraculous view, but not of the sun being still (which would mean, of course, that the earth stopped rotating). Rather, my view was that God caused a massive change in the perception of the people, in how they saw the sun. Some explanations try to take a more phenomenological-type view, as I have with the star. I didn’t buy it. It wasn’t convincing to me at all.

But back to the star: my scientific / natural view indeed can be examined independently, precisely because it involves known astronomical events in particular places. That’s what’s so fun about it. I think its a great argument for the Bible and the miraculous birth of Jesus. It’s one of those things like the Shroud of Turin and the image of Mary Guadalupe and the miracle of the sun at Fatima (witnessed by 70,000) and incorrupt bodies of saints that have all sorts of fascinating aspects to them (and can be scrutinized through scientific techniques). It reminds me of the confirming evidences of biblical archaeology: except here it’s astronomy that confirms biblical accounts.

All of this works to convince the occasional atheist precisely because it can be verified and examined in a way that a supernatural explanation cannot. Atheists can simply dismiss all miracles out of hand, and they do all the time (even though it’s irrational to do so, I would say, since it’s very difficult to prove universal negatives).

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[RSV] Matthew 2:9 . . . the star which they had seen in the East went before them, till it came to rest over the place where the child was.

[DA] This passage refers only to the six-mile journey between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, and I have contended that all it means is that a bright star (I believe, Jupiter, in my scenario, backed up by astronomical charts of what was in the sky and where) was at the time in the direction of Bethlehem (that is, over it) from Jerusalem. It would not have “moved” in the perception of the wise men, over a journey of six miles, just as we could say we were traveling west, following the setting sun. It would always “go before us” as we traveled.

Hello David. I hope you will answer my question.

So the Magi are in Jerusalem. Jupiter is in the southern part of the sky – mostly direct south or perhaps SSW of them. They travel the 5 or so miles in the direction of Jupiter and arrive at Bethlehem. Jupiter hasn’t moved, the time is too short. So it’s still in the southern sky to the Magi.

How is this “came to rest”? The ‘star’ looks exactly the same, and is in the exact same place, it was when they were in Jerusalem. Nothing about Jupiter can indicate to them that they’ve arrived at their destination, because to them, it’s exactly the same as it was one city back. So how is your scenario consistent with the passage?

Thanks for the question. I would reply in two ways: it’s phenomenological language: which is non-literal, but in this case describes what some commentators on the question would say is the retrograde motion or “stationary point” of planets (in this instance, Jupiter).

Thank you for your answer. But I do not understand how that answers my question. You said: “It would not have “moved” in the perception of the wise men.”

Now you’re discussing retrograde motion. Did they see retrograde motion? Is that what you are saying “come to rest” means – the observation of the planet going (very…very…slowly…) west instead of east?

How is this consistent with your original claim, above, that they didn’t see it move?

They wouldn’t see any motion to speak of if Jupiter was at a stationary point and in the sky to the south over Bethlehem, approached from Jerusalem.

Okay, so I’m sorry if I’m being dense about this, but if the Magi didn’t see it move, how is your post about retrograde motion relevant to the verse’s statement that the star ‘came to rest?’

It wouldn’t move much on the way from Jerusalem to Bethlehem. A camel normally travels about three miles an hour, so it would have taken them about two hours. That’s roughly the entire time the Bible refers to them (in non-literal language, I believe) following a star. In the language of appearance (remember, this is my interpretation: non-literal language employed), it “went before them” not in perceived motion, but because it was always ahead of them on the way.

To say, then, that the star “came to rest over the place” is to observe that they didn’t see it moving much over Bethlehem once they arrived there. I’m not an astronomer, so I can only cite other people who know more about these aspects.

The EarthSky site (“Jupiter ends retrograde on July 10-11”) notes regarding Jupiter’s stationary point in July 10-11, 2018:

Tonight – July 10-11, 2018 – the planet Jupiter is poised in front of the stars of the zodiac. It’s now moving neither east nor west against the star background, but will soon resume its usual eastward course. In other words, Jupiter is stationary on July 11 at 04:00 UTC. In United States time zones, Jupiter reaches its stationary point on July 11 at 12 midnight EDT, and on July 10 at 11 p.m. CDT, 10 p.m. MDT, 9 p.m. PDT, 8 p.m. Alaskan Time and 6 p.m. Hawaiian time.

So in my scenario, this was the case in Bethlehem when the Magi arrived. This is what would have looked to them like “[coming] to rest over” Bethlehem. The astronomical charts show this for one of the days in December, 2 BC. That’s my proposed date for their visit. Of course it could be wrong and is only speculation, but Jupiter would behave in this way then.

The Wikipedia article, “Apparent retrograde motion” provides another example:

Galileo’s drawings show that he first observed Neptune on December 28, 1612, and again on January 27, 1613. On both occasions, Galileo mistook Neptune for a fixed star when it appeared very close—in conjunction—to Jupiter in the night sky, hence, he is not credited with Neptune’s discovery. During the period of his first observation in December 1612, Neptune was stationary in the sky because it had just turned retrograde that very day. Since Neptune was only beginning its yearly retrograde cycle, the motion of the planet was far too slight to be detected with Galileo’s small telescope.

That’s lack of motion, and that is what I and others suggest was happening with Jupiter over Bethlehem when the wise men visited, thus bringing about the Bible’s statement that it “came to rest over the place where the child was” (Mt 2:9, RSV). Thus, the language of appearance can explain both clauses: the one just mentioned and also “went before them”, and can be harmonized with celestial events in the way I have explained.

If the wise men hit the right day, Jupiter would have appeared to be stationary, just as Neptune was for Galileo in December 1612 “because it had just turned retrograde that very day.” I didn’t make this stuff up. I had never heard about it till last month when I saw the famous Larson video on the star. But it has fascinated me ever since and it’s my theory unless and until I see something more plausible.

In the Christian view, God in His providence could have again arranged that the wise men, exercising their own free will, arrived at just the right time when the bright Jupiter appeared to be a sign above Jerusalem, for this king they believed was indicated by what they saw in Persia or Babylon (both due east).

Commentator Peter Pett stated that Jupiter “was actually stationary on December 25, interestingly enough, during Hanukkah, the season for giving presents.” That was in 2 BC. Note again that I am not saying this is when Jesus was born, but rather, when He was a year old. Just as the trek to Bethlehem may have taken only 18 or so minutes, likewise, their visit to Jesus may have been very short, for all we know. The overall passage may imply that they left quickly, to avoid a return visit to Herod: going back another way: which I think was either the coastal route west and north or straight through the desert to the east.

But say they were only there two hours. They would have seen very little motion of Jupiter in that time because of its being stationary, and so again, it would be perfectly harmonious with the clause “came to rest over the place where the child was”. Phenomenological language describing natural events all the way . . . That’s my theory.

Why didn’t they stop in Jerusalem? A 20-120 minute travel time means Jupiter would’ve also been in the ‘pause day’ in it’s precession when they were in Jerusalem.

Given that the pause-and-reverse window is relatively long (a day or so), how did they know the “at rest” moment was in Bethlehem, rather than an hour or two earlier in Jerusalem or an hour or two or more down the road?

Well, I did find some good material that I added somewhere in this mammoth thread: about ancient knowledge of retrograde motion of planets. [added to my longest paper on the star]

My view is that they saw a conjunction while in Persia or Babylon that led them (by means of their astronomy / astrology) to believe a king was to be born in Jerusalem or somewhere in Israel, at any rate. They got to Jerusalem by the usual known and well-traveled routes (Royal Road / King’s Highway / Silk Road through the Fertile Crescent around the desert) and inquired for more specific information to find Jesus (Mt 2:1-2). Herod summoned them and they learned about the messianic prophecy of Micah 5:2 from his priests. So now they had general astronomical guidance and more specific prophetic indication.

That’s more than enough to know that the blessed event was in Bethlehem, not in Jerusalem. Bethlehem was, moreover, the city of David, so if one is looking for more “kingly” significance, there you go. And the Old Testament presented David as a prototype of the Messiah. So that’s now two scriptural pointers to Bethlehem.

The star (not the bright conjunction they saw in the east but now Jupiter alone) was in that direction, but they already knew by this point that this was the destination anyway. Once they got there it “came to rest” and they recognized that this was retrograde motion and Jupiter’s stationary point, because we know (as I showed earlier) that the ancients (particularly the Babylonians) knew about these things, which would mean that they, as astronomers and sky-watchers, very likely did. Thus, they may have passed on the highly technical information about retrograde motion and Jupiter’s stationary point in common parlance as “came to rest.”

When they were in Bethlehem, the fact that Jupiter had reached its stationary point and appeared to be 1) over Bethlehem and 2) not moving much or at all, would have been further astronomical verification to them, so, accordingly, “they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy” (Mt 2:10).

The holy family itself could have been found by the usual means. Everyone in a small town knows everyone else. One simply asks around. Certainly, if Jesus was a year-old at this time, as I believe, people in Bethlehem (at least someone there) would have been familiar with the story of Luke 2 and His Nativity and would know where He was living. This ain’t rocket science.

The star didn’t guide them to that extent (right to the house) because it didn’t shine down on the house. That’s not in the text, and is simply widespread “Christmas myth” (and often atheist skeptical anti-Christmas myth as well). It was just sitting there up above Bethlehem, stationary, and so they took that as a sign, along with the messianic prophecy.

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I also note: in my first emails to you I never insulted you. I said your arguments were bad in my second message to you. If you can’t distance yourself from your arguments, then that is a failure on your part. I’ve had friends tell me I’ve made bad arguments before, and I didn’t take it as a personal affront. Moreover, I even told you what you could do to have a good argument. I went out of my way to let you know how you could convince me. But instead, your just went and figuratively flipped the table, and now are looking for more places to vent.

Maybe, just maybe, you are taking this stuff that you don’t even know that well all too personally. I’d either drop it, or learn the underlying material better than folks like me. Flailing about because everyone here finds your arguments to be poor ain’t doing you or your apologetic mission any favors.

You know full well that you weren’t just disagreeing with what you think are bad arguments. You went (starting in your second letter; the first was basically just a few questions) right to me being supposedly deliberately dishonest and an absolutely incompetent researcher.

You made a mountain out of a molehill with a completely minor, “footnote”-like citation I made of [19th century Methodist commentator Joseph] Benson. I explained it and you said in your second reply, “That looks dishonest.” Then you continued (and upped) the rank insults with your post today:

He told me it was a simple mistake, but if so then it shows he’s a poor researcher, searching for any tidbit that seems to favor his theories and blind to any contrary evidence. Sounds like an apologist to me.

Somehow you think that constructive dialogue can occur with an opinion that rock-bottom low, taken of the opponent. It’s not possible, and I have no interest in a mud pie fight.

You’ve engaged in relentless condescension and snobbery. You haven’t overthrown my view at all. All you’ve done is mock and ridicule it and shown your abominable attitude and pomposity. You made it clear more than once that you had absolutely no interest in a point-by-point dialogue (which I am always interested in, if someone wants to be serious), and ridiculed my analogical and “background” arguments as utterly irrelevant: only fit to be ignored. You’ve yet to even fully grasp my position. If you had, you wouldn’t show such a great interest in caricaturing it for the crowd here: knowing they will sop up whatever you say, and that I’ll never receive fair treatment here.

I am grateful to Jonathan, though, for allowing me to at least respond to some extent underneath your atrocious hit-piece and to present my side of it. There were at least a few good smaller discussions. People can think what they will of me. I’ve long since stopped caring about whether the sub-group of anti-theist atheists think I am “honest” or not. I know I am, so it’s of no relevance at all to me if some snob like you decides in one day that I am both utterly incompetent in my very field (Christian apologetics) and dishonest. It means less than nothing. I have defended myself, yes, as most people would. But I know the truth about myself.

Anyone who is fair-minded and attempts even rudimentary objectivity can look at what I’ve written and clarified here and make up their own minds.

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Early artistic depictions of the Nativity show the star as a comet, and it’s possible that the later depictions arose from misunderstanding when translating. I don’t know who came up with this theory, but it’s been proposed that the celestial phenomenon might have been Halley’s Comet. That would mean either that memories of the comet became attached to the Jesus story, or that he was some years older than claimed in the Gospels. None of that is meant to imply that the story is anything more than legend.

Which of course is one of the natural explanations. Jonathan and Aaron opt for the supernatural explanation and mock the alternatives. I don’t do that. I say that reasonable, able people hold both positions. I hold to the natural explanation and give many reasons for why I do.

We don’t even know if there was a star, and the word of whoever wrote that Gospel isn’t sufficient proof. Even if there were a star, and the purported event conformed to what we know of celestial mechanics, attributing the event to a sentient entity like a deity would make it a directed event rather than a natural phenomenon. A deity working through physical laws rather than in violation of them would still constitute another element in the causal chain.

Not necessarily. God in His providence could and would have (in this scenario) simply planned for the supernatural event (the virgin birth and incarnation of Jesus) to correspond with totally natural, not miraculous at all “sign events” (two manifestations of the star of Bethlehem), just as the crucifixion aligned with two natural events: an eclipse and an earthquake.

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Photo credit: OpenClipart-Vectors (1-31-17) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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2021-01-13T13:00:31-04:00

Last updated on: January 13, 2021 at 1:00 pm   By

I assert that the star of Bethlehem was (most plausibly) a conjunction when the wise men first saw it, and a bright Jupiter, when they saw it in Jerusalem and over Bethlehem: without ruling out the possibility that it may have been a supernatural manifestation, as I have made clear in my other recent papers on the topic.

I think the natural interpretation can be harmonized with a straightforward reading of Scripture (as well as astronomical data on conjunctions, provisionally accepting for other reasons, Herod’s death in 1 BC): understood as phenomenological language rather than hyper-literal, as atheists — often former fundamentalists themselves — so often casually assume must always or almost always be the case.

I would put it this way: if a natural explanation is sufficient to explain it, we need not automatically posit a miraculous occurrence. Miracles have always been very rare and the exception to the rule in the Bible and in subsequent Christian history. That being the case, I think a natural explanation is more likely and plausible, in light of what I know about the Bible and miracles.

We Christians believe that God in His providence is equally able to arrange things so that this notable astronomical event happened (from our perspective) to line up with the birth of Jesus, just as we believe an eclipse and an earthquake lined up with the crucifixion of Jesus (another analogy to back up what I’m saying). Both were confirming signs, and both quite natural events. Other things (e.g., the virgin birth / incarnation and resurrection) can only be supernatural events.

My approach in my previous paper was to make a case from “internal plausibility.” The idea was to show how the Bible presents plenty of straight astronomy without viewing the stars per se as supernatural. The Bible views them as part of the natural (and observable and patterned) creation of God.

That was the argument I made, with about two-thirds of the paper being the preliminary goal of showing how the Bible viewed astronomy and the natural world. Then I contended that a natural explanation of the star couldn’t be ruled out in light of these facts; and that it was, in fact, more plausible in my opinion, coupled with the fact that the Magi were astronomers as well.

When they saw the star “in the east” they weren’t thinking, it seems to me: “wow, look at that miraculous light in the sky!” They would much more likely have thought, I submit: “this [natural] star has significance with regard to a very significant king being born in Jerusalem or at least larger Judaea, to the west.”

So my analogical reasoning would be: if it was a natural phenomenon when it first guided them, then chances are it would be again when they arrived in Bethlehem, too. It had a symbolic significance that would be the case whether it was natural or supernatural. But I think they thought “natural” first because that was their methodology as astronomers and some sort of astrologers as well (Kepler and Galileo were still very much into astrology 1500 years later, as I have written about, whereas Augustine and Aquinas condemned it).

I’m not opposed (by some sort of predisposition) to a possible miraculous explanation at all. Thus, when I wrote recently about Joshua and the “sun standing still” my position was that it was supernatural (but in a way that didn’t interfere with the sun’s usual “behavior”: only in how the observers saw it for a time). I also noted a few natural theories that have been proposed, but I found them less probable. Or it could even have been a combination of the two.

Each case has to be argued on its own. I would never deny the miraculous nature of the parting of the Red Sea or Elijah being taken up to heaven, or Balaam and his talking donkey (one of my favorites) or any number of other stories in the Bible, if they were truly presented as miraculous. But I don’t see that the star of Bethlehem immediately requires a supernatural explanation rather than a natural one.

The fact that atheist polemicist against Christmas Jonathan Pearce takes a “the star must be / could only be supernatural” approach is what fascinated me and stimulated me to write my latest paper on the topic. I love the topic of plausibility and also love to use analogical argumentation. And I love the interaction between science and theology. I’ve never found them difficult to harmonize.

As I have argued, the language of the biblical text (Matthew 2:9) only specifies a general area, not a specific house. “House” appears in the narrative only to show that the wise men went to a house (not a cave or manger, as it were). I’ve been to Bethlehem, too. The birthplace is definitely a cave. People then extrapolate and assume for some reason that it is talking about shining on the house. It’s understandable (I had the same opinion before I examined it more closely), but it’s clearly going beyond the textual evidence (i.e., it’s eisegesis).

It’s been noted that the natural explanation was of recent vintage. I have no problem granting that, but it’s of little concern to me. As science has progressed, several aspects of Bible interpretation have progressed along with it, in agreement. Thus, very few educated Christians believe in a 10,000-year-old earth (as even many scientists believed before Darwin) anymore. Why? Because science has shown that it’s far older. Few believe in a universal flood.

The text of the Bible — rightly understood — doesn’t require that, either, in the first place (it’s consistent with a local flood). But science has (in my mind) shown that a worldwide flood was impossible. Many Christians now are theistic evolutionists (as I am). This wouldn’t have been the case before Darwin, though both St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas expressed notions that were broadly similar to evolution.

Few — because of science — think that the sun literally stood still for Joshua. That includes myself. I believe it was some sort of divinely guided optical illusion, just as I believe that was the case in the miracle of the sun in Fatima, Portugal in 1917. Almost all Christians aren’t geocentrists, anymore, either. Nor are we heliocentrists, because the sun is no more the center of the universe than is the earth. Galileo and Kepler got that wrong.

Funny, then, that all we ever hear about was that the Church got it wrong. Bellarmine’s understanding of the nature of a scientific hypothesis was actually closer to ours today than Galileo’s was. It wasn’t a matter of infallible teaching, so this error has no effect on Catholic ecclesiology and dogmatic coherence.

In other words, as science progresses, and Christians by and large accept its advances like everyone else, our exegesis changes as well. It’s not that the Bible was wrong in any of these cases, but that our understanding of it was aided by the further knowledge and input of science. Therefore, we would fully expect to see more naturalistic explanations of texts that aren’t immediately or exclusively explainable as miraculous.

Of course, sometimes science catches up to Scripture, too. We held to a beginning of the universe out of nothing all along. Creatio ex nihilo. Then science got up to speed in the 20th century and agreed with us. Better late than never. The Church taught that God was outside of time. I had a Christian evangelical friend who thought this was impossible because of Newtonian physics.

Then Einstein came around and taught everyone that time isn’t absolute (neither was Newton always right). Christians already knew that long since: at least in God’s case. The Bible knew about laws of hygiene during the time of Moses. That could have prevented many epidemics, had it been applied. Science caught up to that knowledge over 3000 years later, in the 19th century.

Again (to reiterate): I have no big beef with the supernaturalist view. I have noted repeatedly that many good Christian commentators have held it and that I respect them. Mine is only an opinion. I’ve claimed no more for it than that. My position is that equally capable, honest commentators hold both positions. And the Christian commentators themselves repeatedly note this, whatever position they come down on.

I am not claiming to be any sort of expert on the star of Bethlehem. I just started writing about it last month. It’s simply one aspect out of hundreds in my apologetics effort, and I felt motivated to address it. I’ve enjoyed it, and it’s fun. I’ve learned a lot. But I don’t claim to be the last word on the topic. Anyone can “take or leave” my position as they wish. I’m just enjoying myself in analyzing this topic and perhaps, maybe helping a few others a bit in thinking about it, too, and in marveling over how God exhibits His wonders and guides His people.

Related Reading

Star of Bethlehem, Astronomy, Wise Men, & Josephus (Amazing Astronomically Verified Data in Relation to the Journey of the Wise Men  & Jesus’ Birth & Infancy) [12-14-20]

Timeline: Star of Bethlehem, Herod’s Death, & Jesus’ Birth (Chronology of Harmonious Data from History, Archaeology, the Bible, and Astronomy) [12-15-20]

Star of Bethlehem: Refuting Silly Atheist Objections [12-26-20]

Star of Bethlehem: More Silly Atheist “Objections” [12-29-20]

Pearce’s Potshots #12: Supernatural Star of Bethlehem? (Biblical View of Astronomy, Laws of Nature, and the Natural World) [1-11-21]

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Photo credit: astrometeo (2-20-15) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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2021-01-09T14:12:08-04:00

Last updated on: January 9, 2021 at 2:12 pm   By

Featuring Confirmatory Historical Tidbits About the Magi and Herod the Great

Atheist anti-theist Jonathan M. S. Pearce’s “About” page states: “Pearce is a philosopher, author, blogger, public speaker and teacher from Hampshire in the UK. He specialises in philosophy of religion, but likes to turn his hand to science, psychology, politics and anything involved in investigating reality.” His words will be in blue.

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I am replying to Jonathan’s article, “Mental Contortions Required of Christians to Believe the Nativity Accounts” (12-23-19). Although he likely has made each argument in his book on the Nativity and elsewhere, nevertheless, this particular article is in the form of a “gish gallop”: an unsavory argumentative technique or strategy often decried by atheists. Wikipedia explains:

The Gish gallop is a term for an eristic technique in which a debater attempts to overwhelm an opponent by excessive number of arguments, without regard for the accuracy or strength of those arguments. The term was coined by Eugenie Scott; . . . It is similar to a methodology used in formal debate called spreading. . . .

During a Gish gallop, a debater confronts an opponent with a rapid series of many specious arguments, half-truths, and misrepresentations in a short space of time, which makes it impossible for the opponent to refute all of them within the format of a formal debate. In practice, each point raised by the “Gish galloper” takes considerably more time to refute or fact-check than it did to state in the first place.

This is not a formal debate, with timing and structure, etc., so I can take all the time I like to refute each point, but the technique itself remains dubious. It was disparaged on Jonathan’s blog by fellow blogger there, Aaron Adair (3-8-13):

. . . putting out a large number of statements in quick succession that his opponent almost certainly could not refute in the time allotted. This has become known as the Gish Gallop, and it has been noted as a technique used by others in a debate: throw out many arguments, your opponents will be able to deal with only so many and not adequately, and you can claim one of your un-refuted arguments stands and that means you are right.

So — again — this is not a formal debate, and Jonathan has written about this stuff elsewhere and can theoretically defend any of those arguments against criticism (I’m not denying that he has done so or that he would be willing to do so). But this paper of his uses the technique. If a Christian did this in any major atheist forum we would be laughed to scorn and mocked (we always are anyway in those places).

I should note, however, that the delightful, informative RationalWiki page, “Gish Gallop” by no means confines the tactic to oral, formal debate. It refers to readers and written exchanges several times, and even includes an entire section called “in written debate”.

Jonathan throws out no less than 28 objections to the biblical Nativity narratives in Matthew and Luke: most only one-sentence long. I’ll play along and make (mostly) short replies (as my time is not unlimited) or provide a relevant link: as I have written quite a bit about Christmas controversies with atheists as well.

As I write, there are still three of my recent papers in reply to Jonathan that he has chosen thus far not to reply to:

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Jesus the “Nazarene” Redux (vs. Jonathan M. S. Pearce) [12-19-20]

I think there are several older critiques of mine from 2017 that he has not replied to, either. I have offered ten critiques of his material altogether, not including this one. I hope he has not now decided to take the “flee for the hills” / “hear no evil” approach of his fellow anti-theist atheists Dr. David Madison (whom I’ve refuted 44 times with no reply), Bob Seidensticker (69 times without any peep back), and John Loftus (10 critiques of his “magnum opus” book, which he has utterly ignored). If he decides to go this route, I will continue critiquing his material, as I desire. No skin off my back. His choice . . .

Suffice to say that, in order for the Christian to harmoniously believe the Nativity accounts, they have to jump through some seriously demanding hoops. In my humble opinion, there is no satisfactory way that they can coherently harmonise these contradictory accounts found in only two of the Gospels.
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The situation is this. I maintain that, to hold to the notion that the accounts are historical, one has to mentally gerrymander to the extreme. . . . 

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In my book,The Nativity: A Critical Examination, I think I give ample evidence that allows one to conclude that the historicity of the nativity accounts is sorely and surely challenged. All of the aspects and claims, that is. There are problems, for sure, if one accepts that some claims are false but others are true. But the simple fact of the matter is that all of the claims are highly questionable.

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Here are the hoops that a Christian must jump through. They are flaming hoops, and the Christian can do nothing to avoid being burnt, it seems.

[in my replies below, I have added numbers to his gish gallop claims. His original words didn’t have the numbers; it had bullet points]

In order for the Christian who believes that both accounts are factually true to uphold that faithful decree, the following steps must take place. The believer must:

1) Special plead that the virgin birth motif is actually true for Christianity but is false for all other religions and myths that claim similarly.

This is true, but it is neither special pleading nor, I contend, controversial at all. Exclusive claims that logically rule out other competing contradictory claims are made in all belief-systems. It’s foolish and irrelevant to single out Christianity for doing this, as if it is objectionable in and of itself. For example, the current consensus in scientific cosmology / astronomy is that the universe had a beginning and that it is not eternal or without a beginning. There were scientists who resisted this for decades (even Einstein did for a time), until the Big Bang Theory became consensus in the 1960s (or 70s at the latest).

There are atheists who resist it today, and argue for a cyclical universe or “multiverse” (minus any compelling evidence). And there are various religious beliefs as to how the universe began. Of course, the Christian view is completely harmonious with the Big Bang. The universe began out of nothing, or ex nihilo, as the old theological phrase had it. Current science and Christianity teach this (though we add God in there as the cause of the Big Bang and science precludes that in its current methodological naturalism). So much the worse for those who disagree (as far as the Big Bang and the beginning of the universe). They’re wrong.

2) Deny that “virgin” is a mistranslation.

It’s not. I have dealt with this issue twice: both in response to Jonathan. He hasn’t replied to the second paper yet:

Reply to Atheist Jonathan MS Pearce: “Mistranslation” of “Virgin”? (Isaiah 7:14) (with Glenn Miller) [7-26-17]

Dual Fulfillment of Prophecy & the Virgin Birth (vs. JMS Pearce) [12-18-20]

3) Give a plausible explanation of from whence the male genome of Jesus came from and how this allowed him to be “fully man”.

It was (obviously, in Christian belief) a miraculous intervention of God. It can’t be explained naturally, by the nature of the case. Now, of course, for an atheist who denies that both God and miracles exist, it’ll be implausible (what else is new?). But that doesn’t prove that it’s untrue. If one offers rational evidences for God’s existence and also of miracles, then it’s entirely possible and able to be believed in by rational thinkers, as an actual event, as God’s revelation claims.

4) Be able to render the two genealogies fully coherent without the explanation being contrived or ad hoc.

I did that, 3 1/2 years ago:

Reply to Atheist Jonathan MS Pearce: “Contradictory” Genealogies of Christ? [7-27-17]

Atheists are fond of saying that everything we offer by way of evidence is “ridiculous” (on a kind day), or “ad hoc” or “implausible” or “special pleading.” And they do because of what I mentioned above: they deny the necessary presuppositions of God’s existence and (flowing from that) therefore the possibility and/or factuality of miracles and the supernatural. Once having denied the possibility or actuality of those two things, then of course they will immediately dismiss all Christian explanations as ad hoc or “implausible” etc.

It’s a way of trying to look impressive without offering any further arguments. But they have to deny such things, according to their atheist dogmas that literally disallow them from believing in anything that is inconsistent with atheism, or even to entertain a theoretical possibility.

5) Believe that the genealogies are bona fide and not just tools to try to prove Jesus’ Davidic and Messianic prophecy-fulfilling heritage.

This cynical sentiment simply flows from atheist hostility and bigotry against the Bible, Bible-writers, and Christians. Christians aren’t obliged to factor that into any of our apologetics or beliefs. We take the Bible at face value, just as we would any other such literature, rather than starting out inveterately hostile to it. That’s not an objective, scholarly approach. Besides, the Bible has had a mountain of evidence from history and archaeology that shows again and again that it is trustworthy in the details that it provides; therefore, can be trusted as a source. Those sots of independent verifications bolster our faith that the Bible is God’s revelation to humankind.

6) Be able to explain the inconsistency of the two accounts in contradicting each other as to where Joseph lived before the birth (without the explanation being contrived or ad hoc).

See:

Reply to Atheist Jonathan MS Pearce: Bethlehem & Nazareth “Contradictions” (Including Extensive Exegetical Analysis of Micah 5:2) [7-28-17]

7) Believe that a client kingdom under Herod could and would order a census under Roman diktat. This would be the only time in history this would have happened.

8) Find it plausible that people would return, and find precedent for other occurrences of people returning, to their ancestral homes for a census (at an arbitrary number of generations before: 41).

9) Give a probable explanation as to how a Galilean man was needed at a census in another judicial area.

10) Give a plausible reason as to why Mary was required at the census (by the censors or by Joseph).

11) Give a plausible explanation as to why Mary would make that 80 mile journey on donkey or on foot whilst heavily pregnant, and why Joseph would be happy to let her do that.

See:

The Census, Jesus’ Birth in Bethlehem, & History [2-3-11]

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Reply to Atheist Jonathan MS Pearce: Herod’s Death & Alleged “Contradictions” (with Jimmy Akin) [7-25-17]

12) Believe that Joseph could afford to take anywhere from a month to two years off work.

This is a foolish query. If necessary, he could save up for “off” months just as virtually all farmers and teachers do. Is that so inconceivable? Or, as a carpenter and likely stone mason as well, he had a skill that was “portable”: so that he could pick up odd jobs while traveling. This is the kind of stuff which vanishes as a supposed “difficulty” with just a moment or two of unbiased, objective thought.

13) Believe that, despite archaeological evidence, Nazareth existed as a proper settlement at the time of Jesus’ birth.

I don’t know what “archaeological evidence” Jonathan is referring to, but there is more than enough to establish the existence of Nazareth as a town during the time of Jesus’ birth and infancy. I already recounted it in a recent reply to Jonathan:

[T]he archaeological investigation revealed that in Nazareth itself, in the middle of the first century AD, anti-Roman rebels created a sizeable network of underground hiding places and tunnels underneath the town – big enough to shelter at least 100 people. . . .

The new archaeological investigation – the largest ever carried out into Roman period Nazareth – has revealed that Jesus’s hometown is likely to have been considerably bigger than previously thought. It probably had a population of up to 1,000 (rather than just being a small-to-medium sized village of 100-500, as previously thought).

“Our new investigation has transformed archaeological knowledge of Roman Nazareth,” said Dr Dark, who has just published the results of his research in a new book Roman-Period and Byzantine Nazareth and its Hinterland. . . .

The newly emerging picture of Roman-period Nazareth as a place of substantial religiosity does, however, resonate not only with the emergence of its most famous son, Jesus, but also with the fact that, in the mid-first or second century, it was chosen as the official residence of one of the high priests of the by-then-destroyed Temple in Jerusalem, when all 24 of those Jewish religious leaders were driven into exile in Galilee. (“New archaeological evidence from Nazareth reveals religious and political environment in era of Jesus”, David Keys, Independent, 4-17-20)

See also: “Did First-Century Nazareth Exist?” (Bryan Windle, Bible Archaeology Report, 8-9-18; cf. several related articles from a Google search). Did it exist before Jesus’ time? It looks like it did:

The Franciscan priest Bellarmino Bagatti, “Director of Christian Archaeology”, carried out extensive excavation of this “Venerated Area” from 1955 to 1965. Fr. Bagatti uncovered pottery dating from the Middle Bronze Age (2200 to 1500 BC) and ceramics, silos and grinding mills from the Iron Age (1500 to 586 BC) which indicated substantial settlement in the Nazareth basin at that time. (Wikipedia, “Nazareth”)

That’s science. Jonathan has to grapple with the actual findings and not just sit back and deny that there are any such. As it is, that was from one of my reply-papers that he has not found time to reply to these past 19 days (while replying to many others). Maybe he will in due course, since it was during the holidays.

14) Believe that the prophecies referred to Nazareth and not something else.

They do, but they were not from the Old Testament. See:

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15) Believe that the magi were not simply a theological tool derived from the Book of Daniel.

This is a variation of the undue cynicism which I skewered in my reply to #5 above. As such, it can be dismissed as a non sequitur. That said (in principled protest), the factuality of these accounts is completely plausible based on what we know from secular historiography: that there was a group called the Magi, who were were originally a Median (northwest Persian) tribe (Herodotus [Hist.] i.101). They performed priestly functions, perhaps due to Zoroaster possibly having belonged to the tribe (or belief that he did), and studied astronomy and astrology: in part likely learned from Babylon.

Historians note that in Yemen, for example, there were kings who adhered to Judaism from about 120 B.C. to the sixth century A.D. Possibly, then, the wise men were Jewish or at least were strongly influenced by Jews.

If Jonathan or those who think like he does don’t want to take my word for it, then perhaps they will be persuaded by the Encyclopaedia Britannica:

Magus, plural Magi, member of an ancient Persian clan specializing in cultic activities. The name is the Latinized form of magoi (e.g., in Herodotus 1:101), the ancient Greek transliteration of the Iranian original. From it the word magic is derived.

It is disputed whether the magi were from the beginning followers of Zoroaster and his first propagandists. They do not appear as such in the trilingual inscription of Bīsitūn, in which Darius the Great describes his speedy and final triumph over the magi who had revolted against his rule (522 BC). Rather it appears that they constituted a priesthood serving several religions. The magi were a priestly caste during the Seleucid [312-63 BC], Parthian [247 BC-224 AD], and Sāsānian [224-651 AD] periods; later parts of the Avesta, such as the ritualistic sections of the Vidēvdāt (Vendidad), probably derive from them. From the 1st century AD onward the word in its Syriac form (magusai) was applied to magicians and soothsayers, chiefly from Babylonia, with a reputation for the most varied forms of wisdom. As long as the Persian empire lasted there was always a distinction between the Persian magi, who were credited with profound and extraordinary religious knowledge, and the Babylonian magi, who were often considered to be outright imposters. (“Magus: Persian priesthood”)

A visit by such men to the west, based on astrological-type beliefs and star-gazing, using the route through the Fertile Crescent around the Arabian and Syrian deserts that has been taken for many centuries by the Royal Road and the King’s Highway and the Silk Road (as I have recently written about, not in reply to Jonathan) is completely plausible. There is no good reason to doubt the biblical account. Nothing in it (rightly understood in light of the many biblical genres) rings immediately untrue or questionable. Jonathan mentions the book of Daniel. Yeah: that’s accurate, too, as we know that the Magi were in Babylonia at that time as well, as the cited encyclopedia entry above alludes to.

16) Believe that Herod (and his scribes and priests) was not acting entirely out of character and implausibly in not knowing the prophecies predicting Jesus, and not accompanying the magi three hours down the road.

The second thing we can only speculate about, but if the Bible shows itself trustworthy again and again in a host of ways: confirmed by secular archaeology and historiography, then we can trust it regarding such an obscure item that it casually refers to. As to the first question: is it impossible that Herod might not know the prophecy of Micah 5:2? Not at all. He was a very secularized Jew, as a Jewish scholarly article noted:

In his recent book The Herodian Dynasty, Nikos Kokkinos portrayed Herod as  Hellenized Phoenician whose Jewishness was superficial, resulting from the conversion of Idumaea by John Hyrcanus . . . Herod’s departure form the Jewish ethos is manifested by his own deeds contrary to Jewish laws and customs as well as his strong cultural inclination toward Rome. . . .

This impression is nurtured mainly by Josephus’s accounts. (“Herod’s Jewish Ideology Facing Romanization: On Intermarriage, Ritual Baths, and Speeches”, Eyal Regev, The Jewish Quarterly Review, Vol. 100, No. 2, Spring 2010)

That doesn’t strike me (to put it mildly) as the type of Jew who would be all that familiar with a messianic prophecy like Micah 5:2. Maybe he was. But if so, this has to be shown by some convincing argument. The above — as far as it goes (I couldn’t access the entire article) — certainly doesn’t suggest a high likelihood that he would have been. Matthew 2:4 (RSV) states: “assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born.”
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In light of the above information, I don’t find it implausible at all that he didn’t know this. And not knowing it, he did the logical thing a secular Jew would do: ask the religious Jews (priests) in his court circle about it (just as irreligious Jews today would ask a rabbi about some point of Judaism). It’s completely plausible. Yet Jonathan assumes it isn’t. I wonder why? Maybe because he “has to” be skeptical about everything in Scripture, even when there is no clear reason to be?
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17) Believe that the magi weren’t also merely a mechanism to supply Herod with an opportunity to get involved in the story and thus fulfil even more prophecies.
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18) Believe that the magi were also not a reinterpretation of the Balaam narrative from the Old Testament, despite there being clear evidence to the contrary.
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These two represent more of the merely assumed bald speculation and silly undue cynicism against the biblical text (see my answers to #5 and #15 above). It deserves no more serious consideration. I refuse to play these games with atheists. The burden of proof for such hyper-skeptical / hostile claims is on them, not us.
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19) Believe that a star could lead some magi from the East to Jerusalem and then to Bethlehem where it rested over an individual house and not be noted by anyone else in the world.

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I delved into all this in great detail in the last three weeks:

Star of Bethlehem, Astronomy, Wise Men, & Josephus (Amazing Astronomically Verified Data in Relation to the Journey of the Wise Men  & Jesus’ Birth & Infancy) [12-14-20]

Timeline: Star of Bethlehem, Herod’s Death, & Jesus’ Birth (Chronology of Harmonious Data from History, Archaeology, the Bible, and Astronomy) [12-15-20]

Star of Bethlehem: Refuting Silly Atheist Objections [12-26-20]

Route Taken by the Magi: Educated Guess [12-28-20]

Star of Bethlehem: More Silly Atheist “Objections” [12-29-20]

How Do We Understand the Star of Bethlehem Coming to “Rest Over the Place Where the Child Was”? [Facebook, 12-29-20]

20) Believe that the shepherds were not merely midrashic and theological tools used by Luke.

Yet more higher critical hogwash. See my replies to #5, #15, and #18 above. There is no solid reason to doubt this story, either. I recently wrote about one related question: the time of the year with regard to shepherding sheep near Bethlehem:

Jesus’ December Birth & Grazing Sheep in Bethlehem (Is a December 25th Birthdate of Jesus Impossible or Unlikely Because Sheep Can’t Take the Cold?) [12-26-20]

21) Believe that there is (and provide it) a reasonable explanation as to why each Gospel provides different first witnesses (shepherds and magi) without any mention of the other witnesses.

Because I know of no such literary requirement (let alone logical or moral obligation) for each narrator of roughly the same story to include every and all details that the other narrators may have included. The fact that they emphasize different things and omit details that the others include is strong confirmation of authenticity from all four sources.

But there is a factual error here, too: Jesus was a toddler when the wise men visited (based on the Greek word used to describe Him). This didn’t occur at the same time as the birth and the visit of the shepherds. This is what Christians believe, based on the biblical text (which is one reason why our feast of epiphany is on a different day from Christmas: usually on or around January 6th).

Therefore, the wise men are not possible “first witnesses” and there is no conflict in the first place. The text doesn’t claim they were the first to visit Jesus. It’s simply another manufactured pseudo-“contradiction” from our friends, the atheists, who seem to make it their life’s goal to violate (or not comprehend?) elementary-level logic as often as they can.

22) Believe that, despite an absence of evidence and the realisation that it is clearly a remodelling of an Old Testament narrative, the Massacre of the Innocents actually happened.

See my replies to #5, #15, #18, and #20 above.

23) Believe that Herod would care enough about his rule long after his death to chase after a baby and murder many other innocent babies, a notion that runs contrary to evidence.

It’s perfectly in character for a tyrant who murdered two possible royal rivals (see the citation below). Herod was no choirboy. According to one secular source:

The first 12 years of Herod’s reign (37-25 BCE) saw the consolidation of his power. He built fortifications in Jerusalem, Samaria and at Masada, silenced all opposition to his rule and eliminated his Hasmonean rivals, Aristobulus and Hyrcanus II, the brother and the grandfather of his second wife, Mariamme. The former drowned in an arranged swimming pool accident and the latter was strangled.
Mariamme met a bitter end as well, and was executed (a la Anne Boleyn, for “adultery”) in 29 BC. So could Herod conceivably kill a bunch of young infants, out of jealousy over a possible kingly rival? Yes; it’s totally in character. No problem!
The above information was drawn from the record of two prominent historians:
Our chief informant is the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (37-c.100CE), who devoted most of Book I of his Jewish War and Books XIV to XVII of Jewish Antiquities to the life and times of Herod. Josephus uses as his main source the universal history of Nicolaus of Damascus, the well-informed teacher, adviser and ambassador of Herod.

24) Believe that God would allow other innocent babies to die as a result of the birth of Jesus.

This is not the place to enter into a full-fledged Christian explanation of the problem of evil. God grants free will. Otherwise we would be robots (and then this dialogue wouldn’t exist, because in that scenario God simply wouldn’t allow dumbfounded, groundless atheist opinions, and Jonathan would be a Christian because God willed and predestined it to be so, wholly apart from Jonathan’s free will which, of course, wouldn’t exist).

Most evil that human beings commit can at least be partially stopped by other human beings. But we refuse to do so before it’s too late.  One man, Winston Churchill, warned for years in the 1930s about the German build-up of military might. No one listened to him. If they had, World War II (at least in Europe) could very well have been prevented.
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Instead, it happened out of human irresponsibility and a head-in-the-sand mentality (President Kennedy wrote about this in his book, Why England Slept). And then after it did, one of the most popular arguments from atheists was: “why did God allow the Holocaust?” He allowed it, because He doesn’t control us like puppets, but it’s not His fault. It’s the fault of human beings who could have prevented it, but were too naive and stupid and negligent to do so. And so, when human beings fail miserably, what do they do? Blame other human beings or blame God . . . That’s the fool’s way out every time.

25) Believe that the Flight to and from Egypt was not just a remodelling of an Old Testament narrative in order to give Jesus theological gravitas.

See my replies to #5, #15, #18, #20, and #22 above.
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26) Give a plausible explanation as to why the two accounts contradict each other so obviously as to where Jesus and family went after his birth.

Did that:

The Census, Jesus’ Birth in Bethlehem, & History [2-3-11]

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27) Explain the disappearance of the shepherds and magi, who had seen the most incredible sights of their lives, and why they are never heard from again despite being the perfect spokespeople for this newfound religion.
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Why should they necessarily be heard from again? On what grounds? The Magi in particular simply returned to their distant home shortly afterwards (Mt 12:12). What were they supposed to do? Make a phone call? Have a Zoom conference to communicate their thoughts on the whole thing? It’s simply a trumped-up difficulty that is none at all. And it deserves no more consideration than to state its essential silliness (with some flabbergasted humor).

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28) Provide a plausible explanation as to why Jesus’ own family did not think he was the Messiah, given the events of the nativity accounts.

There is no reason to believe that Mary and Joseph didn’t know this all along. As for His extended family, see:

Jesus’ “Brothers” Were “Unbelievers”? (Jason also claims that “Mary believed in Jesus,” but wavered, and had a “sort of inconsistent faith”) (vs. Jason Engwer) [5-27-20]

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Once the believer in the accuracy of these accounts can do all of the above, in a plausible and probable manner, then they can rationally hold that belief.

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I’ve done so, and so I can rationally hold that belief (i.e., by the criterion of Jonathan’s internally contradictory and incoherent standards).

I would contest that it is rationally possible to ever hold such a belief.

I would contend that my (and many others’) replies to his objections render them null and void and of no impact or import. If Jonathan disagrees, then let him counter-reply.

. . . it has been shown that every single claim can be soundly doubted under critical examination . . .

Hogwash!

[W]e have no real evidence for the claims that Jesus is the Messiah and is derived from Messianic and Davidic heritage.
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The Messiah: Jewish / Old Testament Conceptions [1982; revised somewhat on 2-19-00]
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Isaiah 53: Jewish-Christian Dialogue: Is the “Servant” the Messiah (Jesus) or Collective Israel? (vs. Ari G. [Orthodox] ) [9-14-01, with incorporation of much research from 1982]
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Photo credit: cocoparisienne (9-15-16) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]
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2020-12-30T13:54:17-04:00

Last updated on: December 30, 2020 at 1:54 pm   By

Dr. David Madison is an atheist who was a Methodist minister for nine years: with a Ph.D. in Biblical Studies from Boston University.  I have replied to his videos or articles 43 times as of this writing. Thus far, I haven’t heard one peep back from him  (from 8-1-19 to 12-29-20). This certainly doesn’t suggest to me that he is very confident in his opinions. All I’ve seen is expressions of contempt from Dr. Madison and from his buddy, the atheist author, polemicist, and extraordinarily volatile John Loftus, who runs the ultra-insulting Debunking Christianity blog. Dr. Madison made his cramped, insulated mentality clear in a comment from 9-6-19:

[T]he burden of the apologist has become heavy indeed, and some don’t handle the anguish well. They vent and rage at critics, like toddlers throwing tantrums when a threadbare security blanket gets tossed out. We can smell their panic. Engaging with the ranters serves no purpose—any more than it does to engage with Flat-Earthers, Chemtrail conspiracy theorists, and those who argue that the moon landings were faked. . . . I prefer to engage with NON-obsessive-compulsive-hysterical Christians, those who have spotted rubbish in the Bible, and might already have one foot out the door.

John “you are an idiot!” Loftus even went to the length of changing his blog’s rules of engagement, so that he and Dr. Madison could avoid replying to yours truly, or even see notices of my replies (er, sorry, rants, rather). Dr. Madison’s words will be in blue.

Presently, I am replying to his article, “Bible Blunders & Bad Theology, Part 4: The perils of comparing the gospels” (10-16-20).

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The Gish gallop is a term for an eristic technique in which a debater attempts to overwhelm an opponent by excessive number of arguments, without regard for the accuracy or strength of those arguments. The term was coined by Eugenie Scott; . . . It is similar to a methodology used in formal debate called spreading. During a Gish gallop, a debater confronts an opponent with a rapid series of many specious arguments, half-truths, and misrepresentations in a short space of time, which makes it impossible for the opponent to refute all of them within the format of a formal debate. In practice, each point raised by the “Gish galloper” takes considerably more time to refute or fact-check than it did to state in the first place. The technique wastes an opponent’s time and may cast doubt on the opponent’s debating ability for an audience unfamiliar with the technique, especially if no independent fact-checking is involved or if the audience has limited knowledge of the topics. (Wikipedia, “Gish gallop”)

In Mark’s gospel, Jesus comes out of nowhere to be baptized in the Jordan River, . . . 

Mark simply chose to start the story from the vantage-point of the average Jew at that time, observing that this man named Jesus had appeared on the scene after being unknown. Dr. Madison wants to make an issue of this: as if it is a supposed contradiction with other Gospels. It’s not. The four evangelists offer stories and accounts of the same overall events from different perspectives: emphasizing selected things as they choose and please.

Many atheists seem to possess this goofy, silly notion that all four of them must be exactly the same, or else (if not!) they are allegedly endlessly “contradictory.” Well, that’s a dumb and groundless presupposition in the first place, and in fact the Gospels do not contradict, as I have demonstrated innumerable times, as have many other Christian apologists and theologians. And in fact, almost all of the alleged “contradictions” brought up by anti-theist atheist polemicists are simply not contradictions, from the criteria of logic itself.

Here Jesus is portrayed as an apocalyptic prophet . . .

Yes; as He is in all four Gospels. But there are, as I said, different emphases, so this is a relatively minor point.

he promises those at his trial that they will see him coming on the clouds of heaven.

Yep, just as He does in Matthew 24:30 and 26:64 and, in effect, Luke 22:69, where the clause, “Son of man shall be seated at the right hand of the power of God” (RSV) is obviously the same reference as Mt 26:64: “Son of man seated at the right hand of Power”: just without the added mention of the “clouds.” All three passages clearly allude to Daniel 9:12-14: one of the most famous messianic passages. There is no rule or requirement that every Gospel writer must cite complete prophecies and can never cite part of them.

And (need I mention it?), such selective citation does not mean there is logical contradiction, merely as a result of differential citation. It’s like people citing different portions of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. They don’t contradict. Anyone even slightly familiar with American history knows what’s being cited. That’s how it was with messianic prophecies.  Jesus in the Gospel of John expresses the same notion (both the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and His Second Coming) but in a different, more personal way (expressed to His twelve disciples only, at the Last Supper): 

John 16:5, 10  But now I am going to him who sent me . . . [10] . . . I go to the Father . . . [i.e., “at the right hand of the power of God”] (cf. Jn 7:33; 8:21; 14:2-4, 12, 28; 16:7, 17; 17:11, 13)

John 14:18, 28 I will not leave you desolate; I will come to you. . . . [28]. . . I will come to you . . . 

Mark also portrays Jesus as an exorcist.

So do the other two Synoptic Gospels. Mark mentions (in RSV) “demon[s]” or “demoniac” etc. 17 times, but Matthew mentions these words 19 times, and Luke, 24 times.  But there is also the description of “unclean spirit”: which Mark references 13 times, Luke 5 times, and Matthew twice. Luke also uses “evil spirit” twice (and four more times in Acts 19, but we won’t count those). So the grand total, including all three terms are:

Luke: 31

Mark: 30

Matthew: 21

Thus, we can say that Mark emphasizes this element a bit more — being much shorter than Luke (which is fine and dandy), but it’s certainly no “contradiction” compared to Matthew and Luke.

Moreover, he puts far less emphasis on Jesus’ teaching role; Mark says that people were astounded by his message, but little of the content is provided.

This is untrue, and it’s amazing that Dr. Madison could claim that it is. We can observe the term “astounded” used once in Mark (6:51), “astonished” (five times), and “amazed” (eight  times). In all but three of the 14 cases, or 79% of the time in Mark, preceding context makes it clear what they were amazed / astonished / astounded at. Jesus taught them either by word or by deed (miracles send quite a “message” too!):

Mark 1:22: unspecified

Mark 1:27: Jesus had cast out a demon (1:23-26)

Mark 2:12: Jesus had forgiven the sins of a paralytic and healed him (2:3-11)

Mark 6:2: unspecified

Mark 6:51: Jesus has just walked on the water and stilled the wind (6:48-51)

Mark 7:37: Jesus had just healed a deaf man with a speech impediment (7:32-36)

Mark 9:15: unspecified

Mark 10:24: Jesus had just taught about the relation of riches to serving God, in his encounter with the rich young ruler (10:17-23)

Mark 10:26: this is the same reaction as in 10:24, for the same reason. He had added: “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” (10:24-25)

Mark 10:32: Jesus had said to them specifically that they would “receive a hundredfold . . . and in the age to come eternal life” as a reward for their great sacrifices in being His disciples (10:27-31)

Mark 11:18: Jesus had just cleared the temple of the moneychangers and explained that the temple was for “prayer” rather than “robbers” (11:15-17)

Mark 12:17: Jesus had just taught about paying taxes and “rendering unto Caesar” (12:13-17)

Mark 16:5: the dead Jesus was no longer in His tomb (16:5), then the angels says, “do not be amazed” (16:6) 

How odd, then, that Dr. Madison thinks “little of the content is provided.” Granted, it’s another fairly minor point, but it does illustrate Dr. Madison’s relentless quest to find supposed “contradictions” where there are none, and how he is consistently wrong, even on smaller issues. No one (except an apologist like myself) would have neither time nor desire to “check” him on this matter (which is precisely the desired result of the unsavory Gish gallop method of “argumentation”). But this is why I do what I do. I have both time and desire to deal with all of these things, so that others, reading, can get on with far more important matters, and not let Dr. Madison’s nonsense be a stumbling-block to them.

By some estimates, its story of Jesus could have taken place in just two or three weeks . . . 

By comparing it to the other Gospels, it becomes clear that this isn’t the case.

Matthew, indeed, proved to be a master of invention. Other cults felt that virgin-birth was an appropriate credential for their sons of god, so Matthew decided to add that to Jesus; he goofed when he used a mistranslation of Isaiah 7:14 to slip virgin birth into his story.

I dealt with and disposed of this objection:

Reply to Atheist Jonathan MS Pearce: “Mistranslation” of “Virgin”? (Isaiah 7:14) (with Glenn Miller) [7-26-17]

Dual Fulfillment of Prophecy & the Virgin Birth (vs. JMS Pearce) [12-18-20]

But Matthew added troubling Jesus-script (10: 37), unknown to Mark; how does this rank on any scale of moral teaching? “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” We can infer from this that, by Matthew’s time, cult fanaticism was trending in the Jesus sect. As we shall see, Luke made this text worse. . . .  Moreover, he [Luke] felt that Matthew 10:37, was too mild, i.e., “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me…” He changed Jesus’ words to: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” (14:26) You have to hate your own life. 

This is classic cult fanaticism; today we recommend deprogramming for people who get suckered in.  The devout are rightly shocked by Luke 14:26 and assume that surely it’s a misquote. But this verse provides insight into Luke’s agenda: he didn’t want people in the Jesus cult who had divided loyalties. Of course, this text has been a challenge to professional defenders of the faith: How to tone it down? The editors of the English Standard Version use the heading, “The Cost of Discipleship,” for this section, instead of, say, “Jesus the Cult Fanatic.” Most decent Christians would reject hatred of family as a “cost” of discipleship. 

Dealt with already:

Dr. David Madison vs. Jesus #1: Hating One’s Family? [8-1-19]

Madison vs. Jesus #5: Cultlike Forsaking of Family? [8-5-19]

When Luke got to work on his gospel, he knew that Matthew had to be corrected as much as Mark did. 

Right. Now, I dare to ask (sorry for being rational and logical): how could anyone possibly “know” such a thing, unless Luke expressly stated it? This is, of course, the fallacy of the argument from silence.

What a dumb idea—he must have thought—having Mary and Joseph take Jesus to Egypt, so he deleted that from his birth narrative.

See my previous paragraph. This is the “dumb idea” here: not what the Bible describes about Jesus’ infancy.

But he had the even dumber idea of an empire-wide census that required people to travel to the home of their ancestors to sign up. No other historian of the time mentions any such thing; major chaos would have resulted from such a decree. 

Dealt with here:

The Census, Jesus’ Birth in Bethlehem, & History: Reply to Atheist John W. Loftus’ Irrational Criticisms of the Biblical Accounts [2-3-11]

Reply to Atheist Jonathan MS Pearce: Herod’s Death & Alleged “Contradictions” (with Jimmy Akin) [7-25-17]

Luke did include the Sermon on the Mount, but he shortened it, broke it up, altered the wording—and said it took place on a plain.

Dealt with:

Sermon on the Mount: Striking Topographical Facts (9-16-15)

His Jesus had been present at Creation, so he [John] left out the virgin birth; . . . 

This is beyond idiotic. All four Gospels teach the divinity / Godhood of Jesus (the incarnation). They all teach that He is eternal, and the Creator. The virgin birth doesn’t contradict the deity of Jesus. It’s simply the way that God became man. See:

Jesus is God: Hundreds of Biblical Proofs (RSV edition) [1982; rev. 2012]

Holy Trinity: Hundreds of Biblical Proofs (RSV edition) [1982; rev. 2012]

Deity of Jesus: Called Lord/Kurios & God/Theos [10-24-11]

Seidensticker Folly #55: Godhood of Jesus in the Synoptics [9-12-20]

Mark had claimed that Jesus taught only in parables (4:34), but John has no parables.

But Jesus does talk (as recorded in the Gospel of John) in many metaphorical or proverbial (non-literal) ways that bear resemblance to the synoptic parables. For example:

John 2:19-21 (RSV) Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” [20] The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” [21] But he spoke of the temple of his body.

John 3:8 The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or whither it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit.

John 4:13-14 Jesus said to her, “Every one who drinks of this water will thirst again, [14] but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst; the water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

John 6:35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst.

John 10:11 I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. (see also 10:1-10, 12-18, including Jesus calling Himself “the door” three times)

John 11:12-14 But if any one walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.” [11] Thus he spoke, and then he said to them, “Our friend Laz’arus has fallen asleep, but I go to awake him out of sleep.” [12] The disciples said to him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.” [13] Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant taking rest in sleep. [14] Then Jesus told them plainly, “Laz’arus is dead;”

But before we even get to that, one must properly understand Mark 4:34: “he did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to his own disciples he explained everything.” This does not teach “that Jesus [all the time] taught only in parables.” And it doesn’t because we have to understand whether the statement was referring only to the immediate context or to all of Jesus’ teachings whatever. It’s patently obvious by reading the Gospels, that Jesus did not always teach in parables. So that isn’t even in question. Only a totally biased skeptic and apostate like Dr. Madison could even think that it is. He must twist his mind into a pretzel to believe such a ridiculous thing.

Secondly, even when Jesus used parables a lot, it doesn’t follow that He could never use other teaching methods (it’s not a mutually exclusive situation). Mark 4:34 could simply mean, “Jesus often included a parable when He taught.” The Bible uses a lot of hyperbole as well. Even in this passage, it says, “privately to his own disciples he explained everything.” But that’s not literally true, either. It’s only broadly true. So, for example, Jesus said to His disciples: “I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now” (Jn 16:12). In another instance, when Jesus started explaining that He was to be killed, and that this was God’s plan, Peter didn’t understand, and disagreed. Jesus rebuked him, but didn’t further  explain:

Matthew 16:21-23 From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. [22] And Peter took him and began to rebuke him, saying, “God forbid, Lord! This shall never happen to you.” [23] But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me; for you are not on the side of God, but of men.” (cf. Mk 8:31-33)

Here’s another similar example:

Luke 9:44-45 “Let these words sink into your ears; for the Son of man is to be delivered into the hands of men.” [45] But they did not understand this saying, and it was concealed from them, that they should not perceive it; and they were afraid to ask him about this saying.

This was not a parable, but rather, a literal a prophetic statement about what was to happen, and Jesus did not explain it to His disciples.

There is no Eucharist in John’s; instead he washed the disciples’ feet at the Last Supper. 

It’s not stated, but we know that it took place, because this was the Last Supper, which was the Jewish Passover (a meal), incorporated into the new understanding of the Eucharist, instituted by Jesus. Since the three Synoptic Gospels mentioned the institution of the Eucharist, John didn’t necessarily have to. He concentrates on other things Jesus said during the last Supper. What Dr. Madison seems to think is a “contradiction” and a big concern, is none at all.

John also left out the Sermon on the Mount, . . . 

Technically, he didn’t “leave out” anything. He wrote exactly what he wanted to write in his account. If three accounts of something already exist, why have a fourth? Sometimes John also records events from the Synoptics, but he is under no obligation to do any of that. Only atheists seem to have this ludicrous idea that all four evangelists must always write exactly the same about everything, lest it is one of their endless pseudo-“contradictions.” Because of this warped, illogical, irrational mentality, Dr. Madison can write a ridiculous statement such as this, in conclusion:

With these examples, I’ve just scratched the surface. A careful study of the gospels—especially using a gospel parallels version—shows that, right from the start, the authors of the Jesus story couldn’t get the story straight, and it was a blunder to publish the four conflicting accounts side-by-side. Given this mess—so many different ideas from which to pick and choose—it’s hardly a surprise that Christians are so deeply divided. The bigger blunder, of course, was conferring “Word of God” status on these ancient novels. That’s an added layer of magical thinking.

The Bible truly describes people like Dr. Madison:

Proverbs 15:2 . . . the mouths of fools pour out folly.

Proverbs 15:14 The mind of him who has understanding seeks knowledge, but the mouths of fools feed on folly.

Proverbs 18:7 A fool’s mouth is his ruin, and his lips are a snare to himself.

Ecclesiastes 10:13 The beginning of the words of his mouth is foolishness, and the end of his talk is wicked madness.

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Photo credit: netkids (3-22-16) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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2020-12-09T12:32:50-04:00

Last updated on: December 9, 2020 at 12:32 pm   By

Atheist and anti-theist Bob Seidensticker runs the influential Cross Examined blog. He asked me there, on 8-11-18: “I’ve got 1000+ posts here attacking your worldview. You just going to let that stand? Or could you present a helpful new perspective that I’ve ignored on one or two of those posts?” He added in June 2017 in a combox: “If I’ve misunderstood the Christian position or Christian arguments, point that out. Show me where I’ve mischaracterized them.” Delighted to oblige his wishes . . . 

Bob (for the record) virtually begged and pleaded with me to dialogue with him in May 2018, via email. But by 10-3-18, following massive, childish name-calling attacks against me,  encouraged by Bob on his blog, he banned me from commenting there. I also banned him for violation of my rules for discussion, but (unlike him) provided detailed reasons for why it was justified.

Bob’s cowardly hypocrisy knows no bounds. On 6-30-19, he was chiding someone for something very much like his own behavior: “Spoken like a true weasel trying to run away from a previous argument. You know, you could just say, ‘Let me retract my previous statement of X’ or something like that.” Yeah, Bob could!  He still hasn’t yet uttered one peep in reply to — now — 65 of my critiques of his atrocious reasoning.

Bible-Basher Bob reiterated and rationalized his intellectual cowardice yet again on 10-17-20: “Every engagement with him [yours truly] devolves into pointlessness. I don’t believe I’ve ever learned anything from him. But if you find a compelling argument of his, summarize it for us.” And again the next day: “He has certainly not earned a spot in my heart, so I will pass on funding his evidence-free project. Like you, I also find that he’s frustrating to talk with. Again, I evaluate such conversations as useful if I can learn something–find a mistake in my argument, uncover an error I made in Christians’ worldview, and so on. Dave is good at bluster, and that’s about it.”

Bible-Basher Bob’s words will be in blue. To find these posts, follow this link: “Seidensticker Folly #” or see all of them linked under his own section on my Atheism page.

*****

In his post, Faith, the Other F-Word? (2 of 2) (11-25-20, and recycled, as so often, from an earlier one dated 7-13-16), Bible-Basher Bob states:

What does faith mean? Does it mean belief firmly grounded in evidence? That’s the definition in vogue among many conservative apologists (and discussed in part 1). But there’s another definition that is also popular.

Now, I’m happy and delighted to give Bob credit for at least noting in his first part that the Bible has passages about “evidential faith” or “reasonable faith” or faith and reason considered together as parts of the whole picture. But then he goes on to erroneously assert that there is another biblical motif that supposedly contradicts this:

Faith definition 2: belief held not primarily because of evidence and little shaken in the face of contrary evidence; that is, belief neither supported nor undercut by evidence. This would be a belief that can’t be shaken by a change in evidence (such as, “I won’t give up my faith in Jesus for any reason”). Evidence for one’s belief can be nonexistent, or it can actually oppose one’s belief (as in blind faith), or evidence can simply be insufficient to firmly ground the belief.

What he describes is blind faith, or technically, fideism, and there are indeed some Christians who espouse this. But they have never been in the mainstream, and (most importantly), I would contend that the Bible itself doesn’t teach it, as I have written about several times:

Atheist Myths: “Christianity vs. Science & Reason” (vs. “drunkentune”) [1-3-07]

Passionate Defense of Religious Truths: The Biblical Data [6-4-07]

The Certitude of Faith According to Cardinal Newman [9-30-08]

Dialogue on Reason & Faith, w Theological Liberal [1-19-10]

Christianity: Crucial to the Origin of Science [8-1-10]

Christians or Theists Founded 115 Scientific Fields [8-20-10]

Simultaneously Dumb & Smart Christians, Atheists, & Scientists [10-9-15]

Implicit (Extra-Empirical) Faith, According to John Henry Newman [12-18-15]

On Mystery & Reason in Theology [4-5-16]

Is Christianity Unfalsifiable? Is Empiricism the Only True Knowledge? [5-6-17]

Apologetics Doesn’t Mean Being Sorry for Your Faith [National Catholic Register, 6-6-17]

Reason, Science, & Logic Not the Exclusive Possessions of Atheists (7-24-17)

Dialogue with Atheist: Are Christians “Unscientific”? [5-27-19]

Apologetics = Anti-Faith or Absolute “Certainty”? (Or, “Does Christianity Reduce to Mere Philosophy or Rationalism?”) [7-5-20]

Seidensticker Folly #44: Historic Christianity & Science [8-29-20]

See many more articles along these lines on my Philosophy & Science and Catholic & General Christian Apologetics web pages.

Faith definition 2: belief held not primarily because of evidence and little shaken in the face of contrary evidence; that is, belief neither supported nor undercut by evidence. This would be a belief that can’t be shaken by a change in evidence (such as, “I won’t give up my faith in Jesus for any reason”). Evidence for one’s belief can be nonexistent, or it can actually oppose one’s belief (as in blind faith), or evidence can simply be insufficient to firmly ground the belief.

Again, let’s start with the Bible to find support for this evidence-less faith:

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. . . . And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him (Hebrews 11:1–6).

Then Jesus told [Doubting Thomas], “You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who believe without seeing me.” (John 20:29)

The Hebrews passage has no need of evidence, and the statement of Jesus celebrates those who believe despite a lack of evidence.

This reasoning takes insufficient account of the relevant data of context and of related cross-referenced verses. The author of Hebrews states: “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (11:1, RSV). This is one aspect of faith, which is different from reason but not opposed to it: neither logically nor in the biblical / Hebraic worldview.

Atheist scientists believe in things “not seen” just as every Christian does: for example, they believe in, for example, dark matter: at the moment a very mysterious thing indeed, yet scientists are sure it makes up “approximately 85% of the matter in the universe and about a quarter of its total mass–energy density” (Wikipedia). It “has not yet been observed directly.”

It’s deduced from other empirical evidence, but then that’s exactly how Christian faith is also. Scientists have not (and likely cannot ever) observe the moment of the Big Bang when the universe began. Yet they believe in it. They can have an “assurance”and “conviction of things not seen.” Therefore, this clause in Hebrews is not antithetical at all to reason or empirical observation. To make out that it is is simply illogical and an improper interpretation.   

“. . . whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists” (Heb 1:6). This may sound at first sight like blind, raw, unaccompanied faith, apart from reason, but it’s not so, either. St. Paul in Romans 1 grounds such faith in reason and observation:

Romans 1:19-20 (RSV) For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. [20] Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse;

Hebrews 11:3 closely echoes the thought of Romans 1:19-20: “By faith we understand that the world was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear.” This is a primitive, basic form of the argument from design, or teleological argument: one of the classic theistic proofs. Even if one disagrees with it, they can’t deny that it is an argument of some sort of reason, and not merely blind faith. God revealed Himself in His creation. This is more than ever true today: the more we learn about the marvels of the universe and of the even more amazing microscopic world.

Even Albert Einstein thought it was self-evident that there was design in the universe, brought about by some sort of “God” (in his own opinion, a pantheistic one, but still a notion far from atheism). And philosopher David Hume, who is thought to have demolished this theistic proof, accepted one form of the teleological argument. They’re basically expressing what Paul did in Romans 1.

So Hebrews 11 fits together with Romans 1 insofar as the former says that we “must believe that” God “exists” and the latter says that we can’t help believing this by simply observing the universe and the nearby material world. This is why the vast majority of people in the world and in world history have been religious. It’s the default position.” People have to unlearn it.

The rest of the Book of Hebrews is not at all averse to the world of observable reasons to believe in Jesus Christ and Christianity. It starts out with the incarnation of Jesus (chapter 1), then states that “God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit” (2:4). That’s observable stuff: like the miracles of Jesus and His resurrection and post-resurrection appearances. Even atheists call for wondrous miracles that they claim would theoretically prove His existence. Well, God has done that and continues to do so. But if the atheist doesn’t see it himself or herself, they refuse to believe it, and no amount of credible testimony can sway them.

Hebrews 13:6 refers to Jesus’ resurrection, which was compelling evidence for the more than 500 people who saw Him alive after He died: “the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus . . . Thus, there is no evidence that the Book of Hebrews, understood as a whole, has “no need of evidence.”

As for Doubting Thomas, this is no proof that Jesus was averse to such “apologetic” evidence, either, since (we must remember), Jesus decided to  appear after His death specifically to Him, in order to prove the point to him. His statement about faith does not wipe that out. He was simply making the point that there was enough evidence already to believe that He was the Messiah and God incarnate. There is the evidence tied into faith, and there is a demand for evidence that goes beyond what is necessary. Jesus was concerned with the latter. I wrote elsewhere about Doubting Thomas:

Christianity requires belief in a number of things difficult to grasp and accept, but we accept them based on the authority of revelation. Doubting Thomas didn’t believe that Jesus could rise from the dead, even though Our Lord had often predicted it in the presence of the disciples. He had to see it for himself.

It is striking how Jesus is merciful and understanding enough to appear for Thomas’ sake. He knew his faith was weak, and so He offered a little “extra” to help him along. Thomas had an overly empirical mindset (he had said he had to put his finger in Jesus’ side, then he would believe: John 20:25). So Jesus, condescending to the limitations of the overly skeptical mentality, allowed him to do that (20:27).

This results (rather dramatically) in Thomas calling Jesus “God”: one of the most remarkable instances of proclamation of the divinity of Jesus in the New Testament (20:28). But after all this, Jesus nevertheless says, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.” (20:29). He came to Thomas because he was weak, but at the same time He made it clear that this would not be the norm, and that believers would have to exercise faith and not demand empirical proof.

And in another paper I observed:

He came back in one of His Resurrection appearances precisely to persuade Thomas. Thus, it is hardly a proof of supposed Christian “blind faith” to cite this story. Quite the contrary: the whole point of that story was to show that there is such a thing as excessive demands for proof (which Jesus and Paul talk about a lot), not that proof itself is unnecessary or frowned-upon.

The purpose of most of Jesus’ miracles (including, ultimately, His own Resurrection) was also to give testimony to His claims to be God, which is hardly a ringing endorsement of “blind faith” either, but rather, empirical evidence right before people’s eyes (much as atheists are constantly demanding today).

Dialoguing with an atheist about miracles, I stated:

Jesus performed miracles, too. But He also stated:

Matthew 12:38-40 (RSV): Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to him, “Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.”  [39] But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign; but no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. [40] For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

Mark 8:12 And he sighed deeply in his spirit, and said, “Why does this generation seek a sign? . . .”

The sign of Jonah was referring to His Resurrection. But of course, many refused to believe in Jesus even though they saw Him perform many miracles. They denied that they were from God:

Mark 3:22-26 And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem said, “He is possessed by Be-el’zebul, and by the prince of demons he casts out the demons.” [23] And he called them to him, and said to them in parables, “How can Satan cast out Satan? [24] If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. [25] And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. [26] And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but is coming to an end.

So these miracles you demand before you will believe, weren’t good enough for these people. They simply dismissed them, just as many dismissed the Resurrection when it happened, coming up with many idiotic theories to try to rationalize it away.

Jesus is not opposed to observable, empirical evidence at all. He stated that His Resurrection would be the prime example of this. He only condemns the excessive demands for proof all the time. It’s like one spouse in a happy marriage asking a million times if the spouse loves him or her. At some point we must believe in faith a thing that has been demonstrated over and over. That‘s what Jesus is saying. And so the New Testament sums up this attitude of Jesus in the following manner:

Acts 1:3 To them [the apostles] he presented himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days, and speaking of the kingdom of God.

Jesus habitually used reason and logic in His discourses, including even socratic method. So did St. Paul. The New Testament describes him not just as preaching the gospel, but also as “arguing” with Jews and Greeks alike (Acts 17:2; 17; 18:4, 19; 19:9; 24:25). 

Of course, Bob isn’t swayed by any of the evidences for God, which is why he is an atheist:

[T]he data is in for God, and that hypothesis fails for lack of evidence, just like the leprechaun and Zeus hypotheses. . . . If God exists, he’d be happy to see me challenging empty Christian claims.

He challenges, makes manifestly ridiculous comparisons to Zeus and leprechauns, an apologist like me defends the Christian and biblical views, and then Bob ignores that, since he only wants to preach atheism, and has no interest whatsoever in interacting with Christian apologists unless he feels that he can make them look dumb and stupid. No dialogue ever really takes place. If he can’t answer particular challenges, on the other hand, he ignores and flees for the hills, as he has done with me for over two years: ignoring now 65 of my refutations of his fallacious, ignorant treatments.

I really don’t expect this time to be any different. So I ask: “which is more impressive and indicative of a robust confidence in the plausibility and reasonableness and factuality of one’s position: dealing with opposing views in great detail, point-by-point, and precisely showing how they fail and how one’s own viewpoint is superior, or preaching to the choir and ignoring anyone who dares to disagree?” Which of those two approaches suggests (oh, the irony!) blind faith more than the other?

Yes: it’s Bob‘s approach that has more blind faith than anything I believe or defend, because he puts himself into a bubble and allows no one who disagrees in: lest they show how ludicrous Bob’s beliefs are, after being closely scrutinized. That’s the very definition of the sociological “true believer”: impervious to any outside critique, and wrapped up in the pretense that in fact, there are none; that one’s own position is absolutely invulnerable to any imaginable criticism.

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Photo credit: The Incredulity of St Thomas, or The Rockox Triptych: central portion (bet. 1613 and 1615), by Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]

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2020-11-25T14:27:05-04:00

Last updated on: November 25, 2020 at 2:27 pm   By

Atheist and anti-theist Bob Seidensticker runs the influential Cross Examined blog. He asked me there, on 8-11-18: “I’ve got 1000+ posts here attacking your worldview. You just going to let that stand? Or could you present a helpful new perspective that I’ve ignored on one or two of those posts?” He added in June 2017 in a combox: “If I’ve misunderstood the Christian position or Christian arguments, point that out. Show me where I’ve mischaracterized them.” Delighted to oblige his wishes . . . 

Bob (for the record) virtually begged and pleaded with me to dialogue with him in May 2018, via email. But by 10-3-18, following massive, childish name-calling attacks against me,  encouraged by Bob on his blog, he banned me from commenting there. I also banned him for violation of my rules for discussion, but (unlike him) provided detailed reasons for why it was justified.

Bob’s cowardly hypocrisy knows no bounds. On 6-30-19, he was chiding someone for something very much like his own behavior: “Spoken like a true weasel trying to run away from a previous argument. You know, you could just say, ‘Let me retract my previous statement of X’ or something like that.” Yeah, Bob could!  He still hasn’t yet uttered one peep in reply to — now — 63 of my critiques of his atrocious reasoning.

Bible-Basher Bob reiterated and rationalized his intellectual cowardice yet again on 10-17-20: “Every engagement with him [yours truly] devolves into pointlessness. I don’t believe I’ve ever learned anything from him. But if you find a compelling argument of his, summarize it for us.” And again the next day: “He has certainly not earned a spot in my heart, so I will pass on funding his evidence-free project. Like you, I also find that he’s frustrating to talk with. Again, I evaluate such conversations as useful if I can learn something–find a mistake in my argument, uncover an error I made in Christians’ worldview, and so on. Dave is good at bluster, and that’s about it.”

Bible-Basher Bob’s words will be in blue. To find these posts, follow this link: “Seidensticker Folly #” or see all of them linked under his own section on my Atheism page.

*****

Looking over one of Bible-Basher Bob’s notorious comboxes (cesspools of anti-Christian bigotry and ad hominem blitzes) today, I ran across this statement of his:

Serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer converted in prison, so when he died (violently, in prison), he went to heaven. Anne Frank (unrepentant Jew) went to hell.

Praise the Lord. (11-23-20)

He had repeated this mantra eight days earlier and then asked: “Do Christians ever stop to think of the Frankenstein of a religion they’ve created?”

And again on the same day:

I listened to a Christian podcast where 3 or 4 pastors were discussion the case of a father whose 20-something son had just died. So problem 1 is the son has died. But problem 2 is that the son hadn’t accepted Jeebus and so, by the father’s own religion, was now broasting in hell. And the pastors were trying to figure out what consoling words they could offer while sticking to the “everlasting torment” line.

Sometimes Christianity makes things a lot worse.

I’ve often noted how lies and falsehoods are easy to spout: often able to be expressed in a tiny soundbite or slogan short enough to be a nice fit for a bumper sticker or t-shirt.

So Bob threw out this insulting “meat” to his echo chamber: knowing that (almost certainly) no one would challenge it, and that all will be united in a blissful unity, in despising the intellectual bankruptcy of what they erroneously think is mainstream Christianity. To refute it, however (as the reader will soon see), I have to go into at least some depth about Catholic and Protestant theology of salvation (soteriology) and document how the view he spews is far out of the mainstream. And in doing it — if history is any guide — I know he will likely never read it, or if he does, he won’t respond or be corrected (if he continues his behavior of the last two years and three months: ignoring 63 of my critiques).

But I plug away because it’s important to refute lies and falsehoods like this, in order to try to prevent as many as possible from believing them. At any rate, it takes far more ink to effectively refute a lie than to state the lie. Another commenter (Michael) in the same combox wrote:

These are echoed by lots of real people. Obviously, the many Jews who died in the Holocaust (who didn’t become Christians). Plus the commandant of Auschwitz, Rudolf Hoss. He converted to Catholicism and repented prior to being hanged. According to their doctrine, he’ll reach Heaven eventually. Now, at least they are more generous and say that “righteous” non-Catholics can be saved too. Evangelicals like Ray don’t. Young Anne Frank and so many more? Damned. Yet they say atheism is bad…

I’m saved from insanity at least by Michael acknowledging that Catholics teach “that ‘righteous’ non-Catholics can be saved.” Thank you, Michael. I think Bob might actually know that, too. To be as fair as we can be towards him, it is true that this combox was in response to a Protestant evangelical minister, and so that was probably the view he had in mind. Yet atheists have a bad habit of constantly making out that fringe fundamentalist Christian views represent the whole.

I have written about the possibility of atheists being saved, according to pretty clear biblical teaching:

Are Atheists “Evil”? Multiple Causes of Atheist Disbelief and the Possibility of Salvation [2-17-03]

New Testament on God-Rejecters vs. Open-Minded Agnostics [10-9-15]

In a nutshell, the Bible teaches one thing, and denies another:

1) One is judged by what they know and how they act upon it.

2) We don’t (and can’t) know the eternal fate of individuals.

Salvation is brought about by the grace of God and the work of Jesus Christ on the cross for the salvation of the human race (or at least those who believe in Him, having become acquainted with the gospel). This is true whether one is aware of it or not. So nothing I clarify here is to be thought of as a denial of that fact: held in common by all Christians.

There are all sorts of complexities involved in the application of salvation. I address them in many papers on my Ecumenism and Christian Unity page, in the section entitled “Salvation ‘Outside’ the Church / Religious Liberty.” It’s very clear that Catholicism allows for the possible salvation of many many individuals who have either not heard the gospel or have not become members of the Catholic Church. To save space, I simply refer the reader to my papers on that topic.

I’m presently much more interested in showing that mainstream Protestantism doesn’t teach such a crass view as Bob suggests, either. I am already familiar with the expressed view of John Calvin: who is the founder of a large portion of Protestantism, which calls itself Reformed, or Calvinist (including Presbyterians, some Baptists, and some of other denominations as well). He denied that we could know for sure who is of the elect (i.e., would eventually be saved and go to heaven):

[W]e are not bidden to distinguish between reprobate and elect – that is for God alone, not for us, to do . . . (Institutes of the Christian Religion, IV. 1. 3.)

We must thus consider both God’s secret election and his inner call. For he alone “knows who are his” [II Tim. 2:19] . . . except that they bear his insignia by which they may be distinguished from the reprobate. But because a small and contemptible number are hidden in a huge multitude and a few grains of wheat are covered by a pile of chaff, we must leave to God alone the knowledge of his church, whose foundation is his secret election. It is not sufficient, indeed, for us to comprehend in mind and thought the multitude of the elect, unless we consider the unity of the church as that into which we are convinced we have been truly engrafted. (Inst. IV. 1. 2.)

Of those who openly wear his badge, his eyes alone see the ones who are unfeignedly holy and will persevere to the very end [Matt. 24:13] – the ultimate point of salvation. (Inst. IV. 1. 8.)

It is . . . not our task to erase from the number of the elect those who have been expelled from the church, or to despair as if they were already lost. It is lawful to regard them as estranged from the church, and thus, from Christ – but only for such time as they remain separated. However, if they also display more stubbornness than gentleness, we should still commend them to the Lord’s judgment, hoping for better things of them in the future than we see in the present. Nor should we on this account cease to call upon God in their behalf . . . let us not condemn to death the very person who is in the hand and judgment of God alone; rather, let us only judge of the character of each man’s works by the law of the Lord. While we follow this rule, we rather take our stand upon the divine judgment than put forward our own. Let us not claim for ourselves more license in judgment, unless we wish to limit God’s power and confine his mercy by law. For God, whenever it pleases him, changes the worst men into the best, engrafts the alien, and adopts the stranger into the church. And the Lord does this to frustrate men’s opinion and restrain their rashness – which, unless it is checked, ventures to assume for itself a greater right of judgment than it deserves. (Inst. IV. 12. 9.)

The election of God is hidden and secret in itself . . . men are being fantastic or fanatical if they look for their salvation or for the salvation of others in the labyrinth of predestination instead of keeping to the way of the faith which is offered them . . . To each one, his faith is a sufficient witness of the eternal predestination of God, so that it would be a horrible sacrilege to seek higher assurance. (Commentary on John 6:40; in Francis Wendel, Calvin: Origins and Development of His Religious Thought, translated by Philip Mairet, New York: Harper & Row, 1963, 270)

Let us, then, keep this in view above all other things, that it is no less insane to crave for other knowledge of predestination besides that which is given us in the word of God, than if one wanted to walk over inaccessible rocks or to see in darkness. (Inst. III. 21. 2.; in Wendel, ibid., 270-271)

This is highly significant, and immediately disproves Bob’s characterization of even Calvinists. Calvin’s view is in no way compatible with a notion that Jeff Dahmer definitely was saved and went to heaven because he expressed repentance in jail, while Anne Frank was definitely damned and went to hell because she was a Jew. We simply don’t know.

The website Christianity.com offers the relevant article, “How Can I Know If I am One of the Elect?,” by Dave Jenkins (a Baptist). It offers the same view as Calvin, and is utterly contrary to Bob’s caricature:

In the Gospel of John, the Apostle John teaches that Christ alone perfectly knows the hearts and minds of all people (John 2:24-25). Being the incarnate God, Jesus’ knowledge of all men’s hearts is not limited, like our finite minds. Since Jesus is Lord, He alone perfectly knows all those who have true saving faith. Since we are finite, we cannot know the genuine state of anyone’s heart besides our own.

Some may profess faith and persevere until their deaths. Other professing Christians later fall away, revealing that they never had genuine faith in Christ alone, to begin with (1 John 2:19). However, not all of those who profess faith genuinely possess it and will not be revealed until the Lord Jesus returns in the visible church (Matthew 13:24-30).

Martin Luther (the founder of Protestantism and of Lutheranism) expressed in several ways the lack of an absolute certainty of salvation, of even a serious, professed Christian. It would follow all the more so that we cannot know the ultimate fate of anyone else, either. Luther wrote:

The Christian . . . needs to entertain anxiety as to how he shall endure steadfast to the end. There is where all fear and anxiety are due. For while he assuredly is given to possess full salvation, it may be somewhat doubtful whether or no he will steadfastly retain it. Here we must walk in fear. . . . Should temptation force him to lose his confidence, grace also will fail. (Sermon for the Sunday After Christmas; Galatians 4:1-7, 1522)

Do not be moved by Zwingli’s argument concerning the certitude of faith, for he speaks of faith from hearsay and imagination, and not from any experience. It is possible, nay, it happens every day, that in some of the articles of faith we are strong, in others weak. Moses, the man of great faith, was weak at Meribah, and all the children of Israel were weak in the faith that they would receive food and drink, though by faith they had overcome Pharaoh, with many miracles. (Letter to Gottschalk Crucius, 27 October 1525)

Neither the baptizer nor the baptized can maintain his position, for both are uncertain of their faith, or at least are in constant peril and anxiety. For it happens, indeed it is so in this matter of faith, that often he who claims to believe does not at all believe; and on the other hand, he who doesn’t think he believes, but is in despair, has the greatest faith. So this verse, “Whoever believes,” does not compel us to determine who has faith or not. . . . Who has it, has it. One must believe, but we neither should nor can know it for certain. (Concerning Rebaptism, Jan. 1528)

I was the editor of a collection of John Wesley quotations (The Quotable Wesley). Wesley was a lifelong Anglican, but in effect became the founder of Methodism. And he taught the same thing:

It is an assurance of present salvation only; therefore, not necessarily perpetual, neither irreversible. (Letter to Samuel Wesley; 10 May 1739)

We know not how far invincible ignorance may excuse. ‘Love hopeth all things.’ . . . we allow there may be very many degrees of seeing God; even as many as are between seeing the sun with the eyelids closed and with the eyes open. (Letter to Mr. Richard Tompson; 2 Feb. 1756; citing an earlier Methodist conference from 2 August 1745)

Touching the charity due to those who are in error, I suppose, we both likewise agree, that really invincible ignorance never did, nor ever shall, exclude any man from heaven. And hence, I doubt not, but God will receive thousands of those who differ from me, even where I hold the truth. (Letter to “John Smith” [probably one of the Archbishops of Canterbury, Thomas Herring or Thomas Secker], 25 June 1746)

Do you think these words mean, “he that believes” at this moment “shall” certainly and inevitably “be saved?” If this interpretation be good, then, by all the rules of speech, the other part of the sentence must mean, “He” that does “not believe” at this moment “shall” certainly and inevitably “be damned.” Therefore, that interpretation cannot be good. (The Perseverance of the Saints; c. 1746)

That all Christians have an assurance of future salvation, is no Methodist doctrine: and an assurance of present pardon, is so far from causing negligence, that it is of all others the strongest motive to vigorous endeavours after universal holiness. (Second Letter to the Author [Bishop Lavington] of “The Enthusiasm of Methodists and Papists Compared”, 27 Nov. 1750)

This covers, then, the views of the Calvinist, Lutheran, Baptist, Anglican, and Methodist sectors of Protestantism: from (mostly) the most prominent persons of those traditions. One can readily see that the false “assurance” and “knowledge” entailed in claiming to “know” for “certain” the eternal destiny of another, whether proclaimed (or genuine) Christian or not, is presumptuous folly, no “knowledge” at all, and not taught by mainstream Protestant Christianity; nor is it taught by Catholicism or Orthodoxy.

It’s intellectually dishonest to present a view that might be expressed by a tiny fringe, fanatical portion of a belief-system, and present it as if it is the deliberate and certain conclusion of the greatest theologians of said systems (i.e., supposedly the “mainstream” or broadly what Christianity as a whole asserts). It’s an outrage, and we Christians need to speak out against it and refute it. I have done so. This is just one of hundreds of such scurrilous lies on Bible-Basher Bob’s site, which is why I have responded to and refuted him now 64 times.

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Photo credit: Anne Frank (1929-1945): German-Dutch Jew, author of the famous Diary of a Young Girl and victim of Nazi butchery [public domain / Smithsonian Magazine]

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