2021-02-12T11:10:38-04:00

Last updated on: February 12, 2021 at 11:10 am   By

“The Gospel According to Saint Luke” 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.

*****

It might be that the character of Luke was based on an old Roman pagan story about the healing God, Lykos, from Greek culture, and hence why the text was given the name Luke. 

Right-o! I can relate to this, I guess. My name is David, which is based on a King (David), from Hebrew culture. Therefore, I’m not who I am, since I am merely given a title from a mythical Hercules- or Odysseus-like hero who supposedly lived 3,000 years ago.

Out of Mark, 54% is quoted in Luke, and there are a hundred or so versus that, along with Matthew, he took from the source known as ‘Q’. It is surprising that a first-hand eyewitness of Jesus would need to copy so much of other people’s text about Jesus.

Of course, St. Luke never claimed to be an eyewitness of Jesus, so this “point” is completely moot. Luke makes it clear at the beginning of his Gospel that he was not an eyewitness:

Luke 1:1-2 (RSV)  Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things which have been accomplished among us, [2] just as they were delivered to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word,

He didn’t claim to see the risen Jesus, either (see Acts 1:2-3).

Luke contradicts the rest of the Bible on quite a few points of theology and gets many elements of Jesus’ life simply wrong (for example, the Roman-decreed census that never actually happened). For these reasons Luke is best not considered trustworthy.

The one who is untrustworthy is Mr. Crabtree (after the ridiculous contention above): projection if there ever was a case. Luke’s trustworthiness has been confirmed again and again by archaeology, and he was an excellent and accurate historian. See:

Archaeology and the Historical Reliability of the New Testament (Peter S. Williams)

Archaeology and the New Testament (Patrick Zukeran)

Archeology Helps to Confirm the Historicity of the Bible (Sheri Bell)

A Brief Sample of Archaeology Corroborating the Claims of the New Testament (J. Warner Wallace)

The Bible and Archaeology: The Book of Acts—The Church Begins (Mario Seiglie)

Archaeology and the New Testament (Kyle Butt)

Luke also made up the detail of the Romans instigating a census and sending people to the home towns of remote ancestors. This was not Roman policy, and although a local census did occur under Governor Quirinius it happened in 6CE, many years after Herod’s death.

For the question of the census, see:

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]

1. Moral Issues

Luke 11:27-28 is dismissive of the value of motherhood, contradicting Exodus 20:1-2 and Deut. 5:1-23 which says to honour thy father and mother as part of the 10 Commandments.

Luke 11:27-28 As he said this, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that you sucked!” [28] But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

The claim is nonsense, once the passage is properly understood (which atheists never seem to have the time to even try to do). I wrote an entire article about this passage:

Did Jesus Deny That Mary Was “Blessed” (Lk 11:27-28)? [11-19-19]

I have dealt with this (rather irritating) “Jesus was mean / disrespectful / indifferent to Mary” theme in two other articles also:

Jesus’ Interactions with Mary in Relation to Marian Veneration [10-29-08]

“Who is My Mother?”: Beginning of “Familial Church” [8-26-19]

See also: Jesus’ Use of the Term “Woman” [for Mary. Was it Disrespectful?] (by Jimmy Akin)

One easy way to show that Jesus’ [and/or Luke’s] intent was not at all to be “dismissive of the value of motherhood” is to look at some of the translations of the passage that bring out the meaning in a more accurate way:

NKJV But He said, “More than that, blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

Phillips But Jesus replied, “Yes, but a far greater blessing to hear the word of God and obey it.”

Living Bible He replied, “Yes, but even more blessed are all who hear the Word of God and put it into practice.”

CEV Jesus replied, “That’s true, but the people who are really blessed are the ones who hear and obey God’s message!”

Williams But He said, “Yes, but better still, blessed are those who listen to God’s message and practice it!”

Jerusalem Bible But he replied, “Still happier those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

It’s not a matter of “either/or” or of pitting the blessedness of His mother Mary against something else. He agrees with the point and goes on to make it wider in application, to include others as well (typical biblical and Hebraic “both/and” thinking).

Luke 12:47-48 says something about it being right to punish and beat slaves.

Luke 12:47-48 And that servant who knew his master’s will, but did not make ready or act according to his will, shall receive a severe beating.[48] But he who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, shall receive a light beating. Every one to whom much is given, of him will much be required; and of him to whom men commit much they will demand the more.

The Bible also talks about lovingly correcting children through spankings, etc.:

Proverbs 13:24 He who spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.

Proverbs 22:15 Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him.

Proverbs 23:13-14 Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you beat him with a rod, he will not die. If you beat him with the rod you will save his life from Sheol.

Proverbs 29:15, 17 The rod and reproof give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother. . . . Discipline your son, and he will give you rest; he will give delight to your heart.

That’s an entire issue unto itself (that would take far too long to address in this “101 atheist objections” context). I have dealt with it twice (one / two). The issue of slavery and the Bible is even more complex and multi-faceted. I’ve addressed that twice at length, too (one / two).

Luke 12:51-53 says Jesus has not come to bring peace but a sword, and has come to divide families, backed up by Luke 18:29 where Jesus says that those who have left relatives behind for Christ’s sake will find great rewards in their current life and in the afterlife. So much for family life.

This is another groundless objection, based on ignorance of Hebrew metaphor and exaggeration (hyperbole) to make a point. See:

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

Madison vs. Jesus #4: Jesus Causes a Bad Marriage? [8-5-19]

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

David Madison vs. the Gospel of Mark #9: Chapter 10 (Christian Biblical Ignorance / Jesus vs. Marriage & Family? / Divinity of Jesus) [8-20-19]

Seidensticker Folly #50: Mary Thought Jesus Was Crazy? (And Does the Gospel of Mark Radically Differ from the Other Gospels in the “Family vs. Following Jesus” Aspect?) [9-8-20]

2. Contradictions and Mistakes

The Gospel of Luke amasses quite a series of theological contradictions and historical mistakes

So he falsely claims . . .

For example, Luke argues against the virgin birth of Matthew 1:22-23 and goes to inane length to prove that Jesus is descended biologically from the male line of David (Luke 3:23-38).

It doesn’t follow that he is denying the virgin birth here. Joseph was Jesus’ legal father in terms of Jewish law, whether He was His biological father or not. See:

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

He manages to contradict himself as a result of stating that Mary conceived Jesus whilst a virgin – although historians note that the oldest versions of Luke did not include the statements of virgin birth as now found in Luke 2:33 and Luke 2:48 (although some Bibles have now restored the original version in their translations). 

There is no contradiction in these passages. It’s just yet more atheist hyper-skepticism based on groundless, evidence-free foregone conclusions and ultra-bias.

All of Luke’s insertions about singing angels, barns and mangers are not mentioned in Matthew’s version of the story and it is hard to see how others would not mention them if they happened. Luke simply didn’t know his facts when it came to Jesus’ birth.

No one is obliged to include every detail. It’s a very weak (indeed logically fallacious) argument to assert that “earlier text a doesn’t include details provided by later source b, regarding the same [larger] story x; therefore, details unique to x must be rejected as fictitious.” Anyone can see that this is manifestly false, with just a few moments of consideration.

But in any event, the Gospel of Mark didn’t intend to include the story of the Nativity. He starts with John the Baptist Jesus’ baptism. Nor does the Gospel of John have the story. Matthew doesn’t claim to include the story of the shepherds. So a claim of “insertion” into an existing story is bogus, because it’s “apple and oranges” in terms of most elements of the two accounts, that are unique to each Gospel.

Mr. Crabtree is in no position to judge who knew the “facts” regarding Jesus’ birth (or who is supposedly making up fake “facts”). It’s arbitrary and irrational analysis. These things are verified and corroborated by archaeology and historiography. So, for example, Jonathan MS Pearce, a prominent online anti-theist atheist, who also likes to tear down the Bible, made the absurd statement recently (on 12-18-20):

This also coheres with Rene Salm’s thesis in The Myth of Nazareth: The Invented Town of Jesus that Nazareth did not exist at the time of Jesus, according to archaeological analysis, and not until at least 70 CE.

I immediately shot down this rather ridiculous and outrageous claim with archaeology, noting the article: “New archaeological evidence from Nazareth reveals religious and political environment in era of Jesus” (David Keys, Independent, 4-17-20). It stated:

[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.

This is actually doing science, rather than sitting in armchairs and making historically and archaeologically clueless remarks, as these anti-theist atheist polemicists do (figuring no one will have patience enough to bother challenging them). 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. That is how claims in the Bible are objectively verified by something outside of themselves. Atheists make a ridiculous claim such as that Nazareth didn’t exist in Jesus’ time. Actual verifiable, objective science (archaeology) shoots in down in this instance, and in hundreds of other biblical particulars.

Luke is one of those authors that wrote that the end of the world – judgment day – was to occur in the lifetimes of those alive when Jesus was alive (Luke 9:26-27), but was clearly wrong.

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]

At the start of the journey to Golgotha to be crucified, Luke has the Romans grab a bypasser (Simon of Cyrene) and make him carry the cross instead of Jesus, whereas in John’s account Jesus carries it all the way (Luke 23:26 versus John 19:17).

John 19:17 never says that Jesus carried the cross all the way. It says, rather, “he went out, bearing his own cross.” This doesn’t preclude Simon of Cyrene; it simply says that Jesus was bearing the cross when “he went out.” It would be like someone saying when they saw me leave my house, “Dave went out from his house on his bike.” Does that explain everything that may have happened afterwards? No, of course not. I could get a flat tire (in which case I would no longer be “on [my] bike”). I could get hit by lightning. I could have a heart attack. I could get mangled by a bear that jumped out of the woods. I could give away my bike and decide to walk back. It could start pouring and I call my wife to come pick me up in the car. A thousand things might happened that are not covered by “Dave went out from his house on his bike.” The only mystery here is why Mr. Crabtree can’t figure these patently obvious things out on his own.

And what was inscribed on the cross that Simon carried?

All four accounts say that it said “king of the Jews”. Matthew and John add “Jesus.” John adds “. . . of Nazareth.” It’s all quite consistent with the secondary details that four storytellers might get differently from each other.

Of the four gospels, Luke’s account is the only one that has the message inscribed in Latin, Greek and Hebrew (Luke 23:38).

Not true. John 19:20 states that “it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek.” The other two simply don’t mention that, which is no contradiction. I get so tired of explaining simple elements of logic to anti-theist atheists that I could spit . . .

Whilst hanging on the cross, the gospels record that the two other criminals being crucified both mocked Jesus. But Luke only has one criminal insult Jesus (the one on the left), and the other becomes a follower, and speaks not in the insulting and vulgar manner reported in the other gospels, but instead he speaks in a theologically accurate, respectful and elegant manner. The words of Luke’s right-hand criminal are clearly not spoken by the two criminals reported in the other two synoptic gospels: someone (or two people) are making up conversations.

Mark has: “Those who were crucified with him also reviled him” (15:32). Matthew has “And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way” (27:44). Why Luke has one of them mocking and the other rebuking him could be explained simply by a change of heart of the one criminal. Approaching death has a remarkable way of concentrating a mind and making one more acutely aware of one’s own sins. So this man may have repented and decided to make it right by eventually rebuking the other criminal for what he himself was also doing wrongly not long before.

Matthew and Mark would still be correct: both men indeed mocked Jesus (in this proposed scenario).  If one later repented and stopped, that’s not in contradiction with Matthew and Mark. Luke would have to say something like: “the one criminal never mocked Jesus.” But lo and behold, he never does that, and so this is bogus “biblical contradiction” #9,625.

And what of the most important words of all, that any friend would remember forever? Jesus’ last words according to Matthew 27:46 and Mark 15:34, were to quote Psalm 22, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?‘. But in Luke 23:46, his last words were completely different: ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit‘. Luke might have heard that Jesus quoted scripture upon his death, but instead of Psalm 22:1 has him quote Psalm 31:5. Luke doesn’t tell us that he’s unsure which verse was quoted – he states it as a fact, just as the Mark and Matthew state their accounts as fact, even though it is clear that some of them simply didn’t know the truth.

Matthew doesn’t state in 27:46 that these were the last words of Jesus. In fact, he informs us in 27:50: “And Jesus cried again with a loud voice and yielded up his spirit.” This proves that Matthew didn’t regard what he recorded in 27:46 as Jesus’ last words. What He “cried again with a loud voice” were His last words. Matthew simply doesn’t record them.

In Mark 15:37 it’s exactly the same: “And Jesus uttered a loud cry, and breathed his last.”

Luke provides the content what this uttered cry in a loud voice was: “Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit!” And having said this he breathed his last.” The three accounts are completely harmonious with each other.

Jesus dies. Mark 15:39 and Matthew 27:54 both have the centurions say (in different ways) that “truly this man was the son of god“. Luke 23:47 has it differently: “truly this man was innocent“, with no mention at all of Jesus’ divinity.

He said both things. Why is that so inconceivable to the atheists who sit up all night and make up these asinine lists of pseudo-“contradictions”?

Also, in Roman culture the death of a god-man such as Mithras and others was accompanied by miraculous periods of worldwide darkness. Historian Dr Richard Carrier points out that “it was common lore of the time that the sun would be eclipsed at the death of a great king“. Mark:15:33 and Matthew 27:45 both repeat that this happened for Jesus too but Luke makes it a natural darkness by saying it is an eclipse (Luke 23:45). Unfortunately, in doing so, instead of perpetuating pagan stories, he instead contradicts reality: there could be no eclipse at the time of a full moon, and, star gazers who carefully recorded eclipses at that time did not record one.

Luke 23:45 states: “the sun’s light failed.” That’s not necessarily an eclipse. The sun’s light could also fail in midday by dark clouds covering the sky (either in preparation of a big rainstorm or not). It can get very dark in ways other than eclipses. Or God (being omnipotent) could also cause supernatural darkness, if He chose to do so. In any event, the three Synoptic Gospels don’t contradict.

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Photo credit: Saint Luke, by James Tissot (1836-1902) [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.

*****

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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2021-02-10T12:00:16-04:00

Last updated on: February 10, 2021 at 12:00 pm   By

The Purposes and Goals of Contra-Atheist Christian Apologetics

“Sporkfighter” is a friendly and fair-minded atheist who asked me some good questions underneath my article, Groundless Gospel of Mark Bashing Systematically Refuted (2-9-21). Here are my replies, with a short second round as well. It became an excellent opportunity to explain the wider goals and motivations of apologetics. His words will be in blue.

*****

Question: Who are you writing for?

1) Christians: for their existing faith to be strengthened by seeing the weakness of opposing arguments and the strength of our own.

2) For Christians who are wavering in their faith (who would be adversely affected by the material I refute) and perhaps considering leaving it and/or becoming an atheist: to be strengthened by seeing the weakness of opposing arguments.

3) For those wondering about the doctrines of biblical inspiration and infallibility.

4) For fair-minded, honest atheists: to show that these atrocious arguments are embarrassing for atheists to put out: and ought to be rebuked from within their own community.

5) For the atheist who actually thinks these are unanswerable arguments.

6) For the atheist who might be on the fence and is considering forsaking atheism.

7) For atheists or anyone else who think that Christian theology is held only by gullible, infantile ignoramuses, who hate science and reason.

8) For anyone who thinks that Christianity is fundamentally irrational and opposed to reasonable explanation or defense.

9) For the sake of truth itself (i.e., what I, to the best of my ability, have come to believe is truth).

10) For the sake of open and honest discussion between opposing viewpoints: believing that dialogue is a means to obtain truth.

Are you writing to give Catholics support for their beliefs?

Inasmuch as Catholics are in the category of Christians, yes. But I’m also offering support for things where Protestants , Orthodox, and Catholics are in full agreement. I don’t argue about Catholic distinctives when defending Christianity against atheist attacks (I don’t consider it appropriate or prudent): unless they hit upon a specifically Catholic belief. Nothing in my reply here or in others like it should cause the slightest pause for any traditional, conservative (trinitarian / Nicene Creed) Christian. In fact, I could have written this when I was an evangelical Protestant (1977-1990).

Are you writing to convince non-Catholic Christians that Catholicism it one-true or the most-true path to salvation through Jesus?

No; per my previous reply. I do that in many other papers, but in this context it’s inappropriate. The word “Catholic” appears once in the entire article, and it is simply in referring to a “Catholic apologist” who made a general Christian apologetic point: precisely as I am doing here. So why do you keep bringing up Catholicism, as if it were relevant to my paper? It’s odd.

Are you writing to convince non-Christian theists that Christianity generally and Catholicism specifically is the path to the true God?

In a way, the first thing (in an indirect / roundabout sense), but it’s not my direct goal. The latter is addressed in hundreds of other papers of mine.

Are you writing to non-believers, trying to convince them that there is a God, that the Pope in Rome is his representative and the Catholic Church His…marketing arm?

See my previous two replies.

If it’s the first, okay. If it’s the second, okay. If it’s the third, I don’t see how your approach beginning and ending in the Bible can end up convincing anyone by never addressing their own traditions and their own reasons for believing.

It’s a specific argument; not the whole ball of wax. The question at hand is”: “Is Mark trustworthy as a document?, or is it so full of contradictions that the author has no credibility and no one (as a result) could possibly believe it was inspired by God.” I “defeat the defeaters, as Alvin Plantinga often says. It’s not defending the entire Bible (let alone all of Christianity or more specifically, Catholicism). It’s simply showing that these particular objections fall flat and achieve nothing whatsoever to tear down the Gospel of Mark.

If it’s the fourth, the best you’ll ever get a Bible full of events that could have happened without external evidence that they did happen.

Again, this is a “reactive” enterprise. I am showing how these objections fail. You’re way ahead of the game and have to realize the intent of any particular apologetics project. I’m happy to clarify.

I’m in the fourth group, and I just shake my head at the effort you go through to show the Bible can’t be proven false.

It’s not claiming the entire Bible can’t be proven false (though I do believe that). It’s showing how these arguments against Mark are a bunch of hot air and are irrational. It’s meant to give folks pause who are mightily impressed by these ludicrous pseudo-“arguments.” Then there are hundreds of other possible arguments and objections to address (most of which I have dealt with, in my 3180 articles on my blog, and 50 books). The argument for Christianity and the Bible is a cumulative one, consisting of scores and scores of individual arguments, adding up to the conclusion that Christianity is true and atheism false.

Does it really matter if you can explain why apparently differing details in the four Gospels don’t leave the Bible hopelessly internally contradictory?

Yes, but it’s just one piece in a large puzzle. Does it really matter to you that your fellow atheists make such terrible arguments? Are you able to admit that any in this piece are in fact, disproven by my replies? You haven’t said one word about my actual arguments. Instead, it’s all “meta-analysis.”

At best, you have a fantastic tale that “could have happened” with no evidence that it did happen.

People are convinced by an accumulation of considerations, which they feel all point in one direction: the truth of Mark or the Bible or of Christianity. If I make them curious here and persuade them of anything, then they will be game for future attempts at persuasion: all the way up to a possible conversion to Christianity or Catholicism specifically, or to a serious doubting of atheism, or a strengthening of a weak or wavering Christian faith. It’s all good. It’s what I was put on this earth to do (what we call a “calling” or “vocation”).

If you want to convince people outside your tradition, first, why, and second, you need evidence from outside your tradition.

Exactly! I am using reason as that common ground that both sides accept. I never say, “accept x, y, or z simply because Christians / the pope / Christian tradition says so.” I say, “accept it because it appears by virtue of reason to be true,” or “it may be true, given the weakness of opposing arguments” or “it appears to be more plausible than atheist alternatives.”

If you want to convince people inside your tradition, why? They’re already convinced.

It’s strengthening their existing faith, and providing support in reason for their faith, so it can be held more boldly and confidently, and more efficiently and successfully shared with others. Christians are under attack from all directions. There is a need for certain folks in our community to help support the faithful through efforts like this and many others of a different nature (such as social service or prayer, etc.).

If you find the academic challenge interesting, that would be the answer that makes the most sense to me.

I do enjoy that as well. But I find these atheist “objections” so weak, I would hardly even classify them as “academic.” They purport to be academic or semi-academic. Most of them would be laughed off of the stage of any truly academic setting. I’m not an academic or scholar. But I do claim to engage in semi-academic / “thinking man’s” lay apologetic endeavors. And I have held my own in dialogue with many scholars.

Excellent and comprehensive reply. I’m still looking for evidence that any supernatural realm of any kind exists before I wrestle with the details. Picking apart Christianity as a way to support my position would be pointless, because there’s always another tradition or faith to knock down, and another, and another.

Glad you like it. I would say that it sure looks like — according to cutting-edge science — an immaterial “spirit” of some sort, something wildly different from what we have up till now understood as “matter”, exists (to the tune of 95% of the entire universe). Most atheists have been telling us for centuries that it didn’t. You may have seen my recent paper on this: Seidensticker Folly #71: Spirit-God “Magic”; 68% Dark Energy Isn’t?

In other words, even science is leading us rapidly into new realms of “spirit” or “whatintheworldisthis?” stuff. Perhaps that is your gateway into the “supernatural realm of any kind.”

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Photo credit: geralt (2-1-21) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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2021-02-09T11:23:50-04:00

Last updated on: February 9, 2021 at 11:23 am   By

I just finished yesterday an exhaustive (over 8,000-word) point-by-point refutation of a wholesale attack on the Gospel of Mark, written by atheist Steven Carr: Pearce’s Potshots #15: Gospel of Matthew vs. Gospel of Mark?. That piece was actually part of a longer diatribe, entitled The Gospel According to Saint Mark: written by another atheist: Vexen Crabtree in 2006. Now I will examine his piece, too, to see if it is any more worthy of belief than Carr’s relentlessly erroneous analysis. Vexen’s words will be in blue.

*****

This anonymous gospel was the first to be written, around 80 CE, by an unknown Roman convert to Christianity.

Many early Christian writers state that Mark (or John Mark) is the author. The most important “witness” is Papias, a bishop of Hierapolis in Asia Minor (Turkey) until about 130 AD. His statement is recorded in in Eusebius’ History of the Church, written in 325:

14. Papias gives also in his own work other accounts of the words of the Lord on the authority of Aristion who was mentioned above, and traditions as handed down by the presbyter John; to which we refer those who are fond of learning. But now we must add to the words of his which we have already quoted the tradition which he gives in regard to Mark, the author of the Gospel.

15. “This also the presbyter 960 said: Mark, having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately, though not in order, whatsoever he remembered of the things said or done by Christ. 961 For he neither heard the Lord nor followed him, but afterward, as I said, he followed Peter, who adapted his teaching to the needs of his hearers, but with no intention of giving a connected account of the Lord’s discourses, 962 so that Mark committed no error while he thus wrote some things as he remembered them. For he was careful of one thing, not to omit any of the things which he had heard, and not to state any of them falsely.” These things are related by Papias concerning Mark. (Book III, 39:15)

The “presbyter John” referred to may be the apostle John himself. If so, the identification of Mark as the author goes back (via oral transmission) to the first Christians. Other early witnesses to Mark’s authorship include Irenaeus (c. 130-c. 202), Clement of Alexandria (150-c. 215),  Tertullian (c. 155-c. 240), and Origen (c. 184-c. 253). No one can be found in the early Church who dissents from this opinion of authorship.

That this Mark referred to by these early Christians is also the same as “(John) Mark” (mentioned in Acts 12:12, 25;  13:5, 13; 15:37; Col 4:10; Philem 24; 2 Tim 4:11; 1 Pet 5:13) is almost certain.

The author of Mark was not an eyewitnesses of Jesus, and wasn’t friends with any of the disciples nor any other witnesses who could have easily corrected many of his mistakes.

Papias states otherwise: that he drew from Peter, and we have no compelling reason to doubt his report.

The evidence is that (1) the author uses a lot of existing stories (both Hebrew and Greek) and wrote them into the text with Jesus as the centre of the story, instead of the original characters.

A common theme in atheist biblical skepticism is to simply assert these sorts of wild claims, while not presenting any evidence why anyone should accept them. Joe Blow atheist asserting x, y, z skeptical claims about supposed Gospel “fictions and fairy tales” — provided by no evidence whatsoever — has exactly no plausibility or ability to persuade any fair-minded, objective thinking person. Why should we believe them (even before getting into the question of the unreliability of “hostile witnesses”)? But the early Christian tradition is agreed that the author was Mark and that he drew from an eyewitness, Peter.

(2) He didn’t speak Aramaic (Jesus’ language) 

How does he know this? The Gospel of Mark came down to us in Greek, but there is no proof that Mark didn’t speak Aramaic. Professor of New Testament Language Larry Hurtado wrote that “Mark has more Semitic words/expressions (mainly Aramaic) than any of the other Gospels.” As to whether Mark spoke Aramaic, see “Aramaic in Mark” by Dr. Benjamin Shaw (who earned a Th.M. from Princeton Theological Seminary, with an emphasis in biblical languages: Greek, Hebrew, Old Testament and Targumic Aramaic, as well as Ugaritic), 2021.

Ben Witherington in The Gospel of Mark: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary (pp. 18-9) documents a number of stylistic traits of Mark’s Gospel:

  1. Historical present tense verbs
  2. Repetition of phrases
  3. Impersonal plural verb followed by a singular verb
  4. First-person plural narrative
  5. Parenthetical clarifications
  6. γάρ–clauses
  7. Anacoluthon
  8. Paratacticκαί
  9. Aramaic phrases
  10. Unusual words or constructions
  11. Chreia

In sum, these traits point to an author who struggles to express himself in the language he is writing. . . . So the text itself suggests the author of Mark was, in fact, an Aramaic speaker. [source]

Kenneth Kuziej, in his article, “The Aramaic Logic of Jesus in Mark and Matthew,” Consensus: Vol. 2 : Iss. 3 , Article 5 (1976) provides very helpful information:

Mark’s Greek is rough, strongly Aramaic, and not surprisingly, full of grammatical errors. At the same time, however, it is language which is lively and appealing, like that of an enthusiastic young immigrant. . . . Luke’s Gospel preserves no Aramaic words of Jesus. Neither does the Gospel of John, which, though accented with Aramaic, has such a simple vocabulary it almost seems as if this evangelist chooses not to make his work hard to understand for readers who understood no Aramaic.

The question is why did Matthew’s and Mark’s Gospels preserve those Aramaic words and phrases of Jesus? It’s only a guess, but perhaps, like many people who are new to a language, when stumped, fall back on their native words. This almost could be the explanation for the word Mammon (loosely translated “money” but meaning all material things) and Raka (which is an obscure term of abuse loosely translated “you fool”).

and wrote in Greek, not Hebrew, 

The manuscript came down to us in Greek. No one disagrees with that. So why mention it? But the evidence presented above strongly suggests that Greek was not his first language; Aramaic very likely was.

even having Jesus quote a Greek mistranslation of the Old Testament. . . .

All of his quotes from the Old Testament are from the faulty Septuagint translation, in Greek.

Catholic apologist Jason Evert explains the New Testament use of the Septuagint: Greek translation of the Old Testament:

Of the places where the New Testament quotes the Old, the great majority is from the Septuagint version. Protestant authors Archer and Chirichigno list 340 places where the New Testament cites the Septuagint but only 33 places where it cites from the Masoretic Text rather than the Septuagint (G. Archer and G. C. Chirichigno, Old Testament Quotations in the New Testament: A Complete Survey, 25-32).

For those who may not know, the Septuagint was the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament. The common abbreviation for it—LXX, or the Roman numerals for 70—come from a legend that the first part of the Septuagint was done by 70 translators.

By the first century, the LXX was the Bible of Greek-speaking Jews and so was the most frequently used version of the Old Testament in the early Church. For this reason, it was natural for the authors of the New Testament to lift quotes from it while writing in Greek to the Church.

But, while the New Testament authors quoted the LXX frequently, it does not necessarily follow that Christ did. We know for certain that Jesus quoted the Hebrew Old Testament at times, since he read from the scrolls in the synagogue. But Jesus could have only quoted from the Hebrew, and the New Testament authors later used the Greek translation to record the fact.

Some details such as what Jesus said in his personal prayers is made-up. . . . 

How did Mark know what Jesus said in his private prayer in Mark 14:32-36? Jesus specifically goes out of his way to leave the disciples behind, taking only James, John and Peter with him. Then, he departs from them for such a distance that they are asleep by the time he returns – and this happens twice. The occasional academic is not afraid to voice the obvious truth: “So how did Mark know? He ‘knew’ because he made it up” – Price.

On what basis is this to be believed? It’s simply the usual irrational, hostile atheist skepticism. Jesus could have simply communicated what He was praying to Peter, who passed it on to Mark. The Bible doesn’t claim to be absolutely exhaustive, as to what Jesus taught His followers. Indeed, one long conversation in one evening by Jesus would contain far more words, by far, than all of His words recorded in Scripture. And that’s just one night. He was constantly with the disciples for three years, day and night. Mark 6:34 notes in one instance, even with the crowds, not just the disciples: “he began to teach them many things” (RSV, as throughout my reply) None of them are recorded. Mark 4:34 adds: “privately to his own disciples he explained everything.”

So some of this “everything” could have easily been what Jesus prayed. All Jesus had to do was tell Peter, “last night I prayed [so-and-so]” (maybe in response to the ever-zealous Peter asking Him) just as we have cases where He revealed what He prayed in Scripture: “I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail” (Lk 22:32; spoken to Peter). Then Peter could tell Mark about one of these prayers, and that’s how Mark could have “known” about Jesus’ private prayers. It’s not rocket science to envision such a scenario. It’s absolutely not impossible.

He included multiple copies of the same story (but often with different details – evidence that he was using passed-on stories that had diverged over time). This often results in internal contradictions and inconsistencies.

Another bald claim. Mr. Crabtree has to provide more specifics, then the Christian can respond to the accusation (just as I did with Steven Carr’s hit-piece: systematically refuting every “anti-Mark” argument that he made). Christian apologists don’t have time to chase vague phantoms of anti-theist atheists’ unbridled imaginations.

The unfamiliarity with Jewish ways of life. There was no-one to correct his blunders such as misquoting the 10 commandments, attributing God’s words to Moses, and having Jews buy things on the Sabbath.

I thoroughly refuted all of these bogus charges last time, along with many others. They are born of rank ignorance, and it’s embarrassing to see how woefully inadequate and downright silly they are, once scrutinized.

Many of the Gospel of Mark’s mistakes were edited and corrections were attempted by Matthew and Luke when they made their own copies of Mark (together there are only about 30 verses that they didn’t copy).

Once again, specifics would have to be given, for me to reply. When such alleged “corrections” of Matthew were posited by Mr. Carr, I showed in every instance that they were groundless.

Because of its influence, some historians have argued that Mark’s text it the primary material that created the legend of Jesus: “Bruno Bauer believed Mark had invented Jesus, just as Mark Twain created Huck Finn”.

Saying that a real Jesus didn’t exist at all, or if He did, it was nothing like the Gospel portrayal, is intellectual suicide (hence, I spend little time with it, just as I rarely waste my time wrangling about a flat earth or a 10,000-year-old earth. See: Seidensticker Folly #4: Jesus Never Existed, Huh? [8-14-18]

Mr. Crabtree cites Robert M. Price stating about the time of Jesus: “there is no evidence for synagogues in Galilee.” Nonsense. The text Price was dealing with (Mark 3:1-5) was about an incident in Capernaum (see Mk 2:1 for the context regarding place). Capernaum had a synagogue. It’s located in Galilee on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. I visited it myself in 2014, and it was noted that the present one was built on top of an older one, whose foundation could still be seen at the bottom of the structure (much darker basalt rocks). Where do people like Price get off saying stupid things like this? A UNESCO page: “Early Synagogues in the Galilee” gives the real story:

The remains of as many as 50 different synagogues were identified in the Galilee, one of the most concentrated sites for synagogues in the world at that time. These early synagogues included Meron, Gush Halav, Navorin, Bar Am and Bet Alfa and Korazim, and Capernaum by the Sea of Galilee. The earliest synagogue remains in Palestine date to the late first century BCE, or by the early first century CE. By this time the synagogue was a developed central institution throughout the Jewish world.

Len Ritmeyer noted in his article, “The Synagogue of Capernaum in which Jesus taught” (3-15-18):

Digging deeper down in 1981, walls made of basalt stones and a basalt floor turned up 4 feet below the surface. These walls were located underneath the walls of the white synagogue and also under the stylobates (low walls that support a row of columns). It was initially thought that these walls were foundation walls, but when 1st century material was found on and below the basalt floor, it became evident that these basalt walls belonged to a synagogue of the 1st century, i.e, the synagogue in which Jesus taught.

Some of the trenches have been left open and the remains of this early synagogue can be seen today. [the article has a photo of that]

 The Times of Israel reported on 8-19-16 about another synagogue in Galilee from Jesus’ time, that He very well may have visited:

Israeli archaeologists in northern Israel have uncovered the ruins of a rural synagogue that dates back some 2,000 years.

The remains of the synagogue were found during an archaeological dig at Tel Rekhesh, near Mount Tabor in the lower Galilee, in what was an ancient Jewish village.

The find could lend weight to the New Testament narrative that Jesus visited villages in the area to preach.

Mordechai Aviam, an archaeologist at Kinneret College on the Sea of Galilee who led the dig, estimated the synagogue was built between 20-40 AD and was used for a hundred years. . . .

“The site is 17 km (10 miles) as crow flies east of Nazareth, and 12 km from Nin (Naim), and although we don’t have its name in the New Testament, it is in the area in which Jesus acted,” said Aviam.

Mark 1:30 And he went throughout all Galilee, preaching in their synagogues . . .

Mark 6:6 And he went about among the villages teaching. [i.e., “villages” near Nazareth: see 6:1]

I could easily find more about this, but these counter-examples suffice. So goes “bust” another atheist myth: disproven by archaeology and historiography . . .

We have seen already that Mark was not known as a Gospel of ‘Mark’ for over a hundred years. 

That’s of no relevance. All that matters is whether there were reliable oral traditions, based ultimately on eyewitness testimony. These eventually made their way into the written accounts.

When Christians came to name the Gospels, they picked ‘Mark’, who they thought should be a disciple of Peter, who in Greek mythology was associated with the Egyptian god Petra, the gate guardian of Heaven. Nowadays, Christians nowadays consider ‘Peter’ to be a genuine historical person, but it seems that even if he was real, Mark didn’t know him. 

This is simply groundless, arbitrary, downright stupid speculation from atheists: as usual backed up with nothing substantial at all, let alone scholarly. Readers can see, on the other hand, how my replies consistently have scholarly backing. Mr. Crabtree is ridiculous enough to start doubting the historicity of Peter as well.

Peter certainly could have corrected any of Mark’s errors in Jewish knowledge, and it is ludicrous to assume that Mark wrote this text without showing Peter (or any other Jew).

Again, I think I disposed of many of the supposed examples of Mark’s “lack of Jewishness” in my previous reply along these lines. I flatly deny the premise.

It is clear that Mark didn’t know any Jews. 

This is an extraordinary claim. What’s the evidence for it?

All three other gospels refer to Peter (Matthew 16:17-20, Luke 22:28-32 and John 21:15-17) and give him authority, whereas Mark doesn’t. 

Mark mentions “Peter” 19 times. Matthew mentions him 23 times, with 12 more chapters to do so. So, proportionately, Mark has more emphasis on Peter. Luke mentions him 18 times, with eight more chapters than Mark. But then we have to add the use also of “Simon”: his earlier name. That’s ten more times in Mark for a total of references to Peter of 29 times. Matthew adds five more references with “Simon” for 28 total. Luke adds 14, for a total of 32. So the grand totals are:

Mark: 29 in 15 chapters (average of 1.9 times per chapter).

Matthew: 28 in 28 chapters (average of one time per chapter).

Luke: 32 in 24 chapters (average of 1.3 times per chapter).

So Mark mentions Peter (“Peter” or “Simon”) almost twice as much per chapter as Matthew does and almost three times to every two times that Luke does. That’s hardly an underemphasis on Peter.

Moreover, Mark shows him as preeminent, just as the others do, by showing that he is the most mentioned of the disciples and their leader. Peter’s name invariably occurs first in all lists of apostles, including in Mark (3:16). Mark implies that he is the leader, in citing an angel stating, “tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee” (16:7). Singling him out in such a way, over against the rest of the disciples, is clearly expressing his leadership. This occurs again in Mark 1:36 (“And Simon and those who were with him pursued him,”). He’s a spokesman for the other disciples (Mk 8:29). He’s listed first of the “inner circle” of disciples: Peter, James, and John (Mk 5:37; 14:37). He’s the central figure in dramatic stories: for instance, Jesus walking on the water (Mk 10:28).

I think Mark knew Peter was not real; but merely a piece of Roman mythology used symbolically in a way all Romans would have understood.  Later authors (such as the Jewish author of the Gospel of Matthew), who copied Mark’s text, did not know this, therefore they elevated him.

This is just manifestly ridiculous, and not worthy of any attention. It’s self-refuting.

Sandals and Staff: Jesus sends his disciples out to preach, but in Mark [6:8-9] they are told to wear sandals (contradicting Matthew [10:9-10] ), and are told to take a staff (contradicting Luke [9:3]). Only one of these three authors could have really been there (if any).

At least this appears at first glance to be a real contradiction (unlike virtually all atheist proposed ones I’ve ever seen: and I’ve dealt with several hundred). So it deserves a serious treatment. Protestant apologists Eric Lyons and Brad Harrub (on a site that specializes in alleged biblical contradictions) grant the difficulty of interpreting these passages harmoniously in writing that they were “Perhaps the most difficult alleged Bible contradiction that we have been asked to ‘tackle’ . . . A cursory reading of the above passages admittedly is somewhat confusing.” Then they proceed to explain the apparent discrepancies:

The differences between Matthew and Mark are explained easily when one acknowledges that the writers used different Greek verbs to express different meanings. In Matthew, the word “provide” (NKJV) is an English translation of the Greek word ktesthe. According to Bauer’s Greek-English Lexicon, the root word comes from ktaomai, which means to “procure for oneself, acquire, get” (1979, p. 455). Based upon these definitions, the New American Standard Version used the English verb “acquire” in Matthew 10:9 (“Do not acquire….”), instead of “provide” or “take.” In Matthew, Jesus is saying: “Do not acquire anything in addition to what you already have that may tempt you or stand in your way. Just go as you are.” As Mark indicated, the apostles were to “take” (airo) what they had, and go. The apostles were not to waste precious time gathering supplies (extra apparel, staffs, shoes, etc.) or making preparations for their trip, but instead were instructed to trust in God’s providence for additional needs. Jesus did not mean for the apostles to discard the staffs and sandals they already had; rather, they were not to go and acquire more.

They continue by tackling the additional information from Luke:

As is obvious from a comparison of the verses in Matthew and Luke, they are recording the same truth—that the apostles were not to spend valuable time gathering extra staffs—only they are using different words to do so.

“Provide (Greek ktaomi) neither gold nor silver…nor staffs” (Matthew 10:9-10, emp. added).

“Take (Greek airo) nothing for the journey, neither staffs” (Luke 9:3, emp. added).

Luke did not use ktaomi in his account because he nearly always used ktaomi in a different sense than Matthew did. In Matthew’s account, the word ktaomai is used to mean “provide” or “acquire,” whereas in the books of Luke and Acts, Luke used this word to mean “purchase, buy, or earn.” Notice the following examples of how Luke used this word.

“I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get” (ktaomai) [Luke 18:12, emp. added, NAS]

“Now this man purchased (ktaomai) a field with the wages of iniquity (Acts 1:18, emp. added).

“Your money perish with you, because you thought that the gift of God could be purchased (ktaomai) with money!” (Acts 8:20, emp. added).

The commander answered, “With a large sum I obtained (ktaomai) this citizenship” (Acts 22:28, emp. added).

*
[Luke 21:19 is the only place one could argue where Luke may have used ktaomai to mean something other than “purchase, buy, or earn,” but even here there is a transactional notion in it (Miller, 1997)].When Luke, the beloved physician (Colossians 4:14), used the word ktaomai, he meant something different than when Matthew, the tax collector, used the same word. Whereas Luke used ktaomai to refer to purchasing or buying something, Matthew used the Greek verb agorazo (cf. Matthew 14:15; 25:9-10; 27:6-7). Matthew used ktaomai only in the sense of acquiring something (not purchasing something). As such, it would make absolutely no sense for Luke to use ktaomai in his account of Jesus sending out the apostles (9:3). If he did, then he would have Jesus forbidding the apostles to “purchase” or “buy” money [“Buy nothing for the journey, neither staffs nor bag nor bread nor money….”]. Thus, Luke used the more general Greek verb (airo) in order to convey the same idea that Matthew did when using the Greek verb ktaomai.

Just as ktaomai did not mean the same for Luke and Matthew, the Greek word airo (translated “take” in both Mark 6:8 and Luke 9:3) often did not mean the same for Luke and Mark (see Miller, 1997). [Understanding this simple fact eliminates the “contradiction” completely, for unless the skeptic can be certain that Mark and Luke were using the word in the same sense, he cannot prove that the accounts contradict each other.] Mark consistently used airo in other passages throughout his gospel to mean simply “take” or “pick up and carry” (2:9; 6:29; 11:23; 13:16). That Luke (in 9:3) did not mean the same sense of airo as Mark did (in 6:8) is suggested by the fact that in Luke 19:21-22 he used this same verb to mean “acquire.” [see also the visual chart in the article that is very helpful]

Now, the anti-theist atheists (who love bringing up things like this) typically respond that “well, see how hard you had to work to solve the contradiction?! It shouldn’t have to be that hard!” We agree that it shouldn’t be so hard, if one understood Greek in the first place. But for those of us who don’t know Greek, it appears contradictory, because the difference hinges upon different Greek words and even different meanings of the same Greek words (in context): just as English words usually have several definitions.

Therefore, it takes a considerable bit of explaining to clarify for the non-Greek speaker. Once that key difference is understood, the so-called “contradiction” is shown to not be one at all, because the writers are using different Greek words and meaning different things. And there are many alleged “biblical contradictions” that are resolved in this same fashion.

Making Up Details on How Many Were Fed: The scribes who put together the Gospel of Mark included two versions of the same story of Jesus feeding crowds of people with only a small number of loaves of bread and fish. The two copies are at Mark 6:32-44 and Mark 8:1-10. “They are essentially the same in every detail except the precise numbers of people present and food left over. Such figures are, of course, the easiest details to lose and confuse” as the stories were passed on from person to person. This is more proof that Mark wasn’t an eye-witness (or even close to one). 

This is untrue, and easily shown to be so. The two events took place in two entirely different locations, as the text states. The feeding of the 5,000 was near Bethsaida, which was on the north side of the Sea of Galilee (Mk 6:45; cf. Lk 9:10-17). The feeding of the 4,000, however, was a completely different story that occurred in a different place, as opposed to the fairy-tale of “essentially the same in every detail except the precise numbers of people present and food left over“ that the foolish skeptic Robert Price invented, and Mr. Crabtree accepts uncritically.

It occurred in “the region of the Decapolis” (Mk 7:31), which was east of the Sea of Galilee, and included the town of  Hippos, which was literally on a hill overlooking it. Immediately after the miracle, Jesus “immediately . . . got into the boat with his disciples, and went to the district of Dalmanu’tha” (Mk 8:10). Matthew 15:39, the parallel verse, states: “he got into the boat and went to the region of Mag’adan.” That would have been directly across the Sea of Galilee, and some archaeologists believe that Dalmanutha has been found, very close to Magadan, or Magdala, as I recently wrote about at length. There is evidence that the place where the feeding of the 4,000 occurred was near the archaeological site of Kursi. In any event, it’s clearly an entirely different place being described in the two feedings.

The two copies certainly do not represent two different events, as the disciples are surprised all-over-again in the second copy.

The disciples were continually surprised by any miracle Jesus did. This is a more-or-less common theme in every Gospel story of a miracle. They lacked faith and thought “carnally’ as Christians say, because they didn’t yet have the grace of the Holy Spirit dwelling with them (that came after Jesus’ death on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2).

It seems that the story didn’t start out as a story about Jesus anyway, as it looks like a Greek rewrite of 2 Kings 4:42-44, where Elisha also multiplies food.

Similarity to something else doesn’t prove that the second event is merely fictitious.

Mark 7’s Long Story About Unclean Food Practices Contradicts Book of Acts. Mark 7 has Jesus teach the disciples at length that the Jewish laws on food go too far. The obsession with washing hands before eating, and many other precise rules and regulations about cleanliness and uncleanliness, are not actually important. And yet, in Acts 10:14, the Disciples have forgotten the entire thing. Mark might have made-up these stories or (more likely) copied them from stories about other prophets, and rewritten them as with Jesus at their centre instead.

I dealt with this last time too:

Jesus indeed declared the principle that Peter would later publicly declare (after receiving a revelation) that all foods were clean (Acts 10:9-16): a thing shortly afterwards codified at the Jerusalem Council as applicable to all Gentile Christians (Acts 15:19-20). The difference is that Jesus did it only with His disciples (Mark 7:17-23). He wasn’t Himself proclaiming “all foods clean” in so many words (let alone publicly). He simply taught the principle underlying that thought, and Mark made his “theological” comment about it.

I would add now that the disciples didn’t (as far as the text informs us) hear Jesus specifically say in this incident recorded by Mark: “all foods are clean.” It was simply the narrator (Mark) making note of the broader point Jesus had made, summarizing it as “Thus he declared all foods clean.” This would explain why Peter was surprised to hear it more explicitly taught, in Acts 10:14. He was probably unaware that what Jesus had said in the earlier incident had the implication of changing Jewish food laws. So there is no contradiction here.

Galilee or Judea? The gospels describe where Jesus taught. Mark contradicts both Luke’s and John’s accounts:

The different Gospels simply emphasize different things and omit some things others include. There is no inexorable contradictions here. Harmonies of the Gospels (here’s an online version by A. T. Robertson) show how a non-contradictory scenario can be constructed of all of Jesus’ journeys.

Mark contradicts Luke and John on the issue of how Jesus was sentenced:

“According to Matthew and Mark, Jesus was both tried and sentenced by the Jewish priests of the Sanhedrin. Luke has it that Jesus was [not] sentenced by them. Yet according to John, Jesus does not appear before the Sanhedrin at all.” [“The Jesus Mysteries” by Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy (1999) ]

The ultimate sentence of crucifixion could not have been made by the Jews in any event. Only the Romans could put a man to death in that place at that time (see Jn 18:31). So Matthew records that the Sanhedrin concluded that Jesus “deserves death” (26:66), but they couldn’t sentence him. That’s why they had to send him to the Roman governor Pontius Pilate (Mt 27:1-2), who “delivered him to be crucified” (27:26). So Freke and Gandy are dead wrong in their assessment of what Matthew taught in this regard. The story in Mark is precisely the same. The Sanhedrin unanimously “condemned him as deserving death” (14:64), sent him to Pilate (15:1), who alone could sentence Him, and Pilate “delivered him to be crucified” (15:15). So the “interpretation” (to be charitable) above is dead wrong again.

Luke is no different. The Sanhedrin judged Him (as supposedly a blasphemer) in effect by saying, “What further testimony do we need? We have heard it ourselves from his own lips” (22:71). They “brought him before Pilate” (23:1), and we see them still trying to get Him killed (23:2, 5, 10, 14, 18, 21, 23). But Pilate decided (23:24-25). No essential difference whatsoever, and no contradiction. So the atheists, undaunted, and unconcerned with mere reason and never dissuaded from their aim of tearing down the Bible, simply move on to the Gospel of John, in their never-ending mocking crusade to find yet another biblical “contradiction.” What do we find there?

John reports that Jesus was first questioned by Annas: “the father-in-law of Ca’iaphas, who was high priest that year” (Jn 18:13), who “questioned Jesus about his disciples and his teaching ” (Jn 18:19). Annas “Annas then sent him bound to Ca’iaphas the high priest” (18:24). Then “they [implied: the Sanhedrin] led Jesus from the house of Ca’iaphas to the praetorium [where Pilate was]” (18:28). And “They answered him, “If this man were not an evildoer, we would not have handed him over” (18:30). Note that Caiaphas was present at the judgment and “monkey trial” of the Sanhedrin, as indicated by Matthew 26:57, 62, Mark (not named, but mentioned as the “high priest”: 14:53-54, 60, 63, 66), and Luke (“high priest”: 22:54).

So it’s all the same overall story, told by four storytellers, with the expected differences in detail and emphases that we would expect in any four different accounts of the same incident. Matthew and John refer directly to Caiphas the high priest as being involved (Matthew mentions also the assembly, whereas John doesn’t (directly), but still indicates their presence by the two uses of “they” in describing the Jewish leaders leading Jesus to Pilate. Mark and Luke don’t name him, but note that the “high priest” was involved, which is no contradiction.

So we see that Freke and Gandy have misrepresented the nature of all four Gospels in this regard. It’s nothing new, folks. It happens all the time, and I am demonstrating it over and over in this paper. Atheists don’t care what the biblical accounts state, because they think they are a pack of lies written by liars and propagandists, and they approach the Bible like a butcher approaches a hog. There’s no rhyme or reason in any of it; only irrational hostility: which alone can explain how they can consistently be factually and logically wrong, every time.

This is my fourth lengthy paper in the last seven days (links: one, two, three), exhaustively demonstrating that they get everything wrong when they attempt to do biblical exegesis and hermeneutics. Their efforts may look mighty impressive and convincing at first: until a biblical scholar or apologist like myself (who specializes in dealing with anti-theist / anti-biblical polemics) examines what they write and provides another side.

The gospel of Mark does not describe the history of Jesus or his virgin birth.

It doesn’t have to. Mark simply decided to start the story with John the Baptist, whom the Old Testament predicted (as a prototype of Elijah) as the forerunner of the Messiah. In other words, Mark presents the story as most people at that place and time would have witnessed or experienced it: Jesus suddenly appearing out of nowhere at His baptism and commencing His three-year ministry.

These parts of the New Testament’s stories were added by Matthew, 30 years later, who assimilated other myths into the legends.

It’s simply an atheist fairy-tale, with no basis. If they want to make ludicrous claims like this, the burden of proof is on them. But they have nothing. It’s just wild skeptical speculation.

“The accounts of Matthew, Mark and Luke contradict each other, even on the parts of Christian mythology which Christians consider to be the most important: The crucifixion and resurrection. They give different sets of final words, confusingly different accounts of the empty tomb (one of them including an earthquake), and wildly different accounts of the resurrection. They’re all making it up!” [“The Crucifixion Facade” by Vexen Crabtree (2002) ]

The final words of Jesus on the cross are completely harmonious and non-contradictory, as A. T. Robertson shows in his Harmony and as many others have demonstrated. It’s not difficult to synthesize them. It just take s a little work on the chronology.

I just demonstrated in two lengthy papers that all the accusations about contradictory accounts of the empty tomb and Jesus’ resurrection are bogus and a bunch of hot air.

Mr. Crabtree then tries to establish a contradiction between Matthew 20:29-34, where it is said that Jesus healed two blind men, and Mark 10:46-52, where He is said to heal one. Gleason Archer in his Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 1982, p. 333) wrote:

Matthew was concerned to mention all who were involved in this episode . . . Matthew is content to record that actual scene of healing, whereas Luke gives particular attention to the entire proceedings, from the moment that  Bartimaeus first heard about Jesus’ arrival — a feature only cursorily suggested by Mark 10:46 — because he is interested in the beggar’s persistence in request before the cure was actually performed on him. As for the second blind beggar, neither Mark nor Luke find him significant enough to mention; presumably he was the more colorless personality of the two.

No contradiction; no problem at all. Mark and Luke decide to focus on one blind man, whereas Matthew mentions a second as well. So what?

Mr. Crabtree produced a few more challenges, but I replied to 95% of his paper, and I am out of both energy and patience with tomfoolery at this point, having worked on this all day, so I will leave it here.

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Photo credit: Saint Mark (1450), by Andrea Mantegna (1431-1506) [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]

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2021-02-04T13:39:06-04:00

Last updated on: February 4, 2021 at 1:39 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 the post on Jonathan’s site, “Contradictions in the Resurrection of Jesus Accounts” (1-31-21): a guest-post written by one David Austin. This is my second reply. The first dealt with the 18-point chart. Now I tackle the text after it. David Austin’s words will be in blue.

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Paul has no mention of an empty tomb; Just Jesus was “buried”.

Acts 13:28-37 (RSV) Though they could charge him with nothing deserving death, yet they asked Pilate to have him killed. [29] And when they had fulfilled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree, and laid him in a tomb. [30] But God raised him from the dead; [31] and for many days he appeared to those who came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are now his witnesses to the people. [32] And we bring you the good news that what God promised to the fathers, [33] this he has fulfilled to us their children by raising Jesus; as also it is written in the second psalm, `Thou art my Son, today I have begotten thee.’ [34] And as for the fact that he raised him from the dead, no more to return to corruption, he spoke in this way, `I will give you the holy and sure blessings of David.’ [35] Therefore he says also in another psalm, `Thou wilt not let thy Holy One see corruption.’ [36] For David, after he had served the counsel of God in his own generation, fell asleep, and was laid with his fathers, and saw corruption; [37] but he whom God raised up saw no corruption.

[“tomb” was mentioned in 13:29, then Paul says Jesus was “raised him from the dead.” That’s an “empty tomb” is it not?: by straightforward logical deduction. Jesus wasn’t there anymore, and “for many days he appeared” (13:31). Inexorable conclusion: empty tomb!] There are many many more references to Jesus’ Resurrection in Paul:

Acts 17:2-3 And Paul went in, as was his custom, and for three weeks he argued with them from the scriptures, [3] explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead, and saying, “This Jesus, whom I proclaim to you, is the Christ.”

Acts 17:30-31 The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all men everywhere to repent, [31] because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and of this he has given assurance to all men by raising him from the dead.”

Acts 26:22-23 To this day I have had the help that comes from God, and so I stand here testifying both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would come to pass: [23] that the Christ must suffer, and that, by being the first to rise from the dead, he would proclaim light both to the people and to the Gentiles.”

Romans 1:4 and designated Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord,

Romans 4:24 . . . It will be reckoned to us who believe in him that raised from the dead Jesus our Lord,

[see also: Rom 4:24-25; 6:4-5, 9; 7:4; 8:11, 34; 10:9; 1 Cor 6:14; 15:3-8, 12-17, 20; 2 Cor 4:14; 5:15; Gal 1:1; Eph 1:20; Phil 3:10; Col 2:12; 1 Thess 1:10; 2 Tim 2:8]

Normal practice with crucified victims was for their bodies to rot on the cross, and then thrown into a mass grave.

It’s pretty impossible to argue that there could be no conceivable exceptions to this “normal practice” ever. So it’s much ado about nothing. But Protestant apologist Timothy Paul Jones offers an excellent rebuttal to this argument (fashionable among atheists and skeptics): “Is it Possible That Jesus’ Body Was Left on the Cross?” (4-6-12).

According to Paul, if the Resurrection had not occurred, then Christians’ faith is in vain. One would, therefore, expect the Resurrection to be the best corroborated event in the NT, but, as you can see, in the above chart, this is NOT the case. If there are contradictions, this means at least one account  (& maybe more) is incorrect. 

That’s why I wrote this paper and the one before it. I believe I refuted all 18 alleged contradictions, so there is nothing to the charge. And if indeed contradictions aren’t demonstrable, as I contend, then it means that the atheists coming up with such bogus nonsense have a serious problem with 1) logic and [possibly] 2) reading comprehension. They certainly don’t — on the whole — have a clue about biblical exegesis. I’ve shown that over and over in my refutations of atheist “exegetes”: who approach the Bible (as I always say) like a butcher approaches a hog.

The four Gospels are anonymous; The “authorship” of these writings was a 2nd Century addition and was merely speculation by the early Church. The gospels were written in Greek, but it is generally agreed that Jesus & the Disciples spoke Aramaic and were “unlettered”.

Tax collectors for the Romans were in fact, literate and well-educated. Thus, Matthew very likely would have known Greek and Latin. We learn from Colossians 4:14 that Luke was a medical doctor. Wyatt Graham observed:

Consider for example the testimony of a bishop named Papias [c. 60-c. 130 AD] who lived while some disciples of Jesus still lived. For example, he had access to John the elder and Ariston, who were disciples of Jesus. He also knew of the daughters of Phillip who lived nearby to him (Acts 21:8–9). And Papias records the words of one of Jesus’ disciples by the name of John the Elder regarding Mark’s Gospel:

And the elder used to say this: “Mark, having become Peter’s interpreter, wrote down accurately everything he remembered, though not in order, of the things either said or done by Christ. For [Mark] neither heard the Lord nor [accompanied] him, but afterward, as I said, [accompanied] Peter. (Frag. Pap. 3.15; I modified slightly Holmes’ translation) . . .

Papias also records that Matthew wrote the Gospel according to Matthew (Frag. Pap. 3.16). So, Papias lived while disciples of Jesus still lived, and he also lived when the Gospels were being written (or was born around this period). And it is Papias who affirms that Peter committed his preaching to words through Mark’s hand (through the testimony of John). And it is Papias who affirms that Matthew, an apostle of Jesus, wrote the Gospel according to Matthew.

As for Luke as the author of the book bearing his name, see: “Who Wrote the Gospel of Luke and Acts” by Brian Chilton (7-2-17), and by the same writer: “Who Wrote the Gospel of John?” (9-3-17). Chilton thinks that John dictated his Gospel.

Matthew & Mark have the women being instructed for the Disciples to meet Jesus in Galilee.

So what? Unless they say something like “this is the only time they saw the risen Jesus” there is no contradiction. It gets very tiresome having to reiterate elementary logic over and over.

Matthew has the Disciples’ one & only sighting of Jesus on a mountain in Galilee.

This is an absolutely classic and “textbook” example of the dumbfounded and intellectually dishonest methodology of atheist Bible-bashers: seeing “contradictions” under every rock. Nothing in the text of Matthew even remotely hints at this being the “one & only sighting of Jesus.” That’s simply a groundless, completely arbitrary extrapolation from David Austin’s brain with nothing to back it up.

The original manuscripts of Mark end at Chapter 16 verse 8 (Frightened women run from the tomb and tell no-one). . . . Since the women, in Mark, don’t tell the Disciples about what they were told, we can only speculate whether they ever met Jesus at all.

I dealt with this claim concerning the supposed non-canonicity of Mark 16:9-20 in the previous paper. But even if one accepts the shorter version of Mark 16, I wrote about 16:8 in another paper on this same topic:

1) The last clause gives no indication of how long they “said nothing.” It may not have been very long at all. We can only guess or speculate. 2)  “Said nothing” with no indication of how long the silence was, is not the same thing as saying that they never mentioned it to anyone, ever.

Luke & John contradict Matthew. Luke has two Jesus meetings with the Disciples, prior to a locked room meeting, (ie. With two Disciples on the road to Emmaus, and a meeting with Peter {time & location unspecified}) followed by a meeting with all Eleven Disciples in a room in Jerusalem. At this meeting, Jesus specifically tells them NOT to leave Jerusalem until “clothed in power from on high” (ie Pentecost). No 2nd meeting in Jerusalem or Galilee meeting.

Unlike Luke, John has the 1st sighting of Jesus by Ten Disciples in a locked room in Jerusalem, followed by two more appearances to them; 2nd in Jerusalem to Eleven and 3rd at the Sea of Tiberias to seven (This appearance specifically noted as the 3rd, hence NO prior visit to Galilee, “Road to Emmaus” or separate meeting with Peter). . . .  Paul’s Corinthians 15:3 states that the first appearance of the resurrected Jesus was to Cephas (Peter), but according to the Gospel accounts the first witness(es) would be Mary Magdalene & the other Mary, Mary Magdalene alone, or Cleopas & another un-named Disciple, not Peter. 

For a quite sufficient explanation, see the article, “To Galilee or Jerusalem?” by Eric Lyons, at the excellent Apologetics Press website. Here is the heart of his argument:

The truth is, Jesus met with His disciples in both places, but He did so at different times. One of the reasons so many people allege that two or more Bible passages are contradictory is because they fail to recognize that mere differences do not necessitate a contradiction. For there to be a bona fide contradiction, not only must one be referring to the same person, place, or thing in the same sense, but the same time period must be under consideration. . . .

Similarly, Jesus met with His disciples both in Jerusalem and in Galilee, but at different times. On the day of His resurrection, He met with all of the apostles (except Thomas) in Jerusalem just as both Luke and John recorded (Luke 24:33-43; John 20:19-25). Since Jesus was on the Earth for only forty days following His resurrection (cf. Acts 1:3), sometime between this meeting with His apostles in Jerusalem and His ascension more than five weeks later, Jesus met with seven of His disciples at the Sea of Tiberias in Galilee (John 21:1-14), and later with all eleven of the apostles on a mountain in Galilee that Jesus earlier had appointed for them (Matthew 28:16).

Sometime following these meetings in Galilee, Jesus and His disciples traveled back to Judea, where He ascended into heaven from the Mount of Olives near Bethany (Luke 24:50-53; Acts 1:9-12). None of the accounts of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances contradicts another. Rather, each writer supplemented what a different writer left out. . . .

Still, one may ask, “Why did Jesus command His apostles to ‘tarry in the city of Jerusalem’ on the day of His resurrection until they were ‘endued with power from on high’ (Luke 24:49), if He really wanted them to meet Him in Galilee?” Actually, it is an assumption to assert that Jesus made the above statement on the same day that He arose from the grave. One thing we must keep in mind as we study the Bible is that it normally is not as concerned about chronology as modern-day writings.

Frequently (especially in the gospel accounts), writers went from one subject to the next without giving the actual time or the exact order in which something was done or taught (cf. Luke 4:1-3; Matthew 4:1-11). In Luke 24, the writer omitted the post-resurrection appearances of Jesus in Galilee (mentioned by both Matthew and John). However, notice that he never stated that Jesus remained only in Jerusalem from the day He rose from the grave until the day He ascended up into heaven.

See also an article from the always superb Christian Think Tank site, by Glenn Miller, entitled, “Do the Resurrection accounts HOPELESSLY contradict one another?” He includes the following summary of  Protestant theologian and exegete Murray Harris’ chronological schema of post-Resurrection appearances of Jesus: 

1. Mary Magdalene followed Peter and John to the tomb, saw two angels inside, and then met Jesus (John 20: 11-17; cf Mark 16:9).

2. Mary (the mother of James and Joses) and Salome met Jesus and were directed to tell his brethren to go to Galilee (Matt. 28:9-10).

3. During the afternoon Jesus appeared to two disciples on the way to Emmaus. They then returned to Jerusalem to report the appearance to the Eleven and others (Luke 24:13-35; c£ Mark 16:12-13).

4. Jesus appeared to Peter (Luke 24:34; 1 Cor. 15 :5).

5. That evening Jesus appeared to the Eleven and others (Luke 24:33), Thomas being absent (Luke 24:36-43; John 20:19-23; 1 Cor. 15:5; cf Mark 16:14).

6. One week later Jesus appeared to the Eleven, Thomas being present (John 20:26-29) .

7. Seven disciples had an encounter with Jesus by the Sea of Tiberias in Galilee (John 21: 1-22).

8. The Eleven met Jesus on a mountain in Galilee (Matt. 28:16-20; cf Mark 16:15-18).

9. Jesus appeared to more than five hundred people (Luke 24:44-49; 1 Cor. 15:6).

10. He appeared to James (1 Cor. 15 :7) .

11. Immediately before his ascension, Jesus appeared to the Eleven near Bethany (Luke 24:50-52; Acts 1:6-11; 1 Cor. 15:7; cf Mark 16: 19-20).

Assuming the women had gone to anoint the body, how did they expect to gain access to the body with the stone in position, and guards barring the entrance? (Note: Only Matthew mentions guards at the tomb) Protestant apologist William Lane Craig adequately refutes this:

Would that have kept the women away? Well, maybe so, but only if they knew of the guard. But did they know? When you read Mark and Matthew’s accounts of the women’s observation of Jesus’ interment (Mark 15.46-47; Matthew 27.57-61), what you find is that the guard was not posted on Friday when the women watched Joseph inter the body in the tomb. The guard was something of an afterthought on the part of the Jewish authorities, who went to Pilate on the following day (Saturday) to ask that the tomb be sealed and a guard posted before it.

Saturday was, of course, the Jewish Sabbath, and Luke records of the women that “On the sabbath they rested according to the commandment” (Luke 23.56). Like the male disciples, they may have remained in seclusion all that day (cf. John 20.19). So there’s no reason at all to think that when the women set out for the tomb at early dawn on Sunday morning, they expected to find that the tomb was guarded and sealed. That’s why “they were saying to one another, ‘Who will roll away the stone for us from the door of the tomb?’” (Mark 16.3). They didn’t know if anybody would be there. So I see no problem in affirming the compatibility of Matthew’s guard story with the women’s intent to anoint Jesus’ corpse.

As to the stone, Fr. Charles Grondin proposes two possible solutions to the proposed “difficulty”:

The women had seen where Jesus had been placed (Mark 15:47) but might not have stayed long enough to see the stone rolled in front of the tomb, and they asked the question recorded in Mark 16:3 only once they saw the stone from a distance. . . .

The woman expected to encounter other people either along the way or in the vicinity who could roll it back for them—for example, the gardener (John 20:15).

Why was stone rolled away if Jesus could enter locked rooms? Maybe for some-one to remove the body?

Orthodox Christian Network answers this:

There can hardly be any Christian believer who doesn’t know that an angel descended from heaven and rolled away the stone from the entry to the tomb where the Creator of life lay dead, without breath. Very few, however really know why the stone was rolled away. Most people confuse two things which are independent of each other: the Lord’s exit from the tomb and the rolling away of the stone.

In other words, they think that the angel came down and rolled away the stone so that the Lord could emerge, that when He did so there was an earthquake which terrified the guards to such an extent that they ‘became as if dead’. This is not only what ordinary Christians believe, but even what some of those who preach the Gospel think. In many icons of the Resurrection, in fact, both Byzantine and Western, we see the angel taking away the stone and the Lord emerging from the tomb, while the guards, terrified at the sight of Him, fall down as if dead.

This is historically inaccurate! If you study the Gospel of Matthew carefully, you’ll see that the Lord had emerged from the tomb before the descent of the angel, the rolling away of the stone, and the earthquake which occurred at the same time. The stone was rolled away, not so that the Lord could emerge, but to demonstrate that He’d already done so.

If Mary’s tomb visit (in John) was earlier than the visit in Matthew, why did she not encounter any guards?

Because, as John 20:1 states, she “saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb.” An angel had already removed the stone and as a result, “the guards trembled and became like dead men” (Mt 28:4). Presumably they also fled as a result (likely for fear of their lives, for the penalty for not properly guarding something was death in Roman law); therefore, Mary didn’t see them.

Matthew & John say the women/woman met Jesus at the tomb, but Mark & Luke says there was NO such meeting.

Where do Mark and Luke say there was no such meeting? They don’t. So this is just another non-contradiction that atheists somehow conjure up as an authentic one. To not mention something is logically not the same as denying the same thing. The latter would have been a contradiction if Mark and Luke actually did it.  But they didn’t, so it isn’t. But it’s another classic example of atheist special pleading.

The women in Luke see two men inside the tomb BEFORE Peter inspects the empty tomb, but John says that Mary Magdalene saw two angels inside the tomb AFTER Peter & Beloved Disciple had inspected the tomb.

So what? Angels could have been there both times.

The ascension of Jesus is only mentioned in Luke, apparently on the same day as his resurrection (contradicted in Acts [supposedly also written by “Luke”] which says Jesus remained on earth for forty days).

I answer that in this paper: Seidensticker Folly #15: Jesus’ Ascension: One or 40 Days? [9-10-18]

How did the chief priests and Pharisees know that Jesus would be resurrected after 3 days when the Disciples didn’t seem to understand this?

Two Bible commentaries (writing about Matthew 27:63) provide answers:

It appears, then, that though they had deliberately stirred up the passions of the people by representing the mysterious words of John 2:14 as threatening a literal destruction of the Temple (Matthew 26:61; Matthew 27:40), they themselves had understood, wholly or in part, their true meaning. We are, perhaps, surprised that they should in this respect have been more clear-sighted than the disciples, but in such a matter sorrow and disappointment confuse, and suspicion sharpens the intellect. (Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers)

after three days I will rise again: now, though he said to his to his disciples privately, Matthew 16:21, yet not clearly and expressly to the Scribes and Pharisees; wherefore they must either have it from Judas, and lied in saying they remembered it: or they gathered it either from what he said concerning the sign of the prophet Jonas, Matthew 12:40, or rather from his words in John 2:19, and if so, they acted a most wicked part, in admitting a charge against him, as having a design upon their temple, to destroy it, and then rebuild it in three days; when they knew those words were spoken by him concerning his death, and resurrection from the dead: they remembered this, when the disciples did not: bad men have sometimes good memories, and good men bad ones; so that memory is no sign of grace, (Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible)

Who witnessed this meeting when guards were sent to secure the tomb? Who witnessed the meeting between the guards and the chief priests when a bribe was suggested?

Simply because we can’t determine either thing from the texts alone, doesn’t mean or logically follow that there were none, or that this person or persons could not have communicated it to Matthew. Matthew may have also received it by direct revelation from God (under the Christian view that the Bible is inspired writing and God’s revelation to mankind). In any event, this is not a “contradiction”; only an unknown (two different things). But certainly plausible hypotheses exist.

Paul says Jesus appeared to “The Twelve” but if Judas Iscariot was no longer a Disciple, there would be only eleven of them left for Jesus to appear to, not twelve.

Protestant apologist Eric Lyons provides the rebuttal:

Numerous alleged Bible discrepancies arise because skeptics frequently interpret figurative language in a literal fashion. They treat God’s Word as if it were a dissertation on the Pythagorean theorem rather than a book written using ordinary language. . . . The simple solution to this numbering “problem” is that “the twelve” to which Paul referred was not a literal number, but the designation of an office. This term is used merely “to point out the society of the apostles, who, though at this time they were only eleven, were still called the twelve, because this was their original number, and a number which was afterward filled up” (Clarke, 1996). Gordon Fee stated that Paul’s use of the term “twelve” in 1 Corinthians 15:5 “is a clear indication that in the early going this was a title given to the special group of twelve whom Jesus called to ‘be with him’ (Mark 3:14).

This figurative use of numbers is just as common in English vernacular as it was in the ancient languages. In certain collegiate sports, one can refer to the Big Ten conference, which consists of 14 teams, or the Atlantic Ten conference, which is also made up of 14 teams. At one time, these conferences only had ten teams, but when they exceeded that number, they kept their original conference “names.” Their names are a designation for a particular conference, not a literal number.

In 1884, the term “two-by-four” was coined to refer to a piece of lumber two-by-four inches. Interestingly, a two-by-four still is called a two-by-four, even though today it is trimmed to slightly smaller dimensions (1 5/8 by 3 5/8). Again, the numbers are more of a designation than a literal number.

Biblical use of “the twelve” as a designation for the original disciples is strongly indicated in many Gospel passages. Jesus Himself did this: “Did I not choose you, the twelve . . .?” (Jn 6:70). He didn’t say, “did I not choose you twelve men.” By saying, “the twelve” in the way He did, it’s proven that it was a [not always literal] title for the group. Hence, John refers to “Thomas, one of the twelve” after Judas departed, and before he was replaced by Matthias (Jn 20:24). Paul simply continues the same practice. It was also used because “twelve” was an important number in biblical thinking (40 and 70 are two other such numbers). For a plain and undeniable example of this, see Revelation 21:12, 14, 21.

Luke contradicts himself in 3 places during this Resurrection account :- a) Early text states the women meet 2 men inside the tomb, but later says the women met 2 angels there. b) Early text has “only” Peter inspecting the empty tomb, but later text has “some” Disciples going to the tomb.

These two are simply not contradictions, as shown last time.

Early text has Jesus’ body being wrapped in a cloth, but later, the Disciples see cloths in the empty tomb. Matthew, Mark & Luke say Joseph wrapped Jesus’ body in “a clean linen cloth” (ie one cloth), but John says “linen cloths, as per Jewish tradition. John has the Disciples, when inspecting the empty tomb, seeing a separate cloth that covered Jesus’ head, & Luke mentions the Disciples seeing cloths. 

Ethan R. Longhenry explains:

[O]ne particular detail is associated with Peter and John’s visitation to the tomb in John 20:4-7 . . . : the othonion, the linen cloths, were lying on the ground, and the soudarion, normally a handkerchief but also used to cover the head of a corpse (cf. Luke 19:20, John 11:44, Acts 19:12), was in its own place and rolled up. They were the only things left in the otherwise empty tomb.

Today we tend to dress up the dead in their best clothing or in some sort of clothing most special to them. In first century Judea it was customary to wrap the dead body in strips of linen cloths (othonion) and covering the face with the soudarion.

So this is two different things (apples and oranges). It’s not a “contradiction” (as I have by now explained umpteen times) because the head napkin is not mentioned by all accounts. The latter’s existence is not expressly denied (which would be a contradiction). It would be like the time I wore a suit and also my fedora to a wedding. Someone might say, “Dave was dressed up in his nicest suit” and another could say, “Dave was wearing his ‘gangster’ pinstriped suit and also a cool hat.” Both are true, and they are not contradictory. I was wearing a [pinstriped] suit, and I was wearing a hat, and I was wearing both.

When will anti-theist atheists hellbent on opposing the Bible at every turn, ever comprehend these elementary things? This is far from rocket science. Dumbfounded atheist attempted biblical “exegesis” — besides often being hysterically funny —  seems to be an ongoing proof of Romans 1:21-22 (RSV): “. . . they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened. [22] Claiming to be wise, they became fools,”

NB: Mark has Joseph of Arimathea buying a linen cloth. How could he buy this cloth when all shops were closed for Passover?

Theology Web hosted a discussion on this non-issue (“Joseph of Arimathea Buying Linen On Passover?”) in which one of the commenters shredded this “gotcha” question:

The imagined issue here is that it was illegal to work and to buy or sell goods on Passover per the following passages: [cites Ex 12:16; Lev 23:6-7; Neh 10:31]

Joseph, who was prominent on the council, would appear to be publicly breaking Jewish law by buying linen on Passover, and he couldn’t do it on the Sabbath (which was the next day) either. There appear to be a number of solutions to this issue though. So, starting with NT scholar Harold Hoehner, “The purchases of Joseph of Arimathea were proper for necessities could be obtained on the Sabbath (and on a feast day).” His source for this is Mishnah Shabbath 23.4[:] “One may await the dusk at the limits of the techoom, to furnish what is necessary for a bride and for a corpse, and to bring a coffin and shrouds for the latter.” “By ‘techoom’ is meant the distance of 2,000 ells [7,500 feet] which a man may traverse on the Sabbath, and refers to the limits of that distance.”

Hoehner also cites Gustaf Dalman’s Jesus – Jeshua: Studies in the Gospels (1929), where Dalman points out that these were extenuating circumstances. A criminal who had been hung (crucifixion was a type of hanging) had to be buried by nightfall to prevent the land from being defiled and burial on the Sabbath was likely not permitted. The body couldn’t lay out in the hot Judean environment for two days. It had to be buried,

See related papers:

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

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

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Photo credit: geralt (1-23-21) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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2021-01-14T15:45:31-04:00

Last updated on: January 14, 2021 at 3:45 pm   By

Biblical View of Astronomy, Laws of Nature, and the Natural World

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.” His words will be in blue.

*****

I am replying to the following portion of Jonathan’s article, “Frank Tipler refuted on his Star of Bethlehem thesis by Aaron Adair” (8-10-12), and a related comment on another of his posts as well (all bolding added presently):

[Y]ou should consider the possibility that the Star of Bethlehem was a supernatural phenomenon. As such, it may have been visible to the Magi only – which would explain why nobody else saw it. We don’t know. But in that case, there would be nothing to prevent it from resting over a house. . . . I don’t know why Christians bother with trying to find naturalistic explanations for something so clearly supernaturalist. The Bible is full of supernaturalism – why plead this is naturalistic and then look for an incredibly ad hoc and uncorroborated naturalistic explanation! [two typos corrected]

Now, if the star is naturalistic, then the whole world could have seen it, and could have interpreted its indicative nature. Why only three or so Eastern Magi did is bizarre. That no one from Jerusalem follows the star with these people is odd. Even if the Jerusalemites were unanimously skeptical (imagine the probability of THAT!) . . . that not a single person ventured three hours south to verify or falsify the claims of the chief priests and scribes is utterly intelligible. So, really, the star must have been supernatural and only appeared to the vision of the Magi. Nothing else is particularly coherent. (12-22-14)

Jonathan has this notion in his head that the star of Bethlehem described in the Bible “must have been supernatural.” Any natural explanation is, in his opinion, “incredibly ad hoc and uncorroborated” and not “particularly coherent.”  

Why he thinks this way (what presupposition — who knows what? — allegedly requires it) is anybody’s guess. Atheists have this very odd trait of always seeming to think that they know the Bible much much better than those gullible, ignorant Christians who waste their entire lives studying and being devoted to the Bible (believing to be God’s infallible revelation to mankind). In my case, I’ve done so for over 40 years: the last forty as a Christian apologist, and the last nineteen as an apologist by profession / occupation.

In any event, Jonathan magisterially and dogmatically pontificates that the explanation can only be “supernatural” and that nothing else will do, and that this is, indeed, obvious to any rational person. In fact, Christian scholars and commentators and exegetes have come down on both sides of the question, and have offered both supernatural and natural explanations. That being the case, each interpreter can only provide their own reasons for why they believe as they do, in an effort to persuade others. This is how it is for many Bible passages, that allow for differing interpretations. 

I shall argue here that the natural explanation is not ruled out at all, and is quite plausible, based on the analogy of how the Bible treats natural phenomena: particularly astronomical ones. The Bible expresses an acquaintance with the stars by the ancient Hebrews:

Saturn is no less certainly represented by the star Kaiwan, adored by the reprobate Israelites in the desert (Amos 5:26) [RSV: “You shall take up Sakkuth your king, and Kaiwan your star-god, your images, which you made for yourselves;”]. The same word (interpreted to mean “steadfast”) frequently designates, in the Babylonian inscriptions, the slowest-moving planet; while Sakkuth, the divinity associated with the star by the prophet, is an alternative appellation for Ninib, who, as a Babylonian planet-god, was merged with Saturn. The ancient Syrians and Arabs, too, called Saturn Kaiwan, the corresponding terms in the Zoroastrian Bundahish being Kevan. . . . Gad and Meni (Isaias, lxv, 11 [Isaiah 65:11]) are, no doubt, the “greater and the lesser Fortune” typified throughout the East by Jupiter and Venus; Neba, the tutelary deity of Borsippa (Isaias xlvi, 1 [Isaiah 46:1]), shone in the sky as Mercury, and Nergal, transplanted from Assyria to Kutha (2 Kings 17:30), as Mars. . . .

In a striking passage the Prophet Amos (v, 8 [RSV: “He who made the Plei’ades and Orion . . .”) glorifies the Creator as “Him that made Kimah and Kesil“, . . . The word, which occurs twice in the Book of Job (ix, 9; xxxviii, 31) [9:9, RSV: “who made the Bear and Orion, the Plei’ades and the chambers of the south;” / 38:31: “Can you bind the chains of the Plei’ades, or loose the cords of Orion?”], is treated in the Septuagint version as equivalent to Pleiades. This, also, is the meaning given to it in the Talmud and throughout Syrian literature; it is supported by etymological evidences, the Hebrew term being obviously related to the Arabic root kum (accumulate), and the Assyrian kamu (to bind); while the “chains of Kimah”, referred to in the sacred text, not inaptly figure the coercive power imparting unity to a multiple object. The associated constellation Kesil is doubtless no other than our Orion. . . . We may then safely admit that Kimah and Kesil did actually designate the Pleiades and Orion. (Catholic Encyclopedia [1907], “Astronomy in the Bible”; “Astronomical allusions in the Old Testament”)

The Old Testament refers to “constellations” (RSV) four times (2 Kgs 23:5; Is 13:10; Wisdom 7:19, 29). The word in Isaiah 13:10 (“constellations” also in KJV) is the Hebrew Kesil (already noted above; Strong’s word #3685), meaning “a heavenly constellation.” It appears also in Job 9:9; 38:31, and Amos 5:8: translated as “Orion” in the KJV). 2 Kings 2:35 in the KJV renders as “planets” the Hebrew mazzaloth (Strong’s word #4208), which means “constellations, perhaps signs of the zodiac.”

Thus, we find that the ancient Hebrews (Job usually being considered the oldest book of the Old Testament), were quite aware of both planets and constellations, as natural heavenly bodies, created by God.

The Bible (KJV) refers to the “ordinances” of the heavens and the stars. The Hebrew word is chuqqah (Strong’s word #2708), meaning “something prescribed, an enactment, statute.” Just as statutes were part of Mosaic law, chuqqah as applied to the stars and astronomy referred to their natural course across the sky, or, in other words, the “statutes of nature” / laws of nature as applied to the stars in the sky, in these three passages:

Job 38:33 (RSV) Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you establish their rule on the earth?

Jeremiah 31:35 Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar . . .

Jeremiah 33:25 Thus says the LORD: If I have not established my covenant with day and night and the ordinances of heaven and earth,

Hence, other translations have renderings like “laws of the heavens” (NIV and Goodspeed) and “rules that govern the heavens . . . laws of nature on earth” (NEB) for Job 38:33, and “fixed patterns of heaven and earth” (NASB) or “laws of heaven and earth” (NIV) for Jeremiah 33:25. The idea is clearly the laws of nature or scientific laws governing the movement of celestial bodies. The stars have “courses” (Judges 5:20). In other words, it’s a primitive way of expressing a “proto-scientific” understanding in the categories that would be comprehensible to ancient Hebrews. Even so, they came very close to the mark indeed (and of course to the Christian this suggests a divine guiding hand in the authors).

Job 38:32 . . . can you guide the Bear with its children? (cf. 9:9 noted and cited above)

The reference is to the constellation Arcturus, or Ursa Major, in the northern sky. The “sons” referred to are the stars that accompany it, probably the stars that are now called the “tail of the bear.” (Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Whole Bible)

Most people in America know these stars by another name:

The Big Dipper (US, Canada) or the Plough (UK, Ireland) is a large asterism consisting of seven bright stars of the constellation Ursa Major; . . . Four define a “bowl” or “body” and three define a “handle” or “head”. It is recognized as a distinct grouping in many cultures. . . .

The constellation of Ursa Major (Latin: Greater Bear) has been seen as a bear, a wagon, or a ladle. (Wikipedia: “Big Dipper”)

The Bible — very clearly, and in the opinion of most commentators — refers to both solar and lunar eclipses:

Isaiah 13:10 . . . the sun will be dark at its rising and the moon will not shed its light.

Joel 2:10 . . . The sun and the moon are darkened, . . .

Joel 2:31 The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, . . . (cf. Acts 2:19-20)

Amos 8:9 . . . I will make the sun go down at noon, and darken the earth in broad daylight.

Revelation 6:12 . . . the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood

The ancient Hebrews, like the ancient Greeks, noted the phenomenon of the “morning star”:

Such a first appearance of a star was termed by the Greek astronomers its “heliacal” rising, and the mention in Scripture of “morning stars,” or “stars of the twilight” (Job 38:7; 3:9), shows that the Hebrews like the Greeks were familiar with this feature of the ordinances of heaven, and noted the progress of the year by observation of the apparent changes of the celestial host. One star would herald the beginning of spring, another the coming of winter; the time to plow, the time to sow, the time of the rains would all be indicated by successive “morning stars” as they appeared. (International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, 1915, “Astronomy, I”)

St. Augustine in the 5th century and St. Thomas Aquinas in the 13th, both rejected astrology long before modern science, while even the most prominent modern scientists in the 16th-17th centuries, such as Galileo, Tycho Brahe, and Kepler firmly believed in it.

The above shall suffice as a crash course in biblical astronomy. For related papers on the Bible and science, see:

Biblical Flat Earth (?) Cosmology: Dialogue w Atheist (vs. Matthew Green) [9-11-06]

Flat Earth: Biblical Teaching? (vs. Ed Babinski) [9-17-06]

Demonic Possession or Epilepsy? (Bible & Science) [2015]

Old Earth, Flood Geology, Local Flood, & Uniformitarianism (vs. Kevin Rice) [5-25-04; many defunct links removed and new ones added: 5-10-17]

Seidensticker Folly #21: Atheist “Bible Science” Absurdities [9-25-18]

Seidensticker Folly #23: Atheist “Bible Science” Inanities, Pt. 2 [10-2-18]

Loftus Atheist Error #9: Bible Espouses Mythical Animals? [9-10-19]

Seidensticker Folly #42: Creation “Ex Nihilo” [8-28-20]

“Quantum Entanglement” & the “Upholding” Power of God [10-20-20]

Seidensticker Folly #59: Medieval Hospitals & Medicine [11-3-20]

I’d like to highlight two additional areas where the Bible and the ancient Hebrew worldview was quite empirical and practical, rather than prone to quick supernatural, non-scientific, or so-called “snake oil” explanations.

Hippocrates, the pagan Greek “father of medicine” didn’t understand the causes of contagious disease. Nor did medical science until the 19th century. But the hygienic principles that would have prevented the spread of such diseases were in the Bible: in the Laws of Moses. The Bible Ask site has an article, “Did the Bible teach the germs theory?” (5-30-16):

The Bible writers did not write a medical textbook. However, there are numerous rules for sanitation, quarantine, and other medical procedures (found in the first 5 book of the OT) . . . Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (1818 –1865), who was a Hungarian physician, . . . proposed the practice of washing hands with chlorinated lime solutions in 1847 . . . He published a book of his findings in Etiology, Concept and Prophylaxis of Childbed Fever. Despite various publications of his successful results, Semmelweis’s suggestions were not accepted by the medical community of his time.

Why was Semmelweis research rejected? Because germs were virtually a foreign concept for the Europeans in the middle-19th-century. . . .

Had the medical community paid attention to God’s instructions that were given 3000 years before, many lives would have been saved. The Lord gave the Israelites hygienic principles against the contamination of germs and taught the necessity to quarantine the sick (Numbers 19:11-12). And the book of Leviticus lists a host of diseases and ways where a person would come in contact with germs (Leviticus 13:46).

Germs were no new discovery in 1847. And for this fact, Roderick McGrew testified in the Encyclopedia of Medical History: “The idea of contagion was foreign to the classic medical tradition and found no place in the voluminous Hippocratic writings. The Old Testament, however, is a rich source for contagionist sentiment, especially in regard to leprosy and venereal disease” (1985, pp. 77-78).

Some other interesting facts regarding the Bible and germ theory:

1. The Bible contained instructions for the Israelites to wash their bodies and clothes in running water if they had a discharge, came in contact with someone else’s discharge, or had touched a dead body. They were also instructed about objects that had come into contact with dead things, and about purifying items with an unknown history with either fire or running water. They were also taught to bury human waste outside the camp, and to burn animal waste (Num 19:3-22;Lev. 11:1-47; 15:1-33;Deut 23:12).

2. Leviticus 13 and 14 mention leprosy on walls and on garments. Leprosy is a bacterial disease, and can survive for three weeks or longer apart from the human body. Thus, God commanded that the garments of leprosy victims should be burned (Lev 13:52).

3. It was not until 1873 that leprosy was shown to be an infectious disease rather than hereditary. Of course, the laws of Moses already were aware of that (Lev 13, 14, 22; Num 19:20). It contains instructions about quarantine and about quarantined persons needing to thoroughly shave and wash. Priests who cared for them also were instructed to change their clothes and wash thoroughly. The Israelites were the only culture to practice quarantine until the 19th century, when medical advances discovered the biblical medical principles and practices.

4. Hippocrates, the pagan Greek “father of medicine” (born 460 BC) didn’t understand the causes of contagious disease. He thought it was “bad air” from swampy areas. (See also: “Old Testament Laws About Infectious Diseases”)

Moreover, since Jesus observed Mosaic Law, including ritual washings, etc., He tacitly accepted (by His example of following it) the aspects of it that anticipated and “understood” germ theory. The knowledge was already in existence.

The entry on “Health” in Baker’s Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology reveals that ordinary medicinal remedies (my second topic) were widely practiced in Bible times. There wasn’t solely a belief that sin or demons caused all disease. There was also a natural cause-and-effect understanding:

Ordinary means of healing were of most diverse kinds. Balm ( Gen 37:25 ) is thought to have been an aromatic resin (or juice) with healing properties; oil was the universal emollient ( Isa 1:6 ), and was sometimes used for wounds with cleansing wine ( Luke 10:34 ). Isaiah recommended a fig poultice for a boil ( 38:21 ); healing springs and saliva were thought effectual ( Mark 8:23 ; John 5 ; 9:6-7 ). Medicine is mentioned ( Prov 17:22 ) and defended as “sensible” ( Sirach 38:4). Wine mixed with myrrh was considered sedative ( Mark 15:23 ); mint, dill, and cummin assisted digestion ( Matt 23:23 ); other herbs were recommended for particular disorders. Most food rules had both ritual and dietary purposes, while raisins, pomegranates, milk, and honey were believed to assist restoration. . . .

Luke’s constant care of Paul reminds us that nonmiraculous means of healing were not neglected in that apostolic circle. Wine is recommended for Timothy’s weak stomach, eye-salve for the Thyatiran church’s blindness (metaphorical, but significant).

Doctors today often note how the patient’s disposition and attitude has a strong effect on his health or recovery. The mind definitely influences the body. Solomon understood this in several of his Proverbs: written around 950 BC (Prov 14:30; 15:30; 16:24; 17:22).

Now, all of the above is an elaborate “presuppositional background” to the issue and topic I brought up at the beginning: atheist “biblical expert” Jonathan Pearce’s insistence that the explanation for the star of Bethlehem only makes sense in a biblical context if it is supernatural and not natural. The above suggests quite otherwise: especially the data about biblical astronomy.

I would say that the overwhelming likelihood, given all this related, relevant evidence, is that biblical references (based on sheer volume) to stars and particularly the star of Bethlehem are very likely to be to natural phenomena. With that in mind, let’s briefly examine the narrative about the star of Bethlehem:

Matthew 2:2 . . . we have seen his star in the East . . .

There is nothing at all here that demands a supernatural-only explanation or interpretation of this “star.” It’s all the more unlikely in light of the fact that we know that the Magi (wise men) were highly trained in astronomy and/or some variant of astrology (likely not the “horoscope” nonsense of today). They were not likely to immediately jump to a “supernatural / miraculous” explanation. It simply meant that they interpreted it as having something to do with a king and Jerusalem, — as I have explained in other papers –, based on the symbolism of constellations and individual stars (Jupiter being the “king planet” etc.).

The text doesn’t claim that they followed this star the entire way. That’s merely the artistic license of Christmas cards. I have argued that they simply determined that it was a sign that they should journey west in search of a very noteworthy newborn king. The significant city due west of them in northwest Persia was Jerusalem. They then followed well-established, ancient  routes around the desert to get there.

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 many atheists (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. I have argued it in detail in the following papers:

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]

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]

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Photo credit: mskathrynne (9-14-18) [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.

***

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

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2020-11-30T18:43:00-04:00

Last updated on: November 30, 2020 at 6:43 pm   By

Ann, an atheist, commented on my article, Golden Calf & Cherubim: Biblical Contradiction? (11-23-20, vs. Dr. Steven DiMattei), and we got into a serious exchange (though never — by my definition — a true dialogue). Her words (complete from my blog) will be in blue.

*****

This article is a good example of the difference between “Biblical scholarship” (Dr. Steven DiMattei) and “Bible study” (Dave Armstrong.)

“Bible study” tries to prove that its assertions about the meaning of a Bible passage can be proved correct by pointing to another Bible passage.
It takes it for granted that the words of the Bible are factually true, historically spoken, and it just wants to defend one particular interpretation.

“Biblical scholarship” seeks to uncover the origins of the Bible passage and how it demonstrates “the way the contemporary people were thinking.”
There is no special idea that the assertions of the Bible are literally true or describe actual historical events.
Instead, Biblical scholarship sees the passage as a reflection of the historical evolution, the thoughts, the concepts, the philosophy of the people who wrote it.

DiMattei and Armstrong are talking past each other.

It’s a long discussion. You pass over the many internal inconsistencies I point out in his work, and questions about the arbitrary assertions he makes. Since he won’t respond (what a surprise), of course we will be talking past each other. It’s his choice, not mine. I’m confident in my positions; he seems not to be confident in his positions. I’m all in favor of dialogue. Most folks today are not. They want to preach to the choir.

I think there is still something you are not recognizing.

DiMattei does not have a “position” in the way that you do.
He is not preaching for the adoption of his point of view.
Instead, biblical scholarship lays out its research findings among ancient documents as we have them so far.
Then a scholar deduces what the historical significance of those findings may be.
He then presents his deductions to the wider community of fellow scholars in order to introduce this new concept.

These results are necessarily always tentative because more documentary evidence may materialize in the future, or a better scholar may interpret the ones we already have with more learning or a more subtle historical understanding.

In your case, you have come to a conclusion about what God means, and your support is in other parts of the Bible.
New information will not be added in the future, unlike the resources of Biblical scholarship.
Your conclusions are not based on “evidence” — only on “argument.”

There are “many internal inconsistencies” in his work — and that is fine with him — because the documentary evidence he is relying on makes inconsistent claims, which he incorporates into his historical analysis.
He isn’t “preaching” like you are — trying to convince others that (based on the Bible itself), your reading of the words of the Bible is the one God intends.

DiMattei is simply laying out the contents of the documents (in the Bible and elsewhere) that he has researched so far, and describing to other scholars his suggestions about what they they signify historically.

You are talking past each other, not because he does not respond, but because you two are talking about two different topics.

He doesn’t have “believers,” or True Believers™ , or followers.
He has fellow scholars who share or don’t share his proposed suggestions about what the evidence shows so far about what the people of those times used to think and believe.

It’s liberal / skeptical “biblical” scholarship — not the entirety of “biblical scholarship” and its goal is to try to prove that the Bible is not inspired revelation at all, but rather, merely a human document like any other. Those of us who are Christians do not believe that to be the case. But it’s not simply “blind faith” (the liberal caricature of belief) but rather, faith + evidence in a host of ways, in many fields.

If you claim his goal is not to “tear down” the Bible, then tell me: why the extreme emphasis on supposed “contradictions” in the Bible? Why is that so super-important, and where else do we find such efforts? When I refute these, I’m not simply appealing to blind faith. I show internal logical contradictions, which rather defeats his purpose: his attempts at making the Bible contradict itself in every other sentence leads to himself doing so.

Logic is something we can all agree on. He (and many others of his ilk: like Bob Seidensticker, whom I have refuted 65 times, and Dr. David Madison: another 50 or so) have no interest in dialogue because they are not (in my opinion) honest, objective thinkers. If they were serious thinkers, they would grapple with critiques just as all thinkers do. I love to receive serious critiques. I wish I received a ton more than I do.

Rather, they are mere propagandists.

If Dr. DiMattei is such a renowned scholar, where is he teaching now? Where are his articles in peer-reviewed journals? They may exist, but he seems to give no information about them. Does he have more than one book published?

I don’t know this particular person at all, so I am speaking about “Biblical scholarship” as it is distinct from “Bible study.”

Biblical scholarship does not have any “goal” at all — never mind a “goal to try to prove that the Bible is not inspired revelation … but merely a human document like any other.”

Biblical scholarship TAKES IT FOR GRANTED that the Bible actually is merely a human document like any other, and study it (and the preceding legends and myths that it is based on) as an historical phenomenon with historical interest but irrelevant in its religious claims.

The reason that Biblical scholars take it for granted that the Bible is merely a human document like any other is that they study the actual early versions of the myths and legends preceding the versions in the Bible.

We can find exactly similar historical evolution of other kinds of human documents — early versions of fairy tales (and their morphing into the current versions), early developments of Arthurian legends, previous sources of Shakespeare’s plots, early (and increasingly refined) versions of maps …

(Finding early maps as they evolved accuracy is interesting to scholars because it helps locate the dates and places of, for example, expeditionary armies, who return with improved information, thus suddenly changing the maps.)

Naturally if you believe that the Bible is a unique document emanating from an infallible source, you will misperceive the goals of people who blandly refer to documents that contradict your beliefs (such as previous versions of a Bible story in Sumerian documents.)

The interest on the contradictions and errors in the Bible is not an attack on its supernatural origins.
Because they are so familiar with its human origins, no Biblical scholar imagines for a moment that it even had a supernatural origin.

Instead, contradictions and revisions are used as evidence of the historical evolution of the fables of the Bible and how and why they assumed their present form.

For example. the contradictory comments about the spherical nature of the earth are revealing.
Bible passages that know that the earth is a sphere indicate that the author had a Greek education because the Greeks had already discovered that (and even measured the size of the globe.)

Other passages that do not know that the earth is a globe demonstrate that these authors did not have the benefit of a Greek education.
This information is useful in helping the scholars locate the composition of the passage in time and place.

Another example is the story of the walls of Jericho, which was in ruins for centuries before the earliest date the Bible story could have been written.

I am well aware of the nature of liberal / skeptical biblical scholarship. I’ve dealt with it for forty years. It’s you and I who are talking past each other. Steven and I are not because I am talking and he isn’t.

I could write a great deal about conservative / orthodox biblical scholarship and address the many bum raps you have thrown out, but I’m more interested in Steven’s case and his defense of it. With most of the critiques I have made, it matters not if I am a three-toed, green-eyed Rastafarian or an Indian shaman or a Taoist or Buddhist. My critiques deal with internal contradictions in his presentation.

Let me give you an example from another of my recent critiques of Steven’s arguments:

God in Heaven & in His Temple: Contradiction?:

He claimed:

the Deuteronomists would have vehemently disagreed with the Priestly writer’s ideology that Yahweh dwelt among the people. For the Deuteronomist, Yahweh dwelt in heaven. To preserve the holiness of the Temple dwelling, the Deuteronomist claimed that merely Yahweh’s name resided there, not his glory nor presence . . .

I then provided 15 passages from Deuteronomy: all of which contradicted his claim above. Then I wrote about what this would force him to do, to salvage his theory:

He is forced now to say, “well, those are simply non-Deuteronomist portions later added to the book of Deuteronomy . . .” It’s the “answer” to everything (hostile or contrary interpolated texts). But when a particular ploy or theory or fiction is used for every conceivable difficulty, it is soon seen that it is in fact the solution of no difficulty. A thing can explain too much as well as too little. It’s just not plausible. It’s on the level of a conspiracy theory.

This is just one of many problems and difficulties I have raised that Steven — if he is a thinker confident of his convictions — would have to grapple with. He refuses. Those who are of his general opinion almost always refuse to address criticisms. In the case of one guy recently, who writes at the same site I do (Patheos), he threatened to sue me because I critiqued him three or four times.

Nothing you say ameliorates his intellectual duty to address such criticisms.

Most proposed biblical “contradictions” are not at all, by the laws of logic: not some “fundamentalist” prior objection. They don’t hold water. I have dealt with scores and scores of them. You raise a few yourself and bring up other misconceptions. Conservative Bible scholars who accept biblical inspiration are not averse at all to discussing elements of prior stories from regions near Israel that seem similar to biblical ones. One look at my large personal library would quickly disabuse you of that notion. I’ve written (or hosted) several papers that discuss how Christianity “baptizes” many non-Christian beliefs and customs and incorporates them into its beliefs (as did Judaism before it):

Is Catholicism Half-Pagan? [1999]

Is Easter Pagan & the Word a “Pagan Compromise”? [1999]

Halloween Joys & the “Baptizing” of Pagan Customs (Guest Post by Rod Bennett and Mark Shea) [11-1-06; expanded on 10-31-16]

Is Catholicism Half-Pagan, & a Blend of Gospel & Lies? [2007]

You say the Bible teaches a spherical earth in some places and a flat earth in others. This is simply untrue. It doesn’t teach a flat earth at all:

Biblical Flat Earth (?) Cosmology: Dialogue w Atheist (vs. Matthew Green) [9-11-06]

Flat Earth: Biblical Teaching? (vs. Ed Babinski) [9-17-06]

It simply doesn’t teach it. One can be an orthodox Christian like myself or an atheist or anything else, and understand that this is the case: provided they actually study Hebrew culture, how the ancient Hebrews thought and reasoned, and some of the words involved. We are just as interested in finding out what the Bible actually teaches, as the skeptics are (if not more so).

You say (or imply) we are biased and unable to be trusted because we believe in biblical inspiration. That’s like saying that Einstein was biased when writing about relativity because he believed in it, or Newton about gravity or Copernicus about heliocentrism (which is almost as false as geocentrism because the sun isn’t the center of the universe, either), or Madame Curie about radioactivity: because they all firmly believed in those things.

We can just as rightly show that many proposed biblical contradictions are not at all, and that many skeptical claims about what the Bible teaches are equally false and invalid, due to various degrees of illogic, non-factuality, or unfamiliarity with the biblical worldview and proper biblical exegesis and hermeneutics, or various other false premises or wrong turns in reasoning chains.

Bottom line: I have provided plenty of legitimate, serious criticisms of Steven’s work. He ignores them. I let him know that I made them (if he even checks his Twitter page). Instead, you are here defending his general enterprise of biblical skepticism. I enjoy talking with you, but he has the duty to defend his own views, too. If he can’t, then they aren’t worth much: whatever one might be inclined to think of them.

Did you ever notice the “throw-away” bits in The Terminator which demonstrate that dogs recognize Terminators and hate them?

There’s the scene where John and the Terminator call his foster home and hear his dog going ape in the background because a bad Terminator is in his house.
There’s a quick shot of the soldiers in the bunker with a pair of German Shepherds as allies in the fight against Terminators.
There’s the scene where the Terminator is approaching the motel cabin where Sarah is hiding out and a wee little dog is in hysterics barking at the Terminator’s foot (bigger than the whole dog.)
——————–

And here is a scenario that I invented, so please forgive me for not knowing anything about physical geodesy.

Let us imagine that a research post-doc got access to some ultra high accuracy images of earth taken from the ISS.
Following a long effort of the most painstaking precision, he discovers something new about the dimensions of the planet.
(As you many know, earth is not a perfect sphere. It is an “oblate spheroid” for some reason known to the experts.)

In my imaginary story, the researcher is excited because his studies demonstrate that one of the measurements commonly used is actually incorrect by 87 km ± 3 km, and he publishes his findings in a professional journal.
——————–

Now the Terminator is way cooler than I am, so when he got yapped at by a wee little doggie, he didn’t even notice.
Now me — I would have noticed and been amused.

That’s how I imagine the scientist would feel if he was berated by a Flat Earther who conceived of the scientific research paper as an attack on the cult of a Flat Earth — surprised and faintly amused. Not amused enough to respond to the charge that his work was invalidated because it is only withing a tolerance of 3 km, but briefly amusing anyway before he moved on with his science and forgot all about the challenge from the Supernatural realm.
—————–

Your pious beliefs refer to things that are not objectively, empirically, demonstrably true.
In fact, they are objectively, empirically, demonstrably untrue.

Researchers in the area of the dissemination of ancient myths might be interested in tracing the development, the evolution, the spread of the THREE stories of the parting of the waters (Moses, Elijah, Elisha).

Maybe they are interested in the meaning, the reason for writing the two irreconcilable genealogies of Jesus, the point they ancient writers were making.

But the concept that these myths have demonstrable, empirical, objective antecedents cannot be denied.
The evidence exists as physical objects that you can hold in your hand.

Being a “life-long atheist”, it comes as no surprise to me that you take the positions you do. So, for example, obviously you can’t believe the Bible is an inspired infallible revelation from God because there is no God there to form a necessary piece of that puzzle. You may say that causes no bias in you, but it does form a premise that is in stark opposition to the premises I start with — due to reasoning (existence of God; thus the possibility of revelation from Him).

That being the case, you obviously have to adopt by default a position whereby the Bible is not a whit different from any other ancient literature. Ah, but it is massively different, as I have shown in many articles, and many other Christian apologists, theologians, archaeologists, and historians have shown in hundreds of ways.

Here is but one example of many from my paper, Seidensticker Folly #59: Medieval Hospitals & Medicine:

Hippocrates, the pagan Greek “father of medicine” didn’t understand the causes of contagious disease. Nor did medical science until the 19th century. But the hygienic principles that would have prevented the spread of such diseases were in the Bible: in the Laws of Moses. . . .

Hippocrates, the “father of medicine” (born 460 BC), thought “bad air” from swampy areas was the cause of disease.

Mosaic Law and Hebrew hygienic practices, dating as far back as some 800 years before Hippocrates, were far more advanced:

1. The Bible contained instructions for the Israelites to wash their bodies and clothes in running water if they had a discharge, came in contact with someone else’s discharge, or had touched a dead body. They were also instructed about objects that had come into contact with dead things, and about purifying items with an unknown history with either fire or running water. They were also taught to bury human waste outside the camp, and to burn animal waste (Num 19:3-22; Lev. 11:1-47; 15:1-33; Deut 23:12).

2. Leviticus 13 and 14 mention leprosy on walls and on garments. Leprosy is a bacterial disease, and can survive for three weeks or longer apart from the human body. Thus, God commanded that the garments of leprosy victims should be burned (Lev 13:52).

3. It was not until 1873 that leprosy was shown to be an infectious disease rather than hereditary. Of course, the laws of Moses already were aware of that (Lev 13, 14, 22; Num 19:20). It contains instructions about quarantine and about quarantined persons needing to thoroughly shave and wash. Priests who cared for them also were instructed to change their clothes and wash thoroughly. The Israelites were the only culture to practice quarantine until the 19th century, when medical advances discovered the biblical medical principles and practices.

The Bible is no different from any other ancient document? This is but one example. To show that the Bible is not unique here, you would have to show other ancient cultures that had such an in-depth understanding of hygiene and contagious disease. Good luck.

The same sort of thing occurs in many areas: whether it is the sophisticated biblical understanding of creation (ex nihilo) compared to Greek mythology et al, or the spherical earth, or timelessness, etc. The Big Bang theory finally caught up with the biblical teaching of an earth created out of nothing in the 20th century: and that was first introduced by a Catholic priest!

Your pious beliefs refer to things that are not objectively, empirically, demonstrably true. In fact, they are objectively, empirically, demonstrably untrue.

This is a bald assertion; not an argument. If you wish to refute my papers on how the Bible doesn’t teach a flat earth, feel free. If not, mere statements do not sway me because I have actually studied the issue in some depth.

I dealt with the “contradictory genealogies” claim over against atheist JMS Pearce three years ago:

Again, if you wish to dissuade me you’ll have to get into the thick and thin of it and actually interact with my arguments. Bald statements don’t cut it with me. They prove nothing.

Dave, it is my fault that I am not making myself clear.

1) The assertion that the Bible full of claims and anecdotes that are not true is not a BALD assertion.
It is an assertion that is demonstrated with hard physical EVIDENCE.

2) My anecdote about a Flat Earth was intended as an analogy — not an accusation that you believe in a flat earth.
Nevertheless, there are some passages in the Bible that do demonstrate a knowledge that the earth is a sphere, and some passages that show the writer thought the earth was flat.

But it’s silly to get hung up on this error to prove that the Bible is choked full of errors and self-contradictions when there is sooo much low-hanging fruit.

3) I don’t know what you mean by “dealt with” the contradictory genealogies claim, but you certainly did not dissolve the problem by trying to show that it follows the genealogy through the female line or some such thing as that.
If nothing else (and there is a lot else), the very NUMBER OF GENERATIONS cannot be reconciled.

3) You’re correct to point out that “bald statements” prove nothing.
You just don’t admit that ARGUMENTS don’t prove anything either.
Any fool can “prove” anything he wants with “argument.”
That’s why it is not allowed in a court of law.

The only thing that demonstrates anything is EVIDENCE.

4) I don’t want to get into a debate with you that I have been through hundreds of times.
My only interest in posting here is the one I stated in the beginning:
> You are using “Bible study” ARGUMENTS to try to defeat “Biblical scholarship” EVIDENCE.

You say in effect, “When the Bible says XYZ, it means “myXmyYmyZ”, and I know that this is the true interpretation because the Bible says so.”

Biblical scholarship says “This legend originated in Babylon, and here is the physical evidence that shows it.”

I’m puzzled that you’re unable to see the difference.

You’re just repeating yourself now (over and over) and deliberately avoiding any direct interaction with my arguments (which of course include much evidence) so we’re done. I take a very dim view of engaging in exchanges which are not dialogues at all, but mutual monologues. I dialogue, and this is no dialogue.

***

Photo credit: Book of Kells (c. 800), Folio 292r, Incipit to John [public domain / Wikimedia Commons]

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2020-11-23T14:33:51-04:00

Last updated on: November 23, 2020 at 2:33 pm   By

vs. Dr. Steven DiMattei 

Dr. Steven DiMattei is a biblical scholar and author, formally trained in the New Testament and early Christianity, with M.A degrees in Classics and Comparative Literature as well. Rumor has it that he is an atheist, but I haven’t been able to confirm that on his site. He put up a website called Contradictions in the Bible. It seems inactive now (or he has lost interest or moved onto other things: who knows?), but the themes are things I really enjoy discussing and debating, and his articles are still online for all to see; thus fair game for critique — and stimulating food for thought, too. There is almost nothing I like to discuss and think about more than the interpretation of the Bible. Steven wrote in a post dated 5-7-16:

One of my reasons in choosing the word “defend” to describe my aims as a biblical scholar and author was in part to attract Christian apologists to my work and hopefully to get them to read these ancient texts on their terms and from within their own cultural contexts and to create a conversation around the biblical texts, their authors, and their competing beliefs, messages, worldviews, theologies, etc. As you can imagine this has proven quite difficult, nay impossible. Many Christian apologists and fundamentalists just cannot read, or simply identify, the text on its own terms separate from the beliefs and assumptions about the text handed-down through this collection of ancient literature’s title, “the Holy Book.”

Here  I am: an apologist quite willing to engage in conversation. It takes two. So we’ll see if Steven is willing to follow through on his stated desire. I have had my own long history (in almost 40 years of apologetics) of “difficult, nay impossible” attempts to discuss matters with many people who tend to be of a few particular belief-systems, though I have no problem talking with anyone who is civil and can stick to a topic. I don’t just say this, I have a demonstrable record of doing it, which is evident on my blog, with its 1000+ dialogues. But as I said, dialogue takes two, and I would add that it also requires a degree of at least minimal mutual respect. Steven’s words will be in blue.

*****

I am critiquing two related articles of his, on alleged “biblical contradictions”:

#159. The Golden Calf OR the Golden Cherubs? (Ex 32:4 vs Ex 25:18-20, 37:7-9)

#157. Is the festival associated with the Golden Calf a festival to Yahweh OR to other gods? (Ex 32:5 vs Ex 32:1, 32:4, 32:8)

I shall deal with #159 first, because its errors are more basic, groundless, and indefensible.

What is the difference between these golden cherubs and the golden calf? Why is it permitted to fabricate golden cherubs and not the golden calf? 

Short answer: because one was intended to be gross idolatry (the calf) and the other was a permitted non-idolatrous religious image, sanctioned by God. I have written about the details of the outrageous and blasphemous idolatry of the golden calf and the nature of idolatry as the Bible defines it:

Is the Mass Equivalent to OT Golden Calf Worship? [1996]

Biblical Idolatry: Authentic & Counterfeit Conceptions [2015]

On the other hand, there are many examples of permitted images in Old Testament worship, including the temple and ark of the covenant (in other words, not all images were forbidden “graven images” or idolatrous):

Veneration of Images, Iconoclasm, and Idolatry (An Exposition) [11-15-02]

Bible on Holy Places & Things [1-8-08]

Bible on Physical Objects as Aids in Worship [4-7-09]

Biblical Evidence for Worship of God Via an Image [6-24-11]

The Bronze Serpent: Example of Proper Use of Images [Feb. 2012]

“Graven Images”: Unbiblical Iconoclasm (vs. John Calvin) [Oct. 2012]

Worshiping God Through Images is Entirely Biblical [National Catholic Register, 12-23-16]

Statues in Relation to Bowing, Prayer, & Worship in Scripture [12-26-17]

Biblical Evidence for Veneration of Saints and Images [National Catholic Register, 10-23-18]

Crucifixes & Worship Images: “New” (?) Biblical Arguments [1-18-20]

Is Worship of God Through an Image Biblical? (vs. Luke Wayne) [11-10-20]

The ark of the covenant, which included the two golden cherubim on top, was never intended to be a representation of God. One can search the Bible in vain and never find the slightest hint of any such thing. God gave elaborate instructions for the construction of the ark and its use. I recently engaged an anti-Catholic Protestant who correctly noted that these two cherubim were not to be worshiped, but that God appeared in the space between the two of them (as the Bible states several times). But there was a permitted image involved (a cloud), as I detailed:

Luke makes a clever and interesting argument that the space between the mercy seat on top of the ark of the covenant, where God says He is present and to be worshiped (despite being surrounded by carved cherubim [angels]) is “empty space” and “imageless space” and “with no image.” But this is untrue, as the Bible informs us:

Leviticus 16:2 and the LORD said to Moses, “Tell Aaron your brother not to come at all times into the holy place within the veil, before the mercy seat which is upon the ark, lest he die; for I will appear in the cloud upon the mercy seat.

This cloud was visible, just as in other passages above, like Exodus 13:21; 19:18; 24:16; 33:10 (“the people saw the pillar of cloud”), and others like Numbers 16:42 (“the cloud covered it, and the glory of the LORD appeared“) and Deuteronomy 31:15 (“And the LORD appeared in the tent in a pillar of cloud“). The very word “appear” in Leviticus 16:2  and the last two passages also proves it. God doesn’t just say that He will be “present”, but that He will “appear” in this cloud.

The Bible draws a big distinction between a permitted, non-idolatrous image and idolatrous images deliberately intended to be idols.

Aren’t they both idols? Furthermore, why would Yahweh’s most Holy of Holies contain two golden cherubs? Were these representations of the god? Was the golden calf a representation of the god?

These are remarkable questions: asked by one who is highly educated in Bible study. It’s amazing to have to answer such questions at all. But here I go. I dealt with the golden calf in depth 24 years ago. Here are some highlights:

*****

In Exodus 32:1, the NRSV reads, “Come, make gods for us, who shall go before us……” (cf. 32:23)

Exodus 32:4-5 informs us:

    He took the gold from them, formed it in a mold, and cast an image of a calf; and they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation and said, “tomorrow shall be a festival to the LORD.”

It is, therefore, clear that this is idolatry and otherwise sinful, on many counts:

1) It represents not even the one God, but “gods,” so that it falls under the absolute prohibition of polytheism which was known to any observant Hebrew (see, e.g., Ps 106:19-23; cf. Hab 2:18).

2) Nowhere are the Jews permitted to build a calf as an “image” of God. This was an outright violation of the injunctions against “molten images” (Ex 34:17; Lev 19:4; Num 33:52; Dt 27:15: all condemn such idols, using the same Hebrew word which appears in Ex 32:4, 8, 17: massekah).

3) Aaron built an altar before what the people regarded as “gods,” thus blaspheming the true God.

4) Lies were told and believed about “gods,” not God, liberating the Hebrews from Egyptian slavery.

6) NASB and NKJV read “god” at Ex 32:4 (not even capitalized), so that is clearly not intended as a reference to the one true God, YHWH, according to the accepted practice of all Bible translations. NRSV, KJV, RSV, NIV, NEB, & REB have “gods.” In either case, the view is not monotheistic, nor is it at all analogous to the belief and practice of those Christians who accept the Real Presence.

[as to even the early portions of the Bible (and all portions) being monotheistic, see:

Seidensticker Folly #19: Torah & OT Teach Polytheism? [9-18-18]

Seidensticker Folly #20: An Evolving God in the OT? [9-18-18]

Loftus Atheist Error #8: Ancient Jews, “Body” of God, & Polytheism [9-10-19]

Do the OT & NT Teach Polytheism or Henotheism? [7-1-20]

The Bible Teaches That Other “Gods” are Imaginary [National Catholic Register, 7-10-20] ]

Exodus 32:1 (cf. 32:23),. . . is revealing as to the state of mind of these idolaters. They ask Aaron to “make” them “gods.” Obviously, they could not have YHVH in mind at that point, since I imagine they at least knew that He is not “made by hands” and is eternal. Then they say these gods “shall go before us.” In my opinion, , the most straightforward interpretation of that is the golden calf being carried before them. How could they think (even in their debased state of mind) that YHVH Himself could be compelled to “go before them?” Therefore, they must have regarded the calf as a pure idol of their own making, not as a mere representation of the true God, because these contextual verses make clear that they didn’t have YHVH in mind.

If the above data isn’t sufficient, surely Psalm 106:19-21 nails down my case (NRSV):

    They made a calf at Horeb and worshiped a cast image. They exchanged the glory of God for the image of an ox that eats grass. They forgot God, their Savior, who had done great things in Egypt.

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If the biblical writers regarded the golden calf as an idol and condemned propitiating it or any image, then why is not the same upheld for these golden cherubs?

See the above. Short answer: the cherubim were never conceived as representative of God (or even “gods”), let alone worshiped as such. God said that He appeared between their wings, in a cloud. The golden calf, on the other hand, clearly was conceived as, and worshiped as an idol, in place of the true God.

Steven attempts to argue that Jeroboam’s similar idolatry could be seen as some kind of permissible worship by ancient Hebraic standards (partly derived from practices of surrounding or prior cultures):

It is quite possible that the calf altars that Jeroboam constructed, of which the golden calf story is a parody (#157), were throne seats as well. There is ample evidence from the ancient Near East of deities seated upon bulls. Scholars have certainly started to envision Jeroboam’s calf altars as just that—not representations of Yahweh, but his thrones. In this case, the calf-altar cult of the north rivaled the southern temple in Jerusalem. The depiction of the golden calf as an idol, or as gods, was part and parcel to the propaganda and polemic of the pro-Jerusalemite scribes who wrote it. In the end, however, these cultic symbols were no different than the cherubim that stood in the Holy of Holies and also served to represent the deities presence.

This is all arbitrary speculation, of course (as is much of documentary theory, which has long since been discredited). The actual biblical texts show quite otherwise. Ahijah spoke the word of the Lord concerning Jeroboam’s sin:

1 Kings 14:9 (RSV) . . . you have done evil above all that were before you and have gone and made for yourself other gods, and molten images, provoking me to anger, and have cast me behind your back.

Also:

1 Kings 12:28, 32 So the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold. And he said to the people, “You have gone up to Jerusalem long enough. Behold your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.” . . .

. . . and he offered sacrifices upon the altar; so he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves that he had made.

Note: this is not intending “Yahweh to be worshiped through” the graven images, as you claim, but rather (according to God Himself, Who knows all things) “other gods.” Jeroboam himself refers to “gods”: a rank polytheism and idolatry indeed. We know that he sacrificed to these stupid molten images. It couldn’t be more clear than it is.

The New Bible Dictionary (edited by J. D. Douglas, 1962), in its article on Jeroboam, noted:

They threatened true religion by encouraging a syncretism of Yahweh worship with the fertility cult of Baal and thus drew a prophetic rebuke. (p. 614)

Likewise, in its article on “Idolatry”:

[I]t is a most significant thing that when Israel turned to idolatry it was always necessary to borrow the outward trappings from the pagan environment . . . The golden calves made by Jeroboam (1 Ki 12:28) were well-known Canaanite symbols, and in the same way, whenever the kings of Israel and Judah lapsed into idolatry, it was by means of borrowing and syncretism. (p. 552)

Albright, in his discussion of the bulls of Jeroboam, noted:

So Jeroboam may well have been harking back to early Israelite traditional practice when he made the “golden calves.” It is hardly necessary to point out that it was a dangerous revival, since the taurine associations of Baal, lord of heaven, were too closely bound up with the fertility cult in its more insidious aspects to be safe. The cherubim, being mythical animals, served to enhance the majesty of Yahweh, “who rides on a cherub” (II Sam. 22:11) or “who thrones on the cherubim” (II Kings 19:15, etc.), but the young bulls of Bethel and Dan could only debase His cult. (From the Stone Age to Christianity, 2nd edition, Garden City, New York: Doubleday Anchor, 1957, 301)

The brilliant biblical scholar F. F. Bruce draws a similar comparison and contrast:

It may be asked whether there was any difference in principle between the use of bull-calf images to support Yahweh’s invisible presence and the use of cherubs for the same purpose in the holy of holies at Jerusalem. The answer probably is that the cherubs were symbolical beings (representing originally the storm-winds) and their images were therefore not “any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth” [note: Ex. 20:4; Deut. 5:8], whereas the bull-calf images were all too closely associated with Canaanite fertility ritual. It appears from the ritual texts of Ugarit that El, the supreme God of the Canaanite pantheon, was on occasion actually hypostatized as a bull (shor), and known as Shor-El.  (Israel and the Nations, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1963; reprinted 1981, 40-41)

I move on now to Steven’s paper alleging a “biblical contradiction” #157:

[T]he people clamor for gods who “will go in front of us” since Moses has apparently disappeared. Aaron abides by their wishes, and melting the peoples’ gold jewelry down he “fashioned it with a stylus and made a molten calf,” and then proclaimed: “these are your gods Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt.” As our first textual anomaly, we notice that one calf is made, yet the text proclaims “gods” in the plural. Why?

Now Steven is making the orthodox Christian argument for us. Thanks!

Second, and largely illogical in the larger narrative context, merely days after the Horeb revelation, the giving and acceptance of the laws by the people, one of which stipulated no images, and apparently only a short time after witnessing Yahweh’s “signs and wonders” in his destruction of Egypt, their land, livestock, plants, and all firstborns, and the parting of the sea of Reeds, it is these new gods who are proclaimed as the gods “who brought you out of Egypt.” There is much that initially does not make any sense here.

Idolatry and rebellion against God never does: yet it is the constant, continual pattern of the Old Testament.

Lastly, Aaron builds an altar before the molten image and proclaims “a festival to Yahweh tomorrow!” And then we’re told that “they got up early the next day and made burnt offerings and brought over peace offerings”—that is, common sacrificial offerings to Yahweh. So, what or who exactly is being celebrated: Yahweh, the golden calf, or the “gods” who apparently brought Israel out of Egypt? Additionally, what is the relationship, that the text firmly implies, between Yahweh, the Golden Calf, and the “gods” of which it speaks?

It was an heretical mixture of orthodox and heterodox elements (as heretical departures invariably are). Aaron refers to “gods” as supposedly the ones who liberated the Hebrews from Egyptian slavery, builds an altar to the calf who represents them, then speaks of a “festival to the LORD” (Yahweh): Exodus 32:4-5. It’s classic heterodox syncretism: that Judaism and Christianity have been “blessed” with since time immemorial.

Even more puzzling, this all occurs right on the heels of the Exodus, the miraculous crossing of the Red sea, the witnessing of Yahweh’s ten terrifying signs and wonders by which means he destroyed Egypt and redeemed the children of Israel. The story of the Golden Calf makes no sense within this literary context. Even granting the people’s inclination, if you like, toward disobedience, it still makes no sense following the array of Yahweh’s awesome signs, wonders, miracles, and theophany, as well as their own verbally expressed consent to be Yahweh’s people and uphold his covenant. Like so many of the murmuring stories in Exodus and Numbers, the stories have little historical semblance and make no sense in their literary contexts . . . 

Again, rebellion and heterodoxy never do make any sense; and they don’t because they aren’t rational to begin with, and originate in grace-deprived hearts filled with disbelief, lack of faith in and gratefulness to God, and rebellion. Steven doesn’t get it because he himself suffers from the acceptance of scores of false presuppositions and false conclusions drawn from same.

Rather, the Golden Calf episode was written as an independent story with a specific message to a specific audience. It was later inserted, rather poorly it must be said, into its current literary context in Exodus.

Faced with this evidence of irrational behavior of the ancient Jews, Steven does what all biblical skeptics do: he starts to construct imaginary interpolations into the text, from different writers in different times. There’s no proof (I dare bring up!) of any such thing. It’s all completely arbitrary speculation.

So what is the purpose and message of the Golden Calf narrative?

Don’t forsake the true God with blasphemous and downright silly and foolish idolatrous beliefs and practices . . .

Here is an example of the ridiculous speculation that adherents of the documentary theory habitually make:

The statement in 1 Kings 12:28 is claimed to have been said by Jeroboam I, the northern kingdom’s first king after its secession from Solomon’s tyranny. It must also be borne in mind that this is what the author, most likely the pro-Solomonic southern Deuteronomist, says Jeroboam says. It’s certainly a discriminating remark, and was used despairingly to depict Jeroboam as an apostate. This was, no doubt, the Deuteronomist’s intention.

Note that (as always), he attempts to provide no actual evidence or proof of these contentions. None is needed in this mindset. Baseless speculation reigns supreme!

Both the Golden Calf incident as well as the Deuteronomist’s account portray Jeroboam and his Aaronide lead cult as apostates. 

Perhaps (I merely suggest) this is because (duh!) they actually were that!

The only question remaining is: why is Aaron depicted as the one leading the Israelites into sin?

Maybe — just maybe — because he actually did?!

This is a perfect example of how ancient scribes wrote archaized stories as polemical attacks on contemporary rivals.

And how does one prove such a thing in biblical particulars? We hardly if ever see such explanations in the skeptical / atheist anti-biblical polemical narrative fictions.

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Photo credit: BrunoMarquesDesigner (5-15-20) [Pixabay / Pixabay License]

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