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 J. P. Holding [Introduction: Price vs. Craig] [Psychoanalysis Session] [Comments on Miracles] [Principle of Analogy] [The Empty Tomb] [Alternate Burial Traditions] [Crossan and Joe of Arimathea] [Exhuming the Body of Jesus] [The Resurrection Body] [The "Lincoln Challenge"] A wise person once said that foul language is the recourse of those whose arguments lack force otherwise. By the same token, the tactics of Robert Price are remarkably what would be expected of one whose arguments are lacking in cogency sufficient to support themselves - and such is again the case with one of his late, rude efforts for the Secular Web, "By This Time he Stinketh: The Attempts of William Lane Craig to Exhume Jesus." Price's key arguments, indeed, fail miserably on their own; and thus we are not surprised to find them decorated with polemic - for how else will you hide that the tree is bare, other than to cover it in blinking lights and well-spread tinsel? The reader of this material is probably already familiar with the basics, and the tactics of Price: The veiled insults, the childish whining, the sour grapes, the charges of bias, the hypocrisy - all continue to be part and parcel, and represent well Price's ambassadorship for his fellow skeptics and his colleagues of the Jesus Seminar. Price's effort against Craig is by volume nearly one half a personal attack on Craig's motivations and (presumed) individual belief system (as it turns out, obviously misconstrued to a certain extent anyway); about one-quarter an address of the problems of the resurrection, and about another one-quarter regarding issues pertaining to the post-resurrection body. Immediately this gives us confidence: For if Price is representative of what the Secular Web and the Jesus Seminar can offer, the various missionary organizations will have no problem reaching their goal of sharing the Gospel with the entire world. Price's careless, poorly-researched, and poorly-reasoned anti-apologetics continue to be among the best arguments for the truth of the Christian faith that I have ever seen. At any rate, we shall, in accordance with our usual practice, skip over that which is purely diatribe and rhetoric - except where some salient point may be made that I would like to share with the reader. [For those in a hurry: The meatiest stuff begins in section three, entitled "Tomb Time" - just click here to move on down!  Free Psychoanalysis Session But now directly to the task at hand. We begin by noting that Price opens the session with a paragraph containing two techniques of polemic combined. The first is guilt by association: Craig is lumped in together with Scientific Creationism, in a way that is not the least bit subtle, nor intended to be. Of course this is quite all right; it is the standard polemic against we stark raving "fundamentalists", and I do not begrudge Price its use, for of course it also reminds us of his sterling lack of originality - having had several years to sharpen his polemic, I supposed that he would have offered at least some new type of insult, other than the usual associations with the Flat Earth Society, the Ku Klux Klan, and so on. At any rate, it is not the first, but the second tactic that I find enormously offensive, which is that with the taint of hypocrisy. Quite simply, the tactic is this:
Where is this hypocrisy? Quite simply, quite obviously, Price has a dogma of his own. And this is itself not a problem, for of course we all start with certain suppositions that we do not give up, even if it is the dogma that we will adhere to no (other) dogma. Where I object is to the implied pretence that Price himself is somehow objective and above being dogmatic, which is itself manifestly untrue - his occasional qualifying statements about the uncertainty of the various situations not being sufficient evidence to the contrary. Price also briefly complains about Craig's appeal to scholarly consensus. For a discussion of this topic, please see here. However, I am wondering how Price can back up his claim that Craig's appeals to consensus are "ubiquitous." "Ubiquitous" has the meaning of "being everywhere" - yet Price only cites one place where Craig uses this type of appeal, and I can find only a few other places where this happens - and the appeals are backed up by factual data. Could my copies of Craig's material be missing a few pages? And now our first direct quote: ...Dr. Craig would have us believe that the extreme skepticism that once held biblical scholarship hostage to (what he calls) the naturalistic presuppositions of Deism has more recently given way to a general return to confidence in the substantial historical accuracy of the gospels, and especially in the historicity of the empty tomb and the physical resurrection of Jesus. Craig regards such a shift as something of an enlightenment. I doubt he would shun the word for all its historical associations; indeed, he and his cadre of latter-day apologists seem to enjoy gloatingly appropriating the style and accoutrements of the "critical" establishment they think themselves to have displaced. For instance, relishing the opportunity to turn the tables on John Dominic Crossan, Craig confesses himself "puzzled" as to "why a prominent scholar like Crossan would set his face against the consensus of scholarship." Clearly he enjoys being part of the establishment Sanhedrin, now that, as he perceives, his own Pharisaic party, rather than the skeptical Sadducaic faction, controls it. Note, for instance, how Craig refers as a matter of course to his fellow evangelical apologists R.T. France and Robert Gundry simply as "New Testament critics." The hands may be the hands of Baur, but the voice is the voice of Warfield.
I'll skip over a couple of vineyards' worth of sour grapes here, and move to something else that needs addressing: It is only the pious arrogance of Craig's evangelicalism (which denies the name "Christian" to anyone without a personal tete-a-tete with Jesus) that allows him to implicitly depict New Testament scholars as a bunch of newly-chastened skeptics with their tails between their legs. Even Bultmann, a devout Lutheran, was much less skeptical than Baur and Strauss. About "denying" the name "Christian" - as if it were an expandable definition! C. S Lewis once pointed out that the word "gentleman," originally restricted to a very select group of people that met certain conditions of the word, became such a desirable title that ancient precursors of political correctness required it to be applied more broadly, with the result that it now means almost nothing and can be equally applied to the capitalist in the silk hat and the proletarian with the beer can and the lined undershirt. Likewise did "Christian" mean a very specific thing (those who had the "personal tete-a-tete" with Jesus, as Price correctly states), until it was so molded that it now refers to anyone who goes to church on Sunday or sticks a dollar in the offering plate or has a pew named after their family. The word, however, had specific origins and has a specific meaning, one which no amount of sharing or denial will change. This is not "pious arrogance," but linguo-historical actuality. (Of course, Price DOES maintain that words are inadequate to reflect reality [see here], so perhaps this is not so strange coming from him at all!) Here is a paragraph that represents well Price's misplaced faith in idealistic sources: But is this trend to neo-conservatism an enlightenment? Rather, I regard it as a prime example of what H.P. Lovecraft bemoaned as the modern failure of nerve in the face of scientific discovery: "someday the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age." I daresay based on the above that Lovecraft, author of such eminent philosophical and scientific works as Bloodthirsty Tales of Horror and the Macabre, was a sort so lacking in intellectual fortitude that virtually any scientific discovery would have made him jump out of his jodhpurs in fright. Those of us of a more mature mindset will recognize that there are few terrors in knowledge and information - mostly, contrarily, there are surprised people who should have known better and have so little imagination that anything newly discovered frightens them. The computer of today is naught but the abacus of yesterday writ large. As for the concept behind the quote: It remains to be seen whether what is at work is a failure of nerve or a failure (on the part of Price's minions) to accept the natural consequences of having to dispose of theories that no longer work. (And by the way -- for a Biblical scholar, it appears that Price wastes an extraordinary amount of time in pursuit of this "horror hobby" of his. I doubt if Ben Witherington would be half the publishing success if he wasted as much time on stamp collecting. As it is, he also uses it as a vehicle for cheap shots of Biblical criticism. In a book passed to me by a reader, The Book of Eibon, Price plugs the theory of three Isaiahs [see response here] as a comparison to how three authors helped compose a piece for the book, and remarkably claims that Mark used Aramaic words of Jesus [Ephphatha and Talitha cumi] as a way of helping readers use them as magic words in their healing practices! Presumably this is for readers who only want to heal stopped ears [forgte eyes and other stuff] and dead little girls [forget boys]. Presukably also "Corba" [Mark 7:11] was a magic spell to empty the treasury; "Eloi Eloi..." was an incanation, taken from Psalms, to get God's attention, and "Golgotha" was some sort of real estate sales incantation.) I will turn to specific arguments below, but first, a look at two fundamental axioms of Craig's work is in order. The first is what strikes me as a kind of "Double Truth" model. The second is the old red herring attempt to evade the principle of analogy by means of the claim that critics reject miracle stories only because they espouse philosophical naturalism. The second follows from the first. Both commit the fallacy of ad hominem argumentation even while projecting it onto the opponent. Let me note, I have no intention of discounting any of Craig's arguments in advance by trying to reveal their root. Rather, I shall take what seem to me the important ones each in their own right. Here begins the meat of the polemic, and a sampling of one of Price's favorite tactical hypocrisies. "I have no intention of discounting any of Craig's arguments in advance by trying to reveal their root, oh mercy, no. But let me go on and make light of their root anyway, for the next several pages, in great detail!" In all of this I am reminded of the bank robber who committed his crimes in the nude because he theorized that wearing clothes would make him more identifiable. The attempt to disclaim the very tactic that is being employed is as slick as sandpaper, and as transparent as spring water viewed through a glass-bottom boat. It is an insult to the intelligence of Price's readers, as well as a glaring hypocrisy, for him to employ such tactics. (We'll get to those arguments, including that fishy "red herring," a little later on.) William Lane Craig is an employee of Campus Crusade for Christ. Thus it is no surprise that his is what is today euphemistically called "engaged scholarship." Dropping the euphemism, one might call him a PR man for Bill Bright and his various agendas. One thing one cannot expect from party hacks and spin doctors is that they should in any whit vary from their party line. When is the last time you heard a pitchman for some product admit that it might not be the best on the market? When have you heard a spokesman for a political candidate admit that his man might be in the wrong, might have wandered from the truth on this or that point? Do you ever expect to hear a Trekkie admit that the episode about the Galileo 7 was a stinker? Heaven and earth might pass away more easily. A break in this paragraph, for the following observations:
The broader question is, does William Lane Craig have insane devotion to the Christian faith, and contrarily, without any objectivity? Since I do not know Craig personally, I cannot say, but Price feels that he has divulged a very complex answer of motivation and personality from a single paragraph and part of a sentence written by Craig. To wit: And still, there is just the outside chance that Craig might have become convinced through his long years of graduate study that Bill Bright has stumbled upon the inerrant truth, that needle in the haystack of competing world views and theories. But I doubt it. I think he has tipped his hand toward the end of the first chapter of his book Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics, "Faith and Reason: How Do I Know Christianity is True?" There he draws a distinction between knowing Christianity is true and showing it is true. And Price quoteth Craig: What, then, should be our approach in apologetics? It should be something like this: "My friend, I know Christianity is true because God's Spirit lives in me and assures me that it is true. And you can know it, too, because God is knocking at the door of your heart, telling you the same thing. If you are sincerely seeking God, then God will give you assurance that the gospel is true. Now, to try to show you it's true, I'll share with you some arguments and evidence that I really find convincing. But should my arguments seem weak and unconvincing to you, that's my fault, not God's. It only shows that I'm a poor apologist, not that the gospel is untrue. Whatever you think of my arguments, God still loves you and holds you accountable. I'll do my best to present good arguments to you. But ultimately you have to deal, not with arguments, but with God himself." A little further on he saith, "unbelief is at root a spiritual, not an intellectual, problem. Sometimes an unbeliever will throw up an intellectual smoke screen so that he can avoid personal, existential involvement with the gospel." And from this, we are told by the good Dr. Freud: Craig, then, freely admits his conviction arises from purely subjective factors, in no whit different from the teenage Mormon door-knocker who tells you he knows the Book of Mormon was written by ancient Americans because he has a warm, swelling feeling in his stomach when he asks God if it's true. Certain intellectual questions have to receive certain answers to be consistent with this revivalistic "heart-warming" experience, so Craig knows in advance that, e.g., Strauss and Bultmann must have been wrong. And, like the O.J. Simpson defense team, he will find a way to get from here to there. Craig would repudiate my analogy, but let no one who can read doubt from his words just quoted that, first, his enterprise is completely circular, since it is a subjectivity described arbitrarily in terms of Christian belief (Holy Spirit, etc.) that supposedly grounds Christian belief! And, second, Craig admits the circularity of it. Well, that was quite a mouthful; now let's work our way through it. The quotes in question take up about half a page in a thirty-two page chapter on the subject; this alone should raise our suspicions, but let's go over it to be fair. The chapter begins with an overview of the history of thought on the relation of faith and reason, from medieval times to the present. This takes up a third of the chapter. Craig then enters upon the knowing/showing distinction Price alluded to earlier. Knowing that Christianity is true, Craig tells us, is the result of the self-authenticating witness of the Holy Spirit. It is this which Price terms "subjective" and compares to a Mormon stomach-acid attack - presuming, thereby, the very thing that he should set out to prove, which is that the self-authenticating witness of the Spirit is indeed just another episode of gas. Simply saying, "A is like B, so A must be a copy of B" is insufficient. But moving on to the distinction Craig makes. Offering Scriptural backup for the concept of self-authentication from Romans Chapter 8, Craig writes [Craig.RF, 32]: Here (Paul) explains that it is the witness of the Holy Spirit with our spirit that allows us to know that we are God's children...Sometimes this is called 'assurance of salvation' by Christians today; now assurance of salvation entails certain truths of Christianity, such as 'God forgives my sin,' 'Christ has reconciled me to God,' and so on, so that in having assurance of salvation one has assurance of these truths. Then, referring to a passage in John's Gospel, Craig says (ibid., 33): Now the truth that the Holy Spirit teaches us is not, I'm convinced, the subtleties of Christian doctrine...What John is talking about is the inner assurance the Holy Spirit gives of the basic truths of the Christian faith. Keep in mind, here, what these "basic truths" are - forgiveness of sin, reconciliation, specifically - but NOT doctrinal subtleties! Continuing, same page, also re John's Gospel: ...according to Jesus it is the indwelling Holy Spirit that gives the believer certainty of knowing that Jesus lives in him and that he is in Jesus, in the sense of being united with him. And Craig closes this section (ibid., 34): Thus, although arguments and evidence may be used to support the believer's faith, they are never properly a basis of that faith. Now note again the three things that Craig names that the Holy Spirit provides confirmation of: Forgiveness of sins, reconciliation with God, unity with Jesus. On the other hand, the Spirit does NOT provide confirmation of doctrinal subtleties. Craig continues by examining the role of the Spirit in the non-believer. The Spirit's mission in the unbeliever is three-fold, Craig says (ibid., 35): ...he convicts the unbeliever of his own sin, of God's righteousness, and of his condemnation before God. The unbeliever so convicted can therefore be said to know such truths as "God exists," "I am guilty before God," and so forth. Craig then cites Scriptures noting that arguments alone will not convict a person - it must be the Holy Spirit that convicts. He summarizes thusly (ibid.): No one in the final analysis really fails to become a Christian because of lack of arguments; he fails to become a Christian because he loves darkness rather than light and wants nothing to do with God. Let's stop here now and consider this. All of these things that the Spirit convicts us of are of a particular nature. They are spiritual, immeasurable quantities: Forgiveness of sins, of course, can never be measured, nor can it be scientifically determined. There are no "Acme Sin Meters" available to tell us that our burden of sin has been lifted from us. Nor is forgiveness made in a certain color or texture. These are things that could be authenticated NO OTHER WAY than internal witness - even an epiphany of God sitting upon the clouds of heaven could not "prove" that our sins are forgiven. Keep this in mind as we progress to our next section. In the section following, Craig looks at the role of arguments and evidence. It is a subsidiary role, he tells us; reason and evidence do not serve as the basis of our belief, but rather serve to reinforce or confirm it. At once we may hear Price crying "Foul!" Well, let's look at two reasons Craig gives us as to why we cannot allow reason to serve the magisterial role over the Gospel. The first is simple: We can never have all the knowledge we need to make a certain decision. In Craig's words (ibid., 37): The vast majority of the human race have neither the time, training, nor resources to develop a full-blown Christian apologetic as the basis of their faith. Even the proponents of the magisterial use of reason at one time in the course of their education presumably lacked such an apologetic. According to the magisterial role of reason, these persons should not have believed in Christ until they finished their apologetic. Now here is something rather interesting. Price himself admits very much the same as the above in a footnote - but note his significantly different take on the issue: It is telling that Craig wants to justify his use of the appeal to consensus. And in doing so, he appeals to a false analogy. In a court of Law, or in the certification of doctors, lawyers, etc., we may have to go with the verdict of the majority since we have not the leisure to master the subject ourselves. This, in turn, is because we do not have all the time in the world before we must return a verdict, choose a surgeon, etc. We have to make a choice, and the voice of the consensus tips the balance. But it only seems to us that we must take the word of the mass in biblical discussions if we think that here, too, the decision is a matter of practical, even life-or-death choice, and this is not the case in an intellectual consideration of complex issues. But this again reflects Craig's not-so-hidden agenda: he is winning souls, not arguing ideas. "You might get killed on the way home from the stadium tonight, and then you'd enter a Christless eternity! So be convinced of the historical resurrection here and now--get it settled tonight, won't you? If you came with a bus, they'll wait on you." I find this amazing! Once again, Price simply assumes the very thing he sets out to prove: "The apologists say make a decision now, because it is a matter of eternity. But it isn't a matter of eternity, so you don't need to make the decision now. Or even at all." That's the very point at issue! And even then, Price is confusing evangelism with apologetics, as he has done elsewhere (see here). Moreover, is not Price asking his readers to adhere to the consensus within his OWN circle? More deeply, Price has tried to create a false dilemma here: life-and-death or "practically sterile"! But he has misunderstood (or misconstrued) Craig here. The point about surgeons, lawyers, etc applies to ANY field that has a very, very high preparatory requirement -- including accountants, for example. One uses an accountant, not because its a life-and-death issue, but because the organism of knowledge works that way! One uses specialists, and I use my own certification as a librarian, to "authenticate" my sources. I am STILL BEING critical in my thinking, but simply aiming that thinking at source-validation rather than mastering a huge subject matter field. So, Price has characterized the argument incorrectly; and it should be noted that Craig's argument is a formal one -- it is the structure and form of the exchange that is being demonstrated, not the content of the subject matter (i.e., surgery). The time-element involved in those practical matters IS a real concern to Craig, but to make this into an "agenda" that radically separates "winning souls" from "presenting ideas"(!) is downright silly. ALL "presenting ideas" is done with a purpose, whether to convince of a position, or to simply stretch the head of the listener. The mere discussing of ideas, only to never let them affect one's life, amounts to intellectual bulimia. Such a sterile world may be of theoretical interest to some, but the vast majority of scholars have the notion that their subject actually matters! But now to Craig's second rule for the role of reason and evidence (ibid.): ...if the magisterial role of reason were valid, then a person who had been given poor arguments for Christianity would have a just excuse before God for not believing in him...The Bible says all men are without excuse. Even those who are given no good reason to believe and many persuasive reasons to disbelieve have no excuse, because the ultimate reason they do not believe is that they have deliberately rejected God's Holy Spirit. So, for example, Adolf Hitler could plead ignorance and get off scot-free for eternity! Of course, in such a case it would have to be determined whether a person honestly considered the necessary arguments, but that is another point. Next Craig considers the chief role of reason in this arena: what he terms "systematic consistency." After an excursus upon the methods of proof and logic, Craig observes that tests for systematic consistency - which is to say, tests to show that a given assertion is logically consistent and fits all the facts at hand - "(do) not guarantee the truth of a world view. For more than one view could be consistent and fit all the facts yet known by experience; or again, a view which is systematically consistent with all that we know could turn out to be falsified by future discoveries." (ibid., 40) And then he writes: Now some Christian believers might be troubled by the notion that one's apologetic case for Christianity yields only probability rather than certainty. But the fact that Christianity can only be shown to be probably true need not be troubling when two things are kept in mind: first, that we attain no more than probability with respect to almost everything we infer...without detriment to the depth of our conviction and that even our non-inferred, basic beliefs may not be held with any sort of absolute certainty...and second, that even if we can only show Christianity to be probably true, nevertheless we can on the basis of the Spirit's witness know Christianity to be true with a deep assurance that far outstrips what the evidence in our particular situation might support...To demand logically demonstrative proofs as a pre-condition for making a religious commitment is therefore just being unreasonable. From here, Craig proceeds to a tangently-related discussion of Eastern and mystical views of thought; next, he discusses the need for using arguments that are convincing. He then discusses the role of the Holy Spirit when rational argumentation is engaged, pointing out that we are Scripturally mandated to be prepared to defend our faith (1 Pet. 3:15). It is at the conclusion this section that we find the extensive paragraph quoted by Price above, and slightly later, in a summary application, the part of the single sentence. What is the point of this exercise, and of going through Craig's material as we have? The point, other than those that we have allowed Craig to make on his own, is this: The things that Craig points to as part of the authenticating witness of the Spirit are intangibles - forgiveness of sins and so forth. Contrariwise, the things that Craig points to as subjects for apologetics are tangible - the reliability of the NT, the existence of Jesus, and the resurrection. But here is the issue: Even if we prove beyond doubt that (for example) the crucifixion of Jesus took place in history, even if we had one of Price's videotapes to record it, this BY NO MEANS proves that it served as atonement for our sins! The events grant authority to the assertion that it DID atone for our sins, but it can NEVER be proved by evidence or by argument that it did - and thus, our own atonement, as we now stand, cannot be other than a matter of faith confirmed by internal witness. Applied to our topic here, the resurrection, what does this mean? First let's look again at Price's original complaint: Craig, then, freely admits his conviction arises from purely subjective factors, in no whit different from the teenage Mormon door-knocker who tells you he knows the Book of Mormon was written by ancient Americans because he has a warm, swelling feeling in his stomach when he asks God if it's true. Certain intellectual questions have to receive certain answers to be consistent with this revivalistic "heart-warming" experience, so Craig knows in advance that, e.g., Strauss and Bultmann must have been wrong. And, like the O.J. Simpson defense team, he will find a way to get from here to there. Craig would repudiate my analogy, but let no one who can read doubt from his words just quoted that, first, his enterprise is completely circular, since it is a subjectivity described arbitrarily in terms of Christian belief (Holy Spirit, etc.) that supposedly grounds Christian belief! And, second, Craig admits the circularity of it. So is it purely subjective? If Christianity is untrue, then of course it is; but that is the very point at issue. The appointment of dishonesty - i.e., "he will find a way to get from here to there" - assumes that all of the arguments have been decided and that Craig is living in a fantasy world; and more, that Price and Co. have already won the game - which sounds remarkably like a dogmatic presupposition! But before we pass out the party favors and put the pointy hats on our heads, we are obliged to examine the scorecard to see who is really the victor! This we will do, for our topic of pertinence, as soon as Price gets around to it - for now, since we have encountered naught but polemic, we are obliged to ask if the celebration might not be a bit premature, and based upon a presupposition of victory of the very sort that Price decries among believers; and further, we may ask whether the extensive and violent nature of the polemic is not itself a reflection of the insecure foundation upon which the bricks of Price's arguments rest! Continuing: It almost seems Craig has embraced a variant of the Double Truth theory sometimes ascribed to Averroes, the Aristotelian Islamic philosopher, who showed how one thing might be true if one approached it by the canons of orthodox Islamic theology while something very different might prove true by means of independent philosophical reflection. Can it be that Craig is admitting he holds his faith on purely subjective grounds, but maintaining that he is lucky to discover that the facts, objectively considered, happen to bear out his faith? /That, whereas theoretically his faith might not prove true to the facts, in actuality (whew!) it does? Craig is actually embracing nothing of the sort, and indeed, such process would be unscriptural. Why? As Paul has said: If Christ is not risen, our faith is worthless. Or, to Cochranize the phrase: If the body remain, your faith is in vain. If it were conclusively proven that the body of Jesus never rose from the dead, then Christianity too would be dead - and the self-authenticating witness would have to be either reduced to the level of gastro-intestinal disorder or else have to be reworked into some sort of Bultmaniann "even if the facts do not comport you still have faith" scenario with a historical basis no greater than that of any other world religion. In other words, in a sense, this time the Price is right - although his psychoanalysis of Craig more likely reflects his own pre-skeptical indecisiveness, rather than anything that William Lane Craig or any other person in particular believes. (We may add that Price's point of view even then would not win by default! It, too, must be subjected to the same sort of scrutiny, and go through the same raw game of survival.) In the first century, our analysis here would have meant that, for a time at least, Christianity as we know it could have been disproven - but nothing of the sort DID happen, obviously, for we are here arguing the point now, and shall do so further. After that time and today, any point of view becomes a matter of testing for systematic consistency rather than of more or less absolute certainty, which (barring time-travel) is simply impossible. Do we propose that the disciples stole the body? That entails other conclusions that must be tested. So does the swoon theory, the Muslim substitution theory, and John D. Crossan's "the dog ate it" theory. And, of course, the traditional view entails certain conclusions. It is my view (and Craig's) that the traditional view meets the test of systematic consistency better than any other; whereas Price, as we shall see, is content to throw spaghetti against the wall and find any alternative, no matter how wild and desperate, better than that of the Resurrection. That, of course, is his business and his faith; but we are not obliged to take what he says at face value, nor be led down the garden path by his bile-tainted inconsistencies. He would have to agree (though not necessarily like it) that his arguments are as much subject to scrutiny as any others. He would be less likely to admit that any view he holds is, at this late date and barring better evidence, as much a matter of predisposition (actually, I would say more so) as the view of a traditionalist. Price continues: I think he does mean something on this order. But what might first appear to be a double truth appears after all to be a half-truth, for it is obvious from the same quotes that he admits the arguments are ultimately beside the point. If an "unbeliever" doesn't see the cogency of Craig's brand of New Testament criticism (the same thing exactly as his apologetics), it can only be because he has some guilty secret to hide and doesn't want to repent and let Jesus run his life. If one sincerely seeks God, Craig's arguments will mysteriously start looking pretty good to him, like speaking in tongues as the infallible evidence of the infilling of the divine Spirit. Actually, Craig says that it COULD be sin that keeps an unbeliever from repenting and/or admitting the cogency of an argument, but it is not the ONLY possible reason. Craig also allows that poor arguments or poor comprehension could play a role - although, as noted above, rejection of God is the cause of not repenting in the long run. Moreover, Craig advises the reader that if insincerity is suspected, one may do better to "simply break off the discussion and ask...'If I answered that objection, would you then really be ready to become a Christian?' " (ibid., 50) Apologetics may then be effectively used IF the seeker is sincere - and NOWHERE does Craig say, either, that sincerity will mysteriously make the arguments look good! He does indicate that INSINCERITY will cause a skeptic to reject an argument that is a cogent one, but that is NOT the same as saying the opposite! This is an insult to the intelligence of all true seekers and those who take the time to guide them! If, on the other hand, an unbeliever is NOT sincere, then some "guilty secret" MAY indeed be involved! That is certainly not Price's place to judge out of hand, any more than it is our place to do so. [Personally, seeing that the "Christ myth" is one of the latest fads in skeptical circles, I would have to propose that the cause is either a desperately guilty sense of sin, or else a severe deficiency in critical thinking skills! Which do you folks prefer? I'll skip over another paragraph of "pre-suppositonal" thinking and move on to this: (Craig's) is a position that exalts existential decision above rational deliberation, quite ironic in view of his damning Bultmann's supposedly nefarious existentialism! Rational deliberation by itself is not good enough for Bill Craig and Bill Bright because it can never justify a quick decision such as Campus Crusade's booklet The Four Spiritual Laws solicits. I do not mean to make sport of Craig by saying this. No, it is important to see that, so to speak, every one of Craig's scholarly articles on the resurrection implicitly ends with that little decision card for the reader to sign to invite Jesus into his heart as his personal savior. He is not trying to do disinterested historical or exegetical research. He is trying to get folks saved. In any event, the modern form of Pascal's wager comes into play. Would you take a chance on eternity? It's your business if you do, of course; and remember, you can always do what Price has done - pass the grace back for a mess of pottage! We close with a final paragraph of Price's professional shrink session, which we will not bother with here; and then, on to the next topic. Here is our own view of the matter, in closing: Price has looked, so he thinks, into the face of William Lane Craig. What he has seen is his own past mirror image; what he has heard is his own insincere platitudes as a former evangelist/apologist. This view could be wrong, of course, but it is also just as unassailable as Price's own psychoanalysis of Craig. The question remains: Where the rubber meets the road, which of our party is left standing in the dust? Price has sold his skeptical friends a bill of goods, assuring them that it is surely the evangelicals who will be left in the lurch, indeed, are still sitting in the driveway fumbling with their keys. Thus does he believe he achieves the upper hand: He has already guaranteed that we are offering arguments that merely "get from here to there" like the Simpson defense team's arguments, and anything we DO offer in defense, he assures them, is just more fundamentalist pablum! Thus, even if the skeptical reader happens to find one of Craig's arguments convincing enough to make Christianity tenable - don't worry! Even if you can't find it, there's a flaw SOMEWHERE - that, you can be sure of! Sounds a little like FAITH and DOGMA to me! So much to be said, then, for the free exchange of ideas and of productive dialogue. With that, let us divest Price of his gilded trappings; we shall see in the same mirror that the new emperor has no clothes. Miracle Mileage Our next section by Price owes less to psychoanalysis and slightly more to attempts at argumentation. Regrettably, it is also far too dependent upon caricature. To wit: Once one sees the circular character of Craig's enterprise, it begins to make a bit more sense that he would retreat to the old red herring of "naturalistic presuppositions" as a way of doing an end run around the most fundamental postulate of critical historiography. That is, Craig tells us that no one would reject miraculous reports like the resurrection narratives unless already dogmatically committed to Deism or atheism. Since it is in the vested interest of all those unregenerate sinners like Strauss and Schleiermacher to deny miracles, they had no choice but to deny that God had raised Jesus from the dead. Again, this is the most blatant kind of scurrilous mud-slinging, no different from Creationist stump debater Duane Gish charging that "God-denying" evolutionists must want society to become a den of murderers and pornographers. We search again, in vain, for a footnote that tells us where Craig "tells us" these things, and this time, there is no excuse, for the exterminators have caught that nasty elf who renumbered my pages. For Craig's most up-to-date views, let's look again at some cites from A Reasonable Faith: Undoubtedly, one of the major stumbling blocks to becoming a Christian for many people is that Christianity is a religion of miracles...But the problem is that these sort of miraculous events seem to belong to a world view foreign to modern man - a pre-scientific, superstitious world view belonging to the ancient and middle ages. (ibid., 127) For this reason, Craig notes, some like Bultmann sought to "demythologize" Christianity to make it more relevant and easier to accept. Moving further, past some examinations of various views on the subject, Craig concludes (ibid., 140): Although the Christians argued vigorously on behalf of miracles, it was undoubtedly the arguments of Spinoza, Hume, and the Deists that posterity gave an eye to, for in the next century D. F. Strauss was able to proceed in his investigation of the life of Jesus on the a priori assumption that miracles are impossible. According to Strauss, this is not a presupposition requiring proof; on the contrary, to assume that miracles are possible is a presupposition requiring proof. Strauss asserts that God 's interposition in the regular course of nature is "irreconcilable with enlightened ideas of the relation of God to the world." Thus, any supposedly historical account of miraculous events must be dismissed out of hand; '"indeed no just notion of the true nature of history is possible, without a perception of the inviolability of the chain of finite causes, and of the impossibility of miracles." Craig then quotes Schweitzer (ibid.): The exclusion of miracle from our view of history has been universally recognized as a pattern of criticism, so that miracle no longer concerns the historian either positively or negatively. So far from being a "red herring," this dismissal of miracles was an admitted part of the process! The real "red herring" is Price's incredibly twisted "restatement" of Craig's view as a form of mud-slinging! How significant that we have NO direct quotes from Craig in this arena! We shall see what Craig ACTUALLY argues are the motives for this presumption, in a moment. But now for a bit of meat on our plate: After another full paragraph of stamping his feet, Price continues: And thus it is no wonder that apologists show themselves ready to use every rhetorical trick in the book, since all means are justified by the end of making new converts. Craig at one point needs the Johannine pseudo-character of the Beloved Disciple to be a historical witness of the events, and, as a trump, he says, "If it be said that the evangelist simply invented the figure of the Beloved Disciple, then 21:24 becomes a deliberate falsehood." But why should the notion of an apologist, in this case an ancient one, resorting to pious fraud surprise anyone? Indeed, after careful acquaintance with the works of evangelical apologists, it is precisely what we should expect. And so, Price now assumes his own previous commitments of insincerity upon Christians dating back to the first century! Yes, truly is it said, that it is ever the curse of the sick to imagine their disease in others! Lo, doth the conspiracy extend far and wide, and the plague hath engulfed us all! And what of the further implications that must be drawn out from this scenario? (We may add that the sentence Price quotes does NOT end with the word "falsehood." It continues with a comma after that word, followed by: "...the close affinities between chaps. 1-20 and 21 are ignored, it becomes difficult to explain how the person of the Beloved Disciple should come to exist and why he is inserted in the narratives, and the widespread concern over his death becomes unintelligible." - Craig.ET, 188. Is Price not willing or able to address THESE considerations? And why has he engaged in his OWN deliberate falsehood by chopping Craig's sentence up, thereby dulling its point and making it seem like merely a weak protest regarding the evangelists' commitment to honesty? Is this REALLY necessary if Price's arguments by themselves are worth any attention?) Let us drop past a couple of paragraphs of temper tantrum and move on to the key misrepresentation by Price. What is Craig actually charging as the root of the "anti-miracle" presupposition? Let's look at his criticism of a modern skeptic, the venerable Antony Flew: What really lies behind Flew's objection is unregenerate sin and a dogmatic commitment to atheism. Whoops, I seem to have picked up Price's copy of Craig's book! What really lies behind Flew's objection is the conviction that in order to study history, one must assume the impossibility of miracles. This viewpoint is simply a restatement of the nineteenth-century theologian Ersnt Troeltsch's principle of analogy. According to Troeltsch, one of the most basic historiographical principles is that the past does not differ essentially from the present. Though the events of the past are obviously not the same events as those of the present, they must be the same kind of events if historical investigation is to be possible. Troeltsch realized that this principle was incompatible with the miraculous events of the gospels and therefore held that they must be regarded as unhistorical. We will return to that "principle of analogy" shortly - for now, let us note that what Craig has done here is not in the LEAST like what Price's "in other words" claims it to be. Now back to Price himself: So if it would not require a blanket principle to reject the historicity of particular miracle stories, we must ask if it would take a blanket principle to require acceptance of all biblical miracle stories. Clearly it would. And that principle cannot be simple supernaturalism, openness to the possibility of miracles. One can believe God capable of anything without believing that he did everything anybody may say he did. One can believe in the possibility of miracles without believing that every reported miracle must in fact have happened. No, the requisite principle is that of biblical inerrancy, the belief that all biblical narratives are historically accurate simply because they appear in the Bible. After all, it will not greatly upset Craig any more than it upset Warfield to deny the historical accuracy of medieval reports of miracles wrought by the Virgin Mary or by the sacramental wafer, much less stories of miracles wrought by Gautama Buddha or Apollonius of Tyana. We have seen in this article why the miracles wrought by Apollonius are suspect; the miracles attributed to Buddha fall under a similar curse, for the writings in question are far too late for serious consideration. I cannot comment on the medieval miracles, since no specific source is cited. However, generally speaking, Price has once again engaged in the art of the irrelevant parallel: There are far more factors involved than merely what he has reported, and as that is at present an unnecessary tangent, we will refer the reader to Craig's full chapter on miracles, which is a highly relevant treatment - and a fuller view than that offered by Price's "pick and grin" treatment of the chapter. Keep in mind that Craig, though, makes NO statements about inerrancy in this manner. Nor is it clear that he thinks belief in inerrancy is a requisite for faith - I certainly do not maintain this; and like Glenn Miller, I am an inerrantist "by accident"! If you cannot accept inerrancy, that's your camel to swallow; but in no way can it be said that it is a pre-condition of Christian belief. Nor is it impossible to look at the Bible in a critical way while maintaining a belief in inerrancy - and if you doubt that, write me a letter and tell me why! I'm waiting! Now let's get to the bottom line. Price has charged Craig with accusing critics of blanket rejection of miracles. Is this what Craig says? Not exactly. What Craig actually argues is that the "naturalist" viewpoint of the Deists and atheists of the previous century UNDERLIES the current rejection of miracles - in other words, that the imprintur of Deist/atheist thought has left a legacy that, where before "miracles" were not looked upon skeptically to start with, now they are. They are no longer given the "benefit of the doubt" because they are no longer accepted as a given. As an example of this type of underlying presumption, Craig recounts a story of Arthur Peacocke, who "claimed that modern cell biology has 'radically undermined' the credibility of the virgin birth because it would require God's making a Y-chromosome de novo in Mary's ovum - in other words, it would have to be a miracle!" Thus has the presupposition of the Deists left its legacy: It has left people beginning their arguments by saying, in essence, "That miracle could not have happened, because it would require a miracle!" In such cases, I daresay, the logical inconsistency of the position is not even noticed by the arguer! But now back to the principle of analogy. After another brief complaint about Craig's beliefs and motivations, Price writes: Nor is "naturalism" the issue when the historian employs the principle of analogy. As F.H. Bradley showed in The Presuppositions of Critical History, no historical inference is possible unless the historian assumes a basic analogy of past experience with present. If we do not grant this, nothing will seem amiss in believing reports that A turned into a werewolf or that B changed lead into gold. "Hey, just because we don't see it happening today doesn't prove it never did!" One could as easily accept the historicity of Jack and the Beanstalk on the same basis, as long as one's sole criterion of historical probability is "anything goes!" Once again Price resorts to overcaricature. It is far from being said that we should reject critical arguments and adopt a stance that says, "Anything goes!" What IS being said is that the principle of analogy is itself being used uncritically by critics - as in the cases presented in our article where we show how Price has taken, for example, the account of the Sabbatean movement, made mustard of the parallels he perceives to Christianity, and totally IGNORED the differences! And the examples continue, to wit: If there are Buddhist legends or Pythagorean tales about people walking on water but there is no present-day instance, is the historian to be maligned as a narrow dogmatist and, worse, a moral coward refusing to repent, if he or she judges the report of Jesus walking on the water to be an edifying legend, too? Well, if the DIFFERENCES in the stories and their backgrounds are ignored - closeness of witnesses to the event, reliability of their reports otherwise, etc. - then perhaps moral cowardice, etc. IS the problem; but I am content to say that it is rather a lack of critical thinking that is the source! At any rate, I still see NOWHERE where Craig says ANYTHING like this (re narrow dogmatist, moral coward, etc.), and there is not as much as a quote from Craig in that regard. It sounds like Price is cutting and pasting admonitions from his hellfire background into Craig's books! We must point out here that we are not denying here that principle of analogy is valid - it has its purpose: but it only ALERTS US to cases that require more scrutiny. Cases that are vast departures from analogy (e.g., a man turned into a werewolf) would require a vast amount of other supporting evidence, argumentation, etc. In the case of Buddhist or Pythagoras levitations, the same would apply: Although perhaps less departed from analogy than a metabolic transformation, they are sufficiently far off enough to require extra support. In the case of Jesus' walking on water, the same is the case -- it is substantially far off enough from analogy to past experience to require extra support. However, in this case, we have tons of it: His manifest claims to deity, His lifestyle support for it, the testimony of multiple eyewitnesses, supporting bibliographic evidence, the patterns of the miracles under question, the relationship of the miracles to His claims, the relationship of the miracles to OT prophesy, etc. We have a complete portrait of Christ that is systematically consistent with a vast array of data, and the validity of the whole lends support to the validity of isolated (but integrated) details within that whole. The analogy becomes a Procrustean bed ONLY when it is undergirded with naturalism; otherwise, it is a heuristic method that alerts us of situations needing special attention and special care in evaluation. Continuing again with Price: The historical axiom of analogy does not dogmatize; critical historians are not engaging in metaphysical epistemology as if they could hop into a time machine and pontificate "A didn't happen! B did!" Again, Craig and his brethren are just projecting. It is they, and not critical historians, who want to be able to point to sure results. Imagine the creed: "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in thy heart that God hath probably raised him from the dead, thou shalt most likely be saved." But who is the joke on here? Historians don't have creeds. They frame hypotheses. Sure, you can find some hidebound prof, some small-minded, insecure windbag who will not budge from a pet theory because he has too much personally invested in it. But you have no trouble recognizing such a person as a hack, a fake, a bad historian who ought to know better. The last thing you do is to emulate such behavior and make it into an operating principle. But apologists do. Again, it's projection. Again, "it's baloney no matter how thin you slice it." First, Price can provide no quotes from Craig showing that sort of attitude regarding "sure results" - that is merely projection (or rather, retrojection) of his own previous apologetic methodology onto someone else. Second, historians DO have creeds that act as operating principles, even if it is creeds of uncertainty, even if they do not scream them from the rooftops like a windbag professor, even if they wrap them in the pretense of a "hypothesis." (Or even "presupposition" - the first word in the title of Bradley's book referenced above!) We are not tabula rasa that come at our issues objectively and baby-innocent. ALL of us start with certain presuppositions (read: creeds), and while some of us may not be as obnoxious about it as others, and may more easily divest ourselves of them in given situations, that does not mean that we do not have them in the first place. Price has wrapped himself in the pretence of objectivity, but I daresay that the emperor is again stark naked! (Also, re "most likely to be saved" - remember our distinction above! Not even the resurrection on videotape could "prove" that it was a key act in our salvation! It would lend authenticity and authority to any claims that it did - but the only "proof," as we have noted, comes in the form of the self-authenticating witness of the Holy Spirit - and that is ALL we get, until the veil of tears is rent and the curtain comes down!) And now, the final word in this section from Price: It reduces to this: at the end of Bill Bright's Four Spiritual Laws booklet, there is a cartoon diagram showing a toy locomotive engine labeled "fact," pulling a freight car labeled "faith," followed in turn by a superfluous caboose tagged "feeling." The new convert is admonished to let faith rest on fact, not to allow faith to waver with feelings. But the outsider (not to mention the ex-insider) must suspect that it is the caboose that is pulling the train, and pulling it backwards. Faith is based "firmly" upon feeling, and certain notions are postulated as "fact" because of the security they afford to the sick soul who seeks a port in the existential storm. Craig's own essay in the humbly titled online Truth Journal, "Contemporary Scholarship and the Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ" opens with the supposed predicament of "modern man," feeling all alone in a big bad universe. "Against this background of the modern predicament, the traditional Christian hope of the resurrection takes on an even greater brightness and significance. It tells man he is no orphan after all...." Can anyone imagine a genuine work of scholarly research opening with soap-operatic organ music of this kind? No, we find ourselves in a tent revival, even if it is on the mountainside of L'Abri. I guess I can't imagine a "genuine work of scholarly research" opening with that sort of thing; no less than I can imagine opening with clanging cymbals about spin doctors and party hacks and ten pages of misguided psychoanalysis of my opponents. Nevertheless, that the ex-insider Price got lost in the existential storm himself, let his own caboose lead the way, and ended up losing the locomotive in the process and tipping his cargo over the cliff, is his own guilty cross to bear. Those of us with a more mature view of things take more care with our considerations, are more critical and discerning in our thinking, and do not throw coal and cords of wood at those who are still on track when we ourselves hit obstacles on the tracks and end up derailed. And for the record, let me point out that Craig's article does not exactly "open" with the sentence quoted, as even its structure tells us (nor, for that matter, do I see where Truth Journal professes to be a purely scholarly publication). For the convenience of the reader, here is how the article (http://www.leaderu.com/truth/1truth22.html) actually begins: "Man," writes Loren Eisley, "is the Cosmic Orphan." He is the only creature in the universe who asks, Why? Other animals have instincts to guide them, but man has learned to ask questions. "Who am I?" he asks. "Why am I here? Where am I going?" Ever since the Enlightenment, when modern man threw off the shackles of religion, he has tried to answer these questions without reference to God. But the answers that came back were not exhilarating, but dark and terrible. "You are an accidental by-product of nature, the result of matter plus time plus chance. There is no reason for your existence. All you face is death. Your life is but a spark in the infinite darkness, a spark that appears, flickers, and dies forever." Modern man thought that in divesting himself of God, he had freed himself from all that stifled and repressed him. Instead, he discovered that in killing God, he had also killed himself. Against this background of the modern predicament, the traditional Christian hope of the resurrection takes on an even greater brightness and significance. It tells man that he is no orphan after all, but the personal image of the Creator God of the universe; nor is his life doomed in death, for through the eschatological resurrection he may live in the presence of God forever. The above, of course, is where Price gets his quote. And how interesting, what we find in the very next paragraph (emphasis added): This is a wonderful hope. But, of course, hope that is not founded in fact is not hope, but mere illusion. Why should the Christian hope of eschatological resurrection appear to modern man as anything more than mere wishful thinking? The answer lies in the Christian conviction that a man has been proleptically raised by God from the dead as the forerunner and exemplar of our own eschatological resurrection. That man was Jesus of Nazareth, and his historical resurrection from the dead constitutes the factual foundation upon which the Christian hope is based. And for good measure, the next paragraph offers a clear statement of Craig's stance on critical presuppositions regarding miracles: Of course, during the last century liberal theology had no use for the historical resurrection of Jesus. Since liberal theologians retained the presupposition against the possibility of miracles which they had inherited from the Deists, a historical resurrection was a priori simply out of the question for them. The mythological explanation of D. F. Strauss enabled them to explain the resurrection accounts of the New Testament as legendary fictions. The belief in the historical resurrection was a hangover from antiquity which it was high time for modern man to be rid of. Thus, in liberal theology's greatest study of the historicity of the resurrection, Kirsopp Lake's The Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ (1907), Lake carefully plots the legendary development of the resurrection narratives from the root historical event of the women's visit to the wrong tomb. He concludes that it is not the end anyway: what is vital for Christian theology is the belief in the immortality of the soul, the belief that our departed friends and relatives are still alive and that in time we shall be re-united with them. Thus, the NT has been replaced by the Phaedo. And so we come to the end of this section, and proceed to the next: The place where Price finally puts his money where his mouth is and attempts to defend his own view of things. Sadly, we must again wade through a series of rude comments to get to the meat of the issue, and even sadder to say, it seems that the vultures have beaten us to the carcass. Tomb Time That vented, let's turn to the empty tomb story. As elsewhere, the apologist's task is one of harmonization of "apparent contradictions," this time between the empty tomb stories of the gospels on the one hand and the list of resurrection appearances in 1 Corinthians 15 on the other. What's the problem? By the reckoning of most New Testament scholars 1 Corinthians 15:3-11 preserves a list of appearances decades earlier than the writing of Mark's gospel. And it has nothing to say of the discovery of the empty tomb on Easter morning by Mary Magdalene and her sisters. From this some draw the inference that the story of the empty tomb is a later addition and thus an unhistorical embellishment. Naturally Craig cannot have this, so he tries to coax from the text of 1 Corinthians what is not there: a Pauline citation of the empty tomb tradition. Before he is done he will be telling us how Paul must have gotten his information about the empty tomb from a visit he himself made there on a visit to Jerusalem! Presumably Craig derived this privileged information the same way Matthew got his "tradition" that the risen Jesus appeared to the women at the tomb, simply by reading it between the lines (in Matthew's case, the lines of Mark). In the end we actually find Craig saying, "Thus Paul's acceptance of the empty tomb is strong evidence in favor of its historicity"! We have already commented on matters of harmonization elsewhere, and I fail to see why Price does not address the standard reason given why the discovery of the empty tomb by Mary and Co. is not used by Paul (i.e., the uniform prejudice against the testimony of women in Jewish society, noted by Craig in several places). But it is the empty tomb itself that we are concerned with, and here, remarkably, Price becomes rather more of a pacifist: All Craig can actually show, and this much is certainly a point well taken, is that, since 1 Corinthians 15:4 does mention Jesus' burial as the darkness before the dawn of his resurrection, the notion of a vacant tomb would hardly have been alien to the writer's conception. It would be no surprise to find a mention of an empty tomb in this list, and its lack may simply be because the formulator of the list thought it too obvious to mention. True enough. Where I perceive Craig to be fudging the issue is in his assumption that the only alternative is to envision the formulator of the list believing, as modern liberal theologians do, in a resurrection of a type compatible with an occupied tomb. And if this be ruled out as anachronistic (I agree, it seems far-fetched), then, according to Craig, we are back to the gospel's empty tomb scenario. But are we? We agree, of course, that it may have been too obvious to require mentioning that a resurrected body means an empty tomb - just as simply saying, "A zombie rose from the dead!" would today imply an empty grave left behind! On the other hand, Paul does show implicit awareness of the empty tomb elsewhere - for example, where he compares the resurrection to baptism (Rom. 6:4, 8:29; Col. 2:12). Body in, body out - whether water, or earth, the comparison makes the implication of an empty tomb (along with the Jewish concept of bodily resurrection that MUST be applied here, and which we will discuss shortly) inescapable; and the other type of "resurrection" becomes, as Price admits, rather far-fetched. Finally, we may add that Paul's formula is an accounting of things DONE or experienced by Jesus: died, buried, rose, appeared. A citation of the empty tomb would not fit very well within the rhythm and structure of the formula. [Craig.ANTE, 93n] But now to Price's alternative hypotheses to the empty tomb scenario: Craig realizes that he needs to circumscribe the alternatives if he is to make it appear a simple either/or proposition. So he says there are no competing burial traditions. But there is at least one, namely the statement in Acts 13:28-29 that Jesus was buried by the same people who crucified him. In a case like this, one can easily imagine Jesus' disciples knowing (or surmising) that he had been buried, but not knowing where, or knowing it to be a common grave, e.g., the Valley of Hinnom where Jesus himself had warned habitual adulterers and thieves not to end up, since only those not deemed fit for a decent burial were disposed of there (Mark 9:43-48). If the disciples then beheld him resurrected (or thought they did), there would have been no question of finding "his" tomb, whether empty or occupied. The same would be true if, as implied in John 19:42; 20:15 and the anti-resurrection polemic mentioned by Tertullian (De Spectaculis 30), some held that Jesus had been but temporarily interred in Joseph's mausoleum for reburial elsewhere after the sabbath was past. "They have taken away my lord, and I know not where they have laid him." So it's not as if to assume an empty tomb is to presuppose the empty tomb story of the gospels, i.e., that of a known and vacated tomb one could point to, as Craig wants to do, as an item of evidence. These are pretty thin arguments, by any account. One hypothesis at a time; let's start with a cite of Acts 13:28-29 - WITH surrounding verses (16-41) for all-important context. Paul has just been asked to say a few words in the synagogue at Pisidian Antioch. Verses 28-29 are highlighted: Standing up, Paul motioned with his hand and said: "Men of Israel and you Gentiles who worship God, listen to me! The God of the people of Israel chose our fathers; he made the people prosper during their stay in Egypt, with mighty power he led them out of that country, he endured their conduct for about forty years in the desert, he overthrew seven nations in Canaan and gave their land to his people as their inheritance. All this took about 450 years. "After this, God gave them judges until the time of Samuel the prophet. Then the people asked for a king, and he gave them Saul son of Kish, of the tribe of Benjamin, who ruled forty years. After removing Saul, he made David their king. He testified concerning him: 'I have found David son of Jesse a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.' "From this man's descendants God has brought to Israel the Savior Jesus, as he promised. Before the coming of Jesus, John preached repentance and baptism to all the people of Israel. As John was completing his work, he said: 'Who do you think I am? I am not that one. No, but he is coming after me, whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.' "Brothers, children of Abraham, and you God-fearing Gentiles, it is to us that this message of salvation has been sent. The people of Jerusalem and their rulers did not recognize Jesus, yet in condemning him they fulfilled the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath. Though they found no proper ground for a death sentence, they asked Pilate to have him executed. When they had carried out all that was written about him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb. But God raised him from the dead, and for many days he was seen by those who had traveled with him from Galilee to Jerusalem. They are now his witnesses to our people. "We tell you the good news: What God promised our fathers he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm: "'You are my Son; today I have become your Father.' The fact that God raised him from the dead, never to decay, is stated in these words: "'I will give you the holy and sure blessings promised to David.' So it is stated elsewhere: "'You will not let your Holy One see decay.' "For when David had served God's purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his fathers and his body decayed. But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay. "Therefore, my brothers, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Through him everyone who believes is justified from everything you could not be justified from by the law of Moses. Take care that what the prophets have said does not happen to you: "'Look, you scoffers, wonder and perish, for I am going to do something in your days that you would never believe, even if someone told you.'" From this, Price amazingly discerns an "alternate tradition" that Jesus was buried by his enemies! But let's look at this more closely:
By now we need to refer back to what Price has said again, so let's do so: The same would be true if, as implied in John 19:42; 20:15 and the anti-resurrection polemic mentioned by Tertullian (De Spectaculis 30), some held that Jesus had been but temporarily interred in Joseph's mausoleum for reburial elsewhere after the sabbath was past. "They have taken away my lord, and I know not where they have laid him." So it's not as if to assume an empty tomb is to presuppose the empty tomb story of the gospels, i.e., that of a known and vacated tomb one could point to, as Craig wants to do, as an item of evidence. To start, let's look at the verses in John: 19:42 Because it was the Jewish day of Preparation and since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there. I do not see here where Price gets the idea of a "temporary" interrment, other than by a fair stretch of the imagination. Presumably he thinks that the "nearby" means that they planned to take the body somewhere else farther away later on (for a similar idea refuted see here), but this is more plausibly taken to mean that they chose it as a FINAL resting place only because the tomb was nearby and they were in a hurry to get things done before the Sabbath. Good old Joe of A. would not likely have volunteered his tomb had he lived back in Galilee! (And we may add that Joe would NOT be at liberty to lay a body in a tomb not his own, so that his ownership of the tomb is directly indicated here!) Now the next verse: 20:15 "Woman," he said, "why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?" Thinking he was the gardener, she said, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him." Once again, Price is stretching verses out of control, and bringing out a theory not unlike one of those Silly Putty pictures made from pressing down on the Sunday comics. This verse reflects nothing more than confusion by Mary Magdalene. She has yet to comprehend the event of the resurrection - but does so within the next few moments! Presumably, Price thinks there is some latent tradition here that a gardener took Jesus' body. This is supported, allegedly, by the a counter-polemic in Tertullian. De Spectaculis, however, was written some 175 years AFTER the Gospels and, though it may reflect anti-resurrection polemic in Tertullian's time well enough, it tells us NOTHING about such polemic in the first century. Therefore, each of Price's suggestions for alternate burial traditions fail. Each interpretation of a citation from the text of the NT has proved to be nothing more than the result of overactive imagination, and offers no competition for the assertion in the Gospels that Jesus was buried in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. But now we diverge from Price for a moment to consider a "creative and innovative" idea from the mind of John Dominic Crossan, related to our current topic. It is interesting that Price himself does not fight much of a battle against the traditional view that Jesus was laid in the tomb by Joseph of Arimathea, in a tomb owned by him. This is one of the most audacious non-miraculous claims in the Gospels: Good old Joe is described as wealthy, well-connected (a member of the Sanhedrin, no less!), and of enough nerve to approach Pilate for the body of Jesus. How likely is it that the evangelists could INVENT someone like this, who would be so well-known? It is not likely at all - and therefore, the burial by Joe is one of the best-attested facts of the entire scenario. The eminent Mr. Crossan, however, thinks otherwise. In his view, the body of Jesus was disposed of in a common manner (perhaps in the Valley of Hinnom, referred to earlier) and relegated to the status of Alpo by wild dogs. But what of the Joe of A. claim, we may ask? Crossan, ever creative and innovative, posits that it would not be difficult to invent such a claim at all. And now, with drums rolling, let us see what he offers as proof [Cross.WKJ, 176]. He cites as a counter an incident involving a short story by modern author Jorge Luis Borges, "The Aleph." The subject of the story is a mysterious artifact that somehow contains all places on earth simultaneously. Borges for his story located this object in "a house on Garay Street in Buenos Aires." Garay Street was itself a creation of Borges. The story related by Borges, via Crossan: "Once, in Madrid, a journalist asked me whether Buenos Aires actually possessed an Aleph." Borges paused, tempted to say yes, until a friend reminded him that such an object would be known worldwide. Borges therefore replied that there was no such thing. "Ah," said the journalist, "so the entire thing is your invention. I thought it was true because you gave the name of the street." To this, Crossan echoes Borges: "The naming of streets is not much of a feat..." And he adds: "...if you create the events, why not create names as well?" Conclusion: The apostles could have, rather easily, invented a Joseph of Arimathea and gotten away with it. We see now that Price is not alone in his mastery of the irrelevant parallel! Like Price, Crossan, though a scholar of great knowledge, here displays a notable deficiency in critical thinking skills! To wit: The net of this is: There is an ENORMOUS difference between making a claim about a single street in a large metropolitan city and making a claim about the existence and doings of a major (and wealthy!) political figure! Crossan's parallel is irrelevant, inadequate, and may I say, laughable in the extreme! It is so far beyond being comparable to the Gospel situation that we may seriously question whether Crossan even thought the matter through carefully. If this is an example of "creative" or "innovative" NT scholarship, then let us hope that none of these "creative and innovative" folks decide to try their hand at nuclear power plant management! And so there is nothing here to dispute the matter of where Jesus was laid. Now, though, we turn to a usual key argument of "our" side: If there were no resurrection, all the Jewish authorities had to do was produce the body. Or, as Price rudely puts it (along with his answer): Here we reach two related issues of interest to Craig. First, trading on the idea of a known tomb that should have been occupied was wasn't, Craig hauls out the old argument that if the tomb had not been demonstrably empty the authorities could have silenced the apostles' preaching by the simple expedient of producing the body. "Here's your resurrected savior! Take a whiff!" But this is absurd: the only estimate the New Testament gives as to how long after Jesus' death the disciples went public with their preaching is a full fifty days later on Pentecost! After seven weeks, I submit, it would have been moot to produce the remains of Jesus. Does Craig picture the Sanhedrin using modern forensics? Identifying the rotting carcass of Jesus by dental records? In fact, one might even take the seven-week gap to denote that the disciples were shrewd enough to wait till such disconfirmation had become impossible. This is all rather overstated, of course. As Craig points out, all the authorities really had to do was point to the tomb - "There it is; it is still closed up!" - and that would have been a significant deterrent to Christian belief, even a clinching one. Beyond that, if they really needed it: Since the burial place was known, all that was needed was a public demonstration where the tomb was opened, and the body, such as it was, would be taken out or even pointed out; and this could be done in spite of any legal prohibitions, because we know well enough that the Sanhedrin wasn't one to care about the law when their personal interests were at stake! Or, should the Sanhedrin choose to be law-abiding, Wright notes in The Resurrection of the Son of God [707] that Joseph's tomb would not lay unused after this; as a family tomb, it would be expected to be used again and again, and all the Sanhedrin had to do was arrange to have authoritative witnesses present the next time the tomb was opened, or at a period six months to two years later when the bones would be removed for secondary burial in an ossuary. And what of identification problems? 50 days, or even two thousand years later (as we know from finding the remains of another crucifixion victim from the same era - Haber.VH, 153-4), there were plenty of ways to identify the remains with those of Jesus. Who needs modern forensics? If the skeleton taken out of Joe's tomb showed evidence of crucifixion that even an amateur could discern (i.e., nails still in their places; scratched and scraped bones, or bones stretched out of their sockets - but NO breaking of the legs!), and was also about the right size and had no contrasting features (i.e., a larger brow, missing teeth), that, along with the vested authority of the Sanhedrin saying that it was indeed Jesus' body, would have been completely sufficient to destroy Christianity - or at the very least, cause it to have to alter its tactics considerably (a la Sabbateanism) in order to survive! Moreover - and this is a point that Price utterly fails to address, even though Craig does [Craig.ET, 193-4] - the earliest Jewish polemic, and Christian counter-apologetic, ASSUMES the empty tomb. The argument was that the disciples stole the body - so that apparently, there was a known resting place, a knowledge that the body was there - and then, was not! If there had even been an unopened tomb, or even a hint of a body in the form of a skeleton, that would have produced a radically different polemic and counter-apologetic; i.e., "The body is still there!" "No, that's not Jesus' body, it's someone else's!" But this is not what we have; rather, we have polemics and counters that assume that the body is not where it was known to be after being laid to rest! (For those who would argue that the report in Matthew is a late one, post-70 - let me note here that: 1) there is no reason to date Matthew so late - see here) if it IS late, the polemic and the counterpoint is senseless! A late polemic, beyond the time when disconfirmation was possible - and this applies just as well to Price's argument, above - would begin with the Jews denouncing the proclamation; i.e., "That was never said of Jesus!" - NOT agreeing with the fact of the empty tomb and then trying to explain it! - Craig.ANTE, 371) But now to a second counterstrike by Price. Craig notes that in Jesus' time, the Jews "had an extraordinary interest in preserving the tombs of Jewish martyrs, prophets, and other saints by honoring them as shrines." [Craig.KTR, 57]. Thus, we would expect to find the tomb of Jesus venerated, if indeed He had not risen. Price responds: Good point. But on the other hand, a moment's thought will reveal that once the empty tomb story eventually gained acceptance, the visitation of an occupied tomb would have been suppressed by Christian authorities, much as King Josiah shut down local shrines that functioned as rivals to Solomon's Temple. (Here and everywhere Craig simply presupposes a naive picture of the gospels as straightforward records of reporting, without tendential bias.) And, here as always, Price must pull wild theories out of the air in order to effect a refutation. Who are these "Christian authorities" that Price supposes suppressed visits to the tomb of Jesus in the first century? Josiah had the might of the army and his kingship to enforce his will; the first-century Christians had --- ? What? Constantine's Time-Travelling Goon Squad? Rent-a-Temple-Cop? As we have noted elsewhere, there was a "feedback loop" that the apostolic circle used to counter heresy, but it was hardly a Thought Police Force armed with spears and truncheons, and I daresay if there HAD been any veneration at the tomb of Jesus, it would have been stopped in the usual way that wrong ideas were stopped: instruction. "Brothers, know ye not that the body of Christ is no longer in the tomb? Desist, then, from your visits to it. - Paul." But we have no evidence for such counter-instruction, no evidence of a visit-preventing goon squad (though I am sure that Price rejects easily enough Matthew's account of the guard at the tomb - another factor he fails to consider!), and no indication that the location of the tomb of Jesus was remembered! Even today, we are not 100% certain that the designated site is truly "it" - the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was built by Constantine based on investigations done in HIS time! Keep in mind, also, that many early Christians tended to react to persecution by re-asserting themselves and what they believed in even more strongly! Like the forbidden fruit; like the boatloads of independent-thinking people who went and spent seven bucks and/or drove 50 miles to see "The Last Temptation of Christ" just because Jerry Falwell told them not to - trying to stop visits to the tomb would actually serve, especially in a controlling collectivist society, to INCREASE interest in visiting it, by both Christians AND non-Christians! ("Hmmm, what are they hiding? Let's go have a look!") It was after all, quite near Jerusalem; and if a few interested parties got together enough people, I doubt that ANY number of goons could stop them - at least, not without causing a ruckus that would have left literary footprints throughout the NT apologetics, on into the Talmudic polemical literature, and into our own time! Furthermore, if Price wishes to hypothesize a mysterious Tomb Patrol, I may just as easily suggest that the Jewish authorities, who had an interest in strangling Christianity, and had their OWN well-trained Temple Police force, would be more than happy to dispose of that mysterious Tomb Patrol and ENCOURAGE belief that the body was still buried safely away! Again, this sort of gossamer speculation reflects rather poorly upon Price's abilities to take his proposed scenarios under consideration in a holistic manner. A paragraph follows with the usual about attempts to harmonize the Resurrection accounts (with Price once again hoisting upon the flagpole his favorite example of evangelical excess: Harold's Lindsell's "Peter's denial times nine" scenario). Then, a similar paragraph, ending with another irrelevant parallel, thus: ...from Deuteronomy's statement that no one knew Moses' burial place, something scarcely conceivable to the Moses-worshipping Torah reader, ancient scribes inferred that no tomb was known and visited because none existed! Moses must have been assumed bodily into heaven without dying like Elijah and Enoch! Craig is drawing the same midrashic inference in the case of Jesus: no known tomb veneration --> no corpse! As noted here, this interpretation of events is recorded some 1500 years after the death of Moses - not exactly an eyewitness claim! (Not to mention that it contradicts the OT testimony that Moses was indeed buried, so that the ancient scribes [hardly "Moses-worshippers," by the way -- Price is now verging on anti-Semitism!] were simply ignoring what was plainly stated in the text in support of their own wild theories - the parallel is MUCH closer to Price's critical methodology than to Craig's!) Is Price really so intent upon his intellectual vengeance that he cannot see the difference between these two examples? Apparently so; for next we see another common presumptive mistake: Craig tries to make the Markan empty tomb tale a piece of sober, contemporary history. It is harder to say which part of his attempt is the farther fetched. We are told that the story is unvarnished history since it betrays no signs of theological Tendenz. No theological coloring? In a story told to attest the resurrection of the Son of God from the dead? What else is it? Isn't it all varnish? Formica, instead of wood? Charles Talbert has no trouble adducing abundant parallels from Hellenistic hero biographies in which the assumptions into heaven of Romulus, Hercules, Empedocles, Apollonius (and let's not forget Elijah and Enoch) are inferred from the utter failure of searchers to find any vestige of their bones, bodies, or clothing. Talbert concludes that a resurrection appearance, though not incompatible with such an "empty tomb" type episode, would by no means be needful. The ancient reader would know what Mark was driving at: God had raised the vanished Jesus from the dead. This is a prime bit of form-criticism on the part of Talbert (no God-hating atheist, by the way, but a Southern Baptist, if it makes any difference): it shows precisely that the form of the story is dictated by the theological function of the story. Contra Craig, it is theological through and through. Can anyone miss the irony that Craig, who values the story as nothing but a piece of apologetical fodder, can profess to see it as a bit of neutral history? Several points here: At any rate, though Talbert does gather this data thusly, he does NOT reach the conclusion that Price apparently does - that the story of Jesus is fictional in the same vein as that of Hercules. But Price is not through manipulating arguments quite yet: Craig thinks the story not only objective reporting but even headline news. He borrows from Rudolf Pesch the absurd notion that the very vagueness of the story lends it specificity! The pre-Markan passion story (assuming, as apologists like to do, that there was one) does not mention the name of "the high priest" as Caiaphas, and "This implies (nearly necessitates, according to Pesch) that Caiaphas was still the high priest when the pre-Markan passion story was being told, since then there would have been no need to mention his name." The idea is that a historical reference to the past would have named the priest, just as a historian will refer to "King Henry VIII," not just to "the king." A check of any history book will make it clear what any reader knows already. Sometimes it's one way, sometimes another. It means nothing. Besides, Caiaphas' name may just as well be missing because the story-teller had only the vaguest idea of the circumstances and didn't know who was the high priest at the time. Here Price has rather obscured the point. Pesch is saying, in effect: Speaking today, in 2003, when we say, "The President sat on a tack," we know that the person being referred to is George W. Bush - not Ronald Reagan, or George Bush, Sr., or Teddy Roosevelt. Hence, when Mark's pre-passion source referred to only "the high priest," he was writing at a time when Caipy was still in charge, and of course, he had been in charge by that time for quite a while, becoming something of a fixture - there was no need to name Caipy, because everyone knew, at the time the narrative was formulated, who the high priest was. This, I daresay, is not a convincing argument, but nor is it an "empty argument," Price's vague complaint about it "meaning nothing" to the contrary. (Also, I fail to see WHERE, or HOW, it is "sometimes one way, sometimes another" - if this is so, may we have some contrary examples?) Note, however, the weakness of Price's alternate explanation for this vagueness - this, too, is a step into desperation territory! One might as well suggest that members of MY generation would not know who was President when the space shuttle blew up, or that members of the previous generation would not know who was President when Kennedy was shot! Caiaphas was not the sort to be forgotten; he held his post for eighteen years, almost twice as long as the next-nearest officeholder and six to nine times longer than most of the priests lasted; furthermore, his family (Annas and his offspring) held the post as late as 68 AD, when Annas' grandkid Matthias got himself deposed, and the entire Annas line was being memorialized for its excesses as late as Talmudic times! Certainly a memorable guy in a long line of memorable guys! It is EXTREMELY unlikely that the pre-passion source, or Mark, forgot or did not know who the high priest was! (Of course, we may resort to the tactics of the Christ-myth crowd, and suggest, as G.A. Wells did of Pilate, that he was chosen for the Gospels because he was thought to be the likeliest to do such a thing! Sardines, anyone?) The most astonishing assertion Craig makes regarding the empty tomb story of Mark is that concerning the silence of the women in Mark 16:8. "The silence of the women was surely meant to be just temporary, otherwise the account itself could not be part of the pre-Markan passion story." Up to this point Craig has argued that the empty tomb story must have been a continuation of the pre-Markan passion, not a separate pericope, because it has so much thematic continuity with the preceding. And yet here a gross discontinuity is smoothed over in the name of the assumption that the tomb tale formed part of the pre-Markan passion. At this point I must respond with a hearty, "Huh?" The article cited, from Gospel Perspectives Volume 1, does have Craig (in agreement with Pesch) saying that the empty tomb story is not an independent pericope, but is bound up with the passion story. Craig then points out that it is "unthinkable" that a passion story could end with no mention of the empty tomb or the resurrection, and this is confirmed by the died/buried/rose/appeared formula in 1 Corinthians. [Craig.ET, 183] The "silence of the women" comment comes some four pages and several subjects later, and is supplemental to the point previously made: Obviously the women did not REMAIN silent; otherwise, they would not have told the story, and Mark (or his source) would not be writing the story down! And Craig's original point is well taken: For how else could a passion story be useful for preaching, unless it ended with at least an implication of victory? (Craig also notes that the empty tomb story is connected to the passion narrative in other ways: By contextual, verbal, and syntactical similarities - but of this, we hear nothing from Price. - Craig.ANTE, 198-9) But what of this alleged "gross discontinuity"? Piling absurdity atop phantom explanation, Price writes: Craig the apologist calls on his midrashic skills again, just as Matthew, Luke, and the author of the Markan Appendix (really, Appendices) did when they came to the same dead end, as it seemed to them. All alike simply ignored Mark's statement that the women disobeyed the young man's charge and had them inform the disciples, just as they were bidden. Craig ignores it, too. He is a harmonizer. He cannot bring himself to entertain the thought that Mark might have wanted to say something quite different from his redactors. Before silencing Mark by making his silent women speak, we might ask after the implications of the strange and abrupt ending, and it is not far to seek. Isn't it obvious that the claim that the women "said nothing to anyone for they were afraid" functions to explain to the reader why nothing of this had been heard of before? In other words, it is a late tradition after all, and not just because 1 Corinthians 15 lacks it. No, read in its own right, it just sounds like a rationalization, cut from the same cloth as Mark 9:9, where we read that, what do you kn | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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