Recalling the idea of “Jesus on Trial,” we should note that the law does not allow a verdict to be presumed (hence, the methods in place for jury selection, jury sequestering, etc). The law dictates that the evidence should lead to the verdict. Throughout history, the witness has been the chief source of evidence, and such is the case with regards to the life of Jesus.
When witnesses are called, there are five basic tactics employed to impugn testimony:
1. Show evidence that the witness is not consistent in his/her testimony.
2. Show that the witness is biased.
3. Show that the witness is untrustworthy or deficient in character.
4. Show that the witness is/was under duress, under the influence of disease or drugs, or under the influence of some other agent.
5. Provide an alternative witness/explanation to counter the testimony.
Consistency
What we find in the synoptic gospels is a remarkable consistency with regards to the basic tenants of Jesus’ divinity. Some have called into question whether the gospel authors have been consistent on relatively minor details; however, it would require a willing blindness to dismiss the author’s claims of Jesus’ divinity. There is no doubt that Matthew, Mark, and Luke regard Jesus as a miracle worker, that they confirm Him as the messiah, and that they attest to the resurrection. Each is consistent internally and with one another.
Bias
I have heard the case before that the disciples and/or the authors were biased with regards to Jesus, and I don’t find the case to be particularly compelling. First, as I stated in an earlier post, unless the disciples believe Jesus to be the messiah, there is no eternal reward to be had. Second, if the disciples in fact did not witness the divine nature of Jesus, their “bias” would be based on a want to preserve the divine character of Jesus (who they would know to be a mere mortal) over their want to preserve themselves. In essence, they would have to willingly die for a lie… martyrdom with no eternal reward does not have the ring of truth.
The evidence, in fact, suggests that the disciples gave testimony in the face of mortal danger. The only way bias even enters the equation is if the disciples believe their claims to be true. Then, they would be “biased” to the truth.
Character
To my knowledge, there is no evidence that the disciples lacked character. They claim to have spent their lives trying to uphold the moral teachings of God Himself. I have yet to hear of a serious attack on the disciples’ character.
Mental Faculties
The gospel writings are clear and seemingly lucid accounts that do not serve to impugn the mental adeptness of the authors. There was ample reason for them to recant under tremendous pressure in the other direction, but not evidence that they were testifying under duress. The only real question here is whether the accounts were the child of faulty memory recall.
If we incorporate a little common sense, we know that a graduate assistant is a better source of information than a student who is new to the curriculum. As the professor draws on his assistant for help in developing the curriculum, grading papers, occasionally instructing a class, etc, the assistant develops a fuller comprehension of the materials. If the assistant then goes on to lecture himself and answers questions and critics along the way, the likelihood of forgetting the core of his studies continually decreases. This is what we see with the disciples.
"To teach is to learn twice." -Joseph Joubert
Further, there is a common misconception, it seems, that the disciples sat with Jesus for a few years then decided some 30-40 years later to put pen to paper or to dictate their experiences for posterity. The Bible teaches, however, that the disciples spent their lives preaching what Jesus taught them and meeting with one another to share knowledge and experiences. Consistent with what our common sense tells us, Elizabeth Loftus notes that repeated events will be remembered with greater accuracy and detail than one-time events. Our case study (the disciples) spent their lives retelling Jesus’ teachings over and over again.
The tendency is to extrapolate from the idea that memory recall is imperfect in order to question the historicity of the testimony in the New Testament. One example given was that perhaps the disciples’ inaccurate memory coupled with a strong willingness to believe in the divinity of Jesus led to confusing the empty tomb with a resurrected messiah. In essence, the disciples allowed themselves to be fooled into believing things they wished desperately were true. They allowed a legend of Jesus to creep into their minds and eventually believed the legend to be true. It is this legend that was recorded by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
The theory is interesting, but I think it falls well short of explaining what the disciples preached as truth. The disciples didn’t just speak to an empty tomb and a resurrection. The gospels recount 40 days that the disciples spent with Jesus following his resurrection. That means there were 40 days of false memories that crept into the collective psyche of Jesus’ followers. Perhaps if the disciples were held in some kind of internment camp and fed false memories for a few years we might be witnessing the effects of some (really, really strange) psychological experiment. What is the evidence, though, that any oddity on the scope of what must have happened to the disciples ever occurred?
In the book of Acts (chapter 3), Peter performs a miracle of healing. By chapter 5, a couple who “lied [not] to men but to God” is stricken dead at the very words of Peter. Roger Clemens recently made popular the word “misremembered,” but what mis-remembrances account for Peter’s supernatural gifts? The claims of the New Testament are quite simply too extraordinary to have been the product of false memories. For one disciple to misremember the resurrection and the 40 days that followed would be astonishing. As we add more disciples and numerous additional miracles performed by Jesus and by the disciples themselves (it’s very important that this fact does not get lost), it is simply unfathomable that so very many people “oopsied” their way into Christianity.
As Marcus Stone notes, “A robbery or a theft is unlikely to mellow in the fullness of time into a donation of property. A rape will not be transformed into a romance. A vicious assault will probably not be converted into an accidental collision on the street.” Likewise, it is inconceivable that numerous devotees would recall Jesus’ ascension up a flight of stairs as ascension into the clouds or that the time he hung off the branch of His favorite tree as the crucifixion.
Over the course of a lifetime, you will almost certainly never make a claim on the scale of Matthew, Mark, or Luke. Any reasonable person should be skeptical and any reasonable person would reject the prima facie claims of the divinity of another without further evidence. But, when we surmise the evidence in the gospels, we find that there is extraordinary evidence that the disciples believed, that they were not the victims of faulty memories, and that testifying to the divinity of Jesus cannot have been in their own self interests.
Alternatives
When we read the few non-Biblical accounts written around the same time as the gospels, what we get is a picture of Jesus as a miracle-worker, though not necessarily a messiah. Seemingly all of the accounts written in the first couple of centuries acknowledge that there was something special about Jesus. To my knowledge, there are no reputable refutations of the gospels.
Conclusion
Any dismissal of the gospels demands a supposition that is incredibly difficult to reconcile. Did they misremember the most significant details of their lives? Were they duped into believing they could perform miracles? Did they die for a lie? None of these explanations seem plausible in a naturalistic worldview. Rather, it seems clear that the disciples believed their message (evidenced by their willingness to die), that the events they preached to were too remarkable to have been the product of faulty memory or trickery, and that they were able to provide evidence so convincing that thousands upon thousands of people willingly sacrificed their own lives rather than renounce Jesus. Perhaps a flippant dismissal of the gospels is tantamount to ignoring the evidence and instead presuming the verdict.
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11 comments:
People die for a lie every day.
The bible isn't the only show in town, and every person who's died for their faith UNRELATED to your myth of favor MUST HAVE died for a lie in your view.
The court of law's standards of "witness" and"eyewitness" are so far from yours, I don't know where to begin.
In regard to your "why would they lie" approach. Modern day MLM marketing is similar in rational, true or not, they promote their product, in this case, everlasting life, in an attempt to establish a territory, develop a downline (read: congregation), and assume a position of authority. The church is the most successful business model in history, and this didn't require a belief in the supernatural to see.
Selling everlasting life is a sweet gig, but other than that claim that's payable on death, what does your faith get you?
Can you do something better than a non-believer?
Aside from eternity in fiery damnation, how am I handicapped with my naturalist perspective?
Hi, 52Blogs-
I was invited by your correspondent Steve to take a peek at your blog and see what I could make of it. I am an atheist and scientist.
Throughout history, the witness has been the chief source of evidence, and such is the case with regards to the life of Jesus..
But how good are eyewitnesses? Not very good. In modern law, they are recognized to be just about the very worst forms of evidence. Almost anything else is better- cell phone records, blood, DNA, bridge tolls- any record of an objective nature is better than an eyewitness.
Was Mark an eye witness? No. We don't even know who Mark was, or what his real name was. I will stick with Mark because Luke and Matthew are embroidered copies of Mark that added fantasy, not facts. They are not independet writers, let alone witnesses.
What we find in the synoptic gospels is a remarkable consistency with regards to the basic tenants of Jesus’ divinity.
I am no biblical scholar, but firstly, since Luke and Matthew are known to be copies of Mark as far as their historical data goes, they would be expected to be consistent. That would be no big trick. But in fact they are not. They ascribe more divinity to Jesus than does Mark. There is a sort of ascending invocation of divinity as one goes from the earliest gospel (Mark, and also the earliest recognized writings of Paul) to the latest ones like John. This agrees with the usual process of myth-i-cization, as seen in numerous other religions and traditions.
I have heard the case before that the disciples and/or the authors were biased with regards to Jesus, and I don’t find the case to be particularly compelling.
Oh really? Here are cult groupies writing the "history" of their cult prophet, and you think they are not biased? They report miracles that are physically impossible and have no support from contemporary observation, yet are eerily similar to countless other messiah and god-tales of the time, and you don't think they are biased? In later years, adherents of this religion go on to corrupt the only possible historical reference to their prophet (Josephus) so that their stories line up just a little bit better. Not biased? Sounds like Stalinist re-writing of history to me.
I do give Mark some credence as a writer and even historian, but as you may have heard, one of his literary models was Homer and the travels/travails of Odysseus, which gave rise to quite a few plot elements. All this is not to say that Jesus was made up out of whole cloth, but that the story bears countless marks of bias and fancy.
To my knowledge, there is no evidence that the disciples lacked character. They claim to have spent their lives trying to uphold the moral teachings of God Himself. I have yet to hear of a serious attack on the disciples’ character.
Do I detect a bit of bias of your own? Here we have writers who freely report miracles that couldn't happen, and who progressivley beef up their hero as a more and more perfect man/god. Now this was done quite often in the ancient world (e.g. Herodotus), so this does not really impugn their moral character per se, but it does impugn their scholarly character. I mean, this is not exactly like reading Tacitus. And, of course the fact that there are many discrepancies between Luke, Matthew and Mark, despite the fact of working from the same crib sheets, means that their elaborations could not all have been true. We don't know which are which, really.
cont ...
If the assistant then goes on to lecture himself and answers questions and critics along the way, the likelihood of forgetting the core of his studies continually decreases. This is what we see with the disciples.
... Or increases, in the case or oral traditions, or in the game of telephone. I have no problems with the writer's mental faculties. Novelists and writers of historical romances need tremendous mental acuity to keep their stories straight. For instance, making up plot elements to match obscure prophecies from the old testament takes quite a bit of scholarship and creativity. And using Homeric elements creatively within a new context and a partially inverted story also takes great mental acuity.
That means there were 40 days of false memories that crept into the collective psyche of Jesus’ followers. Perhaps if the disciples were held in some kind of internment camp and fed false memories for a few years we might be witnessing the effects of some (really, really strange) psychological experiment.
Who's to say that the number 40 is accurate? This would be the perfect type of thing to inflate as legend. You are choosing to believe as your first order of business, rather than taking a skeptical position that accords with the context of authorship and cult oral traditions in the ancient world.
In the book of Acts (chapter 3), Peter performs a miracle of healing. By chapter 5, a couple who “lied [not] to men but to God” is stricken dead at the very words of Peter.
Does this sound very moral? Sounds like this kind of thing could have led to quite a bit of burning at the stake and so forth in the middle ages. As for its accuracy, it could very well be that people are stricked by highly emotional experiences. Killing people is far easier to credit than resurrecting them.
Over the course of a lifetime, you will almost certainly never make a claim on the scale of Matthew, Mark, or Luke. Any reasonable person should be skeptical and any reasonable person would reject the prima facie claims of the divinity of another without further evidence. But, when we surmise the evidence in the gospels, we find that there is extraordinary evidence that the disciples believed, that they were not the victims of faulty memories, and that testifying to the divinity of Jesus cannot have been in their own self interests.
But this kind of thing happens all the time. Remember Waco and the Branch Dividians? Remember the heaven's Gate cult? Jonestown? Many victims of Stalin's purges freely incriminated themselves for the larger good and went down believing in the truth of Bolshevism. People's capacity for delusion is endless, and the first century seems to take the cake in terms of messianic cults and other bizarre religious movements.
When we read the few non-Biblical accounts written around the same time as the gospels, what we get is a picture of Jesus as a miracle-worker, though not necessarily a messiah. Seemingly all of the accounts written in the first couple of centuries acknowledge that there was something special about Jesus. To my knowledge, there are no reputable refutations of the gospels.
I don't know what you are talking about. There are no extra-gospel sources of historical evidence for Jesus, period. The stories were barely important enough to create- they certainly were not important enough to refute at the time. They were not important enough for anyone outside the movement to comment on till the next century.
Conclusion- Again, you take sincerity of belief to be accuracy of history, and these are totally different things. I am sure some people are willing to die for the Reverend Sun Yung Moon. Does that make his divinity correct? In a few hundred years, the American empire might be run by moonies who then re-write the history books to make their own hard-fought battle for supremacy look a bit better than it looks right now.
Best wishes!
It is refreshing to see another voice of reason joining the comments section. Excellent posts Burk Braun.
As stated before, eyewitness testimony is the most common cause of wrongful convictions in our judicial system. This fact alone indicates that eyewitness evidence does not qualify as “good evidence” as we have been discussing. Remember, you are putting forth claims that violate the laws of physics; it is not reasonable to rely on the most common cause of wrongful convictions to overturn laws of physics.
I find your use of Loftus quite out of context. She has built her distinguished career around demonstrating “how memories can be changed by things that we are told. Facts, ideas, suggestions and other post-event information can modify our memories.” (From her website). It seems to me that you are pretty much quote mining trying to find something to fit your agenda. Sure repeated experience of an event may strengthen the accuracy of a memory, but that is not what we are talking about here. We are talking about the telling and retelling of events over several decades, not re-experiencing it.
Do you acknowledge the mutation of narrative seen in other myths? Do you recognize the many other cases where people are “oopsied” into their respective myths?
Burk,
I do want to welcome you to the blog. It is indeed nice to have a "voice of reason"... and a scientist at that. But I hope you'll take a moment to look over the past few posts where I tried to address quite a few of the concerns you listed. I've been steadily building evidence over the past several weeks and I hope you have the opportunity to view the progression and raise additional objections going forward. As Skyhook has demonstrated, there are no shortage of objections if you really put your mind to it.
I challenge you in the meantime to think of a few differences between a witness who is being led by an attorney and one who is simply attesting to facts without prompting. Also, even in today's courts, as the witnesses compound, the evidence certainly becomes more compelling.
Skyhook,
I assure you that I didn't pull quotes for my own purposes with no regard to their original intent. I appreciate, though, that when you have those suspicions you bring them to me. Thank you for trying to keep me honest. The study mentioned was really just a citation of that which common sense dictates.
All,
I don't mean to ignore quite a few of your objections, but we're a bit off-topic here. I've been talking about whether it's reasonable to assume that a multitude of witnesses misremembered a rather lofty claim. We've been talking in generalities about eyewitnesses to argue against the validity of the gospels. When we look to a courtroom for example, take note that the attorneys don't generally just say, "we all know that eyewitnesses are totally unreliable, so let's just skip this part of the hearing." You still have to look to the particular eyewitness. One eyewitness may be quite a bit more reliable than another.
Hi, Randy-
Thanks for the welcome. We are indeed not in a courtroom. The setting is far more biased than that. there have been decades worth of oral history and retelling going on, through which stories tend to get altered. One discussion... Have you ever been in a courtroom where eyewitnesses have diametrically opposed accounts of the same events? I have.
And how do you account for the similarity of the Jesus tales with those in other traditions- the virgin births and healings, and minor miracles, etc? This kind of thing was rampant in the ancient world. Indeed, tales of magical healing are rampant in our own day, right now. Take a step back from your belief, and you will find that psychological explanations for all this work far better than a special suspension of the laws of the universe for your tales, but not for those of others.
I'm sure such a courtroom situation would give pause to the jury.
If, on the other hand, 5 witnesses were lined up to testify in a highly publicized case against a mob boss, and each witness knew that many other witnesses had been killed before other cases had gone to trial, I would be more inclined to be persuaded by the eyewitness testimony, as I imagine you would be. There is something about that willingness to die that adds a bit of credence.
“There is something about that willingness to die that adds a bit of credence.”
Arguing from emotion.
Galileo was not willing to die. He recanted and spent the rest of his life under house arrest. It is a good thing emotive argument is not what the scientific, reasonable, rational mind relies on.
"We advise trial courts to refrain from informing jurors they may consider a witness's level of certainty when instructing them on the factors that may be considered in deciding the reliability of that identification....We can no longer endorse an instruction authorizing jurors to consider the witness's certainty in his/her identification as a factor to be used in deciding the reliability of that identification"
Signed,
Georgia Supreme Court
June, 2005
How am I handicapped with my naturalist perspective?
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