Critique of Lee Strobel's The Case for the Real Jesus

i.    Introduction
1.   Scholars are uncovering a radically different Jesus in ancient documents just as credible as the four Gospels.
2.   The Bible's portrait of Jesus can't be trusted because the church tampered with the text.
3.   New explanations have refuted Jesus' Resurrection - Part I
4.   New explanations have refuted Jesus' Resurrection - Part II
5.   Christianity's beliefs about Jesus were copied from pagan religions. 
6.   Jesus was an imposter who failed to fulfill the messianic prophecies.
7.   People should be free to pick and choose what they believe about Jesus.
ii.   Conclusion.
 

Introduction

Lee Strobel's latest entry in his "Case for..." apologetic series, The Case for the Real Jesus purports to debunk modern reinterpretations of Jesus.   This entry is most similar to his first of the series, The Case for Christ, as they are both based on historical arguments.  Indeed, this piece is more of a true sequel to the first, while the others in the series cover more diverse topics.

Since the first chapter of Strobel’s book is his introduction, this first section will be my introduction as well.  I will comment specifically on his first chapter, but my introduction will also generally address Strobel’s style, content, and bias, as well as my own intended style, content, and bias.  As such, I fear that this introduction may be rather dry.  But I believe that it lays an important foundation for the body of the paper.  I believe the rest of the paper is more "lively", so I hope the reader will persevere.

I’m an atheist, and have written counter-response pieces to some of Strobel’s prior entries in his "Case for…" series.  It is perhaps little surprise that I found his latest work something short of compelling, and did not change my religious beliefs because of it.  The purpose of this article is, obviously, to present my reasons for disagreeing with Strobel and his experts, and so I am immediately declaring my perspective and bias.  Now, am I being unfair if I charge Strobel and his experts with bias, given that I am biased, too?  I believe that such a charge is fair when Strobel and/or his experts appear to be underplaying or marginalizing their bias.  Or, in the case of Strobel, when he goes so far as to pretend to play the part of the skeptic.

Earlier in the series, I was more willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, thinking that perhaps he didn’t fully appreciate the fact that his theism prevents him from effectively playing the part of the skeptic.  But now, four books into his series, his shtick has grown tiresome.  In this book, Strobel actually has the gumption to attempt to play both sides!  For example, he breaks one interview with Dr. Licona into two parts; in the first part of the interview, he gives Licona the opportunity to present a positive case, and then, in the second half of the interview, he claims to do the cross-examination.  He precedes the alleged "cross-examination" with a few lines from the movie, A Few Good Men, and then goes on to say, 

Few scenes are as gripping in the movies--or in real life--as the tenacious and effective cross-examination of a witness in a criminal trial.  The prosecution may have presented a persuasive case during the first part of the proceedings, but sometimes the persistent questioning of a witness can reverse the entire outcome of a trial… But how will Licona respond to the alternate theories that have been advanced in the last few years by respected scholars, popular authors and Internet gadflies?  Would "the other side of the story" prompt a far different conclusion:  That the Resurrection is actually more wishful thinking than historic reality? (p. 127-128)

Strobel watched the movie A Few Good Men and yet didn’t notice that Tom Cruise’s character didn’t do both sides of the examination?  In every book of the series, Strobel brags about his history as a court reporter--and yet, in all those years as a court reporter, he never noticed that the cross examination wasn’t done by the same side as the initial examination?  Four books into this series, and he’s still churning out this "I’m the skeptical court reporter and will play the part of the skeptic" routine.  It’s asinine.

I’m aware that Strobel is a former atheist and therefore shows some knowledge of skeptical claims, as evidenced by his quotes from notable skeptics such as Richard Carrier, Bart Ehrman, etc.  Well, I’m a former Christian, and am therefore familiar with Christian arguments, and have read the most popular Christian apologetics, such as those by Strobel.  But would anybody buy a book by me where I claimed to play the part of a Christian and challenged other atheists to make their case?  Would anybody buy FOUR such books by me?  Of course not.

So, yes, I’m biased.  But I don’t have the gumption to write four books claiming to play the part of the Christian! Furthermore, as a relative unknown, if I were indeed to try to produce an atheistic counterpart of Strobel’s books, but wanted to be more true to the claim of investigating both sides by interviewing both Christians and skeptics, I probably couldn’t get interviews with top apologists.  But Strobel, being the top apologetic author today, has no such excuse.  If he wanted to have an interview with Bart Ehrman or Richard Carrier, etc., he would surely have no problem doing so, as long as they retained the right to approve any editing. 

Again, I’m not criticizing Strobel or his experts for being biased; I’m criticizing his farcical claim of playing the part of the skeptic. To further clarify my own perspective, I will point out that Strobel spends a good deal of time dispelling theories that I don’t take much stock in either.  For example, I don’t take much stock in any of the Gospels, canonical or alternative, so his arguments against the alternative gospels hold little interest for me.

Strobel does briefly discuss the "mythist" theory, that there was no historical Jesus Christ at all, though of course the position is dismissed as an absurd fringe theory.  However, he concedes that Robert Price is a "legitimate scholar" who "wouldn’t be surprised if Jesus never existed" (p. 150).  I suppose that puts me in Robert Price’s camp; I’m not convinced that there was a historical Jesus, but I don’t claim to know for certain.  But that discussion is really beyond the scope of this review, and, therefore, for the remainder of this series, I will assume that there was a historical Jesus--by which I mean some real person on which the Gospel stories were at least loosely based.

However, beyond that--beyond the assumption that some historical person inspired the Gospel stories--I will look to Strobel and his experts to provide the evidence that specific Gospel events were historical.  After all, the book bills itself as The Case for the Real Jesus.  He needs to bring his case to the table.

Further, while I understand that Strobel can’t duplicate the work of N.T. Wright’s 700-page tome, and while I agree that it is reasonable for him to use that work as a reference, I assert that it is insufficient to simply say something like, "Everything I’m saying here is proved in Wright’s book."  I expect the core of the evidence to be presented in Strobel’s own "case."

The next significant issue to raise is that of qualifications.  I’m clearly an amateur.  I have no credentials on the subject of history, least of all on biblical history.  Nor do I have any theological or philosophical credentials.  In one of Strobel’s interviews, the interviewee cautions the reader to be very cautious of self-appointed Internet-based commentators without any credentials.  Well, as a self-appointed Internet-based commentator without any credentials, I have to concede that he has a point!  Please, do not believe anything I say based on my word alone.  Treat what I have to say as "food for thought"; if what I have to say seems to make sense, then consider it further--by perhaps reading some of my referenced material.

However, Strobel isn’t credentialed on these topics either--he relies on interviewees who are.  Like him, I will refer to reputable sources, and invite the reader to use as guides the same sources I have used.  Though I could quote from as many PhD’s as Strobel can, I encourage the reader not to rely on credentials alone, but also upon what makes the most sense.  I leave it up to the reader to make that call.

One of the credentialed references I will use in this article series will be Understanding History by Louis Gottschalk. [1] Let me explain how I came to choose this book as a reference.  A few years ago, I was involved in an online debate with a Christian who made some of the same kinds of historical arguments that Strobel’s experts make.  The Christian I debated recommended Gottschalk’s book, claiming that if I understood historical methodology, I would see how thoroughly historically documented the Resurrection really is.  Further, apologist Josh McDowell made similar claims in his book, More Than a Carpenter, and also used Gottschalk as a reference.  My point is that I didn’t go out of my way to find a resource friendly to the atheist position; I am specifically using a resource recommended by Christians, including a noted apologist.

Of course, it is possible that I could misrepresent Gottschalk because of my biases.  I will endeavor to quote enough of Gottschalk to make his views clear, but, beyond that, the reader is free to read Gottschalk for themselves.  Believe me when I say that there isn’t much there for a Christian to hang his hat on, and, therefore, that it is quite bizarre that the book is used by Christians.  But it is, and so I will use it as well.

Now some of my other sources will indeed be skeptics, such as Ehrman, Carrier and Price.  However Strobel readily concedes that Ehrman and Price are well credentialed.  And Carrier has a masters degree in history, is a doctoral candidate, and his specialty is Roman history.

Okay, with that out of the way, I’ll discuss Strobel’s introduction.  He spends a fair amount of time laying out potential "challenges" to the Christian faith:

1. Scholars are uncovering a radically different Jesus in ancient documents just as credible as the four Gospels.
    
2. The Bible's portrait of Jesus can't be trusted because the church tampered with the text.
    
3. New explanations have refuted Jesus' Resurrection.
    
4. Christianity's beliefs about Jesus were copied from pagan religions.
    
5. Jesus was an imposter who failed to fulfill the messianic prophecies.
    
6. People should be free to pick and choose what they believe about Jesus.

These six "challenges" are the basis of the seven primary chapters of the book, challenge number three being split into two chapters. This layout is similar to that of the "objections" Strobel laid out in The Case for Faith.

Strobel concedes that these challenges, if valid, would have the potential to devastate the Christian faith.  For example, he admits that it would be very damaging to the Christian faith if, as Bart Ehrman charges in his book, Misquoting Jesus, the Bible is found to be textually unreliable due to changes made by scribes.

In my critique of Strobel’s earlier book, The Case for Faith, I complimented him on his candidness about the potential harm that could be done to Christianity by his "objections."  And if his newest book were my first Strobel book, I might now be praising him for his candidness regarding his new "challenges."  Indeed, considering their incendiary potential, I was occasionally surprised at some of the issues he raised.  But I’m no longer as impressed by Strobel’s apparent candidness--four books into this series, I now see it as just another part of his shtick, a way to add to the pretense of playing the part of the open-minded skeptic and help gain the reader’s confidence.  For example, towards the end of his introduction, he recounts this conversation with his wife:

"You’re hitting the road again, aren’t you?" she asked.  "I have to," I said.  "I can’t ignore any of these [challenges].  If any of them is true, it changes everything."  Leslie wasn’t surprised.  She was aware that I had been wrestling with some of these issues for a while.  And after nearly thirty-five years of marriage, she knew I was someone who had to pursue answers, regardless of the consequences… I was determined to reach whatever verdict was warranted by the hard evidence of history and the cool demands of reason. (p. 21)

So, is Strobel being honest, wanting to "reach whatever verdict was warranted"? Or is it just a setup, so that he can appear eager for the truth, only to--surprise, surprise--find that the objections and challenges just aren’t such a big deal after all?  Four books into this series, I personally lean heavily towards it all just being a setup. In my reviews of Strobel’s earlier books in the series, I pointed out places where I perceived intentional deception on Strobel’s part.  I will do the same throughout the rest of this paper.

Challenge 1:  “Scholars are Uncovering a Radically Different Jesus in Ancient Documents Just as Credible as the Four Gospels”
An Interview with Dr. Craig Evans, Ph.D.

The primary purpose of this chapter is to discuss and dispel the possibility that some of the non-canonical gospels are just as valid as the canonical ones.  As noted in the introduction, much of what is said here isn’t all that relevant to me as an atheist, since I don’t take much stock in any gospel, canonical or not.  So it might seem that my review of this chapter could be finished right here.  However, there are many related topics here that I feel are worth addressing.

The first question that Strobel asks Evans is, “Why are some scholars coming up with such unusual portraits of Jesus?”  Evans responds:

One reason is many of them lack training in the Semitic background of the NT… These scholars can read the Greek in which the New Testament is written, but Jesus didn’t speak Greek, except perhaps occasionally.  Most of his teaching was in Aramaic, and his scriptures were in Hebrew or Aramaic.  Yet most New Testament scholars lack adequate training in the very languages and literatures that reflect his world.  Since they know Greek, they gravitate toward making comparisons between the Jesus of the Greek Gospels, and various Greek philosophies and the Greco-Roman world. (p. 30)

The first thing about this passage that strikes me as odd is that Evans claims that one really needs to understand Hebrew and Aramaic in order to fully understand Jesus.  That seems to leave out the vast majority of the world’s population, no?

Whenever I’ve made this point in similar discussions with Christians, they've invariably responded with something along the lines of, “Maybe to be a true expert on what Jesus said you need to be a language scholar, but one can understand Jesus’ teachings well enough to be saved without being any kind of scholar.”  I speculate that possibly Evans or Strobel might respond similarly to my question.  But that completely contradicts Evans' point about scholars coming to vastly wrong conclusions because they “only” know Greek!  If all you need to know about Jesus is readily attainable, then Greek scholars shouldn’t be coming up with such “unusual portraits” of Jesus by reason of not knowing Hebrew and Aramaic.

If scholars can make egregious errors about Jesus because they don’t know these languages, what chance does the average person have?  The issue of knowing or not knowing these other languages is either a “red herring” (irrelevant) or it shows that most people cannot be expected to understand Jesus.

The next issue brought up by Evans is that of historical methodology.  Evans says,

The first question is:  When was it written?  If the document is about Alexander the Great, was it written during the lifetime of those who knew him?  Same with the New Testament.  There’s a huge difference between a gospel written in AD 60—about thirty years after Jesus’ ministry—and another document written in AD 150. (p. 31)

In general terms, this is correct.  There is a big difference between AD 60 and AD 150.  Evans and Strobel continue this line of logic to show why, in their view, the alternative gospels they discuss are likely too late to be accurate.  And I don’t have a problem with that.  What I do have a problem with is the first thirty-year period.  Strobel and his experts continually downplay the significance of those first 30 years, frequently suggesting that it is a tiny amount of time on a historical scale.  Maybe so, but it’s a huge amount of time when we are talking about what may amount to myth making – or, if short of that, for people to remember speeches and events.  (Evans and Strobel do discuss these issues to some degree later in the interview, which I will discuss later in this paper.)

I notice that Evans says that it is important to ask, “Was it written during the lifetime of those who knew him?”  But a more important question is, “Was it written during his own lifetime; is it a contemporary account?”  He can make a case for the former, but clearly cannot for the latter, which leads me to suspect that that is the reason he asked the question he did.  The point I’m leading to is, there are NO known contemporary references to Jesus--meaning there are no known references to him that date during his lifetime.  Of course, it is always possible that there were contemporary writings about Jesus, but if there were, they are now lost.

The fact that there is no known contemporary reference to Jesus has been a driving force of the mythist theory, which argues that there was no historical Jesus at all.  While I have agreed to set that argument aside for the purposes of this paper, the fact is that there is no contemporary reference to him, which means that, whoever this Jesus was, very little can be said about him.  Which parts of the Gospels are real and which are fictional can, therefore, only be guessed at.

I do realize that I’m making a fairly strong statement here—a statement that is, frankly, beyond my credentials to be able to assert with authority.  I will, however, defend my position to the best of my abilities, using credible historical sources.  As I noted in my introduction, I will quote a good deal from Louis Gottschalk’s Understanding History.  Here, he discusses the importance of using eyewitness testimony:

The historian, let us repeat, uses primary (that is, eyewitness) testimony whenever he can. When he can find no primary witness, he uses the best secondary witnesses available. [...] However, he does not rely upon them fully. On the contrary, he asks: (1) On whose primary testimony does the secondary witness base his statements? (2) Did the secondary witness accurately report the primary testimony as a whole? (3) If not, in what details did he accurately report the primary testimony? (Gottschalk p. 165)

Now, this passage by Gottschalk, at least at first glance, might seem consistent with Strobel’s experts' arguments, as they repeatedly assert that the Gospels were based on eyewitness testimony.  And if, indeed, they are, that would improve their likely reliability. But I’ve not seen any credible evidence for this being so.  In fact, the first two verses of Luke clearly state that he is not an eyewitness:

Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. [Luke 1:1-2 NIV]

Of course, Luke claims to have carefully investigated everything he writes, and says that his material did originate from eyewitnesses somewhere down the line—but he tells us nothing of his methodology.  He tells us nothing of his sources.  We just know nothing about Luke's motives, his methods, his witnesses, etc.  We can't answer the three questions that Gottschalk asked above in regards to secondary sources.

Evans does try to address this to some degree, by claiming that Luke is consistent with the historical methods of his time:

When you look at Matthew, Mark and Luke—also John, but especially thy Synoptics—and use the same criteria that you would use in assessing secular historians like Suetonius, Tacitus or Thucydides, the New Testament Gospels perform very favorably. (p. 33)

 But, actually, that’s not true at all.  Since Evans mentions Thucydides, here is a brief comment by Gottschalk on Thucydides:

Thucydides, who in the fifth century B.C. wrote his famous history of the Peloponnesian War, conscientiously told his readers how he gathered his materials and what tests he used to separate truth from fiction. (Gottschalk p. 51)

So, if the Gospels “perform very favorably” compared to Thucydides, then we should see details in the Gospels on how the authors gathered their material and how they determined what was fact and what was fiction.  We don’t.  In fact, Roman historian and skeptic Richard Carrier notes that, of all the Gospels, only Luke even qualifies as being a historical document at all:

[Luke and Acts are] the only book[s] in the New Testament that actually belongs to the genre of history. Luke alone claims to have written a history (a diagesis...pragmatô, "narrative of events," Luke 1:1). Luke alone claims to have done the work of a historian for the purpose of establishing an accurate account (Luke 1:2-3). Luke alone employs any of the distinct markers of the historical genre (such as fixing dates, e.g. Luke 3:1). And Luke's preface consciously mimics those of known histories, and is an important marker of that genre--a marker absent from all other Gospels. In contrast, the other Gospels seem to fit the genre of mythic biography, in the specialized sense of a "didactic hagiography," an instructional account of a holy man, identical to the legends of medieval saints or the sacred biographies of men like Pythagoras or Empedocles. The meaning of such texts could lay more in universal truths communicated symbolically than in particular claims to historical fact as we understand them today. Whether you agree with that or not, only Luke-Acts bears any definite claim to being a historical account. [2]

Evans also compared the Gospels to works by first-century historian Suetonius.  Carrier also compares Luke to Suetonius, though not so favorably for Luke.  He quotes this passage from Suetonius:

Gaius Caesar was born the day before the Kalends of September in the consulship of his father and Gaius Fonteius Capito. Conflicting testimony makes his birthplace uncertain. Gnaeus Lentulus Gaetulicus writes that he was born at Tibur; Pliny the Elder, that he was born among the Treveri, in a village called Ambitarvium above the Confluence. Pliny adds as proof that altars are shown there, inscribed "For the Delivery of Agrippina." Verses which were in circulation soon after he became emperor indicate that he was begotten in the winter-quarters of the legions: "He who was born in the camp and reared mid the arms of his country, Gave at the outset a sign that he was fated to rule." I myself find in the Acta Publica that he first saw the light at Antium.
       Gaetulicus is shown to be wrong by Pliny, who says that he told a flattering lie, to add some luster to the fame of a young and vainglorious prince from the city sacred to Hercules; and that he lied with the more assurance because Germanicus really did have a son born to him at Tibur, also called Gaius Caesar, of whose lovable disposition and untimely death I have already spoken. Pliny, on the other hand, has erred in his chronology--for the historians of Augustus agree that Germanicus was not sent to Germany until the close of his consulship, when Gaius was already born. Moreover, the inscription on the altar adds no strength to Pliny's view, for Agrippina twice gave birth to daughters in that region, and any childbirth, regardless of sex, is called puerperium, since the men of old called girls puerae, just as they called boys puelli.
       Furthermore, we have a letter written by Augustus to his granddaughter Agrippina, a few months before he died, about the Gaius in question (for no other child of the name was still alive at that time), reading as follows: "Yesterday I arranged with Talarius and Asillius to bring your boy Gaius on the fifteenth day before the Kalends of June, if it be the will of the gods. I send with him besides one of my slaves who is a physician, and I have written Germanicus to keep him if he wishes. Farewell, my own Agrippina, and take care to come in good health to your Germanicus." I think it is clear enough that Gaius could not have been born in a place to which he was first taken from Rome when he was nearly two years old. This letter also weakens our confidence in the verses, the more so because they are anonymous. We must then accept the only remaining testimony, that of the public record, particularly since Gaius loved Antium as if it were his native soil, always preferring it to all other places of retreat, and even thinking, it is said, of transferring thither the seat and abode of the empire through weariness of Rome. [2]

Here is some of Carrier’s analysis, comparing Suetonius to Luke:

[Suetonius shows] how a critical historian behaves. His methods and critical judgment become transparent and laid out for the reader to see. He names--or at least mentions or describes--his sources. In this particular case, Suetonius identifies Gaetulicus, Pliny the Elder, the Acta Publica, and the letters of Augustus, as well as an anonymous oral tradition and a public inscription at Ambitarvium, all in addition to "the historians of Augustus." He analyzes the conflicting claims and tells us how he decided on one over the other--indeed, it is already important that he tells us there were conflicting traditions. He lists the evidence and criticizes it. He gives us information about the reliability of his sources--for instance, he tells us when a source is anonymous, and admits that is a mark against it, and he tells us what evidence any given author appealed to, and remarks on their possible motives. He quotes documents or sources verbatim. And he is openly attentive to chronological inconsistencies.

Luke does none of these things. He never even mentions method, much less shows his methods to us, or any critical judgment at all. He never names even a single (relevant) source, nor does he give us anything like a useful description of any of his sources, and he certainly never tells us which sources he used for which details of his history. And Luke must surely have known there were conflicting claims, yet he never tells us about them, but instead just narrates his account as if everything were indisputable, never once telling us how or why he chose one version or detail and left out others. For example, though Luke copies Mark, he never tells us he did, much less for which material, and he changes what Mark said in some places. This entails either that Luke is fabricating, or preferring some other source that contradicted Mark. So why don't we hear of this other source? Or of why Luke preferred it? [2]

Note:  The article series from which this is excerpted, "Was Christianity Too Improbable to be False?" is an excellent resource and recommended reading, though it is quite lengthy.

Evans continues his discussion of historical methodology, and notes that errors in a document can reveal deception on the part of an author:

A third issue involves the cultural accuracy of the document in terms of its allusions to contemporary politics or events.  This can expose phony documents that claim to have been written earlier than the really were. (p. 32-33)

Yes, Evans is completely correct on this.  What Strobel and Evans neglect to inform the reader, however, is that that is exactly how we know that the Old Testament’s Book of Daniel is fraudulent—it purports to be written around 600 BC, but its historical errors reveal its deception.  Daniel was actually written around 164 BC. [3]  Though Strobel’s book is primarily about the NT, the idea of the NT being a divine new revelation from God isn’t too likely if the first alleged revelation is notably fraudulent! [3]

And, on a related note, Evans could have also mentioned that writing style and themes can reveal fraudulent authorship claims, which is why we know that some of Paul’s epistles were likely not authored by him at all. And again, given that we know of fraud in the NT, it seems rather unlikely to be of divine origin.

Evans continues the discussion of cultural accuracy:

We look at the New Testament documents and yes, they have an agenda:  they’re affirming that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God.  But they also make all kinds of statements that can be evaluated.  Are they culturally accurate? (p. 33)

The Gospels do show cultural accuracy, which helps to place their approximate time of authorship.  But, despite his admission that the NT documents have an “agenda,” Strobel and his experts generally downplay the significance of this.  But the issue of the author’s intent and bias is very important, as Gottschalk notes:

One of the most elementary rules in the analysis of testimony is that which requires the exercise of caution against the interested witness. A witness's interest is obvious when he himself may benefit from the perversion of the truth or may thereby benefit someone or some cause dear to him. Certain kinds of propaganda are perhaps the worst examples of deliberate perversion of truth out of a desire to benefit a cause. (Gottschalk p. 156)

Of course, it is indeed possible for an interested party to be an honest party.  As Evans says later in the chapter, “faith and truthful history aren’t necessarily at odds” (p. 58).  And it is true that they are not necessarily at odds.  But the simple fact of the matter is that faith has been used as justification to distort history time and again, as most religionists recognize when looking at religions other than their own.  And yet when a skeptic does that in regards to Christian writings, rarely does the Christian take it so well.  The bottom line is, a religious agenda doesn’t necessarily mean that a work is falsified, but it does provide a good reason for a reader to exercise caution and require attestation by neutral or even hostile sources.

The next topic for Evans is the possibility that there were a lot of different versions of Christianity in the early years of the church:

There wasn’t one Christianity that thought Jesus was the Messiah and another that didn’t; another Christianity that thought he was divine and another Christianity that disagreed; and another Christianity that thought he died on the cross as a payment for sin and another that scoffed at that… There were no major questions about any of these basic points in the first decades of the Christian movement. (p. 35)

Oh really? And how does he know this?  We have ZERO documents for at least the first two decades of the Christian movement, given the dating of the Paul’s earliest writings to roughly in the 50s.  Evans' statement is a bald-faced assertion with no evidence at all.  We simply do not know what happened in the first two decades, at least, of the Christian movement, and not all that much for quite a while longer.

Now, Evans does concede that the NT reveals tension in the first-century church:

The New Testament quite honestly discusses disagreements when they occur—issues like circumcision, whether Christians can eat meat sacrificed to idols, those kinds of tensions. (p. 35)

He also concedes that Gnosticism in the second century presented a different picture of Jesus, but feels that some scholars are inappropriately placing Gnostic beliefs in the first century:

They’re trying to smuggle into the first century a mystical, Gnostic understanding of God and the Christian life even though first century Christians never heard of these things. (p. 35)

I don’t claim to know for certain what controversies existed in the first century, or to know when Gnosticism or other variations of Christian thought came about.  But here is what we do know:

1.  That we know very little of the very early church, given that there are very few documents from the first century of Christianity.

2.  The documents that we do have reveal conflicts and warnings against false teachers.  The fact that Paul and his successors found it necessary to warn against false teachings certainly looks like good evidence that there were other schools of thought.

3.  Gnostic thought and other schools of thought did gain some prominence in the second century and these differing schools of thought caused a lot of Christian infighting, until “orthodoxy” became established in the fourth century.  Exactly when these other schools of thought originated and from what source, we may not know.  But their views had to come from somewhere.

4. We know that works deemed “heretical” were burned in later centuries.

So we have no way to know how early any of these other schools of thought arose.  This may seem like an “argument from ignorance,” but Evan’s counter-clam that other schools of thought did NOT arise in the first century is a claim without evidence as well.  But the evidence that we have certainly doesn’t give reason to believe that the first century was without significant divisions within the Christian church.

Evans’ discussion then proceeds to the alternative gospels such as the Gospel of Thomas.  One of the arguments that Strobel raises against it is the claim, “It’s a bit anti-woman too, isn’t it?” (p. 40)  Evans responds:

Yes, its very politically incorrect in the way it concludes:  “Simon Peter says, ‘Miryam’—or Mary—‘should leave us.  Females are not worthy of life,” and Jesus answers, “Look, I shall guide her to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males.” (p. 40)

I suppose it’s true that the NT doesn’t have anything about turning females into males, but there are plenty of passages that are “anti-women” and “politically incorrect”:

Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.” [1 Tim. 2:11-14]

Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church. [1 Corinthians 14:34-35]

Given that the NT is itself “politically incorrect,” it seems rather absurd to argue against the Gospel of Thomas by virtue of its being “anti-women.”

Evans then argues that the Gospel of Thomas is just too “weird.”  He says that whenever a student asks about the Gospel of Thomas, he suggests that they read it for themselves and then asks them about it:

You tell me:  Should Thomas be right alongside Matthew, Mark, Luke and John?  Without exception they come back and say, “My goodness, what weird stuff. Good grief!  Now I think the church chose wisely.” (p. 43)

Evans similarly ridicules the Gospel of Peter:

… Then the stone of Jesus’ tomb rolls aside and two angels, whose heads reach all the way to the clouds, go into the tomb and come out helping a third person, whose head goes above the clouds.  I mean, we have an NBA dream team here! (p. 45)

There are a few things to note here.  First, exactly what one considers “weird stuff” is subjective.  I find this passage of Matthew “weird stuff”:

And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many. [Matthew 27:52-53.]

That passage looks just as weird to me as angels reaching into the clouds, and I assert that the only reason why Peter’s “NBA angels” are ridiculed and Matthew’s zombies aren’t is because Christians are familiar with the zombie story and not with the angels in the clouds story.

The second thing to point out is this: notice that Evans judges the validity of the story in Peter purely on its face value.  And yet, later in the interview, when Strobel asks whether the miraculous things Jesus allegedly did must “lead to the conclusion that these writings lack credibility,” Evans responds:

…For us to come along and say, “Unless we can explain it scientifically, metaphysically and philosophically, we should reject it,” is high-handed arrogance. (p. 59)

But that is exactly what Evans did with the “NBA angels” story—he rejected it outright simply for being preposterous.  How can Evans so cavalierly dismiss the idea?  After all, God can raise people from the dead and make gigantic angels if that’s what He wants to do, right?  Isn’t Evans showing “high-handed arrogance”?  Well, actually, no, he’s not. (Well, at least not on this point…)  What he is doing is what we all do when faced with implausible claims.  It doesn’t matter whether a person is a Christian, an agnostic, or an atheist, if someone else proposes something that looks preposterous on face value, he treats it as such.  But religionists complain of “arrogance” when the same treatment is applied to their beliefs.  If Evans can say that NBA angels are implausible on face value, then I can say that the idea of a deity sacrificing himself to himself and then resurrecting himself in order to change his own rules is implausible on face value.

The third thing to point out here is how the story in the Gospel of Peter compares to the other Gospels.  All of the Gospels being discussed here (canonical or not) have some variation of the empty tomb story.  And I’d essentially agree with Evans that the Peter version is more “fantastical” than the versions that appear in the canonical Gospels.  But what he’s not pointing out is how there is an apparent progression of the fantastical nature of the empty tomb story from the earliest Gospels on.  For example, what messengers are at the tomb?

Paul:             (No discussion of the tomb)
Mark:            1 young man
Matthew:     1 angel
Luke:            2 men
John:            2 angels
Peter:           “NBA” angels

As Dan Barker, a former Christian minister for 17 years turned atheist, points out, “This reveals the footprints of legend.”  Further, Barker notes:

Other items fit the pattern. Bodily appearances are absent from the first two accounts, but show up in the last four accounts, starting in the year 80. The bodily ascension is absent from the first three stories, but appears in the last three, starting in the year 85.

The mistake many modern Christians make is to view 30 CE backward through the distorted lens of 80-100 CE, more than a half century later. They forcibly superimpose the extraordinary tales of the late Gospels anachronistically upon the plainer views of the first Christians, pretending naively that all Christians believed exactly the same thing across the entire first century. [4]

Essentially, I believe that Evans is saying that the story about the angels in the clouds is probably a legendary development—which I don’t disagree with.  What I’m taking issue with is the implied dividing line, wherein the canonical Gospels have no legendary development, but the rest do.  This is, as Evans might say, “special pleading.”

After discussing some more of the alternative gospels, Strobel and Evans return to the issue of the alleged reliability of the canonical Gospels:

One criterion historians use is multiple attestation.  In other words, when two or three of the Gospels are saying the same thing, independently—as they often do—then this significantly shifts the burden of proof onto somebody who says they’re just making it up. (p. 56)

Evans is correct, in that the existence of multiple independent testimonials is indeed a criterion of historians.  But that is not all there is to the story, as Gottschalk points out:

The general rule of historians [...] is to accept as historical only those particulars which rest upon the independent testimony of two or more reliable witnesses. [...] Independence is not, however, always easy to determine, as the controversy over the Synoptic Gospels well illustrates. Whenever any two witnesses agree, it may be that they do so because they are testifying independently to an observed fact, but it is possible that they agree only because one has copied from the other, or because one has been unduly influenced by the other, or because both have copied from or been unduly influenced by a third source. Unless the independence of the observers is established, agreement may be confirmation of a lie or a mistake rather than a corroboration of a fact. (Gottschalk p. 166-167)

It is interesting that Gottschalk happened to use the Gospels to demonstrate his point.  There isn’t any serious dispute around the fact that Luke and Matthew copied from Mark—or perhaps something even earlier that Mark also copied from.  Therefore, in the case of the Gospels, independence is not established and, therefore, they do not count in establishing multiple attestation.

The next line of argument Evans raises is that the earliest Gospels would have been written while some of the witnesses were still alive:

Jesus died in 30 or 33 AD, and a lot of scholars lean toward 33.  That means when Mark’s Gospel was composed, some of Jesus youngest followers and disciples would be in the 50s or 60s. (p. 57)

The obvious implication here is that the witnesses would be around to denounce fictitious accounts.  There are lots of problems with this idea, including the fact that the average lifespan of the time was around 45 years.  There really isn’t any guarantee that witnesses would still be alive.  True, if there were a number of original witnesses, then statistically speaking, there should still be some alive.  But that assumes there even were any witnesses to begin with.  And even if there were living witnesses, who would know who they all were and where to find them years later? Further, although Evans wants to date the Gospel of Mark to prior to the Jewish-Roman war, many scholars date it afterwards.  And that war killed or relocated about one-third of the population of the area.  Any possible witnesses probably had more pressing matters than checking on every story somebody wrote.  And even if witnesses were around to contradict the story, contrarian witnesses have never been known to quell religious movements -- rather, contrarian witnesses tend to be lumped in with demonic forces or other reasons to discard what they say.  (I cover this in more detail in the conclusion section of this paper.)

Further, even if Evans is right about the time of original authorship of the Gospel of Mark, that tells us nothing about how well read it was in the early days of the church.  We know, of course, that thousands of copies were made from the second century on, and were well read then.  We don’t know about the first half of the first century because we have NO evidence!

Strobel questions whether the alleged witnesses would have had to remember events from 35 years earlier.  Evans responds:

No, there’s no one individual who had to try to remember everything.  We’re not talking about the story of Jesus being remembered by one or two or three people who never see each other.  We’re talking about whole communities, never smaller than dozens and probably in the hundreds, that got together and had connections, villages filled with Jesus people [sic] in Judea and in Galilee and immigrating throughout the Jewish Diaspora—lots of people pooling and sharing their stories. People were meeting frequently, reviewing his teaching, and making it normative for the way they lived.  The teaching was being called to mind and talked about all the time. (p. 57)

Hoo-boy, is this a complete load of nonsense!  First off, it’s a complete invention: we have NO records at all of what happened in the first two decades of Christianity.  We know from Paul’s epistles starting in the 50’s or so that he was visiting communities of Christians then.  How big those communities were, when they started, how often they met, what they discussed, etc., is completely undocumented.  Even Paul’s epistles only show very small snapshots.  We know what he felt was important at the time of the writing of the letters.  But conclusions about how many people read the letters, how much time they spent discussing them, how many agreed and how many didn’t, and what other issues they may have discussed would all have to be pure guesswork.  But this we know: Paul’s admission that his second visit to the Corinthians didn’t go so well indicates that a lot of people disagreed, and his admonition to avoid “false teachers” implies that there were other schools of thought.  Strobel insisted in his introduction that he wanted pure facts and no guesses or blind faith.  Evans' discussion here was no facts--pure blind faith.

That said, I don’t doubt that the first Christians, however many of them there were, spent time discussing their beliefs.  Evans is subtly playing on a bias we all tend to share—the bias where we assume that people that we feel are “like us” would come to good conclusions, just like we think we do.  I’m guilty too.  For example, let's say I were to hear of some group of atheists discussing their ideas about why they don’t believe in God.  Without knowing a word of what was said, I might have the expectation that they came up with good reasons, when they may well have come up with reasons that I consider fallacious.  That’s a bias that is easy to play upon, but that holds little value to anyone not already an insider for the topic at hand.

Surely the first Muslims had discussions about the teachings of Mohammad.  The first Mormons had discussions about the teachings of Joseph Smith.  The first Buddhists had discussions about the teachings of Buddha.  And members of those respective religions may find that fact supportive of their religion, but it means nothing to anyone who is not already a believer.

Strobel responds to Evans' comments about the alleged communities sharing the teachings of Jesus by saying, “Then this would project the story of Jesus from the kind of distortion we see in the children’s game of telephone, where people whisper something one to another, until at the end the original message is garbled?”  (p. 57) Evans replies:

Unlike the telephone game, this is a community effort… This was a living tradition that the community discussed and was constantly remembering, because it was normative, it was precious, they lived by it.  The idea that they can’t remember what Jesus said, or they get it out of context or they twist it, or they can’t distinguish between what Jesus actually said and an utterance of a charismatic Christian in a church much later—this is condescending. (p. 58)

No, it is not “condescending” to suggest that this type of environment might have led to factual errors—it’s simply a well-known fact that this is exactly the way legends grow!  The fact of the matter is, human memory is extremely fallible, and extremely open to alteration and suggestion over time.  People discussing what they think they heard, what somebody else heard from somebody else, etc., is the way stories change over time.  And, as I quoted from Dan Barker, that is exactly what the “footprints” show: legendary development from one Gospel to the next.

To conclude the interview, Strobel comments:

I found myself admiring Evans’ passion.  He isn’t some dry academic.  He’s bluntly critical of sloppy scholarship and unsubstantiated theories… (p. 59)

And yet, as I noted, Evans was perfectly willing to completely invent history where it suited his purposes.  I mentioned his invention of communities.  Similarly, earlier in the chapter, he insisted that, at least in the very early days of the church, there were no conflicts about the “core” of Christianity:

[The core message of Christianity] is that Jesus is the Messiah, he’s God’s Son, he fulfills the scriptures, he died on the cross and thereby saved humanity, he rose from the dead—these core issues were not open for discussion.  If you didn’t buy that, you weren’t a Christian. (p. 35)

So not only did Evans invent communities, he invented what they discussed and what they didn’t discuss!  How does he know what was discussed and what wasn’t?  There is NO evidence.  We have no record whatsoever of the first two decades of the Christian church.  And what records we do have thereafter hardly confirm his claims that there was one big happy Christian church in the early days.

So, to sum up, are the alternative gospels “just as credible as the four Gospels”?  No, I suppose not.  But the big problem here is that Evans fails to show that the canonical Gospels are credible either.

Challenge 2:  “The Bible’s Portrait of Jesus Can’t Be Trusted because the Church Tampered with the Text”
An interview with Daniel B. Wallace, Ph.D.

Strobel introduces Wallace with an interesting anecdote:  Wallace taught himself to be a Greek scholar, from textbooks he wrote!  He had been a scholar, but then had a serious case of viral encephalitis which caused him to lose much of his memory.  So he taught himself all over again using his own textbooks.  This is an amazing anecdote.  Yet I noticed that Strobel didn’t mention anything about Wallace knowing Aramaic or Hebrew.  Perhaps Wallace has studied those some; I don’t know.  But I expect that Strobel would have noted it if Wallace did have any specific expertise in these languages, since, in Challenge 1, Evans stressed the importance of Bible scholars knowing Hebrew and Aramaic:

[Many scholars] lack training in the Semitic background of the NT… These scholars can read the Greek in which the New Testament is written, but Jesus didn’t speak Greek, except perhaps occasionally.  Most of his teaching was in Aramaic, and his scriptures were in Hebrew or Aramaic.  Yet most New Testament scholars lack adequate training in the very languages and literatures that reflect his world. (p. 30)

Essentially, in this chapter, Strobel pits Wallace against Bart Ehrman, author of Misquoting Jesus.  Ehrman is a scholar in Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic, and does his own translations of manuscripts in those languages. Given that the subject matter deals with the accuracy of current translations, unless Strobel neglected to mention Wallace’s expertise in Greek and Hebrew, I would have to conclude that Ehrman is more qualified on this particular subject.

That said, both of these scholars are far more qualified than I am on the subject, so, again, I realize that my word should not be taken above that of either Wallace or Ehrman.  Nevertheless, I will explain why, in my view, Wallace's arguments are inferior to Ehrman’s, at least from the perspective of this interview.

Before I begin, I must also acknowledge that Wallace is handicapped in this interview, for he has written an entire book on the subject, Reinventing Jesus, and the interview can only hit the highlights of his arguments and his attempted refutations of Ehrman's arguments.  Even so, at the conclusion of the interview, Strobel says:

My interview with Wallace provided strong affirmation that my confidence in the New Testament text was abundantly warranted.  Nothing produced by Ehrman even came close to changing the biblical portrait in any meaningful way. (p. 98)

Essentially, he is saying, with apologies to Ed McMahon, “Everything you ever wanted to know about refuting Bart Ehrman’s arguments is contained in this little interview.”  If I had to finish this review in this paragraph, I would end it by saying that you should consider the possibility that this isn’t everything you might want to know about Ehrman’s arguments, and consider reading his books for yourself.

Likewise, it would be unfair for me to conclude my rebuttal to Wallace by saying something like, “Nothing produced by Wallace even came close to refuting Ehrman,” because I don’t know everything produced by Wallace.  I will simply explain why, in my view, the arguments produced in this interview were not compelling.

One of the important things to note about this interview is that it appears that the primary disagreement between Wallace and Ehrman is not about the facts, but the conclusions that can be drawn from the facts.  For example, Ehrman’s qualifications and skill at textual criticism are never questioned.  Furthermore, Wallace agrees with Ehrman on each passage that Strobel raises from Ehrman’s book.  The argument presented by Wallace is simply that Ehrman is making proverbial mountains out of molehills.  By my reckoning, it is more that Wallace is trying to turn Ehrman’s mountains into molehills so that he can dismiss them.  So let's look at the arguments.

Strobel quotes skeptic Robert Funk: “Why, if God took such pains to preserve an inerrant text for posterity, did the spirit not provide for the preservation of original copies of the Gospels?" (p. 72).  Wallace responds,

Judging by how the medieval church worshipped all sorts of relics, it’s a good thing God didn’t do that!  Enough pieces of Jesus’ cross have been found to build the Rose Bowl.  What kind of chaos would we have if people claimed to have an original of a particular book? (p. 72)

If I were to say something like, “Christian fraud has been rampant throughout history,” I’d bet many Christians would deny it and charge me with making an ad hominem attack.  But I didn’t have to say it, Wallace did!  Don’t take me the wrong way here; I don’t think that Christians have any particular affinity for fraud.  There are honest and dishonest Christians, Hindus, atheists, etc.  But it is a rather strong irony that this religion, which says that all men are selfish sinners not to be trusted, is entirely predicated on the assumption that its earliest sources can be trusted implicitly.  Wallace has no problem admitting that there have been enough Christian frauds to build the Rose Bowl, yet somehow it is impossible that the original sources were anything but 100% truthful and reliable?  Christians don’t accept that the original followers of any other religion are 100% truthful and reliable, but if I have similar doubts about Christianity then I’m committing some grievous crime worthy of eternal punishment?

Speaking of 100% reliability, the next subject that comes up is whether or not the Bible is “inerrant” and/or “infallible.” I found this discussion exceptionally weak on Wallace’s side, as his response is rather wishy-washy.  Wallace acknowledges that some Christians assert that the Bible is inerrant in the sense of being a letter-perfect, word-for-word representation of what Jesus and the other Biblical characters said.  But Wallace acknowledges that the Bible cannot be inerrant in that sense, for there are different wordings in the different Gospels.  He therefore defines “inerrant” as “historically accurate.”  He says that, in that sense, he believes that the Bible is indeed inerrant, but acknowledges some uncertainty.  But regardless of whether the Bible is or isn't inerrant, Wallace says that the issue isn’t critical to the Christian faith either way, and therefore challenges the whole of Ehrman’s attacks on Biblical inerrancy:

It was almost as if Ehrman were saying:  “Find me one error and I’ll throw out the whole Bible.”  That’s something you hear at some ultraconservative Christian schools.  Good grief, that’s a shockingly naïve approach to take.  You’ve basically turned the Bible into the forth person of the Trinity, as if it should be worshiped.  I’ve actually had Christians tell me Jesus is called the Word, the Bible is called the Word, and so I worship the Bible.  That’s scary. (p. 75)

So going to “ultraconservative Christian schools” is a bad thing?  It's worth noting that Ehrman studied theology at Moody Bible Institute, a Christian school that could be described as “ultraconservative.”  In other words, it would seem that according to Wallace, Ehrman treated the topic of inerrancy exactly as one would expect from someone studying theology at MBI. If Wallace has criticisms of the approach Ehrman takes, shouldn’t they be addressed to MBI and other “ultraconservative Christian schools” rather than to Ehrman?

Wallace defines the related term “infallibility” as meaning that "the Bible is true with reference to faith and practice.”  So, a historical error would refute the Bible's inerrancy but not its infallibility.  Wallace places far more importance on infallibility, but asserts his personal belief that the Bible is probably inerrant.  Therefore, Strobel asks Wallace what he would do if someone found an incontrovertible error in the Bible.  Wallace responds,

It wouldn’t affect my foundational view of Christ.  I don’t start by saying, “If the Bible has a few mistakes, I have to throw it all out.”  That’s not a logical position.  We don’t take that attitude toward Livy, Tacitus, Seutonius, or any other ancient historian’s writings.  For instance, does the first-century Jewish historian Josephus need to be inerrant before we can affirm that he got anything right? (p. 76)

In one sense, this is exactly correct.  If Josephus is found to be wrong about one detail, we don’t then trash everything he says.  But this isn’t a good analogy, for Josephus isn’t alleged to be the sole source of the straight scoop from God Himself on how to obtain eternal life!  If I thought that there was the slightest possibility that Josephus had inside information on eternal salvation, I’d be pretty concerned about every possible error!  If, however, I trust Josephus’ report on something that Julius Caesar did, and he is wrong, the impact on me is negligible.  Since the stakes at hand in studying the Bible are infinite in size, Christianity demands infinitely more scrutiny.

As an analogy, I will use an assertion about my lunch today: I had corn with my lunch.  I’m pretty confident that that is a true statement. If someone bet me $1,000 that I didn’t have corn today, I’d take the bet.  But if someone put a gun to my head and said, “If you didn’t have corn for lunch today, I’m gonna blow yer head off,” I’d be a lot more concerned about the slight possibility that I might be misremembering.

In my days of being a weak believer, I wrestled with this particular issue a lot.  If the Bible really is the key to eternal life, it must be the absolute truth.  When not just salvation, but major issues in this life, like whether homosexuality is a sin or not, hinge on the interpretation of a few words, it's not reasonable to take the attitude of, “So it's not exactly right -- no biggie.”  Wallace continues this line of argument:

Personally, I believe in inerrancy.  However, I wouldn’t consider inerrancy to be a primary or essential doctrine for saving faith.  It’s what I call a “protective shell” doctrine.  Picture a concentric circle, with the essential doctrines of Christ and salvation at the core.  A little bit further out are some other doctrines, until, finally, outside of everything is inerrancy.  But if inerrancy is not true, does that mean that infallibility is not true?  No. (p. 76)

Shouldn't Wallace first determine whether inerrancy is true before asserting its “protective shell” nature, instead of the other way around?  How can it be a “protective shell” if he's not even sure it's there?  If a safety product salesman was trying to sell me a “protective shell” that he wasn’t sure actually existed, I’d be rather unlikely to purchase the product.  It's as if Wallace is saying that inerrancy can act as a “protective shell” until he himself is personally no longer convinced of its truth.  Whether it is actually true or not almost seems to be beside the point!  Wallace continues:

It’s a non sequitur to say that I can’t trust the Bible in the minutiae of history, so therefore I can’t trust it in matters of faith and practice. (p. 76)

In Strobel's earlier book, The Case for Christ, he argued that the Bible has been proven reliable in "the minutiae of history" and that is precisely why it can be trusted in matters of "faith and practice."  But now he's saying, "Okay, so maybe it's not accurate in the minutiae of history, but you can still trust it in matters of faith and practice!"  Well, which is it? This is a pattern I’ve seen repeatedly in apologetics, particularly Strobel’s apologetics, and I’ve pointed it out in my earlier reviews:  often an argument might appear, at least superficially, to make some sense.  But when the arguments are taken as a whole, direct contradictions are seen.  It looks like a game of “Whack a Mole,” where the apologist whacks one mole but only causes many others to pop up.

I don't think that the original argument is valid.  Even if the Bible was perfectly historically accurate, that would not be sufficient reason to conclude that it was the one and only perfect key to salvation.  But if it's not even the former, how could it have the slightest possibility of being the latter?  If an allegedly divinely-inspired book can't get history right, how could it possibly be the work of a perfect being?  Strobel has taken his weak argument from his earlier work, and turned it into no argument at all!

A couple of pages later, the issue about whether or not the Gospels portray the exact words of Jesus arises again:

Historians of that day were trying to accurately get the gist of what was said.  For example, it would take you no more than two hours to say all of Jesus’ words in the Gospels.  Well, that’s not a very long time to speak.  It only takes fifteen minutes to get through the Sermon on the Mount--but when Jesus delivered his sermons, people were often hungry at the end.  I don't think Jesus gave fifteen-minute sermonettes for Christianettes.  So the Gospels contain a summary of what he said.  And if it’s a summary, maybe Matthew used some of his own words to condense it.  That doesn't trouble me in the slightest.  It's still trustworthy.

Boy, is there a lot in there to take issue with.  First, it is true that historians of the day were less exacting than modern historians.  But real ancient historians were still far more exacting than what we see in the Gospels.  (See Challenge 1.)  Indeed, as noted by Carrier, except for Luke/Acts, these works don't qualify as historical documents at all!  And even in the case of Luke/Acts, the claim is very tenuous, with no information at all about sources, methodology, etc., as we see exhibited in the works of genuine historians of Jesus' day.

Second, this makes his claim of trustworthiness a bald-faced assertion.  He used Matthew as an example.  Nowhere in the Book of Matthew does it even claim to be a depiction of actual events, and yet Wallace somehow has this divine insight that it is indeed accurate. Even if we were talking about someone with a known record of generally being accurate, we might say, "I find that the author is generally accurate, and therefore am willing to estimate that he is probably accurate here"--but we still wouldn't make a blanket assertion of trustworthiness!

Of possible relevance, I've seen many Christians, when debating among themselves about various doctrinal issues, parse down word-by-word what Jesus is supposed to have said in order to make their case for their own preferred interpretation.  Perhaps Wallace might endeavor to inform other Christians that it is rather pointless to do word-by-word parsing of Jesus when he concedes we don't have word-by-word of what was said.

I did find Wallace's estimation that the Bible contains roughly two hours' worth of Jesus' speech very illuminating.  He further estimates that Jesus often talked for hours, so Jesus presumably preached for hundreds or even thousands of hours.  And all we have is a measly two hours.  Allegedly, this is God Himself, speaking on issues that He must have felt important enough to address, uttering hundreds, maybe thousands, of hours of speeches -- and all we have is two hours!  I'm not sure I'd be willing to trust a team of a thousand linguists headed up by Walter Cronkite to adequately abridge the Word of God to two hours, if I thought I was actually dealing with the genuine goods!  And yet Wallace is certain of the trustworthiness of the Gospels, when most of them don't even make claims about their own accuracy?

I know that Wallace deserves some respect for his education and title.  I doubt I could ever teach myself to be a Greek scholar.  And yet, when I read these arguments, I just find it difficult to take them seriously.  How can anybody take such absurd arguments with any degree of seriousness? Imagine all the things we might know today if Jesus really was God and we had more of his words?  Maybe we would know whether God really has a problem with abortion or not.  Some denominations say that the soul is given at birth, so maybe God doesn't care one whit about abortion.  The Bible simply doesn't say.  The Bible isn't even clear on the requirements of salvation.  (See "Christian Salvation?")  One would think that Jesus made this clear in his hours of speeches, right?  Sorry for the detour here -- I just wanted to emphasize how preposterous it is to assert that, if indeed Jesus was God, a two-hour summary could possibly be considered "trustworthy."

To return to the interview, the idea of the writing of the Gospels being like a game of telephone is introduced again, as in Evans' interview.  Wallace argues that the Gospels do not have the same problem as the telephone game:

First of all, rather than having one stream of transmission, we have multiple streams… A second difference is that rather than dealing with an oral tradition, textual criticism deals with a written tradition… A third difference is that the textual critic--the person trying to reconstruct what the original message was--does not have to rely on the last person in the chain.  He can interrogate several folks who are closer to the original source.  (p. 81)

The "multiple streams" that Wallace refers to are the various manuscripts in various locations and times.  And it is true that written transmission is more reliable than oral.  For these reasons, there are many experts, even many skeptical experts, who feel that the current translations are probably very close to the original.  There is still disagreement here. But I concede that Wallace is not alone in his assessment of the modern Bible as textually accurate.  But, of course, even if we currently have good translations of the original words, that says nothing about how reliable the original words were.  Wallace, by admitting that a written transmission is more reliable than an oral transmission, implicitly admits that he cannot assert the trustworthiness of the Gospels, which were originally oral traditions.

The next subject raised is the infamous manuscript counts.  The reason I say "infamous" is because I've seen the kinds of arguments Wallace raises many times, and the facts are presented in a way I view as dishonest.  Here is some of what Wallace says:

We have more than 5,700 Greek copies of the New Testament.  When I started seminary, there were 4,800, but more and more have been discovered.  Then there are versions in other languages…  So right there we've got 25,000 to 30,000 handwritten copies of the New Testament. (p. 82-83)

Strobel asks, "But aren't many of these merely fragments?" (p. 83). Wallace responds:

A great majority of these manuscripts are complete for the purposes the scribes intended.  For example, some manuscripts were intended just to include the Gospels; others

These claims by Wallace are either deliberately misleading or… well, there is no "or."  It's not plausible that he does not know that the claims he makes are misleading.  So allow me to straighten this mess out.  I will use Kurt and Barbara Aland's Text of the New Testament as a reference for clarification on the manuscript issue.  This textbook is commonly used in seminary school classes on textual criticism.  It is true that this book is somewhat dated, and Wallace does discuss some of the findings that post-date this textbook.  But this book is the best reference I know of for charting the distribution of manuscripts, and is an accepted reference for seminary students.  The following chart shows the known manuscripts, by century, at the time of the publication of Aland's book.  They are classified into three categories:  papyri, uncials, and minuscules:

The first thing to note is that the number of manuscripts is very few until nearly a thousand years after the books were written!  Granted, Aland's chart shows only two manuscripts in the second century, while Wallace indicates that there are "ten to fifteen" now that date to the second century.  I'll take his word on that.  But even so, it is still a fact that the vast majority of those "25,000 to 30,000 handwritten copies of the New Testament" Wallace crows about date to a thousand years or more after the fact.

Further, his claims about the manuscripts not being fragmentary are also misleading.  He mentions that there are at least a few manuscripts that are more than fragmentary that date within the first few centuries.  Yes, there are indeed a few such manuscripts. But the majority of the manuscripts dating to the first millennium are indeed fragmentary. For example, the oldest manuscript that exists is a fragment of John, dated to about the year 125, which contains only a few verses!  Not exactly what the reader might have gathered from Wallace's response.

As an interesting related fact, the second oldest Christian-related artifact is a fragment of a non-canonical Gospel!  There is a fragment of what is called "The Unknown Gospel" dating to approximately the year 150.  It is a fairly small fragment, and doesn't reveal any controversial teachings.  But this small fragment reveals significant differences between the stories in "The Unknown Gospels" vs. the stories in the canonical Gospels.  And remember, this isn't some late Gospel like some of the ones that Evans talked about; this is the second oldest Christian document ever found.  So this, by itself, is good evidence that different stories about Christ were floating around from very early on.

Wallace makes some comparisons to secular works, such as the Iliad:

When you compare the New Testament to the second most copied Greek author, the differences are truly astounding.  Homer's Iliad and Odyssey combined have fewer than 2,400 copies--yet Homer has an eight-hundred-year head start on the New Testament! (p. 84)

Again, this is another "apples to oranges" comparison.  For one, the Iliad and the Odyssey were never the holy books of major religions.  It is simply a fact that allegedly holy books are regularly reproduced by members of their respective religions.  The larger the religion, the larger the number of copies made.  There are also large numbers of copies of the Buddhist Sutras and Islam's Koran, but Wallace doesn't mention that.

Secondly, the fragmentary nature of the manuscripts helps inflate his numbers.  For example, he may count a fragment of a few verses of John as a manuscript of the NT.  No, it's not a manuscript of the NT; it’s a manuscript of those verses of John.  If he has a fragment of Mark, he may count it as another manuscript of the NT, even though it comes from a completely different book!  This can't be done with a single-book manuscript like the Iliad.  If you get to count manuscripts of multiple books to count NT manuscripts, but only get to count manuscripts of one book to count for Iliad manuscripts, then it becomes much easier to show higher manuscript counts for the NT.

And, of course, as noted, he includes much more recent manuscripts in his counts.  Nobody doubts that there have been millions of Christians throughout the centuries and that therefore, obviously, there have been many Bibles printed.  But given that there aren't very many copies in the first thousand years, I don't see any great reason to be excited about how many manuscripts there are overall.

The next question is, how important are any of the disputed passages?  Wallace argues that, of the disputed passages, none of them impact any critical doctrines. Here is one example: 

Mark 9:29 could impact orthopraxy, which is right practice, but not orthodoxy, which is right belief.  Here Jesus says you can't cast out a certain kind of demon except by prayer--and some manuscripts add "and fasting."  So if "and fasting" is part of what Jesus said, then here's a textual variant that affects orthopraxy--is it necessary to fast to do certain kinds of exorcisms?  But seriously, does my salvation depend on that?  (p. 89)

I find myself astonished at the number of issues in that one little paragraph.  Let's start out with how thoughtless Wallace is in regards to the salvation of the allegedly possessed person.  Since he doesn't see how this teaching affects him, he shows little concern.  Imagine some poor folks burning in hell because their preacher botched the exorcism because he didn't fast!  And Satan laughing and pointing fingers, "I bet you folks wish that Jesus had made the 'and fasting' part a bit more explicit, doncha? Bwa ha ha ha!"

Sure, I'm being facetious, but let's think about this.  Is it necessary that exorcisms be done right? If not, what's the point in doing them at all? Are we really talking about saving someone from damnation or not?  If we really are, then we, for damn sure, ought to be doing it right, oughtn't we?

And remember, Wallace had earlier noted that, of the likely hundreds to thousands of hours of Jesus' preaching, we only have a total of two hours of speech captured in the NT.  If Mark thought that Jesus' teaching of how to do an exorcism was important enough to be among those precious minutes to record, it must be really important, no?  And, presumably, God had some hand in guiding Mark to decide what to record, so presumably God Himself must think that this teaching is extremely precious. Shouldn't Wallace be more concerned?

Furthermore, not only is Wallace unconcerned about Mark 9:29, he notes that basically nobody else is either: he says, "Most Christians have never heard of that verse or will ever perform an exorcism" (p. 89).  Christians are always telling me about the demonic activity in the world, often alleging it more rampant now than ever before.  If this is the case, shouldn't exorcisms be going on every day in every church to try to contain this demonic activity?  Shouldn't every Christian be vitally concerned about how to do this right and be checking on the latest developments in manuscript research on Mark 9:29?  Apparently not.  Christians don't know the verse, don't care about the verse, and don't need the verse.  It's only The Word of God. Apparently, that's not too important.

This makes me question whether Wallace--and Christians in general--really believe that we are talking about saving people's souls. How could someone possibly think that Mark 9:29 is part of The Word of God and not be all that concerned about it? Isn't the fact that Christians, as a general rule, don't do exorcisms sufficient in itself to suggest that there really isn't all this alleged demonic activity?  And, by extension, probably that there are no demons at all?

Perhaps I'm being overly harsh.  He stuck his proverbial foot in his mouth, and I've been pounding him over it for the last several paragraphs.  Anybody can unthinkingly make a foolish statement; perhaps I should let it pass.  But he does it again the very next paragraph.  He discusses the scripture about how women should be kept silent in church:

Let's say it isn't authentic.  The role of women in church has never been a doctrinal point that's necessary for salvation.  I'm not trying to trivialize the role of women in the church.  My point is simply that this passage doesn't alter any essential doctrine. (p. 89)

Perhaps I should edit out this next statement, but, as fellow member of the male of the species, all I can say is, Wallace is a misogynistic prick!  Of course he's trivializing the role of women in church, and women in general.  The fact he doesn't see this makes him a fucking misogynistic prick.  Isn't that scripture, like, kinda important as to whether women have the right to be involved in the process of learning and teaching salvation?  And if they are supposed to be taking an active role, might that not impact their salvation?  And perhaps even the salvation of the almighty men in their lives? And, oh, isn't it part of The Word of God?  Seems to me that might be important.

But then again, Wallace's attitude is perfectly consistent with the Bible.  I'll re-quote this passage from 1st Timothy:

Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. [1 Tim. 2:11-14]

Using "polite" language of an official translation doesn't really make fully clear what that says.  To clarify, I'll provide my own translation of this passage:

Sit down and shut up, bitch.  Adam was a cool dude, and he was first!  But then Eve came along, the fucking bitch, and screwed everything up.  What's a man to do? He can't be held responsible for her feminine wiles!  It's all Eve's fault and women are all the same.  So sit down and shut up, bitch.  [1 Tim 2:11-14, modern translation]

Sure, I'm being highly blasphemous.  But anybody that takes offense at my translation should take EQUAL offense at a "polite" translation.  Fundamentally, they say exactly the same thing. So, given that this is what the Bible teaches, I guess I should hardly be surprised that Wallace is totally unconcerned about whether or not one misogynistic passage is legitimate or not.  After all, there's plenty more where those came from.  (See "Why Women Need Freedom from Religion")

Wallace discusses the disputed passage in the Bible about the adulteress who was to be stoned, where Jesus said, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."  Wallace concedes, "The only problem with this story is that scholars have known for more than a century that it's not authentic" (p. 90).  Wallace also concedes the emotional attachment he and other Christians have for that passage:

When you read this passage, you say, "Oh my gosh, that takes my breath away! I'm just amazed at the love and grace and the mercy of Jesus and how he could stand up to these Pharisees."  We say, "I want this to be in the Bible."  …It's as if the scribes said, "I want this to go into my Bible, so I'm going to insert it here or here or here." (p. 91)

Remember that Wallace had stated tentative support for the Bible being "inerrant"—meaning historically accurate.  Pardon my confusion for not understanding how scribes sticking in stories they like wherever they feel like it constitutes inerrancy!  He had earlier argued that exact word choice was not necessary for historical accuracy.  Now we learn that things don't even need to have happened for them to be inerrant!

Well, of course Wallace wouldn't agree with my analysis of his arguments. And actually, he does make some attempt to clarify his position on this:

There is a distinction we need to make.  Is it literally authentic--in other words, did John actually write this story?  My answer is an unquestionable no.  Is it historically authentic?  Did it really happen?  My answer is a highly qualified yes--something may have happened with Jesus being merciful to a sinner, but the story was originally in a truncated form. (p. 91)

Yeah, well, monkeys might have flown out of my ass at some point in my history.  But historians don't go talking about something being "historically authentic" based on the idea that something kind of like it might have happened at some time and somebody who liked the story stuck it wherever they felt like it in an alleged historical record.  I'm sorry, I know this joker has a Ph.D., but he's blabbering complete nonsense.

Now, let's consider whether such an event could have happened at all, assuming that Jesus is God and that he was indeed the Messiah predicted in the OT.  I'd like to refer to Leviticus, using the NIV translation:

If a man commits adultery with another man's wife—with the wife of his neighbor—both the adulterer and the adulteress must be put to death.

If a man sleeps with his father's wife, he has dishonored his father. Both the man and the woman must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

If a man sleeps with his daughter-in-law, both of them must be put to death. What they have done is a perversion; their blood will be on their own heads.

If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

If a man marries both a woman and her mother, it is wicked. Both he and they must be burned in the fire, so that no wickedness will be among you.  [Leviticus 20:10-14 NIV]

Now, where exactly in all this "their blood will be on their own heads" ranting does it say anything about how only the sinless should do the stoning? Where does it say anything about mercy, for that matter?  How can Wallace so cavalierly assume that something "close enough" to the "throw the first stone" story actually happened, given that such an event would be in complete contradiction to the OT that Jesus supposedly fulfilled?

Wallace also criticizes Ehrman for essentially sensationalizing this controversy:

Evangelicals have followed a tradition of timidity by continuing to include this story because they think Bible readers would freak if it were missing.  Read any Bible translation and you'll find a marginal note that says this is not found in the oldest manuscripts.  But often people don't read those.  When Ehrman reports in the popular sphere that the story isn't authentic, people think they've been hoodwinked.  (p. 92)

Why that damned Ehrman, the nerve of him, actually telling people things that evangelicals are too "timid" to tell them!  C'mon!  Wallace has admitted that it isn't genuine, and he's admitted that most clergy aren't willing to tell the public this, and somehow Ehrman's the bad guy for doing so.  Jesus Fucking H. Christ!  Oh, sorry, I guess I should edit that out…

Strobel makes note of some people having died handling snakes because the Gospel of Mark says that believers are able to handle poisonous snakes without harm.  Again, Strobel and Wallace agree with Ehrman about the facts, the fact that this scripture isn't authentic.  It is again what conclusions can be made from the fact that is in dispute.  Wallace notes that manuscripts that have been known about since the fifteenth century don't have those verses.  But the fact remains that since the publication of the King James Version of the Bible, millions of English speaking Christians have only known of translations saying that they should be able to handle poisonous snakes without harm. I presume the situation is similar in other languages.  So, for these people should they not have had every reason to believe that they could indeed handle poisonous snakes without harm?  Strobel and Wallace again show little sympathy for those people following what they understood the Bible to say.  For example, while discussing people dying from handling poisonous snakes, never is any sympathy expressed by Strobel or Wallace.  All that Strobel has to say about the issue is to chide the reporters of these stories for not mentioning the relevant verses are inauthentic.  Really, is this a job for the reporters?  Or is it a job for those "timid evangelicals?"  Strobel comes off as rather a jackass for blaming the reporters of all people!

Also in these twelve disputed verses of Mark is its account of the post-Resurrection appearances of Jesus.  Without those verses, the Gospel ends, "Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid."  [Mark 19:8 NIV]  Strobel asks Wallace if this impacts the doctrine of the Resurrection any.  Wallace responds,

Not in the slightest.  There's still a resurrection in Mark.  Its prophesized, the angel attests to it, and the tomb is empty.  But you can see why a scribe would say, "Oh my gosh, we don't have a resurrection appearance, and this ends with the women being afraid."  I think a scribe in the second century drew essentially on acts--where Paul gets bitten by a snake and people are speaking in tongues--and he wanted to round out the Gospel so he put on that new ending. (p. 93)

Again, in another small paragraph, there's a full metric buttload of stuff to take issue with.  First off, without the fraudulent ending to Mark, there is no bodily resurrection in Mark. Wallace said "There's still a resurrection in Mark" without emphasizing there is no bodily one.  Secondly, given that it says the women ran off afraid and telling no one, no one should even know the event happened!  If Mark thought he was writing a genuine history, shouldn't he have imparted how he knew stuff that nobody was told?  Now if, as Richard Carrier had suggested in my quotation from Challenge 1, that the Gospels other than Luke may have merely been "didactic hagiography," mythical accounts intended to impart truths through symbolism and not intending to be literal history, then Mark's not telling us how he knew things that he couldn't know about if it was a literal history makes perfect sense.

In fact, if one reads Mark without assuming it is supposed to be history, it is notable that it looks suspiciously like "third party omniscient" literary format.  In the study of literature (fiction,) writings are classified into several possible perspectives, such as first-party, second-party, etc.  In the "third party omniscient" form, the story is told from a perspective of knowing everything that happens whether there would actually be someone to record it or not.  In other words, in a work of fiction in the third party omniscient form, a statement like "the woman ran and told no one" is completely normal.  I would find such a statement quite bizarre in a history book.

For the proverbial icing on the cake, Wallace makes Ehrman's point exactly--that scribes didn't see anything wrong with changing the story when it didn't fit what they "knew" the story to be. As I mentioned in Challenge 1, Barker feels this is more indicative of "footprints of a legend," not historical accuracy.  People adding to a story because they think it is "supposed' to be there is exactly how legends grow.  And again, Wallace is speaking out of both sides of his mouth, simultaneously saying the Bible is "inerrant" and also simultaneously admitting it has stuff in it just because a scribe wanted it there!

Before putting this epically atrocious chapter to rest, I will cover one more of the disputed passages.  There is a passage where Jesus healed a leper, and most translations say that Jesus was "filled with compassion," while Ehrman argues that it originally said Jesus became angry, not filled with compassion.  Wallace agrees with Ehrman.  So yet again, we have no dispute from Wallace about any of Ehrman's facts, just the interpretation of them.  Some people say that Jesus couldn't be God if he was ever angry.  Wallace argues that righteous indignation has its place.  Of course Wallace doesn't explain exactly why a man who wanted to be cured of leprosy deserved "righteous indignation".  Does God get pissed off at people with the flu?  I suppose so.  Let's look at some more of Leviticus:

The LORD said to Moses, "Say to Aaron: 'For the generations to come none of your descendants who has a defect may come near to offer the food of his God. No man who has any defect may come near: no man who is blind or lame, disfigured or deformed; no man with a crippled foot or hand, or who is hunchbacked or dwarfed, or who has any eye defect, or who has festering or running sores or damaged testicles. No descendant of Aaron the priest who has any defect is to come near to present the offerings made to the LORD by fire. He has a defect; he must not come near to offer the food of his God. He may eat the most holy food of his God, as well as the holy food; yet because of his defect, he must not go near the curtain or approach the altar, and so desecrate my sanctuary. I am the LORD, who makes them holy. [Leviticus 21:16-23 NIV]

I suppose that Jesus getting mad at people for wanting to be cured of leprosy makes perfect sense in light of the fact that His Father doesn't think that people with birth defects (presumably given by God Himself) are worthy to approach the alter.  But I'm not seeing at how any of this is helping Wallace's case.  Indeed, nothing in this chapter helped Wallace's case in the slightest.

Challenge 3:  Part One:  "New Explanations Have Refuted Jesus' Resurrection"
An interview with Michael Licona, M.A., Ph.D cand.

This chapter is about the possibility that current research refutes Jesus' resurrection.  I'll jump right in with some of the arguments. 

Strobel asks, "Is there any way to compute the probability of the resurrection in mathematical terms?"  Licona responds:

You'd have to use Bayes' Theorem, which is a complicated mathematical equation that determines probabilities.  But there are problems with that.  Bayes' Theorem requires that you plug in certain background knowledge into the equation, such as the probability that God would want to raise Jesus from the dead.  I'm sure you'd agree that probabilities like that are inscrutable…  Mathematically speaking, Ehrman has no grounds to claim the resurrection is "highly improbable." (p. 108)

Before discussing this paragraph, I'd like to quote from later in the Licona interview, when they discuss Islam and a theory that Allah altered the events at the crucifixion.  Strobel states, "You have to admit that it would be hard to prove whether Allah substituted somebody at the last minute on the cross."  Licona responds: 

Listen, I could come up with a theory that says we were all created just five minutes ago with food in our stomachs from meals we never ate and memories in our minds of events that never took place.  How would you disprove that?  But the question is:  Where does the evidence point? (p. 133)

These two positions are in direct contradiction.  Although, of course, I don't think that Allah substituted somebody at the cross, I could defend it exactly the way he defended the resurrection, like so:

In order to determine the probability that Allah substituted somebody at the cross, you'd have to use Bayes' Theorem.  But Bayes' Theorem requires that you plug in certain background knowledge into the equation, such as the probability that Allah would want to substitute somebody at the cross.  I'm sure you'd agree that probabilities like that are inscrutable.  Mathematically speaking, Licona has no grounds to claim that Allah making a substitution at the cross is "highly improbable."

Similarly, I could defend the "we were all created just five minutes ago" theory:

In order to determine the probability that God created the universe five minutes ago, you'd have to use Bayes' Theorem.  But Bayes' Theorem requires that you plug in certain background knowledge into the equation, such as the probability that God would want to create the universe five minutes ago but make it look like it existed for billions of years.  I'm sure you'd agree that probabilities like that are inscrutable…  Mathematically speaking, Licona has no grounds to claim that God creating the universe five minutes ago is "highly improbable."

What we are dealing with is the concept of falisifyability, which means that it is at least possible to disprove a theory.  For example, the theory of evolution would be falsified if we were to find human remains that have been reliably dated at over a billion years old, so it is a falsifiable theory.  Unfalsifiable theories may be acceptable in philosophy, but they can never become accepted scientific theory because they cannot be tested or disproved.

Let's take Licona's "we were all created just five minutes ago" theory.  This is analogous to the "brain in a vat" hypothesis, as popularized in the movie, The Matrix.  Licona asks, "But the question is:  Where does the evidence point?"  The answer is nowhere!  There can never be any evidence for or against such theories.  If I had been created five minutes ago with all my current memories in place, my experience of being alive right now would still be exactly the same as it is now, assuming that I've lived my life the way I think I have.  So I could philosophize about the idea, but I could never produce any evidence.  And, therefore, this could never be answered by science.  The problem for Licona is that this applies equally well to the resurrection hypothesis. 

Licona correctly dismisses the "Allah made a substitution" theory.  Although he doesn't use the term falisifyability, that is what his (correct) argument suggests: the theory that Allah made a substitution is unfalsifiable, and therefore cannot be a scientific theory.

Similarly, unfalsifiable theories can never be asserted in historical study, for history is a branch of science.  Most apologists try to deny this, and argue that if the evidence points to a supernatural explanation, then that is what should be postulated.  But, as Gottschalk notes, it just doesn't work that way: 

Conformity or agreement with other known historical or scientific facts is often the decisive test of evidence, whether of one or more witnesses. A claim that Cellini saw fire-dwelling salamanders, devils, halos, and other supernatural phenomena would hardly seem credible to any modern historian, even if Cellini were otherwise generally truthful, consistent and un-contradicted. And even if Cellini's statements were confirmed by independent witnesses, the historian would only believe that Cellini and his corroborators saw things they thought were fire-dwelling salamanders, devils and halos. General knowledge of how little effect a thumb in a hole in a dyke that had begun to crumble would be sufficient to destroy credence in a well-known legend, even if there had been witnesses to that Dutch hero's tale. (Gottschalk p. 168-169)

No doubt that Licona would charge Gottschalk with the same "methodological naturalism" that he charges James Tabor with (p. 108).  After all, Gottschalk is saying that even if there is evidence in favor of Cellini's fire-dwelling salamanders, it should be dismissed out of hand. But there is a legitimate reason for this, and it's the same problem as falisifyability: how would we prove that he did not see such things?  We don't see them today -- but neither do we see resurrections today.  That doesn't prove for certain that they didn't exist or happen in the past.  We simply lack any way to prove or disprove that they happened in the past.  Therefore, we have little choice but to assume not.

There is also the concept of "initial probability," which says that the amount of evidence that one would need in order to reasonably believe a proposition is inversely proportional to its probability given our overall background knowledge.  No matter how much evidence we may seem to have, there is always some possibility of being wrong.  Conversely, no matter how flimsy the evidence, an outlandish hypothesis could actually be right.  Since we can't look for an infinite amount of evidence for every possible fact, we "play the odds" by looking for more and more evidence as probabilities drop.

This is technically known as "Bayesian epistemology," which Licona alludes to by bringing up Bayes' Theorem.  So, Licona appears to have some understanding of the concept, but he completely misleads the reader, as a proper understanding of Bayesian epistemology leads one to the conclusion that there can never be enough evidence for cases where the "probabilities are inscrutable," as Licona himself termed "the probability that God would want to raise Jesus from the dead."

A couple of pages later, Licona does make some correct statements about historical study, but his points can be used against him.  Licona says, 

New evidence might overturn a theory.  For example, when the Titanic sank, some eyewitnesses said it wend down intact, whereas others said, no, it split before sinking.  Despite the conflicting witnesses, British and American investigations concluded that the Titanic went down intact, based on the preponderance of the evidence at the time.  Later, when explorers discovered the sunken Titanic, they found it had indeed broken in two and then sank.  That is why historians need to hold their theories provisionally. (p 110)

This much is exactly correct.  Notice what he concedes:  In the case of the Titanic, we had many skilled investigators look at both possibilities, and yet they still came to the wrong conclusion.  In the case of the Gospels, we know that there are conflicting reports, as the Gospels have contradictions.  We know nothing of the skill of the authors in judging conflicting claims--indeed, as Carrier notes, they don't even tell us that there are conflicting claims.  And we are talking about unfalsifiable claims of "inscrutable probabilities."  If skilled investigators can often make errors on naturalistic claims, how much more likely are errors by unskilled investigators investigating the supernatural of inscrutable probabilities? We aren't within light-years of being able to say that the Gospels are "historically reliable."

A page earlier, Licona raises some additional claims regarding why there is allegedly good evidence for the resurrection: 

We find that the Gospels fit into the genre of ancient biographies.  We know that ancient biographies were intended to be regarded as history to varying degrees, we've got early accounts that can't be explained by legendary development, we've got multiple independent sources, we've got eyewitnesses, and we have a degree of corroboration from outsiders.  We've also got enemy attestation; that is affirmation from people like Saul of Tarsus, who was a critic of Christianity until he saw the evidence for himself that Jesus had returned from the dead. (p. 109)

I've already covered a lot of this in previous chapters.  But, since the same misinformation is repeated again, I will take the time to again point out that we actually have none of that:

1. The genre of the works, other than Luke, are more mythical than historical. (See Challenge 1.)
2. Regardless, Licona's claim that they can "be regarded as history to varying degrees" certainly doesn't suggest a high degree of credibility or accuracy.
3. We don't have accounts for the first 20+ years, which is plenty of time for legendary development.  And, as Barker indicated, the progression of the Gospel stories "reveal the footprints of a legend."
4. We don't have independent sources; we know the Gospels copied from each other, and where they don't copy each other, they contradict each other!
5. We don't have any eyewitnesses.  The Gospels don't claim to be eyewitness accounts; Luke specifically states that his is not an eyewitness account.
6. We don't have enemy attestation--we don't have any attestation at all for the first 20+ years.
7. Not even Saul counts as "enemy attestation," as we have nothing from him prior to his conversion; nor any attestation as to what Saul did prior to conversion except from Christian-friendly sources.  Post-conversion Paul is a friendly source, and that is all we have any record of.
8. Paul never attests that Jesus "returned from the dead," as in a bodily resurrection.

In that one paragraph, we've got eight errors from Licona.  I'm just going to have to skip some material, as to document every error Licona makes would take a book longer than Strobel's.

Licona borrows Habermas' "minimal facts" argument, the argument stating that, taking a relatively small set of facts agreed to by most scholars, even skeptical scholars, the Resurrection is (allegedly) the best explanation for these facts.  If I were to say that I don't agree with any of these "minimal" facts, I'm sure many readers would consider my position an extreme fringe position beyond even most other skeptics.  Well, it's not so much that I fully reject them all outright; I'm just not seeing these alleged facts as being as far beyond question as Licona, Habermas, etc., see them.

Let's start out with "Fact 1:  Jesus was killed by crucifixion."  According to Licona, Bart Ehrman has called the crucifixion an "indisputable fact."  And I suppose that if Ehrman, whose superior knowledge of the subject I absolutely acknowledge, says it is an "indisputable fact," then I suppose I should agree with Licona and Ehrman and move on.  Crucifixion was certainly a method of execution in that time period, so there is clearly nothing implausible about this alleged fact.  Yet, despite all this, and despite Licona's further arguments, I'm still not seeing this as an "indisputable" fact.

Licona does mention the standard litany of secular sources for the crucifixion, such as Tacitus, Lucian, Josephus, Mara Bar-Serapion, etc.  But in each of those cases, the reference to the crucifixion is made in passing, and none of the sources indicate doing any research into whether there was a crucifixion or not.  So we have no idea how any of them learned of the event.  If they all used what traces back to the same source, we are back to only one source of information.  Remember that Gottschalk indicated the difficulty of ascertaining independence in reporting.  But the bottom line is, we do not have any secular sources from the period that demonstrate any research into the issue.  People were crucified all the time, and if they didn't know that there was any dispute over the question, why would they bother to look?

I suspect that at this point, some readers may be wanting to charge me with "uber-skepticism," that I'm wanting to take any sliver of doubt and blow it up into huge question marks.  As I see it, it’s the other way around--Licona is trying to take very tiny ghosts of evidence and turn them into indisputable facts.  So, I'd like to quote a passage from Richard Carrier.  This passage is about comparing the historical evidence we have for the Resurrection vs. Caesar's crossing of the Rubicon.  Although this passage by Carrier uses the Resurrection as its point of comparison, while the point of discussion here is merely the crucifixion, I believe the points are nearly equally applicable:

Christian apologist Douglas Geivett has declared that the evidence for the physical resurrection of Jesus meets, and I quote, "the highest standards of historical inquiry" and "if one takes the historian's own criteria for assessing the historicity of ancient events, the resurrection passes muster as a historically well-attested event of the ancient world," as well-attested, he says, as Julius Caesar's crossing of the Rubicon in 49 B.C. Well, it is common in Christian apologetics, throughout history, to make absurdly exaggerated claims, and this is no exception. Let's look at Caesar's crossing of the Rubicon for a minute:

First of all, we have Caesar's own word on the subject. Indeed, The Civil War has been a Latin classic for two thousand years, written by Caesar himself and by one of his generals and closest of friends. In contrast, we do not have anything written by Jesus, and we do not know for certain the name of any author of any of the accounts of his earthly resurrection.

Second, we have many of Caesar's enemies, including Cicero, a contemporary of the event, reporting the crossing of the Rubicon, whereas we have no hostile or even neutral records of the resurrection until over a hundred years after the event, which is fifty years after the Christians' own claims had been widely spread around.

Third, we have a number of inscriptions and coins produced soon after the Republican Civil War related to the Rubicon crossing, including mentions of battles and conscriptions and judgments, which provide evidence for Caesar's march. On the other hand, we have absolutely no physical evidence of any kind in the case of the resurrection.

Fourth, we have the story of the &quo