Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Thread Started on Dec 21, 2005, 5:04pm »
A fundamental question that must be asked is, did the universe come into existence and, if so, by what means? There are four possible general answers for this question. The first possibility is that the universe is simply an illusion, that it does not actually exist. But few truly rational people will choose to believe in this view. To a modern human being in a culture founded on logic, the reality of the physical universe would be considered an axiom (that is, a statement or proposition accepted as true without proof).
The second possibility is that the universe exists but never came into existence; in other words, it has always existed. However, this is illogical. The universe (which can be defined as the whole of space, time, and matter-energy) is temporal (non-eternal or limited by time, since we now know that time, space, and matter-energy are interdependent and co-relative). That which is temporal, however, must have had a beginning, for logic dictates that time itself had a beginning. (Let us consider time as a sequence of moments.) If time had never begun, it would extend infinitely far back. However, this would mean that the number of past moments in time would constitute a completed actual infinite series of events formed by successive addition. That, however, is impossible. It is analogous to counting from zero to infinity by increments of one and getting there (or, if one wishes, counting from negative infinity to zero by ones and getting there). Put simply, if time were infinitely old, it could never progress to the present moment. It would be like beginning in a bottomless pit and leaping out, not from a point finitely close to the surface, but from the infinite depths.
Also, the second law of thermodynamics dictates, to put it simply, that in every transmission of energy, a bit of energy is made to be no longer available for work. Eventually, given enough time, no energy will be available to do work, and the universe will have reached a state known as “heat-death”. The universe is not currently there, and cannot have an infinite amount of energy within it. Thus, this process cannot have been occurring for an infinite length of time. In his God and the New Physics, Paul Davies summarized this point as follows:
If the universe has a finite stock of order, and is changing irreversibly towards disorder – ultimately to thermodynamic equilibrium – two very deep inferences follow immediately. The first is that the universe will eventually die, wallowing, as it were, in its own entropy. This is known among physicists as the ‘heat death’ of the universe. The second is that the universe cannot have existed forever, otherwise it would have reached its equilibrium end state an infinite time ago. Conclusion: the universe did not always exist.
Now, Professor Stephen W. Hawking has proposed a theory utilizing “imaginary time,” which appears in theory to avoid the need for an absolute beginning. However, Hawking himself admits that in real time, his theory cannot prevent an absolute beginning of time and the universe, and he himself admits that his theory is nothing more than a metaphysical proposal and cannot explain what happened in real time. Therefore, it is not applicable to the real world.
Others will postulate an infinite series of Big Bangs and Big Crunches (the Cosmic Rebound Theory). Besides the fact that a completed infinite series of concrete events has been shown to be utterly impossible, there is no force capable of making the universe contract, especially given that more recent observations indicate that the rate of expansion would be accelerating, if anything, not decelerating. Also, a cosmic rebound could not circumvent the second law of thermodynamics, and so the problem of not having yet reached heat-death still remains.
It has thus been established that the universe both exists and must have had a beginning. We move on to the third possibility, that this beginning was either natural or uncaused. For there to have been no cause at all would be to defy the Law of Cause and Effect (a basic law of logic that governs all circumstances, regardless of what they might be), for to begin is to be an effect, and all effects have corresponding causes. To deny it is to effectively strip the human mind of all reason and leave it as an emaciated husk. Even the famed skeptic David Hume, writing in a 1754 letter to a man by the name of John Stewart, declared that he would never propose a violation of this law:
But allow me to tell you that I never asserted so absurd a Proposition as that anything might arise without a cause: I only maintain’d, that our Certainty of the Falsehood of that Proposition proceeded neither from Intuition nor Demonstration; but from another Source.
And the beginning cannot be natural, for it is a law of science that matter-energy can neither be created nor destroyed by natural means. This corresponds to the Latin phrase “ex nihilo, nihil fit” (“out of nothing, nothing comes”). Also, prior to the existence of nature, what natural forces would have been available to bring about the existence of nature?
Some, however, may object that in a quantum fluctuation, something can indeed spontaneously arise from nothing. On the contrary, this is not true, for a quantum vacuum is not nothing. It is, rather, a substantial quantity of “matter-antimatter potential”, which is not nothing. As astronomer David Darling put it:
You cannot fudge this by appealing to quantum mechanics. Either there is nothing to begin with, in which case there is no quantum vacuum, no pre-geometric dust, no time in which anything can happen, no physical laws that can effect a change from nothingness into somethingness; or there is something, in which case that needs explaining.
Thus, it has been demonstrated that the universe not only exists and had a beginning, but that this beginning was the result of some cause external to nature (i.e., “non-natural” or “supernatural”). And if this cause is external to our space-time-matter/energy universe, then this cause is unbounded by space (and therefore capable of being omnipresent), unbounded by time (eternal), unchanging (a logical deduction from eternality, for that which is exempt from time cannot change its nature), likely omnipotent (a deduction from the fact that the cause is greater than the effect, and that therefore this cause would be greater than the universe and thus greater than any of its parts), likely omniscient (as it is present at all points in space and time, and would perhaps be capable of knowing the thoughts of beings within the creation—if the cause is a being capable of thought, an issue that shall be dealt with later), and likely infinite (for it would have a total lack of boundaries; also, it is logically deducible that there must be something infinite, for all that is finite has some boundary of some sort, and the definition of a boundary implies something beyond it. Therefore, there must be something lacking boundaries that exists beyond the boundaries of the sum of all finite things). As the cause possesses these attributes (being outside of the realm of nature, being omnipresent, being eternal, being unchanging, being omnipotent, being omniscient, and being infinite), it clearly fits the qualifications of being referred to as “God”.
Famed philosopher Thomas Aquinas, made a similar argument to the one previously detailed:
The second way is from the nature of efficient cause. In the world of sensible things we find that there is an order of efficient causes. There is no case known (neither is it, indeed, possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself; for so it would be prior to itself, which is impossible. Now in efficient causes it is not possible to go on to infinity, because in all efficient causes following in order, the first is the cause of the intermediate cause, and the intermediate cause is the cause of the ultimate cause, whether the intermediate cause be several, or one only. Now to take away the cause is to take away the effect. Therefore, if there be no first cause among efficient causes, there will be no ultimate, nor any intermediate, cause. But if in efficient causes it is possible to go on to infinity, there will be no first efficient cause, neither will there be an ultimate effect, nor any intermediate efficient causes; all of which is plainly false. Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God.
The third way is taken from possibility and necessity, and runs thus. We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, since they are found to be generated, and to corrupt, and consequently, they are possible to be and not to be. But it is impossible for these always to exist, for that which is possible not to be at some time is not. Therefore, if everything is possible not to be, then at one time there could have been nothing in existence. Now if this were true, even now there would be nothing in existence, because that which does not exist only begins to exist by something already existing. Therefore, if at one time nothing was in existence, it would have been impossible for anything to have begun to exist; and thus even now nothing would be in existence—which is absurd. Therefore, not all beings are merely possible, but there must exist something the existence of which is necessary. But every necessary thing either has its necessity caused by another, or not. Now it is impossible to go on to infinity in necessary things which have their necessity caused by another, as has been already proved in regard to efficient causes. Therefore we cannot but postulate the existence of some being having of itself its own necessity, and not receiving it from another, but rather causing in others their necessity. This all men speak of as God.
Furthermore, the universe has one more trait that requires an explanation, and that is design. The very laws of nature are finely tuned to allow for the existence of human life, down to the precise strengths of the fundamental forces of the universe. Only a slight variation in them could be sufficient to remove any possibility of life continuing. They are obviously the result of design, which points strongly to an intelligent being outside of the laws of nature. This fine-tuning is well-known and is referred to as the Anthropic Principle. For example, the power of the “strong force” is tuned to ±5% (a 5% change in either direction would render our existence impossible), the power of the “weak force” is tuned to within only a few percent, the power of electromagnetism is tuned to within 1/1040, and gravity is tuned to 1/1060. Thus the four fundamental forces are tuned to an immensely precise degree (tuned to within 1/10100), a highly improbable result of any chance origin.
Also, the precise situation of the existence of life on earth itself is a product of design. The centrifugal force of planetary motion precisely balances the gravitational forces. If it did not, the solar system could not be kept in orbit around the sun. In fact, there are many constants that, if they were not at the precise values that they are, would preclude any possibility of our existence. These include our temperature, our water supply, our atmosphere, the mass of our planet, the ratio of our moon’s size and mass to the earth’s, the thickness of our crust, the positioning of our sun in the galaxy, the mass and temperature of our sun, and even the shape of our galaxy. The odds of these circumstances all all fitting even one planet have been estimated at 1 in 1053, and anything beyond 1 in 1050 is, according to Borel’s Single Law of Chance as stated by the brilliant French mathematician Emile Borel in his Probabilities and Life, regarded by mathematicians as having a probability of zero by chance without intelligent factors being intimately involved in the process.
Also, the origin of life itself requires an outside intelligence, because life contains information (as distinguished from randomness and from mere repetitive patterns, both of which can be formed by natural processes apart from intelligence, whereas actual information requires intelligence, especially information in larger quantities). The information content of DNA is staggering. Even one of the “simplest” sorts of living organism (such as E. coli) contains the informational content of many sets of the Encyclopedia Britannica (108 pages of it)! Now, a human instinctively recognizes it as obvious that information does not come about without intelligence behind it. Even a simple message (such as a few short words carved into the bark of a tree) is regarded as clearly being the product of intelligent input. The information in the genome of even the smallest living thing is far greater. The origin of life was an intelligent process, and no naturalistic scenario can account for this without intelligence being involved. Several scenarios have been proposed (such as the “RNA-world” and the hydrothermal scenario), but all fail. The probability of a single protein molecule being arranged by undirected natural processes is roughly 1 chance in 10161, allowing the entire supposed age of the earth and all of the atoms on earth, and to get the minimum set of 239 protein molecules required for the smallest theoretical form of life, the probability would be, according to the extremely generous figure given by Dr. Fred Hoyle, one chance in 1040,000. There must have been an intelligence involved in the origin of life on earth.
Some skeptics may allege that all probability calculations such as these are meaningless because, after all, events that are statistically improbable happen. One commonly used example is a lottery. They will say that, although the odds of winning the lottery may be several million to one, someone invariably wins. However, of course someone is bound to win. The result initially in question, however, is a very specific one: a given individual winning. This is more comparable. While there are still a number of instances of said individual winning the lottery, this is also to be expected, because the odds of victory are rather high compared to the odds we are dealing with here, which far exceed what is known as the universal probability bound. If one person were to tell another person that he or she had won the lottery not once, not twice, but seventy times in succession, the second person would not be apt to believe the first person because of the exceedingly low chances of such an event. Yet the odds of the events truly in question (the universe being as hospitable as it is by chance) are far worse. Why, then, ought the same person who would be skeptical of a seventy-victory lottery streak be accepting of a far less probable situation with no evidence whatsoever?
Some, however, will undoubtedly endeavor to escape this frightening conclusion by appealing to a limitless multitude of universes, thereby making any possibility (no matter how improbable) inevitable. This is done in spite of the absolute lack of evidence for the actual existence of other universes (and is often done by those who strive to deny the existence of realms beyond our own universe). Their appeal, however, flies in the face of all reason and common sense, for it would not be applied to a lesser situation. Indeed, under their scenario, any scenario could be explained away as simply a result of the inevitable overcoming of odds by the multiple universes. To hearken back to the example of the seventy-lottery victory streak, such would become not only unsurprising, but even expected! In truth, the consistent application of their argument transforms reality into an utterly unknowable jumble of incoherence. It must be rejected as little more than sophistry.
The next question that arises is the identity of the intelligence behind life on earth. It could, theoretically, be extraterrestrial beings within our own universe. But then the problem of their own origin arises. This explanation merely serves to move the problem of life’s origin to another time and place, and thus the problem still remains. Clearly, the intelligent force behind the origin of life was not within this universe, but rather outside of it. Thus we can add “intelligent” to our already large list of attributes for this creative entity. The creator of the universe is, to name merely a few things, intelligent (being the originator of vast quantities of information), eternal (being the originator of time and therefore outside of it), non-spatial (being the originator of space and therefore outside of it), immaterial (being the originator of matter and therefore outside of it), unchanging (since change is only something that can happen within time-bound beings, not in an eternal one), limitless (that is, not limited by time, space, or matter, since this being created all of it and is unchanging), and extremely powerful (to have created the entirety of the universe out of nothing—perhaps the word “omnipotent” would be suitable to describe this being). These attributes are fulfilled in only one entity: God.
Now, an oft-repeated (and oft-answered) question is, “If God created the world, then who created God?” However, this misunderstands the argument. Only if something has a beginning does it require a cause for existence. And only if something exists within time (and is therefore limited by time) must it have a beginning. However, God (by the definition in question) is the separate Creator of the universe, which includes time. He does not exist within time, and therefore requires no beginning, and thus no cause. Therefore, He is the uncaused First Cause, adding “self-existent” to His impressive list of attributes.
1) Everything that has a beginning has a cause 2) Time had a beginning 3) Therefore, everything within time (i.e., bound by time; temporal) had a beginning 4) The universe is temporal/bound by time 5) Therefore, the universe had a beginning 6) Therefore, the universe had a cause 7) Nothing can cause itself to come into existence 8) Therefore, the universe’s cause must be beyond the space-time-matter/energy universe 9) Let us call this cause “God” 10) God is not bound by time 11) Therefore, God had no beginning 12) Therefore, God had no cause
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #1 on Dec 21, 2005, 5:11pm »
Having perhaps resolved the question of whether or not there is a God, the next question to be asked is, how many gods are there? There are three categorical options for this question. The first is zero deities, as in an atheistic worldview. The second option is that there is just one deity. Such a concept is called monotheism, and is the position taken by at least three major world religions. Finally, the third option is a plurality of deities. In other words, the third option is some form of polytheism. This is the choice taken by numerous mythologies, such as the beliefs of the ancient Greeks, Egyptians, Romans, Aztecs, Norse, Babylonians, Japanese, Canaanites, and Celts, among others.
The option of zero has been demonstrated above to be a rather unlikely option. Therefore, we are left with the options of a singular Deity or of plural deities. However, if there are plural deities separate and distinct from one another (as we see in the mythologies of numerous ancient cultures), none of them could truly be considered infinite, for they are limited by each other and by other circumstances. Looking in mythology at Zeus, Odin, Osiris, Marduk, and the others, we can clearly see that evidenced. Also, as we may note, these deities of the ancient polytheistic cultures were not external to the creation. Rather, they existed within the universe. Perhaps they were considered to be on a higher level than humanity, but they were still within the universe nonetheless, leaving us again with the problem of the origin of the universe itself.
In Greek mythology and later in Roman as a result of adoption, the tale goes that the first gods, who are more or less simply personifications of the heavens and the earth, thus making them parts of the universe rather than the creators of it, had offspring. Among their descendants were all the other gods. In Norse mythology (as revealed in the Elder Edda and other ancient sagas), we have the gods themselves being formed by natural processes occurring within the universe. In this case, they are the end result produced by the melting of ice by a warm wind. In one of the many differing accounts in Egyptian mythology, the first god arose from a watery chaos. In the Babylonian Enuma Elish, the story begins with Apsu and Tiamat, who appear to be personifications of freshwater and saltwater. Apsu and Tiamat bring into being Lahmu, Lahamu, and the rest of the gang, which eventually includes Marduk, who slays Tiamat in battle. Enuma Elish, as translated by L. W. King, begins thus:
When in the height heaven was not named, And the earth beneath did not yet bear a name, And the primeval Apsu, who begat them, And chaos, Tiamat, the mother of them both Their waters were mingled together, And no field was formed, no marsh was to be seen; When of the gods none had been called into being, And none bore a name, and no destinies were ordained; Then were created the gods in the midst of heaven, Lahmu and Lahamu were called into being….
A story of the origins of the gods is called a theogony (such as the Greek writer Hesiod’s famed Theogony), and mythology is rife with them. How absurd it is to declare that a god that once was not, later came to be!
In these, we often see nature (that is, the universe) before the gods, and we have the gods coming into existence within time. However, as shown above, God did not come into existence in time, and He created nature (not vice-versa).
In light of the clear fact that numerous distinct gods do not suffice to account for the creation of the universe, another version of polytheism has been proposed, that of “soft” polytheism. This is the notion that all the gods of the various pantheons, rather than being multiple distinct entities, are instead merely faces of a higher deity. However, consider the behavior of the gods in polytheism. In a rather disgusting Babylonian myth called Enlil and Nanlil, the god Enlil is portrayed as forcibly impregnating a younger goddess named Nanlil numerous times. In the fourth tablet of Enuma Elish, Marduk eventually succeeded in slaying Tiamat, an ancestral goddess. The account of their fight, translated by L. W. King, reads as follows:
Then advanced Tiamat and Marduk, the counselor of the gods; To the fight they came on, to the battle they drew nigh. The lord spread out his net and caught her, And the evil wind that was behind him he let loose in her face. As Tiamat opened her mouth to its full extent, He drove in the evil wind, while as yet she had not shut her lips. The terrible winds filled her belly, And her courage was taken from her, and her mouth she opened wide. He seized the spear and burst her belly, He severed her inward parts, he pierced her heart. He overcame her and cut off her life; He cast down her body and stood upon it.
In Greek mythology, the mighty god Zeus is portrayed as engaging in countless affairs with mortal women, much to the anger of his wife Hera. The gods are often portrayed as quarrelling, such as in the account of Hephaestus attempting to intervene in a dispute between Zeus and Hera, for which he was flung from Olympus for a brief time, crippling him for life. There is also another famous tale of Greek mythology in which Prometheus succeeds in instructing the mortals to outwit Zeus by disguising the contents of the sacrificial piles between which Zeus must choose. There is also the story of Hades, brother of Zeus and god of the underworld, abducting his niece Persephone to be his wife.
Furthermore, in the Iliad, the gods are shown to take various sides in the Trojan War, some siding with the Trojans and others with the Achaeans. Indeed, there are two instances in the Iliad in which the Olympian gods actually personally engage in fighting one another. These events are referred to as theomachies. Here is one example, from Samuel Butler’s translation of the Iliad, Book 21, lines 489-496:
She [Hera] caught both Artemis' wrists with her left hand as she spoke, and with her right she took the bow from her shoulders, and laughed as she beat her with it about the ears while Artemis wriggled and writhed under her blows. Her swift arrows were shed upon the ground, and she fled weeping from under Hera's hand as a dove that flies before a falcon to the cleft of some hollow rock, when it is her good fortune to escape. Even so did she flee weeping away, leaving her bow and arrows behind her.
In Egyptian mythology, we have the famed account of Osiris being murdered by his brother Seth, who proceeded to dismember the body of Osiris, necessitating that Isis locate the pieces and attach them to one another again. In another odd Egyptian account found in “The Contendings of Horus and Seth”, the goddess Hathor dances nude around the throne of her father Ra in order to cheer him out of his dark mood. This is to say nothing of the bizarre and disturbing homosexual competition between Horus and Seth later in the story. In the tale “The Destruction of Mankind”, the fiery, vengeful goddess Sakhmet is an aspect of the ordinarily peaceful Hathor. Sakhmet is ordered by Ra to slay a group of mortals who are conspiring against him, but Sakhmet goes into a frenzied rage of destruction and nearly destroys all of humanity. Ra must trick her into becoming drunk on vast quantities of beer colored to give the appearance of being blood, after which Sakhmet reverts to existing as Hathor.
In Canaanite myths, gods frequently strove against one another. In “The Descent of Anath into the Underworld”, Mot/Mavet demanded the goddess Anath as a ransom for the sun and the moon. Anath accepted and descended into Sheol, managing to win back the sun and moon through repeated sexual activity with Mavet. There was a frequent struggle between the god Baal and other gods, such as Yam and Mavet, as recorded in the Baal Epic. This is to say nothing of Baal’s sexual encounter with a bovine quadruped in that same tale. Here are two samples of Baal’s struggles against other gods:
And the club swoops from the hand of Baal Like an eagle from his fingers. It strikes the head of Prince Yam, Twixt the eyes of Judge Nahar Yam sinks, Falls to the earth. His joints fail His frame collapses. Baal drags and poises Yam Destroys Judge Nahar….
Baal seizes the son of Asherah. The great one he smites on the shoulder. The tyrant he smites with a stick Mavet is vanquished, Reaches earth.
In Norse mythology, there was a pantheon of extremely mortal gods who were all destined to fall in combat with their enemies at Ragnarök. Indeed, the trickster god Loki, who was to oppose the Æsir at Ragnarök, earlier tricked the blind god Höðr into killing Höðr’s brother Baldr with a spear of mistletoe. Snorri Sturlson’s Prose Edda (also called the Younger Edda) narrated the incident, and the translation done by Arthur G. Brodeur in 1916 reads as follows:
Hödr stood outside the ring of men, because he was blind. Then spake Loki to him: “Why dost thou not shoot at Baldr?” He answered: “Because I see not where Baldr is; and for this also, that I am weaponless.” Then said Loki: “Do thou also after the manner of other men, and show Baldr honor as the other men do. I will direct thee where he stands; shoot at him with this wand.” Hödr took Mistletoe and shot at Baldr, being guided by Loki: the shaft flew through Baldr, and he fell dead to the earth; and that was the greatest mischance that has ever befallen among gods and men.
In the myths of the Aztecs, famed for their penchant for human sacrifice, there is a tradition of how a newborn sun god named Huitzilpochtli killed his sister Coyolxauhqui and tossed her head into the sky to become the moon. Another tale recounts how Chantico, goddess of the hearth and of volcanic fire, violated the ban on consuming paprika on a fasting day. Consequently, the maize god Tonacatecuhtli transformed Chantico into a dog.
In Celtic mythology, the Welsh god of the underworld, Gwynn ap Nudd, abducted a goddess named Creiddylad. The Welsh smith-god Govannon unknowingly slew his nephew Dylan, a sea god. Dian Cecht was a god of healing who had replaced his brother Nuada’s missing hand with a silver hand. Dian Cecht’s son Miach then replaced the silver hand with Nuada’s original hand. The result was that Dian Cecht slew Miach out of jealousy. Nuada was later killed by Balor, god of death, but Balor himself was subsequently slaim by his own grandson, Lugh Lamhfada.
In Japanese mythology, the primordial sky god Takami-Musubi killed another god named Ame-No-Wakahiko, who had been sent to rule over the earth. Takami-Musubi had a sun-goddess wife named Amaterasu, and an interesting legend concerns her as well. Her brother, a storm god by the name of Susanowa, noisily ravaged the earth, and Amaterasu sealed herself into a cave so as to escape the noise. She was eventually drawn out of the cavern by the laughter of the other gods as they watched a goddess named Uzume perform obscene, comical dances. Amaterasu and Susanowa had another sibling, the moon god Tsuki-yumi, who killed the fertility goddess Ukemochi when she vomited large quantities of food.
In light of all these myths surrounding the petty, quarrelling, demented gods of the various pantheons, how can a person assert that they are all really one? An Athenian philosopher named Marcianus Aristides, writing to the Roman emperor Hadrian (or possibly to Hadrian’s successor, Antoninus Pius), summed up the issue well:
If then the nature of the gods is one, it is not proper that a god should either pursue or slay or harm a god. If then gods be pursued and wounded by gods, and some be kidnapped and some struck dead by lightning, it is obvious that the nature of their gods is not one. And hence it is known, O King, that it is a mistake when they reckon and bring the natures of their gods under a single nature. If then it becomes us to admire a god which is seen and does not see, how much more praiseworthy is it that one should believe in a nature which is invisible and all-seeing? And if further it is fitting that one should approve the handiworks of a craftsman, how much more is it fitting that one should glorify the Creator of the craftsman?
It is clear that none of these polytheistic ‘deities’ fit the all of the attributes of the Creator, and neither does the sum of all of them fit all of these criteria. Therefore, they are irrelevant in the sense that they cannot hope to compare to the supreme God, and these polytheistic ‘deities’ (though they cannot be said to truly deserve the title) do not satisfy the requirements of the question. Spiritual entities may very well exist, and the ancients may have termed them ‘gods,’ but the sum of all of them would be utterly insignificant when contrasted with the one true infinite God. If they exist, they do not deserve to be called ‘gods,’ and thus the question is reduced simply to how one defines the concept of a ‘god.’
These spiritual entities certainly would not fit the established qualifications, unlike the external Creator. It is only if we broaden our definition of a ‘god’ to a great extent (thus virtually emptying the term of its meaning) that these beings would be included. So whether or not these entities exist, there must still be an uncreated Creator, and the difference between an infinite, uncreated Creator and finite creations is the distance of infinity, and these lesser beings do not therefore merit any term that would imply any sort of equality with the Creator. Nay, these spiritual entities are best termed ‘false gods,’ and before we decide if they exist and what function they might have, we ought seek to know if there is any communication by the Creator to us, which will be examined in the next section.
Also, we may note that the universe and God, as illustrated above, are separate entities. God is unchanging because He is eternal, and He created the universe, which is not eternal, as a separate entity. Therefore, it can be neither a part of Him nor the whole of Him, just as He is not intrinsically a part of it. And pantheism is not truly a logically sustainable system, for it entails the denial of the self in favor of the monistic presence of “Ultimate Reality”. But, as René Descartes showed in his famous declaration “cogito ergo sum” (“I think, therefore I am”), we can say with certainty that the self exists. And if we exist as individual beings, then “all” is not one, and thus monism (the concept that “all is one”) is false. Pantheism also does not offer anything useful to the search for God, it is essentially a system in which logic is disregarded, and thus we must look elsewhere.
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #2 on Dec 21, 2005, 5:26pm »
The next question we might ask is whether or not this God has revealed anything about Himself to us. In fact, there are numerous books that claim to be such revelations from Him. These include the Tanakh (Old Testament), the New Testament, the Qur’an, and several others, such as the Book of Mormon and parts of the Vedas.
Now we might ask ourselves, what are some attributes we might expect to find in a book that was truly inspired by God? Well, first of all, we would expect the autographs (the original manuscripts) to be comparatively free from error. Thus, the book would be inerrant to the extent that it reflects the original. We would expect there to not be historical inerrancies where it discusses history, scientific inaccuracies where it touches upon scientific issues, and so forth.
This, however, is not enough to automatically qualify a book as being divinely inspired, although it is certainly an indicator of trustworthiness in those areas. The book should also make a claim for its divine origin. This is still not enough, since it is rather simple for a book to claim this for itself, and it is still possible that such a book could be accurate in all of these details. Also, the book’s description of God should be consistent with the attributes of God demonstrated above.
The book should also contain something that is clearly the work of God. God, as we have seen, exists entirely outside of time. Therefore, we could expect God to know the past, the present, and the future even better than we can know the present and the past. Thus, God is capable of knowing the future in precise detail. We, however, cannot know the future beyond what is probable and what God has revealed to us. Therefore, we can have another indicator of divine origin, and that is accurate prophecy (as stated in Isaiah 46:10, God is “declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done”).
This prophecy, to be checked, should have already been fulfilled. There may very well be unfulfilled prophecies that are also true, but we cannot yet verify these. Those that have been fulfilled already, however, can be checked. Preferably, the prophecy will have been made many years before the event it predicts. Also, it is preferable if the prophecy contains a few accurate details about the event that would be difficult to predict merely by human intuition or by observing trends of the times. These might include the name of a ruler prior to his birth and the structure of a government before it is established. Also, the greater the time difference between the prophecy itself and its fulfillment, the less the probability that it was made solely by human ability.
First, let us examine the Old Testament for a few of these traits. Is the Old Testament historically reliable? The evidence indicates clearly that it is. Archaeologists have tried and tried for years to prove it inaccurate, but it has been vindicated every time. Skeptics accused it of having fabricated the reign of David at a later time, but they were themselves shown to be incorrect when an inscription on the smashed remains of a basalt stele (stone slab) referencing “the House of David” and “the King of Israel” was discovered in an excavated Aramean royal plaza at Tel Dan at the foot of Mt. Hermon in northern Galilee. The inscription on the stele, which was likely erected by Hazael of Damascus, was found to refer to the defeated Jehoram as the king of Israel and the defeated Ahaziah as ruling over the “House of David”, clearly indicating a Davidic dynasty of monarchs. This is also confirmed by the Moabite Stone, also known as the Mesha Inscription, which also appears to refer to the “House of David”, as well as to YHWH, the God of Israel. Some were once skeptical of the existence of the Hittites, until the Hittite capital of Hattushash was discovered at Boghaz-kôy in Turkey.
Also, the ratios of Noah’s Ark are also to be noted. Unlike the Babylonian flood account in the eleventh tablet of the Gilgamesh Epic, in which the ark was a perfect cube and would have been completely incapable of surviving any sort of flood, the ratios of Noah’s Ark (with a 6:1 ratio of length to width and a 10:1 ratio of length to height) are ideal for shipbuilding and would have provided an optimum stability. Given that the Israelites were not a people renown for their skills in shipbuilding, the fact that the ratios are so ideal lends great credence to the idea that they are a true description of a true event, especially considering that numerous cultures (listings of these cultures number up to 270) have had tales of immense floods, with far too many of the details synchronizing to have arisen independently. Just one example of a distant flood legend is the Aztec account of how the ‘fourth world’ (the one prior to ours) was destroyed via deluge by the goddess Chalchiuhtlicue. Another would be the Greek account of Deucalion and his wife Pyrrha, in which Deucalion was advised by his father Prometheus to construct an ark.
The description of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah were often contested by skeptics, but archaeological excavation seems to have identified Sodom as the site known as Bab edh-Drha, which was found to be charred and buried under a layer of ash several feet thick, as was the site of Numeira, identified as Gomorrah. The cities were found to have been burned from the roofs down, consistent with the Tanakh’s account of the conflagration descending upon the city. Also discovered were the sites of the other cities of the plain. Interestingly, only the center site, Safi, had escaped the destruction. A strong tradition connects Safi with the biblical city of Zoar, which was the only one of the five cities of the plain to be spared destruction. Highly noteworthy is that the Tanakh describes the destruction as being accompanied by “dense smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a furnace” (Genesis 19:28). This sort of smoke seems indicative of a petroleum-based fire. The destruction was likely triggered by an earthquake, since Sodom and Gomorrah sit along a fault line. The region is known for having large subterranean deposits of bitumen. An earthquake could have forced bitumen to the surface, where a spark could have easily ignited it. This scenario is perfectly aligned with the biblical record of the destruction.
The discovery of several bullae (clay seals) in various locations in the Holy Land confirm a number of figures from the Book of Jeremiah, such as Baruch the son of Neriah (Jeremiah 36:4), Jerahmeel the son of King Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 36:26), and Gemariah the son of Shaphan (Jeremiah 36:10). Also found in the “House of Bullae” was a seal confirming the existence of Azariah the son of Hilkiah (1 Chronicles 9:10-11), and another that could possibly be confirmation of the scribe Elishama (Jeremiah 36:12).
Furthermore, the Old Testament has been shown to be very accurate in its descriptions of culture, foreign religions, and other details. Also, secular records of other nations have referenced numerous biblical kings. For example, the Taylor Prism (also known as the Sennacherib Prism) discovered in Nineveh in 1830 provides Sennacherib’s account of attacking the kingdom of Judah when it was ruled by King Hezekiah. The Taylor Prism’s account matches up perfectly with the biblical accounts given in 2 Chronicles 32 and in 2 Kings 18. The third column of the Taylor Prism narrates it thus:
As to Hezekiah, the Jew, he did not submit to my yoke, I laid siege to 46 of his strong cities, walled forts and to the countless small villages in their vicinity, and conquered (them) by means of well-stamped (earth)ramps, and battering-rams brought (thus) near (to the walls) (combined with) the attack by foot soldiers, (using) mines, breeches as well as sapper work. I drove out (of them) 200,150 people, young and old, male and female, horses, mules, donkeys, camels, big and small cattle beyond counting, and considered (them) booty. Himself I made a prisoner in Jerusalem, his royal residence, like a bird in a cage. I surrounded him with earthwork in order to molest those who were leaving his city’s gate.
It can be categorically stated without exaggeration that no archaeological discovery has ever managed to falsify a single historical statement in the Old Testament. Rather, it has been verified over and over again. As said by William Foxwell Albright, considered to be one of the greatest archaeologists, “There can be no doubt that archaeology has confirmed the substantial historicity of Old Testament tradition.” And, of course, when historical texts are shown accurate in those things that can be verified, then they are rightfully assumed accurate in other details in the absence of evidence indicating otherwise.
Contrast the accuracy of the Tanakh with another claimant to divine origin, the Book of Mormon, which Joseph Smith, who was the founder of Mormonism (also known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or the LDS Church) and the author of the Book of Mormon, said was “the most correct of any book on the earth” (History of the Church, Vol. 4, p. 461). None of the claims therein have been verified by archaeology, and all evidence is lacking. The Smithsonian Institution released an open letter that included the following statement:
The Smithsonian Institution has never used the Book of Mormon in any way as a scientific guide. Smithsonian archaeologists see no direct connection between the archaeology of the New World and the subject matter of the book.
Furthermore, the Book of Mormon claims that the Native Americans are principally descended from one of their supposed ancient civilizations of the Americas, the Lamanites, which are in turn supposed to be one of two warring camps (the other being the Nephites) descended from righteous Jews led to America by Lehi and his sons around 600 BC.
The problem with this claim, other than the fact that no evidence whatsoever can be adduced in favor of the existence of the Lamanites, Nephites, or even the hypothesized prior Jaredites, is that genetic studies strongly indicate that the Native Americans, rather than being of Jewish stock, are of Siberian and Asian ancestry. Mitochondrial DNA tests, for example, indicate an overwhelming (99%) Asian ancestry for Native Americans in the distant past, with the remainder of the mDNA appearing to be of European (likely Spanish) origin. Even two LDS scientists admitted as much when they wrote, “The data accumulated to date indicate that 99.6 percent of Native American genetic markers studied so far exhibit Siberian connections” (“Who Are the Children of Lehi?” by D. Jeffrey Meldrum and Trent D. Stephens, Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, vol. 12, no. 1, 2003, p. 41).
Contrast this with the intriguing case of the Lemba tribe, a Bantu-speaking people of Zimbabwe. According to their traditions, their ancestors were a group of Jewish males from a city called Sena, and these men were shipwrecked off of the eastern coast. Genetic tests demonstrated that about 70% of Lemba Y-chromosomes were Semitic, and about 10% appear to share the priestly lineage of the Cohanim. The ancestors of the Lemba arrived at roughly the same time as Lehi allegedly came to the New World, yet the Lemba preserve a large amount of evidence of their background, whereas the Native Americans show no evidence of Israelite ancestry.
The Native Americans do not express Jewish genetics, and neither the founder effect nor genetic drift suffice in any way, shape, or form to account for this fact given the assumption that the Native Americans are of Jewish heritage as the Book of Mormon describes. This demonstrates the central claim of the Book of Mormon to be false.
Mormons might object that even though it is claimed that the Lamanites “are the principal ancestors of the American Indians”, the Lamanites might have been a very small part of Native American ancestry, intermingling with ethnic groups that had already found their way here. However, James Talmage, a Mormon apostle, said that “the Lamanites lived on in their degraded course, and are today extant upon the land as the American Indians” (Jesus the Christ, 23rd ed., p. 49). And 2 Nephi 1:6-9 in the Book of Mormon contradicts this idea, for it says that other nations did not even know of the land as of yet, let alone inhabit it. Now, while another objection that might be raised is the possibility of later groups moving in and displacing the remnants of the Lamanites, this idea is simply in contrast to the teachings of the Mormon prophets and apostles. Spencer W. Kimball, the twelfth Mormon prophet, wrote that “Lamanites share a royal heritage. I should like to address my remarks to you, our kinsmen of the isles of the sea and the Americas. Millions of you have blood relatively unmixed with gentile nations” (The Teachings of Spencer W. Kimball, p. 596). There is simply no evidence whatsoever of a genetic link between the Native Americans and the Lamanites, and all evidence is against it.
In addition, the Book of Mormon contains clear and obvious plagiarisms of large sections from the King James Version of the Bible (including what are now known to be minor translation errors in the King James Version’s text), as well as numerous corrections (such as changes made in Mosiah 21:28, 1 Nephi 11:18, 1 Nephi 11:21, Alma 5:48, and so on) from the original manuscripts of the Book of Mormon. Whereas Mosiah 21:28 initially said that “King Benjamin had a gift from God”, the text now reads that “King Mosiah had a gift from God”. In the original manuscripts of 1 Nephi 11:18, Mary was referred to as “the mother of God” (a lapse into Roman Catholic theology), but the text now says that Mary is “the mother of the Son of God”. In the 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon, 1 Nephi 11:21 called Jesus “the Eternal Father”, whereas it now calls Him “the son of the Eternal Father”.
This should be a quite troubling realization for members of the LDS church, since the Book of Mormon is held to be the supposedly perfectly preserved translation of the “revelation” allegedly given to Joseph Smith on the golden plates (which were allegedly written in the non-existent language of “reformed Egyptian”) he claimed to have found. Also included in the Book of Mormon’s original manuscripts are numerous spelling and usage errors that seem quite out of place, given that Joseph Smith claimed that the Book of Mormon had been “translated by the power of God” (History of the Church, Vol. 1, p. 55), an assertion also made by the so-called “witnesses” (who, incidentally, were later called “counterfeiters, thieves, liars” by their Mormon contemporaries after the “witnesses” apostatized). As far as other errors are concerned, one interesting example is in 3 Nephi 9:18, in which Jesus is portrayed as referring to Himself as “Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end”, borrowing from Revelation 21:6 in the New Testament. The error here, besides that plagiarism, is that the ancestors of the Nephites allegedly left Jerusalem in approximately 600 BC. The Nephites would have had no idea that alpha and omega are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet. In addition to this, Joseph Smith claimed that there had been no Greek on the plates from which he supposedly translated the Book of Mormon.
Ironically, the Book of Mormon contradicts Mormon doctrine on several points. If one wishes to find Mormon doctrine, one should look in Doctrines and Covenants (D&C), Pearl of Great Price (PGP), and the writings of the leaders of the LDS Church. Mormon doctrine, as expressed by founder Joseph Smith on page 5 of volume 6 of Journal of Discourses, says that there is more than one God; the Book of Mormon, however, maintains that there is only one God, as expressed in Alma 11:26-29, Mosiah 15:5, and 2 Nephi 31:21 (which also clearly sets forth the orthodox Christian doctrine of the Trinity, also explicitly denied by the Mormon Church). Mormon doctrine, as expressed by Mormon “apostle” James Talmage on page 55 of Articles of Faith, holds that hell is not forever; on the other hand, several passages in the Book of Mormon (such as Jacob 6:10 and 2 Nephi 28:21-23) offer an opposing view. The LDS Church was famous for its early promotion of polygamy, but the Book of Mormon condemns polygamy in such passages as Jacob 1:15, Jacob 2:23-27, Jacob 3:5, and Mosiah 11:2. Furthermore, a number of key Mormon doctrines (such as God being an exalted man, celestial marriage, men becoming gods, baptism for the dead, and the like) are not in the Book of Mormon. This is quite shocking, considering that according to other Mormon canonical works, the Book of Mormon contains “the fulness [sic] of the everlasting gospel” (D&C 135:3).
Clearly, as far as historical accuracy is concerned, the Book of Mormon, which is not even consistent with the teachings of its own church, fails in its bid for divine inspiration, whereas the Tanakh has thus far been shown historically accurate.
The next question is whether or not any modern scientific knowledge of any sort is included within the pages of the Old Testament. The answer to this is also affirmative. The Torah (the first five books of the Old Testament; they are called the Pentateuch in Greek) contains laws that pertain to health care practices that happen to be remarkably advanced (for example, in Leviticus 13, Numbers 19, and Deuteronomy 23:12-14). Human civilization would have done very well to have always followed these laws, as they would have drastically reduced disease. Indeed, during medieval times the Jews escaped the effects of the Black Plague to a greater degree than most as a result of following these practices.
A practice of leaving land fallow every seventh year was established in Leviticus 25:4-6. We now know that this permits the soil to rejuvenate itself with nutrients, thus resulting in better long-term productivity. The rediscovery of this principle revolutionized agriculture.
Another point of scientific accuracy in the Old Testament is simply the fact that, unlike numerous other ancient cultures, it points clearly to an absolute beginning for the universe. Only in recent years has this been absolutely verified scientifically. The laws of science demand a beginning for the space-time-matter/energy cosmos, and the Old Testament affirms this from the very first verse (Genesis 1:1).
Now, it must be admitted that many people have the misconception that the early chapters of Genesis are in stark contradiction with what is perceived as absolutely proven scientific fact: evolution. It should be noted that not all who accept the Tanakh as divinely inspired believe that Genesis is necessarily in contradiction with evolutionary teaching. However, such an interpretation of Genesis does not necessarily have to be taken. Evolution, which is the notion that all biological life is descended from a common ancestor which itself arose from inorganic material, suffers from several crucial flaws. There is an extreme dearth of viable transitional forms between major body types in the fossil record. The problem of the impossibility of generating vast amounts of new genetic information via random mutation has yet to be solved. As said earlier, there is simply no plausible mechanism for the initial abiogenesis required. Furthermore, the problem of Haldane’s Dilemma, which pertains to the rate at which mutations can spread throughout the population, is a very potent obstacle for evolutionary thought.
Throughout the Old Testament are numerous references to parts of the hydrologic cycle and meteorology, and they happen to be quite scientifically accurate. The descriptions concerning the formation of rain precisely match what we now know.
Another point to be made is from Job 26:7, which states: “He stretches out the north over the empty place, and hangs the earth upon nothing.” In other words, the north axis extends indefinitely into space, and the earth, rather than resting upon the shoulders of Atlas as in Greek mythology or upon the back of a cosmic elephant or turtle, is suspended upon “nothing” in the void of space. Also, in Job 38:16, God asks Job if he has “entered into the springs of the sea”. Though skeptics once scoffed at the notion, modern oceanography has indeed revealed springs on the ocean floor. Only three verses later (Job 38:19), God questions Job about “the way where light dwells” and the place of darkness. It must be noted that light dwells in a “way” (Hebrew derek), that is, it is always in motion, as opposed to darkness, which is static, staying in place (given that darkness is simply the condition of light being absent). This is, in fact, what modern science has shown us to be true.
The Old Testament also alludes to several other scientific facts, such as the Law of Biogenesis (Genesis 1), the Second Law of Thermodynamics (Isaiah 51:6, for example), the necessity of blood circulation (Leviticus 17:11), and the effect of emotion on physical health (Proverbs 17:22).
The Old Testament does make a claim for its own divine origin. The phrase “the word of the LORD” appears over two hundred times in the Tanakh (249 times, to be precise), often prefacing sections that are clearly intended to be considered as the direct speech of God. Furthermore, the phrase “thus says the LORD” shows up even more frequently, appearing 417 times. Entire sections of the Tanakh are presented as direct quotations from God’s speeches to the prophets, who acted as His messengers to bring this word to the people of Israel and to preach against pagan nations whose abhorrent practices would result in their being judged by God.
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #3 on Dec 21, 2005, 5:26pm »
The Old Testament is historically and scientifically accurate (contrary to the common assertions of the skeptics, who are repeatedly proven wrong), and clearly it asserts that it is God’s revelation to man. But this alone does not itself confirm its status as being from God, although it lends greater strength to that claim. That is left to the numerous prophecies found throughout the Old Testament.
A good place to begin is with the visions in the Book of Daniel. The very book itself asserts that these visions refer to several consecutive world kingdoms, and several symbols are used to describe these. The first kingdom is pictured as a “head of gold,” which was to be followed by a “breast and arms of silver,” referring to the two-sided nature of this kingdom. Elsewhere, this second kingdom is compared to a “ram” with two uneven “horns,” the higher (greater) springing up later than the smaller. This kingdom is succeeded and conquered by a kingdom symbolized by both a “belly and thighs of brass” and a “he-goat” with a prominent horn between its eyes. The goat comes from the west of where Daniel’s ram-and-goat vision is taking place (which happens to be Susa/Shushan, winter capital of the Persian Empire, where the “ram” is standing). The goat moves speedily and demolishes the ram, after which the goat becomes very prominent. But in the middle of its strength, the great horn is broken and replaced by four smaller horns. Following this kingdom is one symbolized by “legs of iron”.
This is what was prophesied. But what happened? The first of these great world kingdoms was that of Babylon, as was explicitly stated in the Book of Daniel itself (Daniel 2:37-38). Babylon was known for having an abundance of gold. The Babylonian Empire was succeeded by the Medo-Persian Empire (breast and arms of silver and the two-horned ram), which was a joint empire of the Medes and the Persians. The Persians came up later, but they were the more prominent (just as with the ram’s horns). The Medo-Persian Empire was known for collecting tribute in silver as a rule. India was the sole vassal state that paid in gold, but the value of the tribute was nonetheless reckoned in terms of silver. This was followed by the Greek Empire (belly and thighs of brass and the he-goat). The Greek Empire became a conquering world power under Alexander the Great (the prominent horn), and they conquered with great speed, even defeating the Medo-Persian Empire. But in the height of his power, Alexander the Great died in Babylon at the age of 33 from an illness, and his empire was split between four of his followers (the four smaller horns) after a period of warring over the territories: Ptolemy, Seleucus, Lysimachus, and Cassander (the son of Antipater). The Greeks were known for an affiliation with bronze (having bronze weapons, bronze armor, and being exporters of bronze) to the point that they were called “brazen men” in one instance by a pagan oracle. The symbolism of the goat is particularly fascinating in that Macedonian coins used goat symbols, and Alexander claimed descent from Jupiter Ammon, whose symbol was a goat. Lest anyone think that the identifications of Medo-Persia and Greece with the ram and goat are modern interpretations, Daniel 8:20-21 explicitly says that the ram is the Medes and Persians and that the goat is Greece. After the Greek Empire came the Roman Empire (the legs of iron), which was known to have equipped its soldiers with iron weapons.
More detailed prophecies are then given, beginning in Daniel 11. After the Persian king in whose lifetime Daniel wrote, there would come three more Persian kings, after which would come a fourth Persian king who “shall stir up all against the realm of Grecia” (Daniel 11:2). After that would come the mighty king who “shall rule with great dominion” (Daniel 11:3), but his kingdom would be broken and “divided toward the four winds of heaven,” but “not to his posterity” (Daniel 11:4).
Then there would be kings of the south and the north, and a daughter of a king of the south would “come to the king of the north to make an agreement” (Daniel 11:6). Out of a “branch of her roots” would be another military leader who “shall come with an army, and shall enter into the fortress of the king of the north, and shall deal against them, and shall prevail” (Daniel 11:7). And after sons of the king of the north “stir up strife” (Daniel 11:10), the king of the south would become angered and fight the king of the north, winning, although the king of the north would return with a greater multitude (Daniel 11:13). Later, the king of the north would give away the “daughter of women” in marriage, and she would take sides against him (Daniel 11:17). This king of the north would turn his attention to the isles but be defeated by a commander, after which the king of the north would die.
Then the king’s successor would send out a tax collector and be destroyed, although “not in anger or in battle” (Daniel 11:20). After this, a “vile person” would stand up in the king’s estate and take a large army against the king of the South to win and return to his country with great wealth, after which he would set his heart against “the holy covenant.” He would again go against the south but would be defeated, after which he would work with those who “forsake the holy covenant” (Daniel 11:30). He would desecrate the temple and abolish the daily sacrifice, but “the people that know their God” would fight against him (Daniel 11:32).
The prophecy was proven absolutely correct by history. After Cyrus II the Great (reigned 559-529 BC), the Persian king under whom Daniel served as he finished writing, there came three more Persian kings. The first was Cambyses II (reigned 530-521 BC), who was the son of Cyrus II. After him came Smerdis/Bardiya/Gaumâta/Oropastes (reigned in 521 BC), whose identity is clouded because according to several sources, an usurper named Gaumata replaced Smerdis/Bardiya (the younger son of Cyrus II) after Bardiya’s murder at the hands of Cambyses II. Complications arise because Gaumata posed as the genuine Smerdis/Bardiya and was king for seven months until being killed by his successor. The third king after Cyrus II was Darius I the Great (reigned 521-486/485 BC), who was the son of a Persian satrap named Hystaspes, the son of Arsames, Cyrus II’s predecessor. After them came the next king, Xerxes I, who had military campaigns against the Greeks.
mighty king of Grecia who came later was, of course, Alexander the Great (lived 356-323 BC), and his kingdom was divided between four of his followers. The prophecy then tells of the fights between the kings of the north (descendants of Seleucus I in Syria) and kings of the south (Ptolemy I in Egypt). A daughter of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (reigned 281-246 BC), Berenice Phernophorus, was indeed married to Antiochus II Theos (reigned 261-246 BC), the third king of Syria. The “branch of her roots” was Berenice’s brother, Ptolemy III Euergetes (reigned 246-222 BC), who was successor of Ptolemy II Philadelphius and sacked Syria in revenge for Bernice’s assassination in Antioch at the hands of Antiochus II’s former-and-also-later wife Laodice. The sons of the king of the north would include Antiochus III the Great (reigned 223-187 BC), whose forces went down to fight against those of Ptolemy IV Philopator (reigned 221-204 BC) in Egypt, but the Egyptians won, although Antiochus later returned with a larger army.
“Daughter of women” refers to the daughter of Antiochus, Cleopatra I Syra (not to be confused with the more famous Cleopatra VII Philopator), who was under the care of her mother and a nurse. When Cleopatra I was espoused to the young Ptolemy V Epiphanes (reigned 204-181 BC), Cleopatra sided with him against her father. After this, when Antiochus III turned his attention to the “isles,” he was defeated by a commander, Scipio Asiaticus, who led the Roman army in Asia Minor and defeated Antiochus III’s naval forces at Magnesia. Later, Antiochus was slain. His successor was Seleucus IV Philopator (reigned 187-175 BC), who was assassinated by Heliodorus while trying to raise taxes. His brother, Antiochus IV Epiphanes (reigned 175-163 BC), the second son of Antiochus the Great, was indeed a “vile person,” being one of the more morally degraded men in history. He plundered Egypt successfully, after which he tried again and failed when he was repelled by the Romans. Then he worked with those who had “forsaken the holy covenant,” such as the Jewish high priest Menelaus, who conspired with Antiochus against the Jews who were still faithful to God, and he stopped the Jewish daily sacrifices, made an altar to Zeus in the temple, and slaughtered a pig on it. The “people that know their God” are the heroic Jews led by the aged priest Mattathias and his sons (the Maccabees) who waged a war of independence against Antiochus and succeeded in 167-164 BC (Hanukkah commemorates the rededication of the Temple, which was done in December of 165 BC by the Maccabees).
This is not the only prophecy of the Old Testament by far, although it is quite an impressive one, having foretold an outline of world history several centuries in advance. Skeptics, however, may assert that the Book of Daniel must have been written after all of these events, because obviously there can be no such thing as prophecy. However, this assumption is merely begging the question, and an excellent, although somewhat technical, defense of the early date for Daniel’s authorship can be found at http://www.tektonics.org/af/danieldefense.html. Some skeptics might merely assert that the prophecies themselves were written in later, perhaps sometimes post-165 BC, although these skeptics never produce actual evidence in support of their proposals. Evidently, they feel their mere assertion to be sufficient to give their proposals the weight of factuality. However, to do this, the perpetrator of such fraud would have had to alter all manuscripts in multiple languages (the Septuagint—a translation of the Tanakh into Greek—had already been completed prior to then, for one) in numerous places (not merely Palestine, but also Alexandria in Egypt and others). Also mitigating against this explanation is the fact that the ancient historian Josephus recorded in Antiquities of the Jews 11.8.5 that Alexander the Great was actually personally shown a copy of the Book of Daniel so that he could see the prophecies relating to himself! Josephus wrote:
And when he [Alexander the Great] had said this to Parmenio, and had given the high priest [Jaddua] his right hand, the priests ran along by him, and he came into the city. And when he went up into the temple, he offered sacrifice to God, according to the high priest's direction, and magnificently treated both the high priest and the priests. And when the Book of Daniel was showed him wherein Daniel declared that one of the Greeks should destroy the empire of the Persians, he supposed that himself was the person intended.
Of course, some skeptics may simply assert that history cannot be known and thus these historical records cannot be trusted to be truthful and authentic. Of course, one may ask how it is then that they can know that these records are not authentic. But historical records should be considered “innocent until proven guilty,” and therefore, in the absence of any actual good reasons (such as real evidence, something these skeptics seem to disdain) in favor of considering the records as unreliable in such areas, they ought to be trusted. Therefore we can see that the Book of Daniel clearly contains fulfilled prophecies, given that it dates back at least to the time of Alexander the Great based on Josephus’s testimony, and most likely further back to the traditional date.
Another interesting prophecy of the Old Testament can be found in Isaiah 44:28 and onward, in which God refers to Cyrus II, who was an important Persian emperor, by name over a century before Cyrus was even born! Cyrus would eventually, about 150-175 years after Isaiah had made his prophecy, conquer Babylon in the year 539 BC. Especially worth noting is that Isaiah prophesies that Cyrus would permit the Jews to rebuild Jerusalem and the temple, but in Isaiah’s time Nebuchadnezzar had not yet destroyed Jerusalem and the temple and carried the Jews off into captivity. And the historical and textual evidence indicates that the Book of Isaiah was indeed written entirely in the time it claims to have been, namely, “in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah” (Isaiah 1:1). Arguments were once made that insinuated a vast difference in theology, literary style, and vocabulary between different parts of Isaiah. However, it is now acknowledged that there is, in fact, continuity throughout the text.
Furthermore, in Ezekiel 26, several prophecies are made against Tyre, the great coastal city of the Phoenician Empire. God declared that He would send many nations against Tyre and that they would destroy Tyre’s walls and break Tyre’s towers, making it like the “top of a rock”. Furthermore, the Book of Ezekiel specifies that the stones, timber, and dust of Tyre would be tossed into the sea, and that Tyre would become a place for fisherman to spread their nets upon.
And indeed these prophecies were fulfilled. Nebuchadnezzar II (reigned 605-562 BC) invaded Tyre between 585-572 BC with an army of various nationalities. His forces destroyed the walls and towers of the mainland city of Tyre, but many of the inhabitants escaped to an island city of Tyre, where they prospered for several more centuries until Alexander the Great arrived. In a true feat of military genius, Alexander scraped the ruins of mainland Tyre into the ocean to build a causeway for his armies to cross to reach the island city of Tyre and destroy it, which they did in 332 BC. Alexander rebuilt Tyre, and the new city was an important trading center in the ancient world. But, in 1291 AD, the Mamluks from Egypt assaulted Tyre, massacring many of the citizens while selling others into slavery, and the Mamluks destroyed the city to prevent the Crusaders from returning. And, just as prophesied, the rocky coasts of the original mainland Tyre indeed became a barren place where fisherman would spread their nets to dry.
Contrast this to yet another claimant to divine origin: the Qur’an, claimed by Muslims to be the inspired, perfectly preserved, errorless, and eternal final revelation to mankind from God. However, the Qur’an lacks anything even coming close to this sort of predictive prophecy, which is no doubt why Muhammad declared that the only miracle he would offer was the beautiful literary structure of the Qur’an itself. Such is hardly even a point resembling evidence in favor of divine origin, even if one were to grant that the Qur’an is a superbly written piece of literature. That alone is a very debatable point, even if one were to limit the subject pool only to various other Arabic writings, especially given that it is known that the Qur’an possesses numerous grammatical irregularities. It is claimed that this is most miraculous, especially because Muhammad was, according to the claims of some, illiterate. There is, however, some confusion as to whether the Arabic words “al-ummi”, used in al-A’raf 7:157-158 of the Qur’an in reference to Muhammad, should be translated “unlettered”, to be understood as “illiterate”, or instead as “unscriptured”, referring to one from a people group that has not yet had education in divine scriptures: namely, the Arabs, as opposed to Ahl ul-Kitab, the “People of the Book”.
The few things occasionally claimed by Muslims as prophetic simply do not hold up under the same scrutiny. Other than the predictions of victory by Muhammad for his troops (which is hardly unexpected, coming from a devoutly religious military leader), the only seemingly strong prediction is that found in ar-Rûm 30:2-4, in which it is claimed that the Romans would soon be victorious again “within a few years” after their defeat. However, this is certainly not unfeasible for a lucky guess, given that one could expect the Romans to bounce back in such a time period. Furthermore, the early Uthmanic edition of the Qur’an lacked vowel points, and the Arabic word meaning “they shall conquer” (sayaghlibuna) would, if two different vowels are used, mean “they shall be conquered” (sayughlabuna). Furthermore, commentators such as Abdullah Yusuf Ali point out that the “few years” is to be taken to mean somewhere between three and nine years, yet the actual victory of the Byzantines over the Persians occurred in 628-630 AD, whereas the Byzantine defeat by the Persians occurred in 614 or 615 AD. There is clearly a gap of more than nine years here. However, even if this prediction were absolutely true and within the proper time frame, it would be of no evidential value, since the Byzantines could have been reasonably expected to regain victory sometime soon. This passage is ambiguous, of short range, not particularly spectacular, includes elements of falsity even if taken to be a genuine prediction of Roman victory, and could have been used in either sense after the fact, meaning it has no real value as evidence of fulfilled prophecy. Another proposed prophecy is to be found in al-Fajr 89:1-5, which is taken by some Muslim scholars to refer to ten years of persecution of Islam before the famed Hijrah, when Muhammad fled to Medina. However, the phrase “by the Nights twice five” (al-Fajr 89:2, trans. Yusuf Ali) is usually understood as referring to the first ten nights of the sacred season of pilgrimage (Zul-Hajj). Utilizing this as a prophecy seems a bit desperate to find some sort of supernatural influence in the Qur’an. It cannot be found because the Qur’an does not have the weight of evidence in support of divine origin for it. The Tanakh, however, does.
This itself does not necessarily discount the Qur’an from being divine in origin, unless it can be found to be flawed and definitely contradictory to divinely inspired works in matters of factuality. That would demolish the notion that the Qur’an is from God. Therefore, one must now examine various statements in the Qur’an and see how well they hold up. For example, al-Kahf 18:86 reports that a man named Dhu’l-Qarneyn (alternately transliterated as Zul-Qarnain) found the sun actually setting in a “muddy spring” (al-Kahf 18:86, trans. Pickthall) where a group of people were living. This is not exactly the most credible of tales, given that the sun is approximately 1,392,000 kilometers in diameter, 109 times the diameter of the entire earth. In Maryam 19:28 in the Qur’an, Mary the mother of Jesus is claimed to be the “sister of Aaron”. Aaron indeed had a sister named Miriam (the same as Mary in the original language), but the two were very far removed in time and hardly the same individual. Contrary to all historical evidence, at-Tawbah 9:30 asserts that the Jews believe that Ezra is the son of God, using that as a parallel to Christian beliefs regarding Jesus. Of course, no Jewish group throughout history is known to have thought such things of Ezra, yet the wording of the phrase appears to indicate that the belief is being ascribed to a large, significant portion of Judaism at the time. Furthermore, there is the additional problem of al-An’âm 6:83-86 declaring that Job and Lot are among Abraham’s descendants. Lot was Abraham’s nephew, and Job was a “man in the land of Uz” (Job 1:1) who probably lived before Abraham, and was certainly not among Abraham’s descendants.
The Qur’an also has suffers from internal contradiction, although an-Nisa’ 4:82 asserts the contrary. For example, there is the question of whether or not God forgives the sin of shirk, roughly akin to a broadened sense of idolatry. According to an-Nisa’ 4:116 and al-An’am 6:88, He does not forgive this sin. According to an-Nisa’ 4:153 and az-Zumar 39:53, on the other hand, God does indeed forgive such sins as these. Also, al-An’âm 6:163 claims that Muhammad was the first Muslim, yet al-‘Imrân 3:67 states that Abraham was a Muslim, and in al-‘Imrân 3:52 and al-Ma’idah 5:111, the disciples of Jesus are claimed to be Muslims.
Given that the Qur’an is claimed by Muslims to have descended straight from God and to have been preserved in its original form, another argument can be posed against it, that of grammatical errors in the Arabic text. As an example, al-Munâfiqûn 63:10 includes the Arabic word akun whereas the proper form for the first-person future tense would be akunu. Al-A’râf 7:160 contains the phrase uthnati ashrat asbaatam, whereas proper Arabic uses masculine forms for human plurals. Thus, the phrase in question should be uthaiy ashara sibtaan. Fussilat 41:11 features another mistake in that the word ta’e’een is masculine and plural, whereas the passage requires the dual feminine form ta’e’atain. These three are part of a much larger corpus of flaws in the Qur’anic Arabic.
In light of all this, it seems that one is justified in disposing of both the Qur’an and also the previously mentioned Book of Mormon as divinely inspired writings. However, despite the clear failings of both of these, the Tanakh stands tall, having clearly passed the test. The Tanakh is eminently trustworthy, and even in those areas in which we do not have solid evidence pointing either way for a specific passage, one does well to grant the Tanakh the clear benefit of the doubt. It is indeed the word of God.
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #4 on Dec 21, 2005, 5:34pm »
It seems like an odd question to ask, but there are actually people out there who somehow deny the fact that there even was a Jewish teacher named Jesus from the town of Nazareth in first-century Palestine. They allege that Jesus was merely a myth made up by His followers, and that there was no Jesus who lived, preached, and died on a Roman cross during the time that the Gospels allege.
But is there evidence of His existence outside of the Gospels? Yes, there is. Other people, sometimes not even Christians, also recorded his existence. Furthermore, the time span between the life of Jesus and the writing of the New Testament was not enough for myths to spring up and replace reality, though that is an issue to be covered later.
One of the numerous references we have to Jesus outside of the New Testament is in the writings of Yosef ben Matityahu (Joseph the son of Matthias), also known as Flavius Josephus. Born in approximately 37 AD, Josephus was a rather interesting character. He was a Pharisee (Life of Flavius Josephus 2) who fought against the Romans during the First Jewish-Roman War (66-73 AD). However, during Vespasian’s invasion of Galilee and after many of his fellows had committed suicide (Jewish War 3.7.34), Josephus defected and surrendered to the Romans. Josephus ended up as a historian working for the Romans, and he prepared several valuable works of history, including Antiquities of the Jews.
In Antiquities of the Jews 18.3.3, Josephus wrote:
Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was the Christ, and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men among us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians so named from him are not extinct at this day.
It is true that this passage may contain some interpolations from a later writer, for it is unlikely that Josephus, a non-Christian Jew as far as we know, would have actually declared Jesus to be the Christ. But, even largely apart from the possible interpolations (which themselves were done quite early, if they are indeed interpolations), we still see that Josephus, a famed and reliable historian of the day, says several things about Jesus. Jesus was “a wise man”, was a “doer of wonderful works” (miracles), “drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles”, and was condemned to be crucified by Pontius Pilate at the insistence of the Jewish leaders. Incidentally, an Arabic text of this passage of Josephus is preserved in a quotation within Agapius’ Kitab al-‘Unwan. It is believed to have been uncorrupted, and it translates into this:
At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. His conduct was good and he was known to be virtuous. And many people from among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned him to be crucified and die. But those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that he had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion, and that he was alive; accordingly he was perhaps the Messiah, concerning whom the prophets have recounted wonders.
Also, in Antiquities of the Jews 20.9.1, Josephus makes a more indirect reference to Jesus via his brother James (who, says the New Testament, was converted after Jesus’s resurrection from the dead):
But the younger Ananus who, as we said, received the high priesthood, was of a bold disposition and exceptionally daring; he followed the party of the Sadducees, who are severe in judgment above all the Jews, as we have already shown. As therefore Ananus was of such a disposition, he thought he had now a good opportunity, as Festus was now dead, and Albinus was still on the road; so he assembled a council of judges, and brought before it the brother of Jesus the so-called Christ, whose name was James, together with some others, and having accused them as law-breakers, he delivered them over to be stoned.
As we can see here, Josephus calls James “the brother of Jesus the so-called Christ”, which makes several points clear. The first is that Jesus and James both existed and were brothers. The second is that Jesus was relevant enough to be named as James’s brother. The third is that Jesus was said by some to be the Messiah.
We may move on from here to yet another famed historian, Cornelius Tacitus, who is also rightly regarded as a very reliable historian of his day. Very early in the second century (around 110-116 AD), Tacitus wrote his Annals of Rome. In Annals 15.44, Tacitus wrote:
But not all the relief that could come from man, not all the bounties that the prince could bestow, nor all the atonements which could be presented to the gods, availed to relieve Nero from the infamy of being believed to have ordered the conflagration, the fire of Rome. Hence to suppress the rumor, he falsely charged with the guilt, and punished Christians, who were hated for their enormities. Christus, the founder of the name, was put to death by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea in the reign of Tiberius: but the pernicious superstition, repressed for a time broke out again, not only through Judea, where the mischief originated, but through the city of Rome also, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their center and become popular. Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind.
This is clearly not a forgery, as it is found in all our copies of the Annals and is written in Tacitus’ style. Furthermore, Tacitus was very anti-Christian, including in this passage, which makes it rather unlikely that a Christian would have written it. From this passage, we can see that “Christus” (Jesus) was the founder of Christianity and that he was “put to death by Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judea in the reign of Tiberius”. Furthermore, Tacitus refers to the “pernicious superstition”, meaning the idea that Jesus had risen from the dead.
Next, there are the writings of the second-century Greek satirist Lucian of Samosata, who possessed a very high regard for history. In The Passing of Peregrinus, Lucian made the following statements:
The Christians, as you know, worship a man to this day—that distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account….
These deluded creatures, you see, have persuaded themselves that they are immortal and will live forever, which explains the contempt of death and willing self-sacrifice so common among them. It was impressed on them too by their lawgiver that from the moment they are converted, deny the gods of Greece, worship the crucified sage, and live after his laws, they are all brothers. They take his instructions completely on faith, with the result that they despise all worldly goods and hold them in common ownership.
From this, we see that the early Christians denied the gods of Greece and, instead, were worshipers of “the crucified sage”, obviously a reference to Jesus and His crucifixion. Also, the Christians believed that they would indeed have everlasting life, were willing to be self-sacrificial, and considered themselves brethren. Noteworthy is that some, though not all, scholars believe that the “lawgiver” is a reference to the Apostle Paul.
Another reference we have to early Christianity is from Pliny the Younger, who was governor of the Roman province of Bithynia. In 106-117 AD, he wrote a letter to his friend, Emperor Trajan. In it, he said:
They affirmed, however, that the whole of their guilt, or their error, was, that they were in the habit of meeting on a certain fixed day before it was light, when they sang in alternate verse a hymn to Christ as to a god, and bound themselves to a solemn oath, not to any wicked deeds, but never to commit any fraud, theft, adultery, never to falsify their word, not to deny a trust when they should be called upon to deliver it up.
We also have part of a letter written from prison by a Syrian man named Mara Bar-Serapion to his son Serapion, in which Mara says:
What advantage did the Athenians gain from putting Socrates to death? Famine and plague came upon them as a judgment for their crime. What advantage did the men of Samos gain from burning Pythagoras? In a moment their land was covered with sand. What advantage did the Jews gain from executing their wise King? It was just after that their Kingdom was abolished. God justly avenged these three wise men: the Athenians died of hunger; the Samians were overwhelmed by the sea; the Jews, ruined and driven from their land, live in complete dispersion. But Socrates did not die for good; he lived on in the teaching of Plato. Pythagoras did not die for good; he lived on in the statue of Hera. Nor did the wise King die for good; He lived on in the teaching which He had given.
Mara Bar-Serapion was not a Christian. He put Jesus on equal footing with Socrates and Pythagoras, and he thought that Jesus lived on solely in His teachings, rather than in bodily form after the Resurrection, as Christian doctrine holds. But we may note what he does say of Jesus, that he was “the wise King” of the Jews and was executed by them before the abolition of the Jewish kingdom in 70 AD. Jesus is not here mentioned by name, but the reference is rather clear, given that He is the only truly viable candidate.
There was also a historian called Thallus who lived in the first century AD. Julius Africanus, writing in the early third century AD, cited him as having attempted to explain away the darkness during Jesus’s crucifixion as the result of an eclipse of the sun. Julius Africanus also cites Phlegon as having noted the phenomenon, although Phlegon evidently did not refer to Jesus when speaking of the darkness. Julius Africanus refuted Thallus’s position by pointing out that Jesus was crucified at a time during which there could have been no eclipse. The quote from Julius Africanus is as follows:
On the whole world there pressed a most fearful darkness; and the rocks were rent by an earthquake, and many places in Judea and other districts were thrown down. This darkness Thallus, in the third book of his History, calls, as appears to me without reason, an eclipse of the sun. For the Hebrews celebrate the Passover on the 14th day according to the moon, and the passion of our Savior falls on the day before the Passover; but an eclipse of the sun takes place only when the moon comes under the sun. And it cannot happen at any other time but in the interval between the first day of the new moon and the last of the old, that is, at their junction: how then should an eclipse be supposed to happen when the moon is almost diametrically opposite the sun? Let opinion pass however; let it carry the majority with it; and let this portent of the world be deemed an eclipse of the sun, like others a portent only to the eye. Phlegon records that, in the time of Tiberius Caesar, at full moon, there was a full eclipse of the sun from the sixth hour to the ninth—manifestly that one of which we speak. But what has an eclipse in common with an earthquake, the rending rocks, and the resurrection of the dead, and so great a perturbation throughout the universe? Surely no such event as this is recorded for a long period.
This does not even include the immense number of early references to Jesus by Christian writers, who wrote at length in reference to Jesus. It is clearly implausible to postulate, given all of this, that there was never a Jesus of Nazareth, as some have claimed.
Furthermore, anti-Christian polemics dating from the early centuries BC never shed any doubt on the fact that Jesus of Nazareth existed, although they do claim that Jesus was a sorcerer (cf. Contra Celsum 1.38) who led the people astray. Even in this, we find reference to the fact that Jesus performed unusual works, although the source of the power was disputed by these Jews. The polemics also reference Jesus’s execution.
With all of these references, it becomes clear that there was in fact a man named Jesus who lived in first-century Palestine, preached, had a gathering of followers, performed ‘wonderful works,’ was considered by some to be the Messiah, was crucified under Pontius Pilate at the urging of the Jewish leaders, and was worshiped by his followers, who believed that he had been resurrected from the dead.
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #5 on Dec 21, 2005, 5:38pm »
The next question that we may wish to ask is whether or not the New Testament is historically accurate, especially the Gospels. The first question that might be asked in ascertaining this is when the New Testament was written.
We can be certain that the New Testament was written within the first century AD. Between about 95 AD and 110 AD, 25 of the 27 books of the New Testament (excluding Jude and 2 John) were quoted by three of the early church fathers: Clement, Ignatius, and Polycarp. Clement was in Rome, and Ignatius and Polycarp were both from Smyrna, hundreds of miles away in Asia Minor. To have circulated to those places by that time, the original New Testament manuscripts must have been written significantly earlier, and it is therefore a logical conclusion that the New Testament was written by 100 AD.
Furthermore, many New Testament books would have been completed prior to 62 AD. Acts was written by Luke, a physician who traveled with the Apostle Paul. In Acts, Luke recorded things in great detail, down to local topography, weather patterns, and the names of local politicians. The Book of Acts is centered around the activities of the early church and makes mention of the martyrdoms of Stephen and James the brother of John. But Paul was executed during the reign of Nero, which ended in 68 AD, and James, the brother of Jesus and leader of the church in Jerusalem, was killed by the Sanhedrin (the Jewish legislative and judicial body that had sentenced Jesus to death) in 62 AD. Furthermore, Peter was also killed during Nero’s persecution. Luke certainly wrote Acts before these three events occurred, for such a meticulous reporter of detail would certainly have not left three such impacting events go uncovered had they happened by the time he had finished writing.
Furthermore, if Acts was completed by 62 AD, then the Gospel of Luke had to be completed before then, because both the Gospel of Luke and Acts of the Apostles are addressed to a man by the name of Theophilus (Luke 1:1-4, Acts 1:1), and Acts of the Apostles begins by reminding Theophilus that Luke had already written him a “former book” about the life of Jesus. Therefore, the Gospel of Luke had to be completed before the Book of Acts, which itself had to be written prior to 62 AD.
Also, Luke begins his gospel by stating that others had previously “undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us” (Luke 1:1). Some scholars (though not all) believe that the Gospel of Mark may have been one of these, placing its date of writing prior to the Gospel of Luke if this is the case. The early date is made exceptionally likely by the fact that John Mark, nephew of Barnabas and author of the Gospel of Mark, is reported to have been slaughtered by heathen priests at Alexandria in Egypt in the year 64 AD. The Gospel of Matthew may have also been one of these records and very likely predated the Gospel of Luke, especially given that Matthew is traditionally held to have been killed with a halberd in 60 AD at Nadabah, Ethiopia.
Even before this, other books of the New Testament already had been written, specifically the Pauline epistles. For example, scholars do not doubt that Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians was written around 55-56 AD, which is significant because in it (1 Corinthians 15:3-8), Paul writes that he “received” a testimony (likely when he visited Peter and James in Jerusalem about three years after his conversion). Furthermore, this testimony is believed by scholars to be part of an early creed of the church, thus placing the material even earlier.
Famed archaeologist Nelson Glueck declared, “We can already say emphatically that there is no longer any solid basis for dating any book of the New Testament after about A.D. 80.” Given the oral orientation of the culture in which these books were written (the majority of the people were illiterate and developed strong memories to compensate), this is remarkably early, even with the gap of a few decades between the death of Jesus and these books.
Given the early nature of these books and that the writers declared themselves repeatedly to be eyewitnesses of what had happened and were later horribly executed for what they affirmed without renouncing it when faced with brutal torture and agonizing death, we have every reason to accept them as historically accurate, especially when taking into consideration that the New Testament accounts have never been proven inaccurate by archaeological findings. Rather, archaeology has confirmed it in even minute details, and it is nothing but pure bias to reject the New Testament as being historically accurate, especially with the inclusion of such important and powerful figures as Caesar Augustus (Luke 2:1), Tiberius Caesar (Luke 3:1), Gamaliel the Elder (Acts 5:34, 22:3), and Pontius Pilate (Matthew 27:2), some of whom could have certainly declared their inclusion to be false.
Furthermore, it cannot be stressed enough that the disciples were willing to die for their beliefs. While it can be protested that the same is true of martyrs of other faiths, the difference is in the nature of the beliefs. The disciples died for their belief in a historical event to which they claimed to have been witnesses.
Also, in writing the New Testament, it must be noted that the disciples included details that reflected rather unflatteringly upon themselves. They fail to understand what Jesus is saying, they fall asleep on Him during His hour of greatest need, they are rebuked, they are cowards, and they are doubters—hardly the sorts of facts they would have been likely to manufacture if they were simply telling tales and wished to be held in high esteem by the followers of their fabricated new religion. Also, they include difficult and demanding sayings of Jesus, which they would have been unlikely to manufacture. Furthermore, if they had simply been making up stories, they would have been likely to resolve the many disputes within the early Christian church simply by fabricating quotes from Jesus to end all debate. But this is something they did not do.
In addition, other facts included would have been unlikely to be included, such as the discovery of the empty tomb by women. Women were not even considered reliable enough to give court testimony in those days. It was not much better for the likes of most of the disciples, either, since they were considered “people of the land” who were considered by most to lack trustworthiness. The burial of Jesus by Joseph of Arimathea would also be an unlikely fabrication. Joseph of Arimathea was a member of the hated Sanhedrin that had condemned Jesus to death. The early Christian church would likely have had very unfavorable attitudes toward the Sanhedrin for what they did to Jesus, and therefore the church would not have been likely to invent a man on the Sanhedrin who showed Jesus greater respect than even the disciples by taking His body to be buried. Not only that, but had this been a fabrication, the authorities could have easily demonstrated the obvious lie. The conversion of priests recorded in Acts 6:7 is also a story that would have easily been subject to testing. Later, in Acts 15:5, it even makes perfectly clear that some of the Pharisees had been converted! Had this not been so, the Pharisees would have been more than happy to point out the obvious error in factuality contained within the document.
It is important to keep in mind that, unlike today’s society, people would certainly have checked into the story as much as possible. In contrast to modern society, in which privacy is valued, the ancient world had a group-oriented social structure that ensured the careful monitoring of Jesus and his band of disciples. Nothing escaped notice, and it is clear that the facts as recorded in the New Testament would have been investigated. In fact, the New Testament authors encouraged people to investigate the facts (e.g., 1 Thessalonians 5:21), hardly the move of a group with much to hide!
Another point in favor of historical accuracy is the improbability of someone inventing a religion centered on the adoration of a man crucified as a criminal by the despised Romans. Crucifixion was regarded as a horrid way to die. Josephus called it “a most miserable death” (Jewish War 7.6.4), and the anti-Christian writer Celsus was quoted as saying that Jesus was “bound in the most ignominious fashion” and “executed in a shameful way”. Even more so, the notion of a being due the highest sort of honor, as Christians say of Jesus, descending to earth to suffer and die in such a fashion would have been considered an absolute absurdity to the Romans and to anyone else.
Furthermore, the earliest manuscripts discovered are overwhelmingly closer to the events recalled therein than any other manuscript of antiquity is to its subject. The New Testament in its entirety dates to a time within two generations of the events recorded, which is before the minimum time that scholars indicate that legend can displace history, meaning that it is extremely likely that, had there been errors in the New Testament records, they would have been pointed out, especially given the powerful motives that the Jews and others would have had to do so. To reject the Gospels as being at least historically accurate is no more logical than rejecting every single other historical record of the time and denouncing history as a fraud (which, alas, some people are willing to do). To regard the New Testament as being historically accurate is by no means a leap of blind faith, but a rational decision to accept history as history.
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #6 on Dec 21, 2005, 5:45pm »
Long ago, the Jewish people were promised by God that the Messiah would one day come. The word ‘messiah’ a Hebrew term meaning ‘anointed one.’ In the Greek, this word is ‘Christos,’ from which we get ‘Christ.’ It thus becomes quite clear that claims were made that Jesus was indeed the Christ, the Messiah.
After all, in John 11:27, Martha of Bethany declared to Jesus, “Yes Lord, I believe that You are the Christ, the Son of God, who was to come into the world,” and in Matthew 16:16, after Jesus asked the disciples who they thought He was, Peter responded, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Furthermore, numerous times throughout the entire New Testament, including the early Pauline Epistles, Jesus is called Christ. So it is very clear that the disciples thought that Jesus was the Messiah.
But did Jesus regard Himself as the Messiah? One need only to look to Matthew 16:17 to find His response to Peter’s declaration that He was the Messiah. Jesus said, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.”
The skeptic might ask “Why didn’t Jesus just come out and tell everyone, ‘Hey, I’m the Messiah!’?” It is important to understand that, at the time, the term ‘Messiah’ was a term loaded with misconceptions by the Jewish people. They believed that the Messiah would come as a mighty political leader to overthrow the hated Romans and establish an earthly kingdom, since the Messiah was to be the King of the Jews.
So Jesus did not describe Himself to the masses as the Messiah—at least, not often. He called Himself “the Son of Man” more frequently, which is a reference to a prophetic passage found in Daniel 7:13, which talks about the Son of Man (bar enash, denoting the heir of royalty, as opposed to bar ‘adam, which is used elsewhere to denote ordinary mortals) who would come upon the clouds of heaven, go before the Ancient of Days, be given an everlasting kingdom, and have all the peoples of the earth serve Him. And in Mark 14:61-62, during the trial of Jesus, after Jesus was placed under oath by the high priest and asked directly if He was the “Christ, the Son of the Blessed,” to which Jesus responded, “I am. And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.”
Furthermore, when Jesus was speaking with the Samaritan woman at the well in Sychar, she said that when the Messiah comes, He would “tell us all things,” to which Jesus replied, “I who speak to you am He” (John 4:25-26). It doesn’t get much clearer than that!
Now the skeptic may say, “Fine, so perhaps Jesus did claim to be the Messiah, but so what? I could claim to be the Messiah, too! I could even claim to be a lemon, but that doesn’t make me one (at least, I don’t think it does). So how do I know that Jesus really was the Messiah?” That’s a good question, and to find out the answer we must look at the messianic prophecies within the Old Testament.
A word of caution is in order before beginning. The Messiah was perceived as both the ultimate fulfillment of Israel and the ultimate fulfillment of the Davidic dynasty. Thus, statements that in context appear to be about Israel or a king may actually find their ultimate fulfillment in the Messiah. This is in keeping with the typological nature of early Jewish thought, and should be kept in mind. To a modern mind, some of the connections can seem utterly non-prophetic, yet they are applied nonetheless.
One important messianic prophecy can be found in Micah 5:2, addressing where the Messiah (“the One who is to be Ruler in Israel, whose goings forth are from old, from eternity”) was to be born. Where does Micah 5:2 indicate? Bethlehem. Where was Jesus born? Bethlehem (Matthew 2:1).
Next, there is the lineage. Not only was the Messiah required to be an Israelite, and furthermore be of the tribe of Judah (Genesis 49:9-10), but also a descendant of David (Jeremiah 23:5). Also, throughout the Talmud, the Messiah is frequently referred to as “Son of David”. As can be seen in the genealogies found in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, both Joseph and Mary were descendants of King David, fulfilling yet another messianic prophecy. Luke is no doubt recording the biological lineage of Mary rather than Joseph. If Mary’s father Heli had not had any sons, Joseph would have legally been reckoned as his son from a legal standpoint, although Joseph’s biological father was a man by the name of Jacob (Matthew 1:16). Likewise, Jesus would have been legally counted as a son of Joseph, even though Joseph did not impart any genetic material to Jesus.
The skeptic might say, “Fine, that’s two, big deal! Lots of people were probably descended from King David and born in Bethlehem!” However, these are not the only prophecies, so our skeptic may wish to exercise a bit of patience.
Furthermore, the Messiah would be called the Son of God (Psalm 2:7). All throughout the New Testament, Jesus is referred to as the Son of God. It was also prophesied that the Messiah was to be called Lord (Psalm 110:1, Jeremiah 23:6), and Jesus applies the prophecy of Psalm 110:1 directly to Himself in Matthew 22:43-45.
In Deuteronomy 18:18, it is declared that a great Prophet was to arise out of Israel, and both Rabbi Levi ben Gershon and the famed Jewish scholar Moses Maimonides (Moses ben Maimon) were not at all hesitant to identify this Prophet as the Messiah, although Maimonides was mistaken in stating that the Prophet would not be as great as Moses. Jesus was declared to be a prophet (Matthew 21:11). Also, the Messiah was to be “a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek” (Psalm 110:4), and the New Testament was never hesitant in applying this prophecy directly to Jesus (Hebrews 5:5-6). Furthermore, the Messiah was to be the King (Psalm 2:6, Jeremiah 23:5), and Jesus was declared to be King of the Jews (Matthew 27:37).
Also, the Messiah was to be preceded by a messenger, who was described as “a voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God’” (Isaiah 40:3). This was fulfilled in John the Baptist, who preached in the wilderness (Matthew 3:1-2). John the Baptist directly identified himself as the fulfillment of this prophecy (John 1:23), and it was he who preceded Jesus and pointed people to Him.
Also, the ministry of the Messiah was to begin in Galilee (Isaiah 9:1), which is where Jesus began His ministry (Matthew 4:12-17). It was also prophesied that the ministry of the Messiah would include many miracles of healing (Isaiah 35:5-6), and all throughout the Gospels it is shown that Jesus repeatedly healed many kinds of ailments. In fact, even anti-Christian sources admitted that Jesus worked wonders, although they disagreed with Christians about the source of His power.
Furthermore, the Messiah was to speak in parables (Psalm 78:2), and Jesus certainly taught in parables (Matthew 13:34). The Messiah was also to come to His temple (Malachi 3:1), which Jesus did (Matthew 21:12).
In the final few weeks of His life here on earth, Jesus fulfilled even more prophecies! The Messiah was to be the King who rode into Jerusalem on a donkey colt (Zechariah 9:9), which Jesus did (Luke 19:35-37). It was prophesied through David’s Psalms that “even my familiar friend in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted up his heel against me” (Psalm 41:9), and, as happens numerous times in the Old Testament, while certain statements may have had an immediate application, they would also have a prophetic one. David’s Psalms have much of this. This particular prophecy was fulfilled for the Messiah when Judas Iscariot, who ate of the bread that Jesus broke at the Last Supper, betrayed Him (Matthew 10:4). Furthermore, there is also a prophetic application of Zechariah 11:12-13, which refers to thirty pieces of silver being weighed out and thrown into the house of the LORD for the potter. For his betrayal of Jesus, Judas received thirty pieces of silver (Matthew 26:15), which he later threw into the temple (Matthew 27:5), after which the priests used the money to buy a potter’s field (Matthew 27:7).
According to Zechariah 13:7, when the Messiah (“the Shepherd”) was struck, the “sheep” would be scattered. Jesus applied this to Himself (Matthew 26:31), and indeed the disciples (the “sheep”) did scatter at His arrest. The Messiah was to be silent before His oppressors (Isaiah 53:7), and indeed Jesus refused to answer His accusers (Matthew 27:12). The Messiah would be spat upon (Isaiah 50:6), mocked (Psalm 22:7-8), and wounded (Isaiah 53:5), an apt prophetic description of the torment Jesus endured at the hands of the Roman soldiers (Matthew 26:67-68, Mark 14:65, Luke 22:63-65, John 19:1-3).
The Messiah’s hands and feet would be pierced (Psalm 22:16), which Jesus’s were. He would make “intercession for the transgressors” (Isaiah 53:12), which Jesus did (Luke 23:34). The Messiah would be “hated without a cause” by many (Psalm 69:4), and Jesus applied this to Himself (John 15:25). The Messiah would be able to count all of His bones as people stared at Him (Psalm 22:14,17). Indeed, crucifixion tended to wrench bones out of joint, and “the people stood looking on” (Luke 23:35).
The Messiah’s garments would be parted and lots would be cast for them (Psalm 22:18), which is what happened to Jesus’s garments at the cross (John 19:23-24). People would shake their heads when they looked upon the Messiah (Psalm 109:25, Psalm 22:7), as they did when Jesus was on the cross (Matthew 27:39). The Messiah would thirst and hunger and be given vinegar and gall (Psalm 69:21), which is what happened to Jesus (John 19:28, Matthew 27:34).
Furthermore, “in that day” God would darken the earth in broad daylight (Amos 8:9), which is what happened during the crucifixion of Jesus (Matthew 27:45). On the cross, Jesus quoted the first line of Psalm 22 (Matthew 27:46), a known messianic psalm, and by doing so he brought the attention of His Jewish listeners to the contents of that psalm. Then, the Messiah would commit His spirit into the hands of God (Psalm 31:5), which Jesus did (Luke 23:46). The Messiah would die, being “numbered with the transgressors” (Isaiah 53:12), as Jesus did when He was crucified between two criminals (Matthew 27:38).
The Messiah’s bones would not be broken (Psalm 34:20), and because Jesus was already dead, the Roman soldiers refrained from breaking His legs (John 19:33). The Messiah’s heart would be broken in a rather literal sense (Psalm 22:14), and when Jesus’s side was pierced (itself a fulfillment of the piercing prophecy of Zechariah 12:10), blood and water flowed (John 19:34), which is a sign that Jesus’s heart had ruptured while on the cross. Finally, at His death the Messiah’s grave would be made with the rich (Isaiah 53:9), which is what happened when the wealthy Joseph of Arimathea took the body of Jesus to bury in his tomb.
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Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #7 on Feb 4, 2006, 3:51pm »
Isaiah 52:13-53:12 is known to be a very large and important Messianic prophecy. It reads as follows:
Behold, My Servant shall deal prudently; He shall be exalted and extolled and be very high. Just as many were astonished at you, so His visage was marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men; so shall He sprinkle many nations. Kings shall shut their mouths at Him, for what had not been told them they shall see, and what they had not heard they shall consider. Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness, and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. He is despised and rejected by men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely He has borne our sicknesses and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions; He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. We all like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth. He was taken from prison and from judgment, and who will declare His generation? For He was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgressions of My people He was stricken. And they made His grave with the wicked-But with the rich at His death, because He had done no violence, nor was any deceit in His mouth. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When you make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand. He shall see the labor of His soul, and be satisfied. By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, for He shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide Him a portion with the great, and He shall divide the spoil with the strong, because He poured out His soul unto death, and He was numbered with the transgressors, and He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
The early Christian church father and apologist Origen, in Contra Celsum 1.55, applied this to Christ. However, after Christians pointed out to the rabbis that Isaiah 53 applies to Jesus, the rabbis (beginning with Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki, also known as Rashi, in the eleventh century) began to interpret it as allegorical of the nation of Israel. This is a flawed interpretation, although it was also used much earlier than Rashi by an unnamed Jewish opponent of Origen, as Origen stated in Contra Celsum 1.55. Rabbi Jonathan ben Uzziel, the author of the Targum Jonathan and the most distinguished pupil of the famed Hillel, stated that the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53 is the Messiah:
Behold, my servant the Messiah shall prosper; he shall be high, and increase, and be exceeding strong: as the house of Israel looked to him through many days, because their countenance was darkened among the peopled, and their complexion beyond the sons of men.
The Babylonian Talmud, in Tractate Sanhedrin 98, records the following:
R. Giddel said in the name of Rabh: The years of abundance in the time of the Messiah, will benefit Israel. Said R. Joseph: Is this not self-evident? Who else then should have benefit from them, Hilek and Bilek? This was said by him in order to deny R. Hillel's theory, who said farther on, that Israel has no more to wait for a Messiah, as they have consumed him already at the time of Hezekiah. Said Rabh: The world is created only for such men as David. And Samuel said: For such men as Moses. And R. Johanan said: For such men as the Messiah. But what is his name? The disciples of R. Shilah said: Shilah is his name, as it reads [Gen. xlix. 10]: "Until Shilah will come." The disciples of R. Janai said Jinun is his name, as it reads [Ps. lxxii. 17]: "In the presence of the sun, Jinun is his name." And the disciples of R. Hanina said: Hanina is his name, as [Jer. xvi. 13]: "So that I will not grant you Hanina." (Favor.) According to others, Menachem b. Hiskia is his name as in [Sam. i. 16]: "For from me in Menachem (comforter) that should refresh my soul." And the rabbis said: The sufferer of the house of Rabbi is his name, as [Is. liii. 4]: "But only our diseases did he bear himself, and our pains he carried: while we indeed esteemed him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted." Said R. Na'hman: If Messiah is among the living he is a man like myself, of whom it reads [Jer. xxx. 21]: "And their leader shall be of themselves, and their ruler shall proceed from the midst of them." Said Rabh: If he is among the living it is our holy rabbi, and if he was from the death it was Daniel. Said R. Jehudah in the name of Rabh: In the future the Holy One, blessed be He, will create for them another David, as it reads [ibid., ibid. 9]: "And David their king, whom I will raise up unto them." It does not read "I raised," but "I will raise." Said R. Papa to Abayi, Does it not read [Ezek. xxxvii. 25]: "David my servant shall be prince unto them forever"? As it is now a Cæsar and a half Cæsar.
The Mishnah Rabbah and the Midrash Tanhuma agree with a messianic view of Isaiah 53. The commentary in the Midrash Rabbah on Ruth 2:14, Ruth Rabbah 5:56, made this note:
He is speaking of King Messiah: "Come hither" draw near to the throne "and dip thy morsel in the vinegar," this refers to the chastisements, as it is said, "But he was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities."
The Midrash Tanhuma also supports a messianic interpretation. At the end of parasha Toldot, the following can be found:
"Who art thou, O great mountain?" (Zechariah 4:7) This refers to the King Messiah. And why does he call him the "great mountain?" Because he is greater than the patriarchs, as it is said, "My servant shall be high, and lifted up, and lofty exceedingly." He will be higher than Abraham who said, "I raise high my hand unto the Lord" (Gen. 14:22), lifted up above Moses, to whom it is said, "Lift it up into thy bosom" (Numbers 11:12), loftier than the ministering angels, of whom it is written, "Their wheels were lofty and terrible" (Ezekiel 1:18). And out of whom does he come forth? Out of David.
The ninth-century Jewish religious poet Eliezer HaKalir composed a hymn to be added to the Day of Atonement prayers. In this hymn, there is a passage that reads:
Our righteous Messiah has departed from us; we are horror-stricken, and there is none to justify us. Our iniquities and the yoke of our transgressions he carries, and is wounded for our transgressions. He hears on his shoulder our sins to find pardon for our iniquities may we be healed by his stripes!
Even the famed twelfth-century Rabbi Moses ben Maimon wrote the following in a letter to the Jewish community in Yemen that has become known as the Igeret Teiman (or as al-Risala al-Yamaniyya in Arabic):
And Isaiah speaks similarly of the time when he [the Messiah] will appear, without his father or mother of family being known, He came up as a sucker before him, and as a root out of the dry earth, etc. But the unique phenomenon attending his manifestation is, that all the kings of the earth will be thrown into terror at the fame of him -- their kingdoms will be in consternation, and they themselves will be devising whether to oppose him with arms, or to adopt some different course, confessing, in fact, their inability to contend with him or ignore his presence, and so confounded at the wonders which they will see him work, that they will lay their hands upon their mouth; in the words of Isaiah, when describing the manner in which the kings will hearken to him, At him kings will shut their mouth; for that which had not been told them have they seen, and that which they had not heard they have perceived.
The fourteenth-century Rabbi Shlomo Astruc said:
My servant shall prosper, or be truly intelligent, because by intelligence man is really man -- it is intelligence which makes a man what he is. And the prophet calls the King Messiah my servant, speaking as one who sent him. Or he may call the whole people my servant, as he says above my people (lii. 6): when he speaks of the people, the King Messiah is included in it; and when he speaks of the King Messiah, the people is comprehended with him. What he says then is, that my servant the King Messiah will prosper.
The sixteenth-century Rabbi Moshe Alsheikh of Sefad said the following:
I may remark, then, that our Rabbis of blessed memory with one voice accept and affirm the opinion that the prophet [Isaiah] is speaking of the King Messiah.
Another sixteenth-century figure, Rabbi Elijah de Vidas, had this to say:
Since the Messiah bears our iniquities which produce the effect of His being bruised, it follows that whoso will not admit that the Messiah thus suffers for our iniquities, must endure and suffer for them himself.
Finally, in 1818, Jewish educator Herz Homberg wrote a commentary that included the following statement:
According to the opinion of Rashi and Ibn Ezra, it relates to Israel at the end of their captivity. But if so, what can be the meaning of the passage, "He was wounded for our transgressions"? Who was wounded? Who are the transgressors? Who carried out the sickness and bare the pain? The fact is that it refers to the King Messiah.
The fact is that many details of the prophecy simply do not fit with Rashi’s interpretation. The Jewish people were not “cut off from the land of the living” as was the Suffering Servant, nor was Israel the innocent sufferer for the transgressions of “my people” (the Jews). Furthermore, the singular pronoun is used throughout. This passage refers to one specific individual, and that individual is the Messiah.
Yet this is not the only Servant Song (as they are called) in the Book of Isaiah that refers to the Messiah. There is also a very clear reference in Isaiah 49:1-6, in which the Messiah is the speaker and frequently quotes what God has said to Him. The passage reads as follows:
Listen, O coastlands, to Me, and take heed, you peoples from afar! The Lord has called Me from the womb; from the matrix of My mother, He has made mention of My name. And He has made My mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of His hand, He has hidden Me and made Me a polished shaft; in His quiver, He has hidden Me. And He said to Me, “You are My servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified.” Then I said, “I have labored in vain, I have spent My strength for nothing and in vain. Yet surely my just reward is with the Lord, and My work with My God.” And now the Lord says, who formed Me from the womb to be His servant, to bring Jacob back to Him, so that Israel is gathered to Him (for I shall be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and My God shall be My strength), indeed He says, “It is too small a thing that You should be My servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also give You as a light unto the Gentiles, that You should be My salvation to the ends of the earth.”
“Aha!” may be the cry of some as they note that the Servant is here addressed as “Israel”. But with a bit more thinking, one can perceive that the Messiah was typologically referred to as “Israel”, being the perfect representative of Israel and the fulfillment of Israel. It is this typological thought that allowed Matthew to quote the second half of Hosea 11:1, referring to Israel, in Matthew 2:15 in reference to the Messiah. Furthermore, the passage clearly identifies the Servant as other than the nation of Israel. The Servant is gathering Israel back to the Lord, which the Servant cannot do if the Servant is the nation of Israel. This passage is about the Messiah, who will not only gather Israel to God, but also the Gentile nations as well, and the Messiah will be God’s salvation all across the land. Truly this can only apply to Jesus.
Another beautiful messianic passage is Psalm 22, which reads as follows:
My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? Why are You so far from helping Me, and from the words of My groaning? O My God, I cry in the daytime, but You do not hear; and in the night season, and am not silent. But You are holy, enthroned in the praises of Israel. Our fathers trusted in You; they trusted, and You delivered them. They cried to You, and were delivered; they trusted in You, and were not ashamed. But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and despised by the people. All those who see Me ridicule Me; they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, "He trusted in the Lord, let Him rescue Him; let Him deliver Him, since He delights in Him!" But You are He who took Me out of the womb; You made Me trust while on My mother's breasts. I was cast upon You from birth. From My mother's womb You have been My God. Be not far from Me, for trouble is near; for there is none to help. Many bulls have surrounded Me; strong bulls of Bashan have encircled Me. They gape at Me with their mouths, like a raging and roaring lion. I am poured out like water, and all My bones are out of joint; My heart is like wax; it has melted within Me. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and My tongue clings to My jaws; You have brought Me to the dust of death. For dogs have surrounded Me; the congregation of the wicked has enclosed Me. They pierced My hands and My feet; I can count all My bones. They look and stare at Me. They divide My garments among them, and for My clothing they cast lots. But You, O Lord, do not be far from Me; O My Strength, hasten to help Me! Deliver Me from the sword, My precious life from the power of the dog. Save Me from the lion's mouth and from the horns of the wild oxen! You have answered Me. I will declare Your name to My brethren; in the midst of the assembly I will praise You. You who fear the Lord, praise Him! All you descendants of Jacob, glorify Him, and fear Him, all you offspring of Israel! For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; nor has He hidden His face from Him; but when He cried to Him, He heard. My praise shall be of You in the great assembly; I will pay My vows before those who fear Him. The poor shall eat and be satisfied; those who seek Him will praise the Lord. Let your heart live forever! All the ends of the world shall remember and turn to the Lord, and all the families of the nations shall worship before You. For the kingdom is the Lord's, and He rules over the nations. All the prosperous of the earth shall eat and worship; all those who go down to the dust shall bow before Him, even he who cannot keep himself alive. Posterity shall serve Him. It will be recounted of the Lord to the next generation. They will come and declare His righteousness to a people who will be born, that He has done this.
Jesus applied this psalm to Himself when He was on the cross by quoting the very first line, as has been previously noted. The relevance of this psalm to Jesus is quite clear. Jesus died surrounded by foes who mocked Him. His bones were wrenched out of place, as would have occurred in crucifixion. The Roman soldiers gambled for His garments, and His hands and feet were pierced. Some might object here that the word found in Psalm 22:16 (Psalm 22:17 in Jewish translations) is ka’ari, which translates to “like a lion” rather than a reference to being pierced. However, the Dead Sea Scrolls contain a Psalm scroll designated 5/6HevPs that contains the manuscript variant ka’aru, as do some Masoretic manuscripts. Likewise, the Septuagint translated the word with the Greek verb oruxan, and the Peshitta translated it as baz’u. All of these things point to piercing in the passage in question, thus undermining the basis for the objection. Finally, it is worth noting that using the “like the lion” translation results in an incoherent passage to which additional words must be added in order to produce a vaguely sensible sentence structure.
A common objection to Jesus being the Messiah is that He never fulfilled any of the prophecies about reigning forever and instituting peace in all the land. But this objection clearly misses the mark. Looking at all the prophecies together, a more varied picture arises. Some paint a picture of the Messiah as a victorious king whose reign lasts forever. Others show the Messiah rejected, suffering, and even dying. This is no doubt why some Jewish groups have speculated that there would be two messiahs, rather than one. However, why could both roles not apply to one Messiah, who came to suffer and die, yet will later return to fulfill the remainder of the prophecies concerning Him? Surely this is at least as sensible, if not more so, than either the “two-messiah” theory or the idea that the role of the Messiah would be determined by Israel’s worthiness and that only one of the roles would ever be fulfilled, the other being abandoned.
It seems quite clear that, with the fulfillment of all these prophecies, Jesus of Nazareth was in fact the Messiah. But there is another messianic prophecy, one found in Psalm 16:10. It is applied to Jesus in Acts 2:31. And what Psalm 16:10 says is, “For You will not leave My soul in Sheol [the grave/the place of the dead]; nor will you allow Your Holy One to see corruption [decay].” The Messiah would indeed be killed. But He would not stay that way for very long.
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Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #8 on Feb 4, 2006, 3:58pm »
The central tenet of the Christian message is that Jesus of Nazareth, having been crucified on Golgotha and buried in a tomb by Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, later rose from the dead and appeared to His disciples. Indeed, as Paul put it in 1 Corinthians 15:14, “And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.” This, then, is a very vital issue for Christianity.
Indeed, Jesus prophesied that He would be vacating the tomb shortly after His arrival there. Matthew 16:21 says, “From that time Jesus Christ began to show His disciples that he must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised the third day.” Jesus also commanded, “Tell the vision to no one until the Son of Man is risen from the dead” (Matthew 17:9). He declared, “The Son of Man is about to be betrayed into the hands of men, and they will kill Him, and the third day He will be raised up” (Matthew 17:22-23). He said, “But after I have been raised, I will go before you to Galilee” (Matthew 26:32). And John 2:18-22 makes it clear when it reports:
The Jews answered and said to Him, “What sign do You show to us, since You do these things?” Jesus answered and said to them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” Then the Jews said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will You raise it up in three days?” But He was speaking of the temple of His body. Therefore, when He had risen from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this to them; and they believed the Scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.
Let us consider the fact of the empty tomb. No one at that time and place would have dared to make the case that the tomb was not empty, because that could easily be checked. They certainly would have claimed that the tomb was not empty if they could have done so. In this sort of group-oriented social structure, privacy was virtually nil, and people tended to check into each other’s business—make no mistake, the question of whether or not the tomb was empty would most definitely have been checked, especially by those seeking to crush the newborn Christian movement—and don’t forget that the writers of the New Testament actually encouraged people to check out the facts for themselves. They did not make claims that the tomb still contained the body of Jesus, and that affirms the fact that the tomb was indeed empty. Otherwise, when the disciples began to preach about Jesus having risen from the dead, the Pharisees, eager to crush what they believed to be an utterly outrageous heresy, could have easily gone to the tomb, gotten the body of Jesus, and pulled it through the streets of Jerusalem, shouting that Christ was not risen and that here was the proof. The movement would have ended, and the movement would not have gained hundreds of new followers in such a short period of time. However, history tells a different story, one that involves mass conversions, even among the priests and Pharisees themselves! If the tomb was not empty, then there would have been no need for the outrageous excuses used by those who chose not to believe.
The first major excuse is even recorded in the New Testament itself. The Pharisees had been concerned that the disciples would steal the body of Jesus from the tomb and then claim that He had risen, which is why they came to Pilate after the crucifixion and said, “Sir, we remember, while He was still alive, how that deceiver said, ‘After three days I will rise.’ Therefore command that the tomb be made secure until the third day, lest His disciples come by night and steal Him away, and say to the people, ‘He has risen from the dead.’ So the last deception will be worse than the first” (Matthew 27:63-64).
When the tomb was really found empty despite the guards, this is the first thing that the priests claimed. When the guards came to them to tell them what happened, the priests handed them a large sum of money and said, “Tell them, ‘His disciples came at night and stole Him away while we slept.’ And if this comes to the governor’s ears, we will appease him and make you secure” (Matthew 28:13-14). And, just as Matthew says in the next verse, “this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.”
However, there are quite a few problems with this claim. The first is that it is extremely unlikely that these guards would have all fallen asleep, considering that falling asleep on duty was a capital offense. Various indicators, such as the use of the term koustodia (Latin custodia) and the fact that they were responsible to Pilate, indicate that these were Roman soldiers rather than the Temple police. Also, if the guards really were all asleep, they could not possibly have known what had happened during that time. Furthermore, if the disciples had taken the body from the tomb and knew that the Resurrection was a blatant lie, they would never have consented to be tortured and murdered for proclaiming it. Somewhere along the way, one of them would have certainly recanted under the pressure, especially given the way they fled at Jesus’s arrest and became so fearful. Also, this rationalization does not solve a few other problems, such as the post-Resurrection appearances of Jesus and the conversion of Saul of Tarsus (later the Apostle Paul).
Another theory proposed by some skeptics is the outrageous view that Jesus survived His crucifixion and merely was revived in the tomb. There are a couple problems with that view, one of which being that crucifixion, especially in the case of the crucifixion of Jesus, is simply not a procedure that one tends to live through! Anyone who has seen The Passion of the Christ will have a grasp of how brutal the experience was (and the movie really toned it down a lot). In the Garden of Gethsemane, Luke records that the sweat of Jesus “became like great drops of blood falling to the ground” (Luke 22:44). As a physician (Colossians 4:14), Luke may have been more interested in this extremely rare condition than the other Gospel writers, who did not mention it. This condition, called hematidrosis, is caused by severe stress, and the capillaries near the sweat glands burst open, allowing trace amounts of blood to mix in with the sweat, turning the sweat reddish with blood. This would have weakened His skin for the coming beatings.
After being taken to the high priest’s house for His night trial, Jesus was blindfolded, mocked, and hit repeatedly in the face by His captors. Later, after Jesus was taken to Pilate, who sent Him to Herod, who sent Him back to Pilate, Jesus was sent to be scourged, a thoroughly painful experience from which many prisoners died. His back would have been lacerated over and over again by the cruel whip, in which were likely embedded shards of bone and perhaps metal balls as well. The flesh of His back would have been shredded and torn. Then, in their cruelty, the Roman soldiers made a crown of thorns (likely the largest thorns they could find—and Jerusalem thorns are known to grow up to two or three inches long) and pressed it down into His scalp, cutting into Him. They also placed a purple robe upon His bloodied flesh. The robe was later ripped away, which would have probably reopened the many bleeding wounds.
Pilate then presented Him to the Jews assembled at the Praetorium, who demanded His crucifixion, which Pilate reluctantly granted. Jesus was forced to carry His cross (most likely simply the crossbeam, called the patibulum) to Golgotha, where he was to be crucified. In His weakened condition—Jesus was likely in hypovolemic shock at this point—He required assistance, and so Simon of Cyrene was forced by the soldiers to help Jesus carry the cross (Mark 15:21).
When Jesus arrived at Golgotha, he was nailed to the cross in a traditional manner, with one nail being hammered in above each of His wrists and another through His ankles, which were twisted so as to get both with a single nail. In the language of the time, the wrist area was likely considered to be part of the “hand”—the nails hammered through there would have crushed or pierced the sensorimotor median nerve, causing extreme pain. Alternately, the nails could have penetrated the palms while the wrists were bound to the cross by rope. Another proposal is that the nails were inserted at such an angle as to pierce through the palm and emerge through the back of the wrist.
Here begins the agonizing process of Roman crucifixion, in which the position not only wrenches bones out of joint, but also restricts the pectoral muscles and inhibits breathing. To breathe properly, the crucified person must push up on his pierced feet. Eventually, after he loses the strength to push up any longer, the lungs typically fill with fluid, causing a long and painful suffocation as the person is besieged by cramps, waves of pain, and further laceration of the back as it rubs up and down against the rough wood of the cross. Also, the position would likely have restricted blood flow as well.
Furthermore, the Gospels say that Jesus died and that the other two criminals had their legs broken in the crurifragium, designed to make the victims die more rapidly by taking away their ability to push up in order to breathe. After this event, the centurion thrust a spear up between Jesus’s ribs and into His heart, causing blood and water to flow, which indicates that Jesus was already dead of a ruptured heart—although if He had somehow not been, a spear to the heart would have finished Him off. In addition, the soldiers believed that He was dead, and they were killers by profession. They knew death when they saw it, and the punishment for permitting a victim to come down from the cross alive by mistake was to be executed—not a risk a Roman soldier was willing to take.
One who wishes to believe that Jesus survived His crucifixion ordeal must not only go against the massive medical evidence that indicates that He did, in fact, die on the cross, but also must claim that somehow, after three days in a tomb after suffering those wounds, He rolled away a very heavy stone, got past the guards, and appeared to His disciples in order to convince them that He had risen from the dead and triumphed over the grave. But even supposing that He had survived the massive wounds, His battered and disfigured body would have compelled the disciples to fetch a doctor, not to regard Him as the resurrected and triumphant Lord of all! This proposal simply does not work.
It is clear, then, that Jesus died on the cross and that He was buried in a tomb. This is a fact that even anti-Christian polemics had acknowledged, although they claimed that the disciples had come during the night to steal away the body—a claim already dealt with. Furthermore, the tomb was later empty, and the priests were at a loss to explain what had happened.
“Wait,” the skeptic protests, “couldn’t someone else have stolen the body from the tomb without the knowledge of the disciples or the priests?” Another good question from our skeptic. However, if someone else had stolen the body (somehow getting past the guards, another unlikely feat), this does not explain the post-Resurrection appearances of Jesus. The New Testament reports that Jesus appeared and that “He was seen by Cephas [Peter], then by the twelve. After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep. After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles. Then last of all He was seen by me [Paul] also, as by one abnormally born” (1 Corinthians 15:5-8). If someone else had stolen the body of Christ from the tomb, then by what means did these appearances happen?
One proposed theory is that they were all hallucinations, happening in the fertile imaginations of a superstitious and easily deceived populace. This overlooks several factors, however, one of which is that hallucinations are, by nature, individual experiences, and several of these described appearances were group experiences. Another factor is that many of the people were not in the right state of mind to experience a hallucination. Thomas is remembered for his doubt, expressed in his statement that “unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe” (John 20:25). He did not fit the psychological profile of one prone to hallucinations. Neither did James, the brother of Jesus who did not believe until Jesus appeared to him after the Resurrection. Furthermore, Saul of Tarsus was an even less likely candidate to hallucinate the appearance of Jesus that he did. Saul was a hard-headed, intellectual Pharisee who hated what he viewed as a heresy centered on a false messiah accursed of God. He was bent on the destruction of Christianity and was willing to persecute the church and have Christians beaten and arrested to achieve his goal. He even threatened to kill them (and perhaps did, in some instances). He was not a prime candidate for a hallucination, let alone a spontaneous conversion to become the leading proponent of the movement that he had previously been persecuting. Yet he did in fact become converted, and the explanation he gave was that he actually saw the risen Jesus. This was no hallucination. Furthermore, hallucinations cannot explain the empty tomb.
Let us now examine the common Muslim manner of rationalizing away the Resurrection. They claim that it was not, in fact, Jesus who died on the cross, but rather someone whom God had rendered to look like Jesus. They draw largely on two sources for this claim. One is an-Nisa’ 4:157-159 in the Qur’an, which reads:
That they [the Jews] said (in boast), “We killed the Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah.” But they killed him not, nor crucified him, but so it was made to appear to them, and those who differ therein are full of doubts, with no (certain) knowledge, but only conjecture to follow, for of a surety they killed him not. Nay, Allah raised him up unto Himself; and Allah is Exalted in Power, Wise; and there is none of the People of the Book but must believe in him before his death; and on the Day of Judgment he will be a witness against them.
The other primary source for this claim is the fraudulent Gospel of Barnabas, which ironically blatantly contradicts the Qur’an by having Jesus claim not to be the Messiah (Barnabas 42:2). The Qur’an, on the other hand, does admit that He is the Messiah (al-Ma’idah 5:75). The alleged “Gospel of Barnabas” also possesses a number of severe anachronisms pointing strongly in favor of the scholarly consensus that it was probably written in the fifteenth or sixteenth century.
Instead of admitting that Jesus was crucified, Muslims hold that Jesus ascended instead into heaven (an-Nisa’ 4:158). Thus, Jesus was not resurrected because He did not die. However, although this potentially could explain away such facets as the post-Resurrection appearances of Jesus, it still neglects the issue of the empty tomb. If Jesus were not crucified and resurrected, then whoever had been crucified in His stead (some Muslims say Judas, as does the Gospel of Barnabas; others have proposed Simon of Cyrene or others) was brought back from the dead! And so this explanation fails to account for the evidence, not to mention the fact that it has no supporting evidence of its own rather than the fact that the Qur’an says it to be so.
Furthermore, there is another problem with the Muslim argument here, and that is al-‘Imrân 3:144. The most faithful English rendering of this verse is from the not-so-well-known translation done by Maulvi Sher Ali, and it reads as follows:
And Muhammad is but a Messenger. Verily all Messengers have passed away before him. If then he dies or is slain, will you turn back on your heels? And he who turns back on his heels shall not harm ALLAH at all. And ALLAH will certainly reward the grateful.
Where is the problem? According to the Qur’an, Jesus is one of the Messengers (al-russul) who preceded Muhammad. Yet according to this verse, all of these previous Messengers died prior to the time of Muhammad. Therefore, the Qur’an itself counters this common Muslim denial of the crucifixion of Christ.
All explanations fail except for one, and that one is that Jesus Christ did, in fact, rise from the dead as He said He would. And through this miracle, He vindicated everything He said and did. After He rose from the dead, He appeared to His disciples before ascending to heaven, and He will return in the future. Jesus Christ is risen indeed. He was dead, but He is alive, and He will remain alive forevermore. Paul said that if Christ is not risen, then faith in Him is in vain (1 Corinthians 15:14). But Christ is risen, and this faith is not in vain.
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #9 on Feb 4, 2006, 4:20pm »
It is established that Jesus of Nazareth is the risen Messiah, but is He God? The New Testament writers certainly thought so. After all, John began his Gospel by writing, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). Some people, such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses, will make an effort to translate the last part as “the Word was a god,” but this is unwarranted. They base their claim on the fact that the Greek text of that section reads “theos en ho Logos”, with the definite article omitted in front of “theos”. They claim that to be translated “God,” it should have this article, but this is not the case. If the article were present, then the verse would teach a heresy called modalism (the teaching that God is one person with three roles that He plays in interacting with humanity), which is not orthodox Christian belief. Christianity holds to the Trinity, which is that “within the one Being that is God, there exist eternally three co-equal and co-eternal persons, namely, the Father, the Son [Jesus], and the Holy Spirit”, as James White phrased it). Therefore, their assertion does not hold, since the way to express the Christian view of Jesus being God and yet not being the Father is, in fact, the way the Greek is actually written in this passage.
Furthermore, the Johannine Prologue (John 1:1-18) and other sections of the New Testament bear a striking number of similarities to the intertestamental Jewish Wisdom literature, indicating a deliberate parallel being made by the authors of the New Testament. For example, the Johannine Prologue finds many similarities to the Wisdom of Solomon. Also, the term used in Hebrews 1:3 to describe Jesus as “the brightness of God’s glory” is the same one used by Wisdom of Solomon 7:25-26 to refer to Wisdom’s radiance. Furthermore, in rabbinical literature, oftentimes things were said to have been done by the Memra (or Word) of God, the Memra being viewed as God and yet different in some way. One example is the Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, in which it is said that “the Word of the Lord created man in His likeness”. That particular statement is in parallel to Genesis 1:27, which says that “God created man in His own image”. In other words, the Targums reveal that rabbinic thought included the Memra as God!
Furthermore, the Jewish philosopher Philo, a contemporary of Jesus, actually utilized the term Logos, which he also called Wisdom, and called it “the image of God”, “the very shadow of God”, and God’s “firstborn son”. Using this material to view the context of the New Testament, we see the claim being made that Jesus, as the Word of God (John 1:1) and Wisdom of God (1 Corinthians 1:24), is eternally a “quasi-personification of attributes proper to a deity”, or a hypostasis. As shown by this literature, this Word/Wisdom was seen not as something completely other than God, but rather something intrinsic to His very personality. As a hypostasis, the Word is ontologically equal to God the Father, but it is functionally subordinate, a topic that will be touched upon later. The concept of a hypostatic Word/Wisdom provides the background to the New Testament doctrine of the deity of Christ.
There are many other passages in which Jesus is referred to as God. For example, Titus 2:13 says that we should be “looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.” In this case, Greek grammar (in accordance with Granville Sharp’s Rule) shows that both “God” and “Savior” are titles being applied to the same person, Jesus Christ. Likewise, the same pattern can be found in 2 Peter 1:1, which says, “Simon Peter, a bondservant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained like precious faith with us by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ,” following the same Greek construction that it does later when it refers to “the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 1:11).
Likewise, we have another passage, Hebrews 1:6-8, that says:
But when He again brings His firstborn into the world, He says: “Let all the angels of God worship Him.” And of the angels He says: “Who makes His angels spirits, and His ministers a flame of fire.” But to the Son He says: “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom.”
Not only is the writer (quoting Psalm 45:6 in Hebrews 1:8) saying that the Father is referring to the Son as God, but also note that the Father commands all of the angels to worship the Son! Throughout the Bible, we are commanded to only worship God and nothing else. And in the Gospels we see the people worshipping Jesus, such as the Magi (Matthew 2:11), a leper (Matthew 8:2), a synagogue ruler named Jairus (Matthew 9:18, Mark 5:22), the disciples (Matthew 14:33, Matthew 28:17, Luke 24:52), a Syro-Phoenician woman (Matthew 15:25), the women who found His tomb to be empty (Matthew 28:9), a demoniac (Mark 5:6), and a blind man who Jesus healed (John 9:38).
Furthermore, Colossians 1:15-17 says:
He [Jesus] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn [“firstborn” being the translation of the Greek word prototokos, denoting the supreme heir] over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
Amazing! Jesus is the “image of the invisible God” (and, as Hebrews 1:3 later says, the “exact representation of His [God’s] nature”), something that no mere creature could be perfectly. Jesus has absolute authority over all of creation (as He Himself claimed in Matthew 28:18, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth”). By Him were all things created! Everything was made for Him! And He holds everything together! He is clearly the Creator! How could He be any other than God if this is so?
Also, in Colossians 2:9, we are told that “in Him [Jesus] dwells all the fullness of Deity bodily.” The word translated “Deity” is, in the original Greek text, theotes (in this particular verse, it is found as theotetos), referring to the very essence of God, that very nature that makes Him God. This is not merely saying that Jesus has divine attributes, but that He possesses the very essence and nature of God! He is, therefore, being called God.
Thomas himself, after seeing the risen Jesus, declared Him in John 20:28 to be “my Lord and my God” (ho kurios mou kai ho theos mou). Jesus responded by saying, “Thomas, because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29). If Thomas had wrongly referred to Jesus as “God”, Jesus would have corrected him. Jesus clearly is accepting the designation. He obviously considered Himself to be God.
Furthermore, Jesus asserts that everyone should honor Him just as they honor the Father (John 5:23)! How could any mere creation dare to lay claim to an equal amount of adoration from the masses as the God who declared that He “will not give [His] glory to another” (Isaiah 48:11)? This would be absolutely tantamount to blasphemy coming from any mere man, or even from an angel. Jesus clearly intended His claim for equality of honor with the Father to be construed as a claim to divinity.
A skeptic might attempt to counter this by pointing to a few passages that appear, on the face of them, to be problematic for the proposition that Jesus is God. For example, much is made of the fact that Jesus prayed to the Father, worshipped the Father, referred to the Father as His God, and clearly distinguished Himself from the Father. This objection, however, clearly confuses ontological equality (that is, equality of nature and of essence) with functional equality (that is, role and level of authority displayed). Much in the same way that the President and the Vice-President may be equally human and are of equal value with regard to their dignity and quality of life, yet one is in a higher position of authority while not being any more of a human being necessarily, so is the Father functionally superior to the Son while being ontologically equal to Him. This also makes sense of such statements as “the Father is greater than I” (John 14:28) and Christ’s statements that He could do nothing beyond what the Father willed (that is, Jesus willingly submitted Himself to a position of functional subordination). Also, it must be remembered that, in the Incarnation, Jesus was both fully God and fully human, and thus He had to display how a perfect human should behave with respect to God. He could hardly have done this if He acted in a state of functional equality to the Father. Therefore, it only makes sense that the Son should be functionally subordinate to the Father, yet ontologically equal to the Father. The Son and the Father are of one essence, the nature of God.
A skeptic might also ask why Jesus was not more overt with His claims to divinity. Given the monotheistic worldview within which Jewish culture operated, every time He proclaimed Himself to be God, the Jewish people would have tried to kill Him prematurely, which was already a common enough desire among many of those angered by Christ’s teaching. Furthermore, being too overt concerning His divine nature would have lessened a needed emphasis on His human nature. That would likely have resulted in more widespread propagation of heresies such as Apollinarianism (named after Apollinaris the Younger, bishop of Laodicea around 361 AD), Monophysitism (the name coming from the Greek words monos, meaning “one”, and physis, meaning “nature”), or even Docetism (the name coming from the Greek dokeo, “to seem”). Apollonarianism taught that Jesus’ divine will and nature completely overshadowed His human nature, thus meaning that His mind was solely divine. Monophysitism taught that Jesus lacked a human nature entirely and was in possession of only the divine nature. Docetism taught that Jesus was not truly incarnated, but instead was merely a divine nature with the appearance of being human.
The Incarnation, being a new and radical thing, is obviously a concept that one is best eased into gently. It is difficult for most to comprehend precisely how it is that an individual can have both a human nature and a divine nature. But, despite all this, Jesus still got across the message that He is God.
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #10 on Feb 4, 2006, 4:23pm »
The skeptic might then say, “Just because someone believes himself to be God and then gets other people to agree, that doesn’t make it true.” This is correct, but His claims must be taken in the context of His life. If God were to come down from heaven and incarnate Himself as a human being, what would He be like? Surely the God-man would work wondrous miracles to evidence His divine power. Jesus did that. Surely the God-man would speak words like no other. It was said of Jesus that “no man ever spoke like this Man” (John 7:46). And He declared that “heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away” (Luke 21:33). Two thousand years later, His words still have enduring, live-transforming power, just as we would expect of the words of the God-man. One has only to read His words to realize that He was a genius beyond all others. As G. F. Maclean said of Jesus’s assertion that His words would never pass away:
Never did the Speaker seem to stand more utterly alone than when He uttered that majestic utterance. Never did it seem more improbable that it should be fulfilled. But as we look across the centuries we see how it has been realized. His words have passed into law, they have passed into doctrines, they have passed into consolations, but they have never ‘passed away.’ What human teacher ever dared to claim an eternity for his words?
If God were to become incarnate, He would surely live a perfect life, and that’s just what Jesus alone did. He challenged His foes to tell Him His sins, and they could not. Those closest to Jesus declared Him absolutely sinless. As Thomas Wright stated, “The Sermon on the Mount is Christ’s biography. Every syllable He had already written down in deeds. The sermon merely translated His life into language.” The Sermon on the Mount is a description of His character, and He is its most exemplary paragon.
As Griffith Thomas said, “His life was holy; His word was true; His whole character was the embodiment of truth. There has never been a more real or genuine man than Jesus of Nazareth.”
As Napoleon Bonaparte said, “I know men and I tell you that Jesus Christ is no mere man. Between Him and every other person in the world there is no possible term of comparison.”
Johann Gottfried von Herder declared, “Jesus Christ is in the noblest and most perfect sense the realized ideal of humanity.”
And Jean Jacques Rousseau said:
Can the Person whose history the Gospels relate be Himself a man? What sweetness, what purity in His manners! What affecting goodness in His instructions! What sublimity in His maxims! What profound wisdom in His discourses! What presence of mind, what ingenuity of justice in His replies! Yes, if the life and death of Socrates are those of a philosopher, the life and death of Jesus Christ are those of a God.
Furthermore, if there were to be a God-man, He would have a lasting influence upon the world into which He entered, and this is precisely what Jesus has. Griffith Thomas exclaimed, “He is the greatest influence in the world today.”
The great historian Kenneth Latourette said, “As the centuries pass the evidence is accumulating that, measured by His effect of history, Jesus is the most influential life ever lived on this planet.”
Philip Schaff declared:
This Jesus of Nazareth, without money and arms, conquered more millions than Alexander, Caesar, Mohammed, and Napoleon; without science and learning, He shed more light on things human and divine than all philosophers and scholars combined; without the eloquence of schools, He spoke such words of life as were never spoken before or since and produced effects which lie beyond the reach of orator or poet; without writing a single line, He set more pens in motion, and furnished themes for more sermons, orations, discussions, learned volumes, works of art, and songs of praise, than the whole army of great men of ancient and modern times.
Napoleon Bonaparte said:
Christ alone has succeeded in so raising the mind of man toward the unseen that it becomes insensible to the barriers of time and space. Across the chasm of eighteen hundred years, Jesus Christ makes a demand which is beyond all others difficult to satisfy. He asks for that which a philosophy may often seek in vain at the hands of his friends, or a father of his children, or a bride of her spouse, or a man of his brother. He asks for the human heart; He will have it entirely to Himself. He demands it unconditionally, and forthwith His demand is granted. Wonderful! In defiance of time and space, the soul of man, with all its powers and faculties, becomes an annexation to the empire of Christ. All who sincerely believe in Him experience that remarkable, supernatural love toward Him. This phenomenon is unaccountable, it is altogether beyond the scope of man’s creative powers. Time, the great destroyer, is powerless to extinguish this sacred flame; time can neither exhaust its strength nor put a limit to its range. This is it which strikes me most; I have often thought of it. This is it which proves to me quite convincingly the divinity of Jesus Christ.
Jesus truly did declare Himself to be God. Either He was telling the truth, in which case He truly is God, or He was not telling the truth. If He was not telling the truth, either it was a deliberate falsehood (a blatant deception) or an accidental falsehood (He mistakenly believed Himself to be God). If He truly deceived His followers into believing Him to be God, then He told history’s greatest lie and jeopardized their souls, in which case He was not a relatively good person even by our fallen standards. But a careful examination of His life shows this to not be the case; rather, He lived the most morally perfect life ever lived. It is inconceivable that He deliberately deceived anyone about such an important issue and caused them to come under condemnation. What, then, of the possibility that He mistakenly believed Himself to be God? In context, of course, the sole Creator of the cosmos, an infinitely holy, perfect entity, is the God whom Jesus believes Himself to be. The distance between what a person truly is and what he or she believes him- or herself to be is a measure of insanity, and there is no greater gap than between a mortal, temporal, non-divine creation and the immortal, eternal, divine Creator. Therefore, for someone to mistakenly believe him- or herself to be God is the greatest of insanities. Thus, we are asking if Jesus was insane. Clearly, He was not. His mental stability is impeccable; His wisdom, beyond merely human; His insight, profound. Truly, His mental health is flawless, better than that to which any other person can lay claim. He told neither a deliberate falsehood nor an accidental falsehood; He must have, therefore, been telling the truth when He laid a claim to divinity, to the status of God.
Also, contemplate the implications of Christ’s resurrection from the dead. This is the ultimate vindication of His claim to divinity. Would a just and holy God, the God who “will not give [His] glory to another” (Isaiah 48:11), raise a blasphemer from the dead and give Him glory? By no means! Furthermore, it has already been established that Jesus is the Messiah, the promised one sent by God. God would not send a blasphemer as His holy Messiah. Clearly, Christ is precisely who He claimed to be: the divine, incarnate Word.
If God became a man, He would do great and wonderful miracles, heal the masses, teach timeless truths, speak like no man has ever spoken before, and live a perfect life. His impact on the world would never fade away. He would display His divine power, yet He would not use it unjustly. This is exactly what we find in Jesus, the real God-man, the crucified and risen Messiah who is the eternal Creator and the Kinsman-Redeemer. By His life, death, and resurrection, everything He did and taught was vindicated. He affirmed the authority of Scripture, which says that there is one true God (Deuteronomy 6:4, Isaiah 44:6-8, Jeremiah 10:10) and that all other so-called ‘gods’ are impotent and will not last (Jeremiah 10:11). Only a God-man could declare, as Jesus did, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father except by Me” (John 14:6). Only a perfectly holy God-man could do the sorts of things that Jesus did. Jesus is God become man, the eternal invading the realm of the temporal, the divine invading the realm of the human, the perfect invading the realm of the sinful, in order that the former might redeem the latter. It is as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe admitted: “If ever the Divine appeared on earth, it was in the Person of Christ.” And the eternal Lord Jesus Christ truly is that God-man.
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #11 on Feb 4, 2006, 4:40pm »
“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is made manifest to them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes—even His eternal power and divine nature—are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, so that they are without excuse” (Romans 1:18-20).
“For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in just one point is guilty of breaking all of it” (James 2:10).
“Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is the transgression of the law” (1 John 3:4).
“Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin” (James 4:17).
“As it is written: ‘There is none righteous, no, not one; there is none who understands; there is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; they have together become unprofitable; there is none who does good, no, not one’” (Romans 3:10-12).
“But we are all like an unclean thing, and all our ‘righteous acts’ are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away” (Isaiah 64:6)
“Do not enter into judgment with Your servant, for in Your sight no one living is righteous” (Psalm 143:2).
“All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is everlasting life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23).
“And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21).
“For there is one God and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for all men—the testimony given at its proper time” (1 Timothy 2:5-6).
“Jesus said to him, ‘I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father except by Me’” (John 14:6).
“He who has the Son has life, but he who does not have the Son of God does not have life” (1 John 5:12).
“Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:1-4).
“Surely He has borne our grief and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. We all like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:4-6).
“Let it be known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by Him this man stands here before you whole. This is the 'stone which was rejected by you builders, which has become the chief cornerstone.' Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:10-12).
“Jesus answered and said to him, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God’” (John 3:3).
“And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him. Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son” (John 3:14-18).
“He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him” (John 3:36).
“But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters, and all liars—their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur, which is the second death” (Revelation 21:8).
“And many of them that sleep in the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt” (Daniel 12:2).
“And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into everlasting life” (Matthew 25:46).
“From that time Jesus began to preach and to say, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand’” (Matthew 4:17).
“And those who heard it said, ‘Who then can be saved?’ But He said, ‘The things which are impossible with men are possible with God’” (Luke 18:26-27).
“If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9).
“Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins” (John 8:24).
“And he brought them out and said, ‘Sirs, what must I do to be saved?’ So they said, ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved, you and your household.’ Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house” (Acts 16:30-32).
“And you will be hated by all for My name's sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved” (Matthew 10:22).
“Most assuredly I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life” (John 5:24).
“But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by His blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through Him!” (Romans 5:8-9).
“For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works” (Titus 2:11-14).
“To Him all the prophets witness that, through His name, whoever believes in Him will receive remission of sins” (Acts 10:43).
“Then He said to them, ‘Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem’” (Luke 24:46-47).
“I will deliver you from the Jewish people, as well as from the Gentiles, to whom I now send you, to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me” (Acts 26:17-18).
“For He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son He loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (Colossians 1:13-14).
“But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin” (1 John 1:7).
“‘Come now, let us reason together,’ says the LORD. ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they are like crimson, they shall be as wool’” (Isaiah 1:18).
“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand” (Romans 5:1).
“As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. But because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages He might show us the incomparable riches of His grace, expressed in His kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Ephesians 2:1-10).
Joined: Aug 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 812 Location: USA
Re: JB's Infamous Apologetic Essay (Version 4.0) « Reply #12 on Feb 4, 2006, 4:42pm »
The nature of sin is a grave offense against God’s honor. God, in His limitless glory and honor, deserves the utmost respect and recognition of that honor, and by withholding such from Him, either in action or in thought (since the two form an essential unity), we have committed a very serious offense. Seeing as how justice demands retribution for this act, perfect justice demands that we be shamed in equal fashion. Because humans can never merit an honor status equal to the difference between God's true honor and that which we ascribed to Him, none of our works or praises suffice to atone for our offenses, and we are never capable of incurring the proper amount of shame and thus being released from the debt. It would be vaguely akin to burning the Mona Lisa and offering a sketch on a torn napkin as a replacement in a futile effort to make things right. Therefore, our shaming (in "hell", often symbolized by fire) will be of a limitless duration (i.e., hell is everlasting) unless we are somehow freed from our great debt.
In the Incarnation, Jesus (being the Son of God and indeed possessing the very essence of Deity, and thus having an honor status equal to that of God the Father) took upon Himself a sinless human nature, and that through His crucifixion (a highly shameful status-degradation ritual), He willingly paid the debt we could not, thus offering us the opportunity to be free from the debt, should we accept the gift that He, as our benefactor and the broker of God's patronage, offers. Jesus Christ was raised again, a vindication by God of Christ's honor and also the sign of our hope for the future. Outside of His patronage, there is no one to be our substitute in atonement for sin, and thus we have no alternative to our well-deserved shame. In order to claim His offer, we must enter into a covenant with Him by repenting of our sin (that is, turning from our old ways), asking His forgiveness, accepting Him as our Lord and Savior, acknowledging that He rose from the dead, and requesting His covenant.
A sample prayer could be phrased as follows:
God, I come before You as a broken sinner. I have committed many sins against You, and have greatly dishonored You. I acknowledge fully that You could justly condemn me to hell and put me to everlasting shame for my reprehensible actions. But I am also aware of Your boundless, everlasting love. I believe that You sent Your only-begotten Son to die on the cross, experiencing the shame that would otherwise have been mine. I believe that He was buried in a tomb, and that You raised Him from the dead on the third day. Lord, I plead that You forgive my sins. I wish to enter into a covenant with You through the blood of Jesus Christ, shed for My sins on the cross. Lord, forgive my sins. Have mercy on me, a sinner! I pledge my life to Your service, and I confess that Jesus Christ is my Lord, my God, and my Savior. Lord God, be my patron; Lord Jesus, be the broker of Your Father’s patronage to me. I can never thank you enough for the ultimate sacrifice You made for me. No work of mine can ever suffice, but I pledge to serve You and worship You, my God. You alone are worthy of all glory, honor, and praise, Lord! I will live my life according to Your holy will. I plead with you, my Lord, to send your Holy Spirit upon me to lend me strength in resisting sin. I no longer wish to sin against You, Lord. I repent of my sins and place my full trust and faith in Jesus Christ, who suffered and died for me! Forevermore shall I serve and worship and love You. Your way is above all others, and it is that very way that I shall seek to follow all the days of my life. I give you my never-ending thanks. You truly are the Way, the Truth, and the Life!
Welcome to the New Covenant! As a believer, you are now a child of God (John 1:12), a royal priest to Him (1 Peter 2:9), and a joint heir with Christ (Romans 8:17)! God has covered over your sins! Christ has redeemed you completely! By placing your faith and trust in Him, you have received remission of sins (Acts 10:43). The blood of Christ has cleansed you from all of your sin (1 John 1:7). Arise, your sins are forgiven! You now have peace with God (Romans 5:1). You are saved (Ephesians 2:8), you are redeemed (Colossians 1:14), you are justified by faith (Romans 5:1), and you are born again (John 3:3)! In addition to all these things, you have everlasting life (John 5:24). This is not everlasting life in this tainted, suffering state in which we currently all exist. Even better, this is everlasting life in the resurrection of the dead, and we shall dwell with God! You do not need to fear condemnation, because you will not be condemned (John 3:18).
Now, go in peace, and glorify the amazing God who loved you enough to redeem you even when you were in rebellion against Him. Give thanks to the eternally holy Almighty, the Creator of heaven and earth!
“Praise the Lord, all you nations; extol Him, all you peoples! For His merciful kindness is great toward us, and the truth of the Lord endures forever. Praise the Lord!” (Psalm 117)
“Test all things; hold fast what is good. Abstain from every form of evil. Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thessalonians 5:21-23).
“For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39).
“Now to Him who is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery kept secret since the world began but now has been made manifest, and by the prophetic Scriptures has been made known to all nations, according to the commandment of the eternal God, for obedience to the faith of God, alone wise, be the glory through Jesus Christ forever. Amen” (Romans 16:25-27).
“Peace to the brethren, and love with faith, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace be with those who love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity. Amen” (Ephesians 6:23-24).
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