Posted on 08/16/2004 12:16:13 PM PDT by Mr. Silverback
Note: This commentary was delivered by Prison Fellowship President Mark Earley.
When Julie went away to college, she made a point of sharing Christ with her three roommates. They listened politely and seemed supportive. Julie was excited; they all seemed open to the Gospel. But to her surprise, they responded just as warmly when Sally said she was into the New Age and believed in “the god within all of us”; and when Amy said she believed that God is a “force,” like in Star Wars; and when Ruth said she was a “very spiritual” person but didn’t believe in any god at all.
But what baffled Julie most of all was when the others agreed that “we’re all saying the same thing in the end.”
How can Christian students like Julie make sense of the bewildering range of beliefs they encounter in this post-Christian age? In his recently re-issued book, How to Stay Christian in College, Professor J. Budziszewski explains that Julie had run into the powerful myth that “truth is whatever you sincerely believe.” It holds that, if you believe it, then it’s “true for you”—and rules of logic and evidence don’t apply.
The “myth of sincerity” is especially potent when it comes to life’s big questions—about God and morality. Consider abortion, for example. A few years ago, abortionist James McMahon said, “I frankly think the soul or personage comes in when the fetus is accepted by the mother.” In other words, an unborn baby only becomes human when the mother sincerely believes he’s human.
Christian students encounter the same type of reasoning on the college campus. If a classmate sincerely believes her unborn child is human, friends will call the child a “baby” and congratulate her. But if she doesn’t, they call it a “fetus” and encourage her to have an abortion.
This is such an obvious fallacy. Can we really make something true just by believing it? How about a concrete example? If you sincerely believe your onion rings are French fries, do they become French fries? If you sincerely believe that you’re a frog, do you become a frog? You might leap in the air, but you will not be a frog.
When it comes to concrete, familiar objects, no one falls for the sincerity myth. We all know there’s an objective reality that exists on its own, despite what we may believe about it—and no matter how sincere we are. If we accept the idea of objective truth when dealing with trivial questions, then logically we have to accept it when dealing with big questions about God and morality as well.
When students like Julie leave home, they need to know how to counter the myths they’ll face on college campuses. Why not get your college-bound son, daughter, or grandchild a copy of J. Budziszewski’s book How to Stay Christian in College. You can order a copy through BreakPoint (1-877-322-5527).
Christian young people don’t need to be baffled about how to respond to their roommates or their professors. With a little help, they can learn to cut through the myths and fables with the sharp edge of biblical truth.
> Can we, for the sake of moving the discussion forward, agree that they believed what they said?
No, because the point is not certain. It's a possibility, yes, but "liars" remains a possibility as well.
If you wish to concede the point that they well could have been liars, then we can move on, and I can show you how it's very likely that they were simply duped.
Your argument for circular reasoning has to do with our knowledge, not with events. A circular argument would be "Do this because I told you to." Or "Christ was resurrected because He was the Son of God; Christ was the Son of God because He was resurrected." That is not the argument being presented. You're talking about our knowledge of things. In fact, I'm not saying that "I know that Christ was resurrected because He was the Son of God." Never have. I'm saying, "I believe Christ was resurrected because I have reasoned A, B, and C (though we're still on A). Because He was resurrected in the manner He was, I can only conclude that He is Lord."
> But I wouldn't say that they were actually dead.
But in the first century you would. Hell, into the 20th century you would. There was a reason why Edgar Allen Poe had a phobia about being buried alive... because it happened.
> What caused a heart, previously stopped, to start again?
Ask a doctor. Likely that the heart wasn't actually stopped, just slowed down enough that anything short of an EEG wouldn't pick it up.
> The apostles clearly THOUGHT Christ was resurrected from the dead.
Maybe. Or they just made it up.
> Because He was resurrected in the manner He was, I can only conclude that He is Lord.
But you don't KNOW how he was resurrected. The Bible itself is silent... one minute he was dead in a tomb, next he was out walking around and scaring children. But other people have been resurrected, both with and without medical intervention. Are they all Lords?
I've already said. It's possible, but so unlikely that it isn't worth considering. This is called logical induction: based on the premises, this is the likely (read: not only possible) conclusion. It is a valid argument, by the way, and entirely reasonable.
Faith is not blind belief. True faith is putting your trust in something that has objective value. I have faith that my brakes will stop my car, having tested that belief millions of times over. I don't have faith that if I don't look down, I can keep walking off the edge of a cliff without falling like a Bugs Bunny character because objective reality doesn't work that way.
The Apostles had faith in Jesus, and they knew with 100% objective certainty whether or not the things they based their faith in--like whether or not He really walked around talking and eating with them after His execution. They were not faithless because they could prove their faith with an empty tomb, thousands of witnesses to Jesus' miracles, and the Old Testament prophecies.
Likewise, I believe in Jesus because I don't buy dozens of men deliberately lying about the obsurd proposition that a carpenter from Nazareth came back from the dead would go to their deaths for that lie without most or all recanting. I believe in Him because the Gospel accounts are historically reliable by every test we normally apply to such documents. I believe because Christianity prospered in Jerusalem, where it would have been the easiest thing in the world for the authorities to disprove had it been false. I believe because the Jews admitted that Jesus did miracles. I believe because Jesus Christ fulfilled hundreds of prophecies, because in Him the whole Bible (especially the strange and confusing parts) ties together, and because we see today exactly what the Bible predicted.
My belief is based on logical, historical arguments. My faith was the decision to, having come to that logical conclusion, put my life into His hands, and having done so, I can add my personal experience and growth to the reasons that I believe.
Faith in something worth having faith in does not require checking your brains at the door.
> so unlikely that it isn't worth considering.
You consider "liar" to be less likely than "miracle" ???!?!?!?!?!?!?!
Okay, I've miraculously obtained title to this bridge, see, that can be yours for a low, low price...
That is exactly what I said. That means, of course, that they weren't actually dead.
We haven't yet considered the possibility that was the case here. We will, however, if we can get past the liar thing. I find it highly unlikely that you can find eleven people who would be willing to be tortured and killed for the exact same lie, if they know it to be a lie. That is why I ruled out the possibility. Is that definite proof? No. But it's evidence that cannot be dismissed logically by "nuh uh."
> I believe in Jesus because I don't buy dozens of men deliberately lying about the obsurd proposition that a carpenter from Nazareth came back from the dead would go to their deaths for that lie without most or all recanting.
So you also have faith in the Book Of Mormon and Joe Smith &Co.? How about Heaven's Gate?
> I find it highly unlikely that you can find eleven people who would be willing to be tortured and killed for the exact same lie, if they know it to be a lie.
They wouldn't all need to know it was a lie for it to be a lie. And again... who said they were all willing to be tortured to death?
Not usually. But given the circumstances behind their deaths, I've considered "liar" to be unlikely. It doesn't follow that what they said was accurate, but that they believed what they said. When considering miraculous things, any good skeptic will look at all possibilites--including the possibility that his assumptions are wrong about miracles.
That's a premise we haven't finished talking about. Right now I'm trying to establish my reasoning. It is reasonable, given the premises, to conclude that they were not lying. Would you agree? We can come back to premises later. It is useless to keep coming back to this until we've gotten through everything else. As I said, the biggest contention will be with our assumptions. But we cannot establish a valid argument without them. Once we've established that the argument is inductively valid, we can talk about possible fallacies in the premises.
If you are going to throw out all the eyewitness testimony anyway, why are you bothering to debate the topic at all?
Here we have the eyewitness details: Severely beaten with severe lacerations, beaten some more with a blunt object, made to walk some distance with a heavy object, losing blood along the way. Nailed to a cross, losing some more blood. Left for several hours. Stabbed in the chest with a spear, a deep enough wound that blood and "water" is seen pouring from the wound. By the way, that "water" indicates he had either been dead for some time or his chest cavity was full of fluid preventing normal heart and lung function. Left in a cave for 36 hours, sealed with a guard, no food, no water, no IV drip after losing massive amounts of blood, not to mention having little hydration while on the cross in the first place.
Folks waking up on the coroner's table after they have been thought dead simply aren't in that situation. They have been rehydrated and given powerful drugs in the course of trying to revive them.
How do you deal with the guards? How do you deal with the stone?
Again, if you are going to systematically ignore all the sources, you can make up whatever you want. Except that, as noted, the historical record is quite simply undeniable. Say what you will, but you only discredit yourself when you try to cast doubt on Jesus.
> But given the circumstances behind their deaths
What circumstances... and according to whom?
> they believed what they said
They coudl well ahve, and it would not negate the possibility of liar or liars.
> When considering miraculous things, any good skeptic will look at all possibilites--including the possibility that his assumptions are wrong about miracles.
Indeed. But a good skeptic will also compare the likelihood that all of physics is wrong to the likelihood that someopne is pulling a fast one.
Are you wanting to pay for that bridge with cash or check? I also take PayPal.
> you only discredit yourself when you try to cast doubt on Jesus.
And there we have it. Do Not Question. Accept. Conform!
They would in order for their statements concerining anything that is not true to be a lie. The only thing I have established by the premises is that they believed X event to be true.
Nope. Smith was a huckster who gained a lot of material benefit from his lies, and unlike the bible, the BoM has been thouroughly discredited by modern archaeology.
For the Heaven's Gate cult, I give them full credit for being utterly sincere in their beliefs. But their beliefs were not in something tangible and provable--they believed in alien contact and that a faked photograph of a spacecraft in the Hale-Bopp (which has since been identified and proven to be faked) meant that by committing suicide they could beam up. Nobody really knew what their beliefs were or had a chance to rebutt them.
Compare that to the Apostles! They preached an empty tomb to the people of Jerusalem, one which they could go see. They did so openly, whereas the HG cult practiced in secret. The religious leadership was unable to rebutt their claims, and had to resort to intimidation and persecution instead.
Furthermore, unlike Smith, the apostles didn't settle down with their cult in a place where they could rule over it; they continued to live among the "heathen" or lived hard lives on the road and taught one of the most anti-hierarchal religious systems known to Man. There is no record that any of them ever benefited materially from their claims, just the opposite.
Sorry, the comparisons just don't fit if you know anything about the three different groups.
Oh, no, by all means you have every right to be as stupid as you want to be. Just don't expect to be taken seriously.
If they believed what they said, then they are not lying. To call someone who believes what he says a liar is to change the definition entirely. We cannot have a conversation if we cannot agree on the language that is available to us.
A good skeptic also questions whether or not we know all there is to know--about physics or anything else.
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