Reply - continued ...
If you have been following our discussion from our previous post in the comments section, this is my further reply to my new friend in America that has deviated so much I felt I should start on a new post. I sincerely invite all those who are interested in a discussion on the accuracy (and the proving of such accuracy) of the bible as a document that records historical events ...
I stand to be corrected if I have understood you incorrectly, but from observing your comments and your blog entries, an underlying theme that you bring out is that there is always two sides of the coin that if you try proving one side, you will most certainly neglect the other side to prove your point.
In your most recent blog entry, you have highlighted that Lee Strobel would somewhat provide a bias view just to prove his point, and he somehow neglects or avoids the uncertainty, doubts that may potentially cause a stumbling block for his case.
However if we are dealing with history, it is almost certain that there will be no way where you can have record an event with 100% accuracy. One of the reasons that cause a deficiency in such historical recording includes, but not limited to, the way the person who perceive things will always be bound to be different. Putting the spiritual element of the bible aside (i.e. that the bible is God breathed, true, inerrant etc) and looking at the bible purely as a historic document highlight this. The four gospels are obviously written by four different people at four different times and places. They all claim the one event, but they uniquely portray the events on different perspectives. (I note you probably question whether what they claim is in fact the actual truth, but lets put that aside for now).
You've raised a number of hypothetical scenarios, so perhaps I will add another one more to our discussion.
Although we are nearly half a world apart, but suppose I manage to have a verbal conversation with you (and for argument sake, our oral conversation is not recorded in any way). Now suppose immediately after the conversation, we engage in an exercise to record the exact words of our conversation (i.e. you said "x", then i said: "y" and so on).
You and I would certainly have great difficulty trying to recall every single word that was said, and to make things even harder, in the order that they came out in. HOWEVER, I trust that both of us would have substantial contents or the most important points of our conversation recorded.
I believe you would not disagree if I said we would probably have a greater chance of winning the lottery than to have two identical accounts of the same conversation if there was no collaboration. (Also, for the sake of argument, lets put aside the issue of Christians gambling/playing lottery for the time being).
Now the question I pose is this: are we to doubt whether the conversation existed because we could not record the exact words of our conversation? Are we to doubt whether the conversation existed because we had two accounts that would have some discrepancy somehow or rather?
I would trust the answer is in the negative, simply because you and I just had the conversation. The fact that we could not recall the exact words does not disprove the conversation existed.
Simply because there are doubts in the details of an event does not necessarily mean that we have to doubt whether an event in fact occurred or not. The fact that there is discrepancy in fact supports we did not sit together and fabricated our hypothetical conversation!
You have mentioned the golden "30 years" a number of times, and I take that to be the parallel in the so-called "period of silence" between Jesus's death and the time the gospels were written. I won't go into discussing whether that "period" was in fact silenced out (but perhaps we may explore that some other time), but the point I would wish to highlight is that I guess we just have to accept that society back then operated on an oral one rather than a pen-on-paper society. It's a bit like asking the question 10 or 20 years later by our grandchildren why on earth was information about the 1950s only recorded on the internet some 40 years later in the 90s? Simply because it was not the common mode of communication at all. (Perhaps it is not the most watertight example, because the internet was not even invented until probably the 80s when it was exclusively used, I believe, by your wonderful country's Defense department but I trust you understand the point of my illustration)
I'd love to hear more from you, but to end the comment, I'd like to borrow your closing remarks in your most recent blog.
You noted that Billy Graham just got on with life and in effect said Christianity is all about faith. Yes. I agree with him.
Why are there people like Lee Strobel trying to prove again and again and again? I guess it is to show what Christians believe in is anchored in some sort of reality and its not solely spiritual.
It is when you are satisfied that what is recorded in the bible is in fact a record of what has happened and you have found that anchor, it is time to take the infamous leap of faith, and accept it as God's word, to embark on the journey of Christianity: establishing a personal relationship with Christ Jesus.
I stand to be corrected if I have understood you incorrectly, but from observing your comments and your blog entries, an underlying theme that you bring out is that there is always two sides of the coin that if you try proving one side, you will most certainly neglect the other side to prove your point.
In your most recent blog entry, you have highlighted that Lee Strobel would somewhat provide a bias view just to prove his point, and he somehow neglects or avoids the uncertainty, doubts that may potentially cause a stumbling block for his case.
However if we are dealing with history, it is almost certain that there will be no way where you can have record an event with 100% accuracy. One of the reasons that cause a deficiency in such historical recording includes, but not limited to, the way the person who perceive things will always be bound to be different. Putting the spiritual element of the bible aside (i.e. that the bible is God breathed, true, inerrant etc) and looking at the bible purely as a historic document highlight this. The four gospels are obviously written by four different people at four different times and places. They all claim the one event, but they uniquely portray the events on different perspectives. (I note you probably question whether what they claim is in fact the actual truth, but lets put that aside for now).
You've raised a number of hypothetical scenarios, so perhaps I will add another one more to our discussion.
Although we are nearly half a world apart, but suppose I manage to have a verbal conversation with you (and for argument sake, our oral conversation is not recorded in any way). Now suppose immediately after the conversation, we engage in an exercise to record the exact words of our conversation (i.e. you said "x", then i said: "y" and so on).
You and I would certainly have great difficulty trying to recall every single word that was said, and to make things even harder, in the order that they came out in. HOWEVER, I trust that both of us would have substantial contents or the most important points of our conversation recorded.
I believe you would not disagree if I said we would probably have a greater chance of winning the lottery than to have two identical accounts of the same conversation if there was no collaboration. (Also, for the sake of argument, lets put aside the issue of Christians gambling/playing lottery for the time being).
Now the question I pose is this: are we to doubt whether the conversation existed because we could not record the exact words of our conversation? Are we to doubt whether the conversation existed because we had two accounts that would have some discrepancy somehow or rather?
I would trust the answer is in the negative, simply because you and I just had the conversation. The fact that we could not recall the exact words does not disprove the conversation existed.
Simply because there are doubts in the details of an event does not necessarily mean that we have to doubt whether an event in fact occurred or not. The fact that there is discrepancy in fact supports we did not sit together and fabricated our hypothetical conversation!
You have mentioned the golden "30 years" a number of times, and I take that to be the parallel in the so-called "period of silence" between Jesus's death and the time the gospels were written. I won't go into discussing whether that "period" was in fact silenced out (but perhaps we may explore that some other time), but the point I would wish to highlight is that I guess we just have to accept that society back then operated on an oral one rather than a pen-on-paper society. It's a bit like asking the question 10 or 20 years later by our grandchildren why on earth was information about the 1950s only recorded on the internet some 40 years later in the 90s? Simply because it was not the common mode of communication at all. (Perhaps it is not the most watertight example, because the internet was not even invented until probably the 80s when it was exclusively used, I believe, by your wonderful country's Defense department but I trust you understand the point of my illustration)
I'd love to hear more from you, but to end the comment, I'd like to borrow your closing remarks in your most recent blog.
You noted that Billy Graham just got on with life and in effect said Christianity is all about faith. Yes. I agree with him.
Why are there people like Lee Strobel trying to prove again and again and again? I guess it is to show what Christians believe in is anchored in some sort of reality and its not solely spiritual.
It is when you are satisfied that what is recorded in the bible is in fact a record of what has happened and you have found that anchor, it is time to take the infamous leap of faith, and accept it as God's word, to embark on the journey of Christianity: establishing a personal relationship with Christ Jesus.
I don’t think that is always necessary to neglect the other side to prove a point. Indeed, the most persuasive arguments are usually those that present the opposing points of view honestly. Those that mischaracterize opposing viewpoints are much less persuasive. My objection to Mr. Strobel’s works is that he leads his readers to believe they are getting a fair description of opposing viewpoints.
I agree that history cannot be known with 100% accuracy, but we can look for things like independent contemporaneous accounts that increase our confidence. If I wish to research the Battle of Gettysburg, I can find reports, letters, and diaries written within days and weeks by soldiers of every rank in both the Union and Confederate armies. I can also find newspaper stories from periodicals of various political persuasions. Still, key points of the battle are still the subject of dispute.
Historians are not limited to choosing between whether something did or did not happen; they also have the option of saying that there is not enough evidence to be sure one way or another. Suppose the only documents available to study the Battle of Gettysburg were four anonymous documents written thirty to sixty years after the battle that were attributed to officers serving on General Robert E. Lee’s staff who thought that he was the greatest military mind in history. These documents might be complete and accurate in every way, but without any way to corroborate the accounts, the historian would be unable to consider the information historically reliable.
I can understand and accept why the stories were transmitted orally for those first thirty years but that still does not provide me any information about what happened to the stories during that time. Once the stories start getting written down, I can see how they change and develop over time.
I am perfectly comfortable with Christians who choose to believe the New Testament accounts as a matter of faith. However, when they start claiming that they are persuaded by the evidence, they have to really stretch and contort the very idea of evidence (such as relying upon hypothetical eyewitnesses who were unable to refute the gospel writers). This often makes it difficult to have an intelligent exchange of ideas on other topics as well.
Posted by
Vinny |
12:11 am, October 20, 2007
There is a problem with finding hostile witnesses. Say for instance that you did find a hostile witness that did see Jesus did feed 5000 with truly 5 pieces of bread and 2 fish. Would he believe that Jesus can perform miracles? He would. If he believes that Jesus has the power to perform miracles, then he would be very much inclined to become a follower. Then he can’t be hostile anymore. He would have to be friendly.
So then is it possible to find a hostile witness to miracles? Witnessing a miracle would force a witness to become friendly. Yet you see in the bible that some Pharasies and teachers of the Law still reject Jesus. The bible claims that hostile witnesses exist.
You can understand why they did not write anything down.
Posted by
Jot.. |
1:52 am, October 20, 2007
I misunderstood you when you mentioned the 30yr thing. I thought that you were implying that there was 30yrs of silence, and then suddenly the witnesses decided to write it down. That’s why you believe that the bible is unreliable.
The lack of writings simply means that I do not know how they changed.
I think I understand you now. You are trying to say that over the 30 years, truths in the accounts have been manipulated exaggerated mistranslated etc. Witnesses were alive at the time. Many many of them too. It's not like "chinese whipers" where you can't talk to the first person.
Thirty years is not a long time since most of the witnesses were still alive.
As far as I know, thirty years was just as long a time period back then as it is today.
I think I didn’t write clearly enough. In terms of the transmission of information, the time it takes for information to be transmitted from one part of the world to another is measured in seconds. I am talking to you from the other side of the globe. If this conversation took place two thousand years ago, I think I would still be waiting for your first reply.
The argument simply says that hypothetical witnesses that we know nothing about don't add any weight to either side of the scale. We have to rely on other evidence to reach our conclusions.
I understand that your problem is with the argument about hypothetical witnesses. I don’t quite understand what hypothetical witnesses you are referring to. In my earlier comment, I argued that if someone saw Jesus feed five thousand from a few pieces of food, then they would be a witness for Christians and not for the opposition. If someone didn’t see the event take place, then they can’t be a witness for the event.
You argue that the five thousand people actually bought food themselves. Well that is hypothetical. If you apply this line of reasoning, then you would have to hypothesise, an explanation for every one of those miracles recorded in the bible. You would be in effect calling the thousands of witnesses liars.
This is only one piece of evidence in the entire case for Christ. You need to view the case in its entirety and not a single piece on its own.
Judging from the material written by the gospel witnesses, we can see their genuineness. We can see their firm belief in love, truth, righteousness and God. From reading their accounts, we will not conclude that they are criminals or evil people. We can see what they believe in and stand for. As was pointed out before, people don’t die for lies they create.
From all the comments you have made, I gather that you do not believe that there is a strong case for the events recorded in the bible. I want to ask:
If Jesus did perform miracles, what sort of evidence will compel you to believe that Jesus performed miracles?
If Jesus did perform miracles and was who he claimed to be, then I believe that exactly what happened would have happened. That is, Christians will record it in written form. Churches will be established, and the other evidence that Mr Strobel states is in existence.
Posted by
Jot.. |
12:54 am, October 21, 2007