How-It-Could-Have-Been Scenarios

From The Skeptical Review, 1996 / May-June:

by Farrell Till 

Although previous issues of The Skeptical Review have exposed fallacies in the how-it-could-have-been hermeneutic tactics that inerrantists invariably resort to in their never-ending quest to "prove" that the Bible is perfectly harmonious, they still persist in their determination to use this discredited method of argumentation. First, we had Jerry Moffitt, Jerry McDonald, and Lindell Mitchell bombarding us with highly unlikely but possible scenarios that, according to them, remove inconsistencies and discrepancies that result from accepting the face-value meaning of certain biblical passages. More recently, Roger Hutchinson and Marion Fox have come on the scene to argue from the simplistic assumption that the mere postulation of how-it- could-have-been scenarios is sufficient to defend the doctrine of biblical inerrancy. On pages 4-5 of this issue, we have Hutchinson's latest venture into the Never-Never Land of how-it-could-have-beens, and joining him on pages 7-8 is Wilhelm Schmitt, who seeks to shore up the earlier attempts of Moffitt and Hutchinson to prove that there is no discrepancy in the Exodus 12:40 claim of a 430-year sojourn in Egypt and the Exodus-6 genealogy of Aaron, which lists only four generations from the time of the Israelite descent into Egypt until their exodus under the leadership of Moses and Aaron.

An interesting aspect of this 430-year matter is that Moffitt, Hutchinson, and Schmitt have all offered explanations, yet all of their explanations are different. In other words, Moffitt proposed one solution, Hutchinson another, and Schmitt still another. It isn't possible for all three "explanations" to be right, so aren't we entitled to arch a mental eyebrow at a hermeneutic method whose advocates insist is valid even though they can't even use it themselves to arrive at a consensus on the real meaning of controversial biblical passages? In the past, we have pointed out that biblical inerrantists seem to be infected with an any-interpretation-will-do virus when confronted with the challenge to explain away biblical discrepancies, and the performance of Moffitt, Hutchinson, and Schmitt confirms that. They can't agree on what the Exodus writer meant, but they can agree that their contradictory solutions have removed the discrepancy. In other words, they don't really know what the Exodus writer meant, but they know that he did not contradict himself. How much sense does that make?

Ark Technology

Noah allegedly had the technology to build a seaworthy 450 ft. long wooden ship that could carry massive cargo for a year. How did this technology disappear after the flood? Since the flood, builders of wooden ships have failed to go past the 300 ft. long limit for such a vessel as the Ark. From the Errancy discussion list, January 1997:

MATTHEW
Indeed, the flood itself argues that technology levels would have been lowered following the flood.

TILL
To the contrary, Noah lived for 350 years after the flood (Gen. 9:28), and Shem lived for 500 years after the flood (Gen. 11:11). These two had developed a shipbuilding technology that surpassed anything that the world has ever seen, because they were able to make an all-wooden ship that was 150 feet longer than the barrier that would later baffle modern shipbuilders. Yet that remarkable technology disappeared from the face of the earth, even though Noah and Shem had centuries to teach it to others before they died. The fact that no remarkable ships like the ark were made after the flood is enough to convince reasonable people that the ark was just a legend.

MATTHEW 
Mr. Till, no technology lost following the flood? It seems incredible that Noah's family alone contained all the technology of the world. Furthermore, no additional arks were needed after the flood. God did not ask for another.

TILL
Now that's a strange comment for a biblical inerrantist to make. According to the Genesis story of the flood "all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both birds, and cattle, and beasts, and every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth, and EVERY MAN, all in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life, of all that was on the dry land died" (Gen. 7:21).

Now if this is a true statement, the only humans who survived this disaster were Noah and his wife and their three sons and their wives, eight people altogether. So why does it seem incredible to you that "Noah's family alone contained all the technology of the world"? Who else would there have been? So if Noah was so advanced in the ability to smelt and forge iron, as you seem to believe that Aubrey has brilliantly proven, how do you explain that this technology disappeared after the flood? Surely, Noah and his family would have recognized the value that iron had in construction work and would have used it extensively. So why don't archaeologists find sites dating back to Noah's time that contain numerous iron objects? Furthermore, since Noah lived after the flood for 350 years and Shem lived for 500, why didn't their knowledge of iron forging and shipbuilding spread with the growth of their descendants?

Simon Greenleaf

The following is an excerpt from a debate between a 
Christian,  Fitzpatrick, and Farrell Till on the alleged 
resurrection of Jesus Christ--from the Errancy Discussion 
list, November 15, 1998:

FITZPATRICK

Now let me address the question of whether the NT is 

historically accurate in claiming that the resurrection of 

Jesus of Nazareth took place. In other words, are 

the four Gospels good evidence for the events they 

declare? The inquiry into the goodness of this

evidence is actually a legal question.

One man who was highly skilled at dealing with evidence 

was Dr. Simon Greenleaf. He was the famous Royall Professor 

of Law at Harvard University and succeeded Justice Joseph 

Story as the Dane Professor of Law in the same university. 

The rise of Harvard law School to its eminent position 

among the legal schools of the United States is to be 

ascribed to the efforts of these two men. Greenleaf produced 

his famous three-volume work, A Treatise on the Law of 

Evidence, which still is considered one of the greatest single 

authorities on this subject in the entire literature of legal 

procedure.

Greenleaf examined the value of the historical evidence for the

resurrection of Jesus Christ to ascertain the truth. He rigorously

applied the principles contained in his three-volume treatise on

evidence. His findings were recorded in his book, An 

Examination of the Testimony of the Four Evangelists by the 

Rules of Evidence Administered in the Courts of Justice.

Greenleaf came to the conclusion that, according to the laws

of legal evidence used in courts of law, there is more evidence 

for the historical fact of the resurrection of Jesus Christ than 

for just about any other event in history.

Dr. Simon Greenleaf's great work, "An Examination of the 

Testimony of the Four Evangelists by the Rules of Evidence 

Administered in the Courts of Justice" can be found at the 

following Web page: (no longer available, but check here, 

kwh) Now although I am a Registered Patent Agent, am  

somewhat familiar with legal reasoning, and can practice

Patent Law before the Patent Bar, I am not a regular  

attorney, and am not, therefore, legally competent to 

pass judgement on this work. It is highly convincing to me 

and seems to cover all the bases, legally speaking. Perhaps 

one of your skeptic friends who is an attorney of law can 

assess the strength of Dr. Greenleaf's legal reasoning 

here. If, as I believe, the evidence for the resurrection of  

Jesus Christ is good enough to stand up in any court of law, 

then, on that basis, I re-present the argument of my 

previous e-mail. Mr. Till, what is your answer to the legal 

reasoning of Dr. Simon Greenleaf concerning the strength

of the evidence for the four Gospels and thus for the 

resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth from the dead?

TILL

Simon Greenleaf was a [19]th-century professor of law 

at Harvard University, but he was also a devout believer 

in Christianity and the inspiration of the Bible.  That, of 

course, would not prove that his claims that Mr. Fitzpatrick 

summarized above are incorrect, but it does give sufficient 

reason to question his objectivity.  One thing that is very 

evident in apologetic literature is that those who believe in 

the Bible have no difficulty finding reasons to believe that 

it is "the word of God," and so it was with Simon Greenleaf.  

I don't have a copy of Greenleaf's work that Fitzpatrick 

cited above, but I have read quotations from it in apologetic 

literature.  From what I have seen, it is evident that 

Greenleaf, like Fitzpatrick and almost all biblical inerrantists, 

based his defense of the resurrection on the assumption 

that the NT records were historically accurate.  The following 

is a quotation from Greenleaf that can be found in Josh 

McDowell's *Evidence That Demands a Verdict, * p. 192.  

In reading it, please notice that from beginning to end 

Greenleaf assumed the accuracy of the NT.  I will 

interrupt the quotation from time to time to comment on 

Greenleaf's reasoning.

More About The Resurrected Saints

Farrell Till comments on Ed Babinski's article, What Happened To The Resurrected Saints? and also comments on a reader's "answer" to Babinski's article. From The Skeptical Review,1992:

The attention it has received indicates that Ed Babinski's article about the resurrected saints (TSR, Winter 1992, pp. 14-15) touched a sensitive spot in the thick skin of Bible inerrancy. A reader in Georgia wrote a "response" to it as did also Tom Fishbeck in his newsletter The Bible Answers, which he presents as a bulletin published to express the views of SIG, a special interest group of MENSA, on biblical issues. A reader receiving a free subscription to TSR at the request of a friend called to ask that his name be removed from our mailing list. When asked if he would mind telling us his specific objections to the paper, he cited the "stupid nonsense" in articles like "the one about the resurrected saints" as the reason why he preferred not to have TSR "polluting his mail box."

It is one thing to hurl insults at ideas embarrassing to one's personal beliefs; it is another to refute the ideas with logical arguments. I read Fishbeck's "rebuttal" of Ed Babinski's article and found it weak as water. He suggested four possible explanations he is "willing to believe" about the problem of these mysterious, unnamed saints who were resurrected from their tombs at the moment Jesus died on the cross: (1) Matthew was accurate, (2) Matthew was accurately reporting the occurrence of false testimony of others without knowing it was false, (3) the original gospel of Matthew asserted at least one error, or (4) a change was made to one of the earliest copies of the gospel of Matthew (The Bible Answers, Nov. 1991, p. 4).

The first of these explanations is no explanation at all, because the whole thrust of Babinski's article was that such an event as this would have been so extraordinary that news of it would surely have reached contemporary historians and thus been passed down to us in secular records or, if not that, the other gospel writers would have considered the event to be such convincing evidence of the divinity of Jesus that they too would have included it in their accounts of the crucifixion and resurrection. To say, then, that a possible explanation of this problem is that Matthew was accurate explains absolutely nothing. The mystery of the exclusion of this stupendous miracle from the other gospels still begs for a sensible explanation.

What Happened To The Resurrected Saints?

Ed Babinski has some great thoughts and questions concerning an alleged miracle that is only mentioned in the book of Matthew.(See also Farrell Till's comments on Babinski's article which will follow soon). From The Skeptical Review, 1992:

by Ed Babinski

Two short verses in Matthew raise perhaps the most serious questions that can be put to a literal interpretation of the resurrection stories. Matthew said that at the moment of Jesus' death "the tombs were opened; and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they entered into the holy city and appeared unto many" (27:52-53). This is an account of a miracle unsurpassed anywhere else in the gospels. It makes the postresurrection appearing of Jesus "to above five hundred brethren at once" (1 Cor. 15:6) appear tame in comparison.  

In this case, many saints were raised and appeared to many. Unlike the accounts of Jesus raising Lazarus or the synagogue ruler's daughter or Jesus himself being raised, this depicts saints dead for way over "three days" being raised. And, from the phrase, "they entered the holy city and appeared to many," it is possible to infer that these many raised saints showed themselves to many who were not believers! Yet Josephus, who wrote a history of Jerusalem both prior to and after her fall, i.e., forty years after the death of Jesus, knew of Jesus but nothing of this raising of many and appearing to many. Of this greatest of all miracles, not a rumor appears in the works of Josephus or of any other ancient author. Surely at least one of the many raised out of those many emptied tombs was still alive just prior to Josephus's time, amazing many. Or at least many who had seen those many saints were still repeating the tale. Although people may have doubted that Jesus raised a few people while he was still alive and although "some doubted" Jesus' own resurrection (Matt. 28:17), who could fail to have been impressed by many risen saints appearing to many? How also could Peter have neglected to mention them in his Jerusalem speech a mere fifty days after they "appeared to many in the holy city"? Surely their appearance must have been foremost on everyone's mind. So why didn't Paul mention such a thing in his letters, our earliest sources? Why did the women who visited the "empty tomb" on Sunday morning not take notice that many other tombs were likewise open? Why didn't the visitors to Jesus' tomb mention that they had met or seen many raised saints in that vicinity, meeting them on the way to Jesus' tomb or on the way back to town? Why did the apostles disbelieve the first reports of Jesus' resurrection when a mass exit from the tombs had accompanied his resurrection? Why didn't Matthew know how many raised saints there were? Why couldn't he name a single one or a single person to whom they had appeared? How did Matthew know that these saints had come out of their tombs? That would be more than anyone had seen in the case of Jesus' resurrection.

More Of The Wit And Wisdom Of Mark Twain

In all the ages the Roman Church has owned slaves, bought and sold slaves, authorized and encouraged her children to trade in them. . . . There were the texts; there was no mistaking their meaning; . . . she was doing in all this thing what the Bible had mapped out for her to do. So unassailable was her position that in all the centuries she had no word to say against human slavery.  
~Mark Twain 

It is best to read the weather forecast before praying for rain.    
~Mark Twain

The difference between a Miracle and a Fact is exactly the difference between a mermaid and seal. It could not be expressed better.

~Mark Twain