Perman Wrap-up

This is the final article in a series of four in reply to a Christian, Matthew Perman, on the alleged resurrection of Jesus Christ, from *The Skeptical Review*, 1997/Mar-Apr:

By Farrell Till 

The Jewish author Pinchas Lapide has become the darling of Christian apologists, because even though he himself is not a Christian, he has stated a quasi-belief in the historicity of the resurrection. For some reason, apologists cite this as if it were some kind of conclusive evidence that should end controversy over the foundation doctrine of Christianity, but I find it inconsistent, to say the least, that Christians would use an argument that they would instantly reject if anyone should present it as evidence for a position contrary to what they believe. If, for example, a Christian writer should state his belief that Muhammad was a genuine prophet of God, Christians would rightly see this as proving no more than that this particular Christian thinks that Muhammad was a real prophet. So if such argumentation proves nothing about truth in other religions, it cannot be used to prove anything about Christianity.

This is all that I really need to say about the "testimony" of Pinchas Lapide, but there are other facts about this writer that shed considerable light on possible reasons why he has stated publicly a reserved belief that the resurrection did happen. In his book, The Resurrection of Jesus (Translated by W. C. Linss, London, 1984, pp. 32-34), Lapide reveals an interest in promoting dialogue and unity between Christians and Jews, a goal that would hardly be promoted if he accused Christianity of having been founded on historical falsehood or self-delusion in the first Christians. This fact alone is sufficient to make us wonder if Lapide's position on the resurrection is a matter of sincerity or expedience. I find it hard to imagine that a non-Christian would investigate the Christian resurrection claim, decide that it is a true claim, yet not convert to Christianity. To say the least, this does not sound like a very firm belief in the resurrection.

Still Standing On Sinking Sand

This is the third article in a series of four by Farrell Till in reply to a Christian, Matthew Perman, on the alleged resurrection of Jesus Christ. The first two were *Put Me Down For Myth* (3-12-16) and *Standing On Quicksand*  (3-13-16). The fourth article, *Perman Wrap-Up*, will follow soon (3-18-16). From *The Skeptical Review*, 1997/Jan-Feb:

By Farrell Till 

In his continuing effort to defend the unlikely New Testament claim that Jesus rose from the dead, Matthew Perman, in typical apologetic fashion, made so many unsupported assertions that I could not adequately respond to them in a single article. This time I will address his "arguments" that I didn't have space to comment on in my last article. Then if Perman wants to respond to my rebuttals, he may do so in a later issue.

Standing On Quicksand

This article is a follow-up to "Put Me Down For Myth"(3-12-16), which should be read first. From *The Skeptical Review*, 1996/Nov-Dec:

by Farrell Till 

I welcome Matt Perman's second attempt to prove the historicity of the resurrection. He is to be commended for having the courage to defend his belief in a forum like this. He is not to be commended, however, for the quality of his arguments. Most of them are as transparent as cellophane, and, like many fundamentalists, his primary defenses of the resurrection are based on (1) unsupported assertions, (2) the fallacy of the appeal to authority, and (3) an unwarranted assumption that the New Testament documents are historically accurate. His unsupported assertions are so many that I will not be able to respond to all of them in a single article, so I will publish a series of two, possibly three, responses, after which Perman may respond to them if he wishes. 

Put Me Down For Myth

An excellent article by Farrell Till on the lack of evidence for the alleged resurrection of Jesus Christ and the alleged events surrounding it. From *The Skeptical Review*, 1996 /July-August:

by Farrell Till 

On April 2, 1996, I attended the Horner-Barker Debate at Northern Iowa University, at which time I had the opportunity to meet Matthew Perman with whom I had been corresponding by e-mail for several weeks. Prior to the debate, I spent about four hours with Matthew and two of his friends talking about various issues related to biblical inerrancy. I found them to be particularly intense about their Christian beliefs, and it was very evident throughout our conversations that they had been thoroughly indoctrinated in fundamentalist Christian ideology. In many ways, Matthew, who was the most vocal of the three, reminded me of how I was at that age, i.e., young and idealistic and completely entrenched in inerrantist thinking.

At the debate, survey cards were distributed that among other things offered a complimentary article about the resurrection. I indicated that I would like to receive it, and two days later, the foregoing article arrived in the mail. When I requested it, I had no idea that it had been written by none other than Matthew Perman. It was a pleasant surprise.

An Unbelievable Story

From the Errancy Discussion List, 1997:

Izz 4/29
Three million people leave Eygpt, and we have no records of it by the 
Egyptians. Strong evidence that it simply did not happen, or that the
numbers are highly exaggerated. Maybe at one time 300 people left, 
and the tale later grew in the telling. But we have already swallowed
greater miracles than believing in the size of the exodus. At the start,
we had to believe that sticks turned into snakes and rivers to blood.
And we had to believe in the slapstick story, that it was not enough
that Aaron created a plague of frogs; Pharaohs's magicians created
a plague of even more frogs! I bet that made Pharaoh happy:

Exodus 8:6-7 "So Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt,

and the frogs came up and covered the land. But the magicians did the
same things by their secret arts; they also made frogs come up on the
land of Egypt."

Yoel has pointed out that the Bible was pornographic; here we see it also
invented comedy. Pharaoh probably lined up his magicians and slapped
them all at once, like in the "Three Stooges", for being idiots and making
more frogs.

TILL
This is a point that I made in a written debate with Jerry Moffitt, which
he has apparently abandoned. It is unreasonable to believe that when
Aaron and Moses changed all of the water throughout all the land of
Egypt into blood, pharaoh's magicians would have done "likewise with
their enchantments." Well, as I have already noted in an X but not X
posting, it would have been a logical impossibility for the magicians to
have done likewise with their enchantments, because there would have
been no water left for them to change into blood. But if we assume that
such a feat was logically possible, it was certainly a stupid act on
pharaoh's part. If, for example, terrorists should contaminate all water
east of the Mississippi with a deadly chemical, the president would be
an idiot if he ordered his agents to do the same thing to all water west
of the Mississippi. How idiotic! The story would have been more
reasonable if the magicians had been presented as agents of
pharaoh who undid the plagues that Aaron and Moses inflicted on
Egypt. Instead, we find this tit-for-tat premise in the story of the plagues.
At the beginning whatever Aaron and Moses did, the magicians did
likewise with their enchantments. A & M changed all of the water
in Egypt into blood, and then the magicians somehow changed all of
the water in Egypt into blood. A  M brought forth the plague of frogs,
and then the magicians brought forth even more frogs. Who can believe
such nonsense? Why didn't the magicians show their power by taking
away all of the frogs?

Farrell Till

A Letter To A Concerned Christian Friend [republished from 11-26-13]

(updated 11-26-13)
by Kenneth W. Hawthorne

I’m writing this letter to let you know the main reason why I am no longer a Christian, no longer believe that Yahweh is God and no longer believe that the Bible is the word of God. These decisions were not made lightly; they were made after much thought and study. As I hope you will see, these were the only real choices that I had. But if not, as always, I am ready to consider what you or anyone else has to say on this issue.

Simply, the omni characteristics that the Bible writers give Yahweh are incompatible with the New Testament teaching that he will send the vast majority of humanity to his eternal hell.

The Bible claims that Yahweh is:

1) Omniscient-If he is all knowing, then he knew if he went with the creation of man and the “plan of salvation” for man as revealed in the Bible that the vast majority of humanity would eternally perish (see Mt. 7:13-14).

2) Omnibenevolent- The word benevolent means “characterized by kindness and concern for others” (Answers.com). There are many verses that express his love, compassion and mercy for humanity; 2 Peter 3:9 says that it is not his will that any perish.

I think any Christian would agree that the Creator is greater than the creature (man). So God’s love must be of a much greater magnitude than man’s. But no loving human would conceive a child and allow it to come into the world knowing beforehand that this child would wind up in an eternal hell. So certainly a loving Creator would not do so. But the Bible teaches that this is just what Yahweh did--multiplied billions of times, and continues to allow millions to come into the world every year knowing that most will wind up in his eternal hell.

3) Perfect and Complete-Acts 17:25 says “Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything…” The Bible teaches that Yahweh doesn’t need anything and certainly doesn’t need anything from man. The thought comes to mind--why then did he create man knowing the eternally terrible outcome? It couldn’t have been for anything that he needed; so it must have been merely for something that he wanted but didn’t have to have. However, this is completely inconsistent with his alleged love for man and his will that no human perish. So the only conclusion is that it was not necessary that he create humanity in such a way that any would perish.

4) Omnipotent-If he is all powerful this means that if it was his will that no one perish, then no one would perish. And if he is also all knowing, he could have and would have come up with a plan in which no one would perish. For example, he could have created humans like himself with free will and the inability to sin.

5) Sovereign-This means that there is no authority higher than him, and thus nothing could have overruled him in achieving his will that not one human perish.

Conclusion:

No God with these omni characteristics could/would have allowed even one, much less multiplied billions of humans to eternally perish in hell. However, the Bible teaches that the alleged omni God Yahweh will do just that, allow untold billions of his human creation to eternally perish. Therefore, the Bible, being contradictory on this most important of subjects, loses all credibility and cannot be the inerrant, inspired word of God and its alleged omni God, Yahweh, cannot be God.

Some Objections Answered:

But God wants man to have free will and choose to serve him. There would be no value to God in creating robots who had no choice but to serve him.

The omni love, compassion and mercy that he has for man could not have wanted this—knowing what such a flawed, sin-prone creation (Romans 3:23; I John 1:8) would do with this type of free will and the terrible eternal results.

Yahweh also allegedly has a different want. However, this want is consistent with his omni characteristics. That want is that no one perish. His love for man, and thus his desire that no one perish, being part of his omni character, he could not have wanted something that would cause an infinite eternal calamity to his beloved human creation. It is obvious that his love for man, together with his omnipotence and sovereignty would not have permitted this eternal tragedy to happen and therefore this type of free will could not have been something that he wanted nor could/would have allowed.

Another type of free will is the type that Yahweh allegedly has. He has free will but can’t sin. He is said to have created man in his image. Why then wouldn’t he have truly created man in his image with the type of free will that he has—free will with the inability to sin? Because he loves man, wants no one to perish, is omnipotent and sovereign, and there was no necessity that man be created in a scenario in which the vast majority would perish, he would have had to have created man this way (or something similar) or not have created man at all. And since Yahweh has value, has this type of free will and is not derogatorily considered a robot, then why wouldn’t man also have value (which Yahweh doesn’t need from man anyway) if he had this type of free will and also not derogatorily be considered a robot?

Jesus died for your sins, why won't you believe in him, obey him and save yourself?

The New Testament and Christians make much of Jesus’alleged sacrifice to save man from eternal hell and the love that was shown by Yahweh in providing it. But if Yahweh has the omni characteristics that the Bible claims, he would had to have known, before the first human was ever created, that this sacrifice by Jesus would not accomplish his will that no human perish. He had to have known that it would only save a comparative handful. So, knowing this, the only way that his love could really have been shown toward man would have been in creating man in a way that would achieve his will that no one perish (it not being necessary that he create man in any other way).

Sending Jesus as a sacrifice was part of the “plan of salvation” revealed in the New Testament that would not achieve his will of no one perishing. In fact, under this New Testament plan the vast majority of humanity would wind up eternally perishing (refer back to Mt. 7:13-14). So the “plan of salvation” in the New Testament involving Jesus’ sacrifice has to be considered a puzzling claim, being inconsistent with the characteristics alleged for the omni God Yahweh. This enormously underachieving act is not what Love (see 1 John 4:8) could/would have done if Love is omniscient, perfect and complete, omnipotent, and sovereign. It would have been Love’s will that no one perish—exactly what 2 Peter 3:9 claims—and with these omni characteristics his will that no one perish would have been accomplished.

God [Yahweh] cannot do two mutually exclusive things at the same time. He cannot give man free-will and make him incapable of sinning. [This was added 11-26-13]

This objection assumes that free will and the inability to sin are mutually exclusive; i.e., in the same class with the impossiblity for Yahweh, even with his alleged omni characteristics, to be able to make a square circle. 

However, free will simply means that one is free to choose between options. But options can be limited. For example, neither I nor any other human has the physical ability to jump to the moon. Although I have free will, jumping to the moon is not a choice that I can make. Indeed, mankind has many such limitations on his free will.

It would not be possible for a God with the omni characteristics that Yahweh is alleged to have to give man the option to choose anything that would cause man to eternally perish.

What possible motivation would such a God have to not limit man's available free-will options to those that would not put him in jeopardy of eternally perishing?

An Example Of A Valid Inerrancy Test

From the Errancy Discussion List, 11-14-95:

RH All right, I think inerrancy is a good test to use because the Bible is alleged to be the word of God and to be so, it must not contain any errors.

If the Bible contains errors, or is errant, it cannot be the word of God.

Inerrancy is one test that I think we should use to determine if the Bible is the word of God. What else is needed?

TILL: I don't think we are communicating on this point, Roger. I'm trying to find out how one can go about "testing for inerrancy." I can't really see that fundamentalists "test" inerrancy. When confronted with a text whose face-value meaning contradicts the face-value meaning of another text, they just arbitrarily assign a figurative or possible-but-unlikely meaning to one of the texts. I can't see that this is a valid way to test inerrancy. As I have offered to do in past postings, if you or anyone will send me an example of contradiction or inconsistency in a nonbiblical historical document, I will use inerrantist methods to show that the contradiction or inconsistency doesn't exist when my "explanation" is accepted. However, I can't see that such an explanation would constitute a valid test for inerrancy in the document, because it lacks corroborative proof and fails to recognize the possibility that errancy might actually exist in the text.

Let me give an example of what I think would constitute a valid inerrancy test. The Bible says that David killed a Philistine warrior named Goliath who had a spear whose"staff was like a weaver's beam" (1 Samuel 17:7), but 2 Samuel 21:19 says that the Philistine Goliath "whose spear was like a weaver's beam" was killed by Elhanan. Errantists consider this a "doublet" that found its way into the Bible by writers who incorporated two separate versions of a legend into 1 Samuel. In one legend, David killed Goliath; in the other Elhanan killed Goliath. Inerrantists, however, argue that this is not a doublet, but separate incidents. In other words, there were two Goliaths 'whose spear was like a weaver's beam." David killed one of the Goliaths; Elhanan killed the other. Period, end of the discussion! The discrepancy is resolved, and the Bible has passed the "test" of inerrancy.

Inerrantists, however, fail to realize that just because the postulation of two Goliaths conveniently resolves the problem, it in no way proves that there really were two Goliaths. However, the problem could be satisfactorily resolved if archaeologists should discover extrabiblical records left by the Philistines that clearly and unequivocally refer to the existence of two giants named Goliath. We would also need some kind of archaeological evidence that David existed, because many scholars consider him to be sort of the "King Arthur" of Hebrew folklore. To date, archaeologists have discovered only two very questionable references to David in nonbiblical references. Archaeologists have discovered nonbiblical references to Ahab, Omri, and several other Israelite kings less prominent than David but no indisputable references to David, the most famous king of them all, and this seems strange indeed in view of the prominence that he was given in biblical documents. So if confirmation of David's existence and the existence of two Goliaths could be obtained through extrabiblical records, this would be a reasonable confirmation of the Bible's accuracy in its references to two Goliaths. In the absence of such evidence, however, the two-Goliaths explanation of the inerrantists is pure speculation that proves nothing at all about the Bible's accuracy in this matter.

Farrell Till