What criteria do historians use to get to the minimal facts about the historical Jesus?

Have you ever heard Gary Habermas, Michael Licona or William Lane Craig defend the resurrection of Jesus in a debate by saying that the resurrection is the best explanation for the “minimal facts” about Jesus? The lists of minimal facts that they use are typically agreed to by their opponents during the debates. Minimal facts are the parts of the New Testament that meet a set of strict historical criteria. These are the facts that skeptical historians agree with, totally apart from any religious beliefs.

So what are the criteria that skeptical historians use to derive a list of minimal facts about Jesus?

Dr. Craig explains them in this article.

Excerpt:

The other way, more influential in contemporary New Testament scholarship, is to establish specific facts about Jesus without assuming the general reliability of the Gospels. The key here are the so-called “Criteria of Authenticity” which enable us to establish specific sayings or events in Jesus’ life as historical. Scholars involved in the quest of the historical Jesus have enunciated a number of these critieria for detecting historically authentic features of Jesus, such as dissimilarity to Christian teaching, multiple attestation, linguistic semitisms, traces of Palestinian milieu, retention of embarrassing material, coherence with other authentic material, and so forth.

It is somewhat misleading to call these “criteria,” for they aim at stating sufficient, not necessary, conditions of historicity. This is easy to see: suppose a saying is multiply attested and dissimilar but not embarrassing. If embarrassment were a necessary condition of authenticity, then the saying would have to be deemed inauthentic, which is wrong-headed, since its multiple attestation and dissimilarity are sufficient for authenticity. Of course, the criteria are defeasible, meaning that they are not infallible guides to authenticity. They might be better called “Indications of Authenticity” or “Signs of Credibility.”

In point of fact, what the criteria really amount to are statements about the effect of certain types of evidence upon the probability of various sayings or events in Jesus’ life. For some saying or event S and evidence of a certain type E, the criteria would state that, all things being equal, the probability of S given E is greater than the probability of S on our background knowledge alone. So, for example, all else being equal, the probability of some event or saying is greater given its multiple attestation than it would have been without it.

What are some of the factors that might serve the role of E in increasing the probability of some saying or event S? The following are some of the most important:

(1) Historical congruence: S fits in with known historical facts concerning the context in which S is said to have occurred.

(2) Independent, early attestation: S appears in multiple sources which are near to the time at which S is alleged to have occurred and which depend neither upon each other nor a common source.

(3) Embarrassment: S is awkward or counter-productive for the persons who serve as the source of information for S.

(4) Dissimilarity: S is unlike antecedent Jewish thought-forms and/or unlike subsequent Christian thought-forms.

(5) Semitisms: traces in the narrative of Aramaic or Hebrew linguistic forms.

(6) Coherence: S is consistent with already established facts about Jesus.

For a good discussion of these factors see Robert Stein, “The ‘Criteria’ for Authenticity,” in Gospel Perspectives I, ed. R. T. France and David Wenham (Sheffield, England: JSOT Press, 1980), pp. 225-63.

Notice that these “criteria” do not presuppose the general reliability of the Gospels. Rather they focus on a particular saying or event and give evidence for thinking that specific element of Jesus’ life to be historical, regardless of the general reliability of the document in which the particular saying or event is reported. These same “criteria” are thus applicable to reports of Jesus found in the apocryphal Gospels, or rabbinical writings, or even the Qur’an. Of course, if the Gospels can be shown to be generally reliable documents, so much the better! But the “criteria” do not depend on any such presupposition. They serve to help spot historical kernels even in the midst of historical chaff. Thus we need not concern ourselves with defending the Gospels’ every claim attributed to Jesus in the gospels; the question will be whether we can establish enough about Jesus to make faith in him reasonable.

And you can see Dr. Craig using these criteria to defend minimal facts in his debates. For example, in his debate with Ehrman, he alludes to the criteria when making his case for the empty tomb.

Here, he uses multiple attestation and the criteria of embarrassment:

Among the reasons which have led most scholars to this conclusion are the following:

1. The empty tomb is also multiply attested by independent, early sources.

Mark’s source didn’t end with the burial, but with the story of the empty tomb, which is tied to the burial story verbally and grammatically. Moreover, Matthew and John have independent sources about the empty tomb; it’s also mentioned in the sermons in the Acts of the Apostles (2.29; 13.36); and it’s implied by Paul in his first letter to the Corinthian church (I Cor. 15.4). Thus, we have again multiple, early, independent attestation of the fact of the empty tomb.

2. The tomb was discovered empty by women.

In patriarchal Jewish society the testimony of women was not highly regarded. In fact, the Jewish historian Josephus says that women weren’t even permitted to serve as witnesses in a Jewish court of law. Now in light of this fact, how remarkable it is that it is women who are the discoverers of Jesus’ empty tomb. Any later legendary account would certainly have made male disciples like Peter and John discover the empty tomb. The fact that it is women, rather than men, who are the discoverers of the empty tomb is best explained by the fact that they were the chief witnesses to the fact of the empty tomb, and the Gospel writers faithfully record what, for them, was an awkward and embarrassing fact.

There are actually a few more reasons for believing in the empty tomb that he doesn’t go into in the debate, but you can find them in his written work. For example, in his essay on Gerd Ludemann’s “vision” hypothesis. That essay covers the reasons for all four of his minimal facts.

So, if you are going to talk about the resurrection with a skeptic, you don’t want to invoke the Bible as some sort of inerrant/inspired Holy Book. You want to look at it as a historical book, and use historical criteria to get to some facts that critical historians would accept. From that, it’s possible to make a case for the resurrection, which is the guarantee that the words of Jesus are authoritative. Including the words of Jesus where he describes the Bible as a whole as God’s revelation of Himself to his creatures.

Here is the approach I use when talking to non-Christian co-workers:

  1. Explain the criteria that historians use to get their lists of minimal facts
  2. Explain your list of minimal facts
  3. Defend your list of minimal facts using the criteria
  4. Cite skeptics who admit to each of your minimal facts, to show that they are widely accepted
  5. List some parts of the Bible that don’t pass the criteria (e.g. – guard at the tomb, Matthew earthquake)
  6. Explain why those parts don’t pass the criteria, and explain that they are not part of your case
  7. Challenge your opponent to either deny some or all the facts, or propose a naturalistic alternative that explains the facts better than the resurrection
  8. Don’t let your opponent attack any of your minimal facts by attacking other parts of the Bible (e.g. – the number of angels being one or two, etc.)

And remember that there is no good case for the resurrection that does not make heavy use of the early creed in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8. That passages is universally accepted as early, eyewitness testimony from Paul, and represents the core of early Christian beliefs about the death and resurrection of Jesus. Everyone who takes evidence seriously has to account for that early creed, which passes the historical tests I outlined above.

The best essay on the minimal facts criteria that I’ve read is the one by Robert H. Stein in “Contending with Christianity’s Critics“. It’s a good short essay that goes over all the historical criteria that are used to derive the short list of facts from which we infer the conclusion “God raised Jesus from the dead”. That whole book is really very, very good.

Christian doctor guilty of “professional misconduct” in fascist Australia

If I had to pick which Western countries are the most hostile to Christians, Australia would be near the top of the list. Now there’s a new story about a Christian doctor named Jereth Kok. He posted some pretty standard stuff on social media under his own name. Tame stuff like Katy Faust, Babylon Bee, etc. Stuff we’ve all done. But that was too much for the fascists of Australia.

An article I found from The Daily Declaration, a Christian news site based in Australia explains the facts:

A landmark free speech case has found that Dr Jereth Kok’s Christian and conservative views disqualify him from medical practice, even though his social media posts weren’t directed at patients and most were shared with limited visibility.

Dr Jereth Kok, a Melbourne-based GP suspended for posting memes, satire and Christian commentary on social media, has been found guilty of professional misconduct, in a landmark case with far-reaching implications for free speech in Australia.

In a 186-page ruling handed down last Tuesday, the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) found that Dr Kok’s deeply held religious views, expressed on social media between 2008 and 2022, were sufficient grounds to indefinitely suspend him from the medical profession.

Dr Kok — who had no prior history of patient complaints or professional misconduct before his suspension — now faces a separate sanctions hearing in early 2026 that could result in the full cancellation of his medical license.

In Medical Board of Australia v Dr Jereth Kok, VCAT assessed 85 social media posts made by Dr Kok on topics ranging from abortion to same-sex marriage, Islam, sex change surgery for children, COVID-19 mandates and “conversion therapy” bans.

The Tribunal concluded that two-thirds of the posts “denigrated, demeaned and slurred” members of protected identity groups and other medical practitioners, and also contributed to vaccine hesitancy.

Focus in on this:

Around 80 per cent of Dr Kok’s implicated posts were made on Facebook, with only 13 of those visible to the general public — indicating that complainants and regulators either actively sought them out or were tipped off by people in his wider network.

This is why it is important for Christians to not only have an alias, but be careful about who you let see your posts. As the article indicates, many of the social media posts used to condemn Dr. Kok were posted with the limited audience settings enabled. It didn’t save him from surveillance and persecution by the Australian fascist government.

Another article from The Daily Declaration added more details:

What began as anonymous complaints triggered a years-long, taxpayer-funded witch hunt to comb through over a decade of his online religious and political commentary, ultimately branding him “unfit to practise” for holding and sharing Christian beliefs.

The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal may have only just handed down its ruling against Dr Jereth Kok, but behind the scenes, the witch hunt began years ago. And now, following eight items of correspondence to and from AHPRA to other parties (that have been secured by Nation First), we can see the full scale of the ideological operation to break a Christian GP for the crime of expressing his beliefs online.

And this should be SHOCKING to you:

On 5 August 2019, the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) sent a formal demand to Facebook’s Sydney office. The letter, marked Private and Confidential, required Facebook to produce:

  • Every post and comment ever made by Dr Kok
  • Comments made under his posts by other users
  • Deleted and archived content
  • Evidence of any community standards violations
  • Details of any warnings or bans
  • The dates, times, and content of every interaction

This wasn’t a narrow review. It was a blanket data trawl from 2014 to 2019, a five-year dragnet to scrutinise his private thoughts, satire, and Christian commentary.

And this was all done without a single complaint from a patient. Not one.

And more:

AHPRA hired Ferrier Hodgson, a private forensic firm, and commissioned them to scour not only Facebook, but also websites and blogs, where Dr Kok had posted comments over the years. The result:

  • 239 web pages crawled
  • 122 pages identified with Kok’s name
  • Sophisticated “scrolling” software deployed to uncover hidden and de-ranked comments
  • Facebook’s own privacy settings bypassed using test accounts
  • A full quote for this particular item of work: one email dated 5 June 2019 cites an estimate $4,800 to $6,000 in taxpayer funds.

[…]This was not standard medical oversight but, rather, a government-ordered deep-dive into a man’s personal and political life.

They didn’t just want to know what Dr Kok had said. They wanted to know everywhere he’d said it, everyone he’d said it to, and everything anyone said in response.

I really recommend that you read both of these articles IN FULL, as they were excellent, and help us to understand how the secular left is operating in countries where they have political power.

My thoughts

If you want to be a Christian, it is wise to have to have an alias, and keep that alias a secret from all but close friends and family. One of the advantages of doing this is that you don’t get FIRED and find yourself unable to work in your field for SIX YEARS, when you have a wife and 4 kids to provide for. Don’t listen to advice from people who mock aliases. They aren’t going to pay your bills.

Second, pro-abortion and pro-LGBT “Christian conservatives” like Tomi Lahren are always complaining about “why aren’t men more masculine?” Well, many feminized Christians and feminized conservatives don’t define masculinity as “leading on moral and spiritual issues”. They understand masculinity when “a man pays a woman’s bills and fixes her appliances”. They look at what this doctor did, and they say “that’s wrong, he used his speech to make non-Christians feel bad!” They think that Christianity means “being nice so that I feel good, and non-Christians like me” These people do not see masculinity as correcting lies and protecting the weak from evil. Men are learning from cases like Daniel Penny’s case to be more careful about how they confront lies and protect the weak. It’s straight out of C.S. Lewis’ “Men Without Chests” essay.

Finally, Christians should not be ashamed to vote for lower taxes and smaller government. As we can see in this case, the bigger the government is, the more power they have to ruin your life. So vote for politicians who want to cut taxes and shrink government so that they are only doing the jobs that are outlined in the Constitution.

Things are getting worse for conservatives and Christians in the UK

In the past, I’ve written about how the UK is a dangerous secular left fascist country that suppresses the basic human rights of its citizens. In the UK, free speech that disagrees with government policies is illegal. You can’t defend yourself from the criminals that the government imports from third-world countries. And they have two-tier policing – one justice system for allies, and one for enemies.

So, here is how I formed my opinion of the UK. According to Douglas Murray’s “The Strange Death of Europe”, the UK let in unskilled immigrants from Middle Eastern countries. Some of those went on to run child sex-trafficking rings. This has happened in many cities in the UK. And when the parents of the sex-trafficked girls complained to the police, the police refused to do anything, because they said that it’s “racist” to investigate those crimes. This is secular left woke police in action. And then if UK taxpayers say something about the failures of the taxpayer-funded politicians and police to protect their kids, then the police will charge them with hate crimes and hate speech. That’s what’s going on in the UK right now, and has been for some time.

So, let’s see some news stories to learn how things are going.

Here’s the UK Daily Mail, explaining what you have to do in order to be flagged by the UK government as a threat to their policies.

It says:

Record numbers of over-60s are being referred to the Government’s troubled anti-terrorism scheme, the Daily Mail can reveal today. Home Office figures show 127 adults in their 60s or beyond were put on Prevent’s radar in 2023/24 – the most since records began in 2016. Of them, 43 had sparked alarm for expressing ‘extreme right wing’ views.

“Extreme right wing” views are basically things like disagreeing with the child sex-trafficking rings. If you disagree with child sex-trafficking, then the UK government thinks that you are “extreme right wing” and a potential terrorist.

I’m not kidding:

Last month, it was revealed how Prevent training documents listed sharing the view that Western culture was ‘under threat from mass migration and a lack of integration’ was a ‘terrorist ideology’.

Are you wondering how they determine who is a potential terrorist? Well, if you watch certain comedy shows like “Yes, Minister” and “The Thick of It”, then you might be a terrorist. Or if you like old war movies. Or if you own any Shakespeare plays.

Look:

Even the 1955 epic war film The Dam Busters and The Complete Works Of William Shakespeare were flagged as possible red flags of extremism by Prevent’s Research Information and Communications Unit.

Just FYI, I am probably on their list. I just recently read a book about the Dam Busters mission (“Operation Chastise”) called “Enemy Coast Ahead (Uncensored)” by the lead pilot of that mission, Guy Gibson. And I even want to buy a boardgame version of it, if GMT ever gets around to printing it with a mounted map board.

And of course I own two Complete Shakespeares – The Illustrated Globe edition from my high school days, and an audio book version. Not only that, but I was recently bugging Grok to tell me the best classical commentaries on Shakespeare, because that’s what I want to read when I’m retired (at 50, not 60). I never wanted to be a software engineer – I wanted to teach people the wisdom that you can get out of the British classics and Shakespeare.

And the UK goverment is finding a lot of people who are potential terrorists:

Across all age groups, more than 1,300 people were referred to Prevent last year for ‘extreme right wing’ behaviour, including 27 kids under the age of ten.

But Islam is no big deal:

Over the same period, the overall number of referrals under the Islamist umbrella has plunged by 75 per cent, from 3,706 to 913 – or 13 per cent of the total.

Now, you might think that a failed nation like the UK would be more concerned about their failing healthcare system. Or their violent crime epidemic. Or their third-world economy. Or their diminished role in keeping peace in the world. Or their criminalization of free speech. Or… their child sex-trafficking rings. But no.

Now, let’s look at a different article, one that shows what happens to Christians who try to speak about what the Bible says in the UK.

Here is a recent article from the UK Telegraph:

A school chaplain who was sacked after telling children they were free to question LGBT policies has told how he is still living in “shame and spiritual exile” six years later.

The Rev Bernard Randall, 52, lost his job at Trent College in Derbyshire and was referred to the Government’s Prevent counter-terrorism programme after delivering a sermon to pupils.

During the 2019 sermon, Dr Randall discussed identity politics and said pupils did not have to agree with LGBT teaching.

This obviously affected his finances:

Dr Randall, who is married and has a daughter, said: “I got part-time work with an adult education provider. So we’re OK, but we’ve definitely had to tighten our belts.”

Let me quickly say that many narcissistic people these days are asking “why don’t men lead?” and “why don’t men protect?” and “why don’t men provide?”. And the answer is because it has become costly – finances and freedom – to do so. People find male leadership offensive, and men lose their jobs for leading.

The article also notes that his punishment is ongoing, because of the first female Bishop in the Church of England:

Despite being cleared of wrongdoing over the 2019 sermon, Dr Randall was barred from preaching after a decision by the Rt Rev Libby Lane, the Bishop of Derby, over concerns that he could pose a risk of harm to children.

It’s a common view among feminists that men’s moral and spiritual leadership is “harmful to children”, because feminists interpret their own sad feelings about demonstrated male competence at decision-making as evidence that demonstrated male competence at decision-making will be harmful to children. Single mothers are doing so well raising kids, they think.

Here are more recent stories about life in the UK: