Tag Archives: Christian Apologetics

Mentoring

What is the criterion of embarrassment, and what are some examples of it?

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Sherlock Holmes and John Watson are going to take a look at the data
Sherlock Holmes and John Watson are going to take a look at the data

The criterion of embarrassment is just one of the historical criteria used to select the parts of a piece of ancient literature that is likely to be historical. Other things in the source may have happened, but we can’t know them as history. If significant parts of a text are historical, it is possible to accept it as historical until there are specific reasons to say that some part of it is NOT historical.

Here is William Lane Craig’s list of criteria for a saying or event to be historical:

  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.

The criteria is the same for liberal historians and conservative historians, although some historians weight one criteria more than others when trying to evaluate the historicity of different New Testament parts.

Here’s Christian apologist Dr. Frank Turek explaining what the criterion is, and some examples:

Franks’s a great speaker, you should watch that.

What’s amazing is that even liberal historians will give you facts that are embarrassing to the authors as “historical”.

Anyway, here are 8 examples of parts of the New Testament that exhibit the criterion of embarrassment, thanks to theologian C. Michael Patton.

  1. Jesus’ Baptism
  2. Jesus’ Family Did Not Believe
  3. John the Baptist’s Doubt
  4. The Disciples Doubted After the Resurrection
  5. Jesus Does not Know the Time of His Coming
  6. Women are the First to Witness the Resurrection
  7. Jesus Cursed a Fig Tree
  8. Death and Resurrection of Christ

I think 6 and 8 are the ones I want you to take away with you when you finish this post.

Here they are:

Women are the First to Witness the Resurrection

This is one that is often brought up. Craig Keener puts it well enough: “The witness of women at the tomb is very likely historical, precisely because it was so offensive to the larger culture — not the sort of testimony one would invent. Not all testimony was regarded as being of equal merit; the trustworthiness of witnesses was considered essential. Yet most of Jesus’ Jewish contemporaries held much less esteem for the testimony of women than for that of men; this suspicion reflects a broader Mediterranean limited trust of women’s speech and testimony also enshrined in Roman law.” (Keener, The Historical Jesus, 331)

And:

Death and Resurrection of Christ

This easily escapes our notice since the basic story of Christ is so well known. However, both the death and resurrection of Christ are, from the standpoint of the culture of the day, embarrassing and damaging. Concerning the death of Christ on a cross, Paul sees this problem: “But we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (1 Cor. 1:23). The word used for “stumbling block” is skandalon. Louw-Nida defines this as “that which causes offense and thus arouses opposition.” Why? Because the Jews would never have thought their Messiah would have been hung on a tree. “Cursed is one who hangs on a tree” (Gal. 3:13; Deut 21:23). The Greeks thought of the resurrection as foolishness as they were dualist, essentially believing that the material world was evil and the spiritual world good. They would have scoffed at the idea that Christ returned to physical form. This is why later Greeks attempted to adapt the Christ story, doing away with the physical resurrection. Marcion is the most famous promoter of this view (see Docitism).

Now, when you are talking about the New Testament to your non-believing friends, you definitely want to draw attention to passages that are embarrassing to the authors. It will help you to be more convincing when you explain the New Testament like a historian.

By the way, you can read an entire post I did on all the criteria that historians use to evaluate ancient historical documents.

Mentoring

William Lane Craig talks about the book “Contending With Christianity’s Critics”

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William Lane Craig lecturing to university students
William Lane Craig lecturing to students and faculty at Purdue University

Note: This book is currently on sale for only 99 cents (Kindle edition). Get it! Sorry if the price has changed by the time you read this post.

A series of three interviews from the “Reasonable Faith” podcast about the essay collection “Contending with Christianity’s Critics: Answering New Atheists and Other Objectors“.

Here is the first MP3 file.

Topics:

  • About the editor Paul Copan, (the nicest Christian apologist)
  • 1: Responding to Dawkins’ argument “Who designed the designer?”
  • 2: Responding to the multiverse counter to the fine-tuning argument
  • 3: The argument that rationality and consciouness require theism
  • 4: The evidence for humans being hard-wired for belief in God
  • 5: Responding to naturalism’s claim to rationally ground morality
  • 6: Responding to Dawkins’ idea that the universe looks undesigned

Here is the second MP3 file.

Topics:

  • 7: The criteria that historians use to establish historical reliability
  • 8: Did Jesus think that he was the Son of Man in Daniel
  • 9: A time line for the resurrection of Jesus from the early sources
  • 10: Responding to scholarly distortions of the historical Jesus
  • 11: Responding to Bart Ehrman’s claim that the NT text is corrupted
  • 12: The evidence for Jesus divine self-understanding

Here is the third MP3 file.

Topics:

  • 13: The logical coherence of the concept of God
  • 14: The logical coherence of the doctrine of the Trinity
  • 15: The logical coherence of the doctrine of the Incarnation
  • 16: The logical coherence of the doctrine of the Atonement
  • 17: The logical coherence of the doctrine of the Hell
  • 18: Responding to objections to God’s knowledge of the future

My favorite chapters in this book are the ones by Mark Linville on evolution and morality, and the chapter by Robert H. Stein on historical criteria and methodology. This is not an introductory book, this book is an intermediate-level book. You want to read the two Jim Wallace books and the Lee Strobel “Case For” books before you tackle this one.

Much of the book is philosophy and philosophy of religion and philosophical theology. Well, I guess everyone knows that I hate non-STEM disciplines, and I only read philosophy because it’s useful for Christian apologetics. If you are like me, and think that only STEM disciplines have value, then this book is for you. You will be able to make use of it in your case-making adventures. It. Works. This is the stuff that gets William Lane Craig invited to all the best universities to debate against all the best atheists. And he beats them all up with it, too.

Mentoring

William Lane Craig explains the faith enterprise in an 8-minute video

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Investigation in progress
Investigation in progress

I found the video below on the blog of my friend Eric Chabot, who just recently hosted Michael Licona at the Ohio State University. I am hopeful we will get the recording of that soon, and I heard it was a very good lecture and a good turnout.

Here is the video, featuring Dr. William Lane Craig:

When I was doing my undergraduate degree, I had an atheist friend who was super smart, and he once surprised me by announcing that he had read the gospel of John. Flabbergasted, I asked him why. He said “I just wanted to see what all the fuss was about”. Indeed. And this video from Dr. Craig explains to you what all the fuss is about. This is basically everything that everyone – Christian or non-Christian – should know about what Christianity is about. This is what I wish all my co-workers knew about me.

I really wish that non-Christians could understand how different Christianity is is from other religions, because it is true. Half my family is Muslim, the other half is Hindu and some Catholic. There is literally nothing cognitive going on in the spiritual journeys of my Muslim and Hindu friends and family members. But Christianity is so different from that – it is truth-centered. Anyway, in the rest of this post, I’ll describe three striking things about the Christian worldview.

Christianity is testable

First, the Christian worldview is testable scientifically and historically. There are claims made about the external world in Christianity. For example, creation is a major doctrine in the Bible, and in Romans 1, Psalm 19 and other places, God explains to us through his human scribes that the nature of the world (created, designed) is there to prove to us that there is a Creator and Designer. If the universe were eternal, and complex embodied life common for any permutation of the constants and quantities that are built into the fabric of the universe, that would be evidence for atheism. And the same with history. As 1 Corinthians 15 says, if the historical person of Jesus did not die and was not seen alive after by large numbers of friends, skeptics, and enemies, then there is no point in being a Christian. Christianity started out as a movement in the very time and place where the events that make it significant happened. There was no long delay between the central events, and the earliest proclamation of those events. So, you can test scientifically and historically. If the universe did not begin to exist, and if Jesus did not rise from the dead, then Christianity would be disproved. These are things that anyone can investigate, but some people do not because they are afraid about what they will find, and how much they will have to adjust to God’s existence and character.

Christianity is hard

Second, Christianity is not something that you get into because you need a crutch or because it enhances your life. It is not done in order to fit in with your family or with your culture or with your nation’s dominant religion. Christianity is designed to not be fun, to not be easy, to not make you popular. In fact, one of the ways that you know that you are a real Christian and that God is leading you, is because God allows you to suffer, and because some people around you don’t like you, and because your career and finances and so on are a little harder because now there is God to worry about in the decision-making, and not just you. It’s like being married. A good marriage takes work because it is a commitment to another person. The more you learn about God through your study of science, history, theology and apologetics, the more you love him. And the more you love him, the more you choose to adjust your priorities and actions in a way that will invest in the relationship, instead of just what is best for you.

Christianity is effective

Third, Christianity is not about just being passive, having feelings and doing private things like prayer, singing and attending church. Christianity, when done right, involves projecting your beliefs outward. Evangelism, the practice of telling non-Christians the truth about Christianity, is not optional for Christians. Although many other religions dislike Christians for evangelizing, and some even use coercion and force to stop us, it is our responsibility. Many Christians seek to augment their evangelism by learning how to answer objections to Christianity, and how to make a case for the truth of core Christian beliefs. This involves studying philosophy, as well as scientific and historical evidence. And then there are other things to do – like organizing talks with good scholars on university campuses, and funding them through your job. Giving to charities that protect religious liberty, promote the pro-life message, and natural marriage. Those last two are important, because Christians care about children, since they are made by God, in order to know God, and selfish adults must be convinced control themselves. Christians often get involved in politics, seeking to limit the power of the secular government to infringe on human rights, to promote economic growth and to support the military when they engage in just wars. Christians often serve in the police force or the military, because we seek to restrain and destroy evil and protect the good.

You should use this video as a way to think again about what your life is about. Have you investigated the evidence for Christianity? Have you made an effort to find answers to your objections to Christianity? Have you thought about how to live out your Christianity and make a difference for Christ and his Kingdom? What’s your plan?

Let’s get started

Two good Kindle books are on sale right now, for those who want to investigate the claims of Christianity:

Positive arguments for Christian theism