In Response

This post is in response to comments left on the "Miracles" post. Because of its length, it would not fit in the comments section, which is where I would have liked to reply to these comments. There is a first comment and response left by "Bino" for those of you who would like to start from the beginning; this response from me is a reply to his second and third comments. His comments are in italics; my replies are in normal Times font.

Well, if the very first thing you do is assert that there is no connection, then you're pretty much guaranteed to end up concluding the same thing.


Alexander the Great's father was a great god in the sky, his mother was a mortal woman. The divinity of his father was seen as a sign of his greatness.


Romulus' father was a great god in the sky, his mother was a mortal woman. The divinity of his father was seen as a sign of his greatness.

Scipio Africanus' father was a great god in the sky, his mother was a mortal woman. The divinity of his father was seen as a sign of his greatness.

The Emperor Augustus' father was a great god in the sky, his mother was a mortal woman. The divinity of his father was seen as a sign of his greatness.

Jesus' father was a great god in the sky, his mother was a mortal woman. The divinity of his father was seen as a sign of his greatness.

Shall we accept that you have no answer to explain the similarity between Jesus' divine birth and all these other ancient divine births?

I was not attempting to explain, or deny, the similarity between Jesus’ divine birth and the other ancient divine births. My point was that similarities with other stories which are false does not necessarily make all such stories false. Again, Jesus’ story (and every other one for that matter) deserves to be judged by its own merits, not judged based on the falsehood of others.

If 10 people come up to a total stranger one at a time and claim to be “Bino Bolumai” and the stranger, becoming more skeptical each time, finds the claims not to be true, does it follow that if you, the real “Bino Bolumai” come up to the stranger and claim to be you that it can’t be true because similar claims were found to be false?

Obviously it does not. Your claim deserves to be judged on a case by case basis and the other 10 false claims do nothing on their own to disqualify your claim.

Alexander was a historical person.
Romulus was a historical person.
Augustus was a historical person.
Scipio was a historical person.

Yes, these were historical men. I was comparing the historicalness of Jesus to the mythological figures you mentioned in your post. But let’s deal with the historical men you also mentioned.

Alexander was aware he was promoting a myth when he claimed to be born of deity. Atheist Christopher Hitchens writes, “Alexander himself was not above using myth for propaganda purposes. He claimed descent from Achilles, the hero of Troy, and from Zeus himself. He took the work of Homer with him wherever he went. He wanted to be acknowledged as Pharaoh in Egypt—the loftiest of all aspirations in those days—and also to be recognized as a god by those who worshipped the Olympian pantheon.” (http://slate.msn.com/id/2110188/) Conversely, Jesus believed (whether we believe or not) that His claims to deity were true.

It is only a minority of scholars who believe Romulus was a historical figure. The majority believe he is only a mythological figure.

Augustus was eager to expand his power into the religious realm, and in Rome, where emperors were routinely worshipped among their pantheon of gods, it was easy for him to claim, and be accepted as deity. As in Alexander’s case, Augustus used a claim of deity for his own purposes to gain more power. Also, as we are seeing from these few examples, it was very common for emperors to be worshipped as gods and to be referred to as the sons of gods.

Scipio was said to be the son of Jupiter who had appeared in his mother’s bed in the form of a snake. The historian Polybius believes, however, that Scipio was as manipulative as Alexander and Augustus in letting claims of his deity spread.

While there are similarities between Jesus and these other historical men, there are also important differences. 1) Jesus was not trying to gain anything from his claims. He even discouraged others who wanted to say he was king of any earthly kingdom. He wasn’t after power. 2) While Alexander and Augustus (and maybe Scipio as well) used a claim to deity to manipulate, Jesus actually believed that he was the Son of God. 3) Most importantly, Jesus’ claim to be the Son of God was authenticated by God when He raised Jesus from the dead. (I know you’re unlikely to grant the resurrection is true, but the evidence for it is so strong that it will be incumbent upon you to find a better explanation and provide evidence for that as an explanation to the events after Jesus’ death.) Alexander, Augustus, Scipio, and Romulus – if he was indeed a historical figure – had nothing to verify their claims of deity.

How do you know they didn't?

How do I know that people who knew the stories going around about Jesus weren’t true didn’t call the apostles liars and show that their stories weren’t true? Because Christianity – or “The Way” as it was called in its earliest stages – started and spread in the very city that was filled with people who knew Jesus and were aware of his ministry. If you’re going to spread a lie, do you start where everyone knows it isn’t true? And would it catch on like the Christian message did in a city filled with people who could prove it false?

I have. I can't. Please help me see the differences:

Again, I am referring to the mythological tales. Here is part of the myth of Osiris, one of the myths mentioned in your first comment:

Set was very jealous of Osiris because he was more important than him. He decided to make an evil plan to kill him. He threw a party. At the party, there was a beautiful chest there. Set promised that whoever fit into the chest perfectly would get to keep it. Nobody knew that he had secretly made it the perfect size for Osiris. Everyone tried it but would not fit. When Osiris tried it, Set slammed it closed and nailed it shut. He threw it into the Nile to be swept away. Isis was heart broken and immediately set off to find him.


Meanwhile, the casket had been swept onto shore. A tree had grown op around it, enclosing it in its trunk. Then the tree had been cut down and was used as a pillar for the palace of King Byblos. Isis found this out and came there in disguise. Byblos saw her and begged her to take care of his child. Isis grew quite fond of the child and decided to make him immortal. So every night she would throw him onto magical fires to burn away all that was mortal about him. Then Isis would turn herself into a swallow and fly around the pillar weeping for her spouse. Unexpectedly one day Byblos came home and saw his child in the fires and blew them out. Isis became angry and told him that now his son could never become immortal. He apologized and asked what he could do to make it up to her. Isis asked for the pillar and he let her have it. She removed the casket and wept upon it. Then she brought it home and when no one was looking, she opened it up. She turned into a bird called a kite and flapped her mighty wings. The wind her beating wings created gave him the Breath of Life for one day. During this time, she conceived her son Horus from him. Then she concealed the casket among long reeds. She went away to secretly give birth to her son. (http://www.guardians.net/egypt/kids/myth_of_osiris_and_isis.htm)

I’m sure I don’t have to help you see the difference in this story and Jesus’ story. But to deal with the ones you’ve listed in your second comment, I would again point out that the falsity of the stories told by Tacitus and Josephus cannot lead to the conclusion that the stories told in the New Testament documents are false. They should be investigated independently, as should Tacitus and Josephus, despite their similarities, which I am not denying. Also, these stories came after Jesus’ miracles, so if anything, the stories you quoted regarding Vespasian are mimicking the stories of Jesus. (Perhaps because Christianity was flourishing?)

Josephus is reporting historical events that involved actual, flesh-and-blood people. Tacitus is reporting historical events that involved actual, flesh-and-blood people.

Once again, I had in mind mythology in the popular sense of the word – the fanciful stories of murder, intrigue, and disloyalty…but see above for my comment on the reports of Josephus and Tacitus.

You've devolved into mere assertion.

“Assertion” is a statement made emphatically as if no evidence were needed. I indicated in my response that there is very strong evidence for Jesus’ resurrection. I didn’t go through it all for the sake of space, but we could definitely get in to that topic if you’d like.

I ask because
Jesus healed the sick. Pagan Gods healed the sick.
Jesus walked on water. Pagan Gods walked on water.
Jesus turned water into wine. Pagan Gods turned water into wine.
Jesus calmed the storm. Pagan Gods calmed storms.
Jesus fulfilled prophecy. Pagan Gods fulfilled prophecy.
Jesus prophesied correctly. Pagan Gods prophesied correctly.
Jesus raised the dead. Pagan Gods raised the dead.
Jesus rose from the dead. Pagan Gods rose from the dead.
Jesus apostles performed miracles. Pagan Gods' apostles performed miracles.

Jesus’ miracles were most often set in historical contexts making it at least possible that they could be verified. I’m not sure which pagan stories you’re referring to here, but many are not set in any historical context that would allow them to be verified.

You said nothing in response to my other questions regarding your presuppositions. What proof do you have that Jesus didn’t in fact perform these miracles? Skepticism is not without responsibilities. We are asked to back up what we believe as Christians, we would ask the same of you. Back up your belief that these things didn’t happen.

Either you see the similarities or you don't. If you don't, please just say so.
If you do see the similarities, please tell me how you explain them.

I do see similarities and haven’t indicated otherwise. I just don’t believe similarity between several accounts is enough to prove all of them false out of hand simply because most are false. I also see significant differences which I listed above.

Jesus, Humanness, and Sin

This week I received an email asking me for help in responding to a minister's claim that Jesus sinned and was "messed-up" like the rest of us. The minister contended that Jesus could not have been fully human unless he too sinned. I run into this idea every so often and am surprised what a low, and mistaken, view of humans (not to mention Jesus!) it purports. But, how often are we susceptible to thinking that sin is normal? Is sin an essential part of what it means to be human? Was Jesus not quite fully human if he did not sin?

Sinfullness is neither an essential quality of humanness nor is it a normal human condition. Let's start with my first claim. Think about what it would mean for sin to be an essential part of what it means to be human. The first 'humans' who existed before the Fall, were not in fact humans! They would only become human once they rebelled against God. That seems more than a bit odd. Also, redeemed people will no longer be human in the eternal state when sin is finally eliminated from their lives (unless we want to say that we will go on sinning in the life to come!). Simply because all humans (save one important example) do sin, does not mean that is part of what it means to be human. Consider this. All humans have been born on Earth. But, does this mean being born on earth is essential to being a human? Certainly not. Imagine a person being born on a space craft, or space station built on the moon. Would that person be a non-human? No. Furthermore, I would argue that sin actually dehumanizes us. Sin inflicts tremendous damage to the full humanity in people. So, while sin is prevelant among humans, it does not define who or what humans are.

As for my second claim, sinfulness, while pervasively common, is not normal. Sin is abnormal. We must not confuse abnormality with commonality. The presence of sin in humanity is evidence that things have gone wrong, not right. Heart disease and cancer are quite common in people, but we don't take this commonality as normality. We recognize those physical conditions as maladies that are not normal. Though sin is not exactly a disease (though there are similarities), we should understand it in much the same way. It is a malady that is not normal. So, while common, sin is not the normal condition of the human.

Back to the issue raised in the email I received. This minister was wrong to attribute sinfullness and a 'messed-up' status to Jesus because he or she failed to understand that sin is neither an essential nor a normal condition of being human. Jesus was fully human (he had all the essential qualities of humanness) without having the dehumanizing, abnormal quality of sinfullness that all other humans have. In this way, Jesus was quintessentially human! As such, he could take on himself the sin of the world in order to redeem it.

Miracles - There's Much at Stake

We've talked in earlier posts about the reliability of the New Testament documents and found that they are more strongly attested to than any other ancient document we have. But even with the strong case for their reliablility, some people will get hung up on the miracles recorded in the NT and conclude that these show that the NT documents can't be trusted. Theologian Rudolf Bultmann (1884-1976) went so far as to seek to demythologize the Bible. Embarrassed by what he believed to be pre-scientific and superstitious accounts of miracles, he thought that the removal of miracles in the Bibles would remove a stumbling block to Christianity for the modern, intelligent man of the enlightened era.

The problem with his theology is that without miracles in the Bible we must do away with the most significant mirace of all - the resurrection. And without the resurrection, death has not been conquered and we have no hope of immortality; moreover, our sins have not been forgiven because God's resurrection of Jesus showed his acceptance of Jesus' sacrifice for us.

The widely known Jesus Seminar followed along the same lines of Bultmann. In their attempt to reform the view of Jesus for  the church, they dismissed any accounts having to do with miracles out of hand. They insisted that any of these accounts were unhistorical. How did they come to this conclusion? They say that the historical Jesus cannot be a supernatural figures. They give no reasons why this must be so...it simply is because that's the way they define it - if it's supernatural, it can't be historical. This is a presupposition. They are saying, "we don't believe in miracles, so any miracle story cannot be true and historical." This will of course lead to a non-supernatural Jesus.

Many people with whom we share Christ may have these same presuppositions. They simply have a problem believing the miraculous events in the Bible. Gently reveal their presuppositions to them and show them that there is no good reason for holding them. Many of the people who have a problem with the supernatural Jesus of the NT will nevertheless believe in God. With these people, you can make them see that miracles are not a problem for Him. This may require correcting their image of God first by making sure their view of God is the Christian God of the Bible. With a non-Christian who is held up by the supernatural Jesus, you can start by showing him or her who God is, then moving on to his ability to perform miracles.
Once you have shown that there is no reason to believe miracles are simply myth, you can back up your argument with the strong historical evidence for the resurrection - which couldn't have been anything but a miracle. You can then show how Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection were God's solution to the human predicament of sin, death, and hopelessness and that the miracles Jesus performed in His ministry were done to show that He was indeed God's anointed One, God's appointed Messiah, and ultimately the very Son of God.

While we may give Bultmann the benefit of the doubt by believing that his intentions were good, there is no need to compromise. We can keep the historical, supernatural Jesus and still show people that a saving faith in Him is reasonable and rational. In fact, without the supernatural, historical events of Jesus' birth, death, and resurrection, we have no Christianity at all. We have no hope.

Reflections on Loving God with Our Minds: Part 5

In the last post of this series I want to say a few things about academics and the command to love God and others with our minds. Too often in Christian circles (predominantly, but not exclusively, evangelical ones), there is great suspicion, if not downright fear and contempt, for serious academics. For many Christians, serious academic study and intellectual development are seen as dangerous and somehow opposed to vibrant faith in Jesus. In my experience, nothing could be further from the truth. I think many people’s faith is stagnant because they do not engage their minds with their faith. The problem with Christianity today is not that there is too much thinking and intellectual work going on, but that there is nowhere near enough. And when this happens, we fail to obey God’s desire that we love him and our neighbor with our minds. Don’t let some Christians’ sour attitudes about academics and intellectual development keep you from heeding the “Great Commandment.”

In times past, Christians were frequently the ones who were recognized as the leading thinkers in various disciplines across the academic spectrum. Today this is rare (one positive example is in the area of philosophy where Christians such as Alvin Plantinga, Dallas Willard, Keith Yandell, William Lane Craig, and J. P. Moreland are well respected in the philosophical community). The Church is looking for a generation of women and men who will take up the challenge to love God and neighbor with their minds by engaging in serious academic study. Can you imagine a society in which Christian thinkers were shaping economics, astrophysics, history, medicine, cinematography, law, ecology, literature, politics, etc.? God would certainly be honored and his image-bearers would be greatly benefited. Or, to be more specific, take our current issue of health care reform. What would it be like if Christian thinkers worked out a health care system that provided quality health care which was financially sustainable, affordable for as many people as possible, and included at least minimum care for those who could not afford any care at all?

Though all Christians are under the command to love God and neighbor with their minds, some have a special calling in this area. Perhaps you are one of them. If you are a student (at any level), I encourage you to apply yourself to your academic work. Your diligence in your class work is not only an expression of your love for God and neighbor, but might be something that God uses to propel you to a life using you intellectual capacities in service to him. Don’t look at your education as merely a means to a job, or meeting the expectations of parents, etc. Consider it intellectual development that will prepare you to make a significant impact for God’s kingdom. If God has called you to the life of the mind, being a top notch mechanical engineer, philosopher, journalist, CEO, teacher, or poet is every bit as important as being a pastor or a missionary.

I would like to end with a prayer penned by Church of England Bishop, H. G. C. Moule. This prayer sustained me through times of intense intellectual work while in graduate school. For high school, college, and graduate school students, may it be your prayer as well as you seek to love the only wise God with your minds.

Lord and Savior, true and kind,
be the master of my mind;
Bless and guide and strengthen still,
all my powers of thought and will.
While I ply the scholar’s task,
Jesus Christ be near, I ask;
Help the memory, clear the brain,
knowledge still to seek and gain.

Historical Relativism and Christianity

Most of us have heard of moral relativism - the idea that what is right and wrong is determined by the individual with nothing being absolutely right or wrong - but historical relativism might not be as familiar. Yes, even history is not immune to the attempts of relativism in the twentieth century. Historical relativists believe that the writing of history is hopelessly subjective and that the historian who discovers facts about history ascribes his own meaning to them because these facts carry no meaning of their own. The most devoted postmodernist will insist we can't know the past, and each reconstruction is as valid as any other.

How does this affect Christianity? Because Christianity is a religion rooted in history, - with God acting in history and its key figure being the historical person of Jesus whose claims were validated by the historical event of the resurrection - the claim that we can learn nothing from the past would be crushing if it was true.

But as William Lane Craig points out in Reasonable Faith, "relativists recognize that our knowledge of history is not awash in subjectivism. For although they deny historical objectivity, they do not really treat history in so roughshod a manner." (235) Examples that show this is true include the fact that even historical relativists admit that there are some facts that are so indisputable that only a madman would dispute them; that historians know the difference between history and propaganda which would be one and the same if history was truly relative; and that we recognize and can criticize poor history which would be impossible if one reconstruction of history was just as good as another. (Lane discusses the claims of historical relativists and the objections against them at length in his book.)

This attempt to make history subjective and relative matters to us as Christians because we believe that the events of Jesus' birth, ministry, death, and resurrections were part of objective history and as Craig puts it, part of "an objective revelation mediated through historical events." (241) This means that it is extremely important to defend history as something we can research, learn more about, and know objectively.

Something to keep in mind when engaging with someone on any topic: You may occasionally encounter people who are determined not to believe God's truth no matter what the evidence or how good your arguments are. People like this will often try to keep you on the defensive by peppering you with questions and  making you explain this or explain away that - one thing after another with no intention of truly hearing what you are saying. One way of dealing with people like this is to ask them why they believe what they do. Greg Koukl, an apologist for Stand to Reason, advises asking questions like "How did you come to that conclusion?" and "What do you mean by that?" Remember that unbelievers have just as much responsibility to explain why they don't believe (and what they do believe) as we do to explain what we believe. Skepticism is not a free pass to say and believe whatever one wants without explanation. Of course, always be loving and gentle. The ultimate goal is to win them to Christ as God makes their hearts ready, not to just win an argument.

An Argument for the Existence of God

As you might know, my grad classes have started up again. One of the books we're reading this semester is Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics by William Lane Craig. The first part of the book deals with philosophical arguments for the existence of God and I've decided that you must suffer through this with me! Just kidding...these arguments are actually fascinating even if some of them are a little hard to wrap your mind around. (I'm counting on Mark Mathewson to correct me where my representations of these arguments aren't quite right!)

These arguments are good to know, even in their simplest form, because you may have cause to use them in your own conversations with unbelievers to defend God's existence. Most people will have never heard these arguments before, but if you run across someone who has and who wants to go deeper than a simple representation of a particular argument, don't forget it's always fine to postpone the conversation until you can get help, assuring whoever you're talking to that you want to continue talking once you're prepared enough to do the argument justice.

One such argument for the existence of God is the kalam cosmological argument (written by Craig). It goes like this:

1.) Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2.) The universe began to exist.
3.)Therefore, the universe has a cause.

Seems simple enough, but there are philosophers who refute even point one saying there is no reason to believe that whatever begins to exist necessarily has a cause. For them, it is more reasonable to believe that things like the universe can pop into being out of nothing than to believe in a First Cause of the universe. But we know that this isn't the case...things don't just pop into existence!

We also know that an infinite regress of causes is impossible for the universe or anything else. In other words, at some point the cause of something that began to exist has to be uncaused because causes cannot go back infinitely with no first cause to start the process.

Another common objection to this argument is that if everything that begins to exist must have a cause, what caused God? But this objection does not work because as an eternal being, God did not begin to exist. He exists outside of time and has no beginning or end, so He does not require a cause. The universe however, did begin to exist and so does require a cause (and there are philosophical arguments for this as well). There are many models of the universe put forth and some still try to claim an eternal universe, but most scientists now acknowledge that the universe is not eternal but had a definite starting point. The models that claim otherwise have serious problems that cannot be overcome.

This is a simple representation of the kalam argument and some objection that you might hear. Arguments like this one show that it is reasonable to believe in the existence of God, especially when you add other such arguments to it. If you want to learn more about this argument, Craig's book is a great source as is his website http://www.reasonablefaith.org/

Reflections on Loving God with Our Minds: Part 4

In Part 3, I claimed that one of God’s interests was a restoration of the broken relationship between himself and human beings. In fact, one of God’s prime interests is human beings in and of themselves for they are his image-bearers. Of all creation, humans, and only humans, are given the privilege and responsibility to bear God’s image. God’s love for them is intense. I believe this is the reason that the command Jesus singled out as the greatest is two-fold. We are to love God and humans. But that is not all. To love humans, God’s image-bearers, is equated with loving God. The two directives to love God and humans are not to be taken as separate. I also think that the expectation Jesus has in pointing out our requirement to love our “neighbors” is that, like our love for God, it is also to be done with all one’s heart, soul, and mind. Therefore, loving my neighbor means, among other things, to seek out his or her best interests with the rigorous employment of all my mental powers.

To love God with my mind requires me to love my neighbor (by the way, my “neighbor” includes my enemies as well; Luke 10: 25-37) with my mind. What are some specific ways I can love my “neighbor” with my mind?