Okay, so I’m at work, right! And a coworker and I start talking—he’s a little older than me (maybe 10 years, I’m 37)—somehow we started talking about religion (I mean, really, Bobby Grow talking about religion … come on). Actually my coworker said he’s not religious. Of course for me that’s like an invitation. He said (my paraphrase), “yeah, I grew up Roman Catholic; but once I got to a certain age, I just couldn’t handle a God who predestines people to heaven or hell, and who knows everything before you do it (or basically determines.” He continued, “yeah, I am a pagan; I am part of a heathen belief system, I am an Odenite.” He explained to me what an Odenite [although I’m not totally convinced that he just isn’t a gamer] is (basically a Anglo-European belief system that is polytheistic, worships nature, and has some overlap with eastern monism, interestingly). I talked to him for a second about that, and then said I could say some things about Christianity that might challenge his belief system; but that I would refrain. He said, “no, go ahead.” So I did. Basically I just challenged him with the historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus; I said, on historical grounds, it is irrefutable. Which of course egged him on to react. He tried to argue that the resurrection was the result of mass delusion; that there had been studies on mass delusion. I said so, you need to prove that that applies to the conditions present in the resurrection of Jesus account. I said just to make this assertion as an argument is ultimately a fallacy. Then we started discussing the credibility of the eyewitnesses to Jesus’ resurrection; I used this to help substantiate the validity of the resurrection, I mentioned how the Apostle’s died for their testimony. Then he brought up how Muslims die for their belief all the time too; that doesn’t make it true. I told him how that is a false parallel, and thus fallacious; and therefore he needs to provide something more substantial than that. Unfortunately we had to get back to work, and that ended our little joust (which has been driving me crazy, because I don’t think he really wants to get into it anymore!). I had a bunch more I wanted to talk to him about; in regards to the resurrection, and what precludes his belief in historicity of the resurrection (i.e. his worldview or naturalist assumptions).
What I really wanted to get back to with him was what he had said originally about religion; how he rejected Roman Catholicism because it presents a God who predestines and knows and determines everything. What I wanted to say to him is that not all Christians believe this about God. I wanted to tell him that God is love; which would have brought us right back to the theological import of the cross and resurrection. I wanted to tell him that the God he rejected is the god of the philosophers and not of the God revealed in Jesus Christ. But, alas, I didn’t get the chance; and fear I never will. He still talks to me, but I can tell that he doesn’t really want to go there. Just pray that I can go there with him again sometime, somehow.
Here are a couple good videos on Resurrection from NT Wright and Richard Bauckham:
Interesting comments on the historicity of Christ’s resurrection. I always remember a comment I heard somewhere (I never remember where this stuff floating around in my brain comes from):
“Can we be absolutely sure that Jesus of Nazareth rose from the dead is factual? Probably not. What we can be absolute sure about is that the Apostles believed, with all of their heart, that Jesus rose from the dead, and were willing to die for that belief–and they changed the world because of it.”
For being a history lover, I sometimes surprise myself with how much I am able to not let historicity get in the way of profession and confession.
Do we have ‘case close evidence’ that the apostles died for their beliefs – it seems to be the crux of all arguments for the rational arguments for the resurrection.
How do we know that every apostle except John died for his faith, and are those sources reliable?
“The tradition of apostles’ martyrdom goes back at least to the beginning of the third century. In his third commentary on Genesis, Origen of Alexandria (ca. 185-254) writes that the apostles divided up the work of evangelizing the world between themβPeter, for example, took Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, and Bithynia, and at “the last came to Rome, and was crucified head-downwards; for he requested that he might suffer thus.” According to Origen, other apostles went elsewhere; Thomas was assigned Parthia (today’s India), and John was given “Asia.”
Scholars debate as to where Origen picked up his informationβsome argue that he drew from the roughly contemporary Acts of Thomas, an apocryphal book relating Thomas’ adventures as a missionary in India. That book states that Jesus’ original 11 disciples “divided the countries among them, in order that each one of them might preach in the region which fell to him and in the place to which his Lord sent him.” (Church history web site)
Point is, doubt is ever present in the life of the believer and that is a good thing, for it allows the spirit to convince us subjectively of what reason can on suggest.
On a different note it’s nice to see some NT wright on your site.
@Ken Ranos,
To me, as far as “rational” stuff goes; its simply a matter of probability, or not. I don’t think rationalist certainty (like positivism) is the way to go. Yet this is the pervasive mind set, esp. amongst the populace who know nothing of the history of ideas and the impact that enlightenment rationalism has had upon his/her cognitive processing apparatus. But yes, confession comes before and even should shape history; since in my mind the history is the confession and the confession is the history—and all things are Christian!
@Kenny,
Yeah, there is external criteria; which I think should still be considered, like the death of the Apostles etc (let alone the mass of early martyrs, and why not the contemporary ones too). But I do think there is relative weight with the Apostle’s deaths. Yet, as the videos from Bauckham and Wright highlight; there are stronger and better reasons for understanding the historicity of the resurrection. I like their reasoning because it does not seem rationalist; it just seems reasonable. I like Wright a lot, Kenny; as well as Bauckham π .
What I would like to do with the guy at work is survey the history of ideas. But work is not a good context for doing that; since we’re working. So I’ll do what I can do.