A Short Summary of Ehrman's book "Did Jesus Exist?"

In this post I am going to briefly summarize Bart Erhman's book 'Did Jesus Exist?' and his reasoning for thinking that there was an historical man named Jesus who was crucified. Erhman does not think that Jesus was God or the earliest Christians thought Jesus was God either but these are side points since his goal is to show what he thinks to be overwhelming evidence that a guy name Jesus existed. Therefore, it should be clear his argument is not for the orthodox belief of Jesus but a different still historical Jesus.

                                                           Non-Christian Sources

One non-Christian source the people believed in a historical Jesus is Pliny the Younger who was the governor of the Roman province of Bithynia-Pontus in what is now Turkey. He wrote a letter in 112 A.D and Erhamn summarizes it, "Pliny learned from reliable sources that Christians (illegally) gathered together in the early morning. He provides us with some important information about the group: they included people from a variety of socioeconomic levels, and they are meals together of common food. Pliny may tell the emperor this because of rumors, which we hear from other later sources, that Christians committed cannibalism. (They did after all, eat the flesh of the Son of God and drink his blood.) Moreover, Pliny informs the emperor, the Christians "sing hymns to Christ as to a god."" (Non-Christian Sources for the life of Jesus, P 52). This is important because this means that there were people who believed in Christ about 80 years after Jesus lived and therefore, those people would be in great position to know if Jesus actually did exist.

Another non-Christian source is Tacitus who was a high-ranking Roman officials and Tacitus says, "Nero falsely accused those...the populace called Christians. The author of this name, Christ, was put to death by the procurator, Pontius Pilate, while Tiberius was emperor..." (P 55). Here we have a person who is the perfect position to know if a man name Jesus existed and then was executed and since he does claim this to be true then we should also think it is very plausible.

Flavius Josephus wrote The Antiquities of the Jews in 93 A.D. Now, there is reason to suspect part of what Josephus wrote was altered but there is a reasonable guess to what would have been the original and Erhman states it this way, "At this time there appeared Jesus, a wise man. He was a doer of startling deeds, a teacher of people who receive the truth with pleasure. And he gained a following both among many Jews and among many Greek origin. When Pilate, because of an accusation made by the leading men among us, condemned him to the cross, those who had loved him previously did not cease to do so. And up until this very day the tribe of Christians, named after him, has not died out."(P 61). Now, with Josephus we are getting closer to the time Christ lived and therefore, have more reason to trust what he wrote to be true, meaning that there was a guy named Christ condemn to the cross that a group of people called Christians followed.

This is a very brief summary of the non-Christian sources that we have that indicated a man name Jesus lived and was crucified. Given even these brief accounts the most plausible belief is not Christ never lived but that at very least there was a person named Jesus Christ who some worshiped and followed that was crucified.

                                                The Gospels as Historical Sources

One does not simply have to just take the non-Christian sources as the only evidence that Jesus existed. Christian sources, even the New Testament, can and should count as evidence for the proposition that Jesus existed and was crucified. While it is common to think of the New Testament as one piece of literature it is important to remember that New Testament is a collection of books and letters. It would be more accurate to call the New Testament a Holy Library rather than a Holy Book. This means that each book of the New Testament that has an independent author can contribute to the cumulative case that Jesus existed and was crucified.  It is important that the authors are independent because if Mark, Luke, Matthew, and John all wrote from the same source then these four gospels would not be independent authors all confirming that same event but one author stating something happened. When examining any event it is important to have multiple people confirm said event if we want strong justification for believing the event. Erhman begins with the gospel of Mark, "Our earliest Gospel account of Jesus's life is probably Mark's, usually dated--by conservative and liberal scholars of the New Testament alike--to around 70 CE...for now we are interested in the brute fact that within forty years or so of Jesus (alleged) life, we have a relatively full account of many of the things he said and did and of his death by crucifixion." (The Gospels as Historical Sources, P 75). The important note here is that the Gospel of Mark is within 40 years of Jesus life meaning if Jesus did not exist than people would surely know this. Here I think it is important to know that people of antiquity were not less intelligent than people today, many had less education but still there would be plenty of educated people refuting the claims by Mark yet best to my knowledge there is no one refuting Jesus existed.

Erhman goes on to explain why Matthew and Luke can still be counted towards the cumulative case despite access and using some of Mark's material, "These Gospels were probably written ten or fifteen years after Mark, and so by the year 80 or 85 we have at least three independent accounts of Jesus's life (since an umber of the accounts of both Matthew and Luke are independent of Mark), all within a generation or so of Jesus himself, assuming he lived." (P 76) The important note here is that Luke and Matthew have some accounts of Jesus that cannot be traced back to Mark hence they are independent accounts of Jesus. There is also the gospel of John which is written radically different than the synoptic gospels. John gospel was written around 90-95 A.D. which means that we have four independent accounts of Jesus's life and death.

Erhman wraps up the accounts of Jesus that are closest to the time Jesus existed by saying, "For a historian these provide a wealth of materials to work with, quite unusual for accounts of anyone, literally anyone, from the ancient world. This alone seems sufficient to show that Jesus existed but this is not all we have. There are more sources that also provide evidence but writing about that is for a different day.


                                                                     Work Cited
Ehrman, Bart D. Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth. New York: HarperOne, 2012. Print.

Critiquing The Problem of Non-God Objects

Justin Schieber formulated an argument against the existence of God using non-God objects. Non-God objects are anything, such as a piece a paper, a planet, or plants. The argument is interesting and is valid; meaning that if all the premises are true then conclusion is correct.  Here is a video link of Schieber presenting his argument: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuHyxZ_cylE

Here is the formal shorter version:
P1: If the Christian God exists, then GodWorld is the unique best possible world
P2: If GodWorld is the unique best possible world, then the Christian God would maintain GodWorld.
P3: There are non-God objects, this God didn't maintain GodWorld.
Therefore, the Christian God, as so defined, does not exist.

By P1 Schieber means that GodWorld is the unique best possible world because all goods maximized. All goods are maximized because  GodWorld is identical to God and God traditionally defined is a maximally great being therefore, GodWorld must also be maximally great. P2 and P3 do not need much explanation but just to be clear God would maintain GodWorld because God is benevolent or perfectly good which means He would, if there is a unique best possible world, choose to maintain it. 
 
   Now, it is unclear that there is an actually thing as a unique best possible world because there seem to be an infinite amount of possible worlds that are equally good. Take for instance GodWorld and compare it to a world where only some amoral planets exist. GodWorld and PlanetWorld should be both taken as equally maximized in goodness because there is no good reason to think the addition of amoral planets to GodWorld should degraded GodWorld. Schrieber is familiar with this response and he thinks  that even a single molecule added to GodWorld would degrade GodWorld. He uses this analogy: Take a pure cup of water and add anything that is not water to the cup, the cup of water would no longer be pure and this he thinks applies directly to GodWorld (1.). I found this comparison surprising because GodWorld and the cup of water are hardly comparable at least in the way Schrieber would like. At best this shows that once God creates from the state of GodWorld then God is no longer identical to the world He is in. This does not mean that the maximal greatness of the world is degraded which I think can be shown more clearly through a different analogy. Maximal greatness if comparable to anything would be possibly comparable to infinity. Now, take an infinite set of even numbers. It should be noted that the infinite number of even numbers still has as many numbers that any set can have. Let us add to the even infinite set; (5,7,9), then the infinite set is no longer a completely even one but is still an infinite set. In the same way if there is a maximally great world and non-maximally great objects are added to the world that does not mean the world as a whole is no longer maximally great. It should be noted that I am not wholly convinced this analogy works but if an analogy would work with maximal greatness it is infinity. Even if the infinite analogy does not work Schrieber still must show maximally greatness would be degraded if an any amoral object was added to it since his water analogy does not work and it is not intuitively obvious that GodWorld would would be degraded. 

 I think premise two is problematic as well but that is for a different time. As long as one of the premises is shown to be false then the entire argument falls. At this point there is reason for significant doubt regarding P1. 

 (1.) http://freethoughtblogs.com/reasonabledoubts/2013/08/03/debate-does-the-god-of-christianity-exist-max-andrews-vs-justin-schieber/

Just War Theory and Pacifism

Throughout the last couple of years I have been wrestling with the question should a Christian be a pacifist. There are a lot of hard questions to answer if a Christian is meant to be a pacifist. How am I to protect the innocent? How much force is too much force? If someone was about to murder my family don't I have a right and a duty to kill that person to protect my family? In light of such questions it is quite understandable most people including Christians are at least hesitant if not entirely reluctant to embrace pacifism. First, pacifism must be defined and shall be define loosely to mean that a Christian cannot engage in violent actions towards people. So, in comparison force but not violence can be used. It is hard to figure out where the line is between force and violence but that does not mean there is not one or that pacifism isn't true.

However, there are some very good biblical reasons to embrace pacifism. In Matthew 5:44 it says, "But I tell you, to love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." What is really interesting is that the Greek word for love used in this sentence is agape, which is a selfless, benevolent love. It is tough to reconcile this passage with Just War Theory or self-defense but Augustine attempts to do this by saying that as long as we have a benevolent inward disposition o towards those we are killing then we are permitted to kill. Augustine attempted explanation of this passage is not only wrong but quite sickening. As Christians we are to follow after Christ and become like Him. When examine the character of Jesus it is clear He shows God's benevolent love by dying on the cross for his enemies. If Christ showed what it meant to love your enemy by dying on the cross for them then it does not seem that an inward disposition of benevolence is what is meant by loving your enemy. If there was anyone who could have had a benevolent disposition and still kill people it would have been Jesus yet He never once did that. Secondly, when examining the life of the apostle it is clear that none of them killed to protect their life but rather laid down their lives for the sake of the gospel. If both Jesus Christ and his closest disciples lived this way and if in general the way they lived is the way all Christian are meant to live then it is most likely that all Christians are to follow the ethical practice of be pacifism.

Now, one objection to this conclusion is that God used war in the Old Testament. Since God used war in the OT then clearly Just War Theory still holds as a belief today. Now this would be a sufficient blow to the pacifistic theory except that there is a shift in what God allows in the NT. Matthew 5:43, says, "You have heard that is was said, Love your neighbor and hate your enemy." Then Jesus continues on in Matthew 5:44 to say now you are to love your enemy. This suggests strongly that a revolution is happening in the way Christians relate to their enemy.

                                                                                                    

Lastly, we should examine a situation where a person kills to defend the innocent. In Just War Theory there a clear cut way to handle the situation, where for example, a psychopath comes into your house and is going to kill not only you but you 5 year old child as well. Here a Just War Theorist will say you should kill the psychopath but the pacifist has no options. While that does seem intuitively correct there are some other considerations that must be dealt with. These circumstances of psychopaths are quite rare. Secondly, is the pacifism that I argue is endorsed by the NT is not to deal with every circumstance to turn out favorably but rather to commit oneself to redeeming love that can even save the evil person. This is the goal of every Christian to make more and better disciples and radical love, not violence, has been the key to conversions of the worst sinners. This has been shown to happen throughout history in different martyrs’ lives. So, while the pacifist does not necessarily have a direct tool that can save them from the psychopath it is the case they have the tool that changes people and the world. One only has to imagine how different thing would of been if the disciples believed in redeeming violence, killed Saul before he converted. This would of the left the world without one of the most astounding acts of grace and one of the mightiest men of God would have never been known.