Dynamite under the Vatican

The cult of Mary, including Marian apparitions, has been very profitable–both literally and figuratively–for the church of Rome. For people who take a fancy to that sort of thing, it lends an emotional and popular appeal to Catholicism which would be lacking absent that phenomenon. Marian apparitions become tourist attractions and pilgrimage sites. They gin up lots of fervor. 

I don't mean to suggest that this is purely cynical. I'm sure that many recent popes are genuinely devoted to the cult of Mary. 

But although the papacy benefits from Marian apparitions, this is a potentially destabilizing principle. It's like dynamite under St. Peter's basilica. Just waiting to go off. 

It's my impression that many pious Catholics are far more devoted to Mary than they are to the pope. After all, what's a pope compared to Mary? She's the Queen Mother of God. The Mediatrix and Co-Redemptrix. 

And here's where it could get dicey. Take Lucia Santos:

Soon she had her first vision of an angel, a rather blurred apparition resembling, she told her family, "somebody wrapped up in a sheet"; the description drew much teasing from her siblings.
While watching over the family sheep with her cousins the following year, Lucia saw another angel, this time resembling "a boy of great beauty, about 14 years old, whiter than snow, transparent as crystal when the sun shines through it". Announcing that he was "the Angel of Peace", the apparition taught the children prayers, showing them a vision of a chalice above which he held the Eucharist, which was dripping blood. He revealed, in two subsequent visions, that Jesus and Mary had special plans in store for them.
Announcing that she was from heaven, the Virgin said that she would appear to them for six successive months, at the same place and on the same day each month, revealing her identity during the final vision.
Subsequently, she confided a terrible vision of hell "where poor sinners go", showing blackened souls floating in a fiery pool. If humanity did not repent, warned the Virgin, a second, more terrible war would break out.
This was the first of the Three Secrets of Fatima. The second predicted that Russia would return to Christianity and, in 1944, while gravely ill, Lucia sent a sealed envelope containing the contents of the Third Secret of Fatima to the Vatican, with strict instructions that it should not be opened before 1960.
By 1925, Lucia had entered their novitiate at Pontevedra, over the border in Spain, where she saw fresh visions of the Virgin and Child Jesus. In one, Mary told Lucia about a spiritual exercise she had mentioned at Fatima involving the faithful attending Mass on the first Saturday of each month for five consecutive months in order to offer prayers and sacrifice for the conversion of Russia. Later, the Child Jesus appeared to Lucia in the convent's backyard when she was taking out the rubbish, and urged her to spread this devotion throughout the world.
In 1929 the Virgin Mary instructed Lucia to tell the Pope about this and to ask him to say a special prayer, in union with every Catholic bishop in the world, consecrating the entire world - but especially Russia - to her immaculate heart. Only thus, said the Virgin, would Russia be prevented from spreading its errors (Communism).
When a letter from the Bishops' Conference of Portugal failed to elicit a papal response, Lucia's bishop and her spiritual confessor urged her to write a personal letter to Pope Pius XII. Despite strong misgivings, she complied, signing herself "the least of the daughters of the Church"; and, in 1942, the Pope made the consecration. However, he failed to ask the other Catholic bishops in the world to unite with him in prayer. In 1984, John Paul II repeated the consecration in Rome in union with the world's bishops. For years malcontents speculated that the consecration was incomplete; but in 1989, months after the fall of the Iron Curtain, Sister Lucia announced that "heaven" had accepted the Pope's 1984 consecration. 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1483520/Sister-Lucia-De-Jesus-Dos-Santos.html

Notice that Lucia was supposedly Mary's mouthpiece. In regular communication with the Queen of Heaven! When Lucia spoke, popes listened! 

No wonder! Lucia is taking dictation from the Mother of God–not to mention the Christchild. What pope can compete with that? Compared to that, he's pretty far down the pecking order. 

Imagine having secret revelations from Mary which you can dangle, like a sword of Damocles. Technically, popes outrank nuns, but if the nun happens to be channeling directives from the Queen of Heaven, what gives? 

Imagine if, in an interview, Lucia ever said Mary told her that John XXIII was an antipope or that Vatican II was a robber council? Who are Catholics going to side with–a pope or Mary's mouthpiece? 

Now, Lucia didn't put Rome in that predicament, but given the proliferation of Marian apparitions, what happens if a future confidant of the Virgin Mary becomes a critic of the Vatican policy?

Catholics might point out that the approval process for Marian apparitions precludes that dilemma. If so, there are a couple of problems with that safeguard:

i) What if surviving visionaries of an approved apparition subsequently cite new encounters with the Blessed Virgin which take issue with developments in Catholic theology? Can Rome say, "On second thought, we take it back!" 

ii) Moreover, if a Marian apparition achieves critical mass in popular sentiment, Rome can't afford to shut it down. Imagine the backlash if the Vatican were to say, "Based on historical renewed investigation, we've concluded that Mary's appearance to Juan Diego is a dubious legend. Please scratch Our Lady of Guadalupe from the list of approved apparitions."  

To a great extent, the Magisterium becomes captive to the Marian piety which it fosters. It is simply ratifying popular sentiment. The popes–and Catholic apologists–had better keep their fingers crossed. 

God's eraser

According to Arminian theologian Roger Olson, God had a plan–but he used a pencil rather than a pen:

The original plan (to speak mythically) did not include the cross, but it became part of the plan when humanity rebelled. 

Read more: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2014/12/for-god-so-loved-the-world-that-he-couldnt-stay-away-a-christmas-meditation-2/#ixzz3MxekofBB

How will Jesus return?

This is a follow-up to an earlier post:

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2009/11/second-coming.html

The physical, visible return of Christ is a pillar of the Christian faith. But can we be more specific? What will the return of Christ look like?

i) In the Gospels, Christ's appearance takes two forms. There's his ordinary human appearance. That's how he usually appears. A normal human body. 

But we also have the Transfiguration (Mt 17), where he becomes physically luminous. Blindingly bright. And this is before the Resurrection. So he always (as of the Incarnation) had that capacity. Interestingly, this incident is accompanied by the Shekinah or glory-cloud. 

ii) We have his appearance to St. Paul (Acts 9). This could be a subjective vision. However, it may be an objective vision. Once again, there's intense luminosity. That's reminiscent of the Transfiguration. So this may well be a case where Jesus puts in a physical appearance.

iii) Then you have the Christophany in Rev 1. This could be a subjective vision. But maybe not.

The sword-like tongue suggests figurative imagery. That might imply a subjective vision. 

On the other hand, that might be a figurative description which has a literal analogue. Given the associated imagery, it's reminiscent of the fiery cherubic sword in Gen 3:24. 

The white hair might be a symbol of purity and holiness. But in context it could just as well or better reflect his luminosity. Indeed, you already have the connection between whiteness and brightness in the Transfiguration. 

iv) As commentators note, the imagery in Rev 1 has its counterparts in the visions of Ezekiel and Daniel. Among other things, their visions and/or theophanies combine elements of the Shekinah or glory-cloud and a mobile throne. 

This is sometimes how God appears to prophets on earth. God comes to them in the Shekinah, seated on a throne, surrounded by cherubim. It's a miniature throne-room. A microcosm of heaven descending (as it were) to earth. 

The Translation of Elijah (2 Kgs 2:10) is similar, but in the opposite direction. 

v) This, in turn, helps to flesh out Acts 1:9-11. The return of Christ will reverse the Ascension. As I read it, the Ascension involves Christ levitating above the disciples, at which point the glory-cloud envelopes him. The the glory-cloud passes out of sight. That doesn't necessarily mean it flies away. It may simply vanish. 

vi) For modern readers who've been conditioned by science fiction movies and TV dramas, these Biblical descriptions are apt to trigger associations with wormholes and flying saucers. Of course, that's anachronistic. 

You even have UFO religions, where people think theophanies and angelophanies were really about aliens and spacecraft. On this theory, ancient observers didn't know what they were seeing, so they described what they saw in culturally available categories.

Without taking time to discuss all that's wrong with that, I'd simply point out that the logic is easily reversible. Modern readers are reinterpreting apparitions in the cultural categories available to them. When they read accounts of apparitions, whether in Scripture, church history, or elsewhere, they translate or recast these descriptions in the ufological conventions of science fiction films. Flying saucers. Wormholes connecting parallel dimensions. That's an overlay imposed on the phenomenon rather than derived from the phenomenon.  

BTW, here's a witty critique of urological interpretations of Ezekiel:

http://ancientaliensdebunked.com/references-and-transcripts/ezekiels-wheels/

The Defeat Of Satan

"he has visited us and accomplished redemption for his people, and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of David" (Luke 1:68-9)

"since the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death he might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil" (Hebrews 2:14)

"The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil." (1 John 3:8)

"Satan may be a roaring lion seeking someone to devour, but none of those who take refuge in Christ, the horn of our salvation, can he destroy. If I were an artist, I would paint for my home a special Christmas painting this year and hang it on the wall near the manger scene. It would be one of those big oil canvasses. The scene would be of a distant hill at dawn. The sun is about to rise behind the hill and the rays shoot up and out of the picture. And all alone, silhouetted on the hill in the center of the picture, very dark, is a magnificent wild ox standing with his back seven feet tall and the crown of his head nine feet tall. On both sides of his head there is a horn curving out and up six feet long and twelve inches thick at the base. He stands there sovereign and serene, facing the southern sky with his massive neck slightly cocked, and impaled at the end of his right horn hangs a huge lion, dead." (John Piper)

Did Jesus Exist? Searching for Evidence Beyond the Bible

http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/people-cultures-in-the-bible/jesus-historical-jesus/did-jesus-exist/print/

Defending Daniel

Although this post has special reference to Daniel, much of what I say is applicable to Scripture in general.

i) Warranted belief in Scripture doesn't hinge on corroboration from outside. Most Christians are in no position to independently verify Scripture. If the God of Scripture exists, he wouldn't make faith dependent on access to information which few Christians enjoy. 

In apologetics, we cite various lines of evidence to rebut attacks or provide additional reasons for belief. But that doesn't mean faith in Scripture should depend on independent confirmation. 

ii) Although unbelievers routinely attack the historicity of Scripture, that's really a red herring. Even if we had independent corroboration for every merely historical report in Scripture, that wouldn't make a dent in the unbeliever's disbelief. That's because unbelievers don't really care about the merely historical events recorded in Scripture. Their real objection is to the specifically supernatural or miraculous events. Even if we had complete corroboration for every "natural," nonmiraculous incident in Scripture, unbelievers would continue to reject Scripture out of hand. 

iii) The argument from silence is only significant if there's a reasonable expectation something would be mentioned if it occurred.  

iv) I find historical objections to Scripture inherently unimpressive. As I've said before, hits are far more impressive than misses. 

If two ancient sources disagree, it's easy to account for their disagreement if one or both are wrong. By contrast, if two ancient sources independently agree, then it's hard to account for their agreement unless both are (at least approximately) correct.

If the reported event really happened, they agree because that's the source of their information. And that's the standard of comparison.

Roughly speaking, there's only way to be right, because there's only one event. By contrast, sheer imagination is the only limit on the number of false reports. Since error isn't aligned with a standard of comparison (i.e. the actual event), there's no external check on variations in error. Proliferation of erroneous accounts is uncontrollable in a way that true accounts are not. 

Two accounts can easily disagree if both are out of touch with reality. The permutations of error are infinite. It's sheer coincidence if two fictional accounts happen to agree. Likewise, two accounts can easily disagree if one is factual while the other is fictitious. 

v) What makes the hits even more impressive is the scattershot nature of the surviving evidence. Given how little evidence survives, given how little interest ancient historians took in Israel or 1C Christianity, given the inevitable bias of ancient sources, it's nothing short of remarkable that we even have much independent corroboration of Scripture.

So this is something Christians always need to keep in mind when reading historical criticisms of Scripture. Hits are very impressive, but misses are very unimpressive. These are radically asymmetrical. 

vi) I think some scholars view a historical reconstruction like a jigsaw puzzle. In a good reconstruction, all the available pieces should fit together. 

But that's a misleading metaphor. Events fit together like pieces of a puzzle. Things only happen one way. One thing follows another. One thing happens at the same time as another–in a different locale. So there's only way that events fit together.

But in the case of ancient history, we don't have direct access to the events. What we have are sources. Ancient sources are unlikely to have the tight-fit of a jigsaw puzzle. Due to bias and ignorance, our ancient extrabiblical sources are, at best, raw data. 

If, say, a Christian scholar identifies Darius the Mede with Cyrus, his historical reconstruction needn't dovetail with all of the available evidence. For the extant evidence is likely to have jagged edges rather than smooth edges. The extant evidence is going to be piecemeal at best and often inaccurate to some degree. A rough fit is usually the best we can expect. 

vii) If Daniel was fictional, the more evidence that archeology turns up, the more the historical problems for Daniel should multiply. But the opposite is the case. The more evidence that archeology turns up, the more that eliminates or ameliorates past objections to the historicity of Daniel. 

That's not the emerging pattern we'd expect if Daniel was fictional. That's antithetical to the pattern we'd expect if Daniel was fictional. 

Liberals used to say Belshazzar was fictional, until archeology discovered extrabiblical evidence. 

Liberals used to raise linguistic objections to the 6C date of Daniel. But comparative linguistics based on archeological discoveries of extrabiblical Hebrew and Aramaic texts made that argument backfire. 

Liberals used to say Daniel 1:1 got the date wrong, but archeology has turned up evidence of different calendrical systems which can harmonize Daniel and Jeremiah. 

Liberals often say Darius the Mede is fictional. But archeology has supplied evidence that makes Cyrus a plausible candidate. 

Liberals used to say the designation of Belshazzar as a "king" is inaccurate. Yet archeology has turned up evidence to corroborate that title, viz. distinguising between a "king" and a "great king." 

Likewise, there's fragmentary evidence that Nebuchadnezzar suffered a bout of mental illness, which is consistent with boanthropy. 

viii) Apropos (vii), why would Nebuchadnezzar, Belshazzar, and Jehoiakim be historical figures, but Darius the Mede be fictional? It's consistent to say all three are fictional. But since even liberals admit that's untenable, that puts pressure on their position. You could argue that if the Belshazzar pericope is fictional, and Belshazzar is fictional, then Darius the Mede is fictional. It's all of a piece. But when evidence turns up that Belshazzar is historical, then the claim that Darius the Mede is just a literary construct becomes very ad hoc.

ix) When unbelievers read conservative defenses of Daniel, this smacks of special pleading. Yet liberals and conservatives alike engage in historical reconstructions. Both sides extrapolate from trace evidence. Both sides interpolate missing evidence. 

For instance, Collins, in his commentary, doesn't think Darius the Mede ever existed. However, he's enough of a scholar to realize that it's inadequate to say Daniel was wrong and leave it at that. For he needs to explain what motivated the author to write Dan 6. He needs to provide an alternative explanation to account for Dan 6. 

So he comes up with an ingenious reconstruction. Yet his explanation is at least as complicated and speculative (if not more so) than scholars who identify Darius the Mede with Cyrus. 

The mythicism fad

http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2014/12/24/4154120.htm

Continuing education

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2014/12/23/santas-transcript

In the nick of time

This is a sequel to an earlier post:

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2014/08/psychic-prayer.html

Among other things, Braude says:

The potential psychic strategies are obvious enough: (1) Relevant people could come to know our prayers through ESP and respond consciously or otherwise.

i) One problem with this statement is what he means by "respond consciously or otherwise."

Does he mean they consciously know our need, but unconsciously respond? If so, that's less than self-explanatory. If they become aware of our need, then either they'd consciously respond, or they wouldn't bother to respond at all–if they don't care what happens to us, or don't wish to assume a personal risk.  

Or does he mean we plant a subliminal idea in their minds, which they carry out. Their action happens to meet our exigent need, although they were oblivious the relevance of their action to our exigent need. They didn't know our situation. They didn't know what we needed. But we did. So what they do has the unintended consequence of benefiting us. 

ii) One problem with that interpretation is that it seems to be one of those flexible explanations you resort to to cover your bets. An explanation that makes your theory consistent with any scenario. It can't be falsified, but by the same token, it's hard to see how it can be verified. If nothing counts as evidence against it, what counts as evidence for it? It seems to be independent of the evidence one way or the other. 

iii) Another problem is that this isn't a naturalistic alternative to theism. If there is a God, then he can alert others to our need or influence others to carry out the needed action. 

iv) But there's another problem with Braude's secular explanation. Take the case of retroactive prayer. Suppose I go jet-skiing late afternoon. In the middle of the lake, my jet-ski conks out. Let's say it's too far for me to swim to shore. Moreover, I don't wish to abandon my jet-ski.

Or let's say it's dusk. I if try to swim back in the dark, I could end up swimming in circles. I can't see the shore at night. I will become disoriented. I will drown from fatigue or die from hypothermia. 

So I pray. Just in the nick of time, somebody in a motorboat comes to my rescue, heaves me into the boat, and tows the jet-ski.

But to answer my prayer in time, he had to be on the way before I prayed. How could Braude's alternative account for that?

Braude might appeal to precognition, but there are problems with that appeal in this situation:

i) I didn't know in advance that I was going to find myself in this predicament. 

ii) And if I did have a premonition, I wouldn't put myself in this dire predicament in the first place. I'd have my jet-ski serviced before I went jet-skiing. 

iii) Perhaps Braude might say I had a subconscious premonition. But even assuming that's meaningful, how would I be able to plant an S.O.S. in the mind of my rescuer based on a subconscious premonition? If I'm unaware of my future predicament, how can I telepathically communicate that to a second party? 

iv) For that matter, my rescuer is a perfect stranger to me. How does my mind know ahead of time to reach out to that person?

Now, admittedly, this is a hypothetical example. For now I'm just considering the kinds of answered prayer that Braude's theory lacks the resources to replace. 

N.T. Wright And The Evidence For The Virgin Birth

Steve Hays drew my attention to an article by N.T. Wright arguing for the virgin birth. Wright makes some good points, but some of the best arguments for the virgin birth and some of the best responses to objections to it aren't addressed. Here's an article I wrote earlier this year that outlines some of the evidence for the virgin birth and links a lengthy book review I wrote on the subject.

Among other points I make in my article linked above, it should be noted that the virgin birth receives indirect support in the citation of Luke's gospel as scripture in 1 Timothy 5:18. Though John doesn't refer to the virgin birth in his writings, what he does write is consistent with the doctrine, and it's affirmed early and widely among the disciples of John and the churches he most influenced. The virgin birth was affirmed by Polycarp and other contemporaries of the apostles, as I document in my material linked above. Christian sources in the second century refer to the virgin birth as a core belief of Christianity that's accepted across the Christian world. I've also argued that early and widespread belief in the virgin birth is the best explanation for why the premarital timing of Mary's pregnancy wasn't more controversial in early Christianity. We have far more evidence for the virgin birth than the material found in the opening chapters of Matthew and Luke.

Herod and the magi

Jason Engwer has been responding to Jonathan Pearce's attacks on Matthew's nativity account. I notice that Pearce is very repetitive. He recites his talking-points, paraphrasing the same stump speech without advancing the argument. With that in mind, I'll comment on a representative example of how he proceeds:

http://www.skepticink.com/tippling/2014/12/20/response-to-triablogues-jason-engwer-on-nativity-accounts-part-1/

To set the scene, Herod has been visited by the Magi who inadvertently get lost following a supernatural star (which God is in control of, so this seems by design) and end up in Jerusalem, not Bethlehem. Remember, these are some wise Zoroastrian astrologer/astronomers (probably) who have come together and followed a star that no one else in the known world appears to have seen, thinking it will lead them to something special. What a huge risk!

i) There's no textual evidence that they were following the star at this stage. There's no textual evidence that the star was visible during their journey. To the contrary, the text indicates that the star was only intermittently visible. 

As far as the text goes, the star may have initially appeared for just a few days or less, around the time of Christ's birth. It may have appeared in the direction of Palestine, from their original location. It didn't point to Bethlehem. 

The function of the star at this juncture wasn't to continuously guide them from their country of origin to Bethlehem or even Palestine. Rather, the star had an emblematic significance for them, indicating the birth of a Jewish king. And it gave them a compass point (as it were). Head in that general vicinity. 

ii) Going to Jerusalem isn't just a detour. In the implicit theology of the narrative, the magi bear witness to the Jewish establishment. Their presence signals the birth of the Messiah. That puts the Jewish establishment on notice. 

iii) I don't know why he identifies the magi as Zoroastrians. 

iv) Others may have seen the star, but without a frame of reference, it held no particular significance for them. Unless you know what it signifies, seeing the star doesn't lead to a plan of action. 

v) Matthew doesn't bother to explain how they were able to interpret the star. If they were from Babylon, there was a major Jewish community in Babylon–a holdover from the Babylonian Exile. They might have gotten some information from that source.

Or, even if they weren't from Babylon, given the role of angels in the nativity account, an angelic apparition might have clued them in.

They end up wandering around Jerusalem, where word of their search gets to the king. Herod finds out that they speak of a prophecy which neither himself, his scribes, or anyone else in Jerusalem appear to have the first clue about. Apparently, it speaks of the Messiah being born in nearby Bethlehem. Who knew?!

i) What is even Pearce talking about? There's nothing in the text to indicate that the magi spoke of a prophecy about the Messiah's birth in Bethlehem. To the contrary, that's supplied by Herod's theological consultants. 

ii) Moreover, as an impious halfbreed Jew, there's no reason to think Herod was deeply versed in the OT Scriptures. 

Littered with these issues, the somewhat trusting (out of character) Herod lets the Magi go and assumes they will report back to him. 

i) Matthew doesn't present Herod as trusting, but devious. Herod is used to manipulating people. He doesn't expect the magi to double-cross him. He's the kind of man who prides himself on outsmarting his enemies. He lives by his wits, and that's served him well over the years. He was very cunning. A political survivor in a cutthroat world. 

It's the magi who are trusting. Unsuspecting. They intend to report back to him. It's the angel who warns them. Not something Herod could anticipate. So Herod's behavior is perfectly in character.

ii) But let's assume, for the sake of argument, that it's out of character. So what? In the Bible, God sometimes messes with the minds of wicked kings. God makes them do rash, foolish things. Matthew's God isn't going to let Herod murder the Messiah–who happens to be his Son, no less! 

As I have pointed out, Herod is not likely to have troubled himself with the newborn since at the time he was very ill, very old (in his 70s), suicidal and we know he did not care for the future of his kingdom, leaving it not explicitly to any particular son, with no vision of what it should become. In this light, is he likely to care a fig about a child whose challenge will not come to fruition for another 20-30 years, if at all?

That's not what our extrabiblical sources tell us. To the contrary, they say that as he grew older, he become fanatically possessive and paranoid about his hold on power. 

Is it more probable, then, that the Matthean account of Herod did not happen? That the Magi were a literary and theological mechanism, a device for getting Herod involved to play the Pharaoh in a midrashic retelling of the crucial Old Testament story of Moses? That the firstborns dying is repeated in the Massacre of the Innocents at the hands of Herod, which leads Joseph and family to flee to Egypt only to “come out of Egypt” (“fulfilling” a prophecy in the meantime) like Moses to create a new kingdom of God? To believe this actually happened as reported by Matthew, to me, beggars belief.

i) The firstborn males aren't singled out in the Massacre of the Innocents. Moreover, the males are targeted because the Messiah is male. 

ii) Critics are conflicted on this point. On the one hand they claim that Matthew began with his OT prooftexts, then invented stories to illustrate his prooftexts. On the other hand, they claim that the prooftexts don't match the stories.  

One would certainly have good right to think that this is bizarre and that Herod would more likely accompany them or send troops with them to find the Messiah at risk of death, and kill him there and then.
This, of course, assumes that the Magi were real, which, as I point out in my book (and it is worth reading Adair’s superb The Star of Bethlehem: A Skeptical View). But Jason does have something of a point. However, Herod’s affront at the time would lead him, surely, to accompany the Magi by force. This would mean that there was no margin for error. On pain of death, those Magi would have led him to the baby. 

That's a fallacious inference. The fact that Jesus was born in Bethlehem doesn't imply that he was still residing there by the time the magi arrived on the scene. That's simply his last known address. Neither Herod nor the magi know in advance if Jesus is still there. 

So it would make sense for Herod to let the Magi scout out Bethlehem to confirm his whereabouts. That's the logical place to start. If he had moved, they could query the neighbors. 

Moreover, the Star reappeared, so it would have been trivially easy to go there independently of the Magi. In fact, unless God only magically made the star visible to the Magi, the whole of Jerusalem could have gone to see the newborn Messiah; the entity they had surely been waiting to see for quite some time.

i) The star reappeared for the magi's benefit, not for Herod's henchmen. Why assume the star would compliantly light the way of assassins? It doesn't act like a natural object. It's very discriminating. 

ii) In order for the star to be visible to everyone, it would need to be high in the sky. If, however, it was high in the sky, it wouldn't point to Bethlehem in particular. And to position itself right over the house of Mary and Joseph, it has to be very low in the sky. And not on the horizon, but very localized. yet in that event, it's visibility is obscured by hills and trees. You can't see it by looking up. Rather, you can only see it by looking in the right direction. 

iii) It doesn't occur to Pearce that "all Jerusalem" is hyperbolic. In context, Matthew is probably referring to the religious establishment. 

iv) As the text says, Herod conducted his investigation in secret. It was very compartmentalized. He asked his theological consultants where the Messiah was to be born, and he asked the magi when the Messiah was born (assuming the appearance of the star coincided with the birth of Christ). However, he kept his theological consultants in the dark regarding the timing. Moreover, the general public wasn't privy to what either group told Herod behind closed doors. Only Herod and the magi know both the when and where. 

At best, it takes two coordinates to locate Jesus: time (his birthdate) and space (his birthplace). Even that's fairly roughhewn–which is why Herod allows himself a generous margin of error (boys two years old and under) to make sure he doesn't miss the target. 

v) What does Matthew intend the reader to visualize? What if it's more like ball lightning? It stays ahead of the magi, at about eye-level or a little higher. It illuminates the dark road. It leads them to Bethlehem, then singles out the house of Joseph and Mary. 

I'm not saying it is ball lightening. I think it's likely the Shekinah. My point is simply to consider what the reader is supposed to imagine. 

This concerns the idea that Herod, whilst talking to the Magi, was fortuitous enough to gain the exact information of where the star was at the time, etc etc... 

How's that "fortuitous"? He's posing specific questions to pinpoint the time. And they'd be in a position to know when they first saw the star. 

…so that, when the Magi failed to return, he was amazingly able to triangulate the position and age of the child and go about killing babies unbeknownst to any contemporary historian or recorder of events.

i) How is that "amazing"? He got the birthdate from one source and the birthplace from another source. Those are two key coordinates. However, that's time-sensitive. Indeed, as it turns out, his information was slightly out-of-date. So he just missed his quarry.

ii) Who says the death of the children was unknown to any contemporary historians? We only have fragments of some ancient historians. And the works of other ancient historians, like Nicolaus of Damascus, are completely lost to posterity. 

iii) Moreover, ancient rulers routinely wiped out whole villages. That's so commonplace that we wouldn't expect ancient historians to record it. Ancient historians don't care about the little people. 

More About Matthew 2

Jonathan Pearce has written another response to me on the historicity of Matthew 2. He comments:

Grand theft auto

In the combox, a number of atheists responded to David French's testimony of miraculous healing:

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2014/12/yes-theres-evidence-that-god-exists.html

 I'm going to briefly evaluate their responses:

i) Some resort to the circular argument that since there's no evidence for God, his healing can't be evidence for God. By that logic, nothing would ever count as evidence for God. It will be preemptively discounted. 

ii) Some dismiss this as anecdotal evidence. But what's wrong with anecdotal evidence for particular events? It can be risky to generalize from anecdotal evidence, for the sample may be too small to underwrite a reliable induction, but in this case, anecdotal evidence is just a synonym for French's firsthand experience. 

My high school German teacher was a native German and war bride. Certainly I can't extrapolate from that instance to high school German teachers in general. But my experience is reliable evidence for what was going on at my high school when I was there. Don't atheists rely on personal experience for most of what they believe about their past and present circumstances?  

iii) Some dismiss French's interpretation as an example of confirmation bias. Christians are predisposed to believe in miracles. 

a) Funny thing is how often people who cite confirmation bias illustrate their own confirmation bias in the process. They are blind to their own confirmation bias. They act as if confirmation bias invariably applies to some else–never to themselves. 

The fact that atheists reflexively discount examples of miraculous healing–even in the teeth of medical verification–is a classic example of confirmation bias. They are predisposed to reject miracles out of hand. 

b) Moreover, French didn't expect his classmate's assurance to be true. 

iv) Some cite prayer studies to prove that prayer is statistically ineffective. 

a) To begin with, there is evidence from prayer studies that prayer is statistically effective. For instance:

http://www.fyiliving.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/prayer.pdf

b) The operating assumption behind controlled studies is flawed:

http://www.audiowebman.org/bbc/books/articles/cslewis.htm

c) More to the point, this objection is an exercise in misdirection. Prayer studies are irrelevant to any particular case with specific evidence. 

v) Some appeal to spontaneous remission. But there are many problems with that objection:

a) That was French's choice of terms, speaking informally, as a layman. His doctors didn't attribute his recovery to spontaneous remission. 

In fact, his doctors concluded that since ulcerative colitis is incurable, they must have misdiagnosed him–for his recovery was naturally or scientifically inexplicable given that condition. 

b) Diseases range along a continuum. In some cases, the body has the ability to heal itself, with or without medical intervention. At best, medical intervention hastens the healing process. 

But you can't make a facile appeal to the body's natural healing ability in more extreme cases. Likewise, atheists use this category for diseases in general. But is that customary in medical science? 

c) To my knowledge, spontaneous remission is not a naturalistic alternative to miraculous healing. Spontaneous remission is not a medical explanation. It doesn't say how or why the patient went into remission. It doesn't identify a natural cause or natural mechanism. Rather, it's a superficial description of what happened. Really, an admission of ignorance. 

d)  Why assume that spontaneous remission is not miraculous? The fact that some people are healed in answer to prayer doesn't mean people are only healed in answer to prayer. 

vi) Some appeal to unanswered prayer to counter answered prayer. Atheists act as though, if one person is healed, but another not, the fact that one person was healed cancels out the evidence that the other person was miraculously healed. 

Take a comparison. Suppose I drive my friend to the airport. I park in the parking garage, making careful note of where I parked.  

After I return to the garage, I see that my car is gone. I naturally conclude that my car was stolen. i call the police to report my stolen car. I have them come to fill out a report. 

When they come they give me with a quizzical look. They ask me how I know my car was stolen? I reply that it didn't drive away all by itself. I wrote down the parking spot. 

They admit that the space where my car was is empty. But they point to cars parked to the right and to the left of where my car was. Cars in front and cars in back. So many cars to choose from. 

If my car was stolen, why did the thief steal my car rather than someone else's car? Likewise, if it's worth stealing one car, it's worth stealing many cars. It would be lucrative for a chop shop to hire several car thieves. 

I have no idea why the thief stole my car when there were others he could take. I have no idea why he left the other cars alone. But so what? How does the fact that I don't know what the thief's selection-criterion was zero out the evidence that my car was stolen? 

vii) Apropos (vi), In the nature of the case, we can rarely say why God healed one person but not another. We don't know the specific reason. We can only speculate in any given case. We can, however, suggest general reasons.

Just about every life has a ripple effect. Your life has an impact on other lives. God may heal one person but not another because of the long-term repercussiosn. God might heal one person because his life will have a significant beneficial impact on others. God might not heal another person because his life would have a significant deleterious impact had he lived longer. 

Likewise, some people live too long for their own good. They'd be better off if they died sooner.

God doesn't heal some people because they're special; rather, they're special because God heals them. 

David French is a lawyer for the ACLJ, in which capacity he defends the Constitutional freedom of Christian expression. So he's doing something with his life that benefits many other people. 

viii) One atheist took the opposite tack an appeal to reported cases of miraculous non-Christian healing. 

a) To begin with, the atheist didn't cite any evidence on the extent of reported cases of non-Christian miraculous healing. 

b) But supposing it's true, where does that leave the original objection? Is French's example incredible because too few people are healed in answer to prayer, or incredible because too many people are healed answer to prayer? Hard to see how both objections are mutually consistent. 

c) God can have reasons to heal unbelievers. Human beings are agents of historical causation. Who lives and who dies affects the future. God can heal an unbeliever in the past to benefit a believer in the future. 

ix) Unsurprisingly, some atheists make a last-ditch appeal to coincidence. However, French's case is very specific. He was diagnosed with an incurable disease. He was rapidly deteriorating. A classmate from law school prayed for him, then phoned him to assure him that he was cured. The very next day his symptoms were gone. And that was 19 years ago. 

Appealing to coincidence proves too much. When is something not a coincidence? 

x) The existence of disease doesn't call God's existence into question, for disease is consistent with Biblical theism. The Bible contains many examples of the sick and dying. 

The stone paradox

i) Can an omnipotent being make a stone so heavy that he can't lift it? The stone paradox takes the form of a dilemma:

Either God can make a stone that he can't lift, or he can't make a stone that he can't lift. 

If he can make a stone that he can't lift, then he's not omnipotent (inasmuch as he can't lift the stone).

If he can't make a stone that he can't lift, then he's not omnipotent (inasmuch as he can't make it). 

Either way, there's something he can't do. So whether you answer yes or no, God is not omnipotent. 

ii) Of course, this may be a false dilemma. If the proposed task is really a pseudotask, then inability to perform a pseudotask is not a limitation on omnipotence. Rather, it's disguised sophistry. 

iii) Sometimes the debate turns on the definition of omnipotence. There are many things I can do that God can't. For instance, I can sneeze, but God can't. Is that a problem for omnipotence–or for a silly definition of omnipotence? 

iv) Apropos (iii), if God chooses to work through natural means, then that's a self-imposed limitation on what he can do. Natural means are finite. Natural means have inherent limitations. If he chooses to work through natural means, then his chosen medium limits what he can do. 

God can work apart from means. He's not limited to means. 

v) As formulated, the paradox has anthropomorphic connotations. God can't lift a stone the way a man can lift a stone. God doesn't lift a stone through muscular exertion, or pulleys, or a crane. Perhaps we should substitute a less anthropomorphic verb like "levitate." 

vi) Lifting is a twofold relation:

a) Moving an object from one place to another

b) Moving an object from a lower to a higher position

vii) If the stone is the size of the universe, then it can't move, for it occupies all the available space. It can't shift from one location to another if it takes up all the free space. There's nowhere for it to go. A stone the size of the physical universe is immovable. It can't change position. There's no room for the stone to be displaced. 

viii) Likewise, lifting something presumes a frame of reference. To lift something is to pick it up. 

An agent can't lift a stone in outer space, because the stone has no frame of reference in relation to which it's higher or lower.  

Likewise, does it make sense to say an agent can lift a stone off the ground that's bigger than planet earth? In what sense is it higher than a round object if it's the same diameter (or greater) than the round object? Given the curvature of the reference frame, what makes the stone higher rather than sideways or underneath? 

It only makes sense to say it's higher if the earth is flat or the object is so small in relation to the globe that the point of contact is virtually horizontal in relation to the vertical action (raising the stone to a higher position vis-a-vis the ground).    

ix) I assume the strength of the atomic bond (chemical bonding) naturally limits on how big a physical object can be. I assume there's an upper limit on how large a stone can be. Beyond a certain threshold, the attractive force is too weak to keep the atoms and molecules from shearing. 

Although God could make a miraculously large stone, that interjects equivocation into the paradox. It's not a real stone. By "stone," we usually mean a natural object. 

Further Response To Jonathan Pearce On Matthew 2

Last week, I posted a response to some recent comments by Jonathan Pearce on the historicity of Matthew 2. He's posted a reply. He writes:

Cardinal Dolan disses “Priests for Life” anti-abortion group

“I ... want nothing further to do with the organization”.

Forget about “Evangelicals and Catholics Together”. Now they can’t even manage “Catholics and Catholics Together”.

The fate of false prophets

In his generally excellent commentary on Daniel, Dale Ralph Davis makes an odd comment. He's responding to the allegation that Daniel is a pseudonymous book written in the mid-2C BC, but set in the 6C BC. He says:

Why should they give solemn credence to "prophecies" they knew had been produced by a bunch of visionaries who were their own contemporaries? What divine authority could these pack? The Message of Daniel (IVP 2013), 20. 

i) On the face of it, this comment is peculiar. Perhaps I don't know what he means. Or perhaps he didn't succeed in saying what he means. 

Surely, many OT prophecies were produced by visionaries who were contemporaneous with their audience. And these had divine authority. They were sent by God to speak his words in his name.

ii) I'd add that in the course of church history, you have men and women who claim to be prophets, and their oracles are sometimes taken seriously, at least within their sect or cult or band of followers. But there's a catch. If they make false predictions, then they discredit themselves. Although some of their adherents follow them no matter what they say or do, although some of their adherents explain away the discrepancies, this produces a crisis of faith. Some, or many, former followers become disillusioned with the would-be prophet or prophetess. They drop out of the movement. Some of them write in opposition to their former sect or cult. 

An analogous case is when a popular Bible teacher makes an end-of-the-world prediction based on his confident interpretation of Bible prophecies. He doesn't claim to be a prophet in his own right. But he does claim special insight into the meaning of Scripture. He was able to crack the code. 

That happens every so often in modern times. And when his prediction fails, he loses credibility. 

If Daniel was actually a contemporary of Jews during the Antiochean crisis, and he mispredicted the death of Antiochus, then we'd expect his oracles to suffer the same ignominious fate. At the very least, they'd be very controversial in Judaism. Hard to see how they could possibly attain canonical status. 

So that's one reason, among others, why the liberal date for Daniel is implausible.

Typography and exegesis

Conservative commentators think there's an implicit break between Dan 11:35-36 whereas liberal commentators think it's continuous. In other words, the question is whether this is referring to the same person throughout (i.e. Antiochus Epiphanes), or whether there's a shift from Antiochus to the Antichrist. 

Liberal commentators think it's special pleading for conservatives to posit a break at that point. By way of response:

i) The charge of special pleading cuts both ways. Liberal commentators (e.g. Collins, Goldingay) admit that vv36ff. are not an accurate record of Antiochus. They themselves have to explain away the historical evidence to rationalize their identification.

ii) Some commentators (Davis, MacRae, Steinmann) have noted striking parallels between 11:21-35 & 11:36-45 (or 11:36-12:3). They contend that if both refer to the same person, the duplication is hard to explain. If, by contrast, that's an a fortiori relation, where Antiochus prefigures a future counterpart, then the parallel is more explicable.

iii) There's an abrupt shift in 11:2-3, from the Persian kings to Alexander. It skips over several later Persian kings. So an unannounced shift between v35 and v36 is not unprecedented.

iv) Finally, I'd like to make a point of my own. To my knowledge, ancient Hebrew MSS didn't have chapter divisions or paragraph divisions. It was a continuous block text. Ancient scribes didn't have our modern formatting conventions. One of the things OT commentators (as well as NT commentators) must do is to decide where one unit ends and another unit begins. Sometimes that's obvious, but sometimes that's subtle or ambiguous. Commentators disagree with each other on when a Bible writer begins a new topic.

Given the absence of modern typographical conventions in ancient Hebrew MSS to demarcate transitions from one unit to another, there's nothing inherently ad hoc about commentators positing a shift from v35 to v36. If the writer intended a transition at that juncture, that's something the reader would have to infer for himself. That's not something the ancient writer could signal by starting a new chapter or paragraph. Even if there's an implicit break, the text itself will be continuous. 

So it's not as if conservative commentators are doing anything unusual in this respect. Every commentator, when exegeting a book of the Bible, must decide where the internal divisions occur. That's part of the interpretive process. 

“A New Pagan Era”

When it comes down to it, there are only two worldviews, according to Peter Jones (“One or Two: Seeing a World of Difference – Romans 1 for the Twenty-first Century”, Escondido, CA: Main Entry Editions, 2010). For simplicity’s sake, he identifies these simply as “One-ism” and “Two-ism”. The chart here (which I have modified somewhat) should be familiar to most Reformed readers. It illustrates how these worldviews line up:

When the chickens come home to roost

According to this story, two NYPD cops were assassinated in a revenge-killing today:

http://nypost.com/2014/12/20/2-nypd-cops-shot-execution-style-in-brooklyn/

According to this story, some bystanders cheered their execution:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/12/20/sick-cheers-for-cop-killer-in-brooklyn.html

This is the predictable result of public officials like Obama, Holder, and Blasio who pander to the narrative that cops are out to get blacks.

But the logic of the narrative recasts cop-killers as freedom-fighters. It's hard to see how public officials can do an about-face without repudiating the narrative. 

To take another liberal narrative, Hamas operatives are really freedom-fighters in relation to Israel. It's the same logic. 

We do have a serious problem with rogue cops in this country. But it lacks the racial angle that the liberal establishment, as well as some misguided evangelicals (e.g. Thabiti Anyabwile), foist on it.