How The Author's Travels Support The Authorship Attribution Of Luke/Acts

I've written before about how Acts ends with a "we" passage that places the author in Rome and how some of the earliest evidence we have for Lukan authorship comes from sources closely connected to that city. Something else to note about the authorship of Luke and Acts is that multiple sources in multiple locations should have been in a good position to know who wrote the documents. The "we" passages in Acts, which suggest participation by the author in the events in question, are evidence that the author traveled widely. And he apparently was writing Acts as he traveled, doing preparatory work for writing while traveling (e.g., gathering information from people, taking notes), or some of each, given the nature of the details in the document. (For evidence to that effect, see here, here, and here.) So, people in a large number and variety of locations should have had significant evidence regarding who wrote Acts (and the gospel of Luke). That includes being in a good position to falsify an incorrect authorship attribution. That's especially true given all of Luke/Acts' references to times, places, individuals involved, etc. I've argued that some of Luke's material on Jesus' childhood likely was acquired in the context of Acts 21. So, it looks like the authorship of the third gospel, not just Acts, is also directly connected to his travels in the "we" passages. Attribution of the third gospel and Acts to Luke was widespread and seems to have not faced much opposition. That makes more sense if the attribution is correct than if it's incorrect. That's true not only as a general principle, but even more so in light of the author's travels.

Neglected Evidence For Acts' Material On The Resurrection Appearance To Paul

There are some good arguments that are often brought up for the material on Jesus' appearance to Paul in Acts, such as the authorship of Luke/Acts and the general historical reliability of the author. See, for example, my posts on such issues here, Craig Keener's video on Luke's historiography here, and a video featuring Lydia McGrew on the subject of hard things Acts gets right here. What I want to focus on in this post is some evidence that comes up less often. I'll occasionally mention more common arguments in the process of discussing the less common ones, but my focus here is on lines of evidence that have gotten less attention.

The Number Of Resurrection Experiences Peter Had

The numbers are significant for other individuals as well, but I want to focus on Peter here as an example. He probably was part of at least three of the appearances mentioned in 1 Corinthians 15:5-8, and there's a good chance that he was part of four of them. For a discussion of the potential for his participation in the appearance to more than five hundred in 1 Corinthians 15:6, see here. He also witnessed the appearances in John 21 and Acts 1. And he's reported to have witnessed the empty tomb and the condition of Jesus' grave coverings at the time (Luke 24:12, John 20:3-7).

Such a large number of experiences would tend to involve a large amount of variety as well, and we see that with what Peter experienced. He was alone on one occasion, but with one or more other individuals on other occasions, only with John on the occasion of seeing the empty tomb and with varying larger groups on other occasions. The experiences are reported to have ranged across multiple weeks (John 20:26, Acts 1:3), from seeing the empty tomb on Easter day to seeing Jesus at the time of the ascension.

That sort of number and variety of experiences should be kept in mind. It wasn't just one event or one set of circumstances. Peter is the most significant example in this context, but the same point can be made to a lesser extent about other resurrection witnesses.

Evidence Of How Psalm 22:16 Should Be Rendered

Michael Flowers has produced a series of videos on Psalm 22:16, in which he makes a lot of significant points about the passage. He's also published an article discussing thirteen proposed renderings of the passage and assessing their strengths and weaknesses. Notice how easily most of the proposed readings can be reconciled with crucifixion. The traditional Christian view involving digging, boring through, or piercing is supported by the earliest versions of Psalm 22 that we have. As Flowers notes, "In an article from 1897 Henri Lesêtre observed that although Justin Martyr quotes Ps 22 for his Jewish interlocutor Trypho and appeals to it as a proof-text for Christ’s crucifixion, he never pauses to consider Jewish objections to the Septuagint rendering of v. 17 [verse 16 in Christian Bibles]. Since Justin is aware of other Jewish objections to Septuagint renderings – as in Dial. 67 where the term παρθένος in Isa 7:14 is discussed at length – Lesêtre hypothesized that כארו was still the established reading in the mid-second century." Justin's comments are in section 97 of his Dialogue if you want to read what he wrote for yourself. Furthermore, multiple other details in the psalm suggest a crucifixion, one with Roman characteristics, as I've discussed elsewhere. The language Christians appeal to in Psalm 22:16 was circulating in versions of that psalm in antiquity and seems to have been circulating widely, including in pre-Christian sources. If that language was a textual corruption, then was it a mere coincidence that such unusual textual mistakes so favorable to Christianity entered the manuscript record and became so popular? If somebody is going to advocate that sort of view, we should note how often he appeals to such unusual alleged mere coincidences in other contexts as well, such as with regard to other details in Psalm 22 and in other contexts related to prophecy fulfillment (Jesus just happened to be raised in Nazareth in the region of Zebulun in line with Isaiah 9:1, the flogging in the Servant Song in Isaiah 50 just happens to line up with the common Roman practice of flogging an individual before crucifixion, the Romans just happened to destroy both Jerusalem and the temple in line with Daniel's Seventy Weeks prophecy, etc.). And if the alternative reading of Psalm 22:16 that's adopted is one like the popular Jewish rendering involving a lion doing something to the hands and feet, we should ask what's being accomplished by going with that sort of reading. Even though it wouldn't support a Christian understanding of the psalm as much as a traditional Christian version of the text would, it's still singling out the hands and feet in a significantly unusual way and can easily be reconciled with crucifixion.

How To Approach Easter Prophecy

Issues of prophecy fulfillment often come up in the context of Easter. I want to make a few points about how to best handle the situation.

Easter Resources 2024

A few years ago, I wrote a short post about which evidence for Jesus' resurrection we should focus on the most. And Steve Hays wrote a lengthier article suggesting how to make a case for the resurrection.

Here are some examples of the Easter issues we've addressed over the years:

Skeptics Being Evasive About Recent Miracles

Critics of the supernatural often object to paranormal claims that occurred in the more distant past, since there's no ability to question the witnesses, consult the larger number of records that tend to be available with more recent events, etc. But they often provide poor responses to the evidence we do have for those more distant events, which raises questions like how much these skeptics actually need the larger amount of evidence they're asking for and how sincere their objections are.

Another way of addressing the line of objections I'm focused on here is to look at how these skeptics handle more recent miracle claims. How much interest do they show in asking the witnesses the relevant questions and examining the evidence involved in other ways?

Responses To Objections To The Name Statistics Argument

I've occasionally discussed a line of argument for the gospels and Acts based on the names of individuals in those documents. Lydia McGrew recently completed a good YouTube series responding to some objections to the argument.

Optional Belief In Mary's Assumption

"Pope Innocent IV (1243-1254) counted the Assumption an opinion that could be held or not held, for the Church had not yet decided." (Eamon Carroll, in Juniper Carol, ed., Mariology, Vol. 1 [Post Falls, Idaho: Mediatrix Press, 2018], approximate Kindle location 710)

Credobaptism Before The Reformation

I discussed infant baptism at length in some posts here in 2006. I don't think I've addressed the subject much since then. I want to revisit it.

A Response To Trent Horn's Comments In His Recent Sola Scriptura Debate With James White

In his debate with James White on sola scriptura last week, Trent Horn repeated some sentiments he's expressed before about the alleged lateness of the recognition of the New Testament documents as scripture, their lack of prominence before the time when Irenaeus wrote, etc. I've responded to him on the subject before, in the post here. What I documented there is also relevant to something else Trent said during the debate, when he referred to how Jesus didn't tell anybody to write anything before he ascended to heaven. As my post linked above argues, Jesus' comments on the work of the Holy Spirit in John 14-16 likely anticipate the New Testament. What he said isn't limited to what the apostles would write, but it does include their writings. That's probably why John's comments about his gospel toward the end of the document parallel what Jesus said in those earlier chapters. John seems to have considered his gospel a fulfillment of what Jesus anticipated. Again, see my post linked above for further details. That post also addresses other problems with Trent's view of the New Testament.

Evidence Against Infant Baptism In Aristides

I've written about how Aristides is a neglected source on baptismal issues. A passage I didn't bring up there was the following in section 15 of his Apology:

"Further, if one or other of them [Christians] have bondmen and bondwomen or children, through love towards them they persuade them to become Christians, and when they have done so, they call them brethren without distinction."

If somebody considers infant baptism a means of making the baptized child a Christian, the testimony of Aristides is some early evidence to the contrary. You could add one or more qualifiers to Aristides' comments to reconcile what he said with the view of infant baptism under consideration (e.g., by "children", he only meant a particular subcategory of children), but that would be a less natural reading.

When Tertullian writes against infant baptism in section 18 of his treatise On Baptism, he's often thought to be making the first explicit reference to an actual practice of infant baptism in the historical record rather than to be merely responding to a hypothetical. And I agree. It's likely that infant baptism was being practiced at the time by some people, though only a minority, and that Tertullian was responding to actual people who advocated the practice. And one of the comments Tertullian makes when arguing against infant baptism is "let them [infants] become Christians when they have become able to know Christ". So, it seems that the opponents he has in mind considered infant baptism a means of making the infants Christians. If so, the contrast between their view and Aristides' comments about persuading the children of Christians to become Christians is striking. Aristides appears to be offering two contrasts to the advocates of infant baptism Tertullian is interacting with. Aristides doesn't mention making infants Christians through baptism, and he does mention persuading them to become Christians. Tertullian's comments provide a significant contextual factor in interpreting Aristides.

And a point I made in my earlier thread about Aristides should be reiterated. He was writing to a pagan audience. It's unlikely, accordingly, that he would have expected his audience to make certain unstated Christian assumptions relevant to infant baptism, would have expected them to recognize highly subtle allusions to infant baptism, etc. The best explanation for why he seems to say nothing of infant baptism when discussing relevant topics and seems to even contradict the concept of making infants Christians through baptism is that he didn't hold such a view of baptism.

The Key To History

"Now God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing. That is the key to history." (C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity [New York, New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2021], approximate Kindle location 763)

The Departure Material In John

I've written about what I've called the departure passages in scripture and how they relate to issues like the papacy and sola scriptura. See here, for example. Acts 20, 2 Timothy, and 2 Peter have been discussed a lot, but I want to expand on John's material, which has been neglected.

Widespread Reports Of Near-Death And Out-Of-Body Experiences

Regardless of whether or not these things [near-death experiences, out-of-body experiences] veridically occur, people around the world have been reporting them throughout recorded history and regarding them as being in a separate category to everyday occurrences. This pattern of consistent ascription is an important indicator of the cross-cultural stability of such experiences….

People often also change their beliefs following their own NDE [near-death experience]. Notably, that includes atheists who neither believed in an afterlife nor expected to have an NDE….

In whatever culture it occurs, the OBE [out-of-body experience] is by definition always and unambiguously considered a dualistic state in which consciousness is separated from the body….

Not only are explicit descriptions of OBEs found in Eastern and Western narratives throughout history, but mind-body dualism, often exemplified by descriptions of OBEs, is a common element of nearly every branch of Egyptian, Ancient Near Eastern, Zoroastrian, Graeco-Roman, Hindu, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, and numerous other theologies (see, for example, Badham 1997, Bremmer 1983, Couliano 1991, Metzinger 2005, Pilch 2011, Zaleski 1987). Dean Shiels (1978: 699) found that of the 67 small-scale indigenous societies he reviewed, 95 percent believed in OBEs, and they were consistently described in remarkably similar ways. He concluded that the most likely explanation for this wide cross-cultural occurrence of OBE belief was that it "results from a common experience of this happening" (Shiels 1978: 699). McClenon's fieldwork (1994, 2002: 106-31) provides a mass of cross-cultural evidence that demonstrates that NDEs and OBEs often lead directly to beliefs in an afterlife and in mind-body dualism.

From a neuroscientific perspective, Thomas Metzinger (2005: 57) also theorizes that dualistic beliefs cross-culturally originate in OBEs. He stresses that OBEs "can be undergone by every human being and seem to possess a culturally invariant cluster of functional and phenomenal core properties." They "almost invariably lead the experiencing subject to conclude that conscious experience can, as a matter of fact, take place independently of the brain and the body." Metzinger (2005: 78 n. 8) cites other studies that support his hypothesis, including one (Osis 1979) in which 73% of survey respondents claimed that their beliefs had changed as a result of their OBEs, and another (Gabbard and Twemlow 1984) in which 66% claimed that their OBEs caused them to adopt a belief in life after death.

(Gregory Shushan, The Next World [United States: White Crow Books, 2022], approximate Kindle location 3474)

Paul's Suffering And Prophecy Fulfillment

I've been thinking about Paul's comments in 2 Corinthians 11 regarding how he'd suffered as a Christian. What he says there is significant in a lot of contexts. It provides further evidence that the earliest Christians lived in a setting in which there was a large amount of potential to suffer for the claims they were making (about Jesus' resurrection and other topics). Given Jesus' crucifixion, Paul's former persecution of Christians, and Paul's references to his own suffering in 2 Corinthians 11 and elsewhere, we have multiple, independent lines of evidence that Christianity arose in that kind of atmosphere. And what Paul reports about his own experiences corroborates much of what the gospels and Acts report about such circumstances. The gospels' reports about efforts to throw Jesus over a cliff or stone him, for example, are rendered more plausible by what Paul tells us about the violent reactions he often met with. There are some undesigned coincidences between 2 Corinthians 11 and the gospels and Acts as well. These are just a few examples of the value of Paul's comments in 2 Corinthians 11. What I want to do in the remainder of this post is focus on one of the other examples, the significance of the passage in a context involving prophecy fulfillment.

The New Testament's Historicity Evidenced In The Earliest Extrabiblical Sources

It's common to cite Josephus, Tacitus, Clement of Rome, and other early sources to corroborate certain parts of the New Testament. But the extent to which they support the historicity of the New Testament is underestimated, because so many of the details seldom or never get discussed.

People Converted Through Arguments

"My colleague J.P. Moreland, out at Talbot, has taken to responding to, when people say to him, 'You can't bring anybody to Christ through argument.', J.P. says, 'Oh, yeah, you can. I've done it.' And I can say the same. We constantly get emails and testimonies coming into Reasonable Faith that people who have come to Christ after seeing a debate or a video or have come back to Christ after walking away from Christian faith through Reasonable Faith materials." (William Lane Craig, 8:04 in the audio of his November 13, 2023 Reasonable Faith podcast here)

There are Biblical examples as well (e.g., Acts 17:2-4, 19:8).

Trivializing

"Now, why are these verses [Isaiah 1:29-31] so confrontational? You can ask that question of so many passages in the Bible, especially in the prophets. Why are these verses so confrontational? God is pressing his point because we trivialize ourselves. God takes us more seriously than we take ourselves." (Ray Ortlund, 31:56 in the audio of his August 25, 2002 sermon here)

Racism, Classism, And Other Problems In Paranormal Experiences

I've been citing Gregory Shushan's comments on some aspects of paranormal phenomena that don't get discussed much and don't fit well with a lot of popular interpretations of the paranormal. I'll conclude with this post, in which I'll briefly refer to a variety of other examples that people can read more about in Shushan's book.

He often refers to separations of people in the afterlife according to their race, social class, and such in contexts like near-death experiences and mediumship (The Next World [United States: White Crow Books, 2022], e.g., approximate Kindle location 1962). He writes of how it was "common" for there to be racism in mediumistic messages in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (2096). Leslie Flint, a medium, claimed that in the afterlife, "Oscar Wilde lives a life of 'delicious sin' which in Heaven is 'natural' (ibid. 34, 82, 91-3, 102, 108-10, 112)." (1962) Shushan writes:

Racism, classism, and religious intolerance are disturbing trends in the pre-1975 narratives. This has some important ramifications for those who wish to view the afterlife descriptions as genuine, for they indicate either that the next world is truly a systemized bigoted realm, or that the spirit communicators were portraying merely their personal intolerant mind-dependent afterlife. However, the latter possibility is inconsistent with the recurring claim by the spirits themselves that death brings about spiritual transformation….The other possibility is that the information conveyed by spirits was filtered through the mediums' minds and thus overlaid with the institutionalized bigotry of their times….

In any case, we are left with a somewhat obvious conundrum: communication difficulties cannot explain why statements about the afterlife and its denizens could not be clear, specific, accurate, and consistent while evidential information [verifying paranormality] allegedly could. (2086, 2237)

Shushan often refers to errors and apparent inconsistencies among the phenomena, even inconsistencies within the experiences of one individual. At one point, he refers to "yet another contradiction" from a well-evidenced medium (1910). That medium, Geraldine Cummins, "also credited her communicators with some frankly ludicrous statements, such as that there are monkeys in the sun, according to the spirit of Sir Walter Scott." (1879)