BOOK
REVIEW: "THE CASE FOR THE REAL JESUS"
|
INTERVIEWS WITH CHRISTIAN APOLOGISTS |
|
by
Doug Ward |
It is no accident that Lee Strobel's
collections of interviews are a fixture on Christian bestseller lists. Strobel is an experienced journalist who knows how to gain
and hold a reader's attention. He introduces each topic with an engaging story,
and the fast-paced interview format is entertaining as well as informative. He
does his homework well, making excellent choices of scholars to interview and
asking these scholars the right questions. The reader is thus treated to
stimulating conversations with experts who have important messages to convey.
Strobel's latest book, The Case for the Real Jesus (Zondervan, 2007), is a worthy addition to the series. A
sequel to The Case for Christ, it revisits some subjects discussed in
the earlier book (the resurrection of Jesus, Jesus' fulfillment of messianic
prophecies) and introduces some additional ones (the Gnostic gospels,
postmodernism) that have become prominent concerns in recent years.
In
preparing this volume, Strobel crisscrossed North
America to conduct six interviews. His first stop is Wolfville,
Nova Scotia, where he talks with New Testament scholar Craig A. Evans about the noncanonical gospels-e.g., the Gospel of Thomas and Gospel
of Judas-that picture Jesus as a revealer of secret knowledge. Evans, an expert
on Jesus and his Jewish world, explains that while these unusual books reveal
much about the groups that produced them, they tell us little about the
historical Jesus. In terms of historical reliability, at least two factors put
the four canonical gospels in a class by themselves:
· The
Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) were written within a generation of
Jesus' crucifixion, and the Gospel of John was written within two generations
of that time.
· The canonical gospels contain
numerous historical details that have been corroborated by other sources.1
In contrast, the noncanonical gospels usually show little
interest in history and were written later, as evidenced by their anti-Jewish
slant and their dependence on the canonical New Testament writings.
|
Answering
Ehrman |
Strobel's second interview was prompted
by the controversy surrounding the book Misquoting Jesus, a 2005
bestseller written by Prof. Bart Ehrman. In this book
Ehrman, an expert on the text of the New Testament
and a gifted teacher and writer, presents an engaging general-audience
introduction to the field of New Testament textual criticism. He also explains
the role that his own exploration of this field played in his personal journey
from evangelical Christianity to agnosticism.
The
controversy stems from this second aspect of the book. Ehrman
argues that because of the many variations introduced as manuscripts were
copied and recopied over the early centuries of Christianity, there is no way
to tell what the New Testament originally said, and therefore the New Testament
cannot be divinely inspired. He points out that the number of textual
variations numbers between 200,000 and 400,000, a figure that actually exceeds
the total number of words in the Greek text (a little over 138,000).
However,
there are other experts in New Testament textual criticism who do not draw such
a negative conclusion from the state of our knowledge of the manuscript
evidence. A notable member of this group is Dan Wallace, executive
director of the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts. Wallace, who
has
engaged in public debate with Ehrman and
articulates an alternative point of view on textual criticism in the book Reinventing
Jesus (Kregel, 2006), was an obvious choice for Strobel's interview on this subject.
In
the interview, Wallace estimates that seventy to eighty per cent of the 200,000
to 400,000 New Testament textual variants are differences in Greek spelling
that don't affect the meaning of the text. Another large chunk of the variants
include differences in word order, obvious scribal "typos" that are
easy to correct, and differences involving synonyms (e.g., whether John 4:1
should say "Jesus knew" or "the Lord knew"). These variants
also have no effect on the meaning of the text. Only about one per cent of the
variants are viable candidates to be part of the original manuscripts and also
have some bearing on the interpretation of some New Testament passage.
What
about these variants that are both meaningful and
viable? Here Wallace emphasizes that "no cardinal or essential doctrine is
altered by any textual variant that has plausibility of going back to the
original" (p. 89). Whether I John 1:4 speaks of "your joy" or
"our joy," for example, is hardly
earthshaking. Neither is the question of whether the "number of the
beast" in Rev 13:18 is 666 or 616. Wallace makes a strong case that the
essential message of the original New Testament documents has come down to us
with great clarity.
|
Evidence
for the Resurrection |
The assertion that Jesus of Nazareth was resurrected from the dead
is the central historical claim of Christianity. Based on faith in the
resurrection, Christians believe that they too will be resurrected at the
Second Coming of Jesus (I Cor 15:51-57; Matt
24:30-31). On the other hand, as the apostle Paul told the early Christians in
Corinth, "... if Christ be not raised, your faith is in vain" (I Cor 15:17).
Since
so much hinges on whether the resurrection occurred, it is not surprising that
this question is still as hotly debated today as it was in the first century.
In his third interview, Strobel discusses the
historicity of the resurrection with Mike Licona, who serves as the director of apologetics and
interfaith evangelism for the North American Mission Board of the Southern
Baptist Convention. Licona is the coauthor (with Gary
Habermas) of the book The Case for the Resurrection
of Jesus (Kregel, 2004) as well as the author of Paul
Meets Muhammad: A Christian-Muslim Debate on the
Resurrection (Baker Books, 2006).
Licona bases his case for the resurrection of Jesus on five
"minimal facts" that are acknowledged by the vast majority of
scholarly writers on the subject, skeptical and conservative alike:
· Jesus
was killed by crucifixion.
· Jesus'
disciples believed that he arose and appeared to them.
· The conversion of the church persecutor Saul of Tarsus
(a.k.a. Paul).
· The conversion of the skeptic James, half-brother of Jesus.
· Jesus'
tomb was empty.
He argues that the most reasonable conclusion to draw from these five facts is
that Jesus really was resurrected, as Christians believe. Other models have
great difficulty accounting for one or more of the five facts. For example,
those who explain the empty tomb by saying that Jesus' body was simply moved to
another location have no good way to account for the conversions of Paul and
James, or to explain why five hundred other disciples were sure that Jesus had
appeared to them after his death (I Cor 15:6).
Similarly, those who suggest that Christianity borrowed the idea of the
resurrection from pagan myths about dying and rising gods run into a serious
problem in the fact that James, Paul, and the disciples of Jesus were observant
Jews who were very careful to avoid any contact with paganism.2
Licona has more to say on why a pagan origin for the idea of
Jesus' resurrection is highly unlikely. For one thing, a number of the pagan
resurrection myths actually postdate the first century. Furthermore, those that
do predate Christianity have little in common with the New Testament narratives
of the crucifixion and resurrection. For example, an Egyptian story has Osiris
coming back to life, but only in order to rule the shadowy netherworld-more a
"zombification" than a resurrection, as Licona jokingly observes. While the Gospel accounts are
tied to a specific time and place in history, the pagan stories are said to
occur at some unspecified time in the distant past and are often intended to
explain the annual seasonal cycle of death and rebirth.
|
Borrowed
from Paganism? |
Claims that Christianity's major doctrines are borrowed from paganism
have been widely circulated on the internet and in recent popular books, so Strobel decides to explore this issue further with Dr. Edwin Yamauchi of
Miami University. Yamauchi, an expert on the languages, cultures, and religions
of the ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern world, is well qualified to serve
as a "mythbuster" for modern myths about
ancient mythologies.
Yamauchi
explains that in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a group of
scholars called the "history of religions school" used apparent
parallels among the religions of antiquity to suggest ways in which these
various religions may have influenced each other. The theories of these
scholars have by now been largely discredited, but these theories live on in
popular books like The Jesus Mysteries and The Pagan Christ.
Yamauchi
points out two main weaknesses in the methodology of the history of religions
school. First, these scholars did not pay sufficient attention to the
chronological relationships among the beliefs and practices that they were
comparing. For example, the claim that a mystery religion called Mithraism may
have been source of some aspects of Christianity can be readily disproved by
the fact that Mithraism didn't actually take root in the Roman Empire until the
second century A.D.
The
second weakness is that the alleged parallels noted by the history of religions
school were often only superficial. Closer examination revealed that some allegedly
similar beliefs and practices were actually quite different, and evidence of
any historical cause and effect relationship was lacking.3
For instance, the gospel account of the Virgin Birth of Jesus is nothing at all
like pagan myths about lustful gods mating with mortal
women.
|
Jesus
and the Messianic Prophecies |
When the first Christians began to proclaim the gospel to their
Israelite brethren, a key part of their message was the claim that Jesus was
the promised Messiah. They supported this claim by arguing that Jesus had
fulfilled a number of prophecies recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures.
The
message of the apostles was highly controversial. Some embraced it, while
others rejected it. The debate over the Messiahship
of Jesus has raged ever since. Today, nearly two thousand years later, this
debate is being carried on with renewed vigor, thanks in part to the growth of
the Messianic movement.
One
of the foremost Christian experts on messianic prophecy is Dr. Michael L. Brown, author of the
four-volume (soon to be five-volume) work Answering Jewish Objections to
Jesus. Brown, a Jewish believer in Jesus, has devoted his life to
evangelism, especially evangelism to the Jewish community. His desire to give a
rigorous defense of his faith led to his pursuing advanced study, ultimately
leading to a doctorate in Near Eastern Languages and Literature at New York
University. Brown was a natural choice for Strobel's
interview on the question of whether Jesus is the promised Messiah.
In
his interview, Dr. Brown summarizes a "proof from prophecy" that
Jesus is the Messiah. As a starting point for his argument, Brown examines
Haggai 2:7-9, a prophecy given at the time when exiles from the House of Judah
had returned from Babylonian captivity and were beginning to rebuild the Temple
in Jerusalem.4 In this prophecy,
God proclaims that he would fill the new Temple with glory (v. 7). Previously
the tabernacle and Solomon's Temple had been "filled with glory" by
the coming of God's presence (Exodus 40:34-35; 2 Chron
5:14; 7:1-3), but no comparable event accompanied the rebuilding of the Temple.
In what sense, then, did God's glory fill the Second Temple?
Brown
turns to two other scriptures to help answer this question. One is Malachi
3:1-5, a prophecy that God would "suddenly come to his temple"
bringing purification for some and judgment for others. The other is Daniel
9:24-27, a prophecy that the coming of the Messiah and "reconciliation for
iniquity" would occur within "seventy weeks" (i.e., 490 years)
of "the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem." These three
prophecies together imply that a special visitation of God was to occur during
the time of the Second Temple. Brown argues that the coming of Jesus of
Nazareth, a manifestation of God's glory, is the only real candidate for this
visitation. Christians believe that Jesus died for the sins of mankind,
accomplishing the "reconciliation for iniquity" spoken of in Daniel 9
and bringing peace between God and man in fulfillment of Haggai 2:9.
Brown
asserts that the scriptural messianic job description is very broad, including
both kingly and priestly roles. One biblical passage that mentions both roles
is Psalm 110. Another is Zechariah 6:11-13, in which a priest who symbolizes
the Messiah sits on a throne and is crowned. In his priestly role the Messiah
"bare the sin of many" (Isa 53:12) and was the righteous sufferer of
Psalm 22, whose deliverance from death (the resurrection) has led people all
over the world to turn to God (Ps 22:27). Because Jesus has carried out his
priestly messianic duties, we can be confident that he will also come
"with the clouds of heaven" (Dan 7:13) in a triumphant return as
king.
At
the close of his interview, Brown points out that Christian anti-Judaism and
anti-Semitism probably have been the main barriers preventing many Jews over
the centuries from seriously considering Jesus' messianic claims. (Brown is
also the author of Our Hands are Stained with Blood, a book about
Christian persecution of Jews.) To be effective evangelists, Christians must
follow Jesus' example of love toward God and neighbor.
|
Jesus
and Postmodernism |
Christianity's claim to be the only true religion is seen by many
today as intolerant and judgmental. The "postmodern" view that every
person's beliefs are equally valid and must be accorded equal respect has
become very popular. To investigate the challenges of postmodernism, Strobel interviews Christian philosopher Dr. Paul Copan.
Copan
observes that postmodernism has had some positive consequences. In particular,
it has heightened our awareness of the limits of human knowledge and the fact
that personal biases are unavoidable. However, he then goes on to expose the
inherent contradictions in some popular postmodern viewpoints. For example, the
assertion that there are no absolute truths is itself an absolute truth claim.
The
idea that each person's beliefs are equally true can be a kind of cop out to
avoid the hard mental work of evaluating competing truth claims. In fact, not
all beliefs deserve equal respect. Some beliefs happen to be more in line with
reality than others. The appropriate kind of "tolerance", Copan says,
is that which holds all people to be of equal worth. One can accept other
people without necessarily affirming their beliefs.
The
Case for the Real Jesus
provides a fine starting point for considering the claims of Christianity. If
those claims are valid-specifically, if the resurrection of Jesus did in fact
occur-then Christianity can rightfully call itself the only true religion. Strobel's interview subjects give a compelling defense of
historic Christianity, but the conversations recorded in this inspiring and
stimulating book merely scratch the surface of what can be said on Jesus'
behalf. Strobel provides helpful lists of additional
sources to which readers can turn to learn about the full case for the premise
that the "historical Jesus" and the "Christ of faith" are
one and the same.
1For some examples of
such details, see the report on Prof. Evans's 2008
Miami University lecture in this issue of Grace &
Knowledge.
2For further discussion
of the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus, see our article on the
resurrection in Issue 7 of Grace & Knowledge.
3This is also a major
weakness in The Two Babylons, a popular anti-Catholic polemic.
4For
more on the book of Haggai, see the article “Haggai’s Festival
Message for Today” in Issue 13 of Grace and Knowledge.
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