A Polite Response To YouTube's TheFunkyTheist
_
For anybody
who has ever seen my videos on YouTube knows, I tend to use quite a lot of
sarcasm. Partially, it’s because I can
be a jerk. And partially, it is entertainment value. I know I’m not the most electrifying speaker,
so, throwing in perhaps a clip from a Batman movie can be my way to try to
liven it up a bit.
At any rate, over the last year or two, I’ve had a number of discussions with a YouTube host known as TheFunkyTheist. He used to be known as AnglicanApologist72. He now also posts a full name of David Funk. In my responses to David, I’ve often used a lot of sarcasm. But, despite the fact that I can find his arguments frustrating, I actually think he is basically a good kid. Furthermore, it is true that sometimes that sarcasm can get in the way presenting a message. So, to those ends, I will – at least for this particular response – keep the sarcasm to a minimum.
David did a “documentary” on the alleged reliability of the Gospel of Mark, which was a 25 minute video. I did a refutation video series. It takes longer to refute bad arguments than to state them, so my response was over an hour long. He has chosen to respond to my video series in writing on his blog. Therefore, I am going to do a written response as well. I expect to do a single YouTube video just to introduce the highlights of this response, rather than read the whole thing out.
In short, David says that I’m all wrong and that it is indeed reasonable to conclude that the Gospel of Mark is overall “reliable”. You can read his response if you like, it is at:
thefunkytheist.blogspot.com/2011/12/caseagainstfaith-on-case-for-mark.html
(Note: I took down the video series, as this article replaces it. If you are coming in new, I suggest watching his original video, possibly reading his rebuttal, then rejoining me here.)
Christopher Hitchens said that he would be willing to concede everything about Christianity is true, Jesus’ Resurrection, everything, he still wouldn’t follow Jesus. I personally wouldn’t go that far, but it would be tempting to simply drop all claims, all arguments of mine, and simply respond, “I reject your evidence as insufficient and therefore reject your claims.” As I’ve said before, that really all I should have to say. As an analogy, if someone presents some evidence for an alien visitation, but I find the evidence insufficient, I am not automatically burdened with proving his evidence wrong. I simply can reject it on its own lack of merit, period.
I often say that I don’t have the burden of proof, David or any other apologist has the burden of proof because they are the ones making the claim. But I suppose I am making one minor claim. I am making the claim that David has not provided satisfactory evidence to accept his claims. And I claim that others should come to the same conclusion as I do. Since I am making this small claim, I suppose I have some burden of proof to meet, I have to provide reasonable reason to conclude his evidence is insufficient. But, to meet this burden of proof, I do not need to prove conclusively something else happened. My only burden is to show why his arguments are insufficient to accept. That wouldn’t mean that he was for certain wrong, it would simply mean that he hasn’t given sufficient justification to conclude he is right.
As an analogy, David is like a prosecuting attorney, I am like a defense attorney. David has the burden of proof and I am fully within my rights to simply offer nothing and say other than that David hasn’t met his burden of proof. Some actual court cases actually are won like that, the defense simply motions for dismissal of the case due to failure of the prosecution. But, if I happen to suspect that a “jury” – the readers – might be (erroneously) inclined to believe the “prosecution”, then all I need to do is offer “reasonable doubt” about the quality of arguments presented. I don’t have to prove “innocence,” (I don’t have to prove David is wrong) I just have to show there is reasonable doubt.
Okay, enough with the prelude, let us get to David’s specific arguments in his response. Since I have often charged David with shifting the burden of proof, I will start off by quoting David’s attempt to respond to my charge:
At any rate, over the last year or two, I’ve had a number of discussions with a YouTube host known as TheFunkyTheist. He used to be known as AnglicanApologist72. He now also posts a full name of David Funk. In my responses to David, I’ve often used a lot of sarcasm. But, despite the fact that I can find his arguments frustrating, I actually think he is basically a good kid. Furthermore, it is true that sometimes that sarcasm can get in the way presenting a message. So, to those ends, I will – at least for this particular response – keep the sarcasm to a minimum.
David did a “documentary” on the alleged reliability of the Gospel of Mark, which was a 25 minute video. I did a refutation video series. It takes longer to refute bad arguments than to state them, so my response was over an hour long. He has chosen to respond to my video series in writing on his blog. Therefore, I am going to do a written response as well. I expect to do a single YouTube video just to introduce the highlights of this response, rather than read the whole thing out.
In short, David says that I’m all wrong and that it is indeed reasonable to conclude that the Gospel of Mark is overall “reliable”. You can read his response if you like, it is at:
thefunkytheist.blogspot.com/2011/12/caseagainstfaith-on-case-for-mark.html
(Note: I took down the video series, as this article replaces it. If you are coming in new, I suggest watching his original video, possibly reading his rebuttal, then rejoining me here.)
Christopher Hitchens said that he would be willing to concede everything about Christianity is true, Jesus’ Resurrection, everything, he still wouldn’t follow Jesus. I personally wouldn’t go that far, but it would be tempting to simply drop all claims, all arguments of mine, and simply respond, “I reject your evidence as insufficient and therefore reject your claims.” As I’ve said before, that really all I should have to say. As an analogy, if someone presents some evidence for an alien visitation, but I find the evidence insufficient, I am not automatically burdened with proving his evidence wrong. I simply can reject it on its own lack of merit, period.
I often say that I don’t have the burden of proof, David or any other apologist has the burden of proof because they are the ones making the claim. But I suppose I am making one minor claim. I am making the claim that David has not provided satisfactory evidence to accept his claims. And I claim that others should come to the same conclusion as I do. Since I am making this small claim, I suppose I have some burden of proof to meet, I have to provide reasonable reason to conclude his evidence is insufficient. But, to meet this burden of proof, I do not need to prove conclusively something else happened. My only burden is to show why his arguments are insufficient to accept. That wouldn’t mean that he was for certain wrong, it would simply mean that he hasn’t given sufficient justification to conclude he is right.
As an analogy, David is like a prosecuting attorney, I am like a defense attorney. David has the burden of proof and I am fully within my rights to simply offer nothing and say other than that David hasn’t met his burden of proof. Some actual court cases actually are won like that, the defense simply motions for dismissal of the case due to failure of the prosecution. But, if I happen to suspect that a “jury” – the readers – might be (erroneously) inclined to believe the “prosecution”, then all I need to do is offer “reasonable doubt” about the quality of arguments presented. I don’t have to prove “innocence,” (I don’t have to prove David is wrong) I just have to show there is reasonable doubt.
Okay, enough with the prelude, let us get to David’s specific arguments in his response. Since I have often charged David with shifting the burden of proof, I will start off by quoting David’s attempt to respond to my charge:
_Caseagainstfaith claimed I shifted the burden of proof by
stating that one must explain plausibly how Papias could have been mistaken
about the authorship of Mark's gospel, in order to rationally deny my own
hypothesis that Papias was correct. That means he claimed it is shifting
the burden of proof to ask for an explanation of a given set of data in order
to reject that data as evidence of a different explanation. That's like me
saying that the burden of proof is shifted when someone asks me for an explanation
of the evidence for evolution. Caseagainstfaith is essentially saying that the
whole scientific method is just a way of shifting the burden of proof. But I
think most of us like the scientific method, so we can all agree that
caseagainstfaith is just wrong. It is perfectly justified asking for
explanations of data that requires an explanation.
|
_I have
several responses to David’s defense. I
will start with that last sentence, “It is perfectly justified asking for
explanations of data that requires an explanation”. I take
exception to the idea of someone being mistaken is something that requires an explanation. People are mistaken all the time. It is a sufficiently common occurrence for
people to be mistaken that it is not an event that requires explanation. If
David insists on some kind of explanation, I could simply first point out that no matter how smart Papias might have been, he can still only be as accurate as his source. And surely even the ever-popular Einstein probably occasionally took the word of a bad source. If David would want even more explanation, then I will suggest yet again to
refer to some of Elizabeth Loftus’ work on the limitations of memory and
eyewitness testimony. Here are some
references:
http://faculty.washington.edu/eloftus/
http://www.amazon.com/Eyewitness-Testimony-new-preface-author/dp/0674287770/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1324481804&sr=1-1
In short, the fact that humans are fallible is a well-known, well documented part of the human condition. That is all the explanation of people being mistaken is all that is necessary.
Moreover, the reason why someone is mistaken is likely to be unknown. If I am forced to accept that someone is not mistaken when I lack information on how they came to be mistaken, I’d have to believe every religion on Earth. I don’t know how each and every Muslim came to be mistaken, particularly not the first Muslims. Am I required to assume they were not mistaken? No, I’m not. Can David provide for me exact evidence for exactly how every Muslim, every Hindu, every Mormon, heck every UFO believer, Big Foot believer, etc., came to their wrong conclusions? Is he therefore required to accept their claims?
Perhaps David would say that we aren’t merely talking about some average, ordinary mistake. People may make mistakes all the time, but, would someone make the mistake that Papias may have made? It is possible that it is the nature of the potential mistake is what David says requires an explanation. Then again, what is so particularly unique about the potential mistakes of Papias that is so unusual to demand some kind of explanation? As far as I can see, nothing at all.
So let me be clear, I am not claiming for certain that Papias was specifically mistaken about the report from the Presbyter. Maybe he was, but I don’t know. But not only do I not know whether or not he was mistaken, I don’t even really know that he made the claim at all! All I got is a later source that says he made the claim. Maybe it is correct, I don’t know. There are just too many things I don’t know to even begin to try to assess the probability of what mistake Papias may or may not have made.
But the bottom line is, if there is some peculiar reason why the potential mistakes of Papias demand explanation, then it is, of course, David’s burden of proof to show. Until then, no, people making mistakes have no demand for explanation.
Now I’d like to respond to the rest of David’s defense on the issue of burden of proof. David says, “That's like me saying that the burden of proof is shifted when someone asks me for an explanation of the evidence for evolution. Caseagainstfaith is essentially saying that the whole scientific method is just a way of shifting the burden of proof.” I’m not quite following this argument. But to clarify, let us say you are a proponent of evolution, and endeavoring to convince someone else to accept evolution. You would be the claimant and have the burden of proof. Other people do happen to have the right to say that it doesn’t meet their personal evidence threshold. Yes, I am indeed saying that it is 100% legitimate for a Creationist to conclude, at least for them, that the evidence for evolution is insufficient. Furthermore, they would be perfectly justified to leave it at that without additional explanation. Yes, a Creationist is free to reject the evidence for evolution without any obligation to anybody to explain why. Now, if this Creationist wants me to believe him that evolution is false, that is when he incurs the burden of proof. If he merely rejects the case for evolution and doesn’t care what I think, then he has no burden of proof whatsoever.
So, as to the scientific method, any scientist is free to come up with any hypothesis they like. And free to reject any hypothesis they want. But if the scientist wants anybody else to believe their hypothesis, then they have the burden of proof. Science has methodologies such as experimentation and peer review for scientists to meet such burdens of proof. I’m not quite sure if this answers David’s argument since I didn’t quite see what he was saying. But I hope it answers it.
Since David mentioned the scientific method, I think it worth pointing out that while the subject of history may be classified as a science, but it is the weakest of sciences. Physical sciences have the advantage of being able to do repeatable experiments. History doesn’t have such a luxury. I can’t produce another Papias and repeat the experiment. I can only go by what information is presented to me. Louis Gottschalk discusses this very issue in his book, Understanding History, (available to read online) which I shall quote:
http://faculty.washington.edu/eloftus/
http://www.amazon.com/Eyewitness-Testimony-new-preface-author/dp/0674287770/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1324481804&sr=1-1
In short, the fact that humans are fallible is a well-known, well documented part of the human condition. That is all the explanation of people being mistaken is all that is necessary.
Moreover, the reason why someone is mistaken is likely to be unknown. If I am forced to accept that someone is not mistaken when I lack information on how they came to be mistaken, I’d have to believe every religion on Earth. I don’t know how each and every Muslim came to be mistaken, particularly not the first Muslims. Am I required to assume they were not mistaken? No, I’m not. Can David provide for me exact evidence for exactly how every Muslim, every Hindu, every Mormon, heck every UFO believer, Big Foot believer, etc., came to their wrong conclusions? Is he therefore required to accept their claims?
Perhaps David would say that we aren’t merely talking about some average, ordinary mistake. People may make mistakes all the time, but, would someone make the mistake that Papias may have made? It is possible that it is the nature of the potential mistake is what David says requires an explanation. Then again, what is so particularly unique about the potential mistakes of Papias that is so unusual to demand some kind of explanation? As far as I can see, nothing at all.
So let me be clear, I am not claiming for certain that Papias was specifically mistaken about the report from the Presbyter. Maybe he was, but I don’t know. But not only do I not know whether or not he was mistaken, I don’t even really know that he made the claim at all! All I got is a later source that says he made the claim. Maybe it is correct, I don’t know. There are just too many things I don’t know to even begin to try to assess the probability of what mistake Papias may or may not have made.
But the bottom line is, if there is some peculiar reason why the potential mistakes of Papias demand explanation, then it is, of course, David’s burden of proof to show. Until then, no, people making mistakes have no demand for explanation.
Now I’d like to respond to the rest of David’s defense on the issue of burden of proof. David says, “That's like me saying that the burden of proof is shifted when someone asks me for an explanation of the evidence for evolution. Caseagainstfaith is essentially saying that the whole scientific method is just a way of shifting the burden of proof.” I’m not quite following this argument. But to clarify, let us say you are a proponent of evolution, and endeavoring to convince someone else to accept evolution. You would be the claimant and have the burden of proof. Other people do happen to have the right to say that it doesn’t meet their personal evidence threshold. Yes, I am indeed saying that it is 100% legitimate for a Creationist to conclude, at least for them, that the evidence for evolution is insufficient. Furthermore, they would be perfectly justified to leave it at that without additional explanation. Yes, a Creationist is free to reject the evidence for evolution without any obligation to anybody to explain why. Now, if this Creationist wants me to believe him that evolution is false, that is when he incurs the burden of proof. If he merely rejects the case for evolution and doesn’t care what I think, then he has no burden of proof whatsoever.
So, as to the scientific method, any scientist is free to come up with any hypothesis they like. And free to reject any hypothesis they want. But if the scientist wants anybody else to believe their hypothesis, then they have the burden of proof. Science has methodologies such as experimentation and peer review for scientists to meet such burdens of proof. I’m not quite sure if this answers David’s argument since I didn’t quite see what he was saying. But I hope it answers it.
Since David mentioned the scientific method, I think it worth pointing out that while the subject of history may be classified as a science, but it is the weakest of sciences. Physical sciences have the advantage of being able to do repeatable experiments. History doesn’t have such a luxury. I can’t produce another Papias and repeat the experiment. I can only go by what information is presented to me. Louis Gottschalk discusses this very issue in his book, Understanding History, (available to read online) which I shall quote:
_Here is an essential difference between the
study of man's past and a man's physical environment. Physics, for
example, has an extrinsic and whole object to study–the physical universe–that
does not change because the physicist is studying it, no matter how much his
understanding of it may change. History has only detached and scattered
objects to study that do not together make up the total object that is the
historian is studying and that object–the past of mankind–having largely
disappeared, exists only in as far as his always incomplete and frequently
changing understanding of it can re-create it. (Gottschalk p. 47-48)
|
_Not only
does the field of history not have the ability to do repeatable experiments,
but of all the potential data that we might be able to investigate, the reality
is most of it is lost forever. Here is
Gottschalk on this issue:
_The past, having happened, has perished forever
with only occasional traces. To begin with, although the absolute number
of historical writings is staggering, only a small part of what happened in the
past was ever observed. A moment's reflection is sufficient to establish
that fact. How much, for example, of what you do, say, or think has ever observed
by anyone–including yourself? Multiply your unobserved actions, thoughts,
words and physiological processes by 2,000,000,000 and you'll get a rough
estimate of the amount of unobserved happenings that go on in the world all the
time. And only a part of what was observed in the past was remembered by those
who observed it; only a part of what was remembered was recorded; only part of
what was recorded has survived; only a part of what has survived has come to a
historian's attention; only a part of what has come to their attention is
credible; only a part of what is credible has been grasped; and only part of
what has been grasped can be expanded or narrated by the historian. The
whole history of the past (what has been called history-as-actuality) can be
known to him only through the surviving record of it (history-as-record), and
most of history-as-record is only the surviving part of the recorded part of
the remembered part of the observed part of that whole. (Gottschalk p. 45-46)
|
_The problem of
re-creating the historical past grows more and more difficult the further back
in history we look. Here is some of what Gottschalk says about studying
more ancient history:
_
For
many early periods of history, less disagreement is found among the sources, because
there are fewer sources than for more recent periods. [...] Thus a greater
degree of consensus and certitude my easily exist among historians where the
testimony is lacking than where it is full. Perhaps nothing provides more
eloquent proof than this that the historian's "truths" are derived
from analytical evaluations of an object called "sources" rather than
an object called "the actual past." (Gottschalk p. 170-171)
|
_Because of
the aforementioned problems that history suffers from, there are practical
limits on what a historian is able to do.
Here, Gottschalk comments on this:
_In short, the historian's aim is verisimilitude with
regard to a perished past–a subjective process–rather than
experimental certainty with regard to an objective reality. [emphasis
added] He tries to get as close as approximation to the truth about the
past as constant correction of his mental images will allow, at the same time
recognizing that the truth has in fact eluded him forever. (Gottschalk p. 47)
|
_Before my
digression into the issues of the historical method versed the scientific
method, I was discussing “shifting the burden of proof.” To conclude this issue, the simple bottom
line here is that it David who is making a claim which needs to be
supported. His claim is, “Papias was not
mistaken”. On the other hand, I am not making the claim, “Papias definitely was mistaken.” What I am doing is:
1 Asserting that David has not proven that Papias was not mistaken. At least for me to come to this conclusion, this entails no burden of proof on my part.
2 But, if I expect someone else to agree with me, does entail a small amount of burden of proof on my part. But that is easily met with simply pointing out that people are mistaken all the time. That doesn’t prove Papias was mistaken, it simply gives reason to reject as unproven David’s claim which carries the primary burden of proof.
1 Asserting that David has not proven that Papias was not mistaken. At least for me to come to this conclusion, this entails no burden of proof on my part.
2 But, if I expect someone else to agree with me, does entail a small amount of burden of proof on my part. But that is easily met with simply pointing out that people are mistaken all the time. That doesn’t prove Papias was mistaken, it simply gives reason to reject as unproven David’s claim which carries the primary burden of proof.
_
Okay, on to bigger and better issues, eh? Let’s talk about the actual claims David made in regards to Papias’ testimony. In my video series, I gave a, shall we say, abbreviated rendition of David’s argument, along with a heaping helping of sarcasm. In David’s response, he says that my “summation” is inaccurate, a distortion of what he argues. So, this time I will dispense with the sarcasm and attempt to unpack what he says and show why, ultimately, my summation is roughly correct. He may well have a complaint about how I presented my summation, but it isn’t actually terribly far off.
Before I begin though, I wish to point out that my sarcasm was intended to make a point. The point was that David, by using artistic flourishes of music and graphics made it appear on first glance that he was bringing more to the table than he actually was. He actually brought very little to the table and that his flourishes didn’t change that at all.
So, let’s politely look at what David actually says. First, David quotes from Papias where he tells us that he wasn’t satisfied easily and asked people questions about what they knew and how they knew it. And, this might surprise you, but, I’m actually going to concede this counts for something. There isn’t any perfect way to decide whose testimony to believe and whose not to. But, one of the ways we make such decisions is whether we think the person giving the testimony gave due diligence to determine whether what they said is true or not. So, that Papias is telling us he used due diligence is of some value. On the other hand, I have yet to meet a person to say, “Oh, I just believe any crap people tell me.” There are indeed many people that seem like that is actually the case, but, nobody believes that about themselves. Everybody thinks they have good discernment and use due diligence, certainly at least in regards to their personal core beliefs. So, while it is of some value that someone tells us they used due diligence, we really need more than that to actually believe it. After all, doesn’t David realize that the followers of every religion on earth, especially the devout, would likewise tell him they used due diligence?
David tells us that Papias got his information from the “Presbyters,” early church members who are alleged to have been in contact with Jesus’ actual disciples. Is it not obvious that every church ever to exist has had early members who were in contact with the founders of the religion? And is it not also likewise that every church would say great things about their church founders great men, chosen men, men on a mission from God, etc.? Does giving them a fancy name like “Presbyter” change the fact that we are just talking about a set of people that we know nothing about other than the fact that they were early members of his church? In other words, they are anonymous. We know essentially nothing about them.
David also provides a quote of Papias relaying information from the Presbyter, claiming that Mark was careful to record information accurately from Peter. As near as I can determine, this is David's linchpin for his "umbrella" claim of reliability of the entire Gospel. I am endeavoring to avoid sarcasm, but as politely as I can say, I can scarcely believe David finds this to be an argument at all. David wants us to believe that everything in the Gospel is true because some anonymous first century Christian says it's all true? If I found an anonymous Australian aborigine to assert that that everything in their religion is true, and this aborigine was reasonably close in time to the origin of the religion, would David find this to be powerful evidence? Somehow I seriously doubt it. David continues to talk about "historical accuracy" and this "argument" more than anything reveals how little David understands. Is there any secular equivalent, where a document is given umbrella declarations of "reliability" based on an anonymous source relayed by several hands? And that the source and all the hands thereafter are emotionally committed to the agenda? No, there is not. If there is, I'd love to see David demonstrate it. (In the addendum at the bottom of this article, I will discuss further reasons to reject the claim from the Presbyter as untenable.)
So, what about Papias? Now, I could be wrong on this, but, to my understanding, we don’t have any information about Papias except for what other church fathers wrote, and we don’t have that much of that. Papias may not be accurately termed completely anonymous, but as far as I know, he’s not that far from it. We know little about Papias other than he was an early church member who got some information from some completely unknown early church member. And we wouldn’t know that except for the fact this was preserved by some other early church member. So, pure sarcasm free, that is, at least as far as I know, completely correct and not much different than what I originally said in my video. If David has more than that, okay, great, let’s hear it. But that is all that was actually said. And his use of fancy graphics and music doesn’t add anything more. That was my point.
Later in David’s rebuttal, he returned to the topic of Papias, so, I will group the Papias material here. I had charged that Papias was an unreliable witness, known for accepting wild stories and even denigrated by Eusubius as being “of limited understanding.” David responds,
Okay, on to bigger and better issues, eh? Let’s talk about the actual claims David made in regards to Papias’ testimony. In my video series, I gave a, shall we say, abbreviated rendition of David’s argument, along with a heaping helping of sarcasm. In David’s response, he says that my “summation” is inaccurate, a distortion of what he argues. So, this time I will dispense with the sarcasm and attempt to unpack what he says and show why, ultimately, my summation is roughly correct. He may well have a complaint about how I presented my summation, but it isn’t actually terribly far off.
Before I begin though, I wish to point out that my sarcasm was intended to make a point. The point was that David, by using artistic flourishes of music and graphics made it appear on first glance that he was bringing more to the table than he actually was. He actually brought very little to the table and that his flourishes didn’t change that at all.
So, let’s politely look at what David actually says. First, David quotes from Papias where he tells us that he wasn’t satisfied easily and asked people questions about what they knew and how they knew it. And, this might surprise you, but, I’m actually going to concede this counts for something. There isn’t any perfect way to decide whose testimony to believe and whose not to. But, one of the ways we make such decisions is whether we think the person giving the testimony gave due diligence to determine whether what they said is true or not. So, that Papias is telling us he used due diligence is of some value. On the other hand, I have yet to meet a person to say, “Oh, I just believe any crap people tell me.” There are indeed many people that seem like that is actually the case, but, nobody believes that about themselves. Everybody thinks they have good discernment and use due diligence, certainly at least in regards to their personal core beliefs. So, while it is of some value that someone tells us they used due diligence, we really need more than that to actually believe it. After all, doesn’t David realize that the followers of every religion on earth, especially the devout, would likewise tell him they used due diligence?
David tells us that Papias got his information from the “Presbyters,” early church members who are alleged to have been in contact with Jesus’ actual disciples. Is it not obvious that every church ever to exist has had early members who were in contact with the founders of the religion? And is it not also likewise that every church would say great things about their church founders great men, chosen men, men on a mission from God, etc.? Does giving them a fancy name like “Presbyter” change the fact that we are just talking about a set of people that we know nothing about other than the fact that they were early members of his church? In other words, they are anonymous. We know essentially nothing about them.
David also provides a quote of Papias relaying information from the Presbyter, claiming that Mark was careful to record information accurately from Peter. As near as I can determine, this is David's linchpin for his "umbrella" claim of reliability of the entire Gospel. I am endeavoring to avoid sarcasm, but as politely as I can say, I can scarcely believe David finds this to be an argument at all. David wants us to believe that everything in the Gospel is true because some anonymous first century Christian says it's all true? If I found an anonymous Australian aborigine to assert that that everything in their religion is true, and this aborigine was reasonably close in time to the origin of the religion, would David find this to be powerful evidence? Somehow I seriously doubt it. David continues to talk about "historical accuracy" and this "argument" more than anything reveals how little David understands. Is there any secular equivalent, where a document is given umbrella declarations of "reliability" based on an anonymous source relayed by several hands? And that the source and all the hands thereafter are emotionally committed to the agenda? No, there is not. If there is, I'd love to see David demonstrate it. (In the addendum at the bottom of this article, I will discuss further reasons to reject the claim from the Presbyter as untenable.)
So, what about Papias? Now, I could be wrong on this, but, to my understanding, we don’t have any information about Papias except for what other church fathers wrote, and we don’t have that much of that. Papias may not be accurately termed completely anonymous, but as far as I know, he’s not that far from it. We know little about Papias other than he was an early church member who got some information from some completely unknown early church member. And we wouldn’t know that except for the fact this was preserved by some other early church member. So, pure sarcasm free, that is, at least as far as I know, completely correct and not much different than what I originally said in my video. If David has more than that, okay, great, let’s hear it. But that is all that was actually said. And his use of fancy graphics and music doesn’t add anything more. That was my point.
Later in David’s rebuttal, he returned to the topic of Papias, so, I will group the Papias material here. I had charged that Papias was an unreliable witness, known for accepting wild stories and even denigrated by Eusubius as being “of limited understanding.” David responds,
_
Caseagainstfaith claims that Eusebius, the 4th century
Christian historian considered Papias to be uneducated in regard to
eschatology, and also mentions that Papias recorded a most likely
unhistorical description of the death of Judas Iscariot. Somehow,
caseagainstfaith took this to be a serious argument against Papias' historical
reliability on Mark's authorship. Let's observe why it's not. First of all,
Eusebius didn't regard Papias as unreliable in regard to history, he simply
believed that his millenarian views were idiotic, and I would actually agree
with Eusebius on this. Second, in regard to Papias' account of Judas Iscariot's
death, I couldn't help but be reminded of Josephus' account about the death of
King Herod (antiquities 17.6.5). Read it for yourself. Josephus made very
similar exaggerations about Herod's death as Papias did about Judas's death.
But none of this affects the historical reliability of Josephus and Papias on
certain historical points. We in fact don't know where Papias received his
information about the death of Judas. But we do know where he received his
information about Mark's gospel. And that is what really matters.
|
_
This gets
back to my previous comments about how to determine whether or not to accept
someone’s testimony. David says that
Eusebius didn’t claim that Papias was unreliable in regards to history. Perhaps. On the other hand, calling Papias to
be “of limited understanding as you can see from his discourses” is not exactly
a ringing endorsement now is it? David
says that comment was primarily about different issues. Perhaps.
But, it is still not a ringing
endorsement.
Besides, David just told us that Papias is unreliable in regards to history! He just conceded that Papias “recorded a most likely unhistorical description of the death of Judas Iscariot.” So, I have an even better source than Eusubius for Papias’ unreliability, I have David, the one, the only, The Funky Theist as a source! If Papias was here today, do you honestly think Papias would say, “oh, yeah, that Judas story, I believed that story without due diligence, but for everything else I checked it real careful”?
The bottom line here is that we just don’t have very much to go on to assert Papias is reliable, and have a good deal to suggest he is not. And even if Papias himself is reliable, he can only be as reliable as his source, the Presbyter, which we know even less about. Now, I concede this is somewhat subjective. And I’ll be happy to grant that David or any other Christian has a perfect right for themselves to grant Papias and the Presbyter more leeway in regards to their reliability than another person might. What I object to is his refusal to grant me the same rights and to consider it a reasonable position to disagree. If he were to honestly say, “Hey, I’m deciding to give Papias and the Presbyter the benefit of the doubt here” that would be one thing. To act like he is giving some kind of “powerful proof” that everybody else should accept is quite another, and quite asinine.
Now, sure, it is of course true that just because someone reports one thing that, shall we say, is “unlikely”, doesn’t mean everything they say is garbage. Just because Papias repeated some silly legends doesn’t mean everything he said his nonsense. After all, just like David said, many other people of the time, such as Josephus, reported exaggerated stories. Yet we don’t throw away everything Josephus says. And this is indeed true. But we do throw away a lot of what Josephus says! Further, as I’ve pointed out before, historians now accept that many historians of the time, including Josephus, distorted their reporting due to agendas. (See Greek and Roman Historians: Information and Misinformation by Michael Grant.) This is indeed why modern historians take even the best ancient historians such as Josephus are taken with a grain of salt. And why modern historians just don’t make blanket assertions of “reliability” on any work. David’s claim of “reliability” of the Gospels, or the Gospel of Mark specifically, is a claim that no modern historian makes on any work. This is a point that I’ve made to David many times and he just refuses to acknowledge it and come to grips with it.
I will quote to him, yet again, what Gottschalk says on the issue:
Besides, David just told us that Papias is unreliable in regards to history! He just conceded that Papias “recorded a most likely unhistorical description of the death of Judas Iscariot.” So, I have an even better source than Eusubius for Papias’ unreliability, I have David, the one, the only, The Funky Theist as a source! If Papias was here today, do you honestly think Papias would say, “oh, yeah, that Judas story, I believed that story without due diligence, but for everything else I checked it real careful”?
The bottom line here is that we just don’t have very much to go on to assert Papias is reliable, and have a good deal to suggest he is not. And even if Papias himself is reliable, he can only be as reliable as his source, the Presbyter, which we know even less about. Now, I concede this is somewhat subjective. And I’ll be happy to grant that David or any other Christian has a perfect right for themselves to grant Papias and the Presbyter more leeway in regards to their reliability than another person might. What I object to is his refusal to grant me the same rights and to consider it a reasonable position to disagree. If he were to honestly say, “Hey, I’m deciding to give Papias and the Presbyter the benefit of the doubt here” that would be one thing. To act like he is giving some kind of “powerful proof” that everybody else should accept is quite another, and quite asinine.
Now, sure, it is of course true that just because someone reports one thing that, shall we say, is “unlikely”, doesn’t mean everything they say is garbage. Just because Papias repeated some silly legends doesn’t mean everything he said his nonsense. After all, just like David said, many other people of the time, such as Josephus, reported exaggerated stories. Yet we don’t throw away everything Josephus says. And this is indeed true. But we do throw away a lot of what Josephus says! Further, as I’ve pointed out before, historians now accept that many historians of the time, including Josephus, distorted their reporting due to agendas. (See Greek and Roman Historians: Information and Misinformation by Michael Grant.) This is indeed why modern historians take even the best ancient historians such as Josephus are taken with a grain of salt. And why modern historians just don’t make blanket assertions of “reliability” on any work. David’s claim of “reliability” of the Gospels, or the Gospel of Mark specifically, is a claim that no modern historian makes on any work. This is a point that I’ve made to David many times and he just refuses to acknowledge it and come to grips with it.
I will quote to him, yet again, what Gottschalk says on the issue:
_In the process of
analysis the historian should constantly keep in mind the relevant particulars
within the document rather than the document as a whole. Regarding each
particular he asks: Is it credible? It might be well to point out that what is
meant by calling a particular credible is not that it is actually what
happened, but is as close to what actually happened as we can learn from a
critical examination of the sources. (Gottschalk p. 139-140)
|
_
David keeps
wanting to assert blanket “reliability” to the Gospels despite the fact that I
have shown him repeatedly that this just isn’t what historians do. Is David just not trying to learn?
Furthermore, this is also why as a general rule, modern historians want multiple attestation of events with multiple lines of evidence before accepting any potential historical fact. And why physical artifacts are always stronger pieces of evidence than written testimony no matter who the person given the testimony is. But at least in the case of Josephus, we have a large body of work for which many facts have been verified through other sources. For this reason, if Josephus is a sole source of information, we may provisionally accept it as true, so long as what he reported is consistent with things we also know are true. We would not ever take a sole source, even Josephus, as a “known fact.” And for this reason, many things Josephus says, such his report claiming that chariots flew in the sky, are rejected out of hand – despite his claims to have witnesses!
In regards to what Papias’ report about the authorship of Mark, David says, “...we do know where he received his information about Mark's gospel.” No, we don’t, not unless you call an unknown anonymous source as “knowing” where he received his information from! Besides, David is attempting to use Papias as a source to verify Papias! If all we know about the primary source is what we hear from our secondary source (as in, if all we know about the Presbyter is what Papias tells us) then they don’t count as two sources! After all, if we were to uncover a new Papias writing where he tells us the source of the death of Judas story came from the very same Presbyter, would David then tell us, “we now have two sources for the story including its origin, so the death of Judas report is historically accurate.” Somebody telling us their source of a story can indeed be helpful, but it doesn’t automatically make it “historically attested to,” and doesn’t automatically count as two sources.
But the biggest issue in regards to Papias is that David simply hasn’t given us any reason to believe Papias is reliable. That Papias was literate and could write books indicates he was better educated than the average person at the time. But that is still not the same as saying he was competent at evaluating historical claims. All David has done is taken pot-shots at my claim that Papias is not reliable. In other words, he is yet again, shifting the burden of proof. It is David that has to prove Papias is reliable, not for me to prove he is not. So, fine, I retract my claim that Papias is unreliable. I will simply accept David’s own claim that Papias is unreliable. Remember that he admitted that Papias reports an unlikely story about Judas. And he has provided essentially no evidence to to suggest actual reliability. (And absolutely nothing to suggest reliability of the Presbyter.) I retract my own claim; I’m just going by David’s claims that Papias is unreliable. Thanks, David, for clearing that up! (Okay, a little sarcasm, sue me…)
One final point David made in regards to Papias was an attempt to defend against the possibility Papias lied. I will delay responding to that point until later in this response, as I wish to lay some more groundwork first. So, I will move onto the next point, where David brings up my “another Mark” hypothesis. Here is David’s response:
Furthermore, this is also why as a general rule, modern historians want multiple attestation of events with multiple lines of evidence before accepting any potential historical fact. And why physical artifacts are always stronger pieces of evidence than written testimony no matter who the person given the testimony is. But at least in the case of Josephus, we have a large body of work for which many facts have been verified through other sources. For this reason, if Josephus is a sole source of information, we may provisionally accept it as true, so long as what he reported is consistent with things we also know are true. We would not ever take a sole source, even Josephus, as a “known fact.” And for this reason, many things Josephus says, such his report claiming that chariots flew in the sky, are rejected out of hand – despite his claims to have witnesses!
In regards to what Papias’ report about the authorship of Mark, David says, “...we do know where he received his information about Mark's gospel.” No, we don’t, not unless you call an unknown anonymous source as “knowing” where he received his information from! Besides, David is attempting to use Papias as a source to verify Papias! If all we know about the primary source is what we hear from our secondary source (as in, if all we know about the Presbyter is what Papias tells us) then they don’t count as two sources! After all, if we were to uncover a new Papias writing where he tells us the source of the death of Judas story came from the very same Presbyter, would David then tell us, “we now have two sources for the story including its origin, so the death of Judas report is historically accurate.” Somebody telling us their source of a story can indeed be helpful, but it doesn’t automatically make it “historically attested to,” and doesn’t automatically count as two sources.
But the biggest issue in regards to Papias is that David simply hasn’t given us any reason to believe Papias is reliable. That Papias was literate and could write books indicates he was better educated than the average person at the time. But that is still not the same as saying he was competent at evaluating historical claims. All David has done is taken pot-shots at my claim that Papias is not reliable. In other words, he is yet again, shifting the burden of proof. It is David that has to prove Papias is reliable, not for me to prove he is not. So, fine, I retract my claim that Papias is unreliable. I will simply accept David’s own claim that Papias is unreliable. Remember that he admitted that Papias reports an unlikely story about Judas. And he has provided essentially no evidence to to suggest actual reliability. (And absolutely nothing to suggest reliability of the Presbyter.) I retract my own claim; I’m just going by David’s claims that Papias is unreliable. Thanks, David, for clearing that up! (Okay, a little sarcasm, sue me…)
One final point David made in regards to Papias was an attempt to defend against the possibility Papias lied. I will delay responding to that point until later in this response, as I wish to lay some more groundwork first. So, I will move onto the next point, where David brings up my “another Mark” hypothesis. Here is David’s response:
_The reason this hypothesis fails is because it flips the
bird at Ockham's razor. This hypothesis in order to work must assume unnecessary tenets
and propositions. My hypothesis doesn't have to do that, because of course, my
hypothesis is simple and plausible. But caseagainstfaith's hypothesis has to
assume that there were two Marks in the middle of the first century who were
prominent Christian figures (a claim with no evidence), that all of the gospel
of Mark's striking connections with Peter that I pointed out in my documentary
are just coincidence (which is unnecessary to posit), that Papias or the elder
he quoted from was naive enough to get these things wrong (which is unlikely),
and the list goes on and on.
|
_David continues
on a bit more and says I said that the “another Mark” hypothesis is “just as
plausible” as it being actually written by John Mark. Actually, no, I did not say that. I said a
different hypothesis, the intentional lie hypothesis, is as likely as his
hypothesis. I will get to that later. But
I do not believe the “another Mark” hypothesis is by itself is all that
probable. The thing is, David had said in his original video that there were no
other hypotheses. He laid out his three possibilities and said that was all
there was. I really only intended the “another Mark” hypothesis to show that
David was wrong, there are other options.
I could just retract the hypothesis. I certainly have no proof of any other Mark. But, whether I think “another Mark” is a good hypothesis or bad, David’s response raises several issues I want to explore more. So, I’m going to stick with the “another Mark” hypothesis for a while here.
David says the “another Mark” hypothesis violates Ockham’s razor. Well, Ockham’s razor is a good basic guideline, but, it is indeed just that, a guideline, not any kind of proof. Furthermore, he is certainly known to violate Ockham’s razor. For example, in the debate I had with David, I proposed a scenario where say I claimed I flapped my arms to the store, and say I even had witnesses to the event swearing it really happened. David said he could perhaps hypothesize that I had some kind of flying machine shoes. Didn’t David’s hypothesis violate Ockham’s razor? If he made such a hypothesis, he wouldn’t have any evidence for these flying machine shoes. And in fact, since he already accepts the existence of the supernatural, wouldn’t it be more parsimonious to accept the witnesses and my testimony and accept that I flew to the store rather than add extra unproven elements like flying machine shoes?
Notice how David seems to think it is a-okay for him to produce unnecessary elements when he has to defend not believing something, but, if he thinks I am, then I’m the one violating Ockham’s razor. Funny how that works, isn’t it? The reality is, it is hard to consistently apply Ockham’s razor to history. Primarily because, as I quoted from Gottschalk, we know for a fact that most of history is lost. While Ockham’s razor basically says you shouldn’t add unnecessary elements, in the field of history, we know for a fact that there are unknown elements that we will probably never know at all. For this reason, some amount of guesswork happens to be necessary in history. Here is some of what Gottschalk says on this issue:
I could just retract the hypothesis. I certainly have no proof of any other Mark. But, whether I think “another Mark” is a good hypothesis or bad, David’s response raises several issues I want to explore more. So, I’m going to stick with the “another Mark” hypothesis for a while here.
David says the “another Mark” hypothesis violates Ockham’s razor. Well, Ockham’s razor is a good basic guideline, but, it is indeed just that, a guideline, not any kind of proof. Furthermore, he is certainly known to violate Ockham’s razor. For example, in the debate I had with David, I proposed a scenario where say I claimed I flapped my arms to the store, and say I even had witnesses to the event swearing it really happened. David said he could perhaps hypothesize that I had some kind of flying machine shoes. Didn’t David’s hypothesis violate Ockham’s razor? If he made such a hypothesis, he wouldn’t have any evidence for these flying machine shoes. And in fact, since he already accepts the existence of the supernatural, wouldn’t it be more parsimonious to accept the witnesses and my testimony and accept that I flew to the store rather than add extra unproven elements like flying machine shoes?
Notice how David seems to think it is a-okay for him to produce unnecessary elements when he has to defend not believing something, but, if he thinks I am, then I’m the one violating Ockham’s razor. Funny how that works, isn’t it? The reality is, it is hard to consistently apply Ockham’s razor to history. Primarily because, as I quoted from Gottschalk, we know for a fact that most of history is lost. While Ockham’s razor basically says you shouldn’t add unnecessary elements, in the field of history, we know for a fact that there are unknown elements that we will probably never know at all. For this reason, some amount of guesswork happens to be necessary in history. Here is some of what Gottschalk says on this issue:
_
The historian is
frequently required to imagine things that must have happened. For the exercise
of the imagination in history it is impossible to lay down rules except very
general ones. It is a platitude that the historian who knows contemporary life
best will understand past life best. Since the human mentality has not changed
noticeably in historic times, present generations can understand past
generations in terms of their own experience. (Gottschalk p. 50)
And so historiography, the synthesizing of historical data into narrative or expositions [...] is not easily made the subject of rules and regulations. Some room must be left for naive talent and inspiration, and perhaps this is a good thing. (Gottschalk p. 50) |
_The simple
fact is, it would often be more parsimonious to accept someone’s testimony,
but that doesn’t mean it’s actually true.
But, that said, I reject that the “another Mark” hypothesis is such a
huge violation of the proverbial razor.
Let us look at these alleged “unnecessary” elements of the
hypothesis. David says it takes for
granted the existence of “two Marks in the middle of the first century.”
Agreed, but, the name was common, so no need to prove the existence of two
people named Mark. But David continues,
“...who were prominent Christian figures.”
Who said that? I didn’t. The “another Mark” could have been just some "Mark
Schmuck" and it just got accidentally attributed to John Mark
Perhaps David may object: Papias and/or the rest of the early church wouldn’t be so foolish as to accidentally think some "Mark Schmuck’s" Gospel was actually John Mark. Well, how do you know? We don’t know any of those people. All we know about them is that they are early members of the Christian church. We don’t know if they were geniuses or dumb-asses. But, I’ll tell you this, the world has always been replete with dumb-asses. There are many records of many people believing very foolish things. I’m not saying that early Christians were any more likely to be dumb-asses than anybody else; I’m just saying that they weren’t any less likely either. There are plenty of people to have made dumber mistakes than to mistake Mark Schmuck for John Mark. So no particular proof of this possibility is necessary. And it doesn’t violate Ockham’s razor because we know people making simple mistakes are commonplace.
But okay, let’s say David still insists this other Mark would also have to be a prominent member of the early church. So? David acts like this would be weird and unexpected. Why? After all, the Gospels have multiple significant John’s and multiple significant Mary’s. Didn't David ever notice this? Is multiple significant Mark’s any different? The fact is, there were many common names and so there is no reason to find multiple Mark’s – even multiple significant Mark’s – to be unexpected at all. To consider it possible that ‘x’ exists when it is not unlikely that ‘x’ exists is not a violation of Ockham’s razor.
David says I offer the “another Mark” hypothesis without any proof. That’s the point David, I don’t have to! David has to prove it wrong! Now, if I said that the “another Mark” hypothesis was correct, and say that you should believe me, then yes, I indeed would have the burden of proof. But that is not the situation at all. The situation is that David has made the claim that the Gospel of Mark is reliable; it is written by John Mark working from Peter’s account. I don’t have to prove him wrong. I can simply say that I don’t accept his claims, period. I would have no further obligation. If I perchance give alternate explanations, they need not be exhaustive, they need not be proven. If they are merely plausible, then David, the claimant, has not made his case. To make his case, that requires that he disprove all alternative hypotheses – the multiple Mark’s hypothesis included. But he can’t – there is nothing implausible about multiple Mark’s in a religion that has multiple Mary’s and multiple John’s. And there is nothing improbable about people making mistakes, under any circumstance. For him to ask for me for proof of multiple Mark’s is shifting the burden of proof. He has to prove it wrong.
I suppose this might seem awfully convenient for me. I can say anything I want and not have to prove a thing, while David has to prove everything he says. He even has to disprove every speculation I may have. Yes, it is convenient for me. Just like it is convenient for David that he isn’t obligated to disprove everything some Muslim apologist might post on YouTube. David is under no obligation to respond to any Muslim apologist if he doesn’t want to. And if David does choose to do so, he would not need to prove anything; the Muslim apologist would still have the burden of proof. Of course it is likely the Muslim apologist would try the same tactics, try to shift the burden of proof to David. But David would not have to fall for it no more than I have to fall for his attempts to shift the burden of proof.
I’m wondering to myself that as David has reached this part of this response that he might be thinking to himself, “Caseagainstfaith can’t be serious? He’s saying that he can come up with any crazy story he wants and it’s my job to prove him wrong???” Essentially, yes. Suppose I proposed that Jesus was actually Dr. Who and regenerated on the cross, would it be David’s job to disprove Jesus was Dr. Who? Well, that depends. Do I seriously believe it to be a good hypothesis and does David want me to believe otherwise? If the answers are yes, then yes, he needs to prove that Jesus was not Dr. Who. On the other hand, he might not believe I was serious. Or he might conclude that someone that thinks Jesus was Dr. Who isn’t worth his time. In that case, no. This isn’t too hard to grasp is it? I can't understand why we seem to keep going round and round on this issue. Other than perhaps David would have little to say if he took responsibility for his own burden of proof.
I suppose at this point, a discussion of what even constitutes a good hypothesis and what would even be considered ‘proof’ of it being false is warranted. I basically follow Bayesian epistemology, which says, in an extreme nutshell, that what people believe is subjective, and based on their own subjective evaluation of probabilities. If I were to say that I think something is “probably” true, that means, by definition, I think the chances are better than 50/50, higher than 50%. I might not be able to give you a precise number, but by definition to say something is “probable” means to say it is at least more than 50% likely
Now, my subjective opinion may have absolutely no bearing on reality. Which isn’t surprising, people make errors all the time. But that, according to according Bayesian epistemology, how we decide what to believe (correctly or not) is based on internal 'guestimated' mathematics of things we find to be probable, very probable, almost certain, etc.
So, as far as the “another Mark” hypothesis, I’m just going to pick numbers out of the air. Let us say that I were to grant that the “another Mark” hypothesis only had a 10% chance of being true, that Origen lied about what Papias said only had a 10% chance of being true, that the Presbyter lied to Papias only had a 10% chance of being true, etc. But I gave David’s hypothesis that Papias and the Presbyter and Origen were all correct a 20% chance of being true. So, I’d be granting that his hypothesis is twice as likely as any other individual hypothesis; but that in total, the other hypotheses are five times more likely than his. So, if David wishes for me to grant that his hypothesis is correct, he would have to do more than refute any one other possible hypothesis. If I became convinced that the “another Mark” hypothesis is less likely than I originally thought and drop it to only 1% chance of being true, and pushed David’s hypothesis up to 25%, that’s an improvement but still not enough to accept it.
In ordinary circumstances, I might say that David convincing me of a proposition to be 90% likely would be sufficient to say I’m rather convinced of it being true. But I’d have to be at over 99% convinced for me to say that I’m essentially positive of something being true. Now let’s say David presents some really powerful arguments in a future response and I was to astonishingly raise my estimation of him being correct to 90%. Can he honestly say I should put the number even higher? If he were to even concede that there was only a 90% chance he was right, that would mean that there is a 10% chance he is wrong and perhaps might be headed to some other God’s hell. Is David comfortable with that? Can he honestly say, in his wildest dreams, there is more than 90% chance he is right?
The next topic is that I suggested that a reason why John Mark was ascribed as the author of Mark instead of Peter himself is because Peter was illiterate. David responds,
Perhaps David may object: Papias and/or the rest of the early church wouldn’t be so foolish as to accidentally think some "Mark Schmuck’s" Gospel was actually John Mark. Well, how do you know? We don’t know any of those people. All we know about them is that they are early members of the Christian church. We don’t know if they were geniuses or dumb-asses. But, I’ll tell you this, the world has always been replete with dumb-asses. There are many records of many people believing very foolish things. I’m not saying that early Christians were any more likely to be dumb-asses than anybody else; I’m just saying that they weren’t any less likely either. There are plenty of people to have made dumber mistakes than to mistake Mark Schmuck for John Mark. So no particular proof of this possibility is necessary. And it doesn’t violate Ockham’s razor because we know people making simple mistakes are commonplace.
But okay, let’s say David still insists this other Mark would also have to be a prominent member of the early church. So? David acts like this would be weird and unexpected. Why? After all, the Gospels have multiple significant John’s and multiple significant Mary’s. Didn't David ever notice this? Is multiple significant Mark’s any different? The fact is, there were many common names and so there is no reason to find multiple Mark’s – even multiple significant Mark’s – to be unexpected at all. To consider it possible that ‘x’ exists when it is not unlikely that ‘x’ exists is not a violation of Ockham’s razor.
David says I offer the “another Mark” hypothesis without any proof. That’s the point David, I don’t have to! David has to prove it wrong! Now, if I said that the “another Mark” hypothesis was correct, and say that you should believe me, then yes, I indeed would have the burden of proof. But that is not the situation at all. The situation is that David has made the claim that the Gospel of Mark is reliable; it is written by John Mark working from Peter’s account. I don’t have to prove him wrong. I can simply say that I don’t accept his claims, period. I would have no further obligation. If I perchance give alternate explanations, they need not be exhaustive, they need not be proven. If they are merely plausible, then David, the claimant, has not made his case. To make his case, that requires that he disprove all alternative hypotheses – the multiple Mark’s hypothesis included. But he can’t – there is nothing implausible about multiple Mark’s in a religion that has multiple Mary’s and multiple John’s. And there is nothing improbable about people making mistakes, under any circumstance. For him to ask for me for proof of multiple Mark’s is shifting the burden of proof. He has to prove it wrong.
I suppose this might seem awfully convenient for me. I can say anything I want and not have to prove a thing, while David has to prove everything he says. He even has to disprove every speculation I may have. Yes, it is convenient for me. Just like it is convenient for David that he isn’t obligated to disprove everything some Muslim apologist might post on YouTube. David is under no obligation to respond to any Muslim apologist if he doesn’t want to. And if David does choose to do so, he would not need to prove anything; the Muslim apologist would still have the burden of proof. Of course it is likely the Muslim apologist would try the same tactics, try to shift the burden of proof to David. But David would not have to fall for it no more than I have to fall for his attempts to shift the burden of proof.
I’m wondering to myself that as David has reached this part of this response that he might be thinking to himself, “Caseagainstfaith can’t be serious? He’s saying that he can come up with any crazy story he wants and it’s my job to prove him wrong???” Essentially, yes. Suppose I proposed that Jesus was actually Dr. Who and regenerated on the cross, would it be David’s job to disprove Jesus was Dr. Who? Well, that depends. Do I seriously believe it to be a good hypothesis and does David want me to believe otherwise? If the answers are yes, then yes, he needs to prove that Jesus was not Dr. Who. On the other hand, he might not believe I was serious. Or he might conclude that someone that thinks Jesus was Dr. Who isn’t worth his time. In that case, no. This isn’t too hard to grasp is it? I can't understand why we seem to keep going round and round on this issue. Other than perhaps David would have little to say if he took responsibility for his own burden of proof.
I suppose at this point, a discussion of what even constitutes a good hypothesis and what would even be considered ‘proof’ of it being false is warranted. I basically follow Bayesian epistemology, which says, in an extreme nutshell, that what people believe is subjective, and based on their own subjective evaluation of probabilities. If I were to say that I think something is “probably” true, that means, by definition, I think the chances are better than 50/50, higher than 50%. I might not be able to give you a precise number, but by definition to say something is “probable” means to say it is at least more than 50% likely
Now, my subjective opinion may have absolutely no bearing on reality. Which isn’t surprising, people make errors all the time. But that, according to according Bayesian epistemology, how we decide what to believe (correctly or not) is based on internal 'guestimated' mathematics of things we find to be probable, very probable, almost certain, etc.
So, as far as the “another Mark” hypothesis, I’m just going to pick numbers out of the air. Let us say that I were to grant that the “another Mark” hypothesis only had a 10% chance of being true, that Origen lied about what Papias said only had a 10% chance of being true, that the Presbyter lied to Papias only had a 10% chance of being true, etc. But I gave David’s hypothesis that Papias and the Presbyter and Origen were all correct a 20% chance of being true. So, I’d be granting that his hypothesis is twice as likely as any other individual hypothesis; but that in total, the other hypotheses are five times more likely than his. So, if David wishes for me to grant that his hypothesis is correct, he would have to do more than refute any one other possible hypothesis. If I became convinced that the “another Mark” hypothesis is less likely than I originally thought and drop it to only 1% chance of being true, and pushed David’s hypothesis up to 25%, that’s an improvement but still not enough to accept it.
In ordinary circumstances, I might say that David convincing me of a proposition to be 90% likely would be sufficient to say I’m rather convinced of it being true. But I’d have to be at over 99% convinced for me to say that I’m essentially positive of something being true. Now let’s say David presents some really powerful arguments in a future response and I was to astonishingly raise my estimation of him being correct to 90%. Can he honestly say I should put the number even higher? If he were to even concede that there was only a 90% chance he was right, that would mean that there is a 10% chance he is wrong and perhaps might be headed to some other God’s hell. Is David comfortable with that? Can he honestly say, in his wildest dreams, there is more than 90% chance he is right?
The next topic is that I suggested that a reason why John Mark was ascribed as the author of Mark instead of Peter himself is because Peter was illiterate. David responds,
_
Sorry, this doesn't work. If Peter's alleged illiteracy was
a reason not to ascribe a writing to him, then how come several writings,
two of which are in the New Testament, and several others which are outside of
it (including but not limited to the gospel of Peter, the apocalypse of Peter,
and the epistle of Peter to Philip) were ascribed to Peter? Assuming Peter was
completely illiterate, it apparently didn't keep early Christians from
ascribing several books to him. Moreover, we also may want to note that Peter's
illiteracy is not even a known fact. It is asserted based on 1 vague verse in
Acts and is also asserted in light of Peter's fisherman profession.
|
_
Well, at
least according to Bart Ehrman, to refer to Peter and John as “unschooled and
ordinary” like we see in the Book of Acts was at the time a way of saying they
were illiterate. And the majority of
working class people of the time were illiterate. Does David really suppose that an unschooled,
“ordinary” working class person in the first century would be a good candidate
to have written the Gospel of Mark himself? Not too likely. So it is reasonable to conclude that most
likely, until given better information, that Peter would have been
illiterate. So how did these other works
get attributed to being by Peter if “everybody knew” Peter was illiterate?
Well, I’d first like to mention that these works are indeed generally
considered today to be fraudulent precisely because Peter would be an unlikely
person to have written them. And for
two, obviously not everybody knew
Peter was illiterate. For my hypothesis
to work doesn’t require that everybody think that Peter was illiterate, it only
requires that the person or persons who did the fraud to believe that Peter’s
illiteracy to be a problem! After all,
isn’t it frequently accepted by modern Christians that Peter didn’t write it
himself precisely because he was illiterate and that is why he used Mark as a
scribe to begin with? Is it not reasonable to conclude other people of the time would come to that some conclusion even if not everybody did? Now, true, I
didn’t make this clear in my video series.
But it seems like it should be obvious.
And this, my friend, is what I say is at least as likely as David’s
hypothesis if not more so.
Now I am ready to return to a final Papias issue. David attempted to defend against the possibility that Papias could have lied. David says,
Now I am ready to return to a final Papias issue. David attempted to defend against the possibility that Papias could have lied. David says,
_
The last point caseagainstfaith makes about Papias is that
his account concerning Mark could have had biased interest in personal benefit.
In other words, Papias could have lied to benefit a cause that he considered
important enough to lie about. I already dealt with this in my documentary by
pointing out that the nature of Papias' account could be considered damaging to
the gospel of Mark's credibility, considering that a non-eyewitness was said to
write it.
|
_
Gottschalk does agree in principal to what David is saying. When someone incriminates them-self, it does indeed count as evidence for its veracity. However, like most things in history, it isn't entirely cut and dry. For example, it may not necessarily be the case that the person in question finds his lie to be incriminating at all. If Papias thought that Peter was illiterate, he might not have thought it incriminating at all that Peter used a scribe. In the culture of the time, working class people were commonly illiterate. And scribes were commonly used. So Papias might have lied and not seen it as incriminating at all; but rather thought it was completely mundane. Further, even if Papias would have preferred to attribute Peterine authorship to the Gospel, if Papias thought his audience thought Peter was illiterate, then he may have felt that having Mark work from Peter's accounts was the "least worst" lie. (David noted not everybody thought Peter was illiterate, but we don't know what Papias specifically thought.)
Basically, David is engaging in “mind reading”, what Papias might have thought incriminating, and what he thought his options were based on his audience. Now, guess what? I'll concede bit of "mind reading" is required in history simply because so much evidence is missing. I already quoted Gottschalk admitting that you sometimes have to do some guesswork when studying history. I am also "mind reading", giving other possible options that Papias might have thought. I also acknowledge it is possible that David is right, that Papias is being completely truthful in reporting the information as he understood it. But perhaps the actual lie actually came from the Presbyter, or perhaps whom the Presbyter got his information from, etc. But if we are at the moment just considering whether Papias lied, we just don't know enough about what Papias thought would be incriminating, given the cultural differences, or what he would have thought his options were if he was going to lie to have confidence in David's "mind reading" analysis of the situation. In short his mind reading might be better than mine, it might be worse. But we don't know. David just haven't given us enough information to be confident his mind reading is accurate.
Again, I don't know if Papias or anybody else lied. It is David to show that nobody did. And I reject his evidence against possible lies as insufficient to make such a determination.
Now on to Peter’s alleged martyrdom and what it might mean about Christian claims. I said that just because a religion is false, doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be tolerated. David responds,
Basically, David is engaging in “mind reading”, what Papias might have thought incriminating, and what he thought his options were based on his audience. Now, guess what? I'll concede bit of "mind reading" is required in history simply because so much evidence is missing. I already quoted Gottschalk admitting that you sometimes have to do some guesswork when studying history. I am also "mind reading", giving other possible options that Papias might have thought. I also acknowledge it is possible that David is right, that Papias is being completely truthful in reporting the information as he understood it. But perhaps the actual lie actually came from the Presbyter, or perhaps whom the Presbyter got his information from, etc. But if we are at the moment just considering whether Papias lied, we just don't know enough about what Papias thought would be incriminating, given the cultural differences, or what he would have thought his options were if he was going to lie to have confidence in David's "mind reading" analysis of the situation. In short his mind reading might be better than mine, it might be worse. But we don't know. David just haven't given us enough information to be confident his mind reading is accurate.
Again, I don't know if Papias or anybody else lied. It is David to show that nobody did. And I reject his evidence against possible lies as insufficient to make such a determination.
Now on to Peter’s alleged martyrdom and what it might mean about Christian claims. I said that just because a religion is false, doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be tolerated. David responds,
_
His claim that the falsity of a religion didn't necessarily
cause the intolerance of it in the Roman Empire
is true, but I never argued that just because Christianity was considered
false, it was therefore untolerated. Far from it in fact. Christianity was
untolerated because of its proclamations about the kingdom of God.
'Jesus is Lord', one of the earliest Christian sayings, was a direct rejection
and mockery of the Roman motto 'Caesar is Lord'. Rejection of Caesar's lordship
was what caused Christianity's clash with Roman society.
|
__On the
other hand, the Gospels also say to, “Render therefore unto Caesar the things
which are Caesar's”. That doesn’t sound
so anti-establishment now does? And as I
noted in my video, according to the Gospels, Pilate alludes to Jesus being some
kind of King of the Jews, and yet still says he has nothing to charge Jesus with! David's own Gospel seems to show that what Jesus taught wasn't by itself an automatic death sentence.
Even so, David is correct to some degree. It is indeed true that Christianity did become known as anti-establishment which resulted in heavy persecution in the second and third centuries. But it is unknown as to exactly when Roman authorities took notice of the Christian sect. We don’t actually have much evidence of Christian persecution in the first century. In Paul’s epistles, he laments that Christians are mocked, ridiculed, shunned. He notably doesn’t say they are being jailed and executed. There is some evidence that Nero persecuted Christians, such as blaming them for the fire. Though, as I have noted, it is actually in dispute as to whether in fact Nero did this. But even if he did, there isn’t any good evidence that serious persecution came before Nero.
Speaking of the fire, David has this to say,
Even so, David is correct to some degree. It is indeed true that Christianity did become known as anti-establishment which resulted in heavy persecution in the second and third centuries. But it is unknown as to exactly when Roman authorities took notice of the Christian sect. We don’t actually have much evidence of Christian persecution in the first century. In Paul’s epistles, he laments that Christians are mocked, ridiculed, shunned. He notably doesn’t say they are being jailed and executed. There is some evidence that Nero persecuted Christians, such as blaming them for the fire. Though, as I have noted, it is actually in dispute as to whether in fact Nero did this. But even if he did, there isn’t any good evidence that serious persecution came before Nero.
Speaking of the fire, David has this to say,
_
Nero would only choose the Christian sect as a scapegoat for
the fire in Rome
if they were hated enough as it was. Nero couldn't scapegoat groups that were
accepted by the society and trusted by the general populace, since that would
create further suspicion that he indeed caused the fire.
|
_
I accept
that if Nero did pick a group to scapegoat, he probably wouldn’t pick a group
that was “mainstream”. Fair
enough. But neither I nor Profmth ever claimed that
Christians were considered mainstream. I
don’t have any reason to doubt that non-Christians who even knew who the
Christians were likely considered them to be a fringe group. But there were probably dozens or even hundreds of
other cults with similar reputations.
So, for Nero to pick out the Christians, they needn’t have been any
especially hated group, just a mostly unknown fringe whose members may have
happened to been in the wrong place at the wrong time would be sufficient for
them to be the group Nero picked out. If the case is more than that, it is
David to prove and he can’t because there is no more information to be had.
David continues,
David continues,
_Clement as I quoted specifically spoke of multiple
persecutions that Peter endured, the last of which was martyrdom. Why would
Peter endure these things if he didn't believe the proclamations for which he
was persecuted were true?
|
_
Christian
tradition on what happened to the disciples is contradictory and unsupported
outside Christian tradition. Some
miniscule reference by Clement to “multiple persecutions” doesn’t count as
evidence of anything. But, ultimately, I
don’t doubt it is possible some Peter guy was willing to endure
persecution. So? Lots of people are
willing to suffer persecutions for all kinds of things. Now, I know that David says it was specifically
for the claims made in the Gospel of Mark that he was willing to suffer
for. But, even if I were to grant that
Peter was the source for the Gospel of Mark and I were to grant that Peter was
willing to suffer persecution and death for it, it still doesn’t prove which specific claims he personally was willing
to die for.
Here is a point of reference. Let’s look at Acts and the martyrdom of Steven. While I have my doubts about its historicity, I will assume for sake of argument the depiction is accurate. What does it say Steven was willing to die for? It says that the crowd charged him with believing Jesus was a prophet greater than Moses, and Steven wouldn’t recant. It doesn’t say that Steven wouldn’t recant that Jesus was God or rose from the dead or any of that. So we can’t know what specifically Steven felt was worth dying for and what wasn’t even if Acts is 100% correct.
In short, David has provided no specifics to any of these alleged persecutions. In fact, seems to admit he doesn’t know what happened. He says,
Here is a point of reference. Let’s look at Acts and the martyrdom of Steven. While I have my doubts about its historicity, I will assume for sake of argument the depiction is accurate. What does it say Steven was willing to die for? It says that the crowd charged him with believing Jesus was a prophet greater than Moses, and Steven wouldn’t recant. It doesn’t say that Steven wouldn’t recant that Jesus was God or rose from the dead or any of that. So we can’t know what specifically Steven felt was worth dying for and what wasn’t even if Acts is 100% correct.
In short, David has provided no specifics to any of these alleged persecutions. In fact, seems to admit he doesn’t know what happened. He says,
_
Profmth argued that Peter only died for his Christianity because the emperor Nero in an off-the-cuff fashion scapegoated Christians for the fire in Rome. So Peter only died because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. These claims are not only insufficient to refute my argument, but insufficient to do so even granting they're true.
|
_
Since David
is willing to grant that Profmth could be correct, presumably David doesn’t
know Profmth is wrong. In short, I
rather doubt David has the slightest idea what happened. And he can’t read Peter’s mind to know what
specifically he may have believed was worth dying for. And, as I’ve argued all along, David really
hasn’t proven that the Peter had anything to do with the Gospel of Mark so
there is no justification for asserting that any persecution he may have
received had anything whatsoever to do with the Gospel. In short, David has given us nothing.
Notice how David’s arguments are a house of cards. He first argues that Peter is the source for the Gospel of Mark. He attempts to provide some evidence for it. Its weak evidence, but I suppose it was something. But then he runs with it as guaranteed fact. I noted that it would have at least been honest if David admitted he was just giving Papias (and the Presbyter) the benefit of the doubt rather than pretending he was presenting fact. But he can’t do that, it would break his house of cards. So, once he produces any sort of argument, he is forced to then run with it, no contingency for error is ever considered.
Sorry David, but that isn’t how history works. Sure, historians will use anchors of known history to help test new hypotheses. But they have to be really well supported anchors. A historian would never use a third- or forth-hand anonymous source as a proven fact to use as an anchor for all sorts of other claims. In short, real historians do not build houses of cards.
Gottschalk has some related information to this:
Notice how David’s arguments are a house of cards. He first argues that Peter is the source for the Gospel of Mark. He attempts to provide some evidence for it. Its weak evidence, but I suppose it was something. But then he runs with it as guaranteed fact. I noted that it would have at least been honest if David admitted he was just giving Papias (and the Presbyter) the benefit of the doubt rather than pretending he was presenting fact. But he can’t do that, it would break his house of cards. So, once he produces any sort of argument, he is forced to then run with it, no contingency for error is ever considered.
Sorry David, but that isn’t how history works. Sure, historians will use anchors of known history to help test new hypotheses. But they have to be really well supported anchors. A historian would never use a third- or forth-hand anonymous source as a proven fact to use as an anchor for all sorts of other claims. In short, real historians do not build houses of cards.
Gottschalk has some related information to this:
_
The general rule of historians [...] is to
accept as historical only those particulars which rest upon the independent
testimony of two or more reliable witnesses. [...] Independence is not,
however, always easy to determine, as the controversy over the Synoptic Gospels
well illustrates. Whenever any two witnesses agree, it may be that they do so
because they are testifying independently to an observed fact, but it is
possible that they agree only because one has copied from the other, or because
one has been unduly influenced by the other, or because both have copied from
or been unduly influenced by a third source. Unless the independence of the
observers is established, agreement may be confirmation of a lie or a mistake
rather than a corroboration of a fact. (Gottschalk p. 166-167)
|
_
The next
argument dealt with my claim that people who wrote alternative Gospels and
epistles died for their lies, thus disproving David’s argument. David starts out,
_ Caseagainstfaith asserted that people who forged documents were often executed for doing so, and thus, those who forged these documents died for something they knew was a lie.
|
_
No, I do
not believe that I asserted it was “often”.
I said that Bart Ehrman said it did happen at least a couple of
times. (If David is going to complain
about me allegedly distorting his arguments, it would be nice if he didn’t
distort mine -- or Ehrman's.) David continues,
_
I don't see how the counter-example of people forging
documents and dying for it is analogous to my argument at all. We know of few
cases where particular people we know by name were executed for forging
writings in the early church. We know that many so-called forgeries were not
written to be strict forgeries, but intended to be looked at as a perspective
of what the said-author would have said had he written the book himself.
Thus, due to ambiguity, caseagainstfaith's rebuttal here is simply irrelevant
until he gives us a specific case of someone being executed for forging writing,
so that we may investigate that specific instance and subsequently compare it
to Peter's case of proclaiming Christianity and dying for such.
|
_
Before
going further, I want to address this point by David: “We know that many so-called forgeries were
not written to be strict forgeries, but intended to be looked at as a perspective
of what the said-author would have said had he written the book himself.”
According to Bart Ehrman in his book, Forged, this is actually a
Christian myth. Ehrman argues that there
are some instances of authors writing a book with some kind of “In Honor Of”
heading, where they were attempting to further points as they understood them
of their departed teacher. But that in
such cases, they would make clear that they were not whom they were honoring. Ehrman says that it was never acceptable, even in ancient times, to write documents to
appear as written by someone else, period.
Such documents were, by definition “forged”, hence the title of his
book. Ehrman uses quotations from early
Christians lamenting the existence of such forged documents as evidence that it
wasn’t acceptable to anybody, certainly not to early Christians.
David refers to the claims I reported from Ehrman as being “ambiguous”. As if his report from Clement about “multiple persecutions” was some highly detailed report! I suppose “ambiguity” is in the eye of the beholder, but it certainly seems to be a consistent pattern for apologists to demand airtight evidence from everybody but themselves. But I digress.
Now, true, I suppose that since I mentioned it, it would be fair for David to ask for more details. That would be fair enough, except for the fact that David has signaled his game plan if I were to give more details. David says that he would, “investigate that specific instance and subsequently compare it to Peter's case of proclaiming Christianity and dying for such”. He would take for granted that Peter was indeed martyred, and it was indeed for what he says it was for, and then attempt to distance any other martyrdom from what he assumes happened to Peter. He is, yet again, surprise, surprise, shifting the burden of proof. He wants full disclosure about what happened to those other possible martyrdoms while conveniently ignoring the fact that he has provided nothing for the alleged persecution of Peter outside of some vague “multiple persecutions” alleged by Clement. So, heck no, I’m not giving him any more details until it finally sinks in that he has yet to prove his claims! He can read Bart Ehrman’s book, Forged, himself if he wants.
Besides, it doesn’t really matter that much if Ehrman is right or wrong. By David’s own arguments, the authors of fake Gospels and epistles risked death, whether they actually fell victim or not. Why would someone risk death to write forged documents? The answer is simple: “Who knows? Who cares?” It simply happens. Unless David wants to argue that these forged documents didn’t exist then he has to acknowledge it somehow happened – he must acknowledge that some people risked death for that which they knew were (at least partially) lies.
Now, I’ve said before and I’ll say again, I don’t think people very often risk death for things they have no concern for. I’ll grant that much. But beyond that, what early Christians actually were executed or at least willing to be executed if need be we don’t know. And even if we did, we don’t know what specific beliefs they felt were worth dying for and which weren’t.
The final issues that David raises regard the possibility of psychological deception. David argues,
David refers to the claims I reported from Ehrman as being “ambiguous”. As if his report from Clement about “multiple persecutions” was some highly detailed report! I suppose “ambiguity” is in the eye of the beholder, but it certainly seems to be a consistent pattern for apologists to demand airtight evidence from everybody but themselves. But I digress.
Now, true, I suppose that since I mentioned it, it would be fair for David to ask for more details. That would be fair enough, except for the fact that David has signaled his game plan if I were to give more details. David says that he would, “investigate that specific instance and subsequently compare it to Peter's case of proclaiming Christianity and dying for such”. He would take for granted that Peter was indeed martyred, and it was indeed for what he says it was for, and then attempt to distance any other martyrdom from what he assumes happened to Peter. He is, yet again, surprise, surprise, shifting the burden of proof. He wants full disclosure about what happened to those other possible martyrdoms while conveniently ignoring the fact that he has provided nothing for the alleged persecution of Peter outside of some vague “multiple persecutions” alleged by Clement. So, heck no, I’m not giving him any more details until it finally sinks in that he has yet to prove his claims! He can read Bart Ehrman’s book, Forged, himself if he wants.
Besides, it doesn’t really matter that much if Ehrman is right or wrong. By David’s own arguments, the authors of fake Gospels and epistles risked death, whether they actually fell victim or not. Why would someone risk death to write forged documents? The answer is simple: “Who knows? Who cares?” It simply happens. Unless David wants to argue that these forged documents didn’t exist then he has to acknowledge it somehow happened – he must acknowledge that some people risked death for that which they knew were (at least partially) lies.
Now, I’ve said before and I’ll say again, I don’t think people very often risk death for things they have no concern for. I’ll grant that much. But beyond that, what early Christians actually were executed or at least willing to be executed if need be we don’t know. And even if we did, we don’t know what specific beliefs they felt were worth dying for and which weren’t.
The final issues that David raises regard the possibility of psychological deception. David argues,
_
Caseagainstfaith plays a clip from Profmth discussing
cognitive dissonance. But there are many problems with this. First, the context
of Profmth's video on the matter concerns the resurrection of Jesus, not the
various stories and narratives throughout Mark's gospel. Secondly, it's
absolutely absurd to think that cognitive dissonance explains how Peter came to
believe in the stories that he preached which are found in Mark's gospel.
Cognitive dissonance is a phenomenon that has great explanatory power for some
things, but it simply doesn't do justice to explaining how Peter could have
convinced himself of all the different narrative stories in Mark's gospel– it's
not conceivable at all and I don't understand how caseagainstfaith can
actually think it is.
|
Well, hate to beat a dead horse, but, he hasn’t proven that Peter did preach all the things in Mark’s gospel. Even if I granted Mark used Peter as a source, there is no way to know how faithful to what Peter said Mark was in the document. (Sorry, David's use of the anonymous Presbyter as an umbrella to cover the entire document is epic fail.) Nor do we have any idea how much of that made it into any of Peter’s preaching. David continuously just assumes things happened as the Christian mantra tells him it happened, seemingly not noticing in the slightest that it’s pretty much just baseless assertions.
Secondly, it is possible that at least the basic framework of the Gospel, that Peter was in fact a disciple of an itinerant preacher known for pithy sayings is true; and that cognitive dissonance merely accounts for how Peter come to believe a handful of supernatural additions. David’s response simply assumes too much. He assumed that if cognitive dissonance was a factor at all, then it must account for everything. Therefore, David is just attacking a straw-man. If there is just one thing that David takes from our exchange, I hope it is “don’t assume!”
In short, I’m not opposed to the possibility that there is some historical accuracy in Mark. I’m just saying that we don’t know it if there is. And if there is, what parts are accurate and which parts aren’t. You can’t call a document “historically reliable” while at the same time having no clue what is accurate and what isn’t! As I quoted earlier from Gottschalk, “reliability” applies to individual claims, not to documents as a whole.
In our debate, I said that his actual task to proving any Gospel is “reliable” would be to list each claim he considers to be reliable, and individually support it, just like Gottschalk says. (And no, just putting "Presbyter" down for every claim as his evidence would not be sufficient.) In the debate, given time constraints, it may be said that I was asking for the impossible. But not for written discussion I am not. For each and every claim in the Gospels that he wants to say is “reliable”, I want it supported individually. Until David learns that this is how history really works, he really has no business discussing “historical reliability”.
The other form of “psychological deception” David discussed was mass hallucinations. Here is his response:
Secondly, it is possible that at least the basic framework of the Gospel, that Peter was in fact a disciple of an itinerant preacher known for pithy sayings is true; and that cognitive dissonance merely accounts for how Peter come to believe a handful of supernatural additions. David’s response simply assumes too much. He assumed that if cognitive dissonance was a factor at all, then it must account for everything. Therefore, David is just attacking a straw-man. If there is just one thing that David takes from our exchange, I hope it is “don’t assume!”
In short, I’m not opposed to the possibility that there is some historical accuracy in Mark. I’m just saying that we don’t know it if there is. And if there is, what parts are accurate and which parts aren’t. You can’t call a document “historically reliable” while at the same time having no clue what is accurate and what isn’t! As I quoted earlier from Gottschalk, “reliability” applies to individual claims, not to documents as a whole.
In our debate, I said that his actual task to proving any Gospel is “reliable” would be to list each claim he considers to be reliable, and individually support it, just like Gottschalk says. (And no, just putting "Presbyter" down for every claim as his evidence would not be sufficient.) In the debate, given time constraints, it may be said that I was asking for the impossible. But not for written discussion I am not. For each and every claim in the Gospels that he wants to say is “reliable”, I want it supported individually. Until David learns that this is how history really works, he really has no business discussing “historical reliability”.
The other form of “psychological deception” David discussed was mass hallucinations. Here is his response:
Caseagainstfaith claims that mass hallucination is a better than explanation of Peter's stories in Mark's gospel than "Christianity being true". The problem here is that "Christianity being true" is not my hypothesis. I didn't even discuss the validity of Christianity in my documentary. Christianity can easily be false while Mark's gospel is generally historical.
|
_ I notice
that David didn’t even try to respond to my main point – that David doesn’t
understand the phenomena of mass hallucination.
In his video, he asserted that mass hallucination doesn’t exist, people
can’t have the same hallucination at the same time. I’ve heard this argument many times. It is well refuted. How the phenomena actually works is, a group
of people convince themselves that something will happen. For example, they may
all have a common belief in some religious prophecy. In a heightened emotional
state, they convince themselves something did happen with some relation to
what they were wanting to happen. Now,
if you had the opportunity to interview the participants immediately afterwards
you most likely would get different, probably vague stories. But you likely won’t have such an opportunity
to intervene in the process. What
happens next is that group interaction afterwards, the story congeals. The mind can invent memories to match
emotional desires. (Again, see Elizabeth Loftus, links towards top of this article.) If you interview the participants after this gestation
period, then you’ll get a more consistent story. This was my main point and David didn’t even
try to rebut it. Now, this isn’t a
particularly common occurrence. And I did not propose it as likely. However, I did, as David says, claim that
mass hallucination is at least a more likely scenario than Christianity being
true.
In response to this charge of mine, somewhat surprisingly, David responds that he wasn’t arguing for Christianity being true. He says that Christianity could be false and his hypothesis, that the Gospel of Mark is “generally historical” could still be true. I don’t actually fully understand what he is saying. If Jesus raises people from the dead and is himself resurrected, that presumably means Christianity is true, no? Well, I suppose that it could actually be a work of Satan or something. Is that what he suggesting as at least a conceivable possibility? If that is what he is saying, since neither of us actually are proposing such hypotheses, I don’t think I really want to waste much time addressing such alternatives.
Or is David saying that he would be willing to classify the Gospel of Mark as being “generally historical” even if the miracle stories of the book are false? I was under the impression he was including all the miracle stories as being under his umbrella of being “generally historical”. If he really meant all along to exclude the miracles, that at least would simplify things a bit. I’m willing to grant that it could well be true that some itinerant preacher named Jesus known for having disciples and speaking pithy parables, got himself in trouble and executed. In fact, I’d have no problem granting that this possibility, that there was some actual Jesus that did some things of the Gospel stories is a more likely hypothesis than the mass hallucination hypothesis. See, we can agree on some things, I guess!
Though such a more limited form of being "historically reliable" would be at least more manageable, there are still problems. For example, even if he were to exclude the miracle stories, I would still want my list of which facts he wants to say are reliable and what his specific evidence is for each fact. Just like Gottschalk says. Just excluding the miracle stories doesn't give him a 'get out of producing evidence free' card.
Further, if I was to be generous and grant that most of the non miracle stories were “reliable,” obviously David would use it as a “springboard” to try to assert that the miracle stories are also true and that Christianity is also true. In other words, perhaps David did not – in his video specifically – argue for Christianity being true. But, anything I would concede, he would use as another layer in his house of cards in order to eventually argue that Christianity is true.
This is why I am forced “to put on the brakes.” There are some things that I probably would accept without argument such as the idea of a minimal Jesus. If I knew nothing about Jesus and you just told me about this minimal Jesus guy, I’d probably accept it as true at face value. That wouldn’t mean this minimal Jesus guy existed, it would just mean I’d buy his existence without much evidence. But I know that anything I grant will be used against me. So that is why I am forced to not grant an inch without full evidence.
Now, if I ever mention the fact that I consider it at least possible that there was no historical Jesus at all, immediately people want to say I’m just some lunatic fringe. I don’t want to fight that battle at the moment. So, okay, I’ll concede the barest minimal historical Jesus. I’ll concede a preacher named Jesus existed in the first century. What else do you know about him other than his name and era? Nothing. Maybe this Jesus said some of the things in Mark or the other Gospels, maybe he didn’t. I don’t know. Maybe this Jesus was executed, maybe he wasn’t. I don’t know. David has given us no reason to accept any of it. He offers up vague “multiple persecutions” as evidence. He offers up an unknown Presbyter as a source. That’s all he’s given us. Until he gives us something, anything, more, the burden of proof still lays in his hands. And I mean proof of every single specific claim in the Gospels that he wants to say is “historically reliable.”
I've now covered (and refuted) his response paper to me. In an addendum below, I will review arguments from my original series that he didn't even try to address. But, before that, I am going to take a detour to discuss some philosophical implications of David's position. I notice that David seems to avoid responding to the philosophical points I raise. I am endeavoring to “poke” him into responding.
As I said in my video series, let us suppose that David is right, that I’m all wrong, that indeed the Gospels do represent “good historical evidence”. Even if this were a true statement, it isn’t good enough. Historical standards are more lax compared to legal standards for the very reason that people’s lives are not generally at stake. I had quoted a fair amount from Gottschalk about the serious handicaps the subject of history is limited by. Granted humans are flawed. God says the works of men are inherently flawed. And one of the more flawed “works” of man is the field of history. And yet it is this very tool that Christianity requires to be perfect – at least for the events in question. How does this make any sense?
As I also noted, history can only deal in probabilities. Even in the best of circumstances, history can only give us a probably yes or a probably no. Would David be willing to give us an honest assessment of how probable his claims are, and if it makes sense at all for a God to base eternal salvation on working out some historical probabilities? If he conceded there was even a 1% chance he is wrong, is he comfortable with knowing there is a 1% chance he could be going to some other God's hell?
As I noted, Christianity teaches the fallibility of man. Which is certainly correct, man certainly is fallible. Our best methods can fail us. But Christianity teaches more than man is merely fallible, it teaches that man is inherently completely and totally corrupt. The “flesh”, the physical nature of man, is utterly valueless – except, apparently, as a pathway towards progressing beyond “flesh”, to becoming pure spirit. How does it make sense for a religion that so debases the value of man yet be fundamentally dependent on the infallibility of a handful of original anonymous sources – at least in regards to the specifics in question?
Seriously, would David give any other religion any credence at all that depended on a handful of people to have gotten some key facts exactly correct, and the only things you knew about these people where that they were early followers of their religion? Would David find any other such God reasonable or even sane?
(Note: I opted to do a follow-up paper "Why Historical Apologetics is Useless" where I explore this in more detail. I hope interested readers will read that follow-up article.)
I don’t know what David’s views of salvation are. I’ve assumed he held at least roughly traditional views that belief in Jesus Christ brings salvation; disbelief brings hell and/or eternal separation from God. But, perhaps he is more liberal, I don’t know. When I still considered myself a Christian, I used to talk with a Lutheran minister. He said that in his younger days, he was a fundamentalist. But, he “grew out if it” and said he no longer believes in a God that “throws souls away” for simply coming to a mistaken conclusion. And that if he were to eventually find out that God actually does throw away souls he said he would just walk away and take his chances on what the consequences would be. So, I wonder what David thinks. Is David's God like my Lutheran minister's God? Or does he believe in a God that throws souls away just because they come to different conclusions? If so, why would he even want to worship this entity? If this is David’s God, then God is the stupidest “All-knowing” entity I’ve ever heard of.
Wouldn't you have to agree, David?
In response to this charge of mine, somewhat surprisingly, David responds that he wasn’t arguing for Christianity being true. He says that Christianity could be false and his hypothesis, that the Gospel of Mark is “generally historical” could still be true. I don’t actually fully understand what he is saying. If Jesus raises people from the dead and is himself resurrected, that presumably means Christianity is true, no? Well, I suppose that it could actually be a work of Satan or something. Is that what he suggesting as at least a conceivable possibility? If that is what he is saying, since neither of us actually are proposing such hypotheses, I don’t think I really want to waste much time addressing such alternatives.
Or is David saying that he would be willing to classify the Gospel of Mark as being “generally historical” even if the miracle stories of the book are false? I was under the impression he was including all the miracle stories as being under his umbrella of being “generally historical”. If he really meant all along to exclude the miracles, that at least would simplify things a bit. I’m willing to grant that it could well be true that some itinerant preacher named Jesus known for having disciples and speaking pithy parables, got himself in trouble and executed. In fact, I’d have no problem granting that this possibility, that there was some actual Jesus that did some things of the Gospel stories is a more likely hypothesis than the mass hallucination hypothesis. See, we can agree on some things, I guess!
Though such a more limited form of being "historically reliable" would be at least more manageable, there are still problems. For example, even if he were to exclude the miracle stories, I would still want my list of which facts he wants to say are reliable and what his specific evidence is for each fact. Just like Gottschalk says. Just excluding the miracle stories doesn't give him a 'get out of producing evidence free' card.
Further, if I was to be generous and grant that most of the non miracle stories were “reliable,” obviously David would use it as a “springboard” to try to assert that the miracle stories are also true and that Christianity is also true. In other words, perhaps David did not – in his video specifically – argue for Christianity being true. But, anything I would concede, he would use as another layer in his house of cards in order to eventually argue that Christianity is true.
This is why I am forced “to put on the brakes.” There are some things that I probably would accept without argument such as the idea of a minimal Jesus. If I knew nothing about Jesus and you just told me about this minimal Jesus guy, I’d probably accept it as true at face value. That wouldn’t mean this minimal Jesus guy existed, it would just mean I’d buy his existence without much evidence. But I know that anything I grant will be used against me. So that is why I am forced to not grant an inch without full evidence.
Now, if I ever mention the fact that I consider it at least possible that there was no historical Jesus at all, immediately people want to say I’m just some lunatic fringe. I don’t want to fight that battle at the moment. So, okay, I’ll concede the barest minimal historical Jesus. I’ll concede a preacher named Jesus existed in the first century. What else do you know about him other than his name and era? Nothing. Maybe this Jesus said some of the things in Mark or the other Gospels, maybe he didn’t. I don’t know. Maybe this Jesus was executed, maybe he wasn’t. I don’t know. David has given us no reason to accept any of it. He offers up vague “multiple persecutions” as evidence. He offers up an unknown Presbyter as a source. That’s all he’s given us. Until he gives us something, anything, more, the burden of proof still lays in his hands. And I mean proof of every single specific claim in the Gospels that he wants to say is “historically reliable.”
I've now covered (and refuted) his response paper to me. In an addendum below, I will review arguments from my original series that he didn't even try to address. But, before that, I am going to take a detour to discuss some philosophical implications of David's position. I notice that David seems to avoid responding to the philosophical points I raise. I am endeavoring to “poke” him into responding.
As I said in my video series, let us suppose that David is right, that I’m all wrong, that indeed the Gospels do represent “good historical evidence”. Even if this were a true statement, it isn’t good enough. Historical standards are more lax compared to legal standards for the very reason that people’s lives are not generally at stake. I had quoted a fair amount from Gottschalk about the serious handicaps the subject of history is limited by. Granted humans are flawed. God says the works of men are inherently flawed. And one of the more flawed “works” of man is the field of history. And yet it is this very tool that Christianity requires to be perfect – at least for the events in question. How does this make any sense?
As I also noted, history can only deal in probabilities. Even in the best of circumstances, history can only give us a probably yes or a probably no. Would David be willing to give us an honest assessment of how probable his claims are, and if it makes sense at all for a God to base eternal salvation on working out some historical probabilities? If he conceded there was even a 1% chance he is wrong, is he comfortable with knowing there is a 1% chance he could be going to some other God's hell?
As I noted, Christianity teaches the fallibility of man. Which is certainly correct, man certainly is fallible. Our best methods can fail us. But Christianity teaches more than man is merely fallible, it teaches that man is inherently completely and totally corrupt. The “flesh”, the physical nature of man, is utterly valueless – except, apparently, as a pathway towards progressing beyond “flesh”, to becoming pure spirit. How does it make sense for a religion that so debases the value of man yet be fundamentally dependent on the infallibility of a handful of original anonymous sources – at least in regards to the specifics in question?
Seriously, would David give any other religion any credence at all that depended on a handful of people to have gotten some key facts exactly correct, and the only things you knew about these people where that they were early followers of their religion? Would David find any other such God reasonable or even sane?
(Note: I opted to do a follow-up paper "Why Historical Apologetics is Useless" where I explore this in more detail. I hope interested readers will read that follow-up article.)
I don’t know what David’s views of salvation are. I’ve assumed he held at least roughly traditional views that belief in Jesus Christ brings salvation; disbelief brings hell and/or eternal separation from God. But, perhaps he is more liberal, I don’t know. When I still considered myself a Christian, I used to talk with a Lutheran minister. He said that in his younger days, he was a fundamentalist. But, he “grew out if it” and said he no longer believes in a God that “throws souls away” for simply coming to a mistaken conclusion. And that if he were to eventually find out that God actually does throw away souls he said he would just walk away and take his chances on what the consequences would be. So, I wonder what David thinks. Is David's God like my Lutheran minister's God? Or does he believe in a God that throws souls away just because they come to different conclusions? If so, why would he even want to worship this entity? If this is David’s God, then God is the stupidest “All-knowing” entity I’ve ever heard of.
Wouldn't you have to agree, David?
Addendum
_
In the article above, I gave
rebuttals to David’s rebuttal. There
were a number of arguments I had raised which David didn’t attempt to
rebut. As I want this page to serve as a
complete response to David, both his original video and his rebuttal, I will
now review the arguments David skipped.
In David’s original video, he argued that the Jesus story was considered repugnant by the society at large of the time. Therefore there would be a large social disincentive to join Christianity. Therefore there must have been some powerful evidence to convince Christians of the truth of their religion. I responded that this sounds like a JP Holding argument, which I feel is well refuted by Richard Carrier, whom I shall quote:
In David’s original video, he argued that the Jesus story was considered repugnant by the society at large of the time. Therefore there would be a large social disincentive to join Christianity. Therefore there must have been some powerful evidence to convince Christians of the truth of their religion. I responded that this sounds like a JP Holding argument, which I feel is well refuted by Richard Carrier, whom I shall quote:
_Consider the cult
of Attis and Cybele: this was a popular religion, with priests and followers
all over the Roman Empire, yet it centered on
the worship of a eunuch (the castrated Attis), and priests as a result
castrated themselves in honor of their god. And this despite the fact that the
emasculating act of castration was among the worst of embarrassing disgraces to
the snobbish elite, just as crucifixion was.
[Carrier demonstrates the point by quoting from an ancient philosopher, Seneca, who found this practice to be repugnant. Carrier continues.] Thus, even something so foul and repugnant to an elite scholar like Seneca nevertheless commanded a large following. There can be no ground for claiming Christianity was any different than the cult of Cybele and Attis in this regard. One man's disgrace was apparently another man's holy salvation. Contrary to Holding's assumption, the most repugnant beliefs could command large followings. Therefore, it does no good to present examples of people who find something repugnant or embarrassing--especially from the literate elite. Christianity won very few of the elite over until it had positions of power and authority to offer them within a wealth-generating Church hierarchy (by the mid-to-late 2nd century), amidst an otherwise collapsing social system. Rather, what we want to know is whether anyone would find a crucified god acceptable or even praiseworthy, and whether it was those very people who became Christians. That means we must study the attitudes of those who converted--not the attitudes of those who refused or attacked the religion. Obviously, many people rejected Christianity because it was repugnant to them in various ways, and probably would have rejected it no matter what evidence confirmed its truth. That's why Christianity never won universal acceptance until it had the power to compel that acceptance under pain of death or loss of all property (by the end of the 4th century A.D.) [Carrier then points out that to people who were actually potential converts, the disadvantaged members of society, there actually was much appealing to Christianity. Carrier continues.] This is confirmed by the fact that the Gospel did not really preach a god crucified. No one converted thinking they were worshipping a defeated, disgraced god. To the contrary, from the very beginning the Gospel preached a God crucified and raised to glory. Many a potential convert could find that attractive. Christ was a victorious god receiving the ultimate honor, not a god defeated in humiliation. His crucifixion was only a temporary defeat. The god actually being worshipped, therefore, was not defeated at all--he lived, and sat on the ultimate heavenly throne, his power attested on earth in the charisma, conviction, and "miracles" that belief in him inspired. Not everyone bought it, of course. But many would have. And many did. The crucified Christ was the ultimate hero, who soon would save us all from the awful, corrupt world we despise and can no longer control, while raining down punishment on the wicked elite who seem to us so untouchable. That this hero had to die at the hands of elite conspirators in order to gain this ultimate power was not unusual--many a god required just such a path, from the Sumerian Inanna, to the Egyptian Osiris, to the Roman Romulus. |
_
Since David didn’t attempt
to rebut this material I presented by Carrier, can I assume he finds no fault
in it and retracts the claim that Christianity being socially repugnant was a barrier to
its acceptance?
David also used the “criterion of embarrassment” argument. According to this argument, since the Gospels record events that could be considered embarrassing to the people involved, this implies that they were being truthful. This of course assumes traditional authorship of the Gospels. Given that I have well refuted all of David's reasons for accepting traditional authorship, there is no "criterion of embarrassment" to apply.
Further, even if I had never thought about who wrote the Gospels, and thought the traditional authorship was as likely as anything else, the "criterion of embarrassment" simply fails the "smell test". The far more parsimonious explanation to the so-called embarrassing moments in the Gospels is that Peter is known in literature as a “foil”. From Wikipedia: “In fiction, a foil is a character who contrasts with another character in order to highlight particular qualities of the other character.” Wikipedia notes that foil characters are often the antagonist. But, not necessarily; Dr. Watson is a foil to Sherlock Holmes. Basically, it seems to me rather obvious that the Jesus character’s purpose is to be a forgiving teacher. And thus the character needs a foil, someone to be constantly in need of being taught and forgiven. Honestly, I can’t see how it could be any more obvious.
Sure, it’s possible my interpretation is wrong. Then again, when you turn on the TV and see a giant lizard smashing Tokyo, it could be the case you happened to tune into a live CNN broadcast. It’s just not very likely. It if quacks like a piece of fiction, its probably a piece of fiction.*
David didn’t attempt to rebut this either. Am I to take this as a concession that his “criterion of embarrassment” argument is nonsense?
Finally, David argued that there is circumstantial evidence that the Gospel of Mark is written from Peter’s accounts. David points out that Peter is the main character, other than Jesus, in the Gospel. The other apostles are generally minor characters. Peter is by far the most prominent of the apostles. He then argues that makes it reasonably probable that the Gospel is based on Peter’s recollections. I’ll be happy to agree with David that Peter is the main character other than Jesus. But Luke Skywalker and Han Solo are the first and second most prominent characters in Star Wars. Am I to believe that the Star Wars story stems from some real Luke Skywalker’s or Han Solo’s recollections?
Now that said, I certainly do agree that it is customary that first-hand reports usually have the one doing the reporting prominent in the report. So, I’ll grant that Peter being prominent in the Gospel of Mark would be consistent with it being from Peter’s recollection. On the other hand, first-hand reports are also a written with personal perspective. If I was Peter and I was telling the story, it would be written something like this:
David also used the “criterion of embarrassment” argument. According to this argument, since the Gospels record events that could be considered embarrassing to the people involved, this implies that they were being truthful. This of course assumes traditional authorship of the Gospels. Given that I have well refuted all of David's reasons for accepting traditional authorship, there is no "criterion of embarrassment" to apply.
Further, even if I had never thought about who wrote the Gospels, and thought the traditional authorship was as likely as anything else, the "criterion of embarrassment" simply fails the "smell test". The far more parsimonious explanation to the so-called embarrassing moments in the Gospels is that Peter is known in literature as a “foil”. From Wikipedia: “In fiction, a foil is a character who contrasts with another character in order to highlight particular qualities of the other character.” Wikipedia notes that foil characters are often the antagonist. But, not necessarily; Dr. Watson is a foil to Sherlock Holmes. Basically, it seems to me rather obvious that the Jesus character’s purpose is to be a forgiving teacher. And thus the character needs a foil, someone to be constantly in need of being taught and forgiven. Honestly, I can’t see how it could be any more obvious.
Sure, it’s possible my interpretation is wrong. Then again, when you turn on the TV and see a giant lizard smashing Tokyo, it could be the case you happened to tune into a live CNN broadcast. It’s just not very likely. It if quacks like a piece of fiction, its probably a piece of fiction.*
David didn’t attempt to rebut this either. Am I to take this as a concession that his “criterion of embarrassment” argument is nonsense?
Finally, David argued that there is circumstantial evidence that the Gospel of Mark is written from Peter’s accounts. David points out that Peter is the main character, other than Jesus, in the Gospel. The other apostles are generally minor characters. Peter is by far the most prominent of the apostles. He then argues that makes it reasonably probable that the Gospel is based on Peter’s recollections. I’ll be happy to agree with David that Peter is the main character other than Jesus. But Luke Skywalker and Han Solo are the first and second most prominent characters in Star Wars. Am I to believe that the Star Wars story stems from some real Luke Skywalker’s or Han Solo’s recollections?
Now that said, I certainly do agree that it is customary that first-hand reports usually have the one doing the reporting prominent in the report. So, I’ll grant that Peter being prominent in the Gospel of Mark would be consistent with it being from Peter’s recollection. On the other hand, first-hand reports are also a written with personal perspective. If I was Peter and I was telling the story, it would be written something like this:
_ I remember when I first met Jesus. I didn’t really know what to make of him. I had only heard a few brief stories about
him, and I didn’t really know if he was man or myth. So there I was, minding my own business,
trying to catch my fish for the day, and there was Jesus! And he picked me to join him! I never even did understand why he picked me.
|
_
Perhaps David would protest,
the Gospel of Mark is not first-hand, it is second-hand. Okay, but second hand-reports still carry the
same kind of feel. Something like,
“Peter tells me that he had only heard a few brief stories about Jesus. He didn’t know if he was really man or
myth.” Something like that.
In basic terms, first-hand reports are usually written in first-person prose; second-hard reports are generally written in second-person prose. Third-person omniscient format like we actually see in the Gospels, on the other hand, is much more associated with fiction -- certainly not for first- or second-hand reports. If the Gospel of Mark was actually written from Peter’s recollections, Peter wouldn’t just be a more major character than the other apostles, the writing would in all likelihood do more of “getting in the head” of Peter.
Take for example when Peter is first called to discipleship. Surely this was an important event in the life of Peter, no? If the work was first- or second-hand from Peter, surely the report would have lots more details about how it happened to Peter, verses the other apostles. Instead, this is how we first meet Peter in the Gospel of Mark:
In basic terms, first-hand reports are usually written in first-person prose; second-hard reports are generally written in second-person prose. Third-person omniscient format like we actually see in the Gospels, on the other hand, is much more associated with fiction -- certainly not for first- or second-hand reports. If the Gospel of Mark was actually written from Peter’s recollections, Peter wouldn’t just be a more major character than the other apostles, the writing would in all likelihood do more of “getting in the head” of Peter.
Take for example when Peter is first called to discipleship. Surely this was an important event in the life of Peter, no? If the work was first- or second-hand from Peter, surely the report would have lots more details about how it happened to Peter, verses the other apostles. Instead, this is how we first meet Peter in the Gospel of Mark:
_
Mark 3:13-19 NIV: Jesus went up on a mountainside and called to
him those he wanted, and they came to him. He appointed twelve that they might
be with him and that he might send them out to preach and to have authority to
drive out demons. These are the twelve he appointed: Simon (to whom he gave the
name Peter), James son of Zebedee and his brother John (to them he gave the
name Boanerges, which means “sons of thunder”), Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew,
Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot and Judas
Iscariot, who betrayed him.
|
_Yes, Peter is listed
first. This is consistent with Peter
being a more important character than the other apostles. But not one hint of either first- or
second-hand personal perspective. David
could do some “hand waiving” and say there are conceivable reasons that Mark
opted to “sanitize” the reporting, taking out Peter’s personal
perspectives. But we are talking
probabilities here. Percentage-wise, how
often are first- or second-hand reports written in third-person omniscient
literary form? I defy David to find a
single secular example for comparison.
In short, percentage-wise, I’d say rather close to 0% of first- or
second-hand reports look similar.**
Also note that this is rather strong evidence against the anonymous Presbyter's claim that Mark was very faithful to the information he got from Peter. Surely if the Mark guy did talk to this Peter guy, Peter would have given Mark loads of personal perspectives on how he felt at various moments. I don't see how it could be argued otherwise. Therefore, by definition, Mark couldn't have been slavish to the information he got from Peter because we get no such information, as I demonstrated by my Bible quotation above.
Notice David’s rather selective use of evidence. I do agree that Peter being a major character is consistent with the claim of the Gospel of Mark being based on Peter’s reports, and that is the evidence David presents us with. With evidence inconsistent with such a conclusion, such as the fact that the gospel completely lacks appearance of being of first- or second-hand report, and David doesn’t say a word. Funny how that is, isn’t it?
And there is another thing “funny”. In my YouTube debate with David, I mentioned that in the second gospel, the Gospel of Matthew, allegedly written by Matthew himself – not only is it not written first person, Matthew isn’t even a major character! Matthew is only mentioned three times in the Gospel of Matthew, in passing, without a hint of personal perspective. Matthew is the most minor of the disciples in the Gospel of Matthew. Percentage-wise, how often do people write first-hand reports in third-person omniscient format and the one doing the reporting is essentially nonexistent in the supposed first-person report? Again, I defy David to find a single secular example for comparison.
It should be obvious we are dealing with ad-hoc argumentation. When Peter is a main character, he trumps it up as major evidence. But Matthew is an extremely minor character, and he says it doesn’t matter. If the situation were reversed, that Matthew was a major character and Peter was a minor character, obviously David would just reverse the argument, and say that Matthew being a major character is great evidence and ignore Peter being a minor character. You just can’t have it both ways David!
This is why I call David’s “documentary” in scary-quotes. We aren’t dealing with a documentary in any honest sense, we are dealing with ad-hoc rationalizations stemming from David's religious agenda. I made this charge in my video series, and David didn’t even try to rebut this charge of mine. Am I conclude my charge is correct?
I’ve noticed this pattern with David. He is often curiously silent about responding to many of my arguments. I had at one time suggested that perhaps David is the one honest apologist I’ve ever met. I am now forced to conclude that I still have yet to meet an honest one.
Also note that this is rather strong evidence against the anonymous Presbyter's claim that Mark was very faithful to the information he got from Peter. Surely if the Mark guy did talk to this Peter guy, Peter would have given Mark loads of personal perspectives on how he felt at various moments. I don't see how it could be argued otherwise. Therefore, by definition, Mark couldn't have been slavish to the information he got from Peter because we get no such information, as I demonstrated by my Bible quotation above.
Notice David’s rather selective use of evidence. I do agree that Peter being a major character is consistent with the claim of the Gospel of Mark being based on Peter’s reports, and that is the evidence David presents us with. With evidence inconsistent with such a conclusion, such as the fact that the gospel completely lacks appearance of being of first- or second-hand report, and David doesn’t say a word. Funny how that is, isn’t it?
And there is another thing “funny”. In my YouTube debate with David, I mentioned that in the second gospel, the Gospel of Matthew, allegedly written by Matthew himself – not only is it not written first person, Matthew isn’t even a major character! Matthew is only mentioned three times in the Gospel of Matthew, in passing, without a hint of personal perspective. Matthew is the most minor of the disciples in the Gospel of Matthew. Percentage-wise, how often do people write first-hand reports in third-person omniscient format and the one doing the reporting is essentially nonexistent in the supposed first-person report? Again, I defy David to find a single secular example for comparison.
It should be obvious we are dealing with ad-hoc argumentation. When Peter is a main character, he trumps it up as major evidence. But Matthew is an extremely minor character, and he says it doesn’t matter. If the situation were reversed, that Matthew was a major character and Peter was a minor character, obviously David would just reverse the argument, and say that Matthew being a major character is great evidence and ignore Peter being a minor character. You just can’t have it both ways David!
This is why I call David’s “documentary” in scary-quotes. We aren’t dealing with a documentary in any honest sense, we are dealing with ad-hoc rationalizations stemming from David's religious agenda. I made this charge in my video series, and David didn’t even try to rebut this charge of mine. Am I conclude my charge is correct?
I’ve noticed this pattern with David. He is often curiously silent about responding to many of my arguments. I had at one time suggested that perhaps David is the one honest apologist I’ve ever met. I am now forced to conclude that I still have yet to meet an honest one.
Notes
* The "giant lizard smashing Tokyo" analogy is borrowed from Dr. Robert Price.
** One time I raised the argument about the gospels being written in third-person omniscient format as being more typically associated with fiction with YouTube's Labarum312, also known as Albert. Albert said that in ancient times, authors would sometimes use third-person omniscient for historical reports. I'll accept him at his word, but, were they first-hand or second-hand reports? And are they classified as good historical reports today? I rather doubt either is the case.
References:
I tried to put hyperlinks for most of my references. What follows is my most significant references:
David's original video:
(documentary) The Historical Case For Mark's Gospel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rcNCB3cqTg
David's rebuttal article
http://thefunkytheist.blogspot.com/2011/12/caseagainstfaith-on-case-for-mark.html
ProfMTH's Die for a Lie video series:
http://www.youtube.com/user/ProfMTH#grid/user/8D71CEDB225E5AE0
Richard Carrier's refutation of JP Holding's article, "The Impossible Faith". It was originally entitled "Was Christianity Too Improbable to be False" available for free on the Secular Web:
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/improbable/
Recently expanded and revised to be a book. It was renamed as Not the Impossible Faith. Available in physical book form or as a PDF for $2.50 from Lulu:
http://www.lulu.com/product/ebook/not-the-impossible-faith/17481434?productTr...
Understanding History: A Primer of Historical Method
by Louis Gottschalk
Out of print but now available online for free:
http://www.questia.com/library/book/understanding-history-a-primer-of-histori...
Elizabeth Loftus on memory and eyewitness testimony:
http://faculty.washington.edu/eloftus/
Greek and Roman Historians: Information and Misinformation by Michael Grant
Wikipedia page on a literature foil characters:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foil_%28literature%29
** One time I raised the argument about the gospels being written in third-person omniscient format as being more typically associated with fiction with YouTube's Labarum312, also known as Albert. Albert said that in ancient times, authors would sometimes use third-person omniscient for historical reports. I'll accept him at his word, but, were they first-hand or second-hand reports? And are they classified as good historical reports today? I rather doubt either is the case.
References:
I tried to put hyperlinks for most of my references. What follows is my most significant references:
David's original video:
(documentary) The Historical Case For Mark's Gospel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rcNCB3cqTg
David's rebuttal article
http://thefunkytheist.blogspot.com/2011/12/caseagainstfaith-on-case-for-mark.html
ProfMTH's Die for a Lie video series:
http://www.youtube.com/user/ProfMTH#grid/user/8D71CEDB225E5AE0
Richard Carrier's refutation of JP Holding's article, "The Impossible Faith". It was originally entitled "Was Christianity Too Improbable to be False" available for free on the Secular Web:
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/improbable/
Recently expanded and revised to be a book. It was renamed as Not the Impossible Faith. Available in physical book form or as a PDF for $2.50 from Lulu:
http://www.lulu.com/product/ebook/not-the-impossible-faith/17481434?productTr...
Understanding History: A Primer of Historical Method
by Louis Gottschalk
Out of print but now available online for free:
http://www.questia.com/library/book/understanding-history-a-primer-of-histori...
Elizabeth Loftus on memory and eyewitness testimony:
http://faculty.washington.edu/eloftus/
Greek and Roman Historians: Information and Misinformation by Michael Grant
Wikipedia page on a literature foil characters:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foil_%28literature%29