My Tribute to Dr. James D. Strauss, 1929-2014.

James Strauss with William Lane Craig at my 1985 graduation from TEDS

I wrote this tribute to Doc Strauss a couple of years ago. Now he is gone, forever. He'll never know his entire life was spent on a delusion, for in order to know this he would have to wake up from the dead for a moment.

When I studied with Doc Strauss people called me a "Straussite," along with some others who started the Chi-Lambda apologetical studies group. I wear that badge with honor. I had an education that was next to none when I studied with Doc. He didn't do much writing, except for producing numerous syllabi with long lists of books to read, interspersed with comments. It was a challenge to find a new book he hadn't heard about yet. He was a teacher par excellence without peer though. There is no other intellectual that has made such a big impact on me. His wit also exceeded anything I have ever known. Any truck driver down HWY 10 could be stopped and he would tell us that, Doc would say! How could so much wit, wisdom and love be put together in that one package is quite the mystery to me. But I'm so glad to have crossed his path. He was the most unique and amazing man I'll ever meet! He inspired a generation to dream big. He will be missed greatly.

Strauss motivated me to become a Christian apologist in the first place. The irony is that it eventually led me away from faith and I now use what he taught me in my books. So to the degree I am effective in my attempts to disabuse people of faith, his towering influence casts a shadow over me. My life would be much different had I not met or studied or laughed with him. I am very grateful. Here's why:

Bart Ehrman Writes About Atheist Critics of His Book "Did Jesus Exist?"

I should say that one of the things that struck me, quite forcefully, in the aftermath of the publication of the book, was just how virulent, mean-spirited, and militant some atheists can be. The hate-mail and hate-response that I received for this book from the far left was absolutely as vehement as the hate-mail and hate-response that I have received for other books from the far right. It’s not easy being a historian, wanting simply to know what happened in the past, when so many have so many vested interests in having things their own way. Many of the mythicists are simply fundamentalists of a different stripe. Or so I’ve experienced! LINK.

What I don't understand at all is this phenomenon. Why do atheists get so worked up about the question of the existence of Jesus? Isn't it merely a historical question to be settled in a reasonable dispassionate manner? Don't we have other arguments, plenty of them, showing that the Jesus in the gospels did not exist? I've written about this before in my post Did Jesus Exist? An All Out War is Going On. On this question I do not find Christian scholars attacking atheists but rather calmly trying to explain why they think Jesus existed. What's the problem here folks?

In His Apologetic Book Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth, Bart Ehrman Shares His Faith in Jesus With Atheists

Topic for discussion:  Bart Ehrman’s faith in Jesus

Bart Ehrman (in this YouTube debates, lectures and especially in his 2013 book) clearly states that he believes in Jesus . . . that Jesus existed (getting his “facts” from textual evidence of faith: The Bible, Patristic sources (along two short paragraphs from Josephus)), but mostly by using the New Testament to prove the New Testament.

Christianity Considered: Today's Thought

Church and Sunday school are nothing more than weekly one - two hour info commercials where people are mentally hyped up by motivational speakers ("Preachers") who usually make a good living convincing folks to accept an unproven theory (the product) known as Theology which is totally unregulated by the Department of Consumer Affairs.

John's Interview With The Thinking Atheist

Discover Education Internet Radio with TheThinkingAtheist on BlogTalkRadio

Bill Maher Trashes the Flood Story of Noah

We'll get to Bill Maher in a second. First, if you want to read a book on the Flood story in the Bible get Irving Finkel's The Ark Before Noah: Decoding the Story of the Flood.In a great review of it posted at Skeptic Ink Network, we read:

The Ark Before Noah, written by Irving Finkel, describes the author’s discovery and interpretation of what he calls the “Ark Tablet” – an early and relatively complete version of the Atrahasis story dating from 1900-1700 BCE that sheds new light on the biblical flood story and its Mesopotamian roots.

Looks Like God is Going to Call One of His Faithful Home to Heaven

The Wrath of Yahweh Incarnate

"The Rev. Fred Phelps Sr., who founded a Kansas church that's widely known for its protests at military funerals and anti-gay sentiments, is in a care facility.

Westboro Baptist Church spokesman Steve Drain said Sunday that Phelps is being cared for in a Shawnee County facility. Drain wouldn't identify the facility but says Phelps is 84 and "having some health problems."

Members of the Westboro church, based in Topeka, frequently protest at funerals of soldiers with signs containing messages like "Thank God for dead soldiers" and "Thank God for 9/11," claiming the deaths are God's punishment for American immorality and tolerance of homosexuality and abortion." (The Associated Press)

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I'm one fourth Irish.

I celebrated on Saturday.

Here I am celebrating with a Leprechaun! ;-)

Last year I wrote a series of posts about my Irish Ancestry. Enjoy.

Below see a picture of the Greening of St. Mary's River in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

The river was moving too fast to get it green due to melting snow.

Dr. James McGrath On the Resurrection and the Tools of the Historian

Recently James McGrath has said some important things about the tools of the historian:

I am not interested in defending "the claims of Christianity." I am interested in defending mainstream secular historical study as a discipline from those who seek to manipulate it for ideological ends, whether those be Jesus-mythicists or Christian apologists. Ultimately historical questions need to be settled using the tools of historical study, and not on the basis that a particular conclusion seems particularly appealing in order to defend or attack someone's beliefs...anyone who claims to use history to try to argue for the resurrection, or Matthew's zombie apocalypse, needs to be called out on it. And mainstream scholars do that.

In reference to the resurrection McGrath has said this before: "All sorts of fairly improbable scenarios are inevitably going to be more likely than an extremely improbable one. That doesn't necessarily mean miracles never happened then or don't happen now - it just means that historical tools are not the way to answer that question." When it comes to methodological naturalism McGrath wrote:

I don't see how historical study can adopt any other approach, any more than criminology can. It will always be theoretically possible that a crime victim died simply because God wanted him dead, but the appropriate response of detectives is to leave the case open. In the same way, it will always be possible that a virgin conceived, but it will never be more likely than that the stories claiming this developed, like comparable stories about other ancient figures, as a way of highlighting the individual's significance. And since historical study deals with probabilities and evidence, to claim that a miracle is "historically likely" misunderstands the method in question. READ THIS LINK.

The only way to know if Jesus bodily arose from the dead is by using the tools of the historian. But those tools cannot possibly lead anyone to conclude Jesus arose from the dead. Faith cannot help us know what happened in history. Faith is irrelevant to the historian's task. Faith has no method. Period.

Christians Really Can Be Reasoned Out of Their Faith!

For people who think we cannot reason people out of their faith here is a testimony from Dale Morgan on Facebook (used with permission):

Maybe Irish People Should Have a Moment of Silence On St. Patrick's Day?

What most people don't know about American slavery is that Irish people were used and abused as slaves before Africans were enslaved in the New World (which is my ancestry so it is personal with me). Here is the rest of the story, which can be read in Don Jordan and Michael Walsh's book, White Cargo: The Forgotten History of Britain's White Slaves in America.In an online commentary of the book, John Martin of the Montreal-based Center for Research and Globalization, points this fact out:

Dr. Hector Avalos On "Who Was the Historical Jesus?"

LINK.

There is No Such Thing As Theism or Christian Theism or Mere Christianty

In an earlier post I had argued there is no such thing as "theism" or "Christianity" or "Mere Christianity." Link. In a post where Jeffery Jay Lowder says he doesn't know whether religion causes more harm than good I brought this up, saying religion like theism or Christan theism or mere Christianity does not exist in the abstract. Bradley Bowen, who writes for Lowder for the Secular Outpost responded. Here is what he wrote and my subsequent response:

Christians Falsify Christianity

Claim:  Christians have no need for a teacher, since the Holy Spirit will teach them.

But the anointing that you received from him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about everything, and is true, and is no lie—just as it has taught you, abide in him.  1 John 2:27 (ESV)

 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.  John 14:26 (ESV)

What Does it Mean to Have A Personal Relationship With Jesus?

Non-Stamp Collector does it again! This is an older video I know. Classic!

Our Debates Are Not Unproductive: I Recommend David Marshall's Chapter On "The Outsider Test For Faith" To My Critics

Who would ever think I would say this? But I do. Marshall and I have gone around on this test and I have harshly criticized him here at DC, on Amazon where he reviewed my book, and in the previous ebook edition of "True Reason," edited by Tom Gilson and Carson Weitnauer. But having received a paperback copy of this book and after reading Marshall's revised chapter in True Reason: Confronting the Irrationality of the New Atheism,I now report there is progress. The most ignorant criticisms of the OTF come from Christian scholars Matthew Flannagan and Mark Hanna. They are so bad, so delusional I only recommend them in so far as they show us how intelligent people with a delusion cannot even read with comprehension. The less ignorant criticisms of the OTF come from Victor Reppert, Randal Rauser and Thomas Talbot (all of whom were instructional to me in many ways). Maybe I'm going soft, but I think rather than taking a hard-line approach against Marshall it would be counter-productive for me to do so, since he embraces the OTF (with some caveats). I adjure my critics to read Marshall's chapter even though he is still wrong to claim Christianity passes the OTF. All I'm saying is that this is progress. I'll comment later on where he's wrong, but for now I recommend his chapter to my critics. Hopefully they will listen to him.

What Would Happen if Atheists Gained Power in Democracies?

Would we put all believers in mental institutions, imprison or kill them? I know of no secularist who would do these things. We all affirm, to a person, the separation of religion from the government. When it comes to the secular world people must basically argue for laws that are based on the harm principle of JS Mill, which is endorsed by many believers. Religious people can do what they want in their lives. There are exceptions though. Religious people who refuse to take their children to hospitals, or deny women, other races, or gays their rights, deserve no respect in a civil society. We would force them to comply or completely withdraw from society, like the Amish do.

Three books address these issues. Freedom of Religion and the Secular State, by Russell Blackford, In Freedom We Trust: An Atheist Guide to Religious Liberty, by Edward and Michael Buckner, and Taking Liberties: Why Religious Freedom Doesn't Give You the Right to Tell Other People What to Do, by Robert Boston.

Dr. Avalos to Give a Lecture Titled: “A Historical or Mythic Jesus?”

Avalos will explore how scholars of Jesus divide themselves as historicists and mythicists. This lecture seeks to demonstrate that there is too little information from the time of Jesus to favor either side conclusively, and so agnosticism is the best position until more relevant new data can be acquired. LINK.

Thanks To Christian Scholars Who Have Criticized My Outsider Test for Faith

In the heat of debate I don't always acknowledge a debt of gratitude to Christian scholars who have dealt with my Outsider Test for Faith (OTF) in print. I'm thinking of David Marshall, Mark Hanna, Randal Rauser and Matthew Flannagan (in a review for Philosophia Christi). Thanks! I argue against them all in my book.

And The Mythical Jesus Debates Continue...

Maurice Casey, Professor of New Testament Languages and Literature at the University of Nottingham, UK, published a T&T Clark work arguing Jesus existed: Jesus: Evidence and Argument or Mythicist Myths?It's hot off the press. At least important authors and prestigious publishers are taking notice, and that is a good thing.

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Edit: I was asked on Facebook what my take on this is. So I wrote:

I said "At least important authors and prestigious publishers are taking notice, and that is a good thing." Let me add that I know the Jesus presented in the canonical gospels did not exist, and that's good enough for me.

Then I was asked if I have moved toward the Christ myth position. I responded:

I know less and less about any historical Jesus. But I have no dog in this race so I don't see the need to argue passionately about it either way. To me it's a non-issue and I'll sit back and listen to those who want to argue about it.

With Christians, Faith in God is Never Enough

State and national elections are coming and I usually find myself ending up on a chain email from someone I know.  Here is one such email aimed at other people of faith not consider orthodox (much like the religious wars that have taken place in Europe  for the last thousand plus years . . . and are still going on). 

Notice, the word atheist is not mentioned, but this email does signal out anyone who does not believe in a Christian God (conservative faith in Jesus).  Here’s the email:

Please read to the end, then make your decision!

In God we trust

"Christianity is Not Great" Now Available for Pre-order

Some buyers have already pre-ordered it. You won't be charged until it ships and if the price drops anytime before that date you'll get it for the lowest price. LINK

Robert Ingersoll Quote of the Day

The Solid Sky in Genesis: A Response to Rev. Juan Valdes

One composite reconstruction of biblical cosmology

This is the second installment in a series of responses to comments made by Rev. Juan Valdes in the debate and in his post-debate webpost responses.

In my last post, I refuted his contention that Genesis 1:1-3 does not speak of water as the primeval substance that pre-existed light, the earth, the sky, and all heavenly bodies.

In this post, I concentrate on showing that biblical authors believed that the sky was a solid structure, probably metallic, in which the stars, moon, and sun are embedded.

If so, that certainly does not accord with our observations of how the universe is structured. His relevant webpost is here.

Bill Gothard Resigns Amid Sexual Harassment Investigation

LINK. He faces allegations from over 30 women! So much for his basic biblical life principles, eh?