Holding rebutted on Trilemma
Brian Holtz
article at
http://www.tektonics.org/tekton_01_03_01_CC1.html
Here (again) I post in full Holding's new material. I will reply in a
subsequent posting.
------------- The following text is by Robert Turkel -------------
[..]
(Where's an example of this for Jesus?). In the latest effort, our critic
explains that he went out on the town and asked a "tenured psychology
professor" who assured him that the Christ complex is "not in the APA's
DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) and that it
was never in any previous edition either." This is the standard skeptical
fallacy of moving the goalposts. The issue was never whether it appeared in
any diagnostic manual (no one expects a separate entry for people who think
they are Napoleon either); the issue is whether indeed there are people who
think they are Christ or God, and how serious this delusion is compared to,
say, someone who thinks they are merely a great football player (but not
necessarily any particular one, just themselves with great skills), and
whether such serious delusions can be or ever are gradual in their onset.
The level of delusion and dissonance required is much greater for one with
a divinity complex than it is for one who has lesser-scale delusions, and
whether it makes the DSM-IV as a separate category is utterly beside the
point. And as before, our critic resorts to claiming that Jesus did not
always believe himself to be divinity, a matter we will return to below.
In the matter of the condition slowly evolving, our critic challenges me
"to cite any authority saying schizophrenia is more likely to have sudden
onset than to develop over time." Whose job is this to prove? Our critic
bears the burden of proof in this regard, as it is he who makes the claim
that Jesus fits the mold; but even if he proves that gradual onset is
possible in suhc a context, it proves nothing without a begged question
assumed and without corollary data and an explained means of falsification.
But indeed, we will see that such begging of questions does not disturb our
critic in the least.
On the last point, about finding such conditions in Jesus, our critic
accuses me of not quoting material in context, but still provides no
examples of such behavior in Jesus one way or the other, and does not show
how the alleged misquoting in any way muddles his argument.
[..]
for a bit more on John and Mark's respective Christologies, see here). In
the latest report, our critic ignores the link, makes hash of the idea that
I supposedly allowed that Jesus did not spread around his identity, even as
it was spread around anyway -- actually the "degree" here is in terms of
level of divinity, not in terms of openness.
[..]
my study on the Q/Marcan priority thesis (which, as predicted, our critic
ignored, and now merely declares to be a "dead meme" and therefore not open
to discussion, because it is held by authoritative sources like
Encyclopedias!).
[..]
there are ample indications that he knew and proclaimed his own position.
Our critic now adds some arguments from his own book (quoting himself as an
authority in essence!) in which he offers these examples:
In order of writing, the gospel accounts of Jesus' resurrected
appearances become increasingly elaborate. Original Mark claims
an empty tomb but describes no appearances. Matthew says simply
that the two Marys and later the Eleven "saw him" but "some were
dubious". The Longer Ending of Mark says Jesus appeared "in a
different form" to two disciples, and simply "appeared" to the
Eleven. Luke elaborates on both of these episodes, building the
latter into an account that approaches the full Doubting Thomas
story finally told in John.
The progression here is only in our critic's imagination. Mark is exempt
from such analysis (other than the begged question yet again of Marcan
priority, apparently a "dead meme" off limits for critical discussion by
virtue of our critic's vested authority in encyclopedias) as it is far from
clear that the ending of Mark was the original as it now stands, and the
longer ending is too late to be given consideration -- that our critic sees
fit to include it shows a remarkable lack of scholarly discipline. In terms
of Matthew, here we see again the same illicit interpretation used by
Richard Carrier: as we noted there, "Matt. 28:17 could in no way serve as a
rhetorical defense of this nature. Matt. 28:17 does not say that some
'didn't believe'; it said that some 'doubted' -- doubted what? The answer
is given in that Jesus addresses them with the Great Commission. As Donald
Hagner notes ['Gospel, Kingdom, and Resurrection in the Synoptic Gospels,'
Life in the Face of Death, 114] the verb used here points not to belief or
uncertainty, but to hesitation and indecision. They did not doubt the
presence or veracity of the resurrected Jesus; they wondered, rather, in
the face of a heretofore unexpected event (a unique resurrection before the
final judgment) what was to be done next, and that is why Jesus gives them
instructions on exactly what to do next: spread the word!" In terms of Luke
and John, by "elaboration" our critic presumably means, more details are
given. That may be so, but none of the details adds any degree of
elabortion to the actual event of the resurrection. Resurrection was a
Jewish concept with fixed central ideas, at the core, the fixed idea of a
physical body restored from death. Luke and John add nothing that Matthew
would not, in actually claiming a resurrection, already indicate via the
conceptual template of a resurrection in Judaism. Luke's eating of fish,
and John's Thomas touch, are expectations that would be part of the package
of a resurrected body. Moreover, our critic throws this idea in the air
without details: Does he think Luke elaborated on Matthew directly, and
John on Luke? If he thinks there is a progression, then that implies that
one built on the other knowingly. And if he thinks Luke built on Matthew,
that scrums the Q hypothesis that pairs with Marcan priority, a thesis he
clings to like dryer lint. And if he thinks John built on Luke, he also
stands against the standard line of the scholarship he uses. The
"progression" thesis is quite imagimative, but completely devoid of
substance. It is merely a theory thrown in the air and the data hammered to
fit. Finally, let it be added that if this progression theory has any
validity, one must date 1 Cor. 15, whose quantity-substance is far more
significant than the Gospel records, later than the Gospels!
Moreover, it seems that the "progression" is tailored and adjusted as
needed to suit the thesis. We are told:
In the earliest gospel (Mark), Jesus never calls himself
Christ/Messiah ("anointed"), is reluctant for his special nature
to be known, and (as he does in Matthew) despairs on the cross.
(By contrast, in the later Luke and John, Jesus asserts he is
Christ, and confidently assures a co-crucified criminal of their
impending ascension.)
As noted above, and still again, our critic ignores the very definitive
claims to divinity listed in Mark -- and actually, these things in Mark are
much more decisive than the claim to be "Messiah," which was not in Judaism
of the time equated with the idea of God incarnate anyway! (Not that it
matters: It is wrong to say Jesus "never" calls himself Christ in Mark --
Peter's accepted confession in Mark 8:29; Mark 9:39-41, 13:6, and 14:61-2
amount to such an admission, and Mark 15:32 shows that the people were
aware that Jesus was claiming the title!) And an "impending ascension"
(which is not an accurate descriptor anyway) is no divine claim! Where is
our critic getting his Christology from? Certainly not from NT scholarship!
The bottom line: Anyone familiar with the social background data, with the
contextual meanings of the words used by Jesus of himself, sees no such
progression within the Gospels, though we will see later our critic
straining mightily to divest these claims of their contextually-anchored
meaning. We have also answered the alleged matter of "despair" on the
cross; see below for more obfuscations by our critic.
[..]
like a case where Jesus thought Peter was out to get him!) and
"unrealistic, illogical thinking" as well as hallucinations. (In response
our critic admits that "Jesus obviously was persecuted" -- as he covers
himself with a non-argument that "actual persecution is of course no
guarantee that one does not suffer from paranoid schizophrenia" -- and
claims that I have his "argument backwards" for he is "not saying that some
separate evidence for Jesus' being unrealistic and hallucinatory therefore
establishes him as a schizophrenic." Well, if not, then why quote the
article on this point, or why not quote it and admit that that phrase is
not being taken into consideration? What is happening here is that our
critic simply threw up a quote from the encyclopedia uncritically -- as he
has done with numerous sources -- hoping to land one blow, any blow, with
his skeptical cohorts -- and now has to backpedal furiously in order to
avoid defending himself. Indeed, this is shown in that here, for the first
time, our critic shows his hand, which we have anticipated: "...I'm saying
that if we reserve judgment about the truth of the reports about Jesus, and
instead can show that they are consistent with paranoid schizophrenia, then
it becomes a simple matter of asking which explanation is more
parsimonious: divine incarnation or mental illness? Since mental illness is
obviously more parsimonious than divine incarnation, Holding's burden is to
show that the reports about Jesus are *inconsistent* with paranoid
schizophrenia." That is indeed what we have been doing, but the entire
premise from our critic rests upon the begged question (turned via positive
spin-doctoring into a matter of a "more parsimonious explanation!") that no
such thing as a divine incarnation is possible. To that end, in the service
of a "more parsimonious explanation," do we see our critic spinning out
every event possible into a sign of mental illness, while dispensing with
contrary or insufficient indications of data by any illicit means possible.
We shall see more of this as we proceed.)
[..]
skeptics would posit the usual convenient "group hallucination" theory for
that one. Our critcic has no answer for that, but does as we expected beg
the question by assuming that Jesus' encounter with Satan and apocalyptic
fervor are the result of delusion. The scent of begged question is
overwhelming!
[..]
protestors in front of nuclear power plants and members of PETA also need
help; though see as well here. (Our critic responds to this by saying,
"This analogy fails utterly, as such protests do not get the protester
killed." Whether they get someone killed is beside the point, though in
that case, one may ask about the sanity of American Revolutionary soldiers,
for example, who fought for their freedom knowing there was an excellent
chance they would be killed. At the same time, our critic assumes upon the
ancients certain values and judgments about the value and purpose of life
that are held only by moderns; the ancients had no qualms about dying
sacrificially for a cause they believed in, and if this is a sign of mental
illness, then perhaps Socrates was mentally ill as well.)
[..]
Show that there was deterioration in Jesus' daily living, etc. activities
that would match this. Our critic replies: "Jesus abandoned his profession
of carpentry for a life of wandering asceticism. His ministry caused
strained relations with his family that even the gospels felt obliged to
report." How does this show impairment in any of these areas? It doesn't.
For one thing, the "strain" was clearly only from the family's side, not
from Jesus'. As for abandoning a profession, does this mean we are mentally
ill when we change careers or lifestyle? Is asceticism a sign of mental
illness? We shall see shortly that our critic, apparently now so desperate
as to resort to such a bigoted judgment, thinks so indeed! Nevertheless,
none of this even so reflects a "deterioration" in the named areas, except
by virtue of a modernistic value judgment that assumes that living in a
nice house is a sure sign of mental health order. One would also ask for
detailed qualification proving that a move from carpenter to travelling
teacher is somehow "deterioration," other than by making bigoted and
modernistic value judgments. Do those who leave a comfortable home and join
the Peace Corps to dig wells in Africa count as mentally ill?
[..]
I do not doubt that desperate skeptics will fill in gaps as needed. And
indeed our skeptic does, as he refers to the above thusly: "[C]ave-hiding
fanatics and a similarly delusional preacher." It is telling that our
critic is forced to resort to bigoted ad hominem here, extending the
diagnosis of mental illness to as many as is needed to make his case! So we
wonder now as well: Are, for example, ascetic Buddhist monks in their
mountain temples "hiding fanatics"? The core of this methodology is
becoming crystal clear: Our critic, a skeptic, merely declares all or as
much religious belief as necessary to be indications of delusion! So we put
the question: Is it possible at all to live a life of religious or other
asceticism and not be declared mentally deluded? Evidently not!
[..]
It's compatible with disorder, but not proof of it, especially in light of
contrary evidence. (Our critic in response offers yet more bigoted and
begged questions, pointing to the ascetic habits of Jesus, and adds that
"the gospels report that Jesus was sometimes socially ostracized for his
unconventional associations and was at times was considered mad by his
family (Mk 3:21) and other Jews (Jn 10:20)." Our critic once again displays
his incredible lack of knowledge of the social background of the situation.
Jesus' "unconventional associations" were with tax collectors and
prostitutes and lepers, the marginalized and oppressed of society. Was
Mother Theresa mentally ill for caring for the poorest of the poor, the
lepers, and the despised, in Calcutta? Shall it now be a show of mental
illness to care for terminal AIDS patients?!? What was actually happening
here is that Jesus was standing against ritual purity taboos heavily
ingrained in ancient society. This was an act that was akin to a white man
locking arms with a black man during the Selma march, or a black man
marrying a white woman in 1962! Good or bad, whatever Jesus does, it seems,
is evidence of mental illness! As for the declarations of madness, we would
point out as we did long ago, and below, that the assesments are hardly
those of qualified professionals, and are countered by assessments by
persons just as qualified: John 10:21, and Peter's profession of Jesus as
Christ, and by the recognition of others; but more on this below as well).
[..]
Today we even speak of giving an arm or a leg and no one takes us
literally; in the East even today such expressions are used: "What I say to
you is truth, and if it is not, I will cut off my right arm at the
shoulder/pluck out my right eye." [Rihbany, The Syrian Christ, 118]
[..]
could mean that Jesus' family members "are such not merely by human bonds,
but especially because they obey the Father." (Keep this in mind, as our
critic elsewhere claims that Jesus has nothing good to say to his family;
if anything, this amounts to an invitation to join an extended family!)
[..]
Couldn't have said it much better myself, and would say the same of our
critic's strained attempts to turn Jesus into a mental case.
[..]
Shall we have expected Jesus to wait out in the wilderness? (Isolation in
the wildnerness! A sign of mental disorder!)
[..]
Elst pulls up a parallel (Mark 3:5) and (insert laughter here) Luke 14:26.
(Our critic claims that this article "says nothing to contradict 1) Elst's
implication that Jesus was angry with his family and 2) Elst's statement
that Jesus has no friendly words for his family or mother," but as Elst's
poor interpretation of this passage is his grounds for such an argument,
our response does render the matter pointless, for in that case the anger
and lack of friendliness otherwise must be gratuitiously assumed to be
behind the scenes, as well as rest on the assumption that it was Jesus, not
his family, that was the instigator of the hostility, which is not what the
NT text, our only direct source, suggests).
[..]
Jesus is predicting that the family will be the miscreants, not himself or
the believers. (Our critic is forced to spin this out for his purposes by
claiming that it shows "bitterness" on Jesus' part! There's that ability to
mind-read over the centuries again! Why could it not be said regretfully,
or matter-of-factly?)
[..]
You don't suppose Elst is a paraphrenic, do you? (Not surprisingly, our
critic almost entirely washes his hands of Elst and does nothing to defend
him from our critique, other than the two minor points above. One wonders
why Elst was even bothered with at all.)
[..]
if anything makes it look even more makeshift. In response we are given
this strange sentence: "Holding here inexplicably misses the point that
conversion disorders are not characterized by 'hysteria'. Rather, they are
'characterized by the loss of a bodily function, for example blindness,
paralysis, or the inability to speak'. Does Holding claim 'there is no
evidence' of such loss of bodily function in the gospels?" I have not
missed the point at all. The point I have made, which remains standing, is
that our critic has provided no way to differentiate between blindness,
etc. caused by hysteria and that which is not, and merely assumes
(presumably, under the all-purpose guise of the "most parsimonious
explanation") that the conditions described must be associated as such.
This amounts to an admission that the data, as it stands, does not support
the critic's view, and therefore must be serviced with filled-in gaps
amenable to the assumed skeptical paradigm.
[..]
who can only pull up statements of astonishment like this one. (Later it is
is said, "Embellishment implies falsehood, but falsehood alone does not
imply lying." Didn't our critic just get through saying that the Gospels
were probably a mix of "misinterpretation, exaggeration, rationalization,
delusion, and deception"? In other words, at least three parts out of five,
possibly four, involving lying? So which is it? Is it whatever is
convenient to keep the theory afloat? That our critic only calls the Gospel
writer liars most of the time is not lessened by that he does not call them
that at other times!)
[..]
Within the paradigm of a non-naturalistic worldview, repairing an ear is
peanuts! (Here our critic responds: "Even theist philosophers acknowledge
that miracles are by definition unusual and out of the ordinary. Holding's
'I haven't seen one' standard is another of his hopeless strawmen. Holding
doesn't dare enunciate the *actual* justification: I haven't seen one, and
I haven't seen a credible report of one, and I've seen many reports of them
that are non-credible, and everything I have seen can better be explained
without miracles and miracle-workers." Our critic has again done nothing
but sum up subjective experience and judgment, and thereby only proven me
right once again! The entire basis is his personal experience, and that of
those he agrees with! From there, the rest which cannot be explained away
definitively is explained away via rationalization and the hope that
someday, someone -- science, aliens, James Randi -- will figure out what
"actually" happened and that it wasn't a miracle! And when necessary, claim
that an explanation is "more parsimonious" simply because it fits in our
assumed worldview better!)
[..]
they sure could make his life miserable or arrange a nasty "accident" for
him or his sisters! Side note: Our critic makes the point that John does
not mention the healing; what of it? John does mention other things
uniquely that he considered more important; this does nothing to alter my
thesis of general inclinations of individual writers, and ignores the point
that John was intended to supplement the Synoptic records.)
[..]
Luke is reporting something known now only through his investigations! This
does not require, as our critic somehow thinks, that Malchus "wore a hat
pulled down over his restored ear for the rest of his life" -- why would
that be necessary? The ear was healed and there would be no sign of it ever
having been lost!)
[..]
Do you think Ernest Angley will get out of Dayton and buy himself a new
toupee? Our critic irrelevantly declares, "If Holding has any evidence that
placebo effects (such as conventional faith-healing) cannot be indefinite,
he should present that evidence rather than baldly asserting it to be
obvious." It is obvious, in terms of the types of miracles under
discussion: Healing those blind from birth versus healing back pain, for
example! Our critic commits that category error yet again! He also says I
have named no such healer who went to martyrdom, which is exactly the
point! They don't have the wherewithal or the goods to even try, which they
should have, if they had a genuine gift and an anointing from God! As a
friend asked, "If Benny Hinn has the power, why isn't he visiting
hospitals?" But again, it doesn't take many complaints of false healing --
especially when you are not a member of the controlling and priviliged
ruling class, which also happens to dislike you -- to flush the whole
effort down the toilet! Here again our critic can only point yet again to
Jesus not doing miracles at home, and the "mad" evaluation of his family,
addressed below and above respectively.)
[..]
our skeptic has done us a good turn and inflicted himself with a bad case
of athlete's mouth, and has now even declared closer allegiance to the idea
that Jesus may not have died, which we have amply shown to be a counsel of
despair here. In terms of "embellishment" our critic says that this stops
him from saying so: "...the prior plausibility of the story element in
question, the possible motivations for the one author to include it, and
the likelihood that the remaining authors would exclude it if they believed
it." Oh, really? If these details are included in the service of showing
Jesus to be dead, and thus thereafter alive, it is quite easy to see our
critic claiming that the attempted plausibility is a trick, something added
to the Gospel records (what if one mentions only algor mortis, and one
mentions that and rigor mortis?) as part of a progression, and on and on it
goes. The point being, skeptics have a ready excuse and a theoey for every
possible combination of events. What is at stake is preserving disbelief,
not a rational consideration of the available data. The initial complaint,
requiring mention of these various symptoms of death, falls flat unless it
is definitively shown that description of such effects was somehow normal
in ancient accounts of death that do not have an otherwise technical
interest in the subject (like, i.e., Pliny's Natural History).
[..]
throw cold water, ring bells, slam doors, play rock music, or take similar
measures. (Our critic backpedals furiously, not even acknowledging the
irrelevance of certain of the criteria he uncritically listed, saying, "I
of course don't suggest they 'did nothing'; I merely suggest that whatever
they did may have led them to an incorrectly premature diagnosis of death."
(!) Six of one, half dozen of the other! The point remains, our critic
thinks they did essentially nothing viable to ascertain death, or did not
recognize it as such, this in spite of obvious signs, the obvious human
concern, and the immense experience of the ancients with death; see link
just above.)
[..]
Do you think the family and friends didn't know Lazarus was dead? (All our
critic can say in response is, "Their ability to recognize a definitely
dead person as dead simply does not imply their inability to ever consider
a barely-alive person to be dead." That's a real whopper of logic! So they
knew the signs of "dead" but didn't connect it with dead? They didn't make
the connect this time, because it is convenient for our critic to say so?
They had some category of deadness where those "barely-alive" or in the
tomb for days were called dead? Like Billy Crystal's "mostly dead"
category? Where is this shown to be true in any ancient document? The only
possible example is in the case of imminent death with Jairus' daughter;
see below, and that is not at all applicable to post-mortem categorization!
Our critic is desperately grasping at any straw now, begging exceptions and
oddities wherever he can!)
[..]
there is no time for any of the signs above, and as shown here it is
possible that Jairus spoke of the death proleptically. But what this all
boils down to is the same issue of assuming the ancients were too stupid to
recognize serious illness and death when they saw it, or were just stupid
at the times necessary for our critic to keep his thesis afloat, but not
necessarily at other times.
[..]
just happened to come out of their unperceived, not-actually-dead-or-sick
stupor as Jesus spoke to them, and it just so happened that no one checked,
no countering signs took place, no nothing (and quoting Carrier here, when
he has been soundly refuted for drawing illicit parallels as is done in
Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark, i.e., "using a storytelling template
proves a story is fiction", accomplishes nothing).
[..]
tried to push off parallel accounts in Matthew and Mark as two different
events (he claims he didn't call them different events, but is obfuscating:
listing them twice amounts to doing the same thing if one does not signify
somehow that they are parallels),
[..]
What normal person or being doesn't? (He thinks an "omniscient omnipotent
deity" doesn't, but still does not solve the problem of what just such a
deity ought to do; see below.)
[..]
"due process" was taking place! Our critic then puts his foot in his mouth
yet again, saying, "Holding here doesn't dare quote Mark 3:7, which
continues: 'But Jesus withdrew himself and his disciples to the sea' and to
the (presumably protective) midst of 'a great multitude' of his followers."
So now apparently, Jesus could not even have followers without being
accused of cowardice! But it doesn't matter, for as I have stated,
discretion is the only viable alternative anyway, cowardice or not -- and
keep this particular verse in mind. (Our critic has this idea that I do not
"dare" do certain things -- more of that long-distance psychology again, no
doubt -- but if the daring is lacking, it is only because the dare is
without substance in the first place!)
[..]
this is a remarkable hypocrisy! (He tries to salvage his bacon further by
quoting Luke 13:33 -- "Nevertheless I must walk to day, and to morrow, and
the day following: for it cannot be that a prophet perish out of
Jerusalem." -- and spinning this out to mean, "It's indisputable that when
Jesus was told of the threat, he admitted he would be withdrawing 'today'
in the face of this danger and apparently was embarrassed enough to try to
make an excuse for his retreat." Some retreat that would be! Not only does
Jesus tell everyone in hearing where he was going (Jerusalem!), he
announces that he is walking (not "fleeing" or "running" -- the word used
implies a normal journey). That's some kind of retreat in process!
[..]
sitting on the steps of the Capitol in Washington! Our critic crows here
that I "do not deny" the danger avoidance, but as we have said time and
again, this is of no relevance -- he has not, and still will not, show any
logical way to exercise true prudence for the sake of preserving a mission.
In fact, bring back to memory now the earlier implied condemnation that
Jesus hid himself among followers. Now we are told that "an omniscient
omnipotent being could arrange to never have to retreat from danger. For
example, he could have arranged that at key moments of danger he always
just happened to be in a crowd of followers who would be understood by 'the
bad guys' as preventing harm to Jesus." What the hey? We were just told a
few paragraphs ago that this was just another form of running away! Our
critic apparently can't keep himself consistent -- and still hasn't
provided any logical alternative!
[..]
let's at least come up with rational alternatives! (And again, sorry,
hiding in crowds is just another form of running! So likwise would be "a
truly omniscient Jesus [who] could have continued his journey five minutes
before being told of Herod's threat" -- not that five minutes, or even
hours, did much when the powers that be had horses and you didn't! -- it
could still be spun out as "avoidance of danger" to say nothing of
dismissed by our critic as embellishment! Finally, here's another social
surd for our critic to chew on: Direct, ideological confrontation with his
opponents was essential to Jesus' ministry! The exchanges between Jesus and
his enemies represented contests of personal honor before witnesses which
an ancient, honor-respecting society would require of anyone who defiantly
stood against a given status quo. Hustling out five minutes before the
opponents got there wasn't a live option if Jesus wanted his message to be
spread and respected by others!)
[..]
The critic quotes John 7:6 (and requotes it again, still not effectively
rescinding my point as no explanation or exegesis provided, merely "quote
and there it is")
[..]
evasive when asked to demonstrate his powers. Our critic says, "Holding
here doesn't dare deny my statement that 'the mere existence of
Christianity hardly proves that Jesus was divine'. Actually I do deny it --
I had an article in process at the time I wrote this; here it is.)
[..]
something that wasn't recorded in the polemical record (Our critic spins
out, "What reason do we have to believe that this so-called 'polemical
record' represents anything approaching a thorough and contemporaneous
effort of skeptical journalism? And note that miraculous power was ascribed
to many people in ancient times." -- the first aspect is nought but the
same begged question [i.e., "If James Randi had been around he woulda
figured it out! Everyone else was too dumb."]; the second aspect a
meaningless, non-specific parallel thrown in the air for polemical
purposes, as well as the same begged question)
[..]
an effective cause of Jesus' miraculous power not being expressed. (Our
critic spins again, saying this "is for a mere faith-healer PRECISELY THE
SAME THING as the faith-healer not being able to do the faith-healing" --
it is no such thing; it is the same as saying that one could not rescue
another from a pit, because the victim in the pit refused help, pelting the
rescuer with rocks and missiles until they left.)
[..]
ignoring the overwhelmingly contrary opinion; cf. John 10:21!...)...our
critic psychologizes, "Holding dares (!) not address my point that the
opinion of Jesus' madness was rendered by those who knew him best: his
family (Mk 3:21)." Actually, it's a good time to give our critic another
lesson in the social aspects of the ancient world. In essence, Jesus
violated the norms of his culture in a variety of ways, for example by
associating with tax collectors and prostitutes, he was violating the
accepted social norms and purity codes. In so doing he brought dishonor on
his family in the eyes of his contemporaries -- and the "madness" line of
reasoning not only does not represent the evaluation of a trained
psychologist, but also amounts to no more than a makeshift accusation
designed to a) explain away and mute the dishonor of the situation; b)get
others to move away from Jesus by describing him as ritually impure! The
"madness" reasoning is functionally equivalent to saying Jesus was a leper,
but had the advantage of not being visibly testable.) That there were not
trained professionals making the diagnosis is merely waved off as of no
relevance, but as shown, nor is the family's judgment in the context the
critic wishes to prove!...
[..]
which we have already noted does not apply! Our critc says I don't "dare"
deny it -- OK, I deny it! Now bring up the goods!
[..]
I'll stay ignorant and dependent on others and you'll live with it! (I am
accused of red herring fishing by our critic, but this is mere whitewashing
on his part, an attempt to evade the argument and defense of the premisses
upon which so much of his thesis is based. It is said: "The idea that
Jesus' ministry was three years long and that he cleansed the temple twice
etc. is a dead meme." I never maintained the latter, but as for the former,
see here -- reports of that "meme" dying, as Twain said, are premature, and
we invite our critic to provide his usual evasive non-answer.)
[..]
offer no response as with these others. Which in essence he does now,
saying, "None of Holding's obfuscations can make it plausible that some
preaching in Rome and the destruction of the Temple makes the Olivet
prophecy true." It appears that our critic can't handle a revisit to
complex subjects, and settles for calling them "dead memes" and blowing
them off!
[..]
where Josephus records someone saying he is the Messiah! (Significantly our
critic in his latest reply manages not to report to his readers that I have
my copy of Josephus and have made my check -- and then passes on making his
own report, still deferring merely to Carrier.)
[..]
read the source material, isn't it? (It is claimed that I "admitted" that
none of the claims were such a direct statement, which is patently false in
some cases, and in one case, no longer true, as in the Son of Man title.)
[..]
Let's concentrate, folks. (In the latest effort it is said that the intent
was to suggest that 1) "people could not be guaranteed not to misinterpret,
misunderstand, exaggerate, or selectively forget the sayings or claims of
Jesus" -- in which case, let us have some positive evidence of
misinterpretation, misunderstanding, or exaggeration (i.e., a saying of
Jesus, shown to be misconstrued via contemporary parallels with differing
meanings -- not likely from our critic, given his utter inability to even
crack open Josephus), or proof of forgetfulness (there is none, which is
again the point of the oral tradition article); 2) "...Holding has not
demonstrated that if these recorded sayings were not true then no human
could have done anything that could later lead to these recordings" -- this
is merely an illicit shifting of the burden; it is the critic's burden to
explain how this could have come about, and so far, the silence is
deafening and the truck has nothing in it but generalizations alien to
their context.)
[..]
spin-doctor any historical personage into any mold desired. (That they are,
as our critic says, "especially significant for the case at hand" does not
make them any less a case of creating a root upon which to spin whatever
theory suits one's purposes, all the while not meeting the burden of proof
as the contrary claimant.)
[..]
refused to answer so many issues that it is doubtful if he ever will, or
can, especially as in the latest reply my comments here are merely
dismissed with such comments as "wishful thinking" -- quite a hypocritical
comment from one who has yet to provide a valid example of any of the
above, and still does not; see below.
[..]
as a child or being a former sandal salesman, for in spite of our critic's
one-phrase dismissals, his portrait is about as clear as graffitti on a
restroom wall, and at about the same level of documentation.
[..]
treating them as human records is enough, and this is not a case of me not
"liking the answer" (whatever that means in this context!) but of making
the point that the Gospels deserve treatment at least consistent with any
other set of documents, whether our critic likes it or not.
[..]
contradiction between the two is of no moment in terms of this discussion.
(Our critic completely omits these last points, referring only to
"laughable contortions" to resolve the matter, and also manages to omit the
link to Miller's article.)
[..]
it rests in the old census canard, and indeed it was; our critic blanks out
the Miller link and replaces it with one from Carrier for the "Barnum
victims" in his readership. Dare I say, our critic does not dare provide
access to such material? (It is added, "Note that Holding names not a
single Lincoln biography that supports even a hint of controversy regarding
Lincoln's birth year." There isn't one in the Gospels, either; but there is
plenty of controversy about Lincoln that can be manufactured about his
heritage, his parentage, and his childhood -- if we twist and manipulate
his bios like critics mangle the Gospels.)
[..]
as painful as those alleged in the Gospels (a challenge which he simply
ignores).
[..]
since no number is given -- on this our critic merely flees into denial,
saying since "many" sounds like a "swarm" to him it must have been, never
mind that both words are simply vague;
[..]
recorded in Suetonius' Twelve Caesars. (Our critic significantly cuts off
quoting me at the star, and says, "Nobody is claiming they should not be
weighed, considered, compared, or factored. On the contrary, the difference
that indeed needs to be weighed/considered/compared/factored is that
evangelists want their readers to repent and save themselves from eternal
damnation, whereas secular historians at most want to influence their
readers' political opinions. It would be absurd to say this difference is
insignificant." Insignificant in what way? The subject matters are
different, but the bottom line is that each writer had an agenda, and the
mere having of an agenda is no test of truth or falsity, our critic's
assumptions and biases against religious issues aside, and his inability to
differentiate between categories -- content versus intent --
notwithstanding.)
[..]
maybe there will be a first time! (In the latest we are referred to our
critic's own book on the subject, which he can send us free to PO Box 112,
Clarcona FL 32710-0112 if he thinks it has anything worth reading. Until
then I'll consider it no more than the same mumbo-jumbo in book form.)
[..]
on the Cartoon Network! (Here it is said that I don't "dare quote my
counter-challenge" -- OK, I'm about to, now what? -- asking "why it is that
the secular scholarly consensus is so univocal on things like the 2-source
theory and gospel anonymity." My answer: Because most of them merely accept
the thesis on the basis of previous works and have their own interests, and
therefore no recourse to examine the matter afresh. Not that I would expect
them to. Satan involved? No, Satan wouldn't ruin his reputation with such
absurdities as gospel anonymity. And as it happens, examples of such
complacency are rife. An example? Try Mithraic studies. It took a
revolution to shake off Cumont's thesis, and those, including scholars,
whose speciality is not Mithraism are still using Cumont, unaware that
Mithraic scholarship since Cumont has moved on. And our critic is
apparently unaware that within the ranks of specialists on the subject,
Q/Marcan priority is indeed under fire, and that a coterie of secular
scholars who examined the subject afresh in the 1970s were not impressed --
if he "dares", let the critic address our material on the subject.)
[..]
hungry for a leg and a thigh. (Our critic fails to quote the part about
oral tradition, and writes, "Holding thus admits that the evidence of
Jesus' words is suboptimal." I have admitted no such thing, as anyone who
reads with care may discern, and our critic has still done no more than
throw straw in the air.)
[..]
having knowledge of God's Wisdom. Now our critic claims that I do not
"support this assertion with actual gospel quotes that cannot also be
interpreted as metaphor"! Well, then, where is the proof that such phrases
(drawn, as they clearly are, from Wisdom traditions) were ever used
metaphorically in the Jewish literature or by anyone else of relevance?!?
This is still merely hayseed thrown in the air by someone either not
competent to, or unwilling to, deal with the texts. We are being asked to
ignore clear and direct parallels in favor of some obfuscatory supposition
that somewhere, somehow, these phrases, which just happen to match
contextually and linguistically with the Wisdom tradition, actually mean
something entirely different in a way entirely unattested!
[..]
Jesus called himself the "son of man". On this one, an update: I no longer
hold that this title was intended to be mysterious. "Son of Man" is clear
indication of divinity, at all times it is used by Jesus.
[..]
unsubstantiated speculations to shore up his predetermined view! (Our
critic replies, "This does not imply that Jesus calling God 'abba' is the
same thing as Jesus calling himself God." As we have shown in the article
referenced many moons ago, it does indeed equate with asserting ontological
equality with God -- technically, what we actually argue for, not Jesus =
God in one to one correspondence -- and our critic has still not replied
with anything better than, "No, it doesn't have to!"
[..]
merely an "I say unto you"! In the latest edition our critic merely claims,
in essence, "Yes, I have done enough, so there!"
[..]
with extensive misery attached, and has not shown in any sense that these
claims are consistent with merely claiming to be a special prophet.
[..]
abandoned at the first sign of failure. Our critic's reply to this part of
our essay is terminally amusing. Let it be kept in mind that Bruce Malina
and Jerome Neyrey are widely respected NT scholars, and not inerrantists or
fundies, and Malina is recognized as having written the premier works on
the social/anthropological world of the NT era. Their book is filled with
references to works of social psychology, both ancient and modern. In
reply, our critic, who uses encyclopedias and quotes non-experts like Elst,
has these replies:
"Malina et al.'s conclusion is plainly not warranted by their vague
generalities. (Mark 8:27 is simply Jesus being evasive.)" Imagine
that! Two NT scholars with recognized expertise in social psychology
of the ancient world are merely palming off "vague generalities" and
no, Jesus isn't a man of his world, but is committing a 21st-century
tactical evasion!
"It's ludicrous to claim that delusions were impossible in the ancient
world." This is not what is said; what is said is that delusions would
not take the form, nor have the reaction, nor develop in the way our
critic requires for his thesis, in the ancient world.
"That Jesus' delusions were mutually reinforcing with the beliefs of
his followers does not contradict my thesis. That Jesus could not have
been delusional because his culture was 'group-oriented' is simply
laughable." You heard it fresh from the latest expert in ancient
social psychology, folks. Malina and Neyrey are just prattling in the
wind, and our critic knows better than a whole boatload of Malinas and
Neyreys. Trust him, it's laughable! And don't even bother to explain
how that square peg of reinforcement fits into that round hole of a
thesis, how such a social shebang so contrary to deeply ingrained
contemporary social and religious values (to say nothing of the purity
taboos that would be enforced around a delusional Jesus) managed to
survive and grow rather than become a dead meme itself. But is this
any surprise? Our critic always seeks refuge in such evasions when
cornered; if it isn't a dead meme, it's fit to be laughed at, and our
man knows it better than anyone trained in the field!
"It's simply not the case that followers of deluded people always act
rationally and skeptically." But they do act as their society
dictates, and the ancient group orientation and other social factors
cannot be evaded by simply snuffling, "They were just stupid and
different than everyone else." The group orientation meant that anyone
"hanging with" a deluded Jesus would have been socially pressured to
leave his company. (Not that they would need such pressure anyway! --
also in this society, again, the ritual uncleanness of mental illness
-- associated especially as it was with demonic powers -- would have
driven away anyone that wasn't fast asleep!) As usual our critic
merely throws uninformed generalities in the air with the assumption
that the ancient world was no different than the one down the road in
his local grocery store.
[..]
even think about buying this thesis, and not surprisingly, our critic does
so, offering the thesis that the distance into the sea described is one of
those "exaggerations" to be taken out of the pot and designated as such
when convenient. As predicted, the thesis is altered and tweaked as needed
to make the whole machine continue to work.
[..]
except to uneducated skeptics. (Our critic calls this an "[a]rgument by
(laughable) assertion" but naturally this is the sum and total of his
answer);
[..]
a direct claim (which in this context is indeed different from a "clear"
claim as it is both clear and strong; and as shown in the item on Wisdom
(which our critic has no answer for, read), a claim like "I am God!" would
have been technically inaccurate and imprecise.
In response to the above, our critic further shows his lack of information
by stating that "Nothing in Holding's Wisdom item demonstrates that it
would have been 'technically inaccurate and imprecise' for Jesus to say at
least one of:" and a list follows. Note well, as our critic has not, that I
have only said that one particular claim -- "I am God!" -- would be
technically inaccurate and imprecise, for it implies a one-to-one
correspondence of the sort that would make for a modalist heresy. In
identifyting himself as Wisdom, Jesus did claim, in one package, to be, as
our critic complains, "divine...omniscient and omnipotent (which in the
Wisdom context means, having access to all power and knowledge via direct
relationship with God; Wisdom was always, as Jesus was, functionally
subordinate to the Father)..ontologically equal to God...God incarnate
(more properly, God's Wisdom incarnate)...El/Yahweh made flesh" (though as
these were titles of the Father, actually not usable in this context). Our
critic has no way around these clear divine claims, despite his best
efforts to rob them of meaning or take them from their source.
[..]
that's no more than we would expect. (Our critic repiles, "Lesser in
variety, and no doubt more consistent in claiming Jesus' divinity. This is
precisely what my thesis would predict." No doubt more consistent? Try
again: The Wisdom factor is the same across the board; the Son of Man title
is not used, though the concept is a couple of times, as we would expect
when writing mainly to Gentiles not as familiar with the Daniel 7
tradition; the sonship language is used across the board, and bottom line,
the thesis is under the wrecking ball yet again.)
[..]
dedicated to a principle (and I use the term inclusively here of any set of
beliefs, including observation of demonstrated divinity)
[..]
talk is cheap, and that is why he finds it easy to speak as though Peter
should have stood firm and takes his failure as evidence of guilt and
trauma which inspired their faith (which fails as well on the grounds that
no one was expecting a resurrection)! Let's put our critic before the Roman
gallows with a spear in his left nostril -- I doubt if he'll do any better!
[..]
other than the makeshift game, which he merely repeats yet again in the
latest response in different words, suggesting merely convenient
re-interpretation on our part, and "maybe Jesus used it in an entirely
different way than the meaning that was otherwise universally known and
accepted":
[..]
first line of Ps. 22. (He says now, "The answer is obviously: anything else
indicating despair at abandonment or betrayal." Oh, really? Find us a
contemporary expression of despair at abandonemnt/betrayal with enough
linguistic/structural features similar to the first line of Ps. 22, and
maybe we'll give you some respect; as it is, just throwing "anything else"
in the air is an admission that the critic has no actual answer and must
therefore resort to grasping at invisible straws.)
[..]
we would look into it too. In response to the avove our critic offers
three pale efforts:
"Christianity took decades and centuries to become a significant
force, and so not many people would have cared until the evidence was
gone." This is simply irrelevant ("significant" in what way, and to
what effect?), and in the latter case, absolutely false, merely an
uncritical acceptance of Carrier; see here factor 13, for a response.
"The Christian side of the story had a better chance of being
preserved than the anti-Christian side." In substance and value this
is no better than Acharya S with her wild fantasies of suppressed and
destroyed documents and an immensely begged question. Moreover, we
have ample amounts of material telling the non-Christian side of the
story; our critic however will merely do as done above and assume that
the opponents weren't of good enough caliber to do the job.
"Nevertheless, Matthew 28 *does* report (and of course denies) a
widespread story that the empty tomb was faked." It does, and how does
this help our critic? It doesn't -- we would expect some explanation
to emerge; that resort was made to a ludicrous "stolen body" line
merely shows that, as often comes from critics, they had no better
explanation to offer than one that was manifestly absurd on its face.
It is also said, "If we believed in 'trained sorcerers', we wouldn't
necessarily be interested in disproving the alleged miracles of an
alleged sorcerer." Yes we would, because in disproving the miracles,
we disprove the person's capacity as a sorceror!
[..]
the white sheet still fits; and it is not merely a matter of lack of info
as our critic claims, for there was no lack of information concerning the
possibility of naturalism. He is equating ignorance with stupidity, and
tarring the ancients with that brush, and then trying to fudge by
separating the two and claiming he's only criticizing for one but not the
other. That just won't work. The relationship between knowledge and
critical capacity is non-severable.
(In response, our critic says, "Holding here contradicts himself, by noting
that the ancients were credulous about people (not just Jesus) being
'trained sorcerers', and then asserting the ancients 'were no more ready to
accept wild claims than we are'." I have shown no such inconsistency; our
critic has merely begged the question again -- this time against sorcery!)
[..]
hometown miracles" -- see above, it is not an issue of not being able to
do them with reference to ability
[..]
now, the Old Testament? (We are told to read the critic's book again, if we
"dare" -- again, send a free copy, and we will.)
[..]
call that position names. (Our critic also failed to answer a reply sent to
him, making the point that a person could no more be "99% sinless" that one
could be "99% pregnant".)
[..]
in the 21st century. (Our critic points to "supernatural patterns [in
cosmological or quantum phenomena] or ongoing miracles [such as prophecy or
communication with a spirit world]" -- apparently he is unaware of the
existence of people who would more readily attribute such signs to aliens
than to Jesus; conceptually, this entire argument is refuted in detail
here.
[..]
or Karl Marx. (The matter here is not an issue of appealing to the vanity
of a local tribal deity, but of instigating an event whose effects play out
on a vaster scale, something our critic still can't comprehend, and is
unlikely to, as he is too ingrained in bigotry [i.e., male circumcision, a
rite of passage in many cultures who consider it important, is no more than
"a cynical appeal to the sick fetish of the local tribal deity"] to do so.)
[..]
but also the heart -- and that is why more people aren't believers, and
some fewer are inerrantists!
(We are also told, "The point Holding misses here is that the gospels
shouldn't need convoluted essays to try to obfuscate or explain away their
internal prima facie inconsistencies." The Gospels don't need the essays;
it is the uninformed and bigoted critic that needs them to cure themselves
of reading the Bible like it was a newspaper. Central and simple facts like
Jesus dying at Jerusalem offer no margin of viable expression, unlike a
complex chain of events such as involved the resurrection narratives, which
are also, unlike a simple fact-statement, subject to the limitations of
such constraints as writing space, audience interest, and authroial
purpose; our critic is comparing apples and oranges yet again!)
And so the bottom line as usual: Our critic is manifestly out of his
league, and can do no better than throw conspiracy after conspiracy,
speculation after speculation, begged question after begged question. But I
guess we'll see him again in a few months when he manages to regroup from
the effort.
Brian Holtz
Robert Turkel's latest response contains no less than 137 polemical
blunders, each categorized and separately identified below. On substance,
Turkel's Trilemma argument ignores a fourth possibility: that Jesus was a
faith-healer and apocalyptic preacher whose deluded belief in his
importance was strengthened in the months leading up to his anticipated
martyrdom and was misinterpreted and exaggerated afterwards.
This article has the following sections:
* Argument summary
* Debate background & archives
* State of the debate
* Jesus' psychology
* Jesus' miracles
* Jesus avoiding danger
* Jesus' failed ministry
* Trilemma validity
* Standards of evidence
* Jesus' divinity claims
* Missing evidence for Christianity
ARGUMENT SUMMARY
The burden of the Trilemma is to show that Jesus MUST NOT have been a
lunatic or liar, and the Trilemma fails if Jesus merely COULD have been a
lunatic (e.g. delusional). I explained this point to Turkel no less than
eight times in my previous response, but he still fails to comprehend it.
Turkel's primary article on the Trilemma still contains no mention AT ALL
of schizophrenia or paraphrenia, and cannot be considered a serious attempt
to address whether Jesus exhibited the symptomology of delusional
schizophrenia. Turkel is unable to refute my claim that the evidence about
Jesus is not inconsistent with the diagnostic criteria for delusional
schizophrenia: grandiose identity, role, and ability.
Turkel has no answer for my question of which explanation is more
parsimonious: divine incarnation or mental illness? Turkel dares not
compare the parsimoniousness of our competing theses, and instead claims
that doing so is to "assume" (instead of conclude) naturalism.
Turkel cannot refute my argument that Jesus' faith healings, danger
avoidance, ambiguous claims, and failed ministry are all consistent with
him being Lunatic (i.e. delusional) instead of Lord.
Turkel cannot refute my argument that the gospels and associated evidence
would have to be quite different in several specific ways to support a
convincing case that Jesus was probably divine. Does Turkel dare declare
how different the evidence would have to be to convince him that it was
even POSSIBLE that Jesus was non-divine and delusional?
Turkel dares not include the following link in each of his two essays in
which my edited responses appear:
http://humanknowledge.net/Philosophy/Metaphysics/Theology/Trilemma.html
DEBATE BACKGROUND & ARCHIVES
James Patrick Holding (aka J.P. Holding) is the pseudonym of one Robert
Turkel, who maintains a Christian apologetics web "ministry" at
http://www.tektonics.org/. On his web site he issues to skeptics his
"chicken challenge":
The challenge is simple: Pick up any essay of mine and refute it.
[.. I]f I hear nothing, I'll guess I'll just have to assume that
no one can respond to my material.
I have systematically and comprehensively refuted the "material" in his
essay about the Trilemma (i.e. that Jesus was liar, lunatic, or lord).
Turkel has been responding selectively to my criticisms, but is apparently
too "chicken" to let his readers see my unedited arguments or even to name
me. (Note: in this article's excerpts from previous postings, I replace all
instances of his pseudonym with his real name.) I by contrast have no fear
of anyone reading him in all his tedious and ineffectual detail. I am
continuing to post our entire debate to Usenet, and it is available through
Google Groups from links at
http://humanknowledge.net/Philosophy/Metaphysics/Theology/Trilemma.html. My
systematic refutation of his arguments will be visible to anyone who
searches on "Holding" or "Turkel" or "tektonics" for as long as there is
archiving on the Internet (and its successors) -- i.e. long after
Christianity has gone the way of Mithraism and Zoroastrianism.
STATE OF THE DEBATE
With his latest response, Turkel includes some childish digs at the leisure
with which I'm debating him:
Oh, boy, he's at it again! :-) Our critic on the Trilemma returns
after almost 3 months of running around in the woods. Looks like
he hit some trees facefirst on the way! [..]
But I guess we'll see him again in a few months when he manages
to regroup from the effort.
I debate in order to examine the relative merit of my arguments and the
best possible counter-arguments to them. When Turkel consistently fails to
offer counter-arguments, or argues against positions that are not mine,
then this debate becomes just a tedious exercise in documenting his
instances of retreat, evasion, and misrepresentation. Turkel can rest
assured that as a background task I will relentlessly continue to demolish
his responses to me point by point, sentence by sentence, and clause by
clause. As the quality of his arguments reaches new lows (see below) and
the lopsidedness of this contest grows, I will likely choose to stretch out
my response interval, for the simple reason that my life is not to be
wasted on the obvious delusions of a long-dead carpenter. (Sadly, the same
cannot be said of Turkel's life.)
Turkel is losing this debate so badly that his defeat is amusing to
quantify. In his latest response alone Turkel fails some 79 times to
answer, acknowledge, or correctly represent my arguments. On six occasions
his reasoning is so faulty as to constitute textbook examples of fallacies,
and in six other instances he exhibits a misunderstanding of the elementary
logic of his own Trilemma argument. In 19 instances he edits his essay to
hide from his readers his defeat on particular points, and six other times
he changes the subject to deflect attention from a defeat. Seven separate
times he adopts the pretense that forcing a successful defense of my thesis
is somehow a victory for him. Finally, on 14 occasions he indulges in
insubstantive argument by any of generalization, hollow bluster, ad
hominem, and slurs (such as calling me 'bigoted' for disagreeing with
people of other cultures).
Here are the descriptions, text search markers, and totals for the
aforementioned categories of his polemical stumbles. Each particular
instance is placed in only one category, and so the numbers sum to a grand
total of 137 blunders. (We don't even count his many mis-spellings, and
simply note them in situ with "[sic]".)
Dares not answer a point I've made dares[#] 9
Dares not even let his readers see a point I've made see[#] 37
Misrepresents my position [#misrep] 33
Commits a blatant fallacy fallacy[#] 6
Misunderstands the validity criteria of the Trilemma Trilemma[#]6
Uses editing to hide his defeat from his readers [#lose] 19
Changes the subject to obfuscate his defeat [#retreat] 6
Claims successful defense of my thesis is a victory for him [#!win] 7
Argues by: bluster, ad hominems, slur, generalization [#childish]14
Note that Turkel could conceivably commit all these transgressions and
still be winning on substance, but any reading of my unedited arguments
shows that he is losing badly on that score as well. Turkel nevertheless
concludes his response by saying:
the bottom line as usual: Our critic is manifestly out of his
league
Turkel may have wasted more of his life on biblical trivia than I have, but
as a polemicist he is "manifestly" not equipped to deal with a humble
atheist armed with just clear reason and the relevant fundamental
historical facts. His inadequacy is probably related to his apparent lack
of experience debating in open fora like Usenet, where his current opponent
has been debating politics and religion since 1988. If Turkel too had
submitted and defended over 1500 Usenet postings, he might have learned to
avoid the sort of missteps that we herein document him making 137 times.
Instead, Turkel seems to restrict his debating to the safe and cozy
confines of his little web site, where he can evade and misrepresent his
opponents' arguments with impunity. But Turkel's inability as a polemicist
is not to be blamed for him losing this debate on substance, since he dealt
himself a losing hand in the first place. Rather, it is his propensity for
blunders like these 137 that indicates which of us here is "manifestly out
of his league".
When at the start of this debate I informed Turkel that I would be
rebutting his Trilemma article, he wrote me:
If you insist on embarrassing yourself with your ignorance...I
shall be only too happy to oblige.
It quite obviously has turned out instead that Turkel is the one who should
be embarrassed. My advice to him for minimizing that embarrassment is to do
one of the following:
1. Quit the debate; continue to pretend that my only responses have been
what your editing claims them to be; continue to hope that your
readers cannot find the full unedited text of my responses; save
yourself the effort of finding new ways to misrepresent my positions;
and deny me the satisfaction of annihilating any more of your
attempted counter-arguments.
2. Reply substantively to each of my arguments and in particular to each
of the 79 cases where you fail to correctly represent, substantively
answer, or even admit the existence of my arguments; link to my
responses so I can no longer say you hide your defeats from your
readers; and refrain from ersatz arguments (such as those based on
bluster, generalization, ad hominem, or slurs) that are so easy for me
to diagnose as insubstantive.
Unfortunately for him, Turkel probably has too much pride to do (1), and
too little self-discipline to do (2). Instead, he will probably do (3):
3. Continue to keep your readers from seeing the full unedited text of my
responses; continue failing to correctly represent, substantively
answer, or even admit the existence of so many of my arguments; and
continue to make arguments based on bluster, generalization, ad
hominem, or slurs.
But enough debate about the debaters. Let us turn now to the substance of
the debate, pausing at each instance of Turkel's generalizations and
bluster merely long enough to clinically tabulate them, rather than return
them in kind.
JESUS' PSYCHOLOGY
[the Christ complex] is not in the APA's DSM-IV
(Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders)
The issue was never whether it appeared in any diagnostic manual
(no one expects a separate entry for people who think they are
Napoleon either);
The issue is: what is the relevant psychological diagnosis for the
delusional (i.e. non-liar non-lord) horn of the Trilemma? Turkel dares[#]
not answer my point that "identification with divinity" is not a
differential diagnosis against schizophrenia.
the issue is whether indeed there are people who think they are
Christ or God, and how serious this delusion is compared to, say,
someone who thinks they are merely a great football player [..]
The level of delusion and dissonance required is much greater for
one with a divinity complex than it is for one who has
lesser-scale delusions
Here Turkel just repeats his assertion about the specialness of divinity
claims and dares[#] not address my charge that he "simply ignores (but
later quotes!) my source article listing claims 'that they were God or
Jesus Christ' (i.e. divine) as one of the relevant major forms of
delusional grandiosity."
I challenge [Turkel] to cite any authority saying
schizophrenia is more likely to have sudden onset than
to develop over time.
Whose job is this to prove? Our critic bears the burden of proof
in this regard, as it is he who makes the claim that Jesus fits
the mold;
Turkel yet again misunderstands the conditions for the logical validity of
the Trilemma[#] argument. The Trilemma argument is only valid if Turkel can
positively demonstrate that Jesus COULD NOT have been delusional. In the
absence of such a demonstration, the Trilemma argument fails to prove its
thesis, and Jesus' divinity remains (at best) an open question.
but even if he proves that gradual onset is possible in suhc
[sic] a context,
"Even if"? Turkel [#lose] does not dare let his readers see that I in fact
1) already quoted a reference work as saying that the schizophrenic
"manifests an insidious and gradual reduction in his external relations and
interests", and 2) already nailed him for ignoring this citation.
it proves nothing without a begged question assumed and without
corollary data and an explained means of falsification.
Having been defeated in his attempted denial that there is "evidence of
this or any condition as something that slowly evolves", Turkel here
retreats [#retreat] to denial that Jesus' delusion was gradual. While any
one gospel would naturally try to interpret Jesus as being consistent
throughout his ministry, a few hints remain that point to an evolving
delusion.
1. Jesus seems to (at least initially) have been a disciple of John the
Baptist. A Jesus always convinced of his divinity would have been less
likely to ever have been anyone's disciple.
2. Jesus seems to have been estranged from his family. Such estrangement
could have been produced by his growing delusions of divinity, and would
have been unlikely if he always had true knowledge of his own divinity.
3. Jesus was at times secretive about his special nature. Such secrecy
would be consistent with Jesus initially not being convinced of his
divinity.
about finding such conditions in Jesus, our critic accuses me of not
quoting material in context,
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see [#lose] that I did not merely
"accuse" him of quoting material out of context, but in fact actually
demonstrated it.
but still provides no examples of such behavior in Jesus one way
or the other,
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see[#] that I in fact pointed out
that the "diagnostic criteria match so well the reported behaviors of
Jesus" and that he "does not try to dispute the diagnostic match" with
those criteria -- grandiose identity, role, and ability. Does Turkel deny
that the gospels indicate Jesus had a high opinion of his identity, role,
and ability? Of course not. He would merely claim that Jesus' high opinion
was justified. Claiming that Jesus was non-delusional in order to disprove
the possibility of delusion is begging the question. (By contrast, my claim
is that Jesus' behavior does not completely rule out either delusionality
or divinity, and that delusionality is more consistent with the evidence
and is a more parsimonious explanation than divinity.)
and does not show how the alleged misquoting in any way muddles
his argument.
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see [#lose] that my
demonstration of misquoting showed that Turkel disputed a strawman
diagnostic match with criteria that applied not to Jesus' altruistic
grandiosity but to another (narcissistic) form of grandiosity.
Our critic [says] that his actual stance is that "the gospels are
probably the result of not necessarily fabrication, but of some
combination of misinterpretation, exaggeration, rationalization,
delusion, and deception,"
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see [#lose] that this is not
merely my "actual" stance but my ORIGINAL stance, repeated as an exact
quotation.
a combo claim that sounds effective when hurled in elephantine
form,
The truth by its very nature always "sounds effective", even in spite of
Turkel's favorite epithet "elephantine".
but indicates an unwillingness and an inability to break down the
Gospel records into each of these categories
On the contrary, I have identified candidate instances of each phenomenon:
* misinterpretation: Jesus' divinity claims; reanimation miracles
* exaggeration: Jesus' water-walking
* rationalization: Jesus' danger avoidance as knowledge that it wasn't
his time
* delusion: Jesus' self-conception
* deception: the empty tomb
* fabrication: the Easter zombies
It is of course impossible to say precisely what combination explains each
element of the gospel stories, but that in no way makes the composite
explanation implausible.
and a mere attempt to sound as though some authoritative and
reasonable thesis is being presented, when in fact, it is no more
than several begged questions rather than just one.
Now that Turkel has accidentally admitted that my naturalistic explanation
"sounds effective" and "authoritative and reasonable", it's clear that he
simply has not met his Trilemma burden of showing that no such explanation
is even possible. His charge of "several begged questions" is
unsubstantiated throw-away generalization.
In the latest report, our critic ignores the link [referring to John
and Mark's respective Christologies]
Nothing in the linked article refutes (or even addresses!) my point that in
the early gospel Mark Jesus is reluctant for his special nature to be
known.
makes hash of the idea that I supposedly allowed that Jesus did not
spread around his identity, even as it was spread around anyway
Turkel here does not dare deny or even quote my point, so it suffices
merely to repeat it: he earlier agreed with me that Jesus in Mark "is
reluctant for his special nature to be known" when he went on to say
[#lose] "in spite of this, the special nature did get known".
[our critic] now merely declares [Turkel's disputing of Q/Marcan
priority] to be a "dead meme" and therefore not open to discussion,
because it is held by authoritative sources like Encyclopedias!
Turkel here does not dare answer or even let his readers see[#] my
challenge asking "why it's considered dead by reference works like the
Britannica and Columbia encyclopedias, which are notoriously hesitant to
take sides in any live controversy." Indeed, Turkel's own words elsewhere
on his website undermine his position:
[to disagree with the scholarly consensus] requires a certain
degree of ego anyway. One must assume themselves to be wiser,
smarter, more informed, than literally hundreds of trained
historians and other specialists who have reached the opposite
conclusion. One must assume to have understood things clearly
that few others have clearly understood; one must seek conspiracy
under every bush, an enemy behind every piece of furniture, and
maintain that others who disagree with you are simply too blind,
biased, or ignorant to appreciate your rampant genius.
Of course, it is quite possible that all of the professional
historians (even those with no religious interest!) are biased or
wrong, while proponents of the [contrarian thesis] are the
objective ones. And yes, a consensus does not equate with
evidence. But a consensus on any historical question is usually
based on evidence which is analyzed by those who are recognized
as authoritative in their field, and therefore may be taken at
their word.
Will Turkel dare let his readers see the above unedited (or at all)?
Several examples are in section 1.2.2. (Philosophy /
Metaphysics / Theology) of my book
Our critic now adds some arguments from his own book (quoting
himself as an authority in essence!)
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see [#misrep] my actual words
(restored above). Turkel himself may think that anyone who writes a "book"
should automatically be considered "an authority", but he's quite mistaken
if he believes I think the same way.
In order of writing, the gospel accounts of Jesus'
resurrected appearances become increasingly elaborate.
Original Mark claims an empty tomb but describes no
appearances. Matthew says simply that the two Marys and
later the Eleven "saw him" but "some were dubious". The
Longer Ending of Mark says Jesus appeared "in a
different form" to two disciples, and simply "appeared"
to the Eleven. Luke elaborates on both of these
episodes, building the latter into an account that
approaches the full Doubting Thomas story finally told
in John.
The progression here is only in our critic's imagination. Mark is
exempt from such analysis [..] as it is far from clear that the
ending of Mark was the original as it now stands, and the longer
ending is too late to be given consideration -- that our critic
sees fit to include it shows a remarkable lack of scholarly
discipline.
It's not clear whether Turkel understands that Original Mark ends with
16:8, and that 16:9-20 is indeed the later "Longer Ending" that I referred
to. His confusion allows him to simply ignore my point that the earliest
copies of the earliest gospel (Mark) described no resurrection appearances.
Matt. 28:17 does not say that some 'didn't believe'; it said that
some 'doubted' -- doubted what?
The obvious answer is that the ones who didn't pay him homage were dubious
that it was indeed Jesus: "And when they saw him, they paid him homage; but
some doubted."
the verb used here points not to belief or uncertainty, but to
hesitation and indecision. They did not doubt the presence or
veracity of the resurrected Jesus; they wondered [..] what was to
be done next
Turkel has no basis for a definitive conclusion that Jesus' resurrection
isn't here being described as having been doubted. More to the point,
Turkel dares[#] not even address the fact that Matthew's appearances only
to the two Marys and the Eleven are indisputably less elaborate than those
in the later Luke and John.
In terms of Luke and John, by "elaboration" our critic presumably
means, more details are given. That may be so,
Thus in the space of half a paragraph, Turkel goes from claiming that the
increasing elaboration "is only in our critic's imagination" to admitting
outright that the later the gospel, the "more details are given" about the
appearances. Thus Turkel commits the fallacy[#] of contradiction.
but none of the details adds any degree of elabortion [sic] to
the actual event of the resurrection.
Turkel here simply ignores that we are discussing my claim of a
"discernible progression" in the "resurrection appearances" (as opposed to
the resurrection itself), and that he said my claim was "entirely without
basis". The basis having been demonstrated and conceded, Turkel
desperately tries to change the subject [#retreat].
Luke and John add nothing that Matthew would not, in actually
claiming a resurrection, already indicate via the conceptual
template of a resurrection
It's ludicrous to imply that ANY meager account of an empty tomb or a vague
and selective appearance would have the same evidentiary value as a
detailed descriptions of e.g. a skeptical inspection of Jesus' wounds.
Does he think Luke elaborated on Matthew directly, and John on
Luke? If he thinks there is a progression, then that implies that
one built on the other knowingly.
No, it doesn't. A "progression" can mean simply any increase.
The "progression" thesis is quite imagimative [sic], but
completely devoid of substance.
Turkel here contradicts himself (fallacy[#]), as he just admitted that the
later the gospel, the "more details are given" about the appearances.
Progression (i.e. increase) in elaboration, of course, is precisely what
one would expect if the gospels were a result of misinterpretation,
exaggeration, rationalization, delusion, deception, and mythologizing.
if this progression theory has any validity, one must date 1 Cor.
15, whose quantity-substance is far more significant than the
Gospel records, later than the Gospels!
As Turkel well knows, and as my book notes, the first written account (1
Cor 15) of the appearances lumps them together with post-ascension
manifestations to Paul in a discussion of spiritual resurrection, making
them dubious as accounts of bodily resurrection.
In the earliest gospel (Mark), Jesus [..] is reluctant
for his special nature to be known, and (as he does in
Matthew) despairs on the cross. (By contrast, in the
later Luke and John, Jesus asserts he is Christ, and
confidently assures a co-crucified criminal of their
impending ascension.)
As noted above, and still again, our critic ignores the very
definitive claims to divinity listed in Mark
I have answered every divinity claim that Turkel has cited..
And an "impending ascension" (which is not an accurate descriptor
anyway) is no divine claim!
I never said Jesus' confidence in his imminent salvation was a "divine
claim"; I simply said that it contrasted with his despair on the cross
noted in the two earliest gospels. Turkel here dares[#] not dispute that
the confident-on-the-cross Jesus in the later Luke and John contrasts with
the despairing Jesus in the earlier Mark and Matthew.
Anyone familiar with the social background data, with the
contextual meanings of the words used by Jesus of himself, sees
no such progression within the Gospels
There is an obvious and undeniable progression from the early gospels to
the later gospels in
* the elaborateness of the resurrection appearances,
* the impressiveness of the healing miracles (Lazarus; the congenitally
blind man),
* Jesus' confidence on the cross, and
* Jesus' divinity claims.
we want some proof of "delusions of persecution" [..] and
"unrealistic, illogical thinking" as well as hallucinations.
I'm not saying that some separate evidence for Jesus' being
unrealistic and hallucinatory therefore establishes him as a
schizophrenic.
Well, if not, then why quote the article on this point, or why not
quote it and admit that that phrase is not being taken into
consideration?
Turkel is himself delusional [#misrep] about what I "admit". He does not
dare let his readers see[#] my argument:
Turkel seems to think we are looking for gospel admissions that
Jesus hallucinated or was deluded. We are instead looking for
gospel reports that are consistent with Jesus hallucinating or
being deluded. Hallucinations: Jesus hears or sees God, Satan,
demons, and angels. Delusions: Jesus believes he is sent by God,
believes he has apocalyptic foreknowledge, etc.
Thus, I do not claim that the Gospels say "Jesus delusionally /
unrealistically / illogically believed X" or "Jesus hallucinated Y".
Rather, I claim that the Gospels make statements about what Jesus believed
and perceived that are quite consistent with him being unrealistic,
illogical, hallucinatory, and indeed resolutely determined to be
persecuted.
What is happening here is that our critic simply threw up a quote from
the encyclopedia uncritically -- as he has done with numerous sources
-- hoping to land one blow, any blow, with his skeptical cohorts --
and now has to backpedal furiously in order to avoid defending
himself.
I quote this insubstantive remark from Turkel merely to illustrate yet
again his amusing habit [#!win] of calling it "backpedaling" when I simply
correct him on his blatant misreading of my position.
Indeed, this is shown in that here, for the first time, our critic
shows his hand, which we have anticipated:
I'm saying that if we reserve judgment about the truth of the
reports about Jesus, and instead can show that they are
consistent with paranoid schizophrenia, then it becomes a simple
matter of asking which explanation is more parsimonious: divine
incarnation or mental illness? Since mental illness is obviously
more parsimonious than divine incarnation, Turkel's burden is to
show that the reports about Jesus are INCONSISTENT with paranoid
schizophrenia.
Turkel is simply obtuse to claim [#misrep] that this is "the first time"
that I have pointed out that his burden is to show that the reports about
Jesus are inconsistent with delusion. I said in my previous response that
the mere existence of this fourth alternative [deluded
faith-healer] doesn't in itself prove that this alternative is
true. But it's unrebutted existence DOES invalidate the trilemma
argument, whose validity depends on there being no non-lord
options besides liar and lunatic. It may in fact be possible to
prove Jesus' lordship through other more-direct arguments, but
the Trilemma itself fails to do so if the fourth option is not
actually SHOWN to be false.
It's not surprising that Turkel thinks I haven't made this point before,
since he did not dare answer (or even let his readers see[#]) any of the
above text when it appeared in EACH of my two previous responses. Nor does
Turkel dare let his readers see[#] my point that he "does not meet his
burden simply by asserting that the reports about Jesus are true!".
the entire premise from our critic rests upon the begged question
(turned via positive spin-doctoring into a matter of a "more
parsimonious explanation!") that no such thing as a divine incarnation
is possible.
Utterly false [#misrep]. Divine incarnation is eminently possible, and in a
previous response I even schooled Turkel on the evidence that would be
required to justify belief in it. Turkel seemingly realizes that the issue
of parsimony is devastating to his position, and so he instead argues
against the strawman position that divine incarnation is impossible. I
hold no such position.
By contrast, we have no reason to think that Turkel admits that it was even
remotely possible that Jesus was delusional. I've already said how
different the gospels and associated evidence would have to be to convince
me that Jesus was divine. Does Turkel dare declare how different the
evidence would have to be to convince him that Jesus was instead
delusional?
To that end, in the service of a "more parsimonious explanation,"
do we see our critic spinning out every event possible into a
sign of mental illness, while dispensing with contrary or
insufficient indications of data by any illicit means possible.
We shall see more of this as we proceed.
Turkel dares[#] not answer my question of which explanation is more
parsimonious: divine incarnation or mental illness? Instead, he complains
that I cite all the evidence that is consistent with mental illness. Is he
saying I should omit some of the evidence that supports my thesis? He also
complains that I "illicit[ly] dispense" with the evidence for his contrary
thesis. If he has some evidence for his thesis that I have not addressed
fairly, he should cite it. If instead he is complaining that I am not
arguing his thesis for him, he should stop whining and do his own work.
we do have places where the voice of God is heard, but there,
others hear the voice too. Presumably skeptics would posit the
usual convenient "group hallucination" theory for that one. Our
critcic [sic] has no answer for that,
I indeed offer no answer to a counter-argument against an argument that
I've never made. I'm not familiar with any "group hallucination" theory,
but a more plausible theory is misinterpretation, exaggeration, and
mythologizing.
but does as we expected beg the question by assuming that Jesus'
encounter with Satan and apocalyptic fervor are the result of
delusion. The scent of begged question is overwhelming!
I quote this sputtering [#childish] outburst in full because it is
precisely the place where Turkel should instead have made an argument that
an actual encounter with Satan is a more parsimonious explanation for the
available evidence than my thesis of delusion. Turkel of course dares make
no such argument, but instead misleadingly claims [#misrep] that I "assume"
delusion. I do no such thing. Rather, I "assume" that the most
parsimonious explanation for the available evidence should be taken as the
correct explanation. And I conclude -- rather than "assume" -- that the
most parsimonious explanation is delusion.
Critics sometimes appeal to the cleansing of
the Temple; if this prophetic demonstration
reflects mental disorder of this sort, then
protestors [sic] in front of nuclear power
plants and members of PETA also need help
This analogy fails utterly, as such protests do not get
the protester killed.
Whether they get someone killed is beside the point,
No, the point is precisely that there is a huge difference between someone
who engages in run-of-the-mill civic protest and someone who consciously
pursues a course of religious martyrdom.
though in that case, one may ask about the sanity of American
Revolutionary soldiers, for example, who fought for their freedom
knowing there was an excellent chance they would be killed.
The Continental Army numbered about 230,000 men, but only 25,000 of them
died. Turkel instead should compare Jesus to kamikazes, whose
clear-headedness is indeed open to question. But even so, there is still a
big difference between dying for one's nation and dying for one's belief in
one's own divinity.
At the same time, our critic assumes upon the ancients certain
values and judgments about the value and purpose of life that are
held only by moderns; the ancients had no qualms about dying
sacrificially for a cause they believed in
Modern people are also often willing to risk their lives for their causes,
and indeed in the twentieth century multitudes of people died doing so.
Turkel's vague talk about values serves only to obfuscate the original
point here: that Jesus' behavior is consistent with "distress and
agitation, and irrational behavior appear[ing] as delusions become more
vivid and judgment lessens".
Impairment: Intellectual functioning is
unimpaired. Daily living, occupational
activity, social functioning, and quality of
marriage are likely to deteriorate during
exacerbations.
Jesus abandoned his profession of carpentry for a life
of wandering asceticism. His ministry caused strained
relations with his family that even the gospels felt
obliged to report.
the "strain" was clearly only from the family's side, not from
Jesus'.
Turkel here dares[#] not deny that Jesus' ministry was the cause of his
strained relations with his family, and does not substantiate this
assertion that the strain was "clearly" one-sided.
As for abandoning a profession, does this mean we are mentally
ill when we change careers or lifestyle?
It easily might, if we choose itinerant asceticism over a stable profession
because of the voices we hear in our heads.
Is asceticism a sign of mental illness?
It easily might be, if one chooses it because of the voices one hears in
one's head.
none of this even so reflects a "deterioration" in the named
areas, except by virtue of a modernistic value judgment that
assumes that living in a nice house is a sure sign of mental
health order.
Turkel here fabricates an obvious strawman [#misrep].
One would also ask for detailed qualification proving that a move
from carpenter to travelling [sic] teacher is somehow
"deterioration," other than by making bigoted and modernistic
value judgments.
Jesus' own family and peers evidently considered it a deterioration. Turkel
is quite mistaken if he thinks that a child's choice of poverty and
childlessness is distressful only to "bigoted and modernistic" parents.
Turkel once again calls me a name ("bigoted", [#childish]) for daring to
disagree with anyone from ancient times.
Do those who leave a comfortable home and join the Peace Corps to
dig wells in Africa count as mentally ill?
If they do it because of what we can explain as auditory and visual
hallucinations, and if it is a path to martyrdom rather than a two-year
adventure, then yes.
[Qumranites and by John the Baptist were] cave-hiding
fanatics and a similarly delusional preacher.
It is telling that our critic is forced to resort to bigoted ad
hominem here,
"Fanatic" is simply an accurate description of the Qumranites, who were "an
extremist offshoot of the Jewish apocalyptic movement".
[http://mosaic.lk.net/g-qumran.html] "Delusional" is simply a plausible
explanation for the Baptist's beliefs. Turkel once again calls me a name
("bigoted", [#childish]) for daring to disagree with anyone from ancient
times.
extending the diagnosis of mental illness to as many as is needed
to make his case!
No, only to apocalyptic religious extremists.
Are, for example, ascetic Buddhist monks in their mountain
temples "hiding fanatics"?
Yes, if they believe in an imminent apocalypse and that the majority of
their fellow religionists are heretical.
Is it possible at all to live a life of religious or other
asceticism and not be declared mentally deluded? Evidently not!
Another Turkel strawman [#misrep]. One can be wrong without being deluded,
and there are of course degrees of delusionality -- despite Turkel's
attempts to pretend otherwise.
Our critic in response offers yet more bigoted and begged
questions, pointing to the ascetic habits of Jesus:
Turkel again uses his favorite [#childish] slur "bigot".
the gospels report that Jesus was sometimes socially
ostracized for his unconventional associations and was
at times was considered mad by his family (Mk 3:21) and
other Jews (Jn 10:20).
Our critic once again displays his incredible lack of knowledge
of the social background of the situation. Jesus' "unconventional
associations" were with tax collectors and prostitutes and
lepers, the marginalized and oppressed of society.
Turkel is of course mistaken [#misrep] to think I did not know who I was
referring to by "Jesus' unconventional associations".
What was actually happening here is that Jesus was standing
against ritual purity taboos heavily ingrained in ancient
society.
Right -- and he incurred a resulting degree of social isolation -- despite
Turkel's claim that he "showed no sign at all" of it.
Good or bad, whatever Jesus does, it seems, is evidence of mental
illness!
An obvious strawman [#misrep]. There are of course myriad things Jesus does
in the gospels that are not indicative of mental illness. Precisely none
of them can count as a guarantee that Jesus never had any delusions.
As for the declarations of madness, we would point out as we did
long ago, and below, that the assesments [sic] are hardly those
of qualified professionals, and are countered by assessments by
persons just as qualified: John 10:21
Turkel again pretends that any allegation of madness is worthless if not
made by a trained professional, and ignores the fact that the contrary
assessments were from Jesus' believers. He simply misses the point that
the diagnosis of delusionality is quite plausible if one is willing -- as
Turkel obviously isn't -- to reserve judgment about the truth of the
reports of Jesus' divinity.
The best our critic can do here, and several times hereafter, is
claim that the Trilemma fails if "the reports of Jesus are
consistent with mental illness"; actually it fails only if the
reports are shown to be only consistent with mental illness, and
there is no contrary evidence.
Turkel here betrays a misunderstanding of elementary logic. What he
describes is the burden of showing that Jesus MUST have been a lunatic
(i.e. delusional). But the burden of the Trilemma[#] is to show that Jesus
MUST NOT have been a lunatic (or liar), and the Trilemma fails if Jesus
merely COULD have been a lunatic. I explained this point to Turkel no
less than eight times in my previous response, but he still fails to
comprehend it. As I told Turkel in each of my two previous responses:
The mere existence of this fourth alternative [of a delusional
Jesus] doesn't in itself prove that this alternative is true. But
it's unrebutted existence DOES invalidate the trilemma argument,
whose validity depends on there being no non-lord options besides
liar and lunatic. It may in fact be possible to prove Jesus'
lordship through other more-direct arguments, but the Trilemma
itself fails to do so if the fourth option is not actually SHOWN
to be false. All this means is that the real debate is between
"lord" and such a fourth option. The invalidity of the Trilemma
doesn't lend any weight to either side of that real debate --
it's simply a fact of logic that is inconvenient for those
seeking an easier alternative to the real debate.
I've now repeated the above paragraph to Turkel twice more in this
response; what are the chances he'll notice it and understand it?
the expression could mean that Jesus' family members "are such
not merely by human bonds, but especially because they obey the
Father." (Keep this in mind, as our critic elsewhere claims that
Jesus has nothing good to say to his family
First, Elst's term "family" here obviously refers to his biological family,
and blatantly redefining the word is nothing more than the fallacy[#] of
equivocation. Second, if "our critic" refers to me instead of Elst, then
Turkel's powers of scholarship fail him yet again. Turkel's subsequent
quoting of me clearly shows that I did not subscribe to Elst's claim
[#misrep?], but rather just pointed out that Turkel has not refuted it:
[Turkel] says nothing to contradict 1) Elst's
implication that Jesus was angry with his family and 2)
Elst's statement that Jesus has no friendly words for
his family or mother
but as Elst's poor interpretation of this passage is his grounds
for such an argument, our response does render the matter
pointless, for in that case the anger and lack of friendliness
otherwise must be gratuitiously [sic] assumed to be behind the
scenes,
This unsupported assertion of a "gratuitous assumption" simply does not
constitute a refutation of Elst's implication that Jesus was angry with his
family.
as well as rest on the assumption that it was Jesus, not his
family, that was the instigator of the hostility
No such assumption is necessary, except for the undeniable observation that
Jesus' ministry was a significant cause for the apparently strained
relations. Again, Turkel dares[#] not attempt to produce any gospel
citations showing that Jesus ever had friendly words for his family or
mother.
Jesus is predicting that the family will be the miscreants, not
himself or the believers. (Our critic is forced to spin this out
for his purposes by claiming that it shows "bitterness" on Jesus'
part! There's that ability to mind-read over the centuries again!
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see[#] why my conclusion of
bitterness involves not "mind-reading" but rather just this plausible
explanation:
his own family [..] would have been his earliest and most devoted
disciples if Jesus were really divine. But they weren't, because
he wasn't.
Instead of rebutting this explanation, he rehearses [#!win] his tired
conceit ("forced") that a successful defense of my thesis against his weak
arguments should somehow make my thesis less believable.
Why could it not be said regretfully, or matter-of-factly?
Jesus could of course be regretful and even matter-of-fact about his
disappointment at his family. How does that make his disappointment
necessarily not bitter?
Not surprisingly, our critic almost entirely washes his hands of
Elst and does nothing to defend him from our critique, other than
the two minor points above. One wonders why Elst was even
bothered with at all.
My mention of Elst was the final sentence of an extended discussion of the
symptoms of schizophrenia and its variant called paraphrenia, in which I
merely said that Elst's is "an interesting published attempt to diagnose
paraphrenia in Jesus". It is typical that Turkel devotes three times as
much space to discussing the idiosyncratic Elst than he does to discussing
Jesus' symptoms. Indeed, Turkel's primary article on the Trilemma still
contains no mention AT ALL of schizophrenia or paraphrenia, but instead
goes on at length about the "Messiah complex" and "The Three Christs of
Ypsilanti". Turkel's Trilemma article simply cannot be considered a
serious attempt to address whether Jesus exhibited the symptomology of
delusional schizophrenia.
JESUS' MIRACLES
our critic has provided no way to differentiate between
blindness, etc. caused by hysteria and that which is not,
The way to differentiate between a conversion disorder (which Turkel still
misleadingly calls "hysteria") and physiological deficits is through the
usual clinical techniques. The fact that the gospels do not provide enough
data to differentiate between conversion disorders and physiological
deficits is hardly an argument that they CANNOT be the former, but in fact
is the very reason why we cannot conclude they MUST be the latter!
and merely assumes (presumably, under the all-purpose guise of
the "most parsimonious explanation") that the conditions
described must be associated as such.
Turkel again fails to distinguish [#misrep] between my assumptions and my
conclusions. We both look at the same gospel data, but he explains it as
miracles and I explain it as conventional faith healing. Anyone who knows
anything about epistemology and philosophy of science knows that parsimony
is INDEED the all-purpose way to choose among theses of equal explanatory
power. Turkel, however, dares[#] not compare the parsimoniousness of our
competing theses, because he realizes that doing so wins the debate -- for
me.
This amounts to an admission that the data, as it stands, does
not support the critic's view, and therefore must be serviced
with filled-in gaps amenable to the assumed skeptical paradigm.
The data indeed support (i.e. are consistent with) my view, and my view is
more parsimonious than Turkel's. Thus my view should be considered
correct, but Turkel instead pretends [#misrep] that any conclusion other
than his must instead be a mere assumption.
Embellishment implies falsehood, but falsehood alone
does not imply lying.
Didn't our critic just get through saying that the Gospels were
probably a mix of "misinterpretation, exaggeration,
rationalization, delusion, and deception"? In other words, at
least three parts out of five, possibly four, involving lying?
Since the scholar Turkel failed to look up "lying" in the dictionary (as I
challenged him to), I'll do it for him. A lie is a falsehood deliberately
presented as truth. None of these five things necessarily involve known
falseness (since even deception can merely be the omission of relevant
truths, and exaggeration can be unintentional). Turkel also still hasn't
grasped my earlier point that Luke could merely have been a conveyor of
this embellishment, rather than its originator.
By now, of course, our remediation of Turkel's vocabulary has taken us far
afield from the original point, which nonetheless remains perfectly valid:
three of the four gospel accounts of the severed ear -- including the most
detailed account -- do not mention Jesus healing it, and this is sufficient
grounds to reject that story element as an embellishment (by Luke or his
source(s)).
So which is it? Is it whatever is convenient to keep the theory
afloat?
This successful defense of my theory elicits from Turkel yet another
sputtering complaint [#!win] that my theory is still afloat (i.e. that he
is unable to sink it).
That our critic only calls the Gospel writer liars most of the
time is not lessened by that he does not call them that at other
times!
Turkel does not admit [#misrep] that in fact I have yet to tell him of a
single gospel element that I claim was known to be false by a gospel author
himself. I dare Turkel to quote me otherwise. He of course will not --
nor will his readers probably ever see the previous two sentences in their
entirety.
Even theist philosophers acknowledge that miracles are
by definition unusual and out of the ordinary. Turkel's
'I haven't seen one' standard is another of his
hopeless strawmen. Turkel doesn't dare enunciate the
ACTUAL justification: I haven't seen one, and I haven't
seen a credible report of one, and I've seen many
reports of them that are non-credible, and everything I
have seen can better be explained without miracles and
miracle-workers."
Our critic has again done nothing but sum up subjective
experience and judgment, and thereby only proven me right once
again! The entire basis is his personal experience, and that of
those he agrees with!
The desperate Turkel here tries to pretend that ANY justification I could
possibly have would still be "subjective" simply because, ultimately, it's
PERSONALLY taken by me as a justification! By Turkel's definition, ANY
judgment is similarly "subjective", and thus his complaint of subjectivity
is demonstrated to be meaningless.
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see[#] my rebuttal of his charge
that naturalism is my "faith-paradigm":
[he] seeks to defend what he seems to acknowledge is his
epistemic crime of faith, by fatuously saying that I too am
guilty of it. He is of course flat wrong, as he is unable to name
a single proposition that I believe based on authority and hold
exempt from doubt.
Nor does Turkel dare let his readers see[#] my related question:
Which is more 'convenient': 1) assuming that a set of reported
faith healings of possibly psychosomatic afflictions were indeed
no more than faith healings, or 2) assuming they were miraculous?
Turkel seems ultimately unwilling or unable to debate the epistemological
foundations of the Trilemma argument.
From there, the rest which cannot be explained away definitively
is explained away via rationalization and the hope that someday,
someone -- science, aliens, James Randi -- will figure out what
"actually" happened and that it wasn't a miracle!
With his sputtering litany of strawmen [#misrep], Turkel has forgotten the
context. The miracle under discussion is the restoration of the severed
ear. I have no need to "hope" for a future explanation, since I already
have a plausible explanation for what happened: an ear was severed, and
someone involved in transmitting the gospel story added the embellishment
of miraculous restoration.
And when necessary, claim that an explanation is "more
parsimonious" simply because it fits in our assumed worldview
better!
Realizing that parsimony is the key to why he's wrong and I'm right, Turkel
again sneers at the concept without daring to engage me on its substance.
Our critic makes the point that John does not mention the
healing; what of it? John does mention other things uniquely that
he considered more important; this does nothing to alter my
thesis of general inclinations of individual writers, and ignores
the point that John was intended to supplement the Synoptic
records.
Turkel here is oblivious to the obvious riposte that if John was only
"supplementing" the Synoptics, he wouldn't have needed to mention the ear
being severed in the first place -- or indeed to mention much of the rest
of the Passion, either.
Was Malchus now a Christian, and would bringing up this incident
have endangered him if it had been reported in Matthew and Mark's
earlier works, whereas in the later or geographically removed
works of John and Luke, it would not? [..] This does not
require, as our critic somehow thinks, that Malchus "wore a hat
pulled down over his restored ear for the rest of his life" --
why would that be necessary?
If Malchus were endangered by evidence of his ear's miraculous restoration,
then the presence of the ear blows his cover.
The ear was healed and there would be no sign of it ever having
been lost!
Both Mark and Matthew report it as severed in the very accounts that Turkel
earlier claimed would blow Malchus' cover if they mentioned the healing.
Now Turkel presumes that nobody would notice that those accounts say the
ear had been severed. Turkel here just can't keep his arguments from
stepping on each other and yielding another fallacy[#] of contradiction.
If Turkel has any evidence that placebo effects (such
as conventional faith-healing) cannot be indefinite, he
should present that evidence rather than baldly
asserting it to be obvious.
It is obvious, in terms of the types of miracles under
discussion: Healing those blind from birth versus healing back
pain, for example! Our critic commits that category error yet
again!
Turkel here talks of "the types of miracles under discussion", but then
mentions [#retreat] the ONLY healing miracle that is claimed to have been
for a congenital condition. He knows quite well it is the only such miracle
in the gospels. He knows quite well it is only recorded in one gospel. He
knows quite well it is only recorded in the latest gospel (thus making
skeptical investigation most difficult). He knows quite well that the
congenitalness of the condition is recorded as being disputed. Turkel is
blatantly disingenuous to then claim that placebo effects are of a
different "category" as "the types of miracles under discussion".
And of course, Turkel does not dare let his readers see[#] (let alone
answer) my challenge to deny the comparability of the treatment of
psychosomatic affliction through placebo effects and conventional
faith-healing.
Lastly, Turkel dares[#] not attempt to satisfy my request for evidence that
placebo effects cannot be indefinite.
Are these faith-healers able to induce a
permanent cure? [..] if the parallel were to
hold, then Jesus and his movement, like the
faith-healers, ought to have had a minimum
following of loyalists and practically no new
converts!
Turkel here cites no faith-healer who claimed divine
specialness and then martyred himself, and thus his
"parallel" does not "hold".
He also says I have named no such healer who went to martyrdom,
which is exactly the point! They don't have the wherewithal or
the goods to even try, which they should have, if they had a
genuine gift and an anointing from God!
Turkel here makes the bizarre claim that being able to found a long-lived
religious movement is evidence that the founder's faith healings were
miracles. This is simply a desperate attempt to evade the point that there
is no credible evidence that Jesus' faith healings were any different from
those of conventional faith-healers.
it doesn't take many complaints of false healing to flush the
whole effort down the toilet! Here again our critic can only
point yet again to Jesus not doing miracles at home, and the
"mad" evaluation of his family, addressed below and above
respectively.
In other words, I can "only" demonstrate that Jesus' record as a
miracle-worker was so poor that even the gospels could not help but mention
his shortcomings. Despite Turkel's claim, he in fact here does not let his
readers see[#] (and has never dared address) my repeated point that Jesus'
family should have been his earliest and most devout followers. Turkel's
efforts on hometown miracles are laughable; see below.
[our critic] has now even declared closer allegiance to the idea
that Jesus may not have died
Turkel's powers of textual analysis fail him yet again [#misrep]. All I
said was that "nothing in [the Lazarus account] supports a firm diagnosis
of death, as opposed to e.g. John the Baptist's beheading, or Judas's
hanging himself." Turkel, of course, does not let his readers see[#] this
point.
the prior plausibility of the story element in
question, the possible motivations for the one author
to include it, and the likelihood that the remaining
authors would exclude it if they believed it.
what if one mentions only algor mortis, and one mentions that and
rigor mortis?
We just check the prior plausibility. Background probability that algor
mortis is accompanied by rigor mortis? Close to 100%. Background
probability that ear severing is accompanied by ear restoration? Close to
0%.
skeptics have a ready excuse and a theoey [sic] for every
possible combination of events.
This is a lie [#misrep], since I already told Turkel PRECISELY what
"combination" of evidence would make me a believer in Christianity. But
Turkel can't win by substantive discussion of the evidence, so he instead
pretends that skeptics are closed-minded. Indeed, he dares not let his
readers see[#] my rebuttal of his repeated charge of irrelevance:
if the ancients who created the gospel tradition prematurely and
incorrectly considered these non-dead people to be dead, and
these people later recovered from their illness, then their
recoveries are not the miraculous resurrections that the gospels
say they are.
Instead, unwilling to edit his article and unable to answer my argument, he
ignores this rebuttal.
What is at stake is preserving disbelief, not a rational
consideration of the available data.
While I calmly and rationally consider each of the few pieces of "data"
that Turkel bothers to muster, he prefers instead to make claims about my
assumptions that are obviously and demonstrably false.
The initial complaint, requiring mention of these various
symptoms of death, falls flat unless it is definitively shown
that description of such effects was somehow normal in ancient
accounts of death
Obviously false [#misrep]. I nowhere "require mention of these various
symptoms of death". I simply point out that we happen not to have firm
evidence of death in these three cases of reanimation, and that this
sharply contrasts with e.g. the account of the beheading of John the
Baptist.
it would defy common sense to suggest that
Lazarus' family and/or friends did nothing to
ascertain death before taking steps for
ritual observance and burying
I of course don't suggest they "did nothing"; I merely
suggest that whatever they did may have led them to an
incorrectly premature diagnosis of death.
Our critic backpedals furiously,
Turkel again employs [#!win] his laughable device of saying that I
"backpedal furiously" just because I correct his blatant misinterpretation
of my position.
not even acknowledging the irrelevance of certain of the criteria
he uncritically listed
That some symptoms of death were less likely to be noticeable than others
does not make any of them impossible to have occurred. If even the least
likely symptom had in fact been reported of Lazarus, Turkel would of course
eagerly tout it as firm evidence of death -- and rightly so. Or does he
instead claim that if one of these "irrelevant criteria" were given, he
would then consider it to be an embellishment?
Six of one, half dozen of the other! The point remains, our
critic thinks they did essentially nothing viable to ascertain
death, or did not recognize it as such,
Turkel here pathetically tries [#retreat] to equate being mistaken in
diagnosing death with doing nothing to diagnose death. He should take note:
THIS is what it looks like when someone "backpedals furiously".
this in spite of obvious signs, the obvious human concern, and
the immense experience of the ancients with death; see link just
above.
And to cover his retreat, Turkel just repeats previous irrelevancies.
Neither "human concern" nor the "immense experience of the ancients" is a
guarantee against premature diagnosis of death, and of course there is no
evidence that any special ancient expertise was employed in this case.
Their ability to recognize a definitely dead person as
dead simply does not imply their inability to ever
consider a barely-alive person to be dead.
That's a real whopper of logic!
Does Turkel think that highlighting the logicality of my argument somehow
weakens its force?
So they knew the signs of "dead" but didn't connect it with dead?
No, they were not guaranteed to never mistake a barely-alive person for
dead.
They didn't make the connect this time, because it is convenient
for our critic to say so?
Evidence is ALWAYS "convenient" for the truth -- that is the very nature of
truth. If Lazarus had been beheaded, or hung, or in the belly of a whale
for three days, that would be another story. But yes, "this time" his fate
was not any of those. That's not my fault; that's simply what the gospels
say.
They had some category of deadness where those "barely-alive" or
in the tomb for days were called dead?
If by "category of deadness" Turkel means they were aware of it when they
placed in a burial cave someone barely alive, then no. If by "category of
deadness" Turkel means there was a possible set of cases in which they
could mistakenly place in a burial cave someone barely alive, then yes.
Where is this shown to be true in any ancient document? The only
possible example is in the case of imminent death with Jairus'
daughter; see below, and that is not at all applicable to
post-mortem categorization!
Turkel answers his own question, and then commits the fallacy[#] of begging
the question by assuming that Lazarus truly was a "post-mortem
categorization" instead of a pre-mortem one. (Turkel should note that THIS
is what a "begged question" actually looks like, whereas in his idiolect a
"begged question" is just any self-consistent explanation that he happens
to disagree with.)
Our critic is desperately grasping at any straw now, begging
exceptions and oddities wherever he can!
I of course am merely evaluating the available evidence surrounding the
three supposed reanimations. Unable to to put a dent in my evaluation,
Turkel here resorts to unsubstantiated sputtering [#childish]
generalizations.
what this all boils down to is the same issue of assuming the
ancients were too stupid to recognize serious illness and death
when they saw it, or were just stupid at the times necessary for
our critic to keep his thesis afloat, but not necessarily at
other times.
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see [#lose] my refutation of his
first clause, but his claim is so obviously false that he nevertheless has
to modify it with this new "or.." clause. Of course, Turkel's new effort
still misrepresents [#misrep] my claim, since being "stupid at times" is
obviously not equivalent to being "not always correct in distinguishing
someone barely alive from someone who has just died" -- which remains my
actual claim. For good measure, Turkel again adds [#!win] an implication
("afloat") that a successful defense of my thesis is a victory for him.
and it just so happened that no one checked, no countering signs
took place, no nothing
Turkel yet again [#misrep] gets my position wrong. I need not claim that
"no one checked"; I merely need claim that no one checked SUCCESSFULLY. I
need not claim that "no countering signs took place" (assuming "countering"
here means "vital"); I merely need claim that no vital signs were NOTICED.
Here Turkel dares not let his readers see[#] my rebuttal that "funereal
procedures could be the very reason why nobody noticed 1) any faint signs
of life, or 2) that the indications of death were failing to develop".
(and quoting Carrier here, when he has been soundly refuted for
drawing illicit parallels [on some other topic], accomplishes
nothing).
Turkel here dares not substantively answer -- or even let his readers
see[#] -- my quote from Carrier that "the scene described in Luke 7:15 is
actually identical to various stories told about famous doctors to justify
their renowned skill (Pliny Natural History 7.124, Apuleius Metamorphoses
2.28, 3.24, 10.12 and Florida 19)".
JESUS AVOIDING DANGER
he claims he didn't call them different events, but is
obfuscating: listing them twice amounts to doing the same thing
if one does not signify somehow that they are parallels
Turkel here dares not let his readers see [#lose] my response that I had
called them "mutually confirming reports", which should be enough to
indicate parallelism to anyone not ignorant of the fact that the gospels
are four versions of the same story. Nor does he let his readers see that I
explicitly called them "references to Jesus hiding himself", as opposed to
(say) "instances" of Jesus hiding himself.
What normal person or being doesn't [sometimes chose discretion
over valor]? (He thinks an "omniscient omnipotent deity" doesn't,
but still does not solve the problem of what just such a deity
ought to do; see below)
His point having been soundly rebutted, Turkel here desperately [#retreat]
changes the subject -- to a separate point that is also soundly rebutted;
see below.
Our critic then puts his foot in his mouth yet again, saying
More empty Turkel [#childish] bluster.
Mark 3:7 continues: 'But Jesus withdrew himself and his
disciples to the sea' and to the (presumably
protective) midst of 'a great multitude' of his
followers.
So now apparently, Jesus could not even have followers without
being accused of cowardice!
Turkel again misrepresents [#misrep] my position. I never said that being
in a protective crowd is cowardice, and in fact below explicitly told
Turkel that this would have been a good way for Jesus to avoid having to
withdraw from danger. What I said was that Turkel's claim that "the threat
wasn't immediate" in Mark 3:6 is immediately refuted by Mark 3:7. I defy
Turkel to quote the consecutive gospel words "[..] how they might destroy
him. But Jesus withdrew himself [..]" and then claim this was not a
withdrawal in the face of danger.
Our critic has this idea that I do not "dare" do certain things
-- more of that long-distance psychology again, no doubt -- but
if the daring is lacking, it is only because the dare is without
substance in the first place!
Anyone who wants to see Turkel's own withdrawal in the face of polemical
danger has merely to search this text for the strings "dares[#]" and
"see[#]". I've marked 46 [#total] places where Turkel either doesn't answer
an argument or doesn't even let his readers see it. I dare Turkel to fully
quote and then answer each of these marked arguments.
He tries to salvage his bacon further by quoting Luke 13:33
Yet another instance of Turkel claiming [#!win] that a successful defense
of my thesis should somehow count against me. Turkel implies that this is
the first time I've quoted Luk 13:33, when in fact I quoted it in each of
my two previous responses, and this is merely the first time that Turkel
could bring himself to address it directly.
"Nevertheless I must walk to day, and to morrow, and
the day following: for it cannot be that a prophet
perish out of Jerusalem." It's indisputable that when
Jesus was told of the threat, he admitted he would be
withdrawing 'today' in the face of this danger and
apparently was embarrassed enough to try to make an
excuse for his retreat.
Some retreat that would be! Not only does Jesus tell everyone in
hearing where he was going (Jerusalem!), he announces that he is
walking (not "fleeing" or "running" -- the word used implies a
normal journey). That's some kind of retreat in process!
Turkel here does not even attempt to deny that this is a withdrawal in the
face of danger. All he can do is point out that Jesus could have withdrawn
more quickly -- and thus concede Jesus' withdrawal. There is no evidence
that "everyone in hearing" included anyone who would betray Jesus' ultimate
destination or his possibly roundabout route there, and Jerusalem was at
any rate not a hard place to hide in. Jesus doesn't need to "run" to be
guilty of withdrawing from danger; he merely needs to "depart" when the
person warning him of danger says he should do so.
Our critic crows here that I "do not deny" the danger avoidance,
but as we have said time and again, this is of no relevance -- he
has not, and still will not, show any logical way to exercise
true prudence for the sake of preserving a mission.
False. I gave an example of a way, and Turkel even goes on to immediately
quote it:
Now we are told that
an omniscient omnipotent being could arrange to never
have to retreat from danger. For example, he could have
arranged that at key moments of danger he always just
happened to be in a crowd of followers who would be
understood by 'the bad guys' as preventing harm to
Jesus.
What the hey? We were just told a few paragraphs ago that this
was just another form of running away!
False [#misrep]. I said that retreating from danger to the protection of a
crowd is indeed a withdrawal in the face of danger, but I never said that
being in a protective crowd in the first place is such a withdrawal, and I
in fact JUST SAID that "always just happen[ing] to be in a [protective]
crowd" would be a good way "to never have to retreat from danger".
I will try to make this as easy as possible for Turkel to understand:
(withdrawing from danger to a protective crowd)
=> counts as (withdrawal from danger);
(already being in a protective crowd when danger arises)
does NOT count as (withdrawal from danger).
Our critic apparently can't keep himself consistent -- and still
hasn't provided any logical alternative!
False, and false. Turkel simply misconstrues the plain text of what I say,
and so doesn't recognize an "alternative" even when I preface it with "for
example"!
And again, sorry, hiding in crowds is just another form of
running!
Sorry, but not being in danger by already being safely in a crowd is simply
not the same thing as being in danger and having to withdraw. The former
makes one look powerful and safe; the latter makes one look weak and
scared.
a truly omniscient Jesus [who] could have continued his
journey five minutes before being told of Herod's
threat
-- not that five minutes, or even hours, did much when the powers
that be had horses and you didn't!
Turkel here forgets that Jesus was allegedly omnipotent. He could casually
leave and arrange that the relevant people not notice where he went.
Turkel simply has a stunted imagination if he thinks that the ONLY three
options of an omnipotent omniscience would be to "zap" people, be seen
"teleporting", or be seen withdrawing AFTER danger has become evident.
There are myriad ways that an omnipotent omniscience could withdraw before
danger is evident and without obvious miracles.
-- it could still be spun out as "avoidance of danger" to say
nothing of dismissed by our critic as embellishment!
Turkel here is simply obtuse to the point that if Jesus did things right,
then there would BE no record of withdrawal from danger for me to point
to! It would be ludicrous to claim that if Jesus were divine, then
evidence of him withdrawing from danger would by metaphysical necessity
HAVE to turn up in the gospel accounts. Does Turkel dare make such a
claim?
Direct, ideological confrontation with his opponents was
essential to Jesus' ministry! The exchanges between Jesus and his
enemies represented contests of personal honor before witnesses
which an ancient, honor-respecting society would require of
anyone who defiantly stood against a given status quo. Hustling
out five minutes before the opponents got there wasn't a live
option if Jesus wanted his message to be spread and respected by
others!
I never said anything about "hustling", and Jesus could debate and confront
all he wanted as long as he happened to prevent situations from arising in
which he would be recorded as withdrawing from danger. As a parallel,
consider the gospel record of all the fist fights Jesus had. There were
none! Jesus was busy "confronting opponents" to win "respect", yet none of
them ever took a swing at him. Is the non-existence of any such fist fights
to be taken as evidence of the sort of "all-too-obvious miraculous effort"
that Turkel contends are the only way Jesus had to avoid looking bad? Of
course not.
I note that the critic still offered no connection to a "time"
when things would be right. The critic quotes John 7:6 (and
requotes it again, still not effectively rescinding my point as
no explanation or exegesis provided, merely "quote and there it
is")
Turkel's claim of "no explanation" is a lie. He does not dare let his
readers see[#] my explanation:
Jesus was "purposely staying away from [people] waiting to take
his life" because "the right time for me has not yet come".
Turkel here simply closes his eyes and wishes away the plain text of Jn
7:1-8, and in particular the straightforward connection of 7:6,8 with 7:1.
Turkel seems so accustomed to writing entire essays explaining why simple
bible verses DON'T mean what they plainly say, that he rejects as
inadequate my claim that these verses DO mean what they plainly say.
JESUS' FAILED MINISTRY
Turkel here doesn't dare deny my statement that 'the
mere existence of Christianity hardly proves that Jesus
was divine'.
Actually I do deny it -- I had an article in process at the time
I wrote this; here it is.
(An interlude, on the state of the debate. In answering Turkel's "chicken
challenge" to "pick any essay of" his and refute it, I have as of this
response already refuted not only his Trilemma article and his separate
essay defending it, but also the substance or relevancy of nine OTHER
essays:
* John's chronology vs. synoptics
* Olivet prophecy
* Jesus as God's Wisdom
* Lincoln biographies
* Divine claims of Jesus
* Despair on the cross
* Jesus hating his family
* Miller on Mark/John Christology
* How God could prove himself
Here Turkel tries to pull yet another essay onto his funeral pyre of
arguments. Since it is so tedious -- not to mention cruel -- to enumerate
Turkel's dozens of blatant failures to adequately answer my Trilemma
counter-arguments, I may indeed decide to switch gears and annihilate
another of his toplevel articles. The criterion I use for my decision would
probably be the number of outstanding points he has failed to answer
[#total: 9 + 37] and clear misrepresentations [#total: 33] of my positions.
With this number totaling 79 in just his most recent response, it's anyway
probably time to pronounce as dead the smear on the ground that constitutes
the remains of his Trilemma argument.)
What reason do we have to believe that this so-called
'polemical record' represents anything approaching a
thorough and contemporaneous effort of skeptical
journalism? And note that miraculous power was ascribed
to many people in ancient times.
-- the first aspect is nought [sic] but the same begged question
[i.e., "If James Randi had been around he woulda figured it out!
Everyone else was too dumb."];
Strawman [#misrep]. I don't say they were "too dumb"; I say they were too
credulous and too non-contemporaneous with the alleged events to be
expected to have debunked the miracle allegations. Turkel here gives no
reason why we should believe that word of Jesus' failures WOULD have
reached us, and gives no examples of the oh-so-smart oh-so-skeptical
ancients debunking the reports about any OTHER miracle-workers.
the second aspect a meaningless, non-specific parallel thrown in
the air for polemical purposes, as well as the same begged
question)
Turkel here gives no response to the point that opponents of Jesus who
believe in miracles would be less likely to criticize him on grounds that
his miracles were not genuine.
a "lack of people's faith" is for a mere faith-healer
PRECISELY THE SAME THING as the faith-healer not being
able to do the faith-healing
it is no such thing; it is the same as saying that one could not
rescue another from a pit, because the victim in the pit refused
help, pelting the rescuer with rocks and missiles until they
left.
Turkel here fails to grasp a point of elementary logic. If a person lacks
faith and then Jesus does not heal them, that could be because 1) the
divine Jesus declines to miraculously heal the faithless, or 2) the
non-divine Jesus cannot faith-heal someone who lacks faith. That is, the
faithless ending up not being healed by Jesus is entirely consistent with
Jesus being a non-divine faith-healer. If Jesus were a mere faith-healer,
we would expect that those who knew him longest -- his family members and
hometown neighbors -- would be least impressed by his act. If by contrast
Jesus always had miraculous powers, we would expect that those who knew him
longest would his most faithful followers. They weren't.
Turkel dares not address my point that the opinion of
Jesus' madness was rendered by those who knew him best:
his family (Mk 3:21).
Jesus violated the norms of his culture in a variety of ways, for
example by associating with tax collectors and prostitutes, he
was violating the accepted social norms and purity codes. In so
doing he brought dishonor on his family in the eyes of his
contemporaries -- and the "madness" line of reasoning not only
does not represent the evaluation of a trained psychologist, but
also amounts to no more than a makeshift accusation designed to
a) explain away and mute the dishonor of the situation;
Turkel here gives utterly no explanation for why his family, after knowing
Jesus to be perfectly sinless and altruistic for three decades, would
explain his unconventional associations as "madness" instead of blessed
compassion. Jesus' family seems to rather have dissociated themselves from
him -- DESPITE the alleged angelic revelations to his parents around the
time of his birth.
b) get others to move away from Jesus by describing him as
ritually impure! The "madness" reasoning is functionally
equivalent to saying Jesus was a leper, but had the advantage of
not being visibly testable.
After quoting my challenge about Jesus' family, Turkel here either 1) does
not address it (and instead talks about third-party madness allegations),
or 2) makes the ludicrous claim that Jesus' family wanted "others to move
away from Jesus" as if he were a "leper".
That there were not trained professionals making the diagnosis is
merely waved off as of no relevance, but as shown, nor is the
family's judgment in the context the critic wishes to prove!...
Turkel here does not let his readers see [#lose] this challenge to his
ideas:
a) that Jesus' family's opinion was "polemical", [..] and c) that
"but others said" is in John 10:21 an indication of
"overwhelmingly contrary opinion". Turkel's claims here are
self-refuting.
Nor does Turkel notice that he dismisses as "non-professional" the
diagnoses of Jesus' family but endorses (despite being equally
"non-professional"!) the diagnoses of Jesus' believers. Who is more likely
to make an objective diagnosis, those who knew Jesus all his life or those
recently converted by his faith healings?
OK, let's name all those places where Jesus "often was reluctant
or evasive when asked to demonstrate his powers" -- the only
place like this that might work, where Jesus did not indeed go on
to use his powers, is [example]! Our critc [sic] says I don't
"dare" deny it -- OK, I deny it! Now bring up the goods!
I said Turkel "dares not deny that Jesus often was reluctant or evasive
when asked to demonstrate his powers", and I did not qualify it with the
condition that Jesus was not later recorded in the gospels as nevertheless
"go[ing] on to use his powers". I could indeed "name all those places"
where Jesus was reluctant or evasive, but Turkel will just claim that he
intends the qualification. I in fact dared him to deny that Jesus often
was reluctant or evasive, period -- even if Jesus is said to subsequently
use his powers. Turkel won't deny this unqualified statement, because it's
so obviously true. The bottom line here is that, unable to refute my claim
that Jesus "often was reluctant or evasive when asked to demonstrate his
powers", Turkel tries to claim that it doesn't matter. He is oblivious to
the fact that reports of such reluctance and evasiveness are precisely what
we would expect if Jesus weren't divine -- just as later allegations of
subsequent miracles are precisely what we would expect from accounts trying
to convince us of his divinity.
I am accused of red herring fishing by our critic, but this is
mere whitewashing on his part, an attempt to evade the argument
and defense of the premisses upon which so much of his thesis is
based.
Turkel here doesn't dare let his readers see [#lose] the substance of my
"red herring" accusation, and has the audacity to instead claim that *I*
"attempt to evade the argument". He doesn't dare let his readers see my
charge:
Turkel continues his red herring attempt to attract attention
away from his indefensible comparison of my "sound bite"
reporting the consensus of professional secular scholarship
[about the length of Jesus' ministry] and his "sound bite" that
simply assumes the gospels are completely true. The two simply
are not comparable, and so Turkel vainly tries to change the
subject.
Instead of defending his "sound bite" comparison, he just hides hides from
his readers the fact that he lost on this point. Turkel does not identify a
single point made in the text of his essay that I've "evaded", whereas I
identify 46 [#total] separate points that he cannot bring himself to answer
or even let his readers see.
The idea that Jesus' ministry was three years long and
that he cleansed the temple twice etc. is a dead meme.
1. Jesus knows many people in the Jerusalem area [..]
There is no evidence he didn't meet them before starting his ministry.
2. Jesus had certainly been to Jerusalem before numerous times;
as a Jew he was almost obliged to go there to attend the
festivals! Would critics contend that he never went there in his
12-15 years as an adult, or during the key 2-3 years, even as an
observant Jew?
No; we'd contend that during his one-year ministry he only went there
once. He could have been there numerous times before his ministry.
Those who read the Synoptics woodenly think he was there only
once, at the end of his ministry
No, they think he was there only once DURING HIS MINISTRY, and that indeed
was at the end of his ministry.
3. Mark's allusion to "green grass" (6:39) indicates a season
before summer heat scorches the grass brown
A reference to "sitting [..] on the green grass", written years or decades
after the event, simply cannot be taken as a temporal marker comparable to,
say, an annual festival. It is hardly surprising that, in a fond memory of
sitting in the grass, the grass would be described as green!
Matt. 24:30, where the "Son of Man in the
clouds" image first appears, is now covered
in the essay and we encourage our critic to
read it and offer no response as with these
others.
Which in essence he does now, saying,
None of Turkel's obfuscations can make it plausible
that some preaching in Rome and the destruction of the
Temple makes the Olivet prophecy true.
Turkel's claim that "in essence" I "offer no response" is itself in essence
a blatant lie. He does not dare let his readers see[#] the conclusion of my
response:
The the city of Rome is not the same thing as the "whole world",
and being in "heaven" is not the same thing as "appear[ing] in
the sky" and being "see[n as] coming on the clouds of the sky".
The prophesied things plainly didn't happen during "this
generation", and the prophecy is plainly false.
Turkel continues:
It appears that our critic can't handle a revisit to complex
subjects, and settles for calling them "dead memes" and blowing
them off!
If Turkel claims that one or more of the obfuscations in his "complex"
essay on the Olivet prophecy can explain the equatings that I question
above, then I challenge him to identify it. It is doubtful that he will,
just as he dared not answer or even let his readers see [#lose] my
demonstration of his incorrect attribution to me of quotes about his "lack
of knowledge" about Jesus "hiding".
What I'm doing is citing someone who says that there are no
references in Josephus of this sort
Turkel here dares not let his readers see [#lose] my retort: "In other
words, Turkel is repeating the report of someone who read Josephus. Well,
so am I. QED."
[But I have the works of Josephus sitting at my feet as
I type this -- ] let's hear some of those cites, then,
where Josephus records someone saying he is the
Messiah!
(Significantly our critic in his latest reply manages not to
report to his readers that I have my copy of Josephus
I restore the contested words above, and note that Turkel hypocritically
dares not let his readers see[#] the reason why his claim about his feet is
irrelevant:
Carrier's claim was that "many individuals were claiming to be,
or were proclaimed to be, messiahs of one form or another in
Jesus' day (Josephus recounts several)". Since Turkel cannot even
precisely state the contested issue, his non-quoting citation of
O'Neill to the contrary is even more suspect.
Turkel hypocritically ignores my refrain that I have no fear of anyone
reading anything Turkel writes, and have been posting Turkel's unedited
responses in full and linking to them from my responses. By contrast,
Turkel dares not include the following link in each of his two essays in
which my edited responses appear:
http://humanknowledge.net/Philosophy/Metaphysics/Theology/Trilemma.html
and have made my check
Turkel here faults me for not telling his readers he "made [his] check",
but this is the first time he's actually claimed to have made a check!
Indeed, Turkel ignored my specific complaint (repeated below) that he has
not actually quoted a single word from his "source" O'Neill. Turkel also
dares not let his readers see[#] that I noted a difference between what
Turkel only now says he "checked" -- "Josephus record[ing] someone saying
he is the Messiah" -- and what actually is Carrier's claim: "many
individuals were claiming to be, or were proclaimed to be, messiahs of one
form or another in Jesus' day (Josephus recounts several)".
-- and then passes on making his own report, still deferring
merely to Carrier.
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see[#] my actual response:
I've quoted Carrier, but we have only Turkel's word that O'Neill
contradicts Carrier. Given Turkel's past scholarship errors (e.g.
misquoting me above, distorting the context of the psychology
article earlier, being unable to find and report all the gospel
passages relevant to withdrawal in the face of danger), I'm not
going to recapitulate anyone's published research on the basis of
Turkel's hand-waving non-quoting claim that some other research
contradicts it.
Can the scholar Turkel actually quote O'Neill? Can the scholar Turkel even
correctly state the issue in contention here? One wonders.
It is claimed that I "admitted" that none of the claims [of
Jesus' personal divinity] were such a direct statement, which is
patently false in some cases, and in one case, no longer true, as
in the Son of Man title.
Turkel's essay said that "the direct claim 'I am God' [..] would have been
a little too confusing to Jesus' hearers". If there is some synonym of
'God' or 'divine' that Turkel now wants to claim Jesus used after the words
"I am", then I'd love to hear it.
people could not be guaranteed not to misinterpret,
misunderstand, exaggerate, or selectively forget the
sayings or claims of Jesus
in which case, let us have some positive evidence of
misinterpretation, misunderstanding, or exaggeration (i.e., a
saying of Jesus, shown to be misconstrued via contemporary
parallels with differing meanings
Turkel seems not to realize that in the absence of an argument that
misinterpretation, misunderstanding, exaggeration, and selective forgetting
could not have happened, we simply cannot assume that the red words in the
gospels were the precise words that the Nazarene carpenter actually
uttered.
Turkel has not demonstrated that if these recorded
sayings were not true then no human could have done
anything that could later lead to these recordings
-- this is merely an illicit shifting of the burden; it is the
critic's burden to explain how this could have come about
Turkel again ignores my point that for the Trilemma[#] to be a valid
argument, he has to rule out the other possibilities. If he doesn't rule
them out, then the Trilemma is not valid, and we are back to figuring out
which possibility (lord? delusional faith-healer?) is the most likely.
Turkel just doesn't grasp the fact that the Trilemma is a claim to have won
the debate, and that the Trilemma's failure to win the debate doesn't
therefore imply that Jesus could not have been Lord. It's failure only
implies that it's not the case that Jesus MUST have been Lord. The
debate-ending ambitiousness of the Trilemma is precisely what puts such a
heavy burden on Turkel, a burden he seems unable or unwilling to bear.
TRILEMMA VALIDITY
It is wrong to say that "the burden of proof does not fall
completely on any one side" -- it falls not completely, no, but
very heavily on the critic claiming doubt.
Turkel again fails to grasp an elementary point of logic. The Trilemma[#]
argument of
(A or B or C) & (not-A) & (not-B) => C
is simply not logically valid if one does not actually demonstrate (not-A)
and (not-B). It does not suffice to say that neither A nor B have been
proved; one has to SHOW they are false. This is Logic 101, and I defy
Turkel to quote the previous two sentences in their entirety and then
disagree with them.
That [certain doubts of gospel authenticity that Turkel does not
address] are, as our critic says, "especially significant for the
case at hand" does not make them any less a case of creating a
root upon which to spin whatever theory suits one's purposes,
Thus Turkel offers no substantive defense of his implication that the
accuracy of the gospel accounts is no different from that of "any
historical record", despite their extraordinary differences in identity of
authorship, first-handedness, identification of sources,
contemporaneousness to the events, author motivation, and extraordinariness
of claims.
all the while not meeting the burden of proof as the contrary
claimant.
Turkel yet again fails to grasp the logic of the Trilemma[#] and its burden
on him to show (and not just assume) that non-Lord alternatives are false.
in the latest reply my comments here are merely dismissed with
such comments as "wishful thinking" -- quite a hypocritical
comment from one who has yet to provide a valid example of any of
the above
What Turkel's readers of course cannot see [#lose] is what the unedited
text of my responses actually contains: a clause-by-clause refutation of
any substantive counter-arguments Turkel offers toward me, and a
fully-quoting diagnosis of each of his many insubstantive ad hominem
generalities and strawman histrionics. If Turkel thinks I have not rebutted
the substance of any sentence in his "comments here", I defy him to
identify it. My readers can match his sentences one-to-one with my
rebuttals of their substance or diagnoses of their insubstantiveness, and
all of Turkel's impotent claims to the contrary cannot change this fact.
claiming that I am "unwilling to deal with" his alleged case for
Jesus as a moderately deluded faith-healer and that he thinks I
haven't done the job. I may as well be unwilling to deal with the
case for Jesus making a trip to India as a child or being a
former sandal salesman, for in spite of our critic's one-phrase
dismissals, his portrait is about as clear as graffitti [sic] on
a restroom wall, and at about the same level of documentation.
All Turkel has done here is add a [#childish] analogy to restroom graffiti,
and so the response that he did not dare let his readers see [#lose]
becomes even more applicable:
Turkel here gives two [now three] obviously worthless analogies,
while essentially admitting he is unwilling to deal with what is
now a tetralemma: liar, lunatic, lord, -- or faith-healer and
apocalyptic preacher whose deluded belief in his importance was
strengthened in the months leading up to his anticipated
execution and was misinterpreted and exaggerated afterwards.
Turkel often dilates on various points of biblical arcana, but when it
comes time to actually defend the very core of the Trilemma, he is simply
AWOL. He tells his readers of my "one-phrase dismissals" but does not dare
let them see[#] my argument (which I repeat here for a third consecutive
response, due to Turkel's evident fear of facing it):
The mere existence of this fourth alternative doesn't in itself
prove that this alternative is true. But it's unrebutted
existence DOES invalidate the trilemma argument, whose validity
depends on there being no non-lord options besides liar and
lunatic. It may in fact be possible to prove Jesus' lordship
through other more-direct arguments, but the Trilemma itself
fails to do so if the fourth option is not actually SHOWN to be
false. All this means is that the real debate is between "lord"
and such a fourth option. The invalidity of the Trilemma doesn't
lend any weight to either side of that real debate -- it's simply
a fact of logic that is inconvenient for those seeking an easier
alternative to the real debate.
Again: how ironic that when it comes to this point about the very heart of
the Trilemma argument, Turkel the Trilemmist has nothing substantive to say
in response.
STANDARDS OF EVIDENCE
Which Lincoln biographies are touted as the divinely
inspired word of a deity?
It doesn't matter what they are "touted as"; even treating them
as human records is enough, and this is not a case of me not
"liking the answer" (whatever that means in this context!) but of
making the point that the Gospels deserve treatment at least
consistent with any other set of documents, whether our critic
likes it or not.
The treatment is entirely consistent. Every document, whether gospel or
Lincoln bio, is treated the same IF it contains the SAME claim of being
"the divinely inspired word of a deity". Turkel's analogy collapses due to
the inconvenient fact that no Lincoln bio makes this claim.
Which Lincoln biographies give contradictory genealogies in
trying to demonstrate his royal lineage?
Our critic completely omits these last points [recapitulating Miller's
excuses], referring only to "laughable contortions" to resolve the
matter, and also manages to omit the link to Miller's article.
For anyone who wants to laugh at Miller's seven pages of contortions for
themselves, the article is at
http://www.christian-thinktank.com/fabprof4.html. Now, where is Turkel's
citation of a contorted seven-page explanation for any Lincoln bio's
genealogy? He has no such citation, and so this is yet another point on
which his analogy collapses.
Which Lincoln biographies give contradictory information for
Lincoln's birth year?
our critic blanks out the Miller link and replaces it with one from
Carrier for the "Barnum victims" in his readership. Dare I say, our
critic does not dare provide access to such material?
I did not "blank out" anything; I merely post Turkel's HTML as text, which
automatically loses any underlying hyperlinks. Given that in this essay
alone I document Turkel hiding material from his "Barnum victim" readers a
total[#] of 56 times, Turkel here is throwing rocks in his own very fragile
glass house.
Turkel's doesn't dare let his readers see[#] my Carrier link (which was
given in plain text:
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/quirinius.html) or
the quote I gave from it. For Miller's link, see below.
Note that Turkel names not a single Lincoln biography that
supports even a hint of controversy regarding Lincoln's birth
year.
There isn't one in the Gospels, either;
The scholar Turkel again misreads [#misrep] my text. I didn't say there is
a birth-year controversy "in the Gospels"; I plainly said that they
"support [..] a hint of controversy". That is why the contents of Miller's
article (available at http://www.christian-thinktank.com/quirinius.html)
are utterly irrelevant; its mere EXISTENCE proves my point that the Gospel
birth-year evidence is contradictory enough to spark controversy.
but there is plenty of controversy about Lincoln that can be
manufactured about his heritage, his parentage, and his childhood
Seeing that his analogy has been defeated on the issue of birth year,
Turkel desperately attempts to change the subject [#retreat].
Which Lincoln biographies seem to switch Lincoln's birthplace in
a transparent attempt to make Lincoln fulfill a prophecy?
if he has a good look at the Lincoln bios, he will see plenty of
"glaring contradictions" just as serious and as painful as those
alleged in the Gospels [Turkel now adds:] (a challenge which he simply
ignores).
Turkel here does not dare let his readers see [#lose] my challenge to "name
a single such Lincoln biographical 'contradiction' that is 'just as serious
and as painful' as the ambiguity of Jesus' birthplace". Instead he lies and
says I "simply ignore[d]" his challenge, apparently thinking I can read his
mind about what alleged "glaring contradiction" he is talking about. Thus
(and again), his Lincoln bio analogy still fails on the matter of
birthplace.
Which Lincoln biographies omit events as spectacular and
memorable as the resurrection appearances (missing in original
Mark), the Easter zombies swarming Jerusalem (only in Mat 27:53),
or the Easter darkness "over all the earth" (omitted in John)?
[..] on this our critic merely flees into denial, saying since "many"
sounds like a "swarm" to him it must have been, never mind that both
words are simply vague
Turkel of course does not deny that a "swarm" contains "many" members. And
he dares not let his readers see [#lose] me point out that his paragraph
does not name a a single Lincoln biography that omits a single Lincoln life
event that Turkel would say is in any way comparable to the Gospel events I
cited.
Nor does Turkel dare let his readers see [#lose] my summary of his 0-5 loss
on the Lincoln bios: "having asked 'why the Lincoln biographies [..] should
be taken as accurate', [he] identifie[s] not a single one that is
comparable to the gospels in any of the five ways I asked about." It's not
even that the examples he gives are not comparable; he hasn't even
attempted, in two rounds on this subject, to give a SINGLE example!
Finally, Turkel does not dare let his readers see[#] my point that "it's
laughable to say that some audiences would not have been impressed by [the
Easter zombies miracle], or that miracles so spectacular were consciously
downplayed for fear of straining anyone's credulity."
Nobody is claiming they should not be weighed,
considered, compared, or factored. On the contrary, the
difference that indeed needs to be
weighed/considered/compared/factored is that
evangelists want their readers to repent and save
themselves from eternal damnation, whereas secular
historians at most want to influence their readers'
political opinions. It would be absurd to say this
difference is insignificant.
Insignificant in what way? The subject matters are different, but
the bottom line is that each writer had an agenda, and the mere
having of an agenda is no test of truth or falsity,
I of course never said it was.
our critic's assumptions and biases against religious issues
aside,
Turkel again misrepresents [#misrep] my conclusions as assumptions, even
after having been told what different evidence would lead me to different
conclusions. By contrast, Turkel hasn't given us any reason to believe
that he himself isn't "biased against" naturalism.
and his inability to differentiate between categories -- content
versus intent -- notwithstanding.
Turkel ignores two obvious facts: 1) An explicit agenda relating to
metaphysics and the nature of the universe is much more serious and
fundamental than a possible agenda of how human politics should be
interpreted. 2) An explicit agenda attempting to establish one's most
important values and goals in life is far more heavy-handed than a possible
agenda of how human politics should be interpreted.
background plausibility, external objective
confirmation, internal consistency, spatiotemporal
proximity to the reported events, evidence of
contemporary skeptical cross-examination, absence of
plausible alternative explanations, etc. All of these
factors tend to argue against the complete veracity of
the gospel accounts. My book discusses five of these
six factors in explicit detail.
we are referred to our critic's own book on the subject, which he
can send us free to PO Box 112, Clarcona FL 32710-0112 if he
thinks it has anything worth reading.
My book is available online at http://humanknowledge.net -- a web site to
which I've included a link in every email and rebuttal to Turkel, and to
which Turkel is evidently afraid to refer his readers.
Until then I'll consider it no more than the same mumbo-jumbo in
book form.
Thus "mumbo-jumbo" [#childish] in Turkel-speak apparently means "arguments
against which one has no reply and to which one dares not refer one's
readers".
Here it is said that I don't "dare quote my counter-challenge" --
OK, I'm about to, now what?
So now Turkel has to just quote 37 more [#total] of my arguments and his
readers will finally have seen both sides of the debate.
why it is that the secular scholarly consensus is so
univocal on things like the 2-source theory and gospel
anonymity?
Because most of them merely accept the thesis on the basis of
previous works
I already know THAT they "accept" it; I'm asking WHY they accept it.
and have their own interests, and therefore no recourse to
examine the matter [..] afresh. And as it happens, examples of
such complacency are rife.
(By 'recourse' I assume the scholar Turkel here means something like
'reason', 'impulse' or 'motivation'.) Turkel's explanation of "complacency"
and laziness is not plausible, and he does not even attempt to explain why
this "complacency" correlates so well with not being a fundamentalist
inerrantist Christian. Gospel scholars are doubtless aware of the
inerrantist critiques of the 2-source theory and gospel anonymity. If those
critiques had merit, a new generation of hotshot contrarian grad students
looking to make their names would take up this cause and overturn the
consensus.
An example? Try Mithraic studies. It took a revolution to shake
off Cumont's thesis, and those, including scholars, whose
specialty is not Mithraism are still using Cumont, unaware that
Mithraic scholarship since Cumont has moved on.
A field of study devoted to an essentially dead religion is hardly
comparable to the study of the source documents of the world's largest and
most influential religion.
And our critic is apparently unaware that within the ranks of
specialists on the subject, Q/Marcan priority is indeed under
fire, and that a coterie of secular scholars who examined the
subject afresh in the 1970s were not impressed -- if he "dares",
let the critic address our material on the subject.)
Turkel himself here does not answer or even let his readers see[#] the
final part of my challenge: "In how many decades or centuries, if ever,
does Turkel anticipate that the secular scholarly consensus will see the
light?" The correct answer is of course that the inerrantist position is a
dead meme with no hopes of resurrection, and that is a big reason why it is
not worth my time. Another big reason is that overturning the two-source
theory would not even begin to satisfy the evidentiary requirements I
described as necessary to verify Christianity, and thus the issue is
irrelevant to the overall Trilemma argument.
Our critic fails to quote [Turkel's reference to] oral tradition
Turkel dares not let his readers see[#] my point that his obfuscations
about oral tradition "do not in the least support the strawman supposition
he made earlier that started this particular discussion: 'If these claims
were invented, why would they be invented?' My unrebutted answer remains: I
never said that Jesus' belief in his own divinity was an 'invention' by the
gospel authors or their sources."
If a text were discovered that
repeated the gospels' quotes of
Jesus but were written during his
ministry or by Jesus himself, would
Turkel really claim that it gives
us no more confidence that we know
what Jesus really said?
I would claim that it gives us more
confidence, yes -- but that does not mean
that the present confidence is not sufficient
in itself.
Turkel thus admits that the evidence of Jesus' words is
suboptimal.
I have admitted no such thing, as anyone who reads with care may
discern,
Turkel's fallacy[#] of contradiction is evidenced by his own words, above.
"Optimal" means could not be improved, and Turkel admitted that the Gospels
could be improved both in terms of contemporaneousness and by having been
written by Jesus himself.
and our critic has still done no more than throw straw in the
air.
Another insubstantive [#childish] Turkel generalization.
JESUS' DIVINITY CLAIMS
Turkel then moves on to Jesus' divinity claims without daring to let his
readers see [#lose] his defeat on the issue of whether I "backpedaled":
In floating his strawman argument about divinity "claims being
invented", Turkel merely confuses himself and thinks that to make
a word-for-word restatement of my position is to "backpedal
mightily". Turkel's strawman claim that I charge "invention" is
simply not justified by my statement that "we only have the
second-hand word of evangelical Christian authors that Jesus
fully held this conviction".
Nor can Turkel bear to let his readers see[#] that I answered his earlier
demand for "any relevant evidence [..] from the psychological field. I have
my Rokeach; where is the reply?". The reply that his readers will likely
never see was that he should "investigat[e] the current clinical
understanding of schizophrenia and conversion disorders" -- neither of
which are even mentioned in his Trilemma article's attempt to rule out any
mental illness in Jesus!
[Turkel's article] asserts "ontological equality" of
Jesus and Wisdom and God, but does not support this
assertion with actual gospel quotes that cannot also be
interpreted as metaphor.
Well, then, where is the proof that such phrases (drawn, as they
clearly are, from Wisdom traditions) were ever used
metaphorically in the Jewish literature or by anyone else of
relevance?
Which "phrase"? Turkel's essay doesn't identify a single gospel quote of
Jesus' actual words that ontologically equates Jesus with "Wisdom". He only
cites two quotes of Jesus, Mat 11:19 and 11:30. The latter does not even
mention Wisdom, but simply borrows language (about yokes and burdens) from
an OT passage about Wisdom. In the former Jesus is simply making a point
that his generation does not appreciate him. Turkel's conclusion that
Jesus thus "associat[ed] himself with Wisdom" is hopelessly vague, and his
assertion of "ontological equality" between Jesus and Wisdom is utterly
unsupported by any actual words of Jesus.
This is still merely hayseed thrown in the air by someone either
not competent to, or unwilling to, deal with the texts.
More [#childish] Turkel bluster.
We are being asked to ignore clear and direct parallels in favor
of some obfuscatory supposition that somewhere, somehow, these
phrases, which just happen to match contextually and
linguistically with the Wisdom tradition, actually mean something
entirely different in a way entirely unattested!
No amount of Turkel's OT "Wisdom" obfuscations can put the words into
Jesus' mouth that Turkel wishes the gospel "texts" had quoted him saying.
(My "supposition" that Jesus only meant what he said and nothing more is
hardly "obfuscatory" but rather the opposite: clear and concise. The
scholar Turkel still seems not to have access to a dictionary...)
an update: I no longer hold that this title was intended to be
mysterious. "Son of Man" is clear indication of divinity, at all times
it is used by Jesus.
That the "Son of Man" title was initially considered "mysterious" by
someone so desperate for Jesus to claim divinity is prima facie evidence
that it is no such clear claim. Having already refuted the substance or
relevancy of this and eight other of Turkel's essays, I'll defer
annihilating his update to this essay until Turkel can bring himself to
address some fraction of the 79 [#total: 9 +37 +33] instances I've
identified of him ignoring or misrepresenting my arguments related to THIS
essay.
This does not imply that Jesus calling God 'abba' is the same
thing as Jesus calling himself God.
As we have shown in the article referenced many moons ago, it does
indeed equate with asserting ontological equality with God --
technically, what we actually argue for, not Jesus = God in one to one
correspondence -- and our critic has still not replied with anything
better than, "No, it doesn't have to!"
Turkel here does nothing more than re-assert his claim, and says zero to
rebut my point that the Jews never calling God "abba" does not imply that
Jesus doing so is the same thing as Jesus calling himself God.
That could simply mean Jesus believed he had new superseding
revelation.
"could simply mean" is not enough! This needs to be addressed within
the proper socio-historial [sic] context, in which the ability to
contradict or modify existing revelation from God required, from a
human, a "thus sayeth the Lord" -- not merely an "I say unto you"!
That Jesus considered his authority greater than any previous human's is
simply not the same thing as Jesus clearly considering himself divine.
In the latest edition our critic merely claims, in essence, "Yes, I
have done enough, so there!"
Turkel substitutes [#misrep] a childish strawman for my actual argument:
that I've asserted a prima facie plausible alternative explanation, and
that the Trilemma is invalid if any such alternative is not rebutted.
Misc. claims -- in this category, "Jesus says (Mt 7:21ff) he will be
addressed in heaven as "Lord"; Jesus indicated (Mt 11:27) an exclusive
father-son relationship with God; Jesus claimed (Mt 9:2) the ability
to forgive sins; Jesus affirmed to the high priest that he is the
Christ; Jesus said (Mt 23:34) he sends prophets. I would now regard
the second as not as strong, but the rest remain [..] our critic has
not shown in any sense that these claims are consistent with merely
claiming to be a special prophet.
Each one of these passages is consistent with Jesus merely being a uniquely
special child of God, and none of them strictly implies that Jesus has
ontological equality with God. Turkel yet again misunderstands the
criteria for Trilemma[#] validity if he thinks that I need to "show"
anything other than prima facie plausibility for my claim.
Malina et al.'s conclusion is plainly not warranted by their
vague generalities. (Mark 8:27 is simply Jesus being evasive.)
Imagine that! Two NT scholars with recognized expertise in social
psychology of the ancient world are merely palming off "vague
generalities"
Argument from authority. If Turkel claims that Malina et al.'s conclusion
is warranted by their vague generalities, he should justify his claim. If
Turkel claims that they have some other convincing arguments derived from
their "expertise in social psychology of the ancient world", he should cite
those arguments. Reciting someone's credentials does not lend credibility
to an argument that on its face does not support its own conclusion.
and no, Jesus isn't a man of his world, but is committing a
21st-century tactical evasion!
It would be ludicrous to claim that evasiveness was impossible in the
ancient world.
It's ludicrous to claim that delusions were impossible in the
ancient world.
This is not what is said; what is said is that delusions would not
take the form, nor have the reaction, nor develop in the way our
critic requires for his thesis, in the ancient world.
No, Turkel's claim was a blanket statement about the entire "ancient
world":
The ancient world was not individualistic, but group-oriented.
Malina and Neyrey explain in Portraits of Paul that
group-oriented persons:
...rely on others to tell them who they are ("Who do
people say that I am?" Mark 8:27). Consequently, from
this perspective, modern questions of "consciousness"
(did Jesus know he was God? did Jesus have faith?...)
make no sense. For such questions are posited with the
freight of the individualistically oriented persons in
mind, and not in terms of the group-oriented persons of
antiquity, who depend on others to tell them who they
are, what is expected of them, and where they fit.
It's laughable to claim that the single quote of Mark 8:27 demonstrates
that Jesus was so "group-oriented" and non-individualistic that he could
never have a sincere but false belief.
That Jesus' delusions were mutually reinforcing with the beliefs
of his followers does not contradict my thesis. That Jesus could
not have been delusional because his culture was 'group-oriented'
is simply laughable.
You heard it fresh from the latest expert in ancient social
psychology, folks. Malina and Neyrey are just prattling in the wind,
and our critic knows better than a whole boatload of Malinas and
Neyreys. Trust him, it's laughable!
Turkel blatantly argues from authority, then pretends that I am doing the
same ("trust him") when in fact I claim it's obvious (to ANYONE, not just
ME) that the ancients could be just as delusional as we moderns. I defy
Turkel to cite a psychology reference work saying that the ancients could
not have the sort of sincere but false beliefs that we would classify as
delusional.
And don't even bother to explain how that square peg of
reinforcement fits into that round hole of a thesis, how such a
social shebang so contrary to deeply ingrained contemporary
social and religious values (to say nothing of the purity taboos
that would be enforced around a delusional Jesus) managed to
survive and grow
Turkel here presents a wonderful little case study in obfuscation. If
there's an argument somewhere in here that Jesus could not have been
delusional, I can't find it.
But is this any surprise? Our critic always seeks refuge in such
evasions when cornered; if it isn't a dead meme, it's fit to be
laughed at, and our man knows it better than anyone trained in
the field!
Turkel again offers first obfuscation and now generalizing [#childish]
bluster in place of actual argument. Rather than rebut the prima facie
laughability of the claim he cites, he instead pretends [#misrep] I'm
claiming to know what's laughable "better than anyone trained in the
field". Indeed, Turkel doesn't even quote Malina and Neyreys as saying
unambiguously that an ancient like Jesus could not ever have had a sincere
but false belief, so it's not even clear that Malina and Neyreys agree with
Turkel and not with me.
It's simply not the case that followers of deluded people always
act rationally and skeptically.
But they do act as their society dictates, and the ancient group
orientation and other social factors cannot be evaded by simply
snuffling, "They were just stupid and different than everyone else."
Yet another Turkel strawman [#misrep]. I of course do not claim that
everyone who was not a follower of Jesus always acted rationally and
skeptically.
The group orientation meant that anyone "hanging with" a deluded Jesus
would have been socially pressured to leave his company.
It's simply not the case that "social pressure" can be guaranteed to
prevent deluded people from having any followers. Of course, Turkel here
simply ignores the fact that the gospels report that Jesus and his
followers were indeed under various "social pressures".
in this society, again, the ritual uncleanness of mental illness --
associated especially as it was with demonic powers -- would have
driven away anyone that wasn't fast asleep!
It's ludicrous to claim that ancient attitudes about "the ritual
uncleanness of mental illness" could have guaranteed that anyone with
followers was certifiably free from delusion.
As usual our critic merely throws uninformed generalities in the air
with the assumption that the ancient world was no different than the
one down the road in his local grocery store.
More [#childish] Turkel bluster, followed by a feeble strawman [#misrep]
about grocery stores.
Our critic [..] offer[s] the thesis that the distance into the
sea described is one of those "exaggerations" to be taken out of
the pot and designated as such when convenient.
Turkel here pretends [#misrep] that water-walking isn't the very first
gospel episode that I've identified in our debate as an "exaggeration",
when in fact it is. If Turkel knows of other episodes that I've described
to him as "exaggerations", I defy him to quote me doing so.
Turkel of course does not let his readers see his defeat [#lose] on denying
the exaggeration:
Turkel tries to show that the text is not exaggerated by -- wait
for it -- quoting from the text itself! This again demonstrates
Turkel's clumsiness with the contextual subtleties that are so
critical to good scholarship. Episodes like this are no doubt the
reason why Turkel is too chicken to give his readers any way to
see my undoctored writings in this debate.
And Turkel here again slinks away from acknowledging his defeat [#lose] on
the issue of whether he begged the question (in our earlier discussion of
Jesus' divinity belief) by citing "walking on water, which the OT says that
only God can do". He evidently wants us to forget that he argued that Jesus
should have known from his miraculous powers that he was divine.
As predicted, the thesis is altered and tweaked as needed to make
the whole machine continue to work.
Another bizarre instance [#!win] of Turkel's notion that a successful
defense ("continue to work") of my thesis is somehow a victory for him.
there is nothing "confusing" (real quote) about the Trinity, or
about the dual nature, except to uneducated skeptics. (Our critic
calls this an "[a]rgument by (laughable) assertion" but naturally
this is the sum and total of his answer);
If the scholar Turkel claims that the notion of the Trinity has not been a
source of confusion and contention among Christians (as opposed to just
"uneducated skeptics"), then he is laughably ignorant. (Odds that he will
dare let his readers see the entirety of the previous sentence: 0.1%.)
I have said nothing about a "clear claim"; I have referred to a
direct claim (which in this context is indeed different from a
"clear" claim as it is both clear and strong;
Turkel does not let his readers see[#] my denial that I quoted 'clear' as
Turkel's word, giving further evidence of his lack of scholarly concern
with proper quotation. Turkel scrambles to invent a distinction between
'clear' and 'direct', claiming that 'direct' implies 'strong' but 'clear'
does not. Unfortunately for Turkel, Webster's defines 'clear' as
"unmistakable; unqualified; absolute" and 'direct' as "immediate", and no
support is evident for Turkel's distinction.
and as shown in the item on Wisdom (which our critic has no
answer for,
Demonstrably false. Turkel above even quotes PART of my answer, in which I
made an (unanswered) challenge for gospel Wisdom quotes that cannot be
interpreted as metaphor. Turkel did not dare let his readers see[#] the
rest of my answer: "The best of these is John writing that 'the Word was
made flesh' -- a very pretty metaphor, but simply not evidence that Jesus
claimed to be an omnipotent deity. The article also quotes Paul, but it
can't quote Paul quoting Jesus, since Paul never met Jesus."
Nothing in Turkel's Wisdom item demonstrates that it
would have been 'technically inaccurate and imprecise'
for Jesus to say at least one of [list of claims]
Note well, as our critic has not, that I have only said that one
particular claim -- "I am God!" -- would be technically
inaccurate and imprecise,
Demonstrably false. Turkel's essay still says, two sentences earlier: "a
claim like 'I am God!' would have been technically inaccurate and
imprecise". Turkel's phrase "a claim like" means that his statement applies
to other similar claims, and not just "that one particular claim".
In identifyting [sic] himself as Wisdom, Jesus did claim, in one
package, to be, as our critic complains, "divine ... omniscient
and omnipotent (which in the Wisdom context means, having access
to all power and knowledge via direct relationship with God;
Wisdom was always, as Jesus was, functionally subordinate to the
Father) .. ontologically equal to God ... God incarnate (more
properly, God's Wisdom incarnate) ... El/Yahweh made flesh"
(though as these were titles of the Father, actually not usable
in this context). Our critic has no way around these clear divine
claims,
The only "clear" claims here are Turkel's, not Jesus'. The claims I
proposed were
I am divine.
I am omniscient and omnipotent.
I am ontologically equal to God.
I am God incarnate.
I am El/Yahweh made flesh.
The obfuscating Turkel does not deny that Jesus never said any of these, or
indeed any other similar "I am .." statement. Yet Turkel baldly pretends
he has identified "these clear divine claims", when in fact not a single
such "I am .." claim has been quoted. I defy Turkel to complete this
sentence: "Jesus made a clear 'I am Y' claim to divinity in gospel verse
X", where Y is an actual reference to God or divinity, and not merely some
loose association with some vague phraseology that Turkel's tortured
exegesis claims to demonstrate is not an association but rather an actual
identification. The simple fact is that Turkel can name no such gospel
verse.
despite his best efforts to rob them of meaning or take them from
their source.
Turkel's claim is ridiculous. The gospel "sources" only quote Jesus
uttering the word "wisdom" four times:
"The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, 'Here is
a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and
"sinners." ' But wisdom is proved right by her actions." Mat
11:19, Luk 7:35
The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with this
generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the
earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom, and now one greater than
Solomon is here. Mat 12:42, Luk 11:31
God in his wisdom said, 'I will send them prophets and apostles,
some of whom they will kill and others they will persecute.' Luk
11:49
For I will give you words and wisdom that none of your
adversaries will be able to resist or contradict. Luk 21:15
None of these even approaches a clear or direct claim to divinity. If even
one of them WERE a clear or direct divinity claim, then Turkel would hardly
need a nine-page essay to prove it to be such.
one finds a lesser variety of Christological
titles in the works of Paul and the rest of
the NT
Lesser in variety, and no doubt more consistent in
claiming Jesus' divinity. This is precisely what my
thesis would predict.
No doubt more consistent? Try again: The Wisdom factor is the
same across the board;
Try again: the gospels never quote Jesus calling himself "the power of God
and the wisdom of God", as Paul says Jesus is in 1 Cor. 1:24.
the Son of Man title is not used
As my thesis would predict, since (as Turkel originally admitted) it is
vague as to divinity.
the sonship language is used across the board,
And such language neither necessarily constitutes, nor rules out, a claim
to divinity.
and bottom line, the thesis is under the wrecking ball yet again.
So sonship is similar, the Wisdom/Power language is much more direct, and
the vague Son of Man is not used. Bottom line: less variety, more
consistency, just as I predicted, and contrary to Turkel's impotent
"wrecking ball" bluster.
[our critic] finds it easy to speak as though Peter should have
stood firm and takes his failure as evidence of guilt and trauma
which inspired their faith
Plausible theses are indeed usually "easy to speak".
(which fails as well on the grounds that no one was expecting a
resurrection)!
They should have, if they indeed witnessed Jesus' alleged miracles,
believed his alleged "direct" divinity claims, and heard him say at least
four times (Mat 16:21, 17:23, 20:19; Luk 9:22, 18:33, 24:7, 24:46) that he
would "rise from the dead" or be "raised to life" "on the third day".
Turkel's linked essay in fact merely claims that Jesus' followers didn't
know his third-day "raising" would be bodily, but this is irrelevant to my
point: if they really had seen him claim and demonstrate divinity, they
should not have abandoned him while his omniscient predictions were still
all coming true.
Let's put our critic before the Roman gallows with a spear in his
left nostril -- I doubt if he'll do any better!
Turkel here unwittingly reinforces my point: I indeed would do no better,
because I -- like they -- have not had my salvation guaranteed by someone
I've personally witnessed as clearly claiming and demonstrating divinity.
On my matter of Jesus quoting Ps. 22, and thereby alluding to the
whole of it, including the triumphant ending, our critic [..]
merely repeats yet again in the latest response in different
words, suggesting merely convenient re-interpretation on our
part, and "maybe Jesus used it in an entirely different way than
the meaning that was otherwise universally known and accepted":
Turkel here debates against a strawman argument [#misrep] and dresses it in
quotation marks as if I might have acceded to the ridiculous claim that it
was "universally known" that any utterance of "why have you abandoned me?"
is in fact a proclamation of triumph. Turkel here dares not let his readers
see[#] my actual argument: "it's silly to claim that the crucified Jesus
would necessarily have been unable to use in its literal sense any phrase
that begins a Psalm (or perhaps any phrase from the entire Old
Testament!)."
what on earth he did say that could have been
mistakenly remembered as the distinctive
first line of Ps. 22.
The answer is obviously: anything else indicating
despair at abandonment or betrayal.
Oh, really? Find us a contemporary expression of despair at
abandonemnt [sic] /betrayal with enough linguistic/structural
features similar to the first line of Ps. 22
My point was clearly that Jesus might have said something with similar
meaning to Ps 22:1 but with DIFFERENT words. Is Turkel now going to expand
his claim to say that nobody who had ever heard Ps 22 could have possibly
used any SYNONYM of 'abandon' in its literal sense? What OTHER simple
phrases does Turkel think cannot have ever been used literally due to their
appearance in Psalms? Is this (conveniently) the only one, or does he have
a list?
as it is, just throwing "anything else" in the air is an
admission that the critic has no actual answer
If he thinks that my "anything else" cannot trivially be expanded to a
myriad of options, then the scholar Turkel betrays an unfamiliarity with
not only dictionaries but thesauri. Here is but a sample of phrases that
the dying Nazarene carpenter might actually have said and that are
"[some]thing else indicating despair at abandonment or betrayal":
* Why have you rejected me?
* Why have you renounced me?
* Why do you not save me?
* Why have you betrayed me?
* Why do you not rescue me?
* Why did you let me come to this?
* Why have you left me alone here?
* Why have you cast me aside?
* Why do you not defend me?
* Why have you disowned me?
* Why do you not deliver me?
On the issue of Lazarus, Turkel does not dare let the readers of his essay
see[#] that its charge of "circular reasoning" has been annihilated:
"[Turkel] calls my naturalistic explanation 'circular reasoning' simply
because it encompasses all of the relevant evidence. Consistency is not the
same thing as circularity."
there is no evidence that such fantastic
claims were never disputed
Christianity took decades and centuries to become a
significant force, and so not many people would have
cared until the evidence was gone.
This is simply irrelevant
It's ludicrous to say that the passage of decades and centuries is
irrelevant to whether reports of an event can be convincingly disputed.
("significant" in what way, and to what effect?),
(Like a student called to answer a question he doesn't know, Turkel just
stalls for time.) Obviously: "significant" enough that enough people would
have cared enough to "dispute" Christianity's "fantastic claims". (OK, next
evasion?)
and in the latter case, absolutely false, merely an uncritical
acceptance of Carrier;
Turkel hallucinates [#misrep] that I cited Carrier on what is actually an
elementary fact of history.
see here factor 13, for a response. [which says] In a society
where nothing escaped notice, there was indeed every reason to
suppose that people hearing the Gospel message would check
against the facts
Turkel ignores the obvious point that if someone in Jerusalem six months
after the crucifixion satisfies himself that the resurrection story is not
credible, that investigation could easily be of little use to someone
hearing the resurrection story decades later and perhaps hundreds of miles
away. The Jesus movement had every reason to compose and preserve their
gospels and epistles; does Turkel think that an Anti-Jesus Movement arose
in parallel to preserve skeptical findings?
The Christian side of the story had a better chance of being
preserved than the anti-Christian side.
In substance and value this is no better than Acharya S with her wild
fantasies of suppressed and destroyed documents and an immensely
begged question.
Turkel here offers a feeble (non-)refutation by association, and dares not
actually assert that the anti-Christian side of the story had an equal
chance of being preserved.
Moreover, we have ample amounts of material telling the non-Christian
side of the story;
I defy Turkel to present any (let alone an "ample") amount of
anti-Christian material that is contemporaneous with people who would have
been resurrection eyewitnesses. The earliest anti-Christian writings I've
heard of are described at
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~humm/Topics/JewishJesus/. Of these, none are
dated to the first century, and two (Toledoth Yeshu and the Jewish slander
reported by Tertullian) indeed claim the empty tomb was faked.
our critic however will merely do as done above and assume that the
opponents weren't of good enough caliber to do the job.
I said nothing about the opponents' "caliber"; I rather said that not
enough people would have cared until the evidence was gone. Unable to
handle my actual argument, Turkel substitutes a flimsy strawman [#misrep].
Nevertheless, Matthew 28 DOES report (and of course denies) a
widespread story that the empty tomb was faked.
It does, and how does this help our critic?
Obviously, by directly contradicting Turkel's claim that "there is no
evidence that such fantastic claims [as Lazarus' resurrection] were never
disputed". (Turkel obviously meant "ever disputed", but double negation
apparently taxes his grasp of elementary logic. :-)
It doesn't -- we would expect some explanation to emerge; that resort
was made to a ludicrous "stolen body" line merely shows that, as often
comes from critics, they had no better explanation to offer than one
that was manifestly absurd on its face.
Turkel baldly and inexplicably asserts that the stolen-body theory is
"ludicrous", "manifestly absurd on its face", and doesn't count as an
"explanation". If he can assert this with a straight face, one wonders why
he bothers debating this subject at all, since it's hard to imagine how
even most Christians would agree with this ridiculous assessment. It's more
likely that Turkel saw he was near the end of a 33-page essay that almost
no visitor to his web site would be reading, and so he just wilted under
the weight of my arguments and couldn't bring himself to attempt an actual
rebuttal.
If we believed in 'trained sorcerers', we wouldn't necessarily be
interested in disproving the alleged miracles of an alleged
sorcerer.
Yes we would, because in disproving the miracles, we disprove the
person's capacity as a sorceror [sic]!
Turkel here misses the obvious point that people who disbelieve in sorcery
are more likely to be skeptical that someone is a sorcerer than people who
do not disbelieve in sorcery.
there is now as much superstition and ignorance as there was in
ancient times [..] and it is not merely a matter of lack of info
as our critic claims, for there was no lack of information
concerning the possibility of naturalism.
There was indeed a HUGE lack of information concerning the PROBABILITY of
naturalism: namely, 1) the lack before Darwin of any naturalistic
explanation for all the apparent design in the biological world, and 2) the
lack before neuroscience of any naturalistic explanation for the universe's
most complex known phenomenon: the human mind.
He is equating ignorance with stupidity, and tarring the ancients
with that brush, and then trying to fudge by separating the two
and claiming he's only criticizing for one but not the other.
After I tell him he mistakenly calls it "backpedal[ing]" to deny his
misrepresentation of my position, Turkel merely repeats his
misrepresentation [#misrep] and repeats his claim that to deny his
misrepresentation is to "fudge". He does not dare let his readers see[#]
the text of my charge that
he is trying to equate "ignorance" -- i.e. not having certain
information -- with something like congenital stupidity, in vain
effort to justify his ad hominem attack on me as a "bigot"
and instead absurdly claims that *I* am the one "equating ignorance with
stupidity"! The equating is only in Turkel's mind, as he goes on to show:
That just won't work. The relationship between knowledge and
critical capacity is non-severable.
The latter statement is laughable. There is no evidence that humans of any
era have had any differences in critical capacity, but it is simply
undeniable that knowledge is cumulative and that later humans have access
to more of it than earlier humans did. Of course, the inerrantist Turkel
seems not to believe in modern biology or modern cosmology or perhaps even
in Copernican heliocentrism, so we should not be surprised if he thinks
that knowledge has been static for the last 2000 years! If he's interested
in educating himself as to what humanity currently knows, he should read my
book _Human Knowledge_ (available at http://humanknowledge.net).
Turkel here contradicts himself, by noting that the
ancients were credulous about people (not just Jesus)
being 'trained sorcerers', and then asserting the
ancients 'were no more ready to accept wild claims than
we are'.
I have shown no such inconsistency; our critic has merely begged
the question again -- this time against sorcery!
Turkel can only be consistent here if he is willing to say that a modern
claim that someone is a "trained sorcerer" is not a "wild" claim. Does the
creationist Turkel also believe that sorcery can be trained? Does he think
Harry Potter is a documentary?
Turkel does not dare let his readers see[#] my annihilation of his claim
that "there is now as much superstition and ignorance as there was in
ancient times". I wrote:
Turkel's claim about ignorance and superstition can be
demonstrated as false merely by citing the major phenomena that
the ancients believed were supernaturally caused:
* the daily cycle of the Sun; the motions of the Moon and
planets;
* the seasons; rivers, currents, winds, thunder, lightning,
precipitation and drought;
* the genesis, design, and diversity of life; success in
farming and hunting;
* the human mind; evil, misfortune, disease, pestilence, war,
and death.
Of course, Turkel is at something of a disadvantage here, as he
presumably still believes that some of the above are
supernaturally caused.
MISSING EVIDENCE FOR CHRISTIANITY
On this topic, Turkel runs out of steam and does not even respond to (or
let his readers see[#]) my point that
1) The lack of reference in Paul's letters (c. 58CE) to the
gospels, and their allusions to Rome's fall in 70CE, date them to
decades after the events. 2) The gospels are generally considered
anonymous, and even apologists admit that only two could have
been first-hand. 3) Unlike e.g. Caesar, Jesus himself left no
known writings.
Turkel asserts:
"describe a Jesus able to work hometown miracles" -- see above, it is
not an issue of not being able to do them with reference to ability
As demonstrated to Turkel above in my lesson about elementary logic, it
most certainly IS an issue of ability.
"describe a Jesus whose family never thought him 'mad', and who were
his most ardent believers instead of the object of his apparent
resentment" -- well, that's what they became after the resurrection,
what more does this man want?!?
Turkel dares not let his readers see[#] my devastating rejoinder: "Turkel
here seems unable to read. I wrote precisely what I 'want': 'a Jesus whose
family never thought him 'mad' etc."
"describe a Jesus more self-differentiated from the primitive tribal
deity of the Hebrew Torah" -- [..] a begged question concerning, now,
the Old Testament? (We are told to read the critic's book again, if we
"dare" -- again, send a free copy, and we will.)
Turkel does not dare let his readers see[#] my points that
Turkel mistakenly assumes that a NEW question counts as a
"begged" question. [..] overwhelmingly more Christians take the
gospels literally than take the Torah literally.
My book is available online at http://humanknowledge.net -- a web site to
which I've included a link in every email and rebuttal to Turkel, and to
which Turkel is evidently afraid to refer his readers.
(Our critic also failed to answer a reply sent to him, making the
point that a person could no more be "99% sinless" that one could be
"99% pregnant".)
Turkel's disposable one-line "reply" can hardly be said to merit an
"answer", but for the record I demolish this puny point and reiterate my
unrebutted argument in a separate posting, available on Usenet under "Best
Argument for Justness of Hell". Will Turkel's "encyclopedia" entry on Hell
ever address my arguments? Don't hold your breath.
Turkel also doesn't dare let his readers see[#] my point that "the gospel
accounts could portray a Jesus/Yahweh/El who is not so petulantly defensive
about his anemic inability to provide convincing evidence of his
existence", and goes on to write:
Our critic points to "supernatural patterns [in cosmological or
quantum phenomena] or ongoing miracles [such as prophecy or
communication with a spirit world]" -- apparently he is unaware of the
existence of people who would more readily attribute such signs to
aliens than to Jesus;
Turkel is "apparently unaware" of enough basic science to know that
scientists would readily explain to such people that no alien technology
could possibly 1) re-arrange galaxies at opposite ends of the observable
universe (thus violating relativity, momentum and mass-energy conservation,
etc.), or 2) eliminate the randomness from quantum phenomena (thus
violating the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, the laws of thermodynamics,
etc.).
conceptually, this entire argument is refuted in detail here.
Turkel offers up yet another essay as a (ninth!) sacrificial lamb. The
slaughter is relatively easy, as the essays says
others around the world have time to fill the omen with their own
meaning which they may be hard-pressed to give up when
missionaries arrive to fill in the details.
This of course would not be an issue for a message with layers, as has long
been envisioned by SETI researchers -- and as would be obvious to an
omniscient deity. If Turkel is unfamiliar with the discipline called
anticryptography (making messages that decode themselves), he can always
rent the movie Contact to see a Turkel-understandable example.
What of blind people? Why should they believe such a message is
written on the moon [..]?
Turkel's question is utterly specious. The only blind people who would not
believe a cosmological message are those who would refuse to believe any
astronomy or cosmology whatsoever.
how would one convert in turn the man who thinks that "Jesus
Lives" because he was raised by space aliens?
A total non-issue for the kind of layered, detailed message that an
omniscient omnipotent deity could create (but that Turkel apparently cannot
even begin to imagine).
the complaint is misplaced to begin with, under the paradigm that
being a member of the body of Christ is not merely a process that
starts and stops at conversion but continues throughout life with
the process of discipleship and fellowship
Turkel here simply and blatantly dodges the issue of evidence.
these suggestions would compel a "forced" choice rather than one
made freely
This Divine Shyness argument is of course is the saddest argument of
theists. I suspect it is quite modern, and that historians will say that
it marked the beginning of the end of philosophical theism. The presumably
recent vintage of this argument shows that theists have lost much of their
confidence in their position since roughly a millennium ago, when they
believed they had multiple independent philosophical arguments that
absolutely proved God's existence.
The Divine Shyness argument is refuted by Christianity's own texts.
El/Yahweh had no compunction about "forcing" belief with all his Old
Testament miracles (that were so petulantly primitive and so obviously
constrained by ancient pre-scientific imagination). Jesus similarly had no
compunction about "forcing" belief with his New Testament miracles (which,
happening during a time with far better historical records, were not
coincidentally much more modest than the OT's miracles).
Apologists cannot have it both ways. Either first-hand witness of miracles
is a "forcing" of belief, or it is a non-forcing level of evidence whose
denial to the rest of us is immoral (given the punishment for non-belief).
We are also repeatedly told from skeptical circles that one could
not possibly worship a "monster" like the Biblical God of the OT.
Now if that is so, are Blue Fairies any help at all?
Turkel here misses the obvious point, already explained to him by me under
this very heading of "Missing Evidence", that the requisite evidence would
indeed include a disavowal of the incriminating parts of the Torah.
The Christian paradigm does have a "Blue Fairy" -- the Holy
Spirit. [The] "best case" scenario is fulfilled already. We are
left with that non-believers must simply deny that the Spirit is
convicting them
So Turkel's candidate for the best possible objective, scientific evidence
for Christianity is -- wait for it! -- the "Holy Spirit"! To ask for
better evidence is to "simply deny that the Spirit is convicting" me.
Hilarious!
One may as well suggest that there would have been no concern had
there been infertility suffered by the parents of Martin Luther
King, Ludwig van Beethoven, or Karl Marx. (The matter here is not
an issue of appealing to the vanity of a local tribal deity, but
of instigating an event whose effects play out on a vaster scale,
something our critic still can't comprehend,
Turkel here obfuscates instead of daring let his readers see[#] my point
that his "reasoning here is circular. These figures were important WITHOUT"
any fertility issues, whereas such issues were the alleged instigator of
Abraham's importance.
and is unlikely to, as he is too ingrained in bigotry [i.e., male
circumcision, a rite of passage in many cultures who consider it
important, is no more than "a cynical appeal to the sick fetish
of the local tribal deity"] to do so.)
Turkel again spews his ad hominem [#childish] charge of "bigotry",
apparently unaware that slavery too had "many cultures who consider it
important". Would Turkel call it "bigotry" to condemn slavery, or female
clitoral mutilation in Africa, or binding women's feet in China, or burning
widows alive in India?
the evidence is more than sufficient as it stands [..] the
problem is not just one of the head, but also the heart -- and
that is why more people aren't believers, and some fewer are
inerrantists!
If "the evidence is more than sufficient", and "the Holy Spirit" is busy
"convict[ing] persons of the truth", then presumably either Satan is
actively corrupting all the non-believers' "hearts", or God created man's
"heart" with an inadequate Spirit receptivity (and then bungled the
'recall' attempted via The Flood). This sort of conspiracy-think and
anti-humanism is of course necessary for being a fundamentalist
Christian...
The point Turkel misses here is that the gospels
shouldn't need convoluted essays to try to obfuscate or
explain away their internal prima facie
inconsistencies.
The Gospels don't need the essays; it is the uninformed and
bigoted critic that needs them to cure themselves of reading the
Bible like it was a newspaper.
Turkel again spews [#childish] insults and then seemingly admits that the
gospels are not even as inerrant as a fallible human newspaper.
Central and simple facts like Jesus dying at Jerusalem offer no
margin of viable expression, unlike a complex chain of events
such as involved the resurrection narratives, which are also,
unlike a simple fact-statement, subject to the limitations of
such constraints as writing space, audience interest, and
authroial [sic] purpose; our critic is comparing apples and
oranges yet again!
Turkel prattles about "apples and oranges", but doesn't dare let his
readers see[#] the other "apples" that I compared to the "apple" of the
locus of Jesus' crucifixion: Jesus' genealogy (i.e. paternal grandfather's
name), Jesus' birth city, and the number of years of Jesus' ministry. Each
of these is indeed a "central and simple fact" with no "margin of viable
expression", but the gospels simply botch the job of getting these facts
straight.
--
br...@holtz.org
http://humanknowledge.net