Tough Questions Answered: How Did Paul Find Common Ground with Greek Intellectuals in Acts 17?

This is my reply to a Tough Questions Answered article entitled

           

How Did Paul Find Common Ground with Greek Intellectuals in Acts 17?

Posted: 25 Aug 2017 06:00 AM PDT

Darrell Bock, in Acts, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament, provides an excellent analysis of Paul’s speech to the Athenian Areopagus in Acts 17. Bock demonstrates how the beginning of Paul’s oration found common ground with his Greek audience. By studying Paul’s technique, we can learn how to find common ground with members of our culture who are biblically illiterate.

And the desire to find common ground makes it seem you don't believe the Holy Spirit will be quite as successful with your audience without this secular persuasion technique.  This tells me that at least unconsciously you believe there's nothing more to your selling of God to others, than there is when Arnie sells a used car.  If the Holy Spirit can convict of sin without the human speaker establishing common ground with the unbeliever, why did Paul wish to seek common ground?  Could it be that this is the expected fruit of a man who thinks God can be assisted by employment of secular psychological tactics?

snip

    In addition, ‘we are his offspring’ (γένος ἐσμέν, genos esmen). The expression that we are God’s offspring comes from another pagan poet, Aratus (ca. 315–240 BC), Phaenomena 5 (some scholars also note Cleanthes, Hymn to Zeus; Marshall 1980: 289; but Fitzmyer 1998: 611 rejects a connection to Cleanthes). Paul explicitly notes this connection in introducing the citation as coming from ‘some of your poets.’ Paul is working with ideas in the Greek world that are familiar to the Athenians and only alludes to Scripture in his speech instead of quoting it directly. The text from Aratus, as Paul uses it, recognizes the shared relationship all people have to God.

Paul was also taking it out of context, since the immediate context Aratus gave, clearly indicates the god is Zeus and "offspring" meant humans are little gods:

 PHAENOMENA, TRANSLATED BY G. R. MAIR 
[1] From Zeus let us begin; him do we mortals never leave unnamed; full of Zeus are all the streets and all the market-places of men; full is the sea and the havens thereof; always we all have need of Zeus. For we are also his offspring; and he in his kindness unto men giveth favourable signs and wakeneth the people to work, reminding them of livelihood. He tells what time the soil is best for the labour of the ox and for the mattock, and what time the seasons are favourable both for the planting of trees and for casting all manner of seeds. For himself it was who set the signs in heaven, and marked out the constellations, and for the year devised what stars chiefly should give to men right signs of the seasons, to the end that all things might grow unfailingly. Wherefore him do men ever worship first and last. Hail, O Father, mighty marvel, mighty blessing unto men. Hail to thee and to the Elder Race! Hail, ye Muses, right kindly, every one! But for me, too, in answer to my prayer direct all my lay, even as is meet, to tell the stars.

What would you do if you found out that in the immediate context of the pagan poem Paul quoted, Aratus was talking about people being the children of Zeus?

Would you continue asserting what you've confidently asserted your whole life, namely, that the person who takes a text out of context has engaged in obvious wrong-doing?

Or did you suddenly discover, just now, that taking things out of context can sometimes be a good thing? When is the last time you ever entertained such a stupid notion that taking things out of context could ever be acceptable? 

 

There's no denying Paul took Aratus out of context, so instead of doing the obvious and concluding Paul was wrong to take something out of context, just like you always insist this is wrong for everybody else to do, you instead insist that this act which everybody has always agreed is always wrong, an act that you've used to definitively prove the dishonesty of skeptics and cultists, and now you get a flash of knowledge that perhaps taking something out of context isn't necessarily always indicative of stupidity or dishonesty.

If Paul believed Hebrews 4:12 or the same as that verse, that the word of God is alive and powerful, would he have attempted to find common ground with the pagans by quoting their own devilish polytheistic and fictional literature?

Isn't it more likely that, if Paul believed the same as Hebrews 4:12, he would have concluded that finding common ground is the less forceful way to convince pagans, and the clear settled word of God is the most powerful took in his arsenal to fight through their ingrained paganism?

When you evangelize a Hindu, do you try to find common ground by quoting something from the Vedas? Stupid, right?

If any of this Acts 17 scene is historically true, then Paul clearly had less faith in the revealed word of God to convict pagans of their error, than he had in the purely naturalistic approach of establishing common ground with them. But there is no common ground possible anyway:

15 Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever?
16 Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? (2Co 6:15-16 NAU)

 

Conservative Inerrantist commentators agree Paul was quoting a text that was originally about Zeus, see "Ashamed of the Gospel (3rd Edition): When the Church Becomes Like the World", By John MacArthur, Crossway Pub. 2010, p. 159), so you don't have the option of saying this part of Aratus' poem was inspired by God.

A Christian professor of classics admits that Paul did not use this quotation according to its originally intended Stoic sense:

It is noteworthy that Aratus commences his poem with the words, "let us begin with Zeus," for the gods who were conventionally invoked by Greek poets were the Muses, the goddesses of poetic inspiration. Aratus' contemporaries would have been struck by this change, by which the poet lends a religious Stoic tenor into the Phaenomena. To ancient Greeks Zeus was the sky-god whose control over the sun and clouds directly concerned human beings; mention of him at the outset of a work on constellations and weather is therefore appropriate. For Hellenistic Stoics, however, Zeus was another name for that force which controlled the universe and resided in man and beast. It is a kind of pantheism which Aratus advances in these opening lines:the divine Reason permeates every facet of human endeavour. The city-streets and market-places, the seas and harbours are filled with the presence of this deity (lines 2-3). Zeus must be praised at the start of his poem because this "world-soul" controls the cosmos. Mankind is, according to such belief, part of that environment and so "is indebted to Zeus." The omnipotence of Zeus is expressed with the words "for we are indeed his offspring." Literally the poet states that we are of the race (genos) of Zeus. Thus the ancient weather-god, once depicted in anthropomorphic terms, is replaced by the Stoics with an abstract force which pervades the entire world.

Having noted the context of the half-verse "for we are indeed his offspring," the reader will conclude that the apostle Paul does not quote this passage in complete agreement with its meaning and intent, but in order to show that even to some Greek thinkers and writers the idea of an anthropomorphic Zeus is false.

Verses 24-31 of chapter 17 clarify Paul's use of the quotation in declaring the gospel of repentance to the Athenians. When he cites the saying that man is God's offspring, Paul employs the words in light of God's self-revelation in the Old Testament. Mankind was created in the image and likeness of God, as revealed in Genesis 1 :26-27. Paul does not give the phrase "for we are indeed His offspring" the meaning which Stoics do; rather, he uses it to preach that God abhors idolatrous worship. Paul had stated earlier in his speech that God does not "live in shrines made by man" (24). After quoting Aratus the apostle says that the Deity is not "like gold, or silver, or stone" (25). Surely Paul has in mind the second commandment here, as stated, for example, in Leviticus 26:1 "you shall make for yourselves no idols and erect no graven image or pillar, and you shall not set up a figured stone in your land." The Stoics had rightly reasoned that if mankind is the offspring of God, then the living God cannot be represented by an inanimate object. Paul himself writes elsewhere that God's eternal power and deity are visible in creation (Romans 1 :20). And in yet another context the apostle restates in general terms what he says specifically to the Athenian populace in Acts 17: "What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, 'I will live in them and move among them' (2 Corinthians 6:16)." Thus on the Areopagus Paul points out that the Athenians had exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man.

Verses 24-31 also makes clear that Paul does not adopt the Stoic theology of a guiding principle as expressed by Aratus; the apostle depicts God as the Creator, whose person is real. In verse 25 the missionary reminds his listeners that God is the creator of the universe, who has no need of human idolatrous adoration. Here Paul may have in mind Psalm 50:7-15, where the Lord states that He does not require sacrifices from mortals, for all the world and everything in it is His by virtue of His work of creation. And to underscore the personal quality of the true God Paul states that God has "overlooked" the times of ignorance (30), "commands" all men to repent (31), since He has fixed a day when He "will judge" (31) the world by Christ whom He "has appointed" (31). Thus the apostle in no way identifies with Stoic or Epicurean theology, but declares the God who is Creator and Judge.

Do you agree with this professor that "the apostle Paul does not quote this passage in complete agreement with its meaning and intent"?

If so, what else are you doing when you quote a passage not in complete agreement with its meaning and intent, except quoting it out of context?

The desire to vindicate Paul regardless of how good the evidence against him is, is rather difficult to resist, amen?

 

Clement of Alexandria believed Paul was quoting from Aratus.  From Stomata, Book 1, ch. XIX:

Since, then, the Greeks are testified to have laid down some true opinions, we may from this point take a glance at the testimonies. Paul, in the Acts of the Apostles, is recorded to have said to the Areopagites, “I perceive that ye are more than ordinarily religious. For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with the inscription, To The Unknown God. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you. God, that made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, seeing He giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; and hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek God, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him; though He be not far from every one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we also are His offspring.”
Whence it is evident that the apostle, by availing himself of poetical examples from the Phenomena of Aratus, approves of what had been well spoken by the Greeks; and intimates that, by the unknown God, God the Creator was in a roundabout way worshipped by the Greeks; but that it was necessary by positive knowledge to apprehend and learn Him by the Son. 

Does a pagan take Genesis 1:1 out of context by using it to show that Zeus created the world?  If so, then necessarily, by the same logic, you believe that when Paul quoted a pagan text about Zeus for the proposition that the biblical god is the father of all people, he was taking that pagan text out of context. 

 

Either way, the revealed word of God provides plenty of ammo to fight against ingrained paganism, so Paul's attempt to evangelize using more methods than simply the sure-fire word of God, indicates his lack of faith that God's word is powerful. You don't see Peter coddling the scruples of any Jews in Acts 2, do you? Apparently, successful evangelism of those most against the gospel does not require establishing any common ground whatsoever.

Augustine didn't hold back from admitting Paul quoted Aratus out of context.  From Schaff's edition, Augustine, Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles, Homily 38  Acts 17:16, 17:

 And he does not say, “Through Him,” but, what was nearer than this, “In him.” - That poet said nothing equal to this, “For we are His offspring.” He, however, spake it of Jupiter, but Paul takes it of the Creator, not meaning the same being as he, God forbid! but meaning what is properly predicated of God: just as he spoke of the altar with reference to Him, not to the being whom they worshiped. As much as to say, “For certain things are said and done with reference to this (true God), but ye know not that they are with reference to Him.” For say, of whom would it be properly said, “To an Unknown God?” Of the Creator, or of the demon? Manifestly of the Creator: because Him they knew not, but the other they knew. Again, that all things are filled (with the presence) - of God? or of Jupiter - a wretch of a man, a detestable impostor! But Paul said it not in the same sense as he, God forbid! but with quite a different meaning. For he says we are God’s offspring, i.e. God’s own, His nearest neighbors as it were. 

DeSilva cites E. Ferguson's noting the pantheistic nature of the Aratus quote: 

E. Ferguson notes another conceptual similarity to be the idea of kinship with the divine. 29 The citation from Aratus in Acts 17:28 (“for we are of his offspring”) documents the Stoic concept 30 as does, for example, Epictetus, who speaks of Zeus as the father of humankind (whom Odysseus even regarded as a personal father-like guardian). 31 Paul’s similar statement in Gal 3:26 (“for you are all children of God”) distinguishes itself from the Stoic counterpart by the addition of “in Christ Jesus” and “through faith” as the qualifiers. For the Stoic, there were no qualifiers on kinship with the divine, a relationship all held to the deity by virtue of being the deity’s workmanship together with the rest of nature. Similarly the Stoics held that all parts of the universe formed a whole, and to describe this they employed the metaphor of a body and its component members. 32

29 29. Ferguson, Backgrounds 293.

30 30. Aratus Phaenomena 5.

31 31. Epictetus Dissertations 3.24.

32 32. Cf. ibid. 2.10.4-5; Seneca Ep. 95.52: “All that you behold, that which comprises both god and man, is one—we are the parts of one great body,” cited by Fee, First Corinthians 602.

 JETS 38/4 (December 1995 ) 554,

"Paul And The Stoa: A Comparison", David A. Desilva*

The Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society.

1998 (electronic edition.). Garland, TX: Galaxie Software. 

In 1995 David deSilva was assistant professor of NT

and Greek at Ashland Theological Seminary 

J.D. Charles admits Paul's source is Aratus, and that similar language is found in other Stoics, but the point is that the fundie Christian cannot escape Paul taking Aratus out of context merely by whining that Paul's dependence on specifically Aratus for the quote isn't concretely established:  The Stoic view was pantheistic, so it doesn't matter if Paul was quoting any of them directly or indirectly, he still took the pantheistic statement out of context, given the pantheistic intentions of the Stoic authors writing such stuff.  When you quote a Stoic view of God to get Stoic interested in hearing your perspective, you are leaving them with the false impression that you approve of the theology in the quote, and indeed, Paul nowhere expresses or implies that the pantheistic Stoic view is incorrect:

The second citation, “We are his offspring,” stems from the third-century BC Stoic philosopher Aratus, who, significantly, hailed from Paul’s native Cilicia. Aratus penned these words in a poem in honor of Zeus. Titled Phaenomena, the poem is an interpretation of constellations and weather signs. It reads that “in all things each of us needs Zeus, for we are also his offspring.” Without question, “his offspring” is sure to resonate with any Stoic present in the audience.67

----67 “Phaen 5. It is difficult to confine with precision these words to Aratus of Soli alone, given the fact that this language appears in numerous ancient sources. For example, the words of Cleanthes, another third-century BC. Stoic, are comparable: “You, O Zeus, are praised above all gods… Unto you may all flesh speak, for we are your offspring” (the text is reproduced in M. Pohlenz, “Kleanthes Zeushymnus,” Hermes 75 [1940] 117–23). Similarly, the third-century BC poet Callimachus, in a hymn “To Zeus,” speaks of humankind as “offspring of the earth” (Hymns, Epigrams, Select Fragments [Baltimore/London: Johns Hopkins University, 1988] 3).

"Engaging the (Neo)Pagan Mind:   Paul’s Encounter with Athenian Culture as a Model for Cultural Apologetics"  (Acts 17:16–34, J. Daryl Charles, TrinJ 16:1 (Spring 1995) 58,
Trinity Journal. 1998 (electronic edition.). Deerfield, IL: Trinity Seminary.

If Paul has no problem quoting pagan literature out of context, what exactly is wrong with concluding that he likely didn't have a problem quoting the OT out of context either? If Paul didn't think he did something wrong in taking Aratus out of context, he likely wouldn't believe that taking the OT texts out of context was something wrong either.

 

 Paul even misquoted the sign "to the unknown god", as Jerome says that sign had read "to the unknown gods" plural, and he says Paul changed it to a singular god to make the intended comparison easier to maintain than it really was. 

 

 In Jerome's Commentary on Titus 1:12, Jerome says the signs in question would have been in the plural, such as "To the Gods of Asia and Europe and Africa, to unknown and strange gods":

It has often been discussed whether Paul took a certain degree of “homiletical license” in his reference to the inscription “to an unknown god.” Jerome thought so, arguing in his Commentary on Titus (1:12) that there were altars in Athens dedicated to “unknown gods” and that Paul had adapted the plural “gods” to the singular “god” in light of his monotheistic sermon.78 Pagan writers also attested to the presence of altars “to unknown gods” but always in the plural. For instance, the Traveler Pausanias, writing in the middle of the second century A.D., described the presence of altars to gods of unknown names on the road from Phalerum to Athens and an altar “to unknown gods” at Olympia.79 Written in the third century, Philostratus’s Life of Apollonius of Tyana also refers to these Athenian altars “to unknown gods.”80 There is thus ample literary evidence that Paul did not fabricate his allusion, that there were in fact such altars in Athens. Whether they were invariably inscribed in the plural or whether there was one dedicated to a single “unknown god” remains an open question.

Polhill, J. B. (2001, c1992). Vol. 26: Acts (electronic ed.). Logos Library System;
The New American Commentary (Page 371). Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

  snip

In like manner, when we engage anyone with the truths of Christianity, we must find common ground first.

That doesn't cohere with biblical statements that God's word is powerful on its own (Isaiah 55:10-11, Hebrews 4:12) and conflicts with Peter's alleged ability to successfully evangelize Jews without needing to coddle their scruples in Acts 2.   Really now, if you think you need to quote something from the Vedas to establish common ground with the Hindu you are attempting to evangelize, you are saying you think the Holy Spirit can be helped with secular persuasion techniques.  But if the Holy Spirit truly is moving through your preaching, it is highly unlikely that he needs you to employ naturalistic bridging-tactics to successfully convict them of their sin.

Cold Case Christianity: selling god to the kids Disney-style

This is my reply to an article by J. Warner Wallace entitled

Help Young Christians Make the Case for God's Existence

 

Hello

Susie and I are excited to announce our next children's book, God's Crime Scene for Kids.

...We tried to write the book that we wish we had when our kids were young; a book that will encourage children to be thoughtful believers and give them confidence that all creation is the work of our Glorious Creator. 

Yeah, because despite your spiritually mature understanding as an adult currently, you still don't believe, and never did believe, that the bible alone is a sufficient guide for faith and practice.  If you don't help the Holy Spirit via employment of typical marketing gimmicks learned from secular child psychology, the Holy Spirit probably won't be able to convert as many kids to Jesus as he wants to.

We're excited about the new book, but we're even more excited about our new, updated Case Makers Academy! This interactive website will provide your kids with the opportunity to learn from Detective Allen Jeffries by watching chapter videos, printing out and completing chapter fill-in and activity sheets, and even earning their own Graduation Certificate:

You should be more excited about the fact that God doesn't need your help, and therefore, God will accomplish all He needs to through you if all you do is simply preach from a bible.  Really James, you give every appearance of using Christianity to make money, as Benny Hinn.  Only with you, its not the prosperity gospel or absurdly heretical theology, but "apologetics". 

If you say God is using you in new and exciting ways, we have to decide, as readers, whether this is true, or if it is more likely that your ceaseless promotion of yourself by promoting your views of Christianity testifies that you are in this game for little more reason than to make money.

...Thousands of kids have already completed the Case Makers Academy and they're proud to display their graduation certificates. Check out our Honor Cadet page to see what we mean, and be sure to join our Family Facebook Page to add your cadets to the team.

Yeah, because the biblical teaching that Christian kids are part of the body of Christ, isn't sufficiently eye-catching or interesting for the Holy Spirit to use today....what he was apparently otherwise able to do for more than 20 centuries without your involvement and with no need to imitate secular cartoons.        

A Special Introductory Offer!

And you want your salivating followers to think you are NOT employing typical marketing techniques to sell God?  FUCK YOU.

To celebrate the release of our new book, we've created a special offer for those who want to start the Academy. If you purchase God's Crime Scene for Kids before October 1st, we will send you a FREE digital copy of God's Crime Scene (the adult version) so you can read along with your kids (and use the Parent Guides on the Case Makers Academy).

But if this digital copy for adults is a good idea to supplement the kid's crime scene book, some would argue that because the Holy Spirit is supposed to get all the credit anyway and NOT you, you should add the digital adult supplement to every purchase regardless.   Jesus fucking Christ you hypocrite...what's next?  The first 200 orders will receive a coupon for a free doughnut?  FUCK YOU

We'll also send you a FREE Bonus Activity Sheet for your young aspiring detectives.

Order Your Copy Today

Simply purchase the book, send a screen capture of your receipt to offer@coldcasechristianity.com and we will send you the free offer. We hope God's Crime Scene for Kids will help your kids learn the truth about God and grow in their confidence as Christians.

 Why can't you just bulk-order and resell bibles?   How did God reach the kids for more than 30 centuries into the past without cartoons and daily reminding people of how important it is to purchase forensic faith dvds?

Hey James, you forgot to say "Act now while supplies last".  If you are going to waste your reader's time pretending you aren't selling god on the basis of employing marketing gimmicks, while you employ those gimmicks the whole while,  then why would you limit the amount of gimmicks you stuff into your advertisements?

Dear Mr. Chaffey: John 7:5 justifies calling Jesus a fake

Chaffey in "Defense of Easter" at 30, cites James to help answer the question in his chapter 3 title:  "Did Jesus appear to any skeptics?"

"For whatever reason, James did not believe in Jesus as the Messiah prior to the Resurrection.  In fact, none of his brothers believed in HIm early on (John 7:5).  On one occasion they even tried to prevent Him from speaking, thinking He was out of His mind (Mark 3:20-21, NET).  However, just several weeks after the Crucifixion they were counted among his followers"

In context, John 7:5 appears to be implying that Jesus' brothers did not merely fail to believe in him as messiah, their disbelief motivated them to mock Jesus for making such a claim:

 1 After these things Jesus was walking in Galilee, for He was unwilling to walk in Judea because the Jews were seeking to kill Him.
 2 Now the feast of the Jews, the Feast of Booths, was near.
 3 Therefore His brothers said to Him, "Leave here and go into Judea, so that Your disciples also may see Your works which You are doing.
 4 "For no one does anything in secret when he himself seeks to be known publicly. If You do these things, show Yourself to the world."
 5 For not even His brothers were believing in Him.
 6 So Jesus said to them, "My time is not yet here, but your time is always opportune.
 7 "The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil.
 8 "Go up to the feast yourselves; I do not go up to this feast because My time has not yet fully come."
 9 Having said these things to them, He stayed in Galilee. (Jn. 7:1-9 NAU)

Notice, Jesus' brothers tell him to go do his works in Judea where his disciples are, despite Jesus' brothers not believing in him (notice also the brothers admit Jesus has disciples or followers elsewhere, yet still don't believe him).

 How could they be telling Jesus go do his miracles in Judea, if they didn't believe his claims were true?  There's a plausible explanation:  They had the same attitude toward Jesus that today's skeptics have toward the many fake miracle workers in Christianity today, i.e., "go to the local children's hospital and cure all the diseases and cancers! (i.e., "show yourself to the world", "do something that will permit the world to examine your claims").  When alleged miracle-workers are addressed like this by skeptics, it is clear the skeptics are talking with a bit of mockery, and do think there is the slightest possibility that the advice will be taken, or that the miracle-working claim is true.

Notice also:  the brothers tell Jesus to do this and thus "show Yourself to the world", again, they seem to be taunting him..."if your miracle claims are true, do them in a manner that increases the likelihood that your critics can see your works too, do them out in the open!"

It is clear from this context that v. 5 is a significant summary statement that the unbelief of Jesus' brothers was not simply a lack of belief, but a highly confident attitude that Jesus' claims were more than likely false.
They taunted Jesus at this point in their lives the way conservative Christians and skeptics taunt prosperity gospel preachers who claim ability to do miracles:  If that's really true about you, do your miracle in a non-controlled context!

The purpose of Christians and skeptics taunting that way is:  if you follow our advice, your claims of ability to do miracles will be put to the acid test.  If you can really do miracles, then why would you fear doing them in a context specifically created to guard against trickery and fraud as much as possible?

 13 And He went up on the mountain and summoned those whom He Himself wanted, and they came to Him.
 14 And He appointed twelve, so that they would be with Him and that He could send them out to preach,
 15 and to have authority to cast out the demons.
 16 And He appointed the twelve: Simon (to whom He gave the name Peter),
 17 and James, the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James (to them He gave the name Boanerges, which means, "Sons of Thunder ");
 18 and Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Zealot;
 19 and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him.
 20 And He came home, and the crowd gathered again, to such an extent that they could not even eat a meal.
 21 When His own people heard of this, they went out to take custody of Him; for they were saying, "He has lost His senses."
 22 The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, "He is possessed by Beelzebul," and "He casts out the demons by the ruler of the demons."
 23 And He called them to Himself and began speaking to them in parables, "How can Satan cast out Satan?
 24 "If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.
....31 Then His mother and His brothers arrived, and standing outside they sent word to Him and called Him.
 32 A crowd was sitting around Him, and they said to Him, "Behold, Your mother and Your brothers are outside looking for You." (Mk. 3:13-32 NAU)

If we assume all that inerrantists must assume Jesus' family had experienced up to this point, then the negative view of Jesus held by his mother and brothers becomes more incredible than a miracle:

Jesus' mother had experienced angelic visions explaining she would conceive Jesus solely by the Holy Spirit.
Luke 1:26 ff.  Some would argue this was a literal meeting since "vision" is not implied in the text, rather v. 26 speaks about Gabriel going to Mary physically.

Jesus' step father Joseph had a similar vision.  Matthew 1:19 ff.

For inerrantists who say belief in Jesus' virgin birth is essential to salvation, this implies Mary and Joseph and Jesus would have revealed to others right at the beginning of his ministry the miracle of his birth.

The fact that Mark in 1:10 can write about Jesus at baptism seeing heaven opened and the spirit descending on him like a dove, makes it likely this was something made known to Jesus' immediate family and followers early on.

Jesus was apparently gone for 40 days in the desert being tempted by the devil and having angels minister to him (Mark 1:13), so it is reasonable to assume he would inform his family upon return how he managed to stay alive that long.

 Jesus must have been doing things convincingly showing he was messiah early on, as when he calls Andrew and Peter, they drop everything and follow him, Mark 1:18, so do the others (v. 20).

Jesus created a stir in the synagogues, and in such collectivist society, surely word of such rabbinical dazzling traveled fast, his mother would certainly have heard of it.  Mark 1:21-22

Jesus healing a demoniac, v. 27, creating such a debate about his powers that the news of him spread early and fast throughout Galilee (v. 28).

He heals Peter's mother-in-Law (v. 31)

He heals many more people (v. 32 ff)

He continued to cast out demons throughout Galilee (v. 39)

He heals a leper, and despite warning to keep it quiet, news of it spread so much that Jesus could not even enter a city without causing dangerous overcrowding by those following him around (v. 45)

When he returns to Capernaum several days later, large crowds gather at his door so much that the only way Jesus can heal a paralytic is by removing a section of the house roof and lowering him down into the house (2:1-4)

Jesus healed the paralytic to the amazement of these large pressing crowds (v. 12)

Jesus then is found reclining in the house of a tax-collector, Mark saying there were many such people following Jesus (2:15)

Jesus heals a man's withered hand to the knowledge of the Pharisees (Mark 3:1-6)

Jesus healed innumerable people as large crowds followed him in Galilee, Jerusalem, Idumea, beyond Jordan and in the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon7 Jesus withdrew to the sea with His disciples; and a great multitude from Galilee followed; and also from Judea (Mk. 3:7-10)

All of these events are presented by Mark as taking place before the point where his mother and brothers are said to think Jesus has lost his senses in 3:21.

But if the gospel of Mark is telling the historical truth (i.e., that all of Jesus' alleged miracles done before 3:21 were genuinely supernatural and literal facts of history), how likely is it that despite the crowds believing in him, Jesus' own family thinks he is capable of losing his senses?

Writing for the inerrantist-driven New American Commentary, inerrantist J.A. Brooks admits that the "his own" of 3:21 refers to Jesus' mother and brothers, and that they believed he had gone insane:

3:21 In the Greek text the subject of the first two clauses is literally “those with him.” The KJV and RSV (1st ed.) interpret this to mean “his friends,” the NASB and NKJV “his own people,” and the RSV (2nd ed.), NRSV, NEB, REB, and NIV “his family.” In view of vv. 31–32 the last of these is certainly correct. The idea that Jesus’ family opposed him troubled some ancient copyists who changed the text to read, “When the scribes and the rest heard.” The concern of Jesus’ family was not likely limited to his physical needs (v. 20); they probably were more concerned about the family’s reputation because in their estimation Jesus was acting in a fanatical and even insane way. The same verb is used in Acts 26:24 and 2 Cor 5:13 and means literally to stand outside of oneself. The verb translated “to take charge” means to arrest in 6:17; 12:12; 14:1, etc. Evidently they intended to seize Jesus and force him to return to Nazareth with them.

Brooks, J. A. (2001, c1991). Vol. 23: Mark (electronic e.). Logos Library System; 

The New American Commentary (Page 73). Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

It is interesting that the notion that Jesus' family thought him insane, troubled some ancient copyists sufficiently that they arbitrarily corrupted the text.  Apparently, Jesus' family thinking him insane was not easily harnonized with other Christian doctrine.

21 “His people” renders an ambiguous Greek construction (οἱ παρ᾽ αὐτοῦ) which generally means “envoys” or “adherents” but on occasion can mean “relatives” (e.g., LXX Prov 31:21; Taylor, 236). Wansbrough (NTS 18 [1971–72] 234–35; similarly Wenham, NTS 21 [1974–75] 296–97) has recently argued for “adherents,” meaning the Twelve, to be the more natural reading. Accordingly, Jesus’ disciples go outside to control the excited crowd. This reading, however, fails to take several factors into consideration, not least of which being the evangelist’s “sandwich” structure of 3:20–21 and 3:31–35 around 3:22–30. Mark 3:31 makes clear that Jesus’ “family” is the subject of 3:21.

e.g. exempli gratia, for example

LXX The Septuagint, Greek translation of the OT

NTS New Testament Studies

Guelich, R. A. (2002). Vol. 34A: Word Biblical Commentary : Mark 1-8:26. 

Word Biblical Commentary (Page 172). Dallas: Word, Incorporated.

Jesus’ family in Nazareth has been informed about his exhaustion from dealing with the crowds, and they are concerned about his well-being and distressed that people are pressing upon him so that he is not even able to eat (3:20–21). This alone would not account for their urgency, however, in deciding to travel thirty miles to take charge of him and declaring that he is “out of his mind.” Jesus is behaving oddly according to their expectations and is not only doing but saying strange things. They consider him on the verge of a mental breakdown and are ready to take him back to Nazareth for rest and recuperation. Well-intentioned, their concern arises from a misunderstanding (similar to that of the scribes) of his mission.

Elwell, W. A. (1996, c1989). Vol. 3: Evangelical commentary on the Bible. 

Baker reference library (Mk 3:13). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House.

Or, they did not view him as any more significant than Benny Hinn is viewed by his own family members.  Yes, he makes a big show, and yes he has a lot of followers claiming he can heal, but at the end of the day, he's nothing but a charismatic religious fanatic.

If Jesus' own family didn't believe him to be God up to this point, this strongly boosts the liberal position that Jesus's godhood is a fiction added by later writers to the gospel material.

It's rather easy to see why Chaffey did not spend any time whatsoever on the question of how Jesus' own family could disbelieve his claims early in his ministry.  You cannot get into the biblical data without being forced to conclude that they were either correct to reject his claims, or they were unbelievably thick-headed.

Dear Mr. Chaffey, it was not "multiple" eyewitnesses, it was THREE

Chaffey in "In Defense of Easter" at 25:

"Multiple reliable eyewitnesses testified that Jesus was alive after being dead and buried,.  Some of those eyewitness accounts have been preserved for us in the bible, and because this is the inspired inerrant word of God, Scripture is actually another infallible proof of Christ's resurrection."

 First, the only testimonies to the resurrection of Jesus in the NT that come down to us today in first-hand or "eyewitness" form are Matthew, John and Paul, and that requires generously granting traditional apostolic authorship for those two gospels, despite an avalanche of scholarship, including many Christian scholars, saying Matthew and John are anonymous.  Some would argue that apologists do not mean "three" when they say "multiple", especially if the apologist says "multiple" after reciting at least 6 different sources (Chaffey at 22-24).  Chaffey is simplistically smooshing NT hearsay and first-hand testimony together as if the distinction between the two weren't sufficiently serious to take into account.  On the contrary, no historian or Court of law will support the premise that hearsay and first-hand reports deserve equal treatment. Courts have not generally made hearsay inadmissible over the course of 200 years of jurisprudence merely because they work for the devil.  If you were on trial for murder and knew you were innocent, and the only witness against you on the stand was a person who admitted they didn't see you pull the trigger, they only know this because their best friend, a really honest person, told them so...you'd be screaming at the top of your lungs that this is hearsay and inadmissible. 

Second, Chaffey's appeal to biblical inerrancy to justify saying the bible is another infallible proof of Christ's resurrection, makes clear that despite his claimed purpose to equip Christians to answer skeptical challenges, what he is really doing is providing Christians with reasons to believe their faith rests on reliable historical sources.  How is this any different than the Mormon Sunday School teacher who assures her class that skeptics of Mormonism are wrong, because the Book of Mormon is the word of God?  That preaches nice, but does that really give Mormons anything to shoot back at skeptics?

Third, Chaffey's need to premise his argument on the Christian reader's existing faith is confirmed by his next argument, that skeptics deny these infallible proofs because the bible says they have hardened their hearts to the truth (Chaffey at 25-26).  That is hardly a rebuttal to a skeptical argument, that is nothing but preaching to the choir. 

Fourth, Chaffey at 25-26 cites to Abraham's statement in Luke 16:31 to support his belief that it is sinful hardening of the heart that explains unbelievers' disbelief in the resurrection of Jesus. Chaffey uses a poor excuse given by atheist Michael Martin as a proof that Abe was correct:  thsoe who disbelieve Moses and the prophets will say and do anything, no matter how empty of intellectual merit, to avoid admitting Jesus rose from the dead.

This is a deductive fallacy, as Michael Martin does not represent other skeptics, and certainly not myself.  I deny Martin's absurd premise that a person could rise from the dead apart from any natural or supernatural cause. Under atheism, this universe is governed by nothing but natural causes.  If Martin was implicitly relying on the notion that quantum physics tells us virtual particles can be created from nothing (i.e., it is possible for events to happen without cause), then he is still wrong.  There are multiple schools of quantum theory, and it is only the Copenhagen school that asserts this magical nonsense.  The only reason somebody thinks quantum physics opens the door to supernatural possibilities is because they are not aware of the other competing schools of quantum physics that preach a deterministic universe.

  Sheldon Goldstein, a professor of mathematics, physics and philosophy at Rutgers University and a supporter of pilot-wave theory, blames the “preposterous” neglect of the theory on “decades of indoctrination.” At this stage, Goldstein and several others noted, researchers risk their careers by questioning quantum orthodoxy.

All Chaffey has done is prove, at best, that Michael Martin's unbelief arises from a hardened heart.  I might even agree since causeless events violate common sense and empiricism no less than resurrection does.

Skeptics could, equally uselessly, boast that the only reason Christians cling to their faith is because they are weak-minded and need a crutch to avoid feeling lost and purposeless in a naturalistic universe.

I suggest greater good could be done if we avoid trying to read each other's mind and simply stick to academic argument.

The final confirmation that I've gotten Chaffey right saying he is preaching to the choir is page 27, which indicates the prior sections of the chapter were written so that Christians could have utmost confidence in the resurrection of Jesus.   In this last section, he is simply quoting the bible and blindly assuming the truth of whatever it says.

My Challenge to Tim Chaffey and his "In Defense of Easter: Answering Critical Challenge to the Resurrection of Jesus"

In my studies on the resurrection of Jesus, I recently acquired "In Defense of Easter:  Answering Critical Challenges to the Resurrection of Jesus" (2nd printing, 2016) by Tim Chaffey.  I could not find any publisher information in the book beyond "Copyright © 2014 Tim Chaffey", so apparently this is a self-published effort.

Curiously, his chapter 5 is entitled "What Do Historians Say About the Evidences of the Resurrection?" and yet the only historians he references or cites in that chapter are Habermas and Licona, who are not mere "historians" but two Christian apologists that are the most outspoken on Jesus' resurrection being a provable fact of history.

That Chaffey was writing primarily for Christian edification and less to convince skeptics, is clear from what he says in chapter 5:

"The bible is the Word of God, so it is accurate in all it affirms.  Since it tells us Jesus rose from the dead, we can have completely confidence that he did...The critics and skeptics simply have an anti-supernatual bias, or more accurately, an anti-biblical bias.  Thus, they have developed absurd positions in effort to explain away the only reasonable conclusion that can be derived from those facts."

Mr. Chaffey has authored other books, has advanced degrees in Theology, Apologetics and Church History, and this Easter book come with Gary Habermas' endorsement on the back cover and on the second page.

Half of the second page of the book is taken up by accolades from Answers in Genesis scholar Terry Mortenson, who holds an MDiv and a PhD in the history of geology.

Mortenson says:

“Tim Chaffey has done his homework for this book. He has paid careful attention to the details of all the relevant biblical texts regarding the Resurrection of lesus, and he is thoroughly informed on the multitude of arguments and objections raised by skeptics who have attempted to explain away the empty tomb. His tone is respectful but clear and firm as he dismantles the fallacious reasoning of the enemies of the gospel. Unlike many books on the subject, Tim draws out the connection between the Resurrection and the literal history in Genesis 1-11. I also really appreciated the way he ended the book by sharing how the reality of the Resurrection of Jesus impacted his own life in a time of great testing and by his separate challenge to both his Christian and non-Christian readers. Every Christian will profit by reading this excellent defense of the Resurrection and the gospel. Nonbelievers will be challenged to carefully consider the Messiah Jesus who died for their sins and rose from the dead to restore them to a right relationship with their Creator, if they will simply turn from their sin and trust in Him as Lord and Savior. I heartily recommend this book!” —Terry Mortenson, Ph.D., Coventry University (UK); Speaker and Researcher; Answers in Genesis

Since Mr. Chaffey holds advanced degrees in all the fields highly relevant to the questions that skeptics would naturally ask in debates about gospel sources and historicity, I posted yesterday (August 24, 2017), the following challenge over at Mr. Chaffey's blog.  I will assume that the reason my post remains invisible as of today (August 25) is because Mr. Chaffey has not had time to review it for approval:

Mr. Chaffey,

I obtained your book "In Defense of Easter" (2014).

The back cover of your book says one of the purposes in writing it was to help Christians "to answer today's skeptical challenges."

I am a skeptic with several challenges to the resurrection of Jesus that I believe were not disturbed by anything in your book, and I also have challenges to your arguments in that book.

I would like to discuss your book with you, at any time, date and internet location most convenient to you.

Here's a short list of the issues I'm prepared to discuss, or propositions I'm willing to defend.  Most are especially powerful precisely because they represent specific skeptical attacks that you didn't deal with in your book:

1 - There are only 3 eyewitness accounts of Jesus' resurrection in the NT, at best, all the rest are hearsay.  And that's generously granting assumptions of apostolic gospel authorship that I am otherwise prepared to attack on the merits.

2 - Apostle Paul's gospel contradicts the one Jesus preached.

3 - The actions of the 11 apostles after allegedly experiencing the risen Christ indicate what they actually experienced, if anything, was something less than the "amazing transformation" lauded so loudly by apologists.

4 - Because Matthew is in all likelihood not responsible for the content in canonical Greek Matthew, he and his gospel are disqualified as  witnesses.

5 - Because John was willing to falsely characterize divine words he got by vision, as if they were things the historical Jesus really said and did, John and his gospel are disqualified as witnesses.

6 – John’s intent to write a "spiritual" gospel as opposed to imitating the Synoptics which he knew had already disclosed the “external facts”, argues that “spiritual” here implies something different than mere writing down of eyewitness testimony.  The historical evidence that is accepted by even fundamentalists makes clear that John’s source for gospel material included visions and not just memory.

7 - The NT admission that most of Paul's converts apostatized from him for the Judaizer gospel, warrants skeptics to be a bit more hesitant than Christians before classifying Paul as a truth-robot.  The NT evidence against Paul's integrity is many, varied and strong.

8 - Papias asserted Mark "omitted nothing" of what he heard Peter preach.  Because Bauckham is wrong when saying Papias here was using mere literary convention, Papias meant that phrase literally...in which case Mark's silence on the virgin birth is not due to his "omission" of it, the virgin birth doesn't appear in his gospel because there was never a virgin birth story available for him to omit in the first place...a strong attack on Matthew's and Luke's credibility.

9 - Paul's belief that Mark's abandonment of ministry justifies excluding him from further ministry work (Acts 15) will always remain a justifiable reason (assuming Acts’ historicity here) to say Mark wasn't too impressed with gospel claims, even assuming he later fixed his disagreements with Paul and wrote the gospel now bearing his name.

10 - Mark's strong apathy toward writing down Peter's preaching supports the above premise that he was less than impressed with the gospel, and likely only joined himself to the group for superficial reasons.  Not a good day for fundamentalists who think Mark was inspired by God to write his gospel.

11 - Peter's explicit refusal to endorse Mark's gospel writing, militates, for obvious reasons, against the idea that Peter approved of it.

12 - stories of women becoming pregnant by a god in a way not disturbing her virginity, are securely dated hundreds of years before the 1st century.  The copycat Savior hypothesis is virtually unassailable, once the admittedly false skeptical exaggerations of the evidence are excluded, and rationally warrants skepticism toward Matthew's and Luke's honesty.

13 - The failure of Jesus' own immediate family to believe his ministry-miracles were genuinely supernatural (the logical inference from John 7:5 and Mark 3:21-31) provides reasonable and rational warrant for skeptics to say the miracles Jesus allegedly did, were no more real than those done by Benny Hinn and other wildly popular con artists.

14 - The evidence for the specific contention that most of the apostles or earliest Christians died as martyrs (i.e., were forced to choose between death or committing blasphemy, and chose death) is furiously scanty and debatable, justifying skepticism toward this popular apologetic argument.

15 - the mass-hallucination hypothesis does not require the exact same mental images to have been shared by the original apostles.  Mass-hallucination need not require such impossibility any more than Pentecostals being slain in the spirit requires them to all move and talk in the exact same way before they can validly claim to have shared the same experience. 

16 - There are contradictions in the resurrection accounts that are not capable of reasonable harmonization.

I am also willing to discuss whatever apologetics argument you think is the most clear and compelling.

I will avoid publicly posting our exchanges, if you wish, but if I hear nothing from you by Friday August 25, (you need only send a quick email), I will post this message to my own blog and continue awaiting your response there.

Thank you,

Barry Jones.

barryjoneswhat@gmail.com

 That last part was said with the presumption that my post would post quickly as it normally does elsewhere.

The reason I made so many summary points to Chaffey was to preempt the possibility that he'd employ a popular but dishonest excuse many Christians employ so that they can feel better about running away from the challenges posted by informed skeptics, namely, the excuse that the challenging skeptic does not appear smart enough to make him or her a worthwhile discussion or debate participant.

It should be perfectly obvious from Mr. Chaffey's conservative Christian beliefs, that he would strongly disagree with all of my 16 asserted points.  If so, then we must assume Mr. Chaffey has good reasons to think those 16 points arise from provable misinterpretations of the relevant biblical and patristic sources.

If Mr. Chaffey is confident that the only person who could seriously argue my 16 points is somebody who has has sorely misunderstood the biblical and patristic sources, then he think refuting me on those points would be a piece of cake.

So let's take my first point: there are only 3 resurrection testimonies in the NT that come down to us today in first-hand form, the rest are hearsay.

 The only NT sources that at least potentially qualify as first-hand here are Matthew, John and Paul.  That's a far cry from the "many eyewitnesses" dogma fundamentalists trumpet from the rooftops today in their populist apologetic efforts.

If Mr. Chaffey can find additional testimonies to Jesus resurrection in the NT which come down to us today in first-hand form, I welcome him to get in contact with me and arrange for us to discuss the topic at times, dates and internet sites most convenient to him.

Tough Questions Answered: Pretending Acts 15 is reliable history

 This is my reply to an article from "Tough Questions Answered" entitled 

Commentary on Acts 15 (Jerusalem Council)

Posted: 18 Aug 2017 06:00 AM PDT

In AD 48, some Jewish Christians from Jerusalem come to Syrian Antioch, Paul and Barnabas’ home church. These men from Jerusalem argue that Gentile Christians must be circumcised and adhere to the Mosaic Law if they want to be truly saved.

Which raises legitimate questions such as:

If Paul was the inerrant truth-robot today's fundamentalist Christians think he is, how could his own churches produce legalists of such significant popularity that it took a meeting of Christianity's finest to answer them?  Could it possibly be that the arguments of the Judaizers were far more difficult to answer, than what we can infer from the NT rebuttals to them?

Was Paul such a dolt that despite his establishing churches, he couldn't say enough to keep in check the kind of theological aberration today's inerrantists think is "obviously" heretical?

Paul and Barnabas disagree, so the church in Antioch appoint Paul and Barnabas to go to the mother church in Jerusalem, where they will convene with the apostles and elders there.

Barnabas was personally selected by the Holy Spirit to assist Paul in the Gentile ministry (Acts 13:2), so if a person whose knowledge of Paul was more intimate than anything we could have today, wasn't convinced that Paul had the truth, it is rather immature and presumptuous for today's fundamentalist Christians to act as if the truth of Paul's doctrines is a foregone conclusion. 

The journey to Jerusalem probably takes a month or more, so Paul and Barnabas stop along the way and visit several churches in Phoenicia and Samaria. At each stop, they relay the news that Gentiles are converting in high numbers, and the news is met with great joy.

When they arrive at Jerusalem, they meet with the apostles and elders of the Jerusalem church, along with several other members of the Jerusalem church. Paul and Barnabas describe in detail the conversion of Gentiles during their first missionary journey into Asia Minor.

Paul's stories of conversions need not be considered any more authoritative than the same reports coming from Benny Hinn or Bill Graham.  Smart people realize perfectly well that most such alleged converts aren't true converts. Paul's admission that most of his churches were constituted of intellectually ignorant people and other lower social classes (1st Cor. 1:26) increases the likelihood that something other than appreciation for Paul's intellectual justifications of doctrine is what motivated them to convert. And Paul explicitly admitted God did not want him to preach the gospel in ways the world would deem skillful or wise, because academically persuasive preaching would void the power of the cross,  1st Cor. 1:17.

After they finish speaking, a group of Christians who were formerly Pharisees rise to argue that these Gentile converts must be circumcised and keep the law of Moses. John Polhill, in vol. 26, Acts, The New American Commentary, writes:

    It should come as no surprise that some of the Pharisees had become Christians. Pharisees believed in resurrection, life after death, and the coming Messiah. They shared the basic convictions of the Christians. Because of this they are sometimes in Acts found defending the Christians against the Sadducees, who had much less in common with Christian views (cf. 5:17; 23:8f.). A major barrier between Christians and Pharisees was the extensive use of oral tradition by the Pharisees, which Jesus and Paul both rejected as human tradition. It is not surprising that some Pharisees came to embrace Christ as the Messiah in whom they had hoped. For all their emphasis on law, it is also not surprising that they would be reticent to receive anyone into the fellowship in a manner not in accordance with tradition. That tradition was well-established for proselytes—circumcision and the whole yoke of the law.

On the contrary, if we assume Paul's version of the gospel is what Jesus and James also taught, it is an eye-popping mystery how legalistic Pharisees who think Gentiles must be circumcised to be saved, could possibly be genuine converts to a religious system that preaches the exact opposite.   This is how you solve that mystery:  Christianity in the first century consisted of at least two competing factions; the legalistic Judaizers headed by Peter/James/John, and the non-legalists headed by Paul.  Inerrantist attempts to reconcile NT statements about some apostles' legalism, with Paul's law-free gospel, are laughably trifling word-games played by inerrantists who live under a childish sense of black and white certainty.

A lengthy debate ensues, although Luke leaves out the details.

What would your opinion be of an atheist who wrote up an online review of an atheist-Christian debate not otherwise recorded, wherein the atheist reporter represents the Christian position with two sentences, but spends the next few pages giving numerous details for the atheist arguments and how these were approved by other atheists?

Would you say such a reporter appears more interested in spinning history than in fair and balanced reporting?  Luke says nothing more about how the Judaizers argued their case, except a single summary statement (15:1) repeated one time (v. 5), then spends the entire rest of ch. 15 focusing on the apostolic viewpoint.

I say Luke is lying, James was the leader of the Judaizers at that Council (if it even ever happened), and either a) James Peter and John agreed with the Judaizers that Gentile men must be circumcised to be saved, or b) despite viewing Paul as a heretic, they decided in his favor anyway, because giving Paul that much leeway would likely result in Paul sending the Jerusalem church financial donations from the Gentile churches.  You scream about how stupid Mormonism is all day long, but if you were drowning and the only person who could save you was a Mormon lifeguard, how loudly would be you screaming about Mormonism's falsehoods as you are being rescued?

So then, don't discount the historical plausibility of the original apostles believing the material benefits of making Paul part of the club, outweighed the risks of obstinately pointing out his doctrinal errors.

After listening to both sides, Peter, as the leader of the apostles, stands to speak. In verses 7-9, Peter recounts his experience with Cornelius and his household (Acts 10), an event which had occurred some ten years earlier. The Holy Spirit had been given to Cornelius because his heart had been cleansed by faith, not by circumcision or by following the law of Moses. Peter then argues that to require Gentiles to follow the Law would be to challenge God Himself. After all, if God does not require circumcision and Law adherence, then why should the Christian leadership add these burdens to the Gentiles? Peter closes by reiterating that “we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.”

Why don't any of the apostles make the one argument that the canonical gospels indicate would have been the most powerful, namely, that the Judaizers are in error because Jesus preached the gospel to plenty of Gentiles for three years prior and never once required them to get circumcised?  Did not Jesus preach his gospel to Gentiles to the point of causing massive crowds of them to gather around him (Mark 1:45, Matthew 4:15, Luke 5:15, etc)?

Aren't you just a little suspicious about the fact that in Acts 15, the apostolic response avoids resting on the obvious authority of Jesus every bit as much as Paul himself avoids it in his epistles? 

Or maybe the Judaizers were correct, and the reason they started a stir that required a meeting of Christianity's finest is because their arguments were weighty and powerful and that's why Luke never tells us what arguments they made to support their beliefs...had he done so, it would be clear that the the apostolic reliance on shallow OT exegesis and praise reports from newly established Gentiles churches would make the apostles the losers of this Acts 15 debate.  By kepeing the reader from knowing how powerful the Judaizer case can be made, the apostolic response revealed in the text need not be very substantive.

Read what Jesus said and ask yourself whether Exodus 12:48 was a part of the Law at the time:

 17 "Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill.
 18 "For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
 19 "Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
 20 "For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.   (Matt. 5:17-20 NAU)

At the time Jesus said that, the Law excluded Gentiles from covenant with God unless they got circumcised:

 48 "But if a stranger sojourns with you, and celebrates the Passover to the LORD, let all his males be circumcised, and then let him come near to celebrate it; and he shall be like a native of the land. But no uncircumcised person may eat of it.
 49 "The same law shall apply to the native as to the stranger who sojourns among you." (Exod. 12:48-49 NAU)

Regardless, as long as the canonical gospels continuing having Jesus surrounded with large crowds, fundamentalists are going to look stupid insisting that by some miraculous accident, Jesus never had opportunity to answer the question of whether Gentiles need to be circumcised to be saved.

The whole assembly falls silent until Barnabas and Paul speak up again and describe the miracles that God performed during their mission trip to the Gentiles in Asia Minor.

Sort of like Benny Hinn refuting your accusations of his teaching heresy, because he can allege miracles and conversions in several of his churches.  That phenomena hardly suffices to get him or Paul out of their theological jams.  Any fool can "start a church" and allege "miracles".

James, the brother of Jesus and leader of the elders of the Jerusalem church, now stands to speak.

To clarify, James, a brother of Jesus, who with brother John remained singularly unimpressed with Jesus' miracles (John 7:5).  Unless we count James and John willfully blind idiots, their rejection of their own brother Jesus as Messiah during his physical life justifies the contention that Jesus was an actual fraud...in turn justifying the conclusion that frauds do not rise from the dead.  If James "converted", he only converted to a gospel version that pleased Judaizers (Acts 21:20), and then there's no reason to believe he took the Christian religion any more seriously than Benny Hinn.

James makes the case that Peter’s experience with Cornelius is a precise fulfillment of prophecy.

Once again, under inerrantist assumptions, it is shockingly unexpected that a brother of Jesus who became leader over the Jerusalem church, should think making questionable interpretation of the OT is the best way to resolve a circumcision issue that Jesus himself surely had ample opportunity in three years of preaching to resolve.  What would you think of a Christian apologist who argued that Psalm 16 was a sufficient proof that Jesus rose from the dead, and then never quoted anything in the NT to substantiate Jesus rising from the dead?

Regardless, the fact that Peter feared the legalistic "men from James" (Gal. 2:12) despite knowing James personally, argues he knew their legalism was a correct representation of James' own doctrinal position...and this being so, Luke is lying in Acts 15:24, the real true and legalistic James likely did authorize emissaries to travel to Antioch to impose the circumcision requirement on Gentile converts.

Darrell Bock, in Acts, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament, explains that “James’s quotation matches Amos 9:11–12 LXX with material in verse 18 from Isa. 45:21. Jeremiah 12:15 may be the source for the opening ‘After these things I will return,’ but this is less than clear, since the phrases may be only a transition into the citation that shows how James sees the timing.”

Once again, the Jewish apostles on Acts 15 appear suspiciously Pauline in how they avoid the obvious authority of Jesus in favor of resting their conclusions about important matters on how they interpret the OT.  James said nothing of the sort, this is just Luke putting words in James' mouth to make it appear that the mother church spoke and taught more like Paul than they actually did.

Bock adds:

    The reference to the prophets is important. James’s point is not just about this one passage from Amos; rather, this passage reflects what the prophets teach in general, or what the book of the Prophets as a whole teaches. Other texts could be noted (Zech. 2:11; 8:22; Isa. 2:2; 45:20–23; Hos. 3:4–5; Jer. 12:15–16). James is stressing fulfillment, for the prophets agree with what Peter has described.

 But it is more likely, under inerrantist-assumptions, that James knew that Jesus taught against the Judaizer position.  So the apostolic failure here to rely on the obvious authority of Jesus remains a problem inerrantists cannot resolve in terms of historical plausibility or probability.

This is not an affirmation of analogous fulfillment but a declaration that this is now taking place.

...which makes the account all the less believable.  How could Gentile salvation be such a post-resurrection development like this (i.e., "now" taking place), if the canonical gospels are correct in representing Jesus as having a mix of Jewish and Gentile followers (Matthew 4:15, etc)? 

God had promised Gentile inclusion; now he is performing it. Paul cites a string of OT texts on this theme in Rom. 15:7–13.

Common sense says if the prophets predicted Gentile inclusion, the fulfillment was Christ's own mission to the Gentiles:

 12 Now when Jesus heard that John had been taken into custody, He withdrew into Galilee;
 13 and leaving Nazareth, He came and settled in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the region of Zebulun and Naphtali.
 14 This was to fulfill what was spoken through Isaiah the prophet:
 15 "THE LAND OF ZEBULUN AND THE LAND OF NAPHTALI, BY THE WAY OF THE SEA, BEYOND THE JORDAN, GALILEE OF THE GENTILES--
 16 "THE PEOPLE WHO WERE SITTING IN DARKNESS SAW A GREAT LIGHT, AND THOSE WHO WERE SITTING IN THE LAND AND SHADOW OF DEATH, UPON THEM A LIGHT DAWNED."
 17 From that time Jesus began to preach and say, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Matt. 4:12-17 NAU)

 The presentation in Acts that Gentiles are "now" being included, clashes in bright sparks with the canonical gospel presupposition that inclusion of Gentiles was already established.

The prophets predicted that the Gentiles would be added to God’s people. They would be added when the house of David was restored. The house of David was rebuilt in Jesus of Nazareth, the descendant of David and long-awaited Messiah. Bock notes that the

    goal of this rebuilding work is to allow the rest of humanity, not just Jews, to seek God. This fulfills not only the promise to David about his line but also a commitment to Abraham that through his seed the world would experience blessing (Gen. 12:3; Acts 3:25–26; Gal. 3). Thus James argues that this Gentile inclusion is part of the plan of Davidic restoration that God through the prophets said he would do. The prophets affirm what is taking place now. So both divine events and Scripture sustain the church’s inclusion of Gentiles.

Just one problem:  Luke doesn't tell us about 99% of the Judaizer response, so just how acceptable other Christians found this questionable use of the OT will never be known.  Indeed, it would be reasonable to conclude that the Judaizers cited to Jesus' words to substantiate their position, so much that Luke could not have honestly recorded their response without making the apostles look as willfully stupid as humans are capable of being.

In James’ opinion, the Gentile converts need not be circumcised nor follow the law of Moses to be saved.

An issue he'd never have needed to comment on if the apostle's message was doctrinally the same as the message of Jesus.  If Jesus preached Gentile salvation without circumcision and the apostles followed suit, how could legalistic Pharisees ever attain sufficient status in the new church that their legalistic and false view requires a meeting of Christianity's finest in order to root out?

How about a Mormon who "converts" to Mormonism, but retains her prior distrust in Mormon doctrine?

He agrees with Peter that salvation is now by faith in Christ. But the problem remains that the Gentile converts, since they are new followers of Yahweh, are falling prey to the pagan religious institutions to which they once belonged.

At some point you have to get realistic about God's responsibilities, and acknowledge that some sinners fail because God doesn't do His part as promised.  Stop viewing God as so perfect.  If Copan and Flannagan are correct that OT authors frequently employed language of exaggeration when describing God's commands for Israel to entirely slaughter other nations, it follows quite reasonably that their high and lofty language about God's unspeakably infinite perfections is likewise just more exaggerated talk, hence, if God is real, he likely has his share of imperfections despite laudatory biblical language to the contrary.  Exaggerated language doesn't count for establishing reality.  God has problems and worries about which solution is best.

James believes that the church in Antioch should be sent a letter which states that Gentiles should “abstain from the things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, and from what has been strangled, and from blood.”

Then he must have liked doing things the hard way, because telepathy and teleportation were available to get the job done much more efficiently:

 39 When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; and the eunuch no longer saw him, but went on his way rejoicing.
 40 But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he passed through he kept preaching the gospel to all the cities until he came to Caesarea.
(Acts 8:39-40 NAU)

 9 A vision appeared to Paul in the night: a man of Macedonia was standing and appealing to him, and saying, "Come over to Macedonia and help us."
(Acts 16:9 NAU)

Clinton Arnold, in John, Acts: Volume Two (Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary) explains:

    The focus of the debate now shifts away from the question of what is essential for salvation to one of how to help Gentile believers break away from their idolatrous pre-Christian practices.

The original question is only shifted away from because Luke chose to avoid revealing how the Judaizers responded to these already-unlikely answers from the apostles.

Each of these four instructions relates to dangers associated with involvement in idolatry.

What you don't tell the reader is that despite the importance of this decree, it is textually corrupted.  Metzger says in his Textual Commentary on the NT:

15.20, 29; 21.25

The text of the Apostolic Decree, as it is called, is given at 15.29; it is referred to proleptically in 15.20 and retrospectively in 21.25. The three verses contain many problems concerning text and exegesis: (1) Are Gentiles commanded to abstain from four things (food offered to idols, blood, strangled meat, and unchastity) or from three (omitting either strangled meat or unchastity); and (2) are the three or four prohibitions entirely ceremonial, or entirely ethical, or a combination of both kinds?

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(a) The Alexandrian text, as well as most other witnesses, has four items of prohibition.
(b) The Western text omits “what is strangled” and adds a negative form of the Golden Rule in 15.20 and 29.
(c) Several witnesses omit “unchastity” from 15.20 (so î⁴⁵ [which unfortunately is not extant for 15.29 or 21.25] and eth) and from 15.29 (so Origen, contra Celsum, VIII:29, as well as vg^ms Vigilius and Gaudentius).
The occasion for issuing the Apostolic Decree, it should be observed, was to settle the question whether Gentile converts to Christianity should be required to submit to the rite of circumcision and fulfill other Mosaic statutes. The Council decided that such observance was not required for salvation; at the same time, however, in order to avoid giving unnecessary offense to Jewish Christians (and to Jews contemplating becoming Christians), the Council asked Gentile converts to make certain concessions for prudential reasons, abstaining from those acts that would offend Jewish scruples and hinder social intercourse, including joint participation in the Lord’s Supper.
As concerns transcriptional probabilities, th/j pornei,aj may have been omitted because this item seemed, superficially, to be out of place in what otherwise appeared to be a food law. Although such a consideration may well account for its absence, it is possible that what was intended by the Jerusalem Council was to warn the Gentile believers to avoid either marriage within the prohibited Levitical degrees (Lv 18.6-18), which the rabbis described as “forbidden for pornei,a,” or mixed marriages with pagans (Nu 25.1; also compare 2 Cor 6.14), or participation in pagan worship, which had long been described by Old Testament prophets as spiritual adultery and which, in fact, offered opportunity in many temples for religious prostitution.
Another way to make sure that the list deals entirely with ritual prohibitions is to remove pornei,aj by emending the text. Bentley,²⁹⁵ for example, conjectured that the Apostolic Decree was an injunction to abstain “from pollutions of idols and swine’s flesh (coirei,aj) and things strangled and from blood.” A similar conjecture, intended to

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produce the same dietetic interpretation, is to read porkei,aj²⁹⁶ instead of pornei,aj. But there is no known example of such a word in Greek, and if an example were found it would be an abstract noun (from po,rkoj) meaning “piggishness.”²⁹⁷

Concerning (b), it is obvious that the threefold prohibition (lacking tou/ pniktou/) refers to moral injunctions to refrain from idolatry, unchastity, and blood-shedding (or murder), to which is added the negative Golden Rule. But this reading can scarcely be original, for it implies that a special warning had to be given to Gentile converts against such sins as murder, and that this was expressed in the form of asking them to “abstain” from it – which is slightly absurd!
It therefore appears to be more likely that an original ritual prohibition against eating foods offered to idols, things strangled and blood, and against pornei,a (however this latter is to be interpreted) was altered into a moral law by dropping the reference to pniktou/ and by adding the negative Golden Rule, than to suppose that an original moral law was transformed into a food law.
The alternative to accepting the fourfold decree is to argue, as P. H. Menoud has done,²⁹⁸ that the original text involved a twofold prohibition, namely to abstain from pollutions of idols and from blood, and that to this basic decree respecting kosher foods, î⁴⁵ al added “and from what is strangled,” thus extending the food-law concerning blood to all flesh improperly slaughtered. In the Western tradition the twofold decree was understood to be a moral injunction relating to idolatry and murder, and these witnesses added the prohibition against another major sin, unchastity. Subsequently the injunction concerning the negative Golden Rule was appended to the Western text, which thus extends the moral application far beyond the three

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basic prohibitions. Finally, the text of the great mass of witnesses represents a conflation of several Western expansions of the basic twofold decree.

Attractive though this theory is on the surface, the textual evidence is not really susceptible of such an interpretation. First, there is no manuscript evidence for the hypothetical twofold decree. Menoud does indeed shrink from pressing his conjecture concerning the twofold decree, and is prepared, with Lagrange, to adopt the reading of î⁴⁵ as the original text.²⁹⁹ But such an alternative proposal leaves the text critic with exactly the same problems that confronted him before, namely, how to explain the deletion as well as the addition of certain items in the decree.
Secondly, the fact that in 15.20 pniktou/ precedes kai. tou/ ai[matoj is hardly compatible with the theory that it was added in order to clarify and extend the meaning of ai[matoj.
In conclusion, therefore, it appears that the least unsatisfactory solution of the complicated textual and exegetical problems of the Apostolic Decree is to regard the fourfold decree as original (foods offered to idols, strangled meat, eating blood, and unchastity – whether ritual or moral), and to explain the two forms of the threefold decree in some such way as those suggested above.³⁰⁰
An extensive literature exists on the text and exegesis of the Apostolic Decree. For what can be said in support of the Western text see, e.g., A. Hilgenfeld, “Das Apostel-Concil nach seinem ursprünglichen Wortlaut,” Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Theologie, XLII (1899), pp. 138–149; Gotthold Resch, Das Aposteldecret nach seiner

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ausserkanonischen Textgestalt (Texte und Untersuchungen, N.F. XIII, 3; Leipzig, 1905); A. von Harnack, Beiträge zur Einleitung in das Neue Testament, III (1908), pp. 188–198, and IV (1911), The Acts of the Apostles (London, 1909), pp. 248–263; K. Lake, The Earlier Epistles of St. Paul, their Motive and Origin (London, 1911), pp. 48–60; idem, The Beginnings of Christianity, vol. v, pp. 205–209; J. H. Ropes, The Text of Acts, pp. 265–269; A. C. Clark, The Acts of the Apostles, pp. 360–361; Thorleif Boman, “Das textkritische Problem des sogenannten Aposteldekrets,” Novum Testamentum, VII (1964), pp. 26–36.

Those who have argued in support of the fourfold decree³⁰¹ include Theodor Zahn, Introduction to the New Testament, III (Edinburgh, 1909), pp. 18–22; idem, Die Apostelgeschichte des Lucas (Leipzig and Erlangen, 1921), pp. 523 ff.; William Sanday, “The Apostolic Decree (Acts XV. 20–29),” Theologische Studien Theodor Zahn…dargebracht (Leipzig, 1908), pp. 317–338; idem, “The Text of the Apostolic Decree (Acts XV:29),” Expositor, Eighth Series, VI (1913), pp. 289–305; E. Jacquier, Les Actes des Apôtres (Paris, 1926), pp. 455–458; Hans Lietzmann, “Der Sinn des Aposteldekretes und seine Textwandlung,” in Amicitiae corolla, a Volume of Essays Presented to James Rendel Harris, ed. by H. G. Wood (London, 1933), pp. 203–211; W. G. Kümmel, “Die älteste Form des Aposteldekrets,” Spiritus et veritas [Festschrift Carlo Kundzinš] (Eutin, 1953), pp. 83–98; E. Haenchen, Die Apostelgeschichte, ad loc.; Marcel Simon, “The Apostolic Decree and its Setting in the Ancient Church,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, LII (196–970), pp. 437–460; C. M. Martini, “Il Decreto del Concilio di Gerusalemme,” Atti della XXII Settimana Biblica (Brescia, 1973), pp. 345–355; C. K. Barrett, Australian Biblical Review, XXXV (1987), pp. 50–59.

  ====================

James wants to make sure that these Gentiles make a clean break with their past when they embrace the living and true God. The instructions are, therefore, guidelines to assist their growth as believers, knowing full well that the Gentiles will continue to face significant cultural and spiritual pressures stemming from their past immersion in idolatry and ongoing association with family, friends, and coworkers still involved with it. These guidelines are a practical help in the spiritual and moral battle these Gentiles will face.

Sounds like those guidelines are so important, you should have alerted the reader to the fact that textual corruption problems plague such rules.

snip the rest.