Rebuttal to Jonathan McLatchie's best evidence for the resurrection of Jesus

Apologist Jonathan McLatchie discusses in one of his Youtube videos what he believes to be the best evidence for Jesus' resurrection.

Here's a screen shot of my comments to his video, just in case he decides to make good on his recent promise to avoid debating me:




One legitimate criticism of this video is that McLatchie talks too goddamn fast in his effort to stuff as much commentary into his 4 minutes of time.  It would be better for all apologists if they make a 10 minute video to explore the viability of each and every presupposition that goes into their argument.  If he is going to blindly trust in Paul's credibility, he should know the skeptical arguments attacking Paul's credibility and create a 10 minute video to refute each such attack.  This is more comprehensive.  Talking like an auctioneer simply tells the viewer McLatchie didn't intend to impress anybody except Christians.

At :17, he says some of the greatest evidence is the post-resurrection appearances.  Unfortunately, most Christian scholars not only think Mark is the earliest published gospel, most Christian scholars also believe Mark intentionally ended his gospel at the part we now designate as chapter 16, verse 8.

If that scholarly Christian majority belief be true, the earliest gospel did not mention any resurrection appearances, raising a legitimate concern that the reason they only appear in the later gospels is because the stories are nothing more than later embellishments.  Patristic tradition makes it clear that Mark's express purpose was exactly to "repeat" for the requesting church that which Peter had preached to them and which was the basis on which they converted, so it is feverishly unlikely that Mark knew Peter preached resurrection appearance stories but Mark "chose to exclude" them.

Furthermore Papias' comment that Mark "omitted nothing" of what he heard Peter preach, was made in a context defending Mark from the charge of inaccuracy, so Bauckham is likely wrong to characterize the "omitted nothing" phrase as mere literary convention, which means then that Papias was asserting that Mark literally did not omit in his writing anything he heard Peter preach...which makes it even more difficult to say Mark "chose to omit" Peter's preaching resurrection-appearance stories.

Conservative Evangelical scholar Daniel Wallace believes that because the last part of the manuscript containing Mark's ending would have been most protected when rolled up as normal, it is highly unlikely that Mark wrote a longer ending which somehow became lost, and more likely that he intentionally ended at 16:8.

Frank Turek, apparently a mentor to Mr. Mclatchie, admits at crossexamined.org that most Christian scholars say Mark originally ended at 16:8:

Why do most scholars think the last twelve verses of the Gospel of Mark (Mk. 16:9-20) were not written by Mark?  Lee Strobel calls on manuscript expert Dr. Daniel Wallace to answer here.   Wallace, who thinks the last 12 verses were added later, has an interesting insight:

Turek in the same article explains why he thinks Mark originally containing no resurrection appearance stories, doesn't pose a problem:

What does the inclusion or exclusion of verses 9-20 mean theologically?  Nothing.  If they are included, nothing new is taught.  If they are excluded, nothing is lost because the resurrection appearances are described elsewhere.

Not so fast:  If most Christian scholars are correct that Mark was the earliest gospel, then it is the earliest gospel that lacks resurrection appearances, which means those stories only appear in gospels written later...which implies those resurrection stories are nothing more than later embellishments upon the originally more simple resurrection story.  Mark's silence on resurrection appearance stories is an Achillies' Heel that all bible critics and atheists should ceaselessly hammer on, the stories appearing in other gospels does NOT resolve the problem of Mark being silent about them.

In this crossexamined.org article, the proffered link to Wallace's explanation no longer works but can still be accessed through wayback, here's the link   Therein, Wallace concludes that most scholars deny the originality of the long ending:

When the external evidence (i.e., the manuscripts, ancient translations, and church fathers’ writings) is compared to the internal (i.e., the author’s style, scribal habits, etc.), the conclusion that the vast majority of scholars reach is that Mark did not write 16:9-20. 

 So it is rather difficult to believe that an admittedly smart scholar such as Mr. Mclatchie would believe that the stories most scholars deny were part of the earliest gospel, are "some of the greatest" evidence for Jesus' resurrection. (!?)  Wouldn't the greatest evidence for Jesus' resurrection be resurrection testimonies in the NT that come down to us today in first-hand form and are reasonably linked to eyewitnesses with no credibility problems?

 In McLatchie's video at :21 ff, he cites the resurrection "creed" given Paul in 1st Corinthians 15 as "the best source that we have", which he says likely was believed by the church within a few years after Jesus died.

But it is hard to take McLatchie seriously here, as there are myriad problems with asserting that Paul's testimony here is the "best source":

• The basis for the creed could not be Paul because the story says the apostles both saw and preached the resurrected Jesus long before Paul converted.  See Matthew 28, Luke 24, John 20-21, Acts 1:3, Acts 2:24, 32,  Acts 3:15, Acts 4:10, 33, 5:30. And to Paul's credit, he admits that this creed is what Pual himself also "received" (1st Cor. 15:3).  So at best Paul is a secondary source, and in historiography, secondary sources are normally inferior to first-hand sources, unless the first-hand sources can be shown to be more faulty than the hearsay source.
• McLatchie may argue that because includes himself as one of the resurrection eyewitnesses (1st Cor. 15:8), Paul was basing the creed somewhat on his own first-hand experience.  But even if true, the most explicit accounts of Paul seeing a resurrected Jesus, do not meet the "eye" test in "eyewitness".  The story of Paul's conversion to Christ on the road to Damascus is recorded in Acts 9, Acts 22 and Acts 26, and at no time do the accounts express or imply that Paul saw Jesus with his physical eyes (i.e., what is normally required to qualify as a person as an eyewitness).  Worse, Acts 9:3 describes the flash of light around Paul as "from heaven", and physically blinding him for a while thereafter (v. 8-9), so how could it be that only Paul was physically blinded, if in fact he was physically seeing Jesus, and therefore his traveling companions would have seen Jesus too.  Worse, Acts 9:7 asserts that while the men traveling with Paul heard a voice, they saw nobody, making it impossibly difficult to figure out what is going on:  if Jesus was "physically" appearing to Paul as required for him to fulfill the criteria of eyewitness, how could such a physical manifestation not be seen by Paul's traveling companions?  You can assert a miracle of God preventing them from seeing Jesus, but when you use a miracle to get rid of problems in somebody's testimony, the testimony's evidentiary value is fatally weakened.  The only person who would accept a "god-prevented-them-from-seeing-Jesus" explanation would be Christians, and therefore people who already trust that Paul's testimony is true, hence worthless as testimony to convince non-Christians.  Worse, Acts 22:9 specifies that the traveling companions did not "understand" the voice of Christ, which leads to questions that are critical yet cannot be confidently answered such as:  Paul and his companions likely spoke Hebrew (Acts 26:12 says Paul persecuted Christians by authority and commission from the chief priests, who are Hebrew, hence the natural inference is that anybody who wished to accompany Paul on such ventures likely also spoke Hebrew), and Acts 26:14 specifies that Christ spoke to Paul on the road to Damascus in the Hebrew dialect, so if that is true, how could Paul's travel buddies not "understand" what Jesus was saying?
• Finally, in Acts 26:19 Paul uses the Greek word optasia to say his experience of Christ on the road to Damascus was a "vision", the same Greek word Paul uses elsewhere to describe unbelievable esoteric visionary states that leave him unable to tell, even 14 years after the fact, whether the experience was in his body or out of his body (2nd Corinthians 12:1-4).  Given this cognate usage, it is reasonable and rational to conclude that at least for Paul himself, his Damascus road experience was visionary, not visible, providing even more rational justification for skeptics to say this "testimony" is testifying to something other than what Paul physically saw, further removing Paul from the category of "eyewitness" of the risen Jesus.

And for that reason, Paul's own experience of the risen Christ does not infuse Paul's 1st Corinthians 15 "creed" with the type of creedence that would be deemed significant by skeptics, it only impresses those who are already accepting of all of most Christian beliefs about God, miracles, truth of NT stories, etc.

At :34 ff, McLatchie admits something Paul said that creates further problems:  Paul qualifies the hymn with "according to the scriptures", which would not include the gospel writings if the creed goes back as early as 35 a.d. as conservative apologists wish it to.  That is, the hymn is crediting the notion of Jesus dying, being buried and rising again, to "the scriptures" meaning the OT.  That is, it is upon the basis of the OT that the church knows that Jesus died, was buried, and was raised again on the third day.  Is that true?  Is the OT the basis for the early creedal hymn that Jesus died, was buried and rose again?  That creates further problems such as nobody before the first century thinking the Messiah would die and rise from the dead, and the related skeptical objection that the NT is taking the OT out of context or otherwise misinterpreting it, a problem that also divides Christian scholars (for example, see Christians attacking each other's views on this subject in Three Views on the New Testament use of the Old Testament, Kaiser, Bock and Enns, contributors, Gundry, Berding, Lunde, ed., copyright 2007, Berding and Lunde.

So we have to wonder:  did the post crucifixion church assert the resurrection of Jesus solely on the basis of their belief that the OT said the Messiah would rise from the dead?  Or did they also believe he rose from the dead because they believed they saw him alive after he died?  The fact that the church at such an early period would credit Jesus' resurrection to the "scriptures" is a problem because you cannot find one apologist today who would cite Psalm 16 or any other OT text to "show" that Jesus rose from the dead, so the early beliefs of the church were just a bit more esoteric and removed from reality than apologists would wish.

When we combine this with the majority Christian scholarly opinion that Mark was the earliest gospel and originally ended at 16:8, then the prospect that the earliest church had no more basis to believe Jesus rose from the dead, than simply their OT scriptures, becomes more likely.  What is so problematic for apologists is that, according to the story, the resurrected Jesus had to admonish his witnesses for being slow of heart to believe the alleged resurrection predictions of the OT:

25 And He said to them, "O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken!
 26 "Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?"
 27 Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures. (Lk. 24:25-27 NAU)

These people had walked and talked with Jesus for three prior years...what is the likelihood that for three years of Jesus drilling such OT truth into their heads, they "just didn't get it"?  Very low, and it's even less if we presume as Christians do that these witnesses believed in the authenticity of Jesus' miracles before he died.  Their continuing to misunderstand the OT predictions about Jesus even as late as after he died, is no more believable than the idea of the Hebrews continuing to desire to go back to Egypt despite their having recently seen God part the Red Sea to miraculously save them from Pharaoh (Exodus 16:3).  If Copan and Flannagan are correct when they get rid of God's genocidal mania by asserting that the "kill everything" texts in the OT are mere Semitic exaggeration, then we need to seriously consider that the NT authors were also aware that the OT often employs exaggeration too, and therefore, consider the possibility that the NT authors also felt free to imitate this tendency to exaggerate.

Mclatchie goes on reciting Paul's list of resurrection appearances in 1st Corinthains, but never once expresses or implies that Paul has credibility problems that require resolving before skeptics can accept Paul's word on something.  Again McLatchie appears to be speaking here for Christians and nobody else, since his blindly trusting use of the NT would not impress anybody except Christians.

McLatchie also doesn't address a popular skeptical argument that the unbelievable state of immorality Paul accuses the Corinthian church of being in (3:1 ff, 5:1 ff, 6:1 ff) , reasonably justifies the belief that most of the church members in Corinth were not there because of genuine repentance and belief (which conservatives like McLatchie say result in a life-transformation of morals), which in turn justifies skepticism towards Paul the way one would normally be skeptical toward any "church" founded by Benny Hinn.  Yes, he founded it, yes, it has many members, yes, they all profess to believe the gospel, but if they are plagued with immorality to such an extent that they do things not even most unbelievers do, we can legitimately argue that most such Corinthians found Paul's "creedal hymn" something less than convincing.

 at 1:50 ff, McLatchie says Peter and James preached the gospel before Paul, but according to John 7:5 and Mark 3:21, Jesus' own immediate family members, including his mother and brothers, did not believe him, and thought he was mentally ill, and I show in another post how these admissions justify a modern person to be skeptical of the authenticity of Jesus' message and miracles before he died, and if he was fraudulent before he died, he certainly didn't rise from the dead.

 at 2:05 ff, he says Luke provides "independent" testimony to the resurrection, which doesn't make sense, since Luke admits he is simply conveying to Theophilus what he learned from those who were eyewitnesses and servants, which if true, means Luke's contribution is purely second-hand or hearsay.  Hearsay is a sorry excuse for "independent" corroboration.  Further, if one gang member gets on the stand and "corroborates" the alibi testimony of the gang member on trial for murder, do you suddenly believe the alibi is true?  Of course not, "corroboration" is nice, but still requires independent evaluation of the credibility of the corroborating source.

He says Luke's story of Jesus' appearance to the 12 is corroborated by John and Paul, but John's contribution is devalued by Clement of Alexandria's statement that John did not wish to report the external facts as already done by the Synoptics, but wrote instead a "spiritual" gospel, and the problems with Paul's credibility have already been shown above.

at 2:40 ff, McLatchie unforgivably says these corroborations argue that the disciples were sincere in their belief Jesus rose from the dead because they were willing to suffer for their faith.  But up to that point, McLatchie had not discussed any biblical or historical evidence that any disciple suffered for their faith.

At 2:45 ff, he says Peter in the gospels denied Christ three times, but must have undergone a major transformation because in John 21 Jesus anticipates the way Peter will die for his faith, arguing that it would be unlikely for John to attribute such prophecy to Jesus had it not happened.  McLatchie overlooks that most scholars and church fathers agree John was the latest published of the 4 canonical gospels, which increases the likelihood it was written after the alleged 65 a.d. death of Peter, especially under Clement of Alexandria's statement that John already knew the Synoptic gospels had given the "external facts" and so John at that later time chose to instead write a "spiritual gospel".

He also overlooks the fact that the prophecy of Jesus said Peter will be led where Peter doesn't want to go:

 18 "Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to gird yourself and walk wherever you wished; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you, and bring you where you do not wish to go."
 19 Now this He said, signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God. And when He had spoken this, He said to him, "Follow Me!" (Jn. 21:18-19 NAU)

 Peter being unwilling to die for his faith is hardly evidence in favor of his being a martyr.  Without more clarifying historical evidence, Peter's death implies nothing more than that the ruling secular authorities decided to impose capital punishment on those who were Christians.  No historical evidence suggests Peter shirked a last chance opportunity to deny his faith.


McLatchie mentions Clement's statement about Peter's martyrdom, but again, no discussion of its merits or veracity.

at 3:10 ff, he surprisingly admits on the basis of Mark 3 and John 7:5 that James the brother of Jesus was a skeptic of Jesus before Jesus died.  He is correct to characterize James as this skeptical at this early point, but he does not draw out the implications, he merely notes that in the NT James is characterized as becoming a believer at some point after Jesus died, as if it was beyond controversy that James converted, and that he did so because he experienced the real risen Christ.  But fake Christians being voted into church office is nothing new or extraordinary, so James' continuing involvement with the Christian movement after Jesus died does not increase the likelihood that he became a convert.  And indeed, James' biological relation to Jesus probably made him feel he could received royal treatment if he decided to join the cause.  And indeed, this James appears in Acts 15 and 21:18 ff as if he was the leader of the Jerusalem church.

at 3:50 ff, McLatchie, for unknown reasons, follows his statement of James converting, with a reference to Josephus who said James was executed.  Yes, Josephus said that, but McLatchie's implication that James was executed for his faith, cannot be sustained from Josephus.  Josephus mentions James the alleged brother of Jesus in Antiquities of the Jews, Book 20, ch. 9 as follows:

Chapter 9

Concerning Albinus Under Whose Procuratorship James Was Slain; As Also What Edifices Were Built By Agrippa.

1. And now Caesar, upon hearing the death of Festus, sent Albinus into Judea, as procurator. But the king deprived Joseph of the high priesthood, and bestowed the succession to that dignity on the son of Ananus, who was also himself called Ananus. Now the report goes that this eldest Ananus proved a most fortunate man; for he had five sons who had all performed the office of a high priest to God, and who had himself enjoyed that dignity a long time formerly, which had never happened to any other of our high priests. But this younger Ananus, who, as we have told you already, took the high priesthood, was a bold man in his temper, and very insolent; he was also of the sect of the Sadducees,   who are very rigid in judging offenders, above all the rest of the Jews, as we have already observed; when, therefore, Ananus was of this disposition, he thought he had now a proper opportunity [to exercise his authority]. Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the sanhedrim of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned: but as for those who seemed the most equitable of the citizens, and such as were the most uneasy at the breach of the laws, they disliked what was done; they also sent to the king [Agrippa], desiring him to send to Ananus that he should act so no more, for that what he had already done was not to be justified; nay, some of them went also to meet Albinus, as he was upon his journey from Alexandria, and informed him that it was not lawful for Ananus to assemble a sanhedrim without his consent.

Josephus, F., & Whiston, W. (1999). The works of Josephus : Complete and unabridged.

Includes index. (electronic ed. of the new updated ed.). Garland, TX: Galaxie Software.

  Josephus characerizes the death of James the brother of Jesus as on the basis of James being a "law breaker", which hardly equates to "because he was a Christian", even if the charge against James was false.

 Mclatchie then says James' martyrdom is mention by Clement and Eusebius.  Yes, it is, and here it is:

BOOK II, CHAPTER 9
The Martyrdom of James the Apostle

"Now about that time" "Herod the King stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the Church. And he killed James the brother of John with the sword." And concerning this James, Clement, in the seventh book of his Hypotyposes, relates a story which is worthy of mention; telling it as he received it from those who had lived before him. He says that the one who led James to the judgment-seat, when he saw him bearing his testimony, was moved, and confessed that he was himself also a Christian.

They were both therefore, he says, led away together; and on the way he begged James to forgive him. And he, after considering a little, said, "Peace be with thee," and kissed him. And thus they were both beheaded at the same time.

First, Clement received this story by word of mouth and doesn't name his sources, so fact-checking this is next to impossible, which means it cannot be foisted on skeptics as if it were as obviously truthful as the assassination of Lincoln.  Second, the account says the person leading James to the trial, apparently working for the Court, converted on the basis of James' court testimony, and was so convinced that he endured beheading with James (!?) which makes the account unbelievably legendary, since it is presumed the man who led James to the trial knew about Christian claims somewhat before leading James into court and apparently wasn't yet convinced, so if he didn't believe Christian claims then, nothing James could possibly say would have made much of a difference.  Such a quick conversion on the basis of one man's testimony sounds more like the stuff of legend than of real history.  Third, Schaff says to what degree the account is likely true or false is impossible to say, which means it is historically worthless:

On Clement’s Hypotyposes, see below, Bk. VI. chap. 13, note 3. This fragment is preserved by Eusebius alone. The account was probably received by Clement from oral tradition. He had a great store of such traditions of the apostles and their immediate followers,—in how far true or false it is impossible to say; compare the story which he tells of John, quoted by Eusebius, Bk. III. chap. 23, below. This story of James is not intrinsically improbable. It may have been true, though external testimony for it is, of course, weak. The Latin legends concerning James’ later labors in Spain and his burial in Compostella are entirely worthless. Epiphanius reports that he was unmarried, and lived the life of a Nazarite; but he gives no authority for his statement and it is not improbable that the report originated through a confusion of this James with James the Just.

Schaff, P. (1997). The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol. I. Eusebius: Church History, Life of Constantine the Great, and Oration in Praise of Constantine. Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems.

at 4:10, McLatchie says "I like to ask the skeptic 'how much would it take to convince you that your elder brother was the Yahweh of the Old Testament...?"

I deny the legitmacy of the question, since if I suggest a miracle, then "an evil and an adulteress generation seeketh after a sign" (Matthew 16:4), and if I don't suggest a miracle, then the requested act, when performed, would not necessarily require that it was God who did it, since people are capable of non-miraculous acts.

But if the question is legitimate, then I would have to see my elder brother demonstrate his being the creator of the universe by restoring the limbs to amputees in medically controlled conditions presided over by atheist doctors.  He could also lift the ocean off the seabed about 100 feet high, and use his power to prevent resulting weather catastrophes so that scientists could search the seabed for a month while the world gasped in wild wonder watching the ocean just sit there in mid-air.  He could also rearrange the stars to spell in English "Jesus Christ is Lord".   Don't ask skeptics what miracles would convince them, because we will insist on only those acts that are most reasonably beyond any possibility of fraud.

 At 4:20 ff, McLatchie says Peter and James were willing to die for the resurrection, but unfortunately none of the historical evidence he previously cited expressed or even implied that Peter and James were willing to die for their belief in Jesus' resurrection.  If James whom Josephus mentions is the same guy who authored the Book of James, well that James doesn't even assert Jesus rose from the dead, and curiously doesn't credit Jesus with jack shit, the entire epistle being little more than a Jewish moral tome drawing upon, you guessed it, not examples from Jesus' life or teachings, but from the OT.  The fact that James talks in ways that can be matched thematically to sayings of Jesus in the gospels only invites more trouble:  Why isn't James directly quoting Jesus, if in fact he talks the way he does because he is drawing upon Jesus-traditions? And again, James' disbelief in the miracles of Jesus during his earthly ministry make it excessively difficult to believe he somehow recognized the truth only after Jesus died.

For all these reasons, McLatchie's apologetics in this video appear geared for those who are already Christians, certainly not for skeptics.