Holding's possible farce; an answer to "The Impossible Faith"

For reasons unknown, but likely due to the sin of pride, James Patrick Holding continues to hawk his "Impossible Faith" apologetic as if it was some sort of "smack-down" to atheists and anybody else who say Christianity is false.

I attacked Holding's impossible faith argument in formal debate with him years ago at theologyweb.
I am currently working on a point-by-point rebuttal to Holding's web-based Impossible faith article.  Check back spoon!

First, Holding has configured his website to be inaccessible to the ISP I use to surf the internet.  He knowingly did this soon after I sued him for libel.  If you are a follower of Holding, let me know when you found any legitimately credentialed Christian scholar taking similarly desperate steps to prevent a critic from accessing material.  Go ahead, email Habermas, Licona, Craig, etc, ask them whether they have acted to prevent certain people from accessing their web-based materials.

 The persons who uploaded an interview of Holding discussing his impossible faith, likewise disabled comments to that video:



That video was hosted by a Theology, Philosophy and Science, and by a Dr. Craig Johnson, both of whom have disabled comments to the video.  Even in Christianity, effective marketing is always more important than trusting in the Holy Spirit.

Holding's clamming up like this sounds more like genuine fright than it does any other bullshit excuse he gives for it.  Preventing a critic from accessing one's controversial materials and arguments runs afoul of the basic ethics of Christian scholarship.  But maybe this is just Holding's interpretation of Titus 3:9-11, who knows.

Second, soon after I asserted on this blog that I still access Holding's website through the Google cache, suddenly, the google cache no longer works.  I get paid to be suspicious when I don't have anything to be suspicious about. (Update, June 5, 2018---I verified with the ISP that they prevented all users from accessing google cache since it was being accessed to get around their filters, so I don't accuse Holding of doing something to prevent access through said cache...but that hardly erases the fact that he did take positive steps to prevent me from accessing his website).

Third, that Holding was wasting his time blocking my access to his website,  is seen from the fact that I easily access his website by simply connecting to the internet using any one from among 10 different wireless ISP's within range of my computer.  I hardly exclusively depend on my local library for internet access.  Apparently Holding is right: he does indeed get irrational when he perceives an inevitable smackdown headed his way.  

Fourth, being the fake Christian that he is, Holding accidentally allowed more of his true colors show by hiding his "impossible faith" arguments behind a paywall.  Somewhere along the way, he decided that selling Jesus for profit was more desirable than allowing free access to what he must consider "the gospel".  Despite Holding's claim to be on the cutting edge of apologetics research for the last 20 years, he shows no more spiritual maturity than a televangelist who first tells you how to properly write your check to him, before he starts "healing" anybody.  Money talks, even in Christianity.

Now then, onto more pressing matters...Holding argues that the claims of Jesus and Paul ran counter to what the people in their culture expected of true religion, therefore, if Christianity flourished enough in that context to become world-wide religion, it's survival was against incredible odds, and thus can only be explained on the basis that Jesus' miracles were genuinely supernatural and the first converts knew it.

There are 4 basic fuck-ups in Holding's argument:

1)  Jesus' mother and brothers thought him to be insane and put forth effort to prohibit his public preaching, despite their living in a collectivist society where such activity would bring about a shocking level of shame on themselves if the accusation of insanity was false. Mark 3:21-31.  Let's just say they likely had excellent probable cause to believe Jesus was nothing but a dramatic outspoken extroverted con man, long on surface appearance and short on actual substance.  We find the same in John 7:5, saying even Jesus' brothers were not believing in him. No source of dishonor in that culture was more profoundly shameful than when accusations of insanity come from your own immediate family,  since common sense dictated that the people most likely to know the truth about you, would be your own immediate family.  The point is that if Jesus' miracles were so positively undeniable as Holding alleges, the last people we'd expect to find writing off the miracle-worker as a fraud, would be his own mother and brothers.  Unless Holding suddenly discovers that Mark 3:21 and John 7:5 are mere textual corruptions,  he will have to concede their originality, and their inerrancy, and suffer accordingly from this bit of biblical bad news.

2) There is nearly universal consensus among conservative Christian scholars that James, the Lord's brother, did not believe in Jesus' claims before Jesus died. In other words, during the three or so years that Jesus went around raising people from the dead, walking on water, healing people of diseases, etc., somehow, his own brother saw no reason to conclude Jesus was the Son of God:

Inerrantist G.L. Borchert finds that Jesus’ brothers remained ‘unbelievers’ throughout Jesus earthly ministry:

It is apparent from the text that Jesus’ brothers were not yet to be numbered among the believers. Several writers have seen a confirmation in the similar lack of belief on the part of the brothers in the Markan account at 3:21, 31–35.7 The brothers’ failure to believe in him (John 7:5) was accompanied by a challenge to make evident his messiahship by some public display (7:3–4). In John the demand for signs or public display is an evidence that such persons have an inadequate relation to Jesus, and as a result they are to be reckoned among those who stand condemned (3:18). There is little middle ground in this Gospel for fence-sitters. As far as any believing on the brothers’ part is concerned, it is clear that such would have to await the post-resurrection period when, for example, James, the brother of the Lord, became a leader in the Jerusalem church (cf. Gal 1:19 particularly and also Acts 12:17; 15:13; 21:8).  New American Commentary, Borchert, G. L. (2001, c1996). Vol. 25A: John 1-11 p. 280[3]

From the cd-rom game in Gary Habermas, Mike Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, paperback 352 pages, Kregal Publishers, Grand Rapids, MI. © 2004 (with cd-rom), quiz 1, under the category “Skeptics”, one of the questions was “True or False: Jesus had a brother named James who did not believe in Him before the resurrection”.  The correct answer was “yes”. So Habermas and Licona intend for Christians who are new to apologetics, to believe that Jesus' own brother James somehow didn't find any of Jesus' miracles to be particularly persuasive before Jesus was crucified.

Apologist Norman Geisler agrees:

Finally in addition to appearing to his unbelieving disciples, Jesus also appeared to some who were not his disciples at all. He appeared to his brother James (1 Cor. 15:7), who, with his other brothers, was not a believer before the Resurrection (John 7:5).  When Critics Ask, p. 461[1]

Apologist Josh McDowell is surprisingly specific that James didn't merely maintain unbelief, but "despised" all that Jesus stood for:

Look at the changed life of James, the brother of Jesus.  Before the resurrection he despised all that his brother stood for.  He thought Christ’s claims were blatant pretention [sic] and served only to ruin the family name.]ETDAV, p. 227, par. 4D.

The question that gives apologists nightmares is:  Assuming Jesus’ miracles were genuinely supernatural, what theory best explains his own family rejecting his claims throughout the duration of the earthly ministry?   If your brother began claiming himself to be an angel of the Lord sent to strengthen Christians, and went around gaining fame in your city as somebody who performs real healings, resurrections and other miracles, wouldn't you first have to confirm he was a con artist with sorely deluded followers before you could maintain unbelief toward his claims?  How likely is it that by some quirk, you would just never be in the proper circumstance to watch his miracles or hear testimony of eyewitnesses who claimed healing from him?

Will somebody seriously set forth the trifle that maybe Jesus’ brothers were, for the full 3 years of Jesus’ earthly ministry, always in the wrong place at the wrong time, and never got lucky enough to actually be present when Jesus did any of his miracles?  Perhaps they stayed shut up in their houses so much that they never got around to having a conversation with any of Jesus 12 disciples (Luke 6:13 ff) and never managed to hear anything significant from any of his 70 disciples (Luke 10:1), nor from the entire cities crowded with his supporters who stampeded each other just to get to him (Mark 1:45)?

Maybe his brothers were so unlucky that they never managed to hear testimony from any of the “many” whom Jesus healed of various diseases (Matthew 4:24, etc)?

  Do a search in your NT for "crowds".  There are numerous references to Jesus being found entirely convincing by "large crowds"  (I develop the point in my blog article in rebuttal to Tim Chaffey's "Defense of Easter" book.

Or maybe Jesus’ brothers saw plenty of Jesus’ miracles, but were more obstinately stupid than today’s atheists, and refused to believe their own eyes because they were so intent on assisting the devil in opposing the gospel? 

Can any excuse be too stupid if it favors bible inerrancy?  Not when the bullshit conspiracy scenario comes from the bible:

 19 We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. (1 Jn. 5:19 NAU)

Yup, if yer gonna be a Christian, you have to believe in invisible people who can cause you much trouble without being detected, thus not much different from the toddler who still believes there is monster under her bed and it just turns invisible whenever anybody looks.

  8 Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. (1 Pet. 5:8 NAU)

Anyway...

3) the NT records many instances of apostasy that indicate that the type of faith many of Jesus' followers had, was superficial; not what we'd expect if they had concluded, during conversion to the faith, that the miracles of Jesus were genuinely supernatural.  The bible's devil-verse, John 6:66, provides much truth by declaring that, all because of a statement about eating his flesh, which most people would naturally discern to be figurative, "many" of Jesus' disciples nevertheless stopped following him:  

  57 "As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also will live because of Me.
 58 "This is the bread which came down out of heaven; not as the fathers ate and died; he who eats this bread will live forever."
 59 These things He said in the synagogue as He taught in Capernaum.
 60 Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this said, "This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?"
 61 But Jesus, conscious that His disciples grumbled at this, said to them, "Does this cause you to stumble?
 62 "What then if you see the Son of Man ascending to where He was before?
 63 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.
 64 "But there are some of you who do not believe." For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who it was that would betray Him.
 65 And He was saying, "For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father."
 66 As a result of this many of His disciples withdrew and were not walking with Him anymore.
 67 So Jesus said to the twelve, "You do not want to go away also, do you?"
 (Jn. 6:57-67 NAU)

 If they converted on the basis that Jesus' miracles were undeniably supernatural, how could their faith be disturbed by what was obviously a figurative statement from Jesus, to the point that they actually fall away?  And isn't it rather easy to imagine that those disciples would have asked "when you say we must eat your flesh, are you speaking literally or figuratively?", and Jesus' answer "figuratively" would have preempted the apostasy?

If John 6:66 is historically accurate, it is highly unlikely these disciples had converted to the faith on the basis of Jesus' miracles...in which case it seems more plausible to conclude that the reason they could so easily fall away over such a stupid failure to recognize figurative language, is because they converted to the faith for reasons other than Jesus' miracles.  That makes it sound like not even Jesus' disciples thought his miracles quite as genuinely supernatural as Holding thinks.  This is the part where Holding suddenly discovers that eyewitness testimony doesn't mean shit and never did.  It sounds as if Jesus' popularity had more in common with dramatic extroverted televangelists and their ability to whip up religious zealots into a frenzy of stupidity, and less to do with performing actual miracles.

(by the way, one particularly acute argument against Jesus' miracles is the fact that he could have prevented disease and thus any need to do miracles by simply instructing the people in the realities of germs and disinfecting, truths we recognize today...but he never did.  Wanna watch an apologist squirm with insane gyrations?  Ask him or her how Jesus can be so concerned to go around "healing", but never concerned to give people truth about sanitation? What was Jesus saying in his mind?  "I love you so much I'll heal you of all your sicknesses and diseases....but you 'aren't ready' to learn basic sanitation." (!?)  You will find yourself suddenly in the company of paralyzed idiots who can do nothing more than utter "God's ways are mysterious".  You'll excuse me if I explain this flaw in Jesus' approach on the basis of my presupposition that Jesus didn't know any more about germs than dogs do.  FUCK YOU.)

 4)  Apostle Paul infamously expresses not the slightest interest in the things Jesus did before being crucified.  We have no reason to think Paul's Gentile churches would have more interest in that aspect of Jesus, than their founder Paul did.    So to whatever degree Paul's converts contribute to the flourishing of 1st century Christanity, it was that many people who found reasons other than "miracles" to join the cause.  Maybe you should ask yourself "if the reality of the miracles Jesus performed before he died, was such a powerful argument, why doesn't Paul use that argument?"

 5)  The truth is that Christianity was wiped out by the 5th century and ceased to exist thereafter.  Holding will jump out of his skin and yell "what the fuck!" (when he is sure nobody else is listening; hypocrites have to be aware of their surroundings with great alarm), but it's true:  the gospel Jesus preached contradicts the gospel Paul preached.  Generalizations about how "Christianity survived and flourished" are bullshit, a new form of Christianity that arbitrarily relaxed some rules Jesus had insisted on, to make the religion more palatable to Gentiles, is what "survived".   

 In light of these problems, it is highly unlikely that the 1st generation of Christians found Jesus' miracles to be undeniably genuine.  It is more likely that these early conversions had no more significance than the "conversions" achieved by Billy Graham or other evangelist who manages to attract and convince large crowds despite the bullshit nature of the message.  Therefore, any explanation for Christianity's flourishing, other than "the miracles were real!", must be more probable than Holding's hypothesis.

This page will be regularly updated with quotes from Christian scholars who credit Christianity's survival to causes other than the miraculous.

For now, one such scholar would be Luke:

 28 One of them named Agabus stood up and began to indicate by the Spirit that there would certainly be a great famine all over the world. And this took place in the reign of Claudius. (Acts 11:28 NAU)

Inerrantist scholars believe this occured around 44 a.d.:

In Antioch Agabus predicted that there would be a worldwide famine.131 Luke added the “aside” that this famine did indeed occur during the time of Claudius, who was Roman emperor from A.D. 41–54.132

The reign of Claudius was in fact marked by a long series of crop failures in various parts of the empire—in Judea, in Rome, in Egypt, and in Greece. The Judean famine seems to have taken place during the procuratorship of Tiberius Alexander (A.D. 46–48), and Egyptian documents reveal a major famine there in A.D. 45–46 due to flooding. The most likely time for the Judean famine would thus seem to have been around A.D. 46. In any event, the Antioch church decided to gather a collection to relieve their fellow Christians in Judea, each setting something aside according to his or her ability.135 Eventually, when the famine struck, the collection was delivered to the elders in Jerusalem by Paul and Barnabas. Actually, v. 30 does not mention Jerusalem, but 12:25 does in speaking of Paul and Barnabas’s return from this visit.

Polhill, J. B. (2001, c1992). Vol. 26: Acts (electronic ed.). Logos Library System;

The New American Commentary (Page 274).

Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

My theory is that this famine was the prime motive for most unbelievers in Judea choosing to join a religious group such as the Christians, who apparently advocated the communal lifestyle anyway (Acts 4:34).  During a famine, unless you are rich, the people who stock the market with food begin to clam up, charge high prices, and reserve the increasingly scarce food commodities for themselves and their friends more and more.  You are either rich, or lucky, or you join some religious group, or you die of starvation.

Indeed, apostle Paul admits that the leaders of the Jerusalem church told him to "remember the poor" which most commentators take to mean he should give the Jerusalem church a gift of money:

 9 and recognizing the grace that had been given to me, James and Cephas and John, who were reputed to be pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, so that we might go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised.
 10 They only asked us to remember the poor-- the very thing I also was eager to do. (Gal. 2:9-10 NAU)

Inerrantist schholar T. George, writing for the inerrancy-driven New American Commentary:

Paul and Barnabas were asked to remember “the poor,” a shorthand expression for “the poor among the saints in Jerusalem” (Rom 15:26). From its earliest days the Jerusalem church faced a condition of grinding poverty, as can be seen from the dispute over widows receiving sufficient food and the practice of sharing all things in common to care for the needy (Acts 4:32–35; 6:1–4). A land of soil deprivation and poor irrigation, Judea was also hard hit in this period of history by famine, war, and overpopulation. To all this must be added the ravishing of the church in the persecutions directed by Paul and other leaders of the Jewish religious community. So chronic was the economic deprivation of the Judean Christians that they became known collectively as “the Poor.”

    Paul indicated that the request to remember the poor was not received as an onerous burden but rather as an activity he had already begun and was eager to carry forward. We know from his later writings that Paul devoted much time and energy to the collection of a special offering for the Jerusalem Christians (Rom 15:25–33; 1 Cor 16:1–4; 2 Cor 8:9). The churches of Galatia were among the Pauline congregations who contributed to this relief effort. For Paul this effort was an important witness for Christian unity, a tangible way for Gentile Christians to express materially their appreciation for the great blessing in which they had shared spiritually with their brothers and sisters in Jerusalem. Paul himself carried this love gift to Jerusalem on his last visit to that city, during the course of which he was arrested and began the long journey to Rome that ended with his execution.

George, T. (2001, c1994). Vol. 30: Galatians (electronic ed.). Logos Library System;

The New American Commentary (Page 165).

Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

If inerrantists are correct that in Paul's day the Jerusalem church was constantly poor and in need of charity, it really isn't that much of a stretch to envision unbelievers, half-starved, arriving at the church, confessing their sins and doing whatever was required in order to reap the benefits of the group, in this case, food. (by the way, why was the Jerusalem church poor?  Didn't Jesus assure his followers that their need would be supplied by God as long as they put the kingdom first in their lives?

 30 "But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith!
 31 "Do not worry then, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear for clothing?'
 32 "For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.
 33 "But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. (Matt. 6:30-33 NAU)

Or did Jesus presume that the people listening to him were experts in systematic theology, and thus aware that God's sovereign will always dictated whether or not they would live or die?

The point is if James Patrick Holding thinks the 1st century unbelievers converted to the church because there was just no denying that the miracles of Jesus and his resurrection, its probably because he never noticed, until an atheist pointed it out to him, that severe hunger has a tendency to motivate dying people to suddenly convert to the views of whatever religious group that happens along and can give them food.

Suppose you think Mormonism is a false form of Christianity.  Suppose you were left stranded in the desert and were dying of thirst.  The only people you've seen in 3 days are Mormon missionaries driving across the desert carrying food and water. You flag them down and they stop...but they are assholes; they are willing to help, but only if you agree that Mormonism is true.  How great would be the temptation to feign agreement with whatever they say just so you can save your life?

So unless Holding magically locates some scholar who disagrees with inerrantist scholars, and says the famine referenced in Acts 11 was a small thing, despite the biblical evidence that it savaged the nascent church, he will have to agree that plenty of people who joined the church in the early period, would likely have done so purely to gain food, and without giving two shits whether or not this religion's miracle claims were true.

And when we remember that Jesus' "miracles" were not even enough to convince his own family, and not enough to retain "many" of his own disciples, it's a pretty powerful case that Christianity's flourishing in the 1st century likely occurred for purely naturalistic reasons.

And lord knows, we have plenty of evidence, historically and contemporary, of how easily religious-minded people can be swayed to believe false things.  Methinks a purely naturalistic explanation for Christianity's rise to fame is far more likely to be the correct one, than Holding's hypothesis "the miracles must have been real!"

FUCK YOU, updated regularly
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Demolishing Triablogue: Grave Robbers? Steve Hays apparently forgot about the full-time skepticism of Jesus' mother and brothers

This is my reply to an article by Steve Hays entitled

Grave robbers!

One thing we can say with relative certainty (even though most people – including lots of scholars!) have never thought about this or realized it, is that no one came to think Jesus was raised from the dead because three days later they went to the tomb and found it was empty.   It is striking that Paul, our first author who talks about Jesus’ resurrection, never mentions the discovery of the empty tomb and does not use an empty tomb as some kind of “proof” that the body of Jesus had been raised.

Moreover, whenever the Gospels tell their later stories about the tomb, it never, ever leads anyone came to believe in the resurrection.  The reason is pretty obvious.  If you buried a friend who had recently died, and three days later you went back and found the body was no longer there, would your reaction be “Oh, he’s been exalted to heaven to sit at the right hand of God”?  Of course not.  Your reaction would be: “Grave robbers!”   Or, “Hey, I’m at the wrong tomb!”

https://ehrmanblog.org/an-easter-reflection-2018/

Depends on who my friend is. If my friend is God Incarnate, if my friend performed astounding miracles at will–including the ability to raise the dead–if my friend predicted his death and resurrection, if Isaiah predicted messiah's death and resurrection (Isa 53:7-12), then the first reaction, the most logical reaction, to the empty tomb shouldn't be “Grave robbers!” Or, “Hey, I’m at the wrong tomb!”

  What if the person doing miracles at-will and declaring himself God incarnate was your own brother?

Would you do what Jesus' mother, brother James and other members of his immediately family did  throughout his entire three year ministry, and draw the conclusion that Jesus was mentally unstable?

From Mark 3

 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.
 25 "If a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.
 26 "If Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but he is finished!
 27 "But no one can enter the strong man's house and plunder his property unless he first binds the strong man, and then he will plunder his house.
 28 "Truly I say to you, all sins shall be forgiven the sons of men, and whatever blasphemies they utter;
 29 but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin "--
 30 because they were saying, "He has an unclean spirit."
 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."
 33 Answering them, He said, "Who are My mother and My brothers?"
 34 Looking about at those who were sitting around Him, He said, "Behold My mother and My brothers!
 35 "For whoever does the will of God, he is My brother and sister and mother."
 (Mk. 3:20-35 NAU)

  In the parallel from Matthew 13, Jesus specifies that his enemies includes those living in his own house (i.e., family)

 54 He came to His hometown and began teaching them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished, and said, "Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers?
 55 "Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not His mother called Mary, and His brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas?
 56 "And His sisters, are they not all with us? Where then did this man get all these things?"
 57 And they took offense at Him. But Jesus said to them, "A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household."
 58 And He did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief. (Matt. 13:54-58 NAU)

From John 7:

 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.
 (Jn. 7:1-7 NAU)

Something tells me you'd rather not delve too far into the historically plausible reasons Jesus' immediate family might have had for not finding him the least bit credible throughout his three year ministry...you might discover that they are not likely to have become believers later as the liar who wrote the book of Acts says.

ANNOYED PINOY5/08/2018 10:35 AM☍

...no one came to think Jesus was raised from the dead because three days later they went to the tomb and found it was empty.
Yeah, because the disciples didn't believe Jesus was resurrected because of an empty tomb, but because they SAW and INTERACTED with the risen Lord.

But you aren't answering the argument.  How can today's Christians claim consistency with the apostolic method of preaching, when the apostolic method of preaching nowhere expresses or implies that anybody ever came to faith in Jesus because they were unable to naturalistically account for the empty tomb?

If you want to claim consistency with the apostolic method of truth-proving, show me Jesus, or fuck you.

It is striking that Paul, our first author who talks about Jesus’ resurrection, never mentions the discovery of the empty tomb and does not use an empty tomb as some kind of “proof” that the body of Jesus had been raised.
Because he and the other disciples had better proof than a merely empty tomb. Namely, encounters with the risen Christ.

Things modern Christianity doesn't have, apparently.  No apostolicity for you.

Also, given Paul's purposes of writing, there were no necessary reasons to bring up the tombs being empty. That's already assumed in his Jewish use of the concept of resurrection.

Still doesn't answer the point about why the NT never indicates anybody ever came to faith because of an empty tomb.  If you want to convert people the way the apostles did, stop talking about the empty tomb. 

Moreover, whenever the Gospels tell their later stories about the tomb, it never, ever leads anyone came to believe in the resurrection.
Again, it's because they encountered the resurrected Jesus.

Again, encounters that you don't have to offer today, you lose.

In the same way that a better proof that a baby has just been born is to actually see the baby, instead of focusing on the exhausted mother who had given it birth.

Exactly.  So stop talking about the exhausted mother and show us the baby.  Otherwise, don't expect us to keep listening as you go off into stupid shit like "he's invisible now". God clearly isn't doing his best to convince unbelievers to convert.

An Answer to Cerebral Faith's defense of apostolic gospel authorship

This is my reply to an article by "Cerebral Faith" entitled

Cerebral Faith

Reasons To Accept The Gospels' Traditional Authorship

Posted by Evan Minton on November 07, 2017

Non-Christian scholars and laypeople alike have argued that we don't know or can't know who wrote the gospels.

 Inerrantist Christian scholar Craig Blomberg admits that Matthew's authorship is not demanded by the historical evidence, the best arguments do not amount to proof, and his own conclusion that Matthew is the best candidate, is presented "tentatively":

All of the evidence surveyed so far (“Structure,” “Theology,” etc.) allows for authorship by the apostle Matthew, but none of that evidence demands it…When all the evidence is amassed, there appears no conclusive proof for the apostle Matthew as author but no particularly cogent reason to deny this uniform early church tradition…But again we present these conclusions tentatively.

Blomberg, C. (2001, c1992). Vol. 22: Matthew (electronic ed.).

Logos Library System; The New American Commentary (Page 40).

Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

The gospels are written anonymously, they say, and the names attached to them as we find them in our English Bibles were given to them as a scheme to make their content more credible.

Some skeptic opinion are too skeptical, yes.

After all, if the people writing these things were actually there, that boosts their credibility, doesn't it?

Not unless you think "eyewitness testimony" equals "truth".  But common experience tells us that not only do eyewitnesses lie or get facts wrong, they are willing to lie for their friends and spin facts to make the cause for which they testify appear more justified.

The Non-Christian charge that Matthew didn't really write Matthew,

You give a false impression that only non-Christians denigrate Matthew's authorship. Craig Keener is hailed by apologists as having written a Christian-miracle book that is a game changer in the debate about naturalism v. supernaturalism.  This obviously conservative inerrantist scholar admits the tradition of Matthew's authorship is not as reliable as in the case of other gospel authors:

Authorship. In contrast to, say, Paul’s letters, attributions of authorship in the Gospels are generally based on church tradition rather than evidence in the biblical text itself. Although this tradition is usually trustworthy, in the case of Matthew it may be less reliable (since the same tradition also claims that the original Gospel of Matthew was written in Hebrew, which is not true of our First Gospel). The authorship of the First Gospel is thus debated, but we will speak of “Matthew” for convenience’s sake and lack of a better designation.

 Keener, C. S., & InterVarsity Press. (1993).

The IVP Bible background commentary : New Testament.

Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press.

that John didn't really write John, etc. These were written by people whose identities remain unknown and they attached the names to the gospels to make their claims about Jesus seem legit.

Again, some skeptical opinions are too skeptical.  I'm an atheist, but I don't say whatever Matthew originally wrote is entirely lost.  Perhaps much of what he originally wrote is present in modern canonical Matthew.  But that hardly justifies pretending that his resurrection-testimony is beefed up thereby.

However, I think there are some good reasons to believe that the names attached to these gospels really are the people who wrote them and that the skeptics are wrong.

Again, you misrepresent the issue as if skeptics are the only ones who deny Matthean authorship.  Roman Catholics are big on tradition, yet their scholars call Matthean authorship "untenable": 

The ancient tradition that the author was the disciple and apostle of Jesus named Matthew (see Mat 10:3) is untenable because the gospel is based, in large part, on the Gospel according to Mark (almost all the verses of that gospel have been utilized in this), and it is hardly likely that a companion of Jesus would have followed so extensively an account that came from one who admittedly never had such an association rather than rely on his own memories. The attribution of the gospel to the disciple Matthew may have been due to his having been responsible for some of the traditions found in it, but that is far from certain.  

The unknown author, whom we shall continue to call Matthew for the sake of convenience, drew not only upon the Gospel according to Mark but upon a large body of material (principally, sayings of Jesus) not found in Mark that corresponds, sometimes exactly, to material found also in the Gospel according to Luke.

The New American Bible

Confraternity of Christian Doctrine. Board of Trustees,

Catholic Church. National Conference of Catholic Bishops,

& United States Catholic Conference. Administrative Board. (1996, c1986)

This will not be an exhaustive treatment of the gospel authorship issue, but let me briefly mention three reasons we can believe in the traditional authorship of the gospels.

Reason 1: If people wanted to make up names for the authors of the 4 canonical gospels, they would most likely have chosen weightier names for them.

I have a question for people who say that the canonical gospels are forgeries with the names of the apostles attached to give their content credibility. If people wanted to make up names for the authors of the 4 canonical gospels, then why didn't they choose weightier names for them?

Did you ever notice the names Christians of the 2nd century and afterwardascribed to the apocryphal works?  Thomas, Andrew, Nicodemus, Bartholomew "Acts of Matthias"...neither the bible nor history say much about these figures either, yet for some reason the Christians who created these lies apparently thought ascribing them to such names would increase their popularity.  Consider that perhaps history doesn't tell you how awesome Matthew, Mark and Luke really were.

Names like Peter, Phillip, Mary, James, these names carry a lot of weight. But Mark and Luke weren't even part of the original 12 disciples, nor were they apostles.

I don't see any reason why a forger would have to have an extremist mindset and assume the best way to popularize his works is to ascribe only the most popular apostles to them.  

Matthew was, but he was a hated tax collector and therefore would have been a less likely candidate.

No, tax-collectors were not hated by Christians, and the gospel of Matthew is a Christian production.

I mean, you're writing a document to convince Jews that Jesus is the Messiah

Christian scholars are very divided on who the canonical gospel authors' originally intended audiences were.  Matthew is the only one for whom a predominantly Jewish audience is plausible. 

and you're going to make the author a person from a group of people the Jews were known to have an intense hatred for?

There is very little historical evidence that the gospel authors intended to write for outsiders. Their failure to clearly identify themselves sounds more like they were writing to those who already knew of and approved of them, than it sounds like they were trying to impress unbelievers.  John's theology is too high to take seriously his comment that he writes so that others will come to salvation (John 20:31), he is clearly writing to edify those who already embrace the faith and need to start being fed spiritual meat.

I don't think so. John was one of Jesus' "inner three", so he's the exception. I'll grant that John's name carries a lot of weight, but this "they-gave-them-names-to-make-the-documents-more-credible argument just simply doesn't work for the other three gospels.

If I were trying to make the canonical gospels more credible by attaching false authors to them, I would have named them things like "The Gospel of Peter", "The Gospel Of Mary", "The Gospel Of Thomas", or if you really wanted to induce credibility, "The Gospel Of Jesus". After all, who could be a better eyewitness to Jesus' life and teachings than Jesus Himself?

You are assuming that a forger in the 1st century would always "go for broke" given the fact that he was lying about everything and wanting to lend his writings apostolic authority.  I've shown above that there is no reason to suppose such a forger would only opt for the most popular names.  A forger would have been just as happy to publish under the name of a follower of an apostle.  I'm not arguing the canonical gospels are forgeries, I'm only demonstrating that your attempts to get rid of the forgery hypothesis are based on a misunderstanding of the way things were in the first and 2nd centuries.

. The canonical gospels don't bare these extremely weighty names.

"bear".

However, it's interesting that the apocryphal gospels do.

Yeah, you would find it interesting that the authors of the apocryphal gospels prioritize those among the original Christians that weren't the most popular.

And everyone knew these were forgeries because they were written until long after the apostles died (i.e into the late second, third, fourth, and even fifth centuries). That's one of the primary reasons they didn't make it into the canon.

You speak as if the early church was confident of which books were apostolic and which weren't. You might wish to consult 4th century Eusebius, the church historian, who, even more than 200 years after the apostles died, was admitting many books remained "disputed":

BOOK III, CHAPTER 3
The Epistles of the Apostles

One epistle of Peter, that called the first, is acknowledged as genuine. And this the ancient elders used freely in their own writings as an undisputed work. But we have learned that his extant second Epistle does not belong to the canon; yet, as it has appeared profitable to many, it has been used with the other Scriptures. The so-called Acts of Peter, however, and the Gospel which bears his name, and the Preaching and the Apocalypse, as they are called, we know have not been universally accepted, because no ecclesiastical writer, ancient or modern, has made use of testimonies drawn from them. But in the course of my history I shall be careful to show, in addition to the official succession, what ecclesiastical writers have from time to time made use of any of the disputed works, and what they have said in regard to the canonical and accepted writings, as well as in regard to those which are not of this class. Such are the writings that bear the name of Peter, only one of which I know to be genuine and acknowledged by the ancient elders. Paul's fourteen epistles are well known and undisputed. It is not indeed right to overlook the fact that some have rejected the Epistle to the Hebrews, saying that it is disputed by the church of Rome, on the ground that it was not written by Paul. But what has been said concerning this epistle by those who lived before our time I shall quote in the proper place. In regard to the so-called Acts of Paul, I have not found them among the undisputed writings.

But as the same apostle, in the salutations at the end of the Epistle to the Romans, has made mention among others of Hermas, to whom the book called The Shepherd is ascribed, it should be observed that this too has been disputed by some, and on their account cannot be placed among the acknowledged books; while by others it is considered quite indispensable, especially to those who need instruction in the elements of the faith. Hence, as we know, it has been publicly read in churches, and I have found that some of the most ancient writers used it. This will serve to show the divine writings that are undisputed as well as those that are not universally acknowledged.

BOOK III, CHAPTER 25
The Divine Scriptures that are accepted and those that are not

Since we are dealing with this subject it is proper to sum up the writings of the New Testament which have been already mentioned. First then must be put the holy quaternion of the Gospels; following them the Acts of the Apostles. After this must be reckoned the epistles of Paul; next in order the extant final former epistle of John, and likewise the epistle of Peter, must be maintained. After them is to be placed, if it really seem proper, the Apocalypse of John, concerning which we shall give the different opinions at the proper time. These then belong among the accepted writings. Among the disputed writings, which are nevertheless recognized by many, are extant the so-called epistle of James and that of Jude, also the second epistle of Peter, and those that are called the second and third of John, whether they belong to the evangelist or to another person of the same name. Among the rejected writings must be reckoned also the Acts of Paul, and the so-called Shepherd, and the Apocalypse of Peter, and in addition to these the extant epistle of Barnabas, and the so-called Teachings of the Apostles; and besides, as I said, the Apocalypse of John, if it seem proper, which some, as I said, reject, but which others class with the accepted books. And among these some have placed also the Gospel according to the Hebrews, with which those of the Hebrews that have accepted Christ are especially delighted. And all these may be reckoned among the disputed books. But we have nevertheless felt compelled to give a catalogue of these also, distinguishing those works which according to ecclesiastical tradition are true and genuine and commonly accepted, from those others which, although not canonical but disputed, are yet at the same time known to most ecclesiastical writers -- we have felt compelled to give this catalogue in order that we might be able to know both these works and those that are cited by the heretics under the name of the apostles, including, for instance, such books as the Gospels of Peter, of Thomas, of Matthias, or of any others besides them, and the Acts of Andrew and John and the other apostles, which no one belonging to the succession of ecclesiastical writers has deemed worthy of mention in his writings. And further, the character of the style is at variance with apostolic usage, and both the thoughts and the purpose of the things that are related in them are so completely out of accord with true orthodoxy that they clearly show themselves to be the fictions of heretics. Wherefore they are not to be placed even among the rejected writings, but are all of them to be cast aside as absurd and impious. Let us now proceed with our history.

 Eusebius is writing in the 4th century. Let's just say your confident language about how "everybody knew", overstates the case.

Reason 2: The early church is unanimous in their testimony that Matthew wrote Matthew, Mark wrote Mark, Luke wrote Luke, etc.

The early church is also unanimous that Matthew and Luke were written first, an opinion now rejected by the majority of Christian scholars, who adopt Marcan priority.  They are also unanimous that Matthew wrote his original in Hebrew, and most Christian scholars reject this as mistaken given that canonical Matthew derives solely from Greek and doesn't appear to be translation-Greek.

Papias (ca. AD 70-ca. 163) said that St. Pete was Mark's scribe.

I think you meant that Mark was St. Pete's scribe?

He said; "Mark, having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately, though not indeed in order, whatsoever he remembered of the things said or done by Christ."

But you don't consider the date of Papias nor the dispute between Eusebius and Irenaeus about exactly how close to the apostles Papias was in history.  

1 Irenaeus (ca. 115-ca. 202), a student of Ignatius and Polycarp (who were themselves students of the apostle John) wrote: "Mark, the disciple, and interpreter of Peter, did also hand down to us in writing what had been preached by Peter"

If we are to believe Irenaeus on this point because he was only one-generation removed from John the apostle, then wouldn't you have to, on the same basis, conclude that Irenaeus was being accurate in saying Jesus lived into his 50's?  From his Against Heresies, Book 2:

Chapter XXII.—The Thirty Aeons are Not Typified by the Fact that Christ Was Baptized in His Thirtieth Year: He Did Not Suffer in the Twelfth Month After His Baptism,

But Was More Than Fifty Years Old When He Died.

4. Being thirty years old when He came to be baptized, and then possessing the full age of a Master,145 He came to Jerusalem, so that He might be properly acknowledged146 by all as a Master. For He did not seem one thing while He was another, as those affirm who describe Him as being man only in appearance; but what He was, that He also appeared to be. Being a Master, therefore, He also possessed the age of a Master, not despising or evading any condition of humanity, nor setting aside in Himself that law which He had147 appointed for the human race, but sanctifying every age, by that period corresponding to it which belonged to Himself. For He came to save all through means of Himself—all, I say, who through Him are born again to God148 —infants,149 and children, and boys, and youths, and old men. He therefore passed through every age, becoming an infant for infants, thus sanctifying infants; a child for children, thus sanctifying those who are of this age, being at the same time made to them an example of piety, righteousness, and submission; a youth for youths, becoming an example to youths, and thus sanctifying them for the Lord. So likewise He was an old man for old men, that He might be a perfect Master for all, not merely as respects the setting forth of the truth, but also as regards age, sanctifying at the same time the aged also, and becoming an example to them likewise. Then, at last, He came on to death itself, that He might be “the first-born from the dead, that in all things He might have the pre-eminence,”150 the Prince of life,151 existing before all, and going before all.152

5. They, however, that they may establish their false opinion regarding that which is written, “to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord,” maintain that He preached for one year only, and then suffered in the twelfth month. [In speaking thus], they are forgetful to their own disadvantage, destroying His whole work, and robbing Him of that age which is both more necessary and more honourable than any other; that more advanced age, I mean, during which also as a teacher He excelled all others. For how could He have had disciples, if He did not teach? And how could He have taught, unless He had reached the age of a Master? For when He came to be baptized, He had not yet completed His thirtieth year, but was beginning to be about thirty years of age (for thus Luke, who has mentioned His years, has expressed it: “Now Jesus was, as it were, beginning to be thirty years old,”153 when He came to receive baptism); and, [according to these men, ] He preached only one year reckoning from His baptism. On completing His thirtieth year He suffered, being in fact still a young man, and who had by no means attained to advanced age. Now, that the first stage of early life embraces thirty years,154 and that this extends onwards to the fortieth year, every one will admit; but from the fortieth andfiftieth year a man begins to decline towards old age, which our Lord possessed while He still fulfilled the office of a Teacher, even as the Gospel and all the elders testify; those who were conversant in Asia with John, the disciple of the Lord, [affirming] that John conveyed to them that information.155 And he remained among them up to the times of Trajan.156 Some of them, moreover, saw not only John, but the other apostles also, and heard the very same account from them, and bear testimony as to the [validity of] the statement. Whom then should we rather believe? Whether such men as these, or Ptolemaeus, who never saw the apostles, and who never even in his dreams attained to the slightest trace of an apostle?

6. But, besides this, those very Jews who then disputed with the Lord Jesus Christ have most clearly indicated the same thing. For when the Lord said to them, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day; and he saw it, and was glad,” they answered Him, “Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast Thou seen Abraham? ”157 Now, such language is fittingly applied to one who has already passed the age of forty, without having as yet reached his fiftieth year, yet is not far from this latter period. But to one who is only thirty years old it would unquestionably be said, “Thou art not yet forty years old.” For those who wished to convict Him of falsehood would certainly not extend the number of His years far beyond the age which they saw He had attained; but they mentioned a period near His real age, whether they had truly ascertained this out of the entry in the public register, or simply made a conjecture from what they observed that He was above forty years old, and that He certainly was not one of only thirty years of age.For it is altogether unreasonable to suppose that they were mistaken by twenty years, when they wished to prove Him younger than the times of Abraham. For what they saw, that they also expressed; and He whom they beheld was not a mere phantasm, but an actual being158 of flesh and blood. He did not then wont much of being fifty years old;159 and, in accordance with that fact, they said to Him, “Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast Thou seen Abraham? ”He did not therefore preach only for one year, nor did He suffer in the twelfth month of the year. For the period included between the thirtieth and the fiftieth year can never be regarded as one year…

Roberts, A., Donaldson, J., & Coxe, A. C. (1997). The Ante-Nicene Fathers Vol.I  : Translations of the writings of the Fathers down to A.D. 325. The apostolic fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus. Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 2:22:4-6, ANF

2 Clement of Alexandria likewise wrote that those who heard Peter's teachings "were not satisfied with merely a single hearing or with the unwritten teaching of the divine Gospel,

hence suggesting they were not true converts, since those filled by the Spirit already have what would be supplied by written words.

but with all sorts of entreaties they besought Mark, who was a follower of Peter and whose Gospel is extant, to leave behind with them in writing a record of the teaching passed on to them orally."

 What you don't tell the reader is that Eusebius presented Mark as writing only after buckling under pressure, it was not his initial desire to fulfill this church request:

BOOK II, CHAPTER 15
The Gospel according to Mark

And thus when the divine word had made its home among them, the power of Simon was quenched and immediately destroyed, together with the man himself. And so greatly did the splendor of piety illumine the minds of Peter's hearers that they were not satisfied with hearing once only, and were not content with the unwritten teaching of the divine Gospel, but with all sorts of entreaties they besought Mark, a follower of Peter, and the one whose Gospel is extant, that he would leave them a written monument of the doctrine which had been orally communicated to them. Nor did they cease until they had prevailed with the man, and had thus become the occasion of the written Gospel which bears the name of Mark.

 that's bad news for modern day idiots who think the gospel authors intended to write as they did.  Eusebius also says Matthew and John likewise wrote "only under pressure of necessity"

BOOK III, CHAPTER 24 The Order of the Gospels

And the rest of the followers of our Saviour, the twelve apostles, the seventy disciples, and countless others besides, were not ignorant of these things. Nevertheless, of all the disciples of the Lord, only Matthew and John have left us written memorials, and they, tradition says, were led to write only under the pressure of necessity.

 

3 These earlier church leaders and students of the apostles were in a position to know whether or not Mark authored the gospel of Mark and whether or not he got his information from Peter.

 The author of the gospel of Peter likely knew whether or not Peter authored it.

Time and time again, they affirm that the Gospel of Mark is indeed written by Mark and that Mark was acting as Peter's scribe.

 Even assuming apostolic authorship is correct, I don't see the gain.  You may as well say everything written by Jews who were in Hitler camps, is true. Well...do you believe the Nazi's made lampshades out of Jewish skin?

Regarding Matthew's gospel, In his Ecclesiastical History, the church historian Eusebius (A.D. 265-339) quotes Origen (A.D. 185-254), stating,

“Among the four Gospels, which are the only indisputable ones in the Church of God under heaven, I have learned by tradition that the first was written by Matthew, who was once a publician, but afterwards an apostle of Jesus Christ, and it was prepared for the converts from Judaism.”

that's right, he learned "by tradition", which is likely something a bit more fuzzy than critical investigation.

Irenaeus (A.D. 130-200), who was a student of Polycarp (A.D. 70-160), who in turn was a student of the apostle John, testifies that John wrote John.

He also said Jesus wasn't crucified until he became an old man.  Still impressed by how close Irenaeus was to John?

Furthermore, he asserts that it was written when John was in Ephesus and when he was well on in years. Irenaeus, for example, said "Further, they teach that John, the disciple of the Lord, indicated the first Ogdoad, expressing themselves in these words: John, the disciple of the Lord, wishing to set forth the origin of all things, so as to explain how the Father produced the whole, lays down a certain principle,—that, namely, which was first-begotten by God, which Being he has termed both the only-begotten Son and God, in whom the Father, after a seminal manner, brought forth all things." 4

Polycarp was a student of John, and Irenaeus was a student of Polycarp. This means they were in the best position of all to comment on whether John wrote the gospel of John.

 And the best friend of the gang member on trial for murder, who was there during the shooting, is also in the best position to know what really happened. Therefore, if he says his friend didn't do it, the prosecutor has no choice except to drop charges.

I can imagine Polycarp sitting at John's feet listening to John telling him all about what Jesus said and did, and then at the end John says "By the way, Polycarp. I'm currently writing a book on this. You'll be able to get it at Barnes and Noble in a few weeks".

I can also imagine the gang member, just before committing a murder, telling his friend "if the cops as you about it, just say I was with you the whole night drinking and watching tv!"

Reason 3: Forensic Statement Analysis

J. Warner Wallace

Oh fuck, are you kidding?

talks about this procedure in chapter 5 of his book Cold Case Christianity. Forensic Statement Analysis (FSA) is "the careful study and analysis of the words (both written and spoken) provided by a suspect, witness, or victim. The purpose of Forensic Statement Analysis is to determine truthfulness or deception on the part of the person making the statement." 5 FSA is the art of hanging on every word that a person says. In the work of a homicide detective like Wallace, when they are interviewing witnesses about the events of a crime, detectives carefully scrutinize and dissect every word the witness includes in his or her statement to see if it provides them with any clues about their involvement or lack thereof in the crime. In Wallace' book, he provides two examples of this. In the first example, Wallace recalls interviewing a man whom he called "Scott" about the murder of a young woman in his city in 1981. His question, the same as it was to the other witnesses he interviewed, was "How did you feel about this woman's death?" Scott's response was surprising. "Well, I was sorry to see her dead, you know. We didn't always get along, but it's never good to see anyone die". The detectives knew that the killers stood over the victim's body and made sure she was dead by nudging her. So, Wallace wrote, "it could be reasonably inferred that the killer 'saw her dead'". Of course, this isn't enough to convict someone of murder. But it is a clue that pointed them in the right direction. The statement was only one piece in a large collection of evidence that ended up indicting him.

In J. Warner Wallace's investigation of the gospels' reliability as eyewitness testimony, he applied Forensic Statement Analysis to the text to determine whether the gospels were really written by the people whose names are attached to them. And the amount of FSA clues actually make for a pretty powerful cumulative case for the traditional gospel authorship. Let's look at some of Wallace's findings with regards to...

THE GOSPEL OF MARK --

The way the gospel of Mark is worded strongly hints at Peter being the source of the information.

Gee, that conclusion wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that church history has been telling you your whole life that Mark is a written record of Peter's preaching, would it?

As we've seen above, the early church's testimony was unanimous that Mark's gospel was actually Peter's gospel.

Thank you for your honesty.

1: Mark mentioned Peter with prominence.

Peter is featured frequently in Mark's gospel. He referred to him 26 times in his gospel.

 And when Matthew quoted Mark about wthat Peter said, he apparently wasn't satisfied with Mark's inerrant text:

“Messiah”?  or “Messiah, Son of the living God”?
Mark 8	Matthew 16
27 Jesus went out, along with His disciples, to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way He questioned His disciples, saying to them, "Who do people say that I am?"  28 They told Him, saying, "John the Baptist; and others say Elijah; but others, one of the prophets."  29 And He continued by questioning them, "But who do you say that I am?" Peter answered and said to Him, "You are the Christ."  30 And He warned them to tell no one about Him.  31 And He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes,	13 Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, He was asking His disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?"  14 And they said, "Some say John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; but still others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets."  15 He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?"  16 Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."  17 And Jesus said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.  18 "I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.  19 "I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven."  20 Then He warned the disciples that they should tell no one that He was the Christ. 21 From that time Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day.

Sorry, but if Mark was based on Peter's preaching, we'd expect the opposite, that Mark's record of Peter's speech would be more inclusive of content.  No speculation on your part about "well maybe Mark was running out of paper, or felt the shortened form was appropriate" is going to change the fact the historical improbability here.

Matthew referred to Peter only 3 additional times in his much longer gospel.

 Mark's 16 chapter mention Peter 21 times, an average of 1.31 times per chapter.

Matthew's 28 chapters mention Peter 23 times, an average of 1.2 times per chapter.

Sorry, but the difference between "1.2" and "1.3" would only be considered significant by inerrantists.

 

2: Mark Identified Peter with the most familiarity

Mark is the only writer who never once used the term "Simon Peter".

Suggesting the author wasn't a Christian, since he himself admits Jesus assigned Simon the new name of Peter, and a Christian would rather do things Jesus' way than any other: 16 And He appointed the twelve: Simon (to whom He gave the name Peter), (Mk. 3:16 NAU)

He uses the words "Simon" and "Peter" but never "Simon Peter". This may seem like a silly and frivolous thing to point out, but not when you consider that "Simon" and "Peter" were the most popular male names in 1st-century Palestine.

No can do:  Mark was likely writing for a Roman church.

Mark never makes an effort to distinguish between the Apostle Simon with the boatloads of other Simons running around. Compare this to John's referring of the apostle as "Simon Peter" 17 times.

post-biblical history doesn't say shit about Apostle Simon either, suggesting the number of Jesus' original disciples has more theological than historical significance.

3: Mark Used Peter As a Set Of "Bookends"

In Cold Case Christianity, Wallace points out that out of the 12 disciples, Mark identifies Peter first (Mark 1:16) and he mentions him last at the very end of his gospel (Mark 16:7). Wallace said that scholars describe this as "inclusio" and noticed this same thing occurring in other ancient writings where the document is attributed to an individual. In these other ancient writings, it was the individual being "bookended" that was also the one who wrote the thing.

But a true Christian would have started and ended with Jesus, making himself fade into the background.

4: Mark Omitted Peter's Embarrassments

If you're writing a biography of someone and you're heavily involved in their life, you'd probably have a tendency to leave unflattering and embarrassing details about yourself out, right?

Not if you are inspired by an inerrant God who is incapable of giving a false impression of the facts.

You would paint yourself in a much gentler light than someone else would. We find Peter painted in the kindest possible way in Mark's gospel, far more kinder than the other 3 gospels which recount the same events. For example, while Matthew 14:22-23 calls Peter a doubter and a "man of little faith", Mark 6:45-52, which records the same event, omits Peter's involvement altogether.

 No, Mark 6:52 is including Peter in saying the disciples prior witnessing of Jesus' miracles still gave them no insight into Jesus' true nature. Mark is therefore saying Peter's level of obstinate stupidity was the same as that of the other disciples.

Luke 5 records Jesus' miracle of the catching of the fish in which Peter doubts Jesus' wisdom. Yet Mark's parallel account omits Peter's cynicism altogether.

 And for those who originally read Mark (i.e., at a time when access to other gospels was impossible) they would have gotten a more favorable impression of Peter than could be historically justified. In this case Mark being Peter's disciple gets you in trouble.  The buddy is lying by omission to make his hero look better.

5: Mark mentions details that can best be attributed to Peter

J. Warner Wallace explains that "Mark alone included a number of seemingly unimportant details that point to Peter's involvement in the shaping of the text. Mark alone told us that 'Simon and his companions' were the ones who went looking for Jesus when He was praying in a solitary place (Mark 1:35-37). Mark is also the only gospel to tell us that it was Peter who first drew Jesus' attention to the withered fig tree (compare Matt 21:18-19 with Mark 11:20-21). Mark alone seemed to be able to identify the specific disciples (including Peter) who asked Jesus about the timing of the destruction of the temple (compare Matt 24:1-3 with Mark 13:1-4)." 6

Even assuming Mark's gospel pays more attention to Peter than the others, I fail to see how you justify the jump over to "Mark must have been an eyewitness!".  It is to Wallace's shame that serious NT scholars who actually know what the fuck they are talking about, NEVER use these arguments to justify being dogmatic about Peter's influence over Mark's gospel:

"Petrine influence cannot be proved or disproved, but it should be acknowledged as a possibility."

Brooks, J. A. (2001, c1991). Vol. 23: Mark (electronic e.). Logos Library System; The New American Commentary (Page 27). Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

 

Given this cumulative set of FSA pieces of evidence, the best explanation is that Mark really did write Mark and that he really did get his information from Peter.

Then the fact that Matthew often corrects Mark constitutes Matthew's correcting Peter.

Was Jesus incapable, or merely unwilling? Why didn’t Matthew want others to know that Jesus marveled at sinners lacking faith?
Mark 6	Matthew 13
NAU  Mark 6:1 Jesus went out from there and came into His hometown; and His disciples followed Him.  2 When the Sabbath came, He began to teach in the synagogue; and the many listeners were astonished, saying, "Where did this man get these things, and what is this wisdom given to Him, and such miracles as these performed by His hands?  3 "Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? Are not His sisters here with us?" And they took offense at Him.  4 Jesus said to them, "A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and among his own relatives and in his own household."  5 And He could do no miracle there except that He laid His hands on a few sick people and healed them.  6 And He wondered at their unbelief. And He was going around the villages teaching.	54 He came to His hometown and began teaching them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished, and said, "Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers?  55 "Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not His mother called Mary, and His brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas?  56 "And His sisters, are they not all with us? Where then did this man get all these things?"  57 And they took offense at Him. But Jesus said to them, "A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household."  58 And He did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief.

First, there will be inerrantists who are so zealous to pretend everything has fast easy answers, that they don’t stop to notice that inerrantists and non-inerrantist Christian scholars don’t find things so obvious:

Mark 6:1-6…The statement in v. 5 about the inability of Jesus is also difficult. Whether Mark’s source was Peter is much less certain.[1][1] NAC, Brooks, J. A. (2001, c1991). Vol. 23: Mark, p. 97

Geisler also has much difficulty explaining Mark 5:8 (where Jesus more than once commanded some demons to leave) and Mark 6:5 (where the text says that Jesus was not able to do any miracles in Nazareth because of the unbelief of the people there) (see pp. 149, 152).[2]

[2] Wayne Grudem, SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine,

Zondervan Publishing House, 2008

It is a strange expression, as if unbelief tied the hands of omnipotence itself[3]

[3] Matthew Henry, Mark 6:5

Barclay knows what’s up:

Matthew shrinks from saying that Jesus could not do any mighty works; and changes the form of the expression accordingly.[4]

[4] The Gospel of Matthew  : Volume. 2000, c1975 (W. Barclay, lecturer in the University of Glasgow, Ed.). The Daily study Bible series, Rev. ed. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press.

This conclusion from Forensic Statement Analysis is only made stronger by the testimonies of the early church fathers, and the fact that Mark isn't a likely name you'd make up if you wanted to forge a gospel.

You don't know to what extent Mark was hailed as an authority in the early church, so you cannot pontificate on how a forger "would never" ascribe his gospel to the name of Mark.

Forensic Statement Analysis can actually be used to confirm the authorship of the other three gospels, but for brevity's sake, I've chosen to only highlight how it helps the case for Mark's gospel.

And the fact that Wallace cannot cite any actual scholars of the NT that find his FSA credible, sort of sucks for him.  

This Is Irrelevant To The Minimal Facts Approach

I'd like to point out that while establishing the authorship of the traditional gospels may be important to their overall reliability and trustworthiness, in The Minimal Facts approach, the issue of gospel authorship is totally irrelevant. It can be set aside.

 I accuse Habermas of taking the minimal facts approach precisely because he knew that doing things the standard way (i.e., establishing the identities and credibility of the alleged Jesus-resurrection eyewitnesses) constituted mission impossible.

How so?

First of all, Dr. Gary Habermas says that the minimal facts approach only uses data that meet two criteria: (1) the fact must have a lot of evidence in its favor, and (2) it must be nearly universally excepted by all scholars who study the subject, even the skeptical non-Christian scholars.

If J. Warner Wallace wants to apply modern American notions of evidence to the bible, then he needs to reject Habermas' shortcut approach and stick with establishing the eyewitnesses' identities and their respective levels of credibility.

While I do think the traditional authorship meets criteria 1, it's obvious that it doesn't meet criteria 2.

Secondly, the principles of historical authenticity or "The criterion of authenticity" can still be applied to all of the New Testament documents (epistle and gospel alike) to cough up the 5 facts which undergird the inference to Jesus' bodily resurrection (i.e Jesus died by crucifixion, His tomb was empty the following Sunday morning, that church persecutor Saul was converted on the basis of what he perceived as an appearance of the risen Jesus, and that the skeptic James was converted on the basis of what he perceived as an appearance of the risen Jesus), see here and here.

For example, one argument for the historicity of Jesus' unoccupied tomb is that all 4 gospels mention women as the chief witnesses to the tomb, and given their low rung on the 1st century Jewish social latter and the fact that they weren't permitted to serve as witnesses in a Jewish court of law, the gospel authors would never have made women the first on the scene if they were just making stuff up.

I think you and Wallace and Habermas have missed the boat:  the gospels were not written to convince unbelievers, the consistent testimony of the patristic sources is that the gospels were written to edify the church, and since the church elevated women higher than their own culture did, a church forger, creating gospels, would see much benefit to having women be the first eyewitnesses.

If they were making up the empty tomb narrative, they would have made males the first on the scene (far more credible witnesses). Now, does it matter whether you find this in the gospels of (A) Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, or (B) The gospels of Bob, Tim, Suzan, and Randy? No. The criterion would still apply. Group A or Group B would probably have avoided making women the chief witnesses of the empty tomb for the reasons given above if they were simply making it up

 then apparently apostle Paul was making stuff up, because in his own chronological list of resurrection appearances, he mentions no women...despite his theological belief that they are equal with men in every way, thus leaving him no culturally ingrained reason to view the witness of women as less reliable or unworthy of preservation:

 3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,
 4 and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,
 5 and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.
 6 After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep;
 7 then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles;
 8 and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also. (1 Cor. 15:3-8 NAU)

 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Gal. 3:28 NAU)

. The Jerusalem Factor argument would also be unaffected (i.e that the empty tomb is the best explanation for the opponents of Christianity didn't just produce Jesus' body to squash the whole thing).

Sorry, but a) you are assuming unbelievers hearing the original Christian message gave enough of a shit about the message to bother with the legal mess of opening the grave and following Christians around with a display of the Jesus' corpse, which is fucking stupid; b) you are assuming no such thing happened, when in fact by your own admission, some gospel authors felt it best to omit things they felt would hinder their case.  If anybody did use Jesus' corpse to disprove the original resurrection preaching, we have good reason to think Christians would have made sure to do what Mark did in the case of Peter, and "omit" details that would make the movement look foolish, and c) Acts makes it clear that the disciples didn't publicly preach the resurrection of Jesus until at least 40 days after he died (Acts 1:3), during which time the corpse would have decomposed sufficiently to make it difficult or impossible to use it to discredit the resurrection preaching.

And I think Acts is bullshit anyway, the consensus of Christian scholars is that Mark is the earliest gospel and ends at 16:8, meaning the earliest written form of Christian preaching leaves you no historical evidence that the risen Christ ever made any resurrection appearances.  So if Acts has the apostle going all over hell and back screaming their heads off about the bodily resurrection of Jesus, it's a good story...and that's all.

You can still make The Jerusalem Factor argument without knowing who authored the gospels.

But proper identification of the alleged eyewitnesses and independent evaluation of their testimony and credibility is still the more responsible method of establishing history.  For example, the unanimity of the early church fathers on Matthew's authorship of  gospel is rejected by most scholars who think all the Fathers are doing is merely repeating what Papias had to say.  In other words, there can be legitimate scholarly concern that what looks so "multiply attested" is actually a single false testimony that was picked up and echoed by subsequent authors.

Or, does it matter in establishing that Jesus died by crucifixion? No, both the canonical gospels and John mention Jesus' crucifixion, and therefore they can be included in the list of ancient documents that record it along with Josephus, Tacitus, Lucian, Mara Bar Sarapian, and the epistles of Paul. We can still include the gospels as being additional sources in our claim that Jesus' death by crucifixion is multiply attested, no matter who wrote them.

Now, whether or not Paul wrote 1 Corinthians, 2nd Corinthians, Galatians, and the other epistles would have a bearing on the potency of the minimal facts approach, but virtually no skeptical historian of ancient history doubts that Paul wrote the epistles that bare his name (save for the pastoral epistles), so we apologists don't have to worry about that.

 Correct, Paul can be impeached by his own statements and errors, no need to invoke German theologians of the 19th century who are skeptical of everything except their own skepticism.

I bring this up because gospel authorship is one of the things I hear in my debates against skeptics about the minimal facts case for the resurrection of Jesus, and it's just not relevant.

on the contrary, establishing the identity and credibility of the alleged resurrection eyewitnesses is the more justified historiographical procedure.

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 I informed "Cerebral faith" of this reply: