Cold Case Christianity: Sorry Wallace, Daniel 9 isn't about Jesus

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

Cold Case Christianity: Perhaps the Greatest Old Testament Prophecy of All

Posted: 08 Mar 2019 01:21 AM PST

Fulfilled prophecy is an important evidence of Divine origin, and I’ve already highlighted just a few of the more important fulfilled prophecies in the Old Testament.

 The OT contains no predictions about Jesus' life or death, except in the uselessly subjective "typological" sense. Since even Christian scholars admit this, who are spiritually alive, it is rather stupid for you to "expect" that spiritually dead people would or "should" appreciate the divine authenticity of your interpretation.

A fellow law enforcement brother, Sir Robert Anderson, described perhaps the greatest Old Testament prophecy, if his calculations were accurate. Anderson was the Assistant Commissioner of the London Metropolitan Police (Scotland Yard) from 1888 to 1901; he was also a theologian and author. He wrote many books related to Christianity, science and prophecy, including The Coming Prince. In this short volume, Anderson makes the case for a remarkable Old Testament prophecy from the prophet Daniel. While the Israelites were certainly comforted by prophecies predicting their enemies would eventually be destroyed, there was a far more reassuring prophecy described by Daniel. He predicted the coming of a Messiah, a savior who would deliver the Jews. Daniel’s prophecy was incredibly specific. I’ll do my best to reconstruct the case made by Anderson, but I encourage you to research his work for yourself.

Already have.  Years ago.  And there are even Christian bible believers who find Anderson's exegesis and calculations to be incorrect.  See here.  If spiritually alive people cannot even agree on what a bible verse means, how stupid must you be to insist that spiritually dead people "should" know better?  But if Christian common sense says atheist bible critics are just dumb dogs who cannot be expected to know better, then how stupid is it to try and "reason" with them?  Do you ever attempt teaching algebra to a dog?

Other Christian scholars disagree with Anderson's populist account:

Perhaps the most popular interpretation of this passage has been given by Sir Robert Anderson.  He pinpoints the end of the sixty-ninth week, the coming of “Messiah the Prince,” as Sunday, April 6, A.D. 32, and claims that this was the very day of our Lord’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem.  Unfortunately this view, as spectacular as it is, faces some serious problems.

Robert C. Newman, Daniel’s Seventy Weeks And The Old Testament Sabbath-Year Cycle  

JETS 16:4 (Fall 1973) 230

Interpreters should hesitate before entering afresh into the exegesis of Daniel’s seventy weeks, a passage that has been characterized as “the Dismal Swamp of Old Testament criticism.”  

 J. Barton Payne,  The Goal Of Daniel’s Seventy Weeks, JETS 21/2 (June, 1978) 97-115, 

citing J. A. Montgomery, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Book of Daniel  

(ICC; New York: Scribner’s, 1927) 400.

Wallace continues in his blissful ignorance:

In 538 B.C. Daniel wrote the following bold prediction:

No, the 6th century B.C date for Daniel is nothing but a fundamentalist pipe dream, insisted upon solely because dating it that early would then require the conclusion that the author was empowered by God to accurately predict the future.  Responsible scholars who are more concerned about truth than defending bible inerrancy, date Daniel to the 2nd century B.C.  But obviously the issues are too involved to get into here.

Daniel 9:25

“So you are to know and discern that from the issuing of a decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Messiah the Prince there will be seven weeks of years and sixty-two weeks of years”

In this prophecy (written 538 years before Christ was born), Daniel claimed there would be 69 “weeks of years” between the issuing of a decree to rebuild Jerusalem and the appearance of the Messiah.

But even Christian scholars acknowledge that getting Jesus out of Daniel 9 has more to do with flights of fancy than with serious exegesis: 

24–27 Jeremiah had spoken of seventy-years’ desolation for Jerusalem, but it was actually to last centuries longer than that. God is free to exact whatever chastisement he chooses. But the message’s good news is that it is not chastisement without end. The number 490 is not an arithmetical calculation to be pressed to yield chronological information. It is a figure that puts together two symbolic figures, the seventy years (a lifetime) of Jer 25:11/29:10 and the sevenfold chastisement of Lev 26:28. The result is a doubly symbolic figure extending from the beginning of chastisement in the exile to whenever it is seen as ending. The description of the end in vv 24–27 is allusive...In Jewish and Christian tradition, Gabriel’s promise has been applied to rather later events: the birth of the messiah, Jesus’ death and resurrection, the fall of Jerusalem, various subsequent historical events, and the still-future manifesting of the messiah. Exegetically such views are mistaken. The detail of vv 24–27 fits the second-century b.c. crisis and agrees with allusions to this crisis elsewhere in Daniel. The verses do not indicate that they are looking centuries or millennia beyond the period to which chaps. 8 and 10–12 refer...There is another aspect to the significance of Gabriel’s allusiveness. It accompanies an inclination to speak in the words of Scripture reapplied. Daniel is doing with Isaiah what subsequent exegetes do with Daniel. This, too, reflects the fact that the author speaks “with faith rather than knowledge” (Heaton). The period of deepest oppression did last about 3 1/2 years, but that is not the point. This is not prognostication or prediction. It is promise.

Goldingay, J. E. (2002). Vol. 30: Word Biblical Commentary : Daniel.
Word Biblical Commentary (Page 266). Dallas: Word, Incorporated.

  Perhaps this might have something to do with the fact that the KJV depicts a single messiah, the RSV depicts two.  You may laugh at the idea that Jesus had an identical twin never otherwise mentioned in history, but I say God's ways are mysterious...so I win.

And after the 1943 Pope issued Divino afflante Spiritu, Catholics have largely abandoned the fundie interpretation and have espoused the position of liberal Christian scholars on Daniel's 2nd century date, and the vatacina ex eventu nature of the history which the book dishonestly presents as predictions of the future.

Wallace continues:

In 464 BC, Artaxerxes, a Persian king, ascended to the throne. Nehemiah, the Jewish cupbearer to King Artaxerxes, was deeply concerned about the ruined condition of Jerusalem following the defeat of the Jews (Nehemiah 1:1-4). As a result, he petitioned the king:

Nehemiah 2:5,6

“Send me to Judah, to the city of my fathers’ tombs, that I may rebuild it. So it pleased the king to send me”.

According to the Old Testament, the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem was issued “in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king” (Nehemiah 2:1). The Jewish calendar month was Nisan, and since no day is given, it is reasonable to assume the date would be understood as the first, the Jewish New Year’s Day. And, in the Julian calendar we presently use, the corresponding date would be March 5, 444 BC.

 But even inerrantist Christian scholars find a different decree given on a different date, to be the "decree" Daniel speaks of:

The view accepted here is that the decree to Ezra in 458 B.C. is the correct starting point for the seventy sevens,

Miller, S. R. (2001, c1994). Vol. 18: Daniel.
Includes indexes. (electronic ed.). Logos Library System;
The New American Commentary (Page 263).
Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

The new interpretation of Daniel’s “sevens” presented here allows us to retain Cyrus’ decree as the terminus a quo of the seventy “sevens” while at the same time taking Daniel’s numbers at their face value. Once we realize that the “sevens” can be any integer multiple of seven years, we can see that Cyrus’ 538 B. C. decree fits the terms of Daniel’s prophecy perfectly. Finally, while it is not my purpose here to enter into the vexed question of the meaning of Daniel’s final or seventieth “seven,...

David H. Lurie, A New Interpretation Of Daniel’s “Sevens”
And The Chronology Of The Seventy “Sevens”, JETS 33/3 (September 1990) 309

At this point, one has to wonder whether the grammatical and exegetical ambiguities in Daniel 9 place an intellectual burden on the atheist bible critic to take the time to tromp through the commentaries and figure out which interpretation is "correct", or whether these uncertainties of text and translation intellectually justify the atheist bible critic to consider the issue of Daniel 9 as uselessly subjective, and choose rather to spend their time doing something more productive, such as watching Breast Monsters from Jupiter 26 times per day.

So when did the Messiah appear?

Doesn't matter, it wasn't Jesus, because Daniel 9:26 makes clear the messiah's function is limited to his earthly life, and his ultimate end is a sad thing, he is "cut off", and nothing more is asserted about him.  So unless you wish to say Jesus stopped being relevant after he was crucified...

There are several feasible interpretation not implicating Jesus:

Cyrus (539 bc, in Isaiah 45:1 god calls him :anointed’, Matthew Henry/New American Bible)
Onias III (171 bc, Jewish High Priest that was murdered, Cambridge Bible Commentary: Book of Daniel)
Zerubbabel (Interpreter’s Bible)
Joshua ben Jozadak (538 bc, see Zech. 4, Interpreter’s Bible/New American Bible)
 
And the original Hebrew doesn't set off the "messiah" in capital letters, that's limited to the English translation provided by the obviously Christian translators.

Jesus, on numerous occasions, forbade and prevented his followers from revealing His identity as the Messiah.

Or maybe those are just fabricated words the gospel authors conjured up and falsely placed into Jesus' mouth to help explain why this allegedly important person didn't make much of an impact during his earthly lifetime.  I find such viewpoint attractive given the sheer stupidity of a Jesus who runs around the countryside doing everything anybody would expect to cause his popularity to explode all over the place (Mark 1:45), and yet we are to believe such a person didn't want the very publicity he was creating for himself?

Exactly how often did Jesus act in diametric opposition to his intentions?  More than once a day?

He frequently performed miracles and swore His disciples to silence, saying his “hour has not yet come” (John 2:4, 7:6).

Yeah right...Jesus goes around causing large crowds to follow him the way deranged groupies follow rock stars (Mark 1:45)...but he didn't wish to attract any publicity?

If Jesus could cleanse the temple and somehow miraculously escape arrest/death, then apparently his swearing the disciples to silence was not something he deemed necessary to make sure his death came at the "appropriate" time. His swearing them to silence is nothing more than a fabricated literary device of the author.

But, on March 30, 33 A.D., when he entered Jerusalem on a donkey, he rebuked the Pharisees’ protest and encouraged the whole multitude of his disciples as they shouted, “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord”. Jesus even said, “If these become silent, the stones will cry out” (Luke 19:38-40). This was the day on which Jesus was publicly declared the Messiah.

 William Lane Craig disagrees:

Now before we look at this passage in detail, let’s set the scene geographically and chronologically. It is the spring of the year, the time of the great Passover feast in Jerusalem, during the Jewish month of Nisan, which is in early April on our calendar. Passover always began on the 14th of Nisan, which that year fell on Friday. So scholars using astronomical data have determined that the date of the Passover feast during which Jesus was crucified was either April 3, AD 33 or else April 7, AD 30.  Source here.

 So do other scholars who otherwise try to get Jesus out of Daniel 9:

This is the only occasion that Jesus presented Himself as King. It occurred on April 6, 32 AD. When we examine the period between March 14, 445 BC and April 6, 32 AD, and correct for leap years, we discover that it is 173,880 days exactly, to the very day!  Source here.

Wallace continues:

Let’s compare then, the date of the decree (March 5, 444 BC) with the date of Jesus’ declaration (March 30, 33 AD). Before we begin, we must clarify (as noted by Anderson) an important feature of the Jewish prophetic year: It was comprised of twelve 30 day months (it had 360 days, not 365 days). Since Daniel states 69 weeks of seven years each, and each year has 360 days, the following equation calculates the number of days between March 5, 444 BC (the twentieth year of Artaxerxes) and March 30, 33 AD (the day Jesus entered Jerusalem on the donkey):

69 x 7 x 360 = 173,880 days

Now let’s compare Daniel’s prophecy with the true interval between the two events. The time span from 444 BC to 33 AD is 476 years (remember 1 BC to 1 AD is only one year). And if we multiply 476 years x 365.2421879 days per year (corrected for leap years), we get the result of 173,855 days. Close, but not precisely what Daniel predicted (although I still think this is pretty amazing). Now let’s add back the difference between March 5 and March 30 (25 days). What is our total? You guessed it, 173,880 days, exactly as Daniel predicted.

What's interesting is that other Christian scholars are aware of this type of apologetic, and yet do not find it convincing, thus raising the question of whether a skeptic would be wiser to consider this issue to be nothing but useless babble, and accordingly turn away from it.  If even spiritually alive people don't think Daniel 9 is an amazingly accurate prediction of Jesus, how stupid must you be to "expect" spiritually dead people to "recognize" this prophecy as amazingly accurate? 

The ancient Jews were careful to use prophecy as a measuring stick.

A goal that clearly failed them.

If someone claimed to be a prophet, yet his predictions did not come true, he was abandoned and his writings did not make it into the Canon of Scripture:

Deuteronomy 18:22

When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that [is] the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, [but] the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.

 Then there is a reasonable presumption that because the Jews sought to kill Jesus (John 11:53), either they were so stupid as to defy belief and suggest such stupidity is nothing but a literary device and not actual history, or, they had a reasonable basis to view Jesus as the type of lying prophet deserving of the death penalty (Deut. 13:5).

That's a question apologists never give a convincing answer to:  If in real life Jesus was just as wonderful and loving as he is presented to be in the gospel texts, then why were the Jews so pissed off at him?  Did the Jews also go around murdering little old women who sewed patches on baby blankets?  The whole business of the Jews opposing Jesus in a violent way sounds more like a dramatic literary device, because it doesn't "ring true" as literal history.  The only reasonable alternative is to presuppose that Jesus was more reactionary and insurrectionist than the gospels present him to be.  In that case, the Jews seeking to arrest and execute him rings a bit truer historically.

Sorry, Wallace, but again, your apologetics appear geared for nobody else except Christians.  When you decide to become honest, maybe some day you'll allow your devoted followers to watch you get steam rolled in a live debate with an atheist bible critic who has written a thorough critique of your Cold Case Christianity book.

Cold Case Christianity: Why Are Young Christians Leaving the Church? It’s Simple Math

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

Cold Case Christianity:   

Why Are Young Christians Leaving the Church? It’s Simple Math  

Posted: 06 Mar 2019 01:53 AM PST

 

Several years ago I had the opportunity to speak to an engaging group of Christians in Elgin, Iowa at the First Baptist Church of Elgin. The congregation was a wonderful combination of young families and older members who understand the challenges facing the younger Christians in their midst. I shared the overwhelming statistics chronicling the growing number of young Christians leaving the church during their college years, but many in the audience had already seen the departure firsthand. The dilemma was personal, and they were ready (and eager) to examine the causes (and the possible solutions). Before I shared my T.R.A.I.N. paradigm, I took a minute to describe the causal factors leading to the departure of so many young Christians. This isn’t rocket science; three simple truths combine to create the situation we see today:

 And significantly, none of your alleged causal factors include "because its harder for modern Christians to hide the problems of the bible in this information-age".

Our Christian Teenagers are Inarticulate and Uninformed

Unfortunately, most of the young Christians who graduate from our youth programs and enter college are surprisingly inarticulate about their Christian beliefs. Sociologists Christian Smith and Melinda Denton did an excellent job of reporting the problem in Soul Searching: The Religious Lives of American Teenagers. They discovered Christian teens have the ability to be articulate about a number of issues, but are seldom articulate when it comes to their Christian beliefs. Most could not describe simple principles and claims of Christianity, and even those who could, struggled to provide simple responses to typical skeptical objections they will surely encounter in college. Our students have not been trained with the university battlefield in view.

But I see nothing in the bible that indicates illiteracy is a bad thing, or that it needs to be overcome.  Illiteracy didn't stop the original Christians from allegedly possessing the power of the Holy Spirit to perform the work of evangelism and defending the gospel.  See Acts 4:13.  

It does you no good to trifle that this only means Peter and John weren't formally educated in schools; apostle Paul twice referred to the illiteracy of his intended readers with no sign in the context that he thought this to be any type of problem:

 26 For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; (1 Cor. 1:26 NAU)

16 When this letter is read among you, have it also read in the church of the Laodiceans; and you, for your part read my letter that is coming from Laodicea. (Col. 4:16 NAU)

 Secondly, there is no reason why the average Joe living in Israel between 1500 b.c. and 200 a.d. should ever find it helpful to bother with learning to read or write.  Peter and John were allegedly fishermen, and you can cast nets and haul fish all day every day without even knowing how to spell your own name.  Unless your goal was to specifically become a person who needs to read and write, like a scribe, illiteracy was never deemed unacceptable at all in biblical days.

There is literally NOTHING in the bible expressing or even implying that being illiterate is an unacceptable state of affairs that believers have a duty to "overcome".  Wallace continues:

University Campuses are Generally Hostile to Christianity

And make no mistake about it, the university setting will likely be a battlefield populated with people opposed to Christianity. Sociologists Neil Gross (Harvard University) and Solon Simmons (George Mason University) conducted a study in 2006 revealing 1 in 4 university professors are atheists or agnostics (nearly 5 times the ration in the general population. And according to an Institute for Jewish and Community Research survey of 1,200 college faculty members, only 6% of the professors say the Bible is “the actual word of God,” 51% say the Bible is “an ancient book of fables, legends, history & moral precepts,” and more than half of the professors surveyed have “unfavorable” feelings toward Evangelical Christians.

The NT nowhere expresses or implies that becoming educated by worldly standards should be seen as helpful toward the goal of dealing with hostile critics of Christianity.  Therefore, under the conservative hermeneutic "where the bible is silent, we are silent", you are forced to agree that the NT has a solution for the Christian dealing with hostile critics of Christianity, and it isn't "learn how to read".  For all you know, America's long-time fascination with reading is against your god's wishes, since apparently the only purpose literacy is intended to serve is so the child can grow up and "get a job" (i.e., help promote a decidedly anti-Christian form of greedy capitalism).  Some would argue that we could learn to be spiritually mature much more efficiently if we forego buying a house and car, and simply choose to live on the street, especially since in today's world, to get a house and car require that you make committments that you have no rational reason to think you'll be able to keep.  You only want a house and car because you desire ease of life, not because you wish to use them for "god's glory". 

Young Men and Women Are Eager to Chase Their Desires with Liberty

Most of us, if we’re honest, understand the temptation facing young Christians, because we’ve also experienced such enticements. As fallen humans, we’ve all experienced the temptation of youth.

Sure is funny that as people get older their chasing after sin and vice occurs less and less.  This is true even for non-religious people and atheists. Elderly people who are very sinful are mere exceptions proving the rule.  Seems much more likely that mere aging, and not "god", are the reason why we chase after vice less often as we get older.  So unless you think older people have less freewill than younger people, then god could have taken the chemical and physiological truths about older people and infused them into younger people, and presto, the younger people would pursue "sin" far less than they currently do...yet nobody's freewill would violated.

By the way, we all remember when we were little that one kid at school that just seemed to always stay out of trouble get good grades, etc.  We also know lots of people who are free from spirituality/religion and yet who do not pursue worldly "vice".  Whatever realities about their brains cause them to find vice unappealing, God could have infused this into all other people, and all other people would pursue sin far less, yet nobody's freewill would be violated.

And by the way, I need not pander to freewill anyway: sometimes the more loving thing to do is to force the loved one to conform to your demands, such as having a rebellious drug dealing daughter involuntarily committed, or having your thief-son arrested and put in jail.  So I don't understand your hang-up about "freewill".  God would be even stupider than you if he went around always thinking that refusal to violate a person's freewill is always the more "loving" thing to do.  And if Romans 13:4 is true, it is "God" who wished for earthly authorities to violate the freewill of other people we call criminals.  And if God really did command Moses and Joshua to massacre the pagans, gee, did that involve violating anybody's freewill?

Apparently, your bible-god is far less worried about respecting freewill than you think.

And your trifle that god's ways are mysterious does nothing to intellectually obligate the skeptic, even if it might make people whose minds are still trapped by fairytale theology, to breathe a great sigh of relief.   Mormons could also invoke god's mysterious ways to explain why there's no South American archaeological support for exclusively Book of Mormon claims, but then again, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to recognize when the gods-ways-are-mysterious excuse is being abused as a cover for one's inability to overcome an argument.

For many of our Christian students, their college years are the first opportunity they’ve ever had to be free of their parent’s consistent oversight. It’s also a place filled with attractive young people, many of whom don’t share their Christian worldview. Consider the strength of the temptation and imagine the selfish value of an alternative worldview allowing young students to chase their passions and desires without restriction, inhibition or guilt.

 All very good reasons for the Christian to notice that they are far too concerned about worldly matters and they aren't serving Christ as well as they can, if they attend college.  NOBODY attends a secular college in order to grow closer to Christ.  They do it for no other reason than to help ensure they'll have a decent income in the future...a decidedly "earthly"  priority the NT nowhere endorses.  Yes, you need to pay your bills.  No, you don't need to take out a mortgage, have a car, or any of the other vanities made possible by the modern world.

For many, atheistic naturalism, with its alternate creation story, moral code, materialistic values and goals, is an incredibly attractive alternative to Christianity.

Sorry, atheism doesn't have a "moral code".  Morals are relative, which is why 10 atheists would disagree with each other on a host of moral issues.  But if you paint atheism as a "code" that tells its followers to just indulge in whatever they feel like doing, I'm sure your already entrapped cult members will clap rapidly enough to generate more book-sales. And we already knew that your "apologetics" was never aimed at informed skeptics anyway, you only preach to the choir.

The fallen inclination to chase our selfish desire is common to all of us, but it’s a critical driving force for many young students.

 Blame it on god, who refuses to use his magic fairy dust to successfully overcome a sinner's freewill resistance.  See Ezra 1:1.

It’s time to align our churches and ministries to engage the most important demographic within the Church: young Christians.

 Sounds to me like in your better judgement, the younger Christians are not spiritually mature enough to justify their trying to beat back the forces of darkness with "apologetics".  And it's perfectly clear in the NT that personal holiness must first exist before you can presume to teach others, as hypocrisy is a sin.  

The NT views the office of Christian teacher with grave solemn seriousness, James 3:1.  Something tells me that spiritually immature youth probably shouldn't be trying to do battle with the devil?

It doesn’t take a researcher with a PhD to understand the forces at work here. In fact, the dilemma can be characterized with a simple equation:

College Equation

Most of us ought to be able to predict the sum in this equation; it should be easy to anticipate the outcome. Take a closer look at all three “addends” being added in this equation. Which of these three additive realities can we, as parents, youth pastors and leaders, impact or change? We can’t change the hostile nature of the university campus or the human nature of our young Christians. If we want to alter this math equation, we’re going to have to get involved with the first addend. We’ve got to do whatever it takes to inform, equip and engage young Christians in a rational, evidential investigation of Christianity.

 That's not how Paul thought the youth should be reached.  He taught that their issues must be addressed at home, where the intent is that their home-education will help them be holy adults, Ephesians 6:1-3.

Wallace, it sure is funny that you give not a single second's consideration to the hypothesis that "college" in modern America is so filled with anti-Christian sentiment, the truly spiritual Christian will find non-Christian colleges to be off-limits.

But if you had considered this, you hurt your own reason for living:  The more Christians simply stay away from sources of sin, the less they need your books and speeches.

Jesus was worse, he encouraged people to give up custody of their own kids just to free up more time to go following him around. Notice "children" in the list of farms, houses, and other things Jesus wants them to give up so they can achieve the goal of eternal life and more:

 29 "And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or farms for My name's sake, will receive many times as much, and will inherit eternal life. (Matt. 19:29 NAU)

Wallace, you don't tell parents to seriously consider giving up custody of their kids just to make more time for Christian "ministry", so you aren't giving the needy Christian people the harsh lesson they actually need.

It’ll be tough enough for our students to resist the temptation to abandon their Christian worldview when tempted by their own desires; especially given the nature of university life and the encouragement they will receive to pursue their passions. But, it will be even easier to walk away if our students aren’t even sure why Christianity is true in the first place. It’s time to align our churches and ministries to engage the most important demographic within the Church: young Christians. It’s time to get in the game, redirect our efforts and start training.

Translation: "I'm a salesman.  Like all salesman, I seek to convince you a problem exists, and that I have a solution you can purchase!"

Sorry, Wallace, but if the Holy Spirit did just fine for 2,000 years without needing your marketing gimmicks, the sad fact is that you represent nothing more than somebody who has chosen to jump on the capitalist Jesus bandwagon, selling Jesus for profit, while making sure to allocate your fair tax-burden to other people who aren't dishonest enough to use religion to escape their civil responsibilities.

Rebuttal to Dr. Timothy McGrew's attack on arguments from silence

Dr. Timothy McGrew is a Christian scholar and apologist, and argues against the validity of the argument from silence.  The full article is not available online, and I've requested it from him directly.

 
 
For now, here's an online intro to McGrew's article:

The Argument from Silence.
Source: Acta Analytica. Jun2014, Vol. 29 Issue 2, p215-228. 14p.
Author(s): McGrew, Timothy
Abstract:     The argument from silence is a pattern of reasoning in which the failure of a known source to mention a particular fact or event is used as the ground of an inference, usually to the conclusion that the supposed fact is untrue or the supposed event did not actually happen. Such arguments are widely used in historical work, but they are also widely contested. This paper surveys some inadequate attempts to model this sort of argument, offers a new analysis using a Bayesian probabilistic framework that isolates the most problematic step in such arguments, illustrates a key problem besetting many uses of the argument, diagnoses the attraction of the argument in terms of a known human cognitive bias affecting the critical step, and suggests a standard that must be met in order for any argument from silence to have more than a very weak influence on historical reasoning.

Source here.

While my critique cannot be full until McGrew releases the full article to me, the reader will be interested to know that American courts of law consider the argument from silence viable for the jury to consider, that is, the courts do not consider the argument from silence to be necessarily or automatically fallacious:

"Impeachment by omission" is a recognized means of challenging a witness's credibility. "A statement from which there has been omitted a material assertion that would normally have been made and which is presently testified to may be considered a prior inconsistent statement." State v. Provet, 133 N.J.Super. 432, 437, 337 A.2d 374 (App.Div.), certif. denied, 68 N.J. 174, 343 A.2d 462 (1975); see also Silva, supra, 131 N.J. at 444-45, 621 A.2d 17; State v. Marks, 201 N.J.Super. 514, 531-32, 493 A.2d 596 (App. Div.1985), certif. denied, 102 N.J. 393, 508 A.2d 253 (1986). This principle is widely accepted. Jenkins v. Anderson, 447 U.S. 231, 239, 100 S.Ct. 2124, 2129, 65 L.Ed.2d 86, 95 (1980) ("Common law traditionally has allowed witnesses to be impeached by their previous failure to state a fact in circumstances in which that fact naturally would have been asserted."); Kenneth S. Broun, McCormick on Evidence § 34 (7th 784*784 ed. 2013) ("[I]f the prior statement omits a material fact presently testified to and it would have been natural to mention that fact in the prior statement, the statement is sufficiently inconsistent."); 3A Wigmore on Evidence § 1042 (Chadbourn rev. 1970) ("A failure to assert a fact, when it would have been natural to assert it, amounts in effect to an assertion of the non-existence of the fact.")

 from Manata v. Pereira, 93 A. 3d 774, 783-4- NJ: Appellate Div. 2014

I'll give a sample argument from silence to show that it can be employed to draw skeptical yet reasonable conclusions about the bible.

Most Christian scholars believe Mark is the earliest gospel (Markan priority) and that Matthew borrowed extensively from Mark's text (Two-Source Hypothesis).

Ok...Mark obviously doesn't tell the story of Jesus' virginal conception.  But Matthew does (Matthew 2).

I draw the confident conclusion that Mark omits the virgin conception story either because he knew nothing about it (and since he wrote around 60 a.d., Mark continues to be ignorant of this story more than 25 years after Jesus died, thus creating obvious problems for claims of Matthew's historical reliability, especially if we also assume, as fundies wish, that Matthew wrote early, around 60 a.d.), or Mark omits the story because he knew about it, but deemed it false (which if true, means the NT authors disagreed with each other about which Christ-events were true and which were false, a heavy blow to anything even remotely resembling bible inerrancy).

Is this skeptical argument from silence so utterly compelling that it would render "foolish" anybody who disagreed with it?  No.  I would imagine that nothing in ancient history, that comes us to upon no further basis than the testimony found within books of disputed and likely anonymous authorship, can be settled so strongly as to render "foolish" anybody who would disagree with it.

Must an argument render the gainsayers foolish before it can be considered "reasonable"?  No.

Do you think your beliefs about Bigfoot are reasonable?  Likely yes.  Does that thus imply you are confident you could "blow away" any person who held opposing beliefs on the subject?  No.  Not even you yourself believe that "reasonableness" hinges on obviousness.  Juries can be reasonable to declare a man guilty of a crime, even if technically he was innocent.  Sometimes you cannot blame a person for thinking the false theory was the one that looked the most likely true.

Well then, "reasonableness" doesn't require batting the opposing side's viewpoint all the way out of the ballpark.  Only with asshole idiots like James Patrick Holding and other "apologists" like him, does one get the impression that skeptics can make no legitimate progress whatsoever unless they "completely demolish" every possible scintilla of hope that bible inerrancy might have going for itself.  Such extremist view is just another proof that such "apologists" have the emotional maturity of a teenager.  The secular version of James Patrick Holding would be "If you don't like Slayer, yer a pussy".

In the real world, by contrast, legitimately credentialed and responsible historians and scholars recognize that the reasonableness of an explanatory theory can remain in place even if there's another theory on the horizon with an acceptably arguable basis.

But if that is the case, then this skeptical argument from Mark's silence is not "debunked" or "refuted" merely by trifling that Mark could have found the virgin conception story true and yet have had legitimate reasons for not wishing to include it in his gospel.  That trifle is a legitimate possibility, of course, but mere possibilities do not transform a reasonable position into an unreasonable position.

Upholding this argument from Mark's silence is the following:

• Jesus being Lord by nature would have been, and proved to be, one of the most controversial of all his claims.  We reasonably expect those who wish to convince others to believe controversial claims, to use the very best evidence available to them.  So if Jesus really did go around proclaiming himself Lord, the corroborating testimony from his mother, the only other human being whose input would carry the most evidential weight, would have been both sought and valued in a collectivist honor/shame society.  The idea that she just said nothing about it anyone until after Mark wrote in 60 a.d. is an absurd unlikelihood.  The greater Jesus spoke and acted, the more his mother would be hounded with questions by the masses.  So it is likely that if the virgin birth tale is true, Mary would have divulged this to the apostles before Jesus died.
  
• Peter was within Jesus' inner circle, only he, James and John accompany Jesus at the Mt. of Transfiguration, Mark 9:2). Hence Peter is more likely to know whatever intimate detail Mary would have shared, even if she wouldn't likely share it with the rest of the world.
• So if the virgin birth tale is true, it is likely that Peter knew, before Jesus died, that Jesus was Lord from birth.
• It is without question that if Jesus really did do genuinely supernatural miracles, his immediate followers would be asking him all sorts of pointed nuanced questions about his mother and family.  The polished regal portrait of events we get in the gospels obviously doesn't reflect how actual reality would have played itself out.  They surely did ask him "when did your family discover that you are God?  Before, during or after you were born?", or even "If your mother is blessed to have conceived you, how shall we honor her?"
• So if Peter preached his gospel to the Romans often with Mark tagging along, as the patristic sources allege, Mark would likely have heard Peter tell the story of Jesus' conception.
• Peter would have recognized that a man being a god by nature, would have been difficult for non-Christians to accept unless there was a story about how this god came down in the likeness of men.
• Peter would have known that his allegedly Roman audience would expect to see claims of a god appearing in human form, to be substantiated by tales involving his mother to the same effect, the way they had tales of other gods such as Jupiter/Zeus becoming manifest on earth in physical form via getting some woman pregnant.  So he likely would have told them the story of Jesus' conception, had he known about it and thought it true.
• Indeed, Dr. McGrew unwittingly admits that back in the first century, the pagans expected atmospheric portents to be associated with anybody claiming to be divine.  “Unusually long, portentious eclipses of the sun also take place, as when Caesar the dictator was slain; and in the war against Antony, the sun remained dim for nearly a year.” McGrew, quoting Pliny, Natural History 2.30, here.
• Mark's goal, at least according to patristic sources that fundies are slow to question, was to give the requesting church a written version of apostle Peter's oral preaching. 
• Mark likes the idea of showing how Jesus measures up to pagan expectations about divine men, Mark's Jesus similarly causes "darkness over the whole land" at his death, Mark 15:33.
• Therefore, if Mark was writing to a Roman audience, indeed, if he had accompanied Peter often during the preaching tours as the patristric sources allege, Mark thus was likely aware that the Romans would be just as interested in Jesus' origins no less than they were interested in the origin of their own sons of the gods.
• Therefore, Mark would likely find worthy to include in a gospel (intended for a Roman audience) any story about how Jesus came to earth, as long as he felt the story was true.  Salesman usually don't refrain from using their best evidence to make their case as convincing as possible.
• Therefore it doesn't matter if he could still possibly have valid reasons to exclude it; the first reasonable expectation is not the exception, but the rule, and we are reasonable to insist that, without good evidence otherwise, Mark would have told his Roman audience the story of Jesus' conception IF Mark knew of and accepted that story as true.
• Therefore, because Mark says nothing about the story of Jesus' conception, despite writing to an audience whose Roman nature implies selling them a god is much easier when accompanied by stories of his conception and his mother, it doesn't matter Mark "could have" had valid reasons to avoid using a powerful supporting proof for his claim that Jesus was a son of a god, we are reasonable to say Mark omits the story either because he didn't know about it, or thought it false.
• If Mark omitted it because he didn't know about it, then generally agreeing with the fundies that he wrote around 60 a.d., then Mark's ignorance of the virgin birth "truth" thus persists for more than 25 years.  Yes, it is "possible" that somebody with such constant unfettered access to the apostles as Mark, could somehow miraculously just "never hear" about that story, but it's not likely.
  
• Fundies are naturally slow to question patristic stories of the apostles, and Papias said Mark "omitted nothing" of what he heard, so assuming the reliability Papias/Eusebius, as fundies would have it, Mark wasn't "omitting" anything when leaving out the virgin birth story, anymore than he was "omitting" mention of Hitler.  His gospel reflects ALL that Peter preached, even if only in condensed form.  Dr. Bauckham is wrong to pretend Papias' "omit nothing" phrase is mere literary convention, Papias mentions this trait of Mark in a context mentioning other traits that fundies say are literally true about Mark and his gospel (i.e., that Mark doesn't write about events in proper chronological fashion or "order") so it is likely that "omit nothing" was meant to describe the nature of Mark's writing in reality, and thus isn't Papias' choice to use mere literary convention. Papias doesn't ascribe "omit nothing" to the other gospel author he mentions (Matthew), so "omit nothing" is a real uniqueness of Mark's gospel.
• It hardly needs to be spelled out why Mark's omitting the virgin birth story because he thought it false, would be the equal of running a jumbo jet into the inerrancy house of cards.  One NT author thought the virgin birth story was false?  Not a happy day.

As you can see, it doesn't matter that there continue to exist trifling possibilities that, if proven true, would render this argument from Mark's silence invalid.  The person who wins the history debate shows their theory to be more probable or likely than the theory they disagree with.  They do not win by merely positing possibilities (otherwise, because its possible that Jesus didn't rise from the dead, skeptics win the resurrection debate) or by insisting that their opponent must smack all other possibilities all the way out of the ballpark of conceivable options before the surviving theory can be held with reasonable confidence.

Here's another argument to justify skepticism, again, from Mark's silence:  Mark and Matthew often tell the same story in very similar wording, which raises thorny questions about those instances where they tell the same story with otherwise unexpected omissions or differences.  Peter’s confession at Caesarea Philippi is a striking case in point:

“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."  (omitted!)   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.

Why does Mark leave unexpressed the lengthy and theologically significant answer Jesus gives to Peter, as seen in Matthew's version?  The argument from silence would go like this:

• If Mathew is accurate, then Jesus really did give the answer Matthew portrays.   Since then the option of Matthew's embellishment would then be off the table, Mark really is "omitting" something here, contra Eusebius/Papias who insist Mark "omitted nothing".
• The longer version of Jesus' reply contains theologically significant teaching.  Doesn't matter if an author can consciously choose to omit important teaching, we normally don't expect them to do so without good reasons for believing they intended to so omit.  You could possibly consciously choose to take no food or liquids with you as you race to rescue family members thirsting and starving to death in the desert, but without good explanation otherwise, the more reasonable expectation is that you'd take along food and water.  Remember, Peter did not preach merely to Romans, he also preached to Jews, so the problem of the unlikelihood of Peter "choosing to exclude" evidence that he was specially empowered by Christ to decide disputes, remains.
• We reasonably expect that Peter would have found important the extra words of Jesus reported in Matthew's version, as they seem to bequeath a special, even if not exclusive, power on specifically Peter.
• Peter would not likely "choose to exclude" words of Jesus that give Peter any special type of status or authority.  People don't normally choose to omit mention of accolades from their bosses; for as humans, they desire recognition and respect if they actually hold a position of authority.  Most people display proofs that third-parties have approved of them, we don't normally destroy such things or keep them hidden.
• If the patristic sources are generally accurate in describing Mark as Peter's companion, then we are reasonable to conclude that when Peter preached this incident to unbelievers, Mark was there and heard Peter utter the longer version of Jesus' reply as found in Matthew's version.
• The competing theory is a possibility but yet an absurdity of improbability, namely, that Mark might have had a valid reason for consciously choosing to exclude from his Petrine gospel that part of Jesus' reply to Peter that is critically important to the nature and scope of apostolic authority.  yeah right, and maybe I'll write a book someday entitled "The Sexual Scandals of the Clinton Presidency" and "choose to exclude" any mention of Monica Lewinsky?  FUCK YOU.

 I therefore conclude that the reason the longer version of Jesus' answer is missing from Mark's account is because Jesus never said it.  The long version seen in Matthew originated from nowhere else except Matthew's mind.

Once again, it doesn't matter that other possibilities will always exist.  Historiography was never a science in the first place, but an art, there is plenty of room to be reasonable with this argument from Mark's silence, even if it's accuracy falls short of infallible proof.

How many things do you believe are true, but whose falsity remains at least a possibility?

Bigfoot is a genuine cryptid
Bigfoot is a hoax

Space aliens are real.
Space aliens are fake.

Man is a dichotomy
Man is a trichotomy

Premillenialism is biblical.
Premillenialism is not biblical. 

The zombie resurrection of Matthew 27:52 is real history
The zombie resurrection of Matthew 127:52 is only apocalyptic symbolism

God wants you to take this job.
God doesn't want you to take this job.

God wants you to have kids.
God doesn't want you to have kids.

If the mere "possibility" that your views on these matters could be wrong, doesn't slow you down from holding the beliefs you do with reasonable confidence, how can you seriously say that the mere possibility that Mark could have had valid reasons for knowingly excluding historically valid material , "smashes" the above-argument from Mark's silence?

Can you marshal as much evidence for your theory about Mark's silences, as I have done for my theories about his silences, supra?   It doesn't look like it, since what is either known about Mark, or what fundies believe about Mark, supports my theory of his silence far more than any "he-knew-about-it-and-thought-it-true-but-still-didn't-want-to-mention-it" theory.

In conclusion, there are good reasons to say these skeptical theories of Mark's ommisions are reasonable, the evidence in support of the alternative theories isn't enough to render the skeptical theory unreasonable, and therefore, the reasonableness of the skeptical theory cannot be disturbed on current evidence.

Thus, the existing criteria for the argument from silence are sufficient to make the skeptical position on these matters sufficiently grounded as to remain "reasonable" even in light of fundamentalist Christian attempts to refute them or favor more some alternative explanation for Mark's silences.  The reasonableness cannot be deemed to disappear merely because historiography is an art, and there must always exist metaphysical possibility that testimony can be understood in a different way.

Cold Case Christianity: Why a Christian Response Needs to Be Different Than a Mormon Response

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

Cold Case Christianity: 

Why a Christian Response Needs to Be Different Than a Mormon Response

Posted: 01 Mar 2019 01:48 AM PST

I regularly get the opportunity to train groups of high school students in preparation for Berkeley Missions trips. These students spend four to eight weeks learning about the evidence supporting the Christian worldview and examining many of the most popular objections to Christianity.

 That's not very wise.  Public representatives of Christ shouldn't be youths who pretend to be doing battle with Satan.  They more than likely don't have the spiritual maturity necessary to keep safe from the subtleties of the greatest of the liars. 

And contrary to what you might think, your bible tells you that Satan is a master deceiver. Your impressing spiritual babies with your one-dollar apologetics crap is not going to adequately prepare them for spiritual warfare, which is what the NT says is really going on when Christians witness for Christ.

By the way, there is zero NT precedent for equipping children to defend the gospel.  You are just blindly assuming, without evidence or argument, that Jude 3 applies to kids just as much as it applies to adults.  Common sense says because Satan has America strongly deceived, the person who chooses to go battle with the prince of darkness probably needs to have just a bit more spiritual maturity and theological knowledge than what your 60-second answers can stuff into the underdeveloped brains of teenagers.

You may say teens were considered not kids but adults in the 1st century, but your problem is what your teen audience is like TODAY.  TODAY, teens are not as mature as they were centuries ago when the world's sins weren't being flashed into their brains ever second of the day, as happens in today's sick consumerist America. 

Paul didn't even think certain adults should be publicly taught:

 34 The women are to keep silent in the churches; for they are not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves, just as the Law also says.
 35 If they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home; for it is improper for a woman to speak in church. (1 Cor. 14:34-35 NAU)

But if modern American Christianity is correct about equal rights for women, then this is one of those bible verses that doesn't apply to you today because the culture has changed.  That's foolish, of course, as nothing in the context expresses or implies that Paul's comment there was only made out of regard for the particular Corinthian culture.  Consistent with Paul's other teachings, Paul did not believe women should be taught publicly, any known exceptions merely proving the general rule.  Women in the first century also were generally disallowed from speaking in the synagogue, so viewing Paul here as a mysoginist is at least more reasonable than the transparently hollow "cultural" interpretation that gets rid of this bothersome requirement.

But for now the point is that if Paul thought even some adults should not be publicly taught, it is fairly certain that he also wouldn't approve of publicly teaching religion to children (i.e., spiritual babies).  Why?  Because such people can ask hard questions and turn the public lesson into the forbidden "wrangling of words" which Paul said harms everybody else that might be present (2nd Timothy 2:14).

When we are early in the process, I begin by asking the students to tell me why they are Christians in the first place.

 And if your spiritual warriors were honest with themselves and with you, they'd have admitted that their having grown up in the faith, or having done the church thing because their friend invited them to start becoming involved in church life, was a major motivating factor.  Sorry, but genuine salvation requires genuine remorse, and it's a rare teen that truly feels guilty, and even rareer is the teen who is trying to feel guilty about transgressing something written in an ancient holy book.  They have a hard enough time feeling guilty about transgressing modern-day law! 

I spent most of my life convinced theism was little more than a useful delusion, and I only became a believer after examining the evidence for the eyewitness reliability of the New Testament Gospels.

I spent 15 years of my young adult life convinced Christianity was the only true religion, and I only became an atheist after examining the evidence for the eyewitness authorship of the New Testament Gospels (among other developments).  Go ahead, google it:  there are scores of atheist bible critics who honestly admit that back when they were Christians, it was when they started doing more scholarly studies in biblical issues, that their faith started wavering.

As a result, when people ask me why I am a Christian today, I briefly outline the evidence I found persuasive.

 Objectivity would demand that you also admit you are a salesman, and you like the whole idea of selling Jesus for profit without paying taxes, an enterprise wherein you ironically make yourself the center of the discussion while trying to convince people that they should fix their gaze only upon Jesus.

With one group of students, however, when I asked the students to tell me why they were Christians, I didn’t get a single evidential response. Most had difficulty answering the question at all, and those who did sounded like members of the Mormon Church.

 An excellent reason for you to identify such "Christians" as spiritually immature at best, and in no condition to be "equipped to defend the gospel", given that the NT describes this not as an intellectual exercise, but as doing battle with the most dark force in the cosmos.  If you wouldn't give a baby a shotgun...

I didn’t know a lot of Christians growing up; I was surrounded by atheists and Mormon family members. I have six fantastic half-brothers and sisters who were raised in the LDS (Latter Day Saints) Church. Many are still committed to Mormonism and happy to share their faith. But if you ask them why they are believers, you’ll get many of the same answers I received with the high school students in the Berkeley training. “I prayed about it and God confirmed it was true,”

You are not so subtley implying that mere prayer is insufficient to achieve salvation or other Christian objectives.  The NT disagrees with your shit-attitude:

 16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. (Jas. 5:16 NAU)

Will you trifle that because James said this in the context of healing, that therefore, the effective fervent prayer of a righteous man doesn't accomplish much when directed toward other issues?

Wallace continues:

“I have a relationship with God and I feel His presence,”

 Subjective feelings of god's presence are legitimized by the bible:

 13 Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Rom. 15:13 NAU)

 Wallace continues:

“I had a strong experience that changed my life,”

That sort of shit is also biblical:

  2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect. (Rom. 12:2 NAU)

 9 But if I say, "I will not remember Him Or speak anymore in His name," Then in my heart it becomes like a burning fire Shut up in my bones; And I am weary of holding it in, And I cannot endure it. (Jer. 20:9 NAU)

 Wallace continues:

“I just know it is true,”

 Subjective feelings of certitude, which are not easily explained to others, is also biblical:

  26 In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; (Rom. 8:26 NAU)

  14 For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful. (1 Cor. 14:14 NAU)

 Wallace continues:

“I was raised in the Church and I’ve never had a reason to question it; God has always been a part of my life,”

 Being a Christian because that's always been what your family was involved in, is biblical:

1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. (Eph. 6:1 NAU)

 1 It is a trustworthy statement: if any man aspires to the office of overseer, it is a fine work he desires to do.
 2 An overseer, then, must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, prudent, respectable, hospitable, able to teach,
 3 not addicted to wine or pugnacious, but gentle, peaceable, free from the love of money.
 4 He must be one who manages his own household well, keeping his children under control with all dignity (1 Tim. 3:1-4 NAU)

Wallace continues:

“I know it’s true because my life is very different now.”

Any morally good difference counts as a biblically justified excuse to believe one is saved:

  17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. (2 Cor. 5:17 NAU)

Wallace continues:

These are all great responses and I want to be careful not to minimize the importance or validity of experiential evidence. But when I heard these kinds of answers offered as justification by the Christian students in our group, I asked them: “Do you believe Mormonism is true?” Many of these students had already been on the Utah Missions trip, so they understood the dramatic difference between the claims of Mormonism and the claims of Christianity. They all confirmed they did not believe Mormonism was true and immediately recognized the problem with their responses.

Then they also recognized the problem with the bible verses that justify their subjective beliefs, supra.

The manner in which they had been measuring and evaluating their beliefs about God was insufficient.

Which can only mean you do not think the Holy Spirit moves in Christians today, unless they demonstrate the empirical validity of their beliefs.  Sorry, that's not in the spirit of 1st century Christianity.  That's in the spirit of some modern evangelical who didn't notice that making everything into an "argument" leaves no room to attribute reasonable significance to the Holy Spirit's alleged invisible convicting-work.  According to you, the Holy Spirit does do anything when a Christian is testifying...unless the Christian can demonstrate satisfaction of modern-day criteria for authenticating historical documents.  If the age of miracles has passed, that's your problem, and it likely means a) Acts is no longer a good blueprint for the church of today, and b) this deficiency in Acts has probably gone unnoticed by most Christians who "believe the bible".

None of them had ever examined the evidence for Christianity.

Which creates for you a problematic possibility that the reason they came to Christ without apologetics is because the Holy Spirit actually doesn't need apologetics to do what he does...which would mean god needs you and your arguments about as much as you need Pepsi.

They were what I refer to as “Accidental Christians,” holding the correct and true view of the world, without actually knowing why it was the correct and true view of the world.

And unless you condemn that way of salvation, the fact that they became genuinely born again, unrelated to apologetics, proves that the Holy Spirit is much less interested in apologetics than you are. 

In all the years I’ve been in the midst of Mormon believers (both in my family and on the streets of Utah as a missionary) I’ve never once encountered a Mormon believer who told me he or she was a Mormon because of the evidence.

Which ought to tell you how deceptive religious faith can be.  No evidence is never a problem.  Where there's a will, there's a way, even if it doesn't involve evidence.  And by your own testimony, such clouded thinking is even found in abundance in the typical mainstream Protestant churches which you personally believe are the closest thing to real Christianity on earth today.

It’s never happened. Mormonism cannot be supported by the historical evidence, especially when examined through the template I use for eyewitness reliability.

 True, but you cannot pretend the problems with the various different versions of Joe Smith's first vision, are substantially greater than the differences between the 4 gospels.  What's more likely, that Mark thought telling the readers how Jesus called the original disciples into service (Mark 1) was more important than what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount?  Nah, Mark didn't "knowingly exclude" the Sermon on the Mount.  He leaves it out more than likely because he didn't know Jesus said any such thing.  And since Mark's ignorance was manifested this way when he wrote the gospel 25 years after Jesus died, his omission of the Sermon on the Mount and preference for other less significant stories is a bastard of a headache for inerrantists to "fix".

Christianity, however, is supported by the historical facts and can hold up under fair scrutiny.

Not if my argument against Jesus' resurrection is considered.

When young believers are challenged in their university years, they will undoubtedly be questioned about their “epistemology” (their “theory of knowledge”). They’ll be asked not only about what they believe, but why and how they came to believe it.

 Which should not bother them if they know their bible, since the bible doesn't condemn or sideline the validity of completely subjective experience the way today's Christian apologists do....and I draw the further conclusion that because Christian apologetics virtually obliterates the significance of completely subjective experience, this is where it deviates from NT teachings.  Not saying the NT never requires apologetics, but only that those parts clash with the parts that justify inward feelings of salvation.

I draw a final conclusion that if God really was god and had the magic fairy dust Ezra 1:1 says he has, then the best explanation for passages like Jude 3 would be completely naturalistic (i.e., god not only doesn't "need" you to give arguments, he likely doesn't even "want" you to give arguments).  Sure, you can learn spiritual maturity by learning apologetics, but God can infuse the same into you by waving his Ezra 1:1 magic wand.  If God wants to draw a family closer to him, he doesn't have to stand aside and allow a pedophile to rape their little girl to death and plunge the family into lifetime depression...he can just do his Ezra 1:1 wand-waving and that family will do or believe whatever he wants them to do or believe. 

In the last analysis, the requirement to argue the case for Christ sounds more like what naturalistic men with false religion would require, not what a truly sovereign god would require.  Your god is like the stupid dad who allows his young son to play with a chain saw and endure amputation, because dad thinks this extreme accident will work a greater good in the future and help keep his son humble when he grows up.  FUCK YOU.

That’s why our answers have to be more than subjective; we must be prepared to make a defense to everyone who asks us to give an account for the hope that is in us (1 Peter 3:15), using objective evidence, just as Jesus often did.

 Nevermind the fact that the need to do apologetics, as expressed in such passages, clashes with the fact that God could get anybody to believe anything he wanted with a wave of his magic Ezra 1:1 wand, and in doing so, preempt the vast majority, if not ALL, of the sin in the world thereby.    So your god is sort of like the stupid man who fulfills his sexual desires by raping little girls instead of having consensual sex with adult women.  He does things the stupid wasteful hurtful hard way that violates basic common sense, then demands that we stop asking questions when we notice what an unfair cocksucker he really is. Well fuck you, I'm asking questions and I won't be stopping anytime soon.  I allow no exceptions for the big invisible man who lives in the sky and has an eternal inability to properly manage money.

Our responses, as Christians, need to be very different than the responses offered by Mormons if we hope to influence a skeptical world and have the confidence necessary to survive in an ever more hostile cultural environment.

 Correct, because if YOU don't do anything, God certainly isn't going to do anything.   Somebody either learns apologetics, or God cannot accomplished his salvific goals in the world.

Clearly, the kinds of responses our Mormon friends and family members might offer are insufficient, because they ignore the objective evidence we, as Christians, would cite to demonstrate the falsity of Mormonism.

 While Mormonism is ultimately false, you've gone too far here.  If you don't think so, introduce your spiritual babies to organizations dedicated to demonstrating the historical and theological accuracy of the book of Mormon, such as

https://www.shields-research.org/
https://www.fairmormon.org/

 Some Christian scholars admit mormon scholarship is becoming more and more formidable:

Our fourth conclusion is that at the academic level evangelicals are losing the debate with the Mormons. We are losing the battle and do not know it. In recent years the sophistication and erudition of LDS apologetics has risen considerably while evangelical responses have not.4 Those who have the skills necessary for this task rarely demonstrate an interest in the issues. Often they do not even know that there is a need. In large part this is due entirely to ignorance of the relevant literature.

 Source here.

Dr. James White is one of the more intellectual of the Christian apologists, and yet he took a rather brutal beating from a mormon scholar in an extended debate about the OT and monotheism. See
http://www.shields-research.org/Critics/A-O_01b.html



Wallace continues:

Why then, would we, as Christian believers, take a similar approach to defending our own faith?

 Maybe because the NT supports the wholly subjective experience thing just as much as it does the "apologetics" approach?

We can offer so much more if we are only willing to familiarize ourselves with the evidence.

 But more is not always better. Suggest you read Michah 6:8.

Our responses, as Christians, need to be very different than the responses offered by Mormons if we hope to influence a skeptical world and have the confidence necessary to survive in an ever more hostile cultural environment.

 No doubt because the Holy Spirit is helpless without human beings.