Apologetics is biblical. That’s why it should play a foundational role in the ministry of the local church. However, here are five additional reasons apologetics should be a staple in the life of the church.

First, it helps believers master the fundamentals of Christian doctrine so that they can effectively evangelize the lost (Titus 2:7-8). Second, it provides answers to objections leveled against truth (1 Pet. 3:15). Third, it inspires believers as well as nonbelievers to inquire more about the Christian faith (Acts 17:32-34; 26:28). Fourth, it teaches Christians to think critically through the philosophies of opposing worldviews (1 Tim. 1:3, 6-7). Finally, it can help the Christian who is experiencing a crisis of faith.¹

In short, apologetics is an essential component to help us grow in our faith and is therefore vital to the church in the twenty-first century. It is not vital to the church’s existence per se, but rather her quality of existence, that is, her effectiveness in engaging the culture for Christ (Matt. 5:13). Consider the words of Nancy Pearcey and Charles Thaxton as they describe the infiltration of the church into the world: “We learn that until comparatively recent times, Christians have actively worked out the implications of their faith in all areas of life and scholarship-from philosophy to mathematics to physics to biology. Christian faith has not been a purely private matter. Nor has it been shut off in a separate part of life, as though it were relevant to worship but not to work.”² It is time we take our rightful stand in the world. The local church has been given an identity. She is the Lord’s mouthpiece and the world’s conscience. She is salt and God can use apologetics to shake her and the world up. Every church dedicated to the Lord’s mandate (Matt. 28:19-20) should be interested in evangelism. If evangelism deals with the spreading of the good news, then those who share it must be ready to articulate and defend the faith (1 Pet. 3:15).

Birth of an Apologetics Ministry. The ability to give a defense for the apostolic doctrine is at the core of the Christian faith (Acts 2:42). Any believer who constantly shares the good news will eventually meet someone who has a question about the Christian faith. This was my (Perseus’s) plight when we began witnessing in 1991. I just accepted Christ a year before and I had a zeal for witnessing. This burning desire to share Christ was also fueled by my close friends. They also loved the Lord and were willing to spread the gospel each Saturday. We met at the church at 11:00 a.m. for prayer and consecration. We would then walk the streets around the church sharing the gospel door to door. It was through this method of evangelism that our apologetics ministry was born. During one of our street witnessing ventures, we encountered two gentlemen. They were dressed in white shirts, black ties, and dark pants. They were very friendly and well informed. These two men professed to be believers in Jesus, the Bible, and the church. As our discussion progressed, however, we soon discovered their doctrinal belief was inconsistent with our biblical worldview. As a result, all the members of our witnessing group agreed to begin studying more about other faiths. We wanted to be able to articulate the Christian faith while effectively being able to give a defense for God’s word. This encounter compelled us to do more studying on the cults. In order to better understand the doctrines of the major cults, we made appointments to visit them. We were able to visit the Kingdom Hall of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Nation of Islam mosque, and an orthodox Islam mosque. These experiences further buttressed the need for Christian apologetics. Our hearts were saddened from the experiences with the cults. We soon realized that if we were going to make an impact in our community, it would have to start with the church. As a result, we decided to approach our pastor about starting an apologetics ministry. Fortunately, we have a pastor who understands the word of God and he gave us permission to start the ministry. The St. Paul apologetics ministry started in 1992 at St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church, located in the Oak Park neighborhood of Sacramento, California. Under the leadership of Pastor Ephraim Williams, the church blossomed to a membership of about five thousand. According to a local survey, Oak Park had within its limits approximately one hundred churches. We were not aware that any of these churches had an apologetics ministry and so there were no models for us to follow, but Pastor Williams publicly gave us his vote of confidence from the pulpit and informed the congregation about the new apologetics ministry and its function. We met as a group once a month and engaged in systematic theology. Initially we averaged approximately eight people per meeting. We now have more than seventy members in this ministry. The early years were extremely difficult. Some church members did not understand the need for an apologetics ministry while other members strongly supported us. We pressed on, and eventually we became known as the ministry that answered biblical questions. We made it easily available for the congregation to obtain answers regarding their Christianity. We created a resource cabinet in the administrative wing of the church. The cabinet contained Christian Research Institute (CRI) perspectives, which are one-page statements on various issues. We were able to provide answers immediately to many questions through the aid of the CRI perspectives. In addition, we created an information box. The box was intended for church members to drop in their questions. Someone from our ministry contacted the church members to provide answers within two to three days of receiving a question in the box. We even received questions from various Sunday school teachers. Eventually the church started to understand the role of the apologetics ministry. Furthermore, the influence of this ministry has expanded outside the church walls. Since the inception of our apologetics forums in 1998, many other churches have expressed interest in apologetics training. We have been blessed to have individuals such as Phillip Johnson, Norman Geisler, J. P. Moreland, and Hank Hanegraaff speak at our forums. We also developed series on “Loving God with All of Your Mind,” “Let the Truth Be Told,” and “The Essentials of the Christian Faith.” The forums are intended to expose Christians to apologetics. In addition, our hope is for attendees to take the information back to their own churches. It is always a blessing to see different people from various nationalities and denominations talking about sound doctrine. My favorite part about the forum series is the question-and-answer period, where participants are welcome to question our speakers.

The Value of Apologetics in the Local Church. As a ministry, we find it helpful to have a church that believes in the inerrancy of the Bible. As a result, the ministry has become a vital component of the church. In an attempt to promote hermeneutics, we approached our new membership department. With the approval of our pastor, we created an apologetics class for all new members. It is essential that we give our new converts the purity of the major doctrines without contamination (1 Pet. 2:2). This was the purpose for incorporating an apologetics class into the new membership curriculum. By attending the apologetics class, many new members have been able to gain confidence in their knowledge and understanding of the Christian faith. The church has additionally utilized the apologetics ministry in terms of research. When St. Paul was working on opening a bookstore, church staff asked us to identify sound and heretical authors. The ministry accepted this awesome task and was able to recommend authors that adhered to sound doctrines. Our ministry is currently working on a youth apologetics class. According to David Wheaton, approximately fifty-one percent of Christian college enrollees deny their faith upon graduating.³ It is in light of these alarming statistics that we decided to develop apologetics training sessions for our youth. Since they share classrooms with atheists, naturalists, skeptics, and students with many other worldviews, it is important that they receive training in sharing and defending their faith. In order to train them, we conducted a workshop entitled, “Let the Truth Be Told.” It is also our hope that our youth will develop Christian clubs at their various schools. Ultimately, we hope to develop trained ambassadors for Christ (2 Cor. 5:20). I understand that each church is different. I am also cognizant that resources vary from church to church. Despite obvious challenges, it is very important for every Bible-teaching church to have an apologetics ministry or curriculum woven into its programs. Failure to do so will ultimately create an atmosphere for erroneous doctrine. Developing a culture for apologetics will help churches root out unbiblical statements, lyrics, teachings, and traditions. Having an apologetics ministry has helped our church tremendously. Many of our members are now doctrinally sensitive. They search the scriptures for edification (Acts 17:11) and are willing to confront any aberrant views. The heartbeat of every church should be to develop an apologetics ministry dedicated to maintaining the integrity of sound doctrine. -Perseus Poku and Rodney Scott

Perseus Poku holds an A.A. in Education and a B.A. in History from California State University, Sacramento. Mr. Poku is currently working on his Masters in Christian Apologetics at Southern Evangelical Seminary, and serves as the full-time Staff Minister at St. Paul Baptist Church in Sacramento, California.

Rodney Scott holds a B.A. in Biblical Studies from Biola University and an M.A. in Philosophy from Talbot University. He serves as Director of Evangelism and Discipleship at Progressive Community Church in Stockton, California.

NOTES

1 When my Aunt Bennie died, my years of study on the evidence of the bodily resurrection of Jesus gave me assurance that she not only survived the death of her body, but that she would soon receive a new body at the resurrection.

2 Nancy R. Pearcey and Charles B. Thaxton, The Soul of Science: Christian Faith and Natural Philosophy (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1994), xiii.

3 David Wheaton, University of Destruction (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2005), 170.

In July of 2008 a flurry of academic journals and news sources reported a new archaeological artifact that might “shake our basic view of Christianity”—especially about first-century mes-sianic expectations and the resurrection accounts. The new find was a large stone tablet on which was written eighty-seven lines of Hebrew text in ink, but much of the text was missing. The message of the text, thought to be composed just before the time of Jesus, is being called Gabriel’s Revelation. A scholar named Israel Knohl created headlines about this artifact by filling in some of the missing text with words that line up with his idea that the notion of a suffering and dying messiah who rises on the third day was part of the consciousness of Judaism before Christianity emerged and is therefore the source of the stories about Jesus. Evangelical scholars have concluded that even if Knohl’s recreation of the text of the tablet is correct, there is no threat to the New Testament picture of Jesus. Indeed, Knohl’s views, if proven true, could actually bolster the Christian case.

Almost every year now as we approach the traditional Easter holiday, we brace ourselves for news that will “shock the faithful worldwide.” In the Spring of 2007, it was this:

An incredible archaeological discovery in Israel changes history and shocks the world. Tombs with the names Maria, Jesus son of Joseph, Mariamne e Mara, and Judah, their son, are found and an investigation begins. The Jesus Family Tomb [movie] is a riveting archaeological adventure, a real-life detective story, co-produced by filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici and Titanic director James Cameron. In 1980, in East Talpiot, Jerusalem, a bulldozer accidentally uncovered what may be the most explosive archaeological discovery of all time.…What they find is the discovery of a lifetime, and raises questions about the historical Jesus.¹

Of course, after the dust settled with regard to the purported family tomb of Jesus, the only thing “remarkable” and “shocking” was the speed and cleverness of a group of pseudoscholars to grab some headlines, sell a book and a DVD, and hightail it out of town before people with real knowledge about such matters were able to weigh in.² I believe Jacobovici and Cameron set a whole new standard with regard to profitable hit-and-run Jesus exposés.

We have seen a number of these kinds of issues exploited both for financial gain and for the purpose of undermining the picture of Jesus that emerges from the New Testament documents. The DaVinci Code, the various Gnostic Gospels, the lost years of Jesus, the Passover Plot, and so on. Of course, the “shocking conclusion” of each new conjecture never seems to be that we have compelling and reliable evidence to know that an extraordinary, innocent man died at the hands of a Roman crucifixion squad and returned from the dead several days later in first-century Jerusalem just as He and the Scriptures predicted!

A DEAD SEA SCROLL ON STONE

The latest archaeological find that is being used by some to call into question the New Testament witness to Jesus is being called “Gabriel’s Revelation” (also called the Vision of Gabriel, or Hazon Gabriel in Hebrew). The filmmakers and exploiters have not yet arrived on the scene of this relic—but the day is young.

Gabriel’s Revelation is a Hebrew apocalyptic text written on the face of a thick stone tablet measuring three feet by one foot.³ One would expect the inscription to be engraved into the stone, but the message here was painted onto a smooth surface of the tablet using ink. The text is arranged in two columns with a total of eighty-seven lines. The arrangement of the text is very much like that on a scroll; hence some scholars have been calling it a “scroll on stone.”

The tablet was cracked into three pieces in its journey through the centuries, but all the pieces are accounted for. The Hebrew lettering on the tablet, however, did not fare so well. It is a very poorly preserved artifact and a good deal of the text is either gone or indecipherable—but this is, of course, a key reason for the mystery and the current controversy surrounding it. Paleographic analysis (that is, a study of the script and materials of writing) place the date of composition from the late first-century BC to the early first century AD—the same general time frame that has been assigned to the Dead Sea Scrolls. In both appearance and apocalyptic tenor, the Gabriel Tablet appears to have more than a little in common with these other ancient Hebrew texts from the Qumran community.⁴

Although scholars are comfortable with the date range of the writing on the tablet, they really have no idea who wrote it or anything about its provenance. The tablet surfaced about a decade ago in the possession of a Jordanian antiquities dealer. It was then purchased by David Jeselsohn, an Israeli collector living in Zurich, who kept the artifact at his home. Although a knowledgeable antiquities patron himself, Jeselsohn did not know the importance of the coffee-table-sized stone occupying three square feet of his living room.

Eventually he showed it to Ada Yardeni, an expert in ancient Hebrew scripts, paleography, and epigraphy from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Dr. Yardeni, in collaboration with Binyamin Elitzur, recognized the text as the work of a professional scribe and clearly from the first-centuries time frame already mentioned based on “the shape and the form of the letters.”⁵ According to a New York Times report, chemical analysis of the artifact done by a renowned expert in archaeological dating, Yuval Goren of Tel Aviv University, confirmed the proposed date range from paleography.⁶ The question of the basic time-frame of composition seems for the most part closed, but where it was and who had it for 2,000 years is still wide open.

After spending some quality time with the Gabriel Tablet, Yardeni and Elitzur published an article in 2007 in the Hebrew language periodical Cathedra.⁷ In that article they offered their best attempt at a transcription of the lines of ancient Hebrew.⁸ Their own English translation was published on the Web site of the Biblical Archaeology Review and shows all of the missing and illegible parts according to their expert analysis.⁹ This is important because these two textual scholars were most concerned with reconstructing and reading the actual text and less concerned with broader interpretation or how it might “shake the very foundation of Christian history.”

Upon reading Yardeni’s and Elitzur’s English translation of Gabriel’s Revelation and the English-language summary of their article from Cathedra’s Web site, one wonders what the controversy could possibly be?¹⁰ No doubt this is a fascinating find. We have here a very unusual artifact emerging from the Second Temple period that gives us a new but very small window into the variety of Jewish prophetic literature of the period. As Yardeni herself wrote,

The text has not been identified, but it is clearly a literary composition, similar to Biblical prophecies. It is written in the first person, perhaps by someone named Gabriel….It is apparently a collection of short prophecies addressed to someone in the second person…. It is difficult to say more. Perhaps this intriguing text only emphasizes the variety of Jewish movements at the turn of the era—and how much about them we don’t know.¹¹

Yardeni displayed great scholarly restraint in her analysis by sticking to the legible text on the tablet without making grand extrapolations to determine what the text was “really” all about.

Enter Israel Knohl.

GABRIEL’S REVELATION AS TEXTUAL MISSING LINK?

New York Times reporter Ethan Bronner referred to Knohl as an “iconoclastic” scholar because Bronner picked up on the fact that Knohl was interested in nothing less than to “shake the world of Christology.”¹² In the preface to a book he published in 2000 (in which he believed he was the first ever to find the elusive connection between the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament), Knohl was upfront with his deep desire to overturn long cherished beliefs: “In the present work I challenge the point of view dominant in New Testament scholarship for over a hundred years.…I have a strong compulsion to reveal the truth as I see it.”¹³ Over the years, Knohl’s work is known to be competent, creative, and bold—necessary attributes for notable work in ancient texts and history. However, no one would ever accuse him of “under reaching” in his attempts to draw conclusions from limited evidence.¹⁴

Professor Knohl first read about the tablet and Gabriel’s Revelation in the Yardeni and Elitzur article in Cathedra. His interest in seeing the stone was immediate. The New York Times article captured the reason for this. “Mr. Knohl posited in a book in [the year] 2000 the idea of a suffering messiah before Jesus, using a variety of rabbinic and early apocalyptic literature as well as the Dead Sea Scrolls. But his theory did not shake the world of Christology as he had hoped, partly because he had no textual evidence from before Jesus.”¹⁵ For Knohl, Gabriel’s Revelation was the missing link he needed.

ISRAEL KNOHL AND THE “PREQUEL” TO JESUS’ RESURRECTION

After studying the tablet himself, Knohl published three articles—one scholarly and two popular—from April 2007 to April 2008.16 A subsequent New York Times report on his conclusions regarding Gabriel’s Revelation became the top blogged and e-mailed story on the newspaper’s Web site for a period of time.¹⁷ Knohl’s conclusions—or at least the way he was packaging them—were magnetic for the media and garnered broad and immediate popular interest.

Of the eighty-seven lines of text on the tablet, Knohl knew just where to focus his gaze in order to find the controversy—the now infamous line 80. According to Yardeni’s original study of the tablet, lines 80 and 81 read as follows (of course, ellipses, brackets, and question marks indicate missing and unreadable text):

80. In three days li[ve], I, Gabri’el …[?],

81. the Prince of Princes, …, narrow holes(?) …[…]…¹⁸

Israel Knohl rendered the same two lines this way:

80. In three days, live, I Gabriel com[mand] yo[u]

81. prince of the princes, the dung of the rocky crevices []… ..[]¹⁹

In comparing Yardeni’s original version to Knohl’s, it is easy to see that Knohl filled in some key blank spots in the tablet’s text. The insertions he made, though, make the message very sympathetic to his long-held position that the picture of a dying and rising messiah was part of the Jewish consciousness in the years before Jesus arrived on the scene. When Knohl rendered line 80 as “In three days, live, I Gabriel command you,” he was massaging the text to express the idea that a powerful angel (Gabriel) was ordering a messianic figure (prince of the princes) to rise from the dead after three days.

Knohl, of course, does not believe in the supernatural resurrection of Jesus on the third day as the Gospels attest, so in his mind the tablet helps provide a naturalistic explanation as to how this central Christian idea took hold among the earliest believers. In Knohl’s own words, “This should shake our basic view of Christianity.…Resurrection after three days becomes a motif developed before Jesus, which runs contrary to nearly all scholarship. What happens in the New Testament was adopted by Jesus and his followers based on an earlier messiah story.”²⁰

In all fairness, Knohl’s reflections on Gabriel’s Revelation go far beyond his provocative thoughts about line 80. He draws other conclusions from the prophetic lines of the tablet and weaves them together with other texts and trends from the time to form some interesting ideas about the variety of messianic expectations during the Second Temple period. However, with limited space here, those cannot be addressed.

POST HOC, ERGO PROPTER HOC

Scholarly reactions to Knohl’s work on the Gabriel Tablet can be placed in two categories. There are reactions to his interpolations of the text itself and reactions to his overall interpretation—especially the cause-and-effect relationship he sees between the tablet and the early ideas about Jesus. Although Ada Yardeni has come out in support of one of the key illegible words (“live” in line 80) proposed by Knohl,²¹ others such as Prof. Moshe Bar-Asher, President of the Israeli Academy of Hebrew Language, concluded (with a tip of the hat to the obvious) that “in crucial places of the text there is a lack of text. I understand Knohl’s tendency to find there keys to the pre-Christian period, but in two or three crucial lines of text there are a lot of words missing.”²²

Like many in the decades before him who overreached on their interpretation of the Dead Sea Scrolls to reveal the “real” origins of Christianity and make headlines, Knohl appears a little too desperate to find the foundation-shaking evidence for which he longs. In doing so he seems to have welded himself to the post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy (“after this, therefore because of this”). It is not the case that just because the messianic movement featuring Jesus of Nazareth followed the composing of Gabriel’s Revelation that Gabriel’s Revelation was necessarily the cause or source of the central ideas of the movement. Positing this, even with a bevy of scholarly qualifiers, is mostly wish fulfillment and goes well beyond what the hard evidence warrants.

SO WHAT?

Evangelical scholars have been less concerned about how Knohl has reconstructed the missing lines and illegible characters of the text and have instead focused on the simple but important question, “So what?”23 That is, what would it mean for our traditional views of Jesus as the resurrected Christ if Knohl’s textual rendering of Gabriel’s Revelation (not his broader interpretation) turned out to be correct? The early consensus of noteworthy evangelical scholars who have weighed in (mostly informally on Internet sites) is that, ironically, if Knohl’s reading is right, it would be more helpful than harmful to our traditional views in several ways.²⁴

Perhaps the most important positive would be that Knohl’s view would do significant harm to the pervasive idea promoted for years by radical Jesus scholars that the predictions made by Jesus about His own passion and resurrection²⁵ were not authentic sayings, but rather were words put into His mouth by later followers. Leaders among the modern messianic Jewish movement picked up on this helpful attribute right away. Here is some “evidence that Jesus was the kind of messiah Israel was waiting for, even if the rabbis now teach that Jesus failed to meet the biblical messianic criteria.”²⁶

In addition, if correct, Knohl’s broader ideas correlate in modest ways with Daniel 9:26 and the Anointed One being “cut off.” It corresponds well with the suffering messiah of Isaiah 53:5. It brings to life the idea of the Sign of the Prophet Jonah mentioned by Jesus in Matthew 12:39–41. It also can help us understand why Paul would claim that Christ was raised on the third day “according to the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:4). Of course, these are all things that evangelicals have promoted vigorously.

The only downside noticed by Resurrection experts such as Gary R. Habermas, if Knohl is correct, has been that apologists who make much of the fact that the death and resurrection of Christ caught His followers completely off guard need to dial down that point.²⁷ Perhaps there was a stronger expectation in the air about a suffering and rising messiah than previously thought.

With all of this said, it is important to remember two things. First, Knohl’s broader interpretation is based on text that he is reading into the blank spots on the tablet. Second, even if he is right, the original belief and early proclamation of the suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus derive from eyewitness accounts of an empty tomb and a risen Christ. Early Jewish messianic expectations alone would simply not have been enough to propel this early movement forward.

As Prof. John J. Collins of Yale Divinity School concluded,

But even if Knohl’s interpretation were right, it would hardly warrant the ensuing fuss. Everyone who has taken an introductory New Testament course knows that the early Christians understood Jesus in light of Jewish prophecies and expectations. The motif of resurrection after three days is based on a passage from the prophet Hosea about restoration of the people: “on the third day he will raise us up that we may live before him.” If Knohl’s interpretation should prove to be right, it would be an interesting contribution to the history of religion. But its supposed threat to Christian theology is no more than a marketing strategy. In that respect, the Vision of Gabriel is only the latest of many discoveries that have been sensationalized for the sake of publicity.²⁸

At this point, the fast-buck filmmakers and executives from cable channels desperate for provocative programming have not descended on the Gabriel Revelation as a new way to boost ratings and revenue. But just wait. Another Easter season will come soon enough.

Craig J. Hazen, Ph.D., is the founder and director of the M.A. program in Christian Apologetics at Biola University and the editor of the scholarly journal, Philosophia Christi. His latest book is the breakout new apologetics novel Five Sacred Crossings (Harvest House, 2008).

notes

1 http://www.jesusfamilytomb.com (accessed January 9, 2009), and http://www.jesusfamilytomb.com/movie_overview/about.html (accessed January 9, 2009).

2 For detailed and thorough responses to the claims about the “Jesus Family Tomb” in Talpiot, see Gary R. Habermas, The Secret of the Talpiot Tomb (Nashville: B and H Publishing Group, 2007) and Charles L. Quarles, ed., Buried Hope and Risen Savior (Nashville: B and H Publishing Group, 2008).

3 An “apocalyptic text” is a written record of a special revelation about the future (but sometimes the past and present) in deeply symbolic language. These apocalyptic revelations usually come in the form of dreams or visions and often involve angels as messengers or interpreters. They usually have as their purpose the bringing of hope and encouragement to people of faith undergoing difficult times and tribulations.

4 The “Qumran community” is the name of the settlement near the Dead Sea where it is thought that a group of Jewish separatists called the Essenes had a kind of wilderness retreat or monastic outpost. It is believed that the Essenes in the Qumran community were responsible for writing and then hiding in caves the famous Dead Sea Scrolls.

5 Ada Yardeni, Biblical Archaeology Review 34 ( January/February 2008), 60.

6 Ethan Bronner, “Ancient Tablet Ignites Debate on Messiah and Resurrection,” New York Times, World Section, July 6, 2008. Also according to the article, Goren’s results have been submitted to a peer-reviewed academic journal. Hence details of the analysis will be coming forth in the near future.

7 Ada Yardeni and Binyamin Elitzur, “Document: A First-Century BCE Prophetic Text Written on a Stone; First Publication,” Cathedra 123 (2007): 155–66.

8 Ibid., 158.

9 See http://www.bib-arch.org/news/dssinstone_english.pdf (accessed January 9, 2009).

10 See Cathedra abstracts at the Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi Web site at http://ybz.org.il/?ArticleID =1712 (accessed January 9, 2009).

11 Yardeni, Biblical Archaeology Review, 60, 61. Emphasis added.

12 Bronner.

13 Israel Knohl, The Messiah before Jesus: The Suffering Servant of the Dead Sea Scrolls, trans. David Maisel (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), xi.

14 See, e.g., the review of Knohl’s The Messiah before Jesus by Eileen M. Schuller in Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 21 (2002): 153–56.

15 Bronner.

16 Israel Knohl, “In Three Days, You Shall Live” Haaretz, April 19, 2007; “‘By Three Days Live’: Messiahs, Resurrection, and Ascent to Heaven in Hazon Gabriel,” Journal of Religion 88 (April 2008): 147–58; and “The Messiah Son of Joseph: ‘Gabriel’s Revelation’ and the Birth of a New Messianic Model,” Biblical Archaeology Review 34 (September/October 2008): 58–62.

17 According to Alan Abbey of the Shalom Hartman Institute Blog, July 7, 2008. http://hartmaninstitute.wordpress.com/2008/07/07/hartmans-israel-knohl-in-the-newsfor-pre-jesus-jewish-tablet/ (accessed January 9, 2009).

18 From http://www.bib-arch.org/news/dssinstone_english.pdf (accessed January 9, 2009).

19 Found in Knohl, “The Messiah Son of Joseph,” 62.

20 Bronner.

21 See the letter to the Biblical Archaeology Review editor, Hershel Shanks, from Ada Yardeni at the BAR Web site. http://www.bib-arch.org/bar/extra.asp?ArticleID=11&ParentArticleID= 14 (accessed January 9, 2009).

22 Bronner.

23 See Ben Witherington’s blog post “The Death and Resurrection of Messiah—Written in Stone,” July 5, 2008, at http://benwitherington.blogspot.com/2008/07/death-andresurrection-of-messiah.html (accessed January 9, 2009).

24 See, e.g., Gary R. Habermas, “‘Gabriel’s Vision’ and the Resurrection of Jesus,” July 2008 at http://www.garyhabermas.com/articles/gabrielsvision1/gabrielsvision.htm (accessed January 9, 2009); Witherington, “The Death and Resurrection of Messiah;” and Craig Blomberg, “No Threat Here!” July 7, 2008. Blog post at http://blog.bible.org/ primetimejesus/content/and-raised-3d-day%3F (accessed January 9, 2009).

25 Such as in Mark 8:31; 9:31; 10:33–34; and 14:27–28.

26 Quote from Israeli historian Gershon Nirel as reported by Ryan Jones on the Israel Today Magazine Web site on July 11, 2008, http://www.israeltoday.co.il/default.aspx?tabid= 178&nid=16576 (accessed January 9, 2009).

27 Habermas, “‘Gabriel’s Vision’ and the Resurrection of Jesus.”

28 John J. Collins, “The Vision of Gabriel,” Yale Alumni Magazine (September/October 2008) at http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/2008_09/forum.html (accessed January 9, 2009).

One of the most satisfying aspects of apologetics ministry is hearing from people who ask permission to use ministry material to begin an apologetics teaching program in their own church. In these times when the Christian faith is increasingly under attack at all levels and discernment is scarce, sponsoring some sort of apologetics ministry at your home church can become an essential first line of defense for your friends, family, and neighbors. Sadly, not all churches have an interest in supporting apologetics ministry, and others, though willing to provide moral and prayerful support, may not be able to provide financial support for more extensive ministry projects. However, even under the most stringent circumstances, there is a great deal that can be done to assist your fellow church members in defense of their faith.

Lay the Foundation.

Initially, you may have to explain to your fellow church members—or perhaps even pastoral staff!—what apologetics is, and provide a sound biblical basis for its practice. Most apologists cite passages at 1 Peter 3:15, Jude 3, and 2 Corinthians 10:5 for evidence of the practice of apologetics in the apostolic church. It is also helpful to note that early evangelism was based on the presentation of fact, and that potential converts were called to repentance based on the historical resurrection of Jesus Christ and the evidence of both His miracles and His fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy (see, e.g., Peter’s speech in Acts 2).¹

Once a biblical basis for apologetics is established, the specific need for such ministry within your church and/or community should be demonstrated. An appeal on this basis can be made from both a positive and a negative perspective. From a negative perspective, church members and pastors can be awakened to the need for apologetics via awareness of crisis statistics indicating serious reductions in church membership and in professions of faith in Jesus Christ.

While there have been numerous analyses with varying theories concerning the cause of

these defections from practicing faith, it is clear that whatever approach to this problem a church implements would need to incorporate apologetics as part of the antidote. As the noted apologist John Warwick Montgomery has observed, “The 21st century Apologist…needs to incorporate Apologetics into every aspect of his or her ministry: every sermon, every class, every evangelistic activity. We have woefully neglected our responsibility to train our young people in the solid case for Christianity, and then we wonder why they depart from the faith under the influence of secular university instruction.”² Having excellent, solid reasons to believe the Christian faith is fundamental to maintaining a healthy worldview that is consistent with our observations and experience.

The apologist may also justify his or her ministry through the power of personal testimony.

Testimony can be offered in both a negative and a positive light. It is not difficult to find what might be called “anti-testimonies” from persons professing to have formerly been Christians, who say that they abandoned their faith because of unanswered questions that a trained apologist could easily have resolved, but which pastors or other Christians they consulted were unable to answer.³ It may also be helpful (if not indeed provocative) to present samples of atheistic or skeptical literature critical of Christianity, in order to highlight a tangible aspect of the problem.

Finally, it can be beneficial to survey your fellow church members concerning any questions

they may have had about the veracity of the Christian faith. I have found it effective, for example, to go around a room where a group is gathered, asking each member what they think the greatest challenges to their faith are, or what unresolved questions they have had about the Bible and Christianity. Few were unwilling to share their doubts and questions in a setting where others were doing the same.

Positively, the testimonies of those whose faith was strengthened by apologetics material,

and who found themselves more motivated in their evangelism because of their newfound surety of faith, can also be powerful tools. People who believe in Christianity because they have solid reasons to think that it is true will provide a far more effective witness than people who believe merely because someone else told them to, or because they had some sort of subjective experience.

Build the Walls.

Once the foundation has been established, the next step is to build a collection of resources for your church. If your church has an active library, you may be able to persuade library staff to purchase apologetics material; or perhaps you can purchase it yourself and donate it to the library. Obviously, a great deal will depend on the financial resources available. You may have to be content with providing the library with a set of bibliographies, listing books that members can read if they want more information on specific topics.

If you can add books to your church library, I would recommend giving priority to “gateway” apologetics works such as Lee Strobel’s Case series, or Hank Hanegraaff’s The Complete Bible Answer Book. More technical works by authors such as Ben Witherington or Craig Blomberg can be made as secondary purchases, or else can be listed as resources in bibliographies.

Printed materials are not your only potential resources. You may also be able to compile a roster of expert persons and organizations that church members can consult if they have questions. This may include an apologetics ministry such as the Christian Research Institute or a local seminary professor.

Have Some Class.

With resources in place, it is time to design a curriculum for an apologetics class. One of the greatest temptations is to “overload” a course with information. We should keep our audience in mind. A class composed of teachers and church leaders can be presented with more detailed information than a class composed of lay church members.

In practice, I find that it is best to craft a lesson so that the most startling or interesting aspects of an issue are highlighted, and thereafter provide a bibliography for further reading. Thus, for example, in doing a lesson on claims that the story of Jesus was based on pagan Christ-figures, I will select some of the clearest and most outrageous claims to present in the lesson proper (e.g., “1 Corinthians 10:4 was copied from Mithraic scriptures”), and this will be sufficient to alert the student to the issue and firmly implant it in his or her memory.

A bibliography attached to lesson notes will tell the students where to go for more information,

when and if they need it. Thereafter, if he or she, or a family member, encounters such claims (e.g., from the popular online movie Zeitgeist), they will know where to go for answers, without having to remember a virtual truckload of information from the lesson.

For classes for the average churchgoer, we should keep our primary focus on the defense and understanding of basic doctrines (the Atonement, the Resurrection, etc.) and major issues facing Christians in popular culture. If we teach other teachers or church leaders, a more advanced course of study is warranted, because these are the people that others look to for answers. Regrettably, it is precisely when leaders are unable to answer questions, and thereby assuage doubts, that Christians can enter into a cycle of discouragement and disillusionment in which they question their faith. This in turn can lead to a downward spiral in which the Christian loses motivation to evangelize or to serve in the Body of Christ.⁴

Stay in View.

A final, necessary step involves not only building awareness within your church fellowship, but also maintaining it. As apologists, we should make it a priority to remain on top of “hot button” issues (e.g. the alleged “tomb of Jesus,” or more recently, the Bill Maher film Religulous) and broker information about them for our churches. Ideally, we should request that pastoral staff bring attention to such issues from the pulpit on Sunday morning, and promote more in-depth programs that can be presented at other times. We might also ask for permission to provide some sort of information in our weekly church bulletins.

The critical point is that when “hot button” issues emerge, they should not simply be swept under the rug. Inevitably, inactivity in apologetics makes for ineffectiveness in evangelism. If, for example, we cannot answer questions about a film like Religulous, we foster an impression of Christians as being unwilling or unable to articulate or defend why they or anyone else should become a Christian.

As Nancy Pearcy has noted:

To be effective in equipping young people and professionals to face the challenges of a highly educated secular society, the church needs to redefine the mission of pastors and youth leaders to include training in apologetics and worldview.…Pastors must once again provide intellectual leadership for their congregations, teaching apologetics from the pulpit. Every time a minister introduces a biblical teaching, he should also instruct the congregation in ways to defend it against the major objections they are likely to encounter. A religion that avoids the intellectual task and retreats to the therapeutic realm of personal relationships and feelings will not survive in today’s spiritual battlefield.⁵

The growth of challenges to our faith, and the easy accessibility of information that challenges us, makes Pearcy’s summons a particularly urgent one. When it comes to educating Christians in the defense of their faith, it is time to be proactive instead of reactive.

—James Patrick Holding

James Patrick Holding is President of Tekton Apologetics Ministries and author of Shattering the Christ Myth (Xulon Press: 2007).

notes

1. See James Patrick Holding, “When Apologetics Was Evangelism,” Christian Research Journal 26, 1 (2003): 10–11, 51.

2. John Warwick Montgomery, “Defending the Hope That Is in Us: Apologetics for the 21st Century,” http://www.jwm.christendom.co.uk/unpublished_essay.html (accessed September 12, 2008).

3. See James Patrick Holding, “Witnessing to Those Fallen from Faith,” Christian Research Journal 28, 1 (2005): 10–11, 40.

4. On the cycle of doubt and disillusionment, see C. Michael Patton, “Leaving (Christ)ianity: An Evangelical Epidemic,” Reclaiming the Mind, http://www.reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2008/07/ leaving-christianity%E2%80%93-an-evangelical-epidemic/ (accessed September 15, 2008).

5. Nancy R. Pearcy, Total Truth: Liberating Christianity from Its Cultural Captivity (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2005), 127.

SYNOPSIS

Most Christian teenagers today are rolling through life without much thoughtful reflection about their faith. They have deep confusion about the nature and character of the Trinitarian God, other essential Christian truth claims, and the nature of truth itself. Most of their worldviews are shaped by a pluralistic culture rather than biblical literacy, so, naturally, their beliefs diverge widely from biblical standards. As a result, many teens are leaving the faith they grew up with, and of those who remain in the fold, few are living as bold witnesses for Christ.Dedicated teenagers who embrace an authentic Christian worldview, however, not only are less likely to abandon the faith, but are more likely to practice it in their daily lives. This is why apologetics training is such a critical component in the discipling of youth. If we can help them to internalize the truth and beauty of Christianity, they will be far more likely to live out its goodness.History has shown that people act on what they believe—not what they say they believe, or want to believe, but what they really believe. People who believe that God truly has spoken through the Bible are far more likely to follow its guidance and are much bolder in their witness for the truth of Christianity than are those who are not so convinced. We must lovingly train young people to be able to defend their faith with confidence and authority.

The lunch bell rang and Mike sheepishly slipped into my classroom, slouched into a desk, and buried his face in his folded arms. As a typical high school sophomore, he didn’t want to appear “uncool” in front of friends, so he came to talk to me when no one would be around. As I approached, he sat up, looked me in the eyes, and said abruptly, “Mr. McDowell, we need to talk. I think I am losing my faith.”Like many young people, Mike was caught up in his day‐to‐day routine, without much thoughtful reflection about his Christian beliefs. The night before we talked he came across an atheist Web site that raised difficult questions about his beliefs. Lacking the intellectual tools and the confidence to answer the challenges, he started to wonder: Is the Bible really true? What about evolution? How can I believe that Christianity is the only way to God? How could a loving God who is all‐powerful and who could prevent evil allow it to happen? Doubts such as these came crashing down like bricks to assail and overpower his confidence in God.Fortunately, Mike trusted me enough to enlist my guidance during this challenging part of his faith journey, and over the next few months we spent many lunch hours exploring crucial apologetics questions. We examined the Bible’s authenticity as well as extrabiblical evidence for Christianity’s truth claims in history, philosophy, and science. Mike appreciated having a knowledgeable adult to help him through the hard questions, and later shared with me that had I not been there, he likely would have jettisoned his faith.

THE APOLOGETICS DIFFERENCE

As Mike demonstrates, apologetics training is (or should be!) a critical component in the discipling of youth. All young people inevitably will have their beliefs directly challenged, whether while they are in high school, during college, or when they get out in the “real world.” We must train young people to love God not only with their hearts and souls, but with their minds (Matt. 22:37) as well, and to be able to offer a defense of their faith to all those who ask (1 Pet. 3:15).For the past decade or longer, the Christian marketplace has been flooded with books about how to do ministry in a postmodern world. Their authors rightly have pointed out many cultural changes due to postmodernism, but often have failed to realize how much has actually remained the same. I am perplexed when I read contemporary writers, particularly some in the “emerging church” movement, who question the need for apologetics in ministry to postmodern youth.Sociologist Christian Smith, who has conducted one of the most extensive research studies of culture and contemporary youth, points out that youth today are not in need of a “radically new ‘postmodern’ type of program or ministry.”¹ Smith believes, instead, that one of the key things young people need is to be challenged to consider why they believe what they believe and to learn how to articulate their faith. It is certainly true that living the Christian life with consistency and conviction can be an attractive witness toteens, but this must not deter us from making a rational apologetic for the knowability of truth, or the coherence of Christian truth claims with reality.My experience has been that, especially when given the privacy of a note card to respond, students often ask the tough questions, and are interested in reasons for belief in Christianity and its claims. In speaking engagements throughout the United States, I have collected thousands of these questions from curious students. “How can I know God is real?” “How can there be only one right religion?” These types of questions demand an apologetic response by an adult mentor or leader who is well versed in apologetics issues. We need to give our youth reasons why Christianity is objectively true, why the Bible is God’s inspired and infallible Word, and how we know Jesus’ resurrection from the dead is more than mere mythology or an elaborate hoax. If we cannot rise to the task, we run the risk of losing our children and generations to follow. One might argue that such a disturbing and tragic loss already has begun.

The Loss of Faith

Thousands of teenagers who claimed no religious system of belief said, when interviewed for the 2005 National Study of Youth and Religion, that they had been raised to be religious, but over time had become “non‐religious.”² The teenagers were asked, in an open‐ended question with no set answers from which to choose, why they left the faith in which they were raised. The most common answer (thirty‐two percent) was intellectual skepticism. Their answers included, “Some stuff was too far‐fetched for me to believe in,” “I think scientifically there is no proof,” and “There were too many questions that can’t be answered.”³Young people are leaving faith behind because the Christian community is failing to engage their minds as well as their hearts.I once met a young man who told me that he had lost his faith in God. The reason he gave for this was the inexplicable and unforgivable death of his best friend—something he believed a loving God never could allow. I asked him whether he, prior to the death of his friend, had ever thought about the problem of evil and suffering. He admitted that he hadn’t thought about it, assuming such a thing would never happen to him. His problem was one of ignorance, since he had never wrestled with the problem of suffering before his tragedy and had never developed a biblical worldview that could help prepare him for such an event.Those who give thoughtful reflection to the reality of suffering ahead of time have far greater odds of holding fast to their faith when tragedy strikes. As parents, educators, and youth ministers, we can give children a priceless gift by helping them to think biblically and to defend their faith before they leave our sphere of influence.

The Crisis of Belief

Most adults are concerned about the behavior of young people. Few, however, go deeper to the source of their behavior: their beliefs. Glenn Schultz demonstrates how beliefs influence behavior in his book Kingdom Education: “At the foundation of a person’s life we find his beliefs. These beliefs shape his values, and his values drive his actions.”⁴ If we want to shape the behavior of young people, then, we must guide them to truthful beliefs about the world and help them to strengthen and build on their existing true beliefs and convictions.People act on what they believe—not what they say they believe, or want to believe, but what they truly believe. Young people who have a biblical worldview are not only less likely to leave the faith, they are more likely to practice it in their own lives, and those who believe that God truly has spoken through the Bible are far more likely to follow it than are those who are not so convinced. Teens who trust in God’s plan for purity, for example, are much more likely to abstain from impure acts.This is why it is so critical to help our youth come to terms with their actual beliefs and to help address their doubts, questions, uncertainties, and fears honestly. This doesn’t mean that we should pretend to have all the answers (teens are far too savvy today to believe that anyone has it all figured out), but that we should guide them lovingly to a greater understanding of the truth.Given the importance of truthful beliefs, we should be deeply concerned about our youth today. In his top religious trends of 2005, George Barna concluded:

American Christians are biblically illiterate. Although most of them contend that the Bible contains truth and is worth knowing, and most of them argue that they know all of the relevant truths and principles, our research shows otherwise….the younger a person is, the less they understand about the Christian faith…With fewer and fewer parents teaching their kids much of anything related to matters of faith, young people’s belief systems are the product of the mass media.⁵

Consider some of the beliefs of conservative Protestant youth:⁶

• Eighteen percent believe that God is either a personal being who created the world but is not involved in it today (as in deism) or an impersonal entity, something like a cosmic force (as in pantheism);
• twenty‐three percent are not assured of the existence of miracles;
• thirty‐three percent either “definitely” or “maybe” believe in reincarnation;
• forty‐two percent are not assured of the existence of evil spirits;
• forty‐eight percent believe many religions may be true.

Take a moment to consider the implication of these statistics. How can our young people have vibrant prayer lives when nearly one in five (18 percent) do not believe God is personally involved in the world today? How can they avoid falling into “the snare of the Devil” (1 Tim. 3:7)⁷ when more than two in five (42 percent) are not even assured of the existence of evil spirits? How, finally, can they confidently believe that Jesus is “the way the truth and the life” (John 14:6), when nearly one in two believe that many religions may be true?This is why Paul attaches such prime importance for spiritual transformation on the training of the mind: “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Rom. 12:2). Helping our youth, then, to transform their reasoning and understanding and to become like Jesus begins with helping them to think like Jesus and to put those thoughts into action. This involves asking not just, “what would Jesus do?” but, more importantly, “why would Jesus do what He would?”In The Scandal of the Evangelical Conscience, author Ron Sider concludes that people who have a biblical worldview demonstrate genuinely different behavior. They are nine times more likely to avoid “adultonly” material on the Internet, three times as likely not to use tobacco products, and twice as likely to volunteer to help the poor.⁸People’s beliefs about God, the world, and truth itself do make a difference in their practice of the Christian faith.

THE CONFUSION ABOUT TRUTH

This past summer I was the guest speaker at a youth Bible camp in Northern California. The theme throughout the week was Matthew 22:37—loving God with all our heart, soul, and mind. I taught from passages such as 1 Samuel 16:7, which show that God judges the heart rather than appearance, and encouraged the students to consider Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 10:28: “Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” I challenged them to use their minds to consider the claims of Jesus as the sole means of salvation (Acts 4:12).I asked the campers for feedback at the end of the week, and their responses shocked me. One camper summed it up in these words: “We like his stories, but that’s just his truth. I don’t want to judge him, but I have a different truth.” Her response probably should not have surprised me as it did, especially since recent studies reveal that the majority of our youth (81 percent) have adopted the view that “all truth is relative to the individual and his/her circumstances.”⁹ The common attitude toward religion and morality is, “Something may be true for you, but not true for me.” Many young people claim to be Christians, but I can’t help but wonder how many truly understand that Christianity is the truth, the only hope for salvation, and the sole opportunity for a relationship with the living God who created the universe.Christian Smith demonstrates that for youth today, “The very idea of religious truth is attenuated, shifted from older realist and universalist notions of objective Truth to more personalized and relative versions of ‘truth for me’ and ‘truth for you.’”¹⁰ Smith says we often hear youth proclaim, “Who am I to judge?” “If that’s what they choose, whatever,” and, “If it works for them, fine.” Many youth see truth pragmatically as that which “works” in their lives, rather than upholding the classical view of truth as “that which corresponds to reality.” If Hugh Hefner’s hedonistic motto, “If it feels good, do it,” characterized the 1960s, the rallying cry of relativism, “If it works for you, it’s right,” describes today’s youth.

The Division of Truth

Why do youth think they can pick and choose religious beliefs, as if they were merely choosing movies to watch or iTunes to download? In Total Truth, Nancy Pearcey explains that contemporary culture holds widely divergent opinions about the concept of truth itself. According to Pearcey, culture has drawn a dividing line between the sacred and the secular, and ascribed religion, morality, and “private” understanding to the sacred, subjective realm, and science and “public” knowledge to the secular, objective realm.¹¹ “In short,” she writes, “the private sphere is awash in moral relativism….Religion is not considered an objective truth to which we submit, but only a matter of personal taste which we choose….”¹² As Pearcey has realized, religious and moral claims are considered matters of personal preference rather than knowledge claims about the real world.As a result of this cultural divide, teenagers have been trained to compartmentalize their belief in God away from their daily lives—to keep their beliefs about God in the private, subjective realm and not to consider them objective knowledge. This compartmentalization is revealed most clearly in the way youth prioritize spirituality.A study by the Harvard University Institute of Politics revealed that seventy percent of students consider religion “somewhat” or “very” important in their lives.¹³ This at first may seem like a sign of spiritual vigor but when researchers asked students what they got excited about, what pressing issues they were dealing with, and what experiences or routines seemed most important in their lives, their answers were radically different. Rather than talking about their religious identities, beliefs, or practices, most teens talked about their friends, their My Space accounts, music, romantic interests, or other personal issues.Christian Smith observed, “What a number of teens apparently mean in reporting that religion is very important in their lives is that religion is very important in the strictly religious sector of their lives. Religion influences them religiously—that is, when it comes to church attendance, basic beliefs, prayer, and so on—but not necessarily in other ways.”¹⁴ He then concluded, “What our interviews almost never uncovered among teens was a view that religion summons people to embrace an obedience to truth regardless of the personal consequences or rewards.”¹⁵This division into realms of truth poses no problem for some religions, but biblical scrutiny exposes it as incompatible with orthodox Christianity. We must help young people to grasp that what makes Christianity unique is that it is identified with the life, work, character, and person of Jesus Christ—who walked on the earth 2,000 years ago and claimed to be both the Son of God and God‐in‐the‐flesh.Many religions of the world are based on timeless principles, but Christianity is based primarily on the historical resurrection of Jesus. Paul makes this clear in 1 Corinthians 15:17: “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins.” Christianity is “total truth,” in that it encompasses all of reality, sacred as well as secular, public as well as private.One of the greatest obstacles we face in ministry to youth today is their distorted view of truth. This is why I spend nearly three weeks teaching my high school seniors about the nature of truth. Paul warns us in his second letter to the church in Thessalonica that people perish for not loving truth (2 Thess. 2:8–10). Unless we rebuild the foundations of truth among our youth, they will be “tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men” (Eph. 4:14).

Do Youth Really Care about Truth?

Philosopher Francis Beckwith once had a skeptical student who questioned him every day in his ethics class. One day she asked, with an air of superiority, as though her question would undo her professor’s philosophical foundations, “Dr. Beckwith, why is truth so important?” After thinking for a moment he replied, “Well, would you like the true answer or the false one?” In other words, her very question assumed the existence, knowability, and importance of truth.Deeply rooted in the hearts of young people is the awareness that truth is a necessary bedrock for life. We should not dismiss the fact that youth believe in truth, that they want truth, and that they organize their lives around what they believe is ultimately true. They just need help to clear away the misconceptions about truth that they unwittingly have adopted from our culture.Dan Kimball, pastor at Vintage Faith Church, reinforces this truth in his book The Emerging Church: “I am finding that emerging generations really aren’t opposed to truth and biblical morals. When people sense that you aren’t just dogmatically opinionated due to blind faith and that you aren’t just attacking other people’s beliefs out of fear, they are remarkably open to intelligent and loving discussion about choice and truth.”¹⁶ I have found that although they clearly are turned off by people who arrogantly think they have all the answers, young people respond positively to someone who can lovingly lead them to truth.The purpose of apologetics is not merely to win an argument, but to draw people into a loving relationship with their Creator. It often is our attitude that speaks more powerfully than our words; thus, if we have the greatest arguments in the world but have not love, it profits us nothing (1 Cor. 13:1– 3). The old axiom, “People don’t carehow much you know, unless they know how much you care” still applies.More than ever, we need to follow the advice of Peter and give our youth reasons for believing in the truth that concurs with reality, yet do it with gentleness and respect. Living the truth is just as important as defending it, especially for a generation that judges truth by how well it “works.” This crucial concept is worth repeating: living the truth before a teenager is just as important as defending it.

Clearing Up the Confusion

How then do we help young people see that Jesus’ claims are about objective reality and simply cannot be true for one person, and false for another? I once performed the following experiment with my students. I placed a jar of marbles in front of them and asked, “How many marbles are in the jar?” They responded with different guesses: 221, 168, and so on. Then, after giving them the correct number of 188 I asked, “Which of you is closest to being right?” They all agreed that 168 was the closest guess, and they all agreed that the number of marbles was a matter of fact, not personal preference.Then I passed out Starburst candies to each one of my students and asked, “Which flavor is right?” As you might expect, they all felt this was an unfair question because each person had a preference that was right for him or herself. “That is correct,” I concluded. “The right flavor has to do with a person’s preferences. It is a matter of subjective opinion or personal preference, not objective fact.”Then I asked, “Are religious claims like the number of marbles in a jar, or are they a matter of personal opinion, like preference for flavors of candy?” Most of my students concluded that religious claims belonged to the category of candy preference. I then opened the door for us to discuss the objective claims of Christianity. I pointed out to my students that Christianity is based on an objective fact in history—the resurrection of Jesus. I reminded them that while many people may reject the historical resurrection of Jesus, it is not the type of claim that can be “true for you, but not true for me.” The tomb either was empty or it was occupied on the third day—there is no middle ground. I also pointed out that Christianity has an objective view of creation, the nature of the triune God, the nature of man, and the authenticity of the Bible.

A STRATEGY FOR CHANGE

Once we have cleared up the confusion about truth, we have laid the groundwork for beginning to help teenagers understand creation, the historical Jesus, the problem of evil, and other important apologetic issues. In my own work with teens, I have found four helpful strategies.First, help teens develop the skills of critical thinking. In our fast‐paced, image‐oriented culture, youth are more persuaded by images and stories than reasoned proofs. Few have cultivated the ability to think critically, yet critical thinking is the very skill they need to distinguish truth from error. All young people should be able to identify self‐refuting statements such as, “There is no truth,” ad‐hominem fallacies such as, “Christianity is false because there are so many hypocrites,” and appeals to emotion such as, “We must legalize abortion because so many unwanted babies get abused in the world.” Basic logic skills are indispensable for training students in apologetics. I regularly bring in to my students examples of logical fallacies from magazines or the newspaper to help them identify poor thinking.Second, use examples from the media to teach biblical truths. Studies indicate that students spend more time interacting with the media outside the classroom (e.g., the Internet, television, video games) than they do interacting with subject material in the classroom, which makes media examples powerful tools. I try to incorporate a media example nearly every time I teach youth. Film clips and song lyrics are great springboards for discussion and thoughtful reflection on issues pertaining to God and society. One of the best lessons I had in high school about thinking biblically and critically was watching Schindler’s List with my family and interacting with my dad over dinner about truth, morality, and God. I remember that valuable lesson to this day.Third, ask pointed questions. The best way to help teenagers learn how to defend their faith often is through probing questions and interaction rather than “preaching” or lectures. This is how Jesus Himself taught: When Jesus was challenged or asked a question, He often responded with a question. I often begin a lesson with a thought‐provoking question (which also helps me to find out what my students truly believe about a subject). For example, I recently asked, “Does it benefit a couple to live together before they get married?” About half of my students thought that it does, and this gave me the chance to challenge their thinking and to help them come to terms with a biblical perspective on marriage.Fourth, help teenagers put their knowledge into practice. Without application, apologetics is often simply a head game that makes little difference in their lives so we must provide supervised opportunities for them to apply what they have learned in real‐world situations. I know of one group, for example, that has taken Christian students on a trip to the University of California at Berkeley¹⁷ to expose them to secular thought before they go to college. The youth were not thrown into this situation suddenly, but trained for months before the trip on defending the Christian faith. Students got connected with Christian groups on campus, but also heard presentations against theism from students involved in Berkeley atheist clubs. The youth were able to interact personally with the atheist students, to ask good questions, and to put their faith on the line. As a result, many of the students walked away with a renewed zeal for learning apologetics.

A Bold Stand for Truth

As I reflect back on my conversations with my student Mike, I realize that his progress developed in a particular fashion. Once Mike realized there were answers to his deepest questions, he started to wonder about how he could share these truths with his non‐Christian friends. A key principle that I learned in our discussions is that when young people find answers to their questions about the Christian faith, they often become bolder in their witness for Christ. Apologetics training creates confidence and courage. If we want our young people to be bold witnesses for Christ, we must equip them with the intellectual tools to defend their beliefs.NOTES

1. Christian Smith, Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 266.
2. The Web site for the National Study of Youth and Religion is www.youthandreligion.org. The methods of the study as well as the findings are chronicled by Smith in Soul Searching.
3. Smith, 89.
4. Glenn Schultz, Kingdom Education (Nashville: LifeWay Press, 1998), 39.
5. George Barna, “Barna Reviews Top Religious Trends of 2005” (December 20, 2005)
6. Smith, 41–45, 74.
7. All Bible quotations are from the New American Standard Bible (NASB).
8. Ron Sider, The Scandal of the Evangelical Conscience (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2005), 128.
9. George Barna, Real Teens (Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 2001), 92.
10. Smith, 144.
11. Nancy Pearcey, Total Truth (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2004), 20.
12. Ibid., 20.
13. As cited in “Youth Culture Update,” YouthWorker Journal (July/August, 2006): 9.
14. Smith, 138.
15. Ibid., 149.
16. Dan Kimball, The Emerging Church (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2003), 86.
17. See Brett Kunkle, “You’re Taking Students Where?!” Student Impact, Stand to Reason,http://www.str.org/site/DocServer/brettkunklenews0602.pdf_1.pdf?docID=903, and “The Berkeley Mission Report,” StudentImpact, Stand to Reason, http://www.str.org/site/DocServer/brettkunklenews0603.pdf?docID=882.

Christians who have grasped the value of apologetics are well aware of the patience needed when trying to convince someone to believe or to act differently. We sometimes wonder whether we will ever reach that coworker who denies absolute truth and believes that all religions are right, that teen who thinks Christianity is boring and Wicca is cool, or that neighbor who is convinced that the Mormons who visit her are good Christians. We wonder whether we can ever be persuasive enough to reverse the destructive trends in our Western culture. Will our efforts to counter the latest popular theories thrown about in the media ever rescue the reputation of Jesus as historic and the Bible as authentic? Will our continuing public efforts succeed in saving the traditional family from erosion, the unborn from abortion, the disabled from euthanasia, and the student from Darwinism? We often present our best arguments for why a belief or action is false, wrong, or harmful, and why another is true, right, or helpful, and yet see seemingly little or no change in the persons, groups, or cultures to which we present them.

The result of our apologetic efforts is not always indifference or rejection, however. God can accomplish what is or seems to be impossible with man. Some of the Journal’s own authors, for example, were people who, though unbelieving, encountered the truth and allowed it to change their thinking and their lives profoundly. Elliot Miller embraced the truth of Christianity after having experimented with the philosophy and lifestyle of the 1960s hippie culture. Marcia Montenegro turned to the truth after being heavily involved in astrology, the New Age movement, and the occult. Lee Strobel was an obstinate atheist until his mind and heart were changed as a result of thoroughly investigating the evidence for Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. Readers who are familiar with cult apologetics will recognize the names of former Mormons Jerald and Sandra Tanner, and former Jehovah’s Witnesses Bill and Joan Cetnar, who converted to Christianity after encountering the truth and became apologists to those who remain in the groups they left. Other figures throughout history, such as C.S. Lewis, Malcolm Muggeridge, and Simon Greenleaf, though uninterested in, or even opposed to, the truth, eventually turned not only to embrace it, but to become some of its staunchest defenders. There is precedent, then, that our friends and family members who are seemingly disinterested, antagonistic, or immovable may not remain so forever.

It generally takes longer to effect change in groups than in individuals, and the transformation often is incomplete, primarily because multiple wills are involved. There are examples, however, that long-time Journal readers will recall. Apologist Norman Geisler, along with a coalition of pastors, professors, and countercult ministries, convinced leaders of the Evangelical Free Church of America to reject an unorthodox view that one of its seminary professors had begun to espouse, that Jesus’ resurrection was not literal (physical). A lengthy series of exchanges regarding this essential Christian doctrine resulted in the denomination reaffirming the orthodox view. In another instance, Hank Hanegraaff opened the door wide for dialogue with leaders of the Worldwide Church of God, encouraging and counseling them as they shed their past unorthodox doctrines and embraced orthodoxy. In this instance the process took years, and not everyone in the denomination accepted the changes. These examples, however, demonstrate that patience and persistence in defending the truth with sincere but wayward groups may one day yield greater discernment within those groups.

Cultural changes, that is, changes in public opinion or public policy, are incremental and the story is still being written on most of the major issues. People are still examining the church’s reasoned responses to attacks on the historicity of Christ and the veracity of Scripture from such sources as the Jesus Seminar, The Da Vinci Code, and the newly touted Gnostic gospels. As the church continues to expose the flawed claims of such sources, a significant part of our Western culture in time may reject those sources rather than rejecting Scripture as inaccurate and untrustworthy. Regarding the holocaust of abortions, even if the U.S. Supreme Court does not overturn Roe v. Wade, apologists for the unborn still could succeed in convincing many women to reject this immoral “choice” and thereby reduce the number of abortions. Judging by the frantic tactics and tone of its advocates in recent years, Darwinism is struggling to maintain its dictatorial rule over the education institutions in America even as arguments for intelligent design are convincing many objective observers that the emperor has no clothes.

If this column sounds a bit like a halftime, locker-room pep talk, it is because it was meant to have a similar effect. Anyone who engages in apologetics can become overwhelmed by the difficulty of the task and the enormity of the need, especially when those who are in need do not recognize their need, but the examples here were given to act as a second wind to encourage you to press on. Keep studying, thinking, preparing, dialoguing, reasoning, pleading, debating, and lobbying. Continue looking for opportunities to share the truth that God providentially has led you to discover.

— Steve Bright

“The New Testament has been changed and translated so many times over the past 2,000 years, it’s impossible to have any confidence in its accuracy. Everyone knows that.”

This challenge has stopped countless Christians in their tracks. The complaint is understandable. Whisper a message from person to person in a group, then compare the message’s final form with the original. The radical transformation that occurs in so short a period of time is enough to convince the casual skeptic that the New Testament documents are equally unreliable. Communication is never perfect. People make mistakes and errors are compounded with each generation. How then can we know that the New Testament documents we possess correctly reflect the original documents that were destroyed nearly two thousand years ago?

This challenge is remarkably easy to answer if you know a few simple details. In most cases, the person making the skeptical claim doesn’t have the facts. To prove this, just ask, “Have you studied how the ancient documents were handed down?” Be prepared for a blank stare — they haven’t. Let’s go over some of the facts you can use to respond in case they ask you the same question.

Setting the Facts Straight. It’s hard to imagine how one can reconstruct the text of something written two thousand years ago. The skepticism, though, is based on two false assumptions about how an ancient document such as the New Testament was transmitted over time. The first assumption is that the transmission was more or less linear — one person told a second who talked with a third, and so on, leaving a single message many generations removed from the original. The second assumption is that the text was transmitted orally, in which case it is more easily distorted and misconstrued than if it had been written. Neither assumption, however, applies to the text of the New Testament. First, the transmission was not linear, but geometric — that is, one original birthed 50 copies, which generated 500 copies, and so on. Second, the transmission was done in writing, and written manuscripts can be tested in a way oral communications cannot.

Reconstructing Aunt Sally’s Letter. Here’s a little story you can use to illustrate how such a test works. Pretend your Aunt Sally learns in a dream the recipe for an elixir that preserves youth. When she wakes up, she scribbles the directions on a scrap of paper, then runs to the kitchen to make her first glass of the potion. In a few days Aunt Sally is transformed into a picture of radiant youth because of her daily dose of “Sally’s Secret Sauce.”

Aunt Sally is so excited that she sends detailed, handwritten instructions on how to make the sauce to her three bridge partners. They, in turn, make copies for 10 of their own friends.

All goes well until Aunt Sally’s dog eats the scrap of paper on which she first wrote the recipe. In a panic she contacts her three friends who have suffered similar mishaps, so the alarm goes out to the others in an attempt to recover the original wording.

Sally rounds up all the surviving handwritten copies, 26 in all. When she spreads them out on the kitchen table, she immediately notices some differences. Twenty-three of the copies are exactly the same. Of the remaining three, however, one has misspelled words, another has an inverted phrase (“mix then chop” instead of “chop then mix”), and one includes an ingredient that is not listed on any of the others.

Do you think Aunt Sally can accurately reconstruct her original recipe from this evidence? Of course, she can. The misspellings are obvious errors and are easily corrected. The single inverted phrase stands out and can easily be repaired. Sally would then strike the extra ingredient, reasoning that it is more plausible that one person would accidentally add an item than that 25 people would accidentally omit the same one. Even if the variations were more numerous or more diverse, the original could still be reconstructed with a high level of confidence if Sally had enough copies.

This, in simplified form, is how scholars do “textual criticism,” an academic method used to test all documents of antiquity, not just religious texts. It’s not a haphazard effort based on hopes and guesses; it’s a careful linguistic process allowing an alert critic to identify and correct the possible corruption of any work.

How Many and How Old? Confidence that the original text has successfully been reconstructed depends on two factors: how many copies exist and how old they are. If the numbers are few and the time gap wide between the original manuscript (called the autograph) and the oldest copy, then the original text is harder to reconstruct. If, however, many copies exist and the oldest are close in time to the original, the scholar can be more confident that the exact wording of the original can be pinpointed.

To get an idea of the significance of the New Testament manuscript evidence, let’s first look at the manuscript evidence for other ancient, nonbiblical texts. Josephus’s first-century document The Jewish War survives in only nine complete manuscripts dating from the fifth century AD — four centuries after they were written.¹ Tacitus’s Annals of Imperial Rome is one of the chief sources for the history of the Roman world during New Testament times, and yet it survives in partial form in only two manuscripts dating from the Middle Ages.² Thucydides’s History survives in eight copies. There are ten copies of Caesar’s Gallic Wars and seven copies of Plato’s works. Homer’s Iliad has the most impressive manuscript evidence for any secular work with 647 existing copies.³

Note that for most documents of antiquity only a handful of manuscripts exist, some facing a time gap of 800–2,000 years or more. Scholars, nevertheless, are confident they have accurately reconstructed the text of the originals. In fact, virtually all of our knowledge of ancient history depends on documents like these.

The Biblical Manuscript Evidence. The manuscript evidence for the New Testament is stunning by comparison. The most recent count (1980) shows 5,366 separate Greek manuscripts. These are represented by early fragments, uncial codices (manuscripts written in all uppercase Greek letters and bound together in book form), and minuscules (manuscripts written in lowercase Greek letters).⁴

Among the nearly 3,000 minuscule fragments are 34 complete New Testaments dating from the ninth to the fifteenth centuries AD.⁵ Uncial manuscripts providing virtually complete New Testaments date back to the fourth century and earlier. Codex Sinaiticus is dated c. AD 340.⁶ The nearly complete Codex Vaticanus is the oldest, dated c. AD 325–50.⁷ Codex Alexandrinus contains the whole Old Testament and a nearly complete New Testament and dates from the late fourth century to the early fifth century.

The most fascinating evidence comes from the fragments. The Chester Beatty Papyri (papyri are manuscripts written on paperlike material made from papyrus reeds) contain most of the New Testament and are dated mid-third century.⁸ The Bodmer Papyri II collection includes the first fourteen chapters of the Gospel of John and much of the last seven chapters. It dates from AD 200 or earlier.⁹

The most amazing find of all, however, is a small portion of John 18:31–33, discovered in Egypt. Known as the John Rylands Papyri and barely three inches square, it represents the earliest known copy of any part of the New Testament. The papyri is dated on paleographical grounds at AD 117–38 (though it may be even earlier).¹⁰

Keep in mind that most papyri are fragmentary and only about 50 manuscripts contain the entire New Testament. The manuscript evidence is nevertheless exceedingly rich, especially when compared to other works of antiquity.

Ancient Versions and Patristic Quotations. The accuracy of the manuscripts can also be checked by comparing them with two other groups of texts known as the ancient versions and the patristic quotations. By the third and fourth centuries the New Testament had been translated into several languages, including Latin, Coptic, Syriac, Armenian, and Georgian. Translations of the Greek manuscripts (called versions) help modern-day scholars answer questions about the underlying Greek manuscripts.

In addition, there are ancient extrabiblical sources — catechisms, lectionaries, and quotes from the church Fathers — that contain large portions of Scripture. Biblical authority Bruce Metzger notes, “If all other sources for our knowledge of the text of the New Testament were destroyed, [the patristic quotations] would be sufficient alone for the reconstruction of practically the entire New Testament.”¹¹

The Verdict. What can we conclude from this evidence? Professor Daniel Wallace notes that although there are about 300,000 individual variations of the New Testament text in the manuscripts, this number is very misleading. Most of the differences are completely inconsequential — spelling errors, inverted phrases, and the like.¹² Of the remaining differences, virtually all can be sorted out using vigorous textual criticism. In the entire 20,000 lines of text, only 40 lines are in doubt (about 400 words), and none affects any significant doctrine.¹³ This means that the Greek text from which we derive our New Testament translations is 99.5 percent pure.

Using these facts, the point to press home with the skeptic is this: If we reject the authenticity of the New Testament on textual grounds, we’d also have to reject every work of antiquity prior to AD 1000, since there is less manuscript evidence for their authenticity than for the New Testament.

Has the New Testament been changed? Critical, academic analysis says it has not.

— Gregory Koukl

NOTES

1. Paul Barnett, Is the New Testament History? (Ann Arbor, MI: Vine Books, 1986), 45.

2. Norman L. Geisler and William E. Nix, A General Introduction to the Bible (Chicago: Moody Press, 1986), 405.

3. Bruce M. Metzger, The Text of the New Testament (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1968), 34.

4. Geisler and Nix, 402.

5. Ibid.

6. Ibid., 392.

7. Ibid., 391.

8. Ibid., 389–90.

9. Metzger, 39–40.

10. Geisler and Nix, 388.

11. Metzger, 86.

12. Daniel Wallace, “The Majority Text and the Original Text: Are They Identical?” Bibliotheca Sacra 148, 590 (1991): 157–58.

13. Geisler and Nix, 475.

This past February I boarded a plane for a long flight. I had a new book that I had saved for the flight and was very much looking forward to reading it. Shortly after I took my seat, an elderly man, probably in his eighties, took his seat next to me. I smiled thinking, “He’s going to fall asleep and I’m going to get in a lot of reading!”

I was mistaken. Just after I began to read, my fellow passenger leaned over and looked very deliberately at the pages I was reading. I smiled and showed him the cover. It was a book on the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus. He chuckled and said, “Well, I guess we don’t have to think seriously about that, since it has now been proven that Jesus never even existed!” He nodded and sat straight up, as though our conversation had ended and now it was time to find something else to do. Hit and run? Not a chance, my new friend.

“Why do you think Jesus never existed?” I asked. This led to a short conversation on Jesus’ existence that would take us outside the scope of this article.¹ It did not take long for him to concede that Jesus indeed had existed, but he maintained that “resurrections are made of fairy tales. There is no evidence for the resurrection of Jesus and it certainly could never be proved.” Perhaps you have had a similar discussion with someone and wished you had known how to reply. I will share the approach I took.

What Is Proof? When stating conclusions, historians may say “such and such occurred”; however, all historians concede that absolute or 100 percent certainty in historical matters is impossible. They, instead, seek reasonable certainty. We cannot prove with absolute certainty that Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon in 49BC, for example, but the evidence is good enough for historians to conclude that he did. Historians consider a number of theories of what occurred and select the best theory. They refer to this as an argument to the best explanation. At the end of this article, I’ll explain how to do this with two resurrection theories.

Minimal Facts. A very strong case can be made for the trustworthiness of the New Testament, but those who argue for Jesus’ resurrection from trustworthiness must be prepared to answer questions raised by skeptics regarding hundreds of alleged errors and contradictions in the New Testament. Since most Christians are unable to do this, I would like to propose a way that I learned from my mentor, professor Gary Habermas. He calls it the minimal facts approach, where we consider only those historical facts related to the resurrection of Jesus that are so strong that the vast majority of scholars, including skeptical ones, agree that they are facts. This is not to suggest that accounts in the New Testament that do not meet this strict criteria are false; only that we cannot prove them as being true. It also is not to say that we should believe something simply because the majority of scholars believe it. It is saying, rather, that we will use only those facts that are so strong that the majority of scholars concede them.

The strength of this approach is that a skeptic cannot deny the resurrection of Jesus simply because he or she does not believe the Bible. I do not believe that the Qur’an is God’s Word; however, there is historical knowledge to be gained from reading the Qur’an. For example, we can learn what seventh-century Muslims taught and perhaps be able to trace a few teachings back to Muhammad himself. The New Testament, likewise, at minimum, tells us much about the beliefs of the first-century church, and historians are able to determine with reasonable certainty a number of teachings and actions of the apostles and Jesus Himself.

Here are the three most important minimal facts related to Jesus’ resurrection:

1. Jesus’ death by crucifixion. This event is reported even outside of the New Testament. The Jewish historian Josephus reported it toward the end of the first century, and the Roman historian Tacitus likewise reported it in the beginning of the second century.²

2. Jesus’ empty tomb. One must consider that Jesus’ resurrection was proclaimed in Jerusalem, the same location where Jesus had been publicly executed and buried. If the tomb had been occupied, Jewish or Roman authorities would only have had to go to the tomb and view the corpse and the claim of a resurrection would have been demolished immediately, but there is no indication that this occurred. Jesus’ enemies instead claimed that His disciples had stolen His body, which appears to be an alternate explanation for an empty tomb. This is reported not only by Matthew (28:13), but Justin Martyr reported that the Jewish leaders were making the same claim in his day (c. AD150).³ It also is significant that the primary witnesses to the empty tomb reported by the Gospels were women, who in general had a low status in the first century. If you are going to invent a story you want people to believe, why invent witnesses who would be unbelievable? An invented story more likely would have portrayed Joseph of Arimathea or Nicodemus or the disciples themselves as the witnesses. We instead find the male disciples, who were to become the church’s leaders, hiding behind closed doors in fear while the women check out the tomb!

3. Jesus’ resurrection appearances. A number of people, friends and foes, reported that Jesus had risen from the dead and had appeared to them. That Jesus’ disciples had claimed this is reported by Paul (1Cor.15:11), by a disciple of Peter named Clement (1Clement42:3), and by various early oral traditions embedded in the New Testament writings (1Cor.15:3–7).⁴ The historical data also indicate that a skeptic (James) and, more important, an enemy of Jesus (Paul) became followers of Jesus after experiencing what they believed were post- resurrection appearances of Jesus. Paul, according to his own testimony, had persecuted Christians severely prior to his conversion (1Cor. 15:9–10; Gal.1:12–16, 22–23; Phil.3:6–7). Luke corroborates Paul’s testimony in Acts (chaps.9,22,26) and we perhaps have an early oral tradition to this effect (Gal.1:23). Early, eyewitness, and multiple testimonies mount a strong case for Paul’s conversion. No less than11 ancient sources report that the disciples of Jesus, who then included James and Paul, were willing to suffer continuously and even to die for their testimony that they had seen the risen Jesus. This suggests that they sincerely believed what they were proclaiming; after all, liars make poor martyrs.

The Historian’s Task. The task of the historian is to weigh various possibilities and to identify the best explanation for the facts. This process is much like putting together a puzzle. The correct solution to a puzzle uses all of the pieces and does so without having to force any of the pieces to fit. In a similar manner, the best historical explanation incorporates all of the facts without forcing any of them to fit that explanation. Let’s see how this works with regard to two explanations for the resurrection accounts.

Hallucination. Suppose Jesus’ grieving followers merely hallucinated that He had risen from the dead and appeared to them. Do the facts fit using this theory?

1. Jesus’ death by crucifixion? Yes. Jesus’ agonizing death would be a reasonable cause for the grief required on the part of the disciples to hallucinate that He was resurrected.

2. Jesus’ empty tomb? No. If the resurrection appearances were merely hallucinations, Jesus’ body would have remained in the tomb.

3. Jesus’ resurrection appearances? No. Many of Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances were reported to have occurred in a group setting. Hallucinations, however, like dreams, occur in the mind of an individual; thus, even if all the members of a group simultaneously hallucinate—an incredible claim itself—they would not experience the same hallucination. Grief hallucinations also cannot account for the appearances to James or Paul. Paul especially would not have been grieving.

The hallucination theory, accordingly, is very weak, since it cannot account for most of the facts.

Resurrection. Suppose Jesus really did rise from the dead. Do the facts fit using this theory?

1. Jesus’ death by crucifixion? Yes. There can be no resurrection if there is no death.

2. Jesus’ empty tomb? Yes. There can be no resurrected body if there is no empty tomb.

3. Jesus’ resurrection appearances? Yes. This certainly explains the transformed lives of the disciples and the conversions of the skeptics James and Paul.

The resurrection theory accounts for every fact and none are forced. The pieces of the puzzle come together beautifully. It is by far the best explanation. (Try fitting together the resurrection facts using a few other theories, such as the disciples stole the body, the resurrection was a legend that developed over time, or Jesus only appeared to be dead.)

After discussing the facts, I let my new friend formulate numerous theories of what he thought may have occurred. Then we both examined how each theory accounted for the facts. Growing frustrated, he waved his hand for me to stop and said, “Well, I’m not a historian.” I replied, “I understand. But we can think logically. Isn’t it amazing how well the evidence supports the truth of the greatest love story of all time? God loves you and did not spare even His Son so that you could have a relationship with Him.” He would hear no more of it.

I have thought of that man several times since. Being in his eighties, eternity is weighing on him. Perhaps he likewise has given further thought to our discussion. I hope so.

— Michael Licona

NOTES

1. For more on this subject, see Paul L. Maier, “Did Jesus Really Exist?” Apologetics—Jesus, North American Mission Board, http://www.4truth.net/site/apps/nl/ content3.asp?c=hiKXLbPNLrF&b=784399&ct=1740233.

2. For references and more on this subject, see Mike Licona, “Can We Be Certain That Jesus Died on a Cross?” Apologetics—Jesus, North American Mission Board, http://www.4truth.net/site/apps/nl/content3.asp?c=hiKXLbPNLrF&b=784437&ct=1483159.

3. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 108.

4. Most scholars regard the sermon summaries in Acts 2, 10, and 13 as reflections of the content of the apostles’ teaching.

People need answers to their questions about Christianity, but waiting for them to ask a question isn’t the only way to begin an evangelistic encounter. There are many ways to ask your way into a conversation about the gospel. If you start by asking questions about a popular book or movie, for example, you can direct the conversation to spiritual matters. Then, by asking questions that reveal people’s beliefs and the assumptions behind their beliefs, you may discover what stands between them and Christ.

Below is a hypothetical conversation with a skeptic who has some of the common objections to belief in God. Most skeptics or atheists have these objections not because they’ve studied the issues carefully, but because they don’t want Christianity to be true, and/or they’ve accepted the notion that faith and reason are at odds.

As you read the dialogue, notice how the right questions can reveal the basis of people’s beliefs and objections. You may not have all the answers, but if you ask good questions in your conversations, you may help people realize they don’t really know what they thought they knew. You may even get skeptics to doubt their own skepticism. At the very least, you’ll plant a seed that may cause them to reexamine the basis for their faulty views.

Christian: Hey, what did you think of the Da Vinci Code?

Skeptic: Good book! I can’t wait to see the movie.

Christian: The book casts a lot of doubt on the Bible. What do you think of that?

Skeptic: I think the Bible is filled with myths.

Christian: Such as?

Skeptic: Jonah. Who can believe that nonsense?

Christian: Why is that not believable?

Skeptic: Because science has disproved miracles.

Christian: What science has disproved miracles?

Skeptic: Modern science.

Christian: How do you define “science”?

Skeptic: It’s using experiments to prove a theory.

Christian: What if you can’t do experiments because you’re investigating the past?

Skeptic: You mean like a courtroom investigation?

Christian: Yeah. You can’t do an experiment to find out who committed a crime.

Skeptic: Well, what definition of science do you have in mind?

Christian: I think Francis Bacon, the father of modern science, had it right. He said that true knowledge is knowledge of causes. In other words, science is a search for causes.

Skeptic: I can accept that. So what?

Christian: Well, logically, there are only two types of causes: intelligent and nonintelligent (or natural). But many modern scientists rule out intelligent causes before they look at the evidence. So, to say that modern science has disproved miracles is false; modern scientists have ruled them out, not proved them out.

Skeptic: But science deals only with natural causes.

Christian: Can you prove that through science?

Skeptic: Well, no.

Christian: That’s because it’s an assumption you make in order to do what you call science. Science is built on philosophy.

Skeptic: So? What’s the problem?

Christian: If you rule out intelligent causes before examining the evidence, then you can’t discover what really caused intelligently designed things. For example, is the geologist being unscientific when he claims an intelligent cause for the faces on Mount Rushmore?

Skeptic: No, but that’s because we know that people cause sculptures like Mount Rushmore.

Christian: How do we know natural laws don’t do it?

Skeptic: Come on. It’s obvious.

Christian: Why is it obvious?

Skeptic: Because we never see natural laws create sculptures.

Christian: That’s right; so when we discover something from the past that has the clear marks of intelligence, isn’t it reasonable to believe that it had an intelligent cause? It certainly would be a mistake to rule out intelli­gent causes before we even look at the evidence!

Skeptic: What does this have to do with the Bible and miracles?

Christian: Because we have scientific evidence that the greatest miracle in the Bible is the work of a powerful, intelligent being.

Skeptic: You have scientific evidence for Jonah?

Christian: No, not Jonah. That’s nothing compared to the greatest miracle in the Bible.

Skeptic: What’s more incredible than Jonah?

Christian: The greatest miracle in the Bible is in the first verse: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. If that’s true, then every other miracle, including Jonah, is believable. A God who performed the biggest miracle of all—creating the universe out of nothing—can perform the smaller ones like parting the Red Sea, keeping Jonah safe in a great fish, or raising Jesus from the dead. Doesn’t that make sense?

Skeptic: Hold on. What’s the scientific evidence for Genesis 1:1?

Christian: The second law of thermo­dynamics, the expanding universe, and Einstein’s general theory of relativity are all accepted observa­tions of modern science, and they show us that the universe is not eternal—it had a beginning. If it had a beginning, then it had a beginner. And this beginner left clear signs of intelligence because this universe includes more than 100 environmental conditions that are precisely tweaked to support life here on earth.

Skeptic: If that’s true, then who made God?

Christian: No one made God—He’s the unmade, eternal, self-existing First Cause.

Skeptic: If you can have an unmade God, then why can’t I have an unmade universe?

Christian: Because there are only two possibilities: either the universe has always existed or something outside the universe has always existed. The scientific evidence shows us that the universe hasn’t always existed—it had a beginning. So, the uncaused first cause must be outside the universe. That’s implied by Genesis1:1: God must be outside the universe because He created it.

Skeptic: You’re going beyond science.

Christian: No, I’m only going where the evi­dence leads. Since the evidence leads beyond your definition of science, don’t you think your definition of science is too narrow?

Skeptic: But if we defer to God, we’ve committed the God-of-the-gaps fallacy. How many times did the ancients think that God caused something—like lightning or earthquakes—only for us to discover natural causes for them later? Whenever we have a gap in our knowledge, we always seem to discover a natural cause. We’ll discover a natural cause for the universe some day.

Christian: Why do you think that is likely?

Skeptic: Because of the progress of science.

Christian: It has nothing to do with the progress of science. It’s highly unlikely we’ll find a natural cause for the universe, because, unless all of modern cosmology is wrong, nature itself had a beginning. A cause must exist before the effect, but nature didn’t exist until the universe began. So, when it comes to the origin of the universe, natural causes are ruled out. If the cause must be beyond nature, then it must be supernatural, correct?

Skeptic: Isaac Asimov said there was positive and negative energy before creation.

Christian: No, until creation, there was literally no thing. All time, space, energy, and matter came into existence at creation. So, what’s more reasonable: to say that someone created something out of nothing or that no one created something out of nothing?

Skeptic: But your answer is the God-of-the-gaps!

Christian: No, it isn’t. We don’t merely lack a natural explanation for the universe, we have observational evidence for an intelligent creator.

Skeptic: What observational evidence do you have for God? According to your own theology, you can’t see Him or touch Him. So how can you have observational evidence for such a cause?

Christian: Have you ever seen gravity?

Skeptic: No.

Christian: Then how do you know it exists?

Skeptic: Because I don’t float away.

Christian: That’s the same way we know God. We observe effects that point to Him. We may not see God directly, but we see effects that only He could be responsible for. Here’s a key question for you: If there is no God, how did this incredibly designed universe come into existence?

Skeptic: I prefer to say “I don’t know” rather than punt to God.

Christian: What would you say to someone who said he wasn’t sure a book had an author?

Skeptic: That’s stupid. Every book has an author, even if it is anonymous.

Christian: Yes, and we know that because a book is an intelligent effect, it is not caused by natural law. The universe and life are like that—effects of intelligence. You can say “I don’t know,” but isn’t it possible you’re ignoring the facts?

Skeptic: I’m still not convinced.

Christian: Can I ask you a rather personal question?

Skeptic: Why not? You’ve been asking me questions for the past 10 minutes.

Christian: Because this one may cause you to reveal your soul. I’ve found that many skeptics reject God not because evidence for His existence is lacking, but because they don’t want to give up control over their lives by doing things God’s way. In other words, their objection is in the will, not the mind. So here’s my question: If I showed you evidence that demonstrates beyond a reasonable doubt that God exists and Christ rose from the dead, would you then become a Christian?

Skeptic: Well, I doubt the evidence is there.

Christian: Suppose it is. I can recommend a good book that presents this evidence. Would you be willing to read it?

Skeptic: No, I’m not interested in reading Christian propaganda.

Christian: How do you know it’s Christian propaganda?

Skeptic: It’s written by Christians who have an agenda.

Christian: Don’t all writers have an agenda? Don’t atheists have an agenda when they write books that try to disprove Christianity? Do you dismiss those books?

Skeptic: No, but religious people are biased.

Christian: Might you be biased against religious people?

Skeptic: Atheists are religiously neutral.

Christian: No, they’re not. All people—even skeptics and atheists—have some kind of religious viewpoint. If a religious viewpoint makes an author unable to get the facts straight, then you couldn’t believe anything anyone writes! Isn’t the real issue what the evidence might prove, not the writer’s agenda?

Skeptic: Maybe, but I’m still skeptical.

Christian: Why are you skeptical of everything but skepticism?

Skeptic: Huh?

Christian: Maybe you should start doubting your doubts. Would you believe if you were shown the evidence?

Skeptic: I believe I gotta go.

Christian: Wait! You’re not going to run from the truth like Jonah, are you?

— Frank Turek

SYNOPSIS

In the realm of philosophy, Blaise Pascal (1623–62) is perhaps best remembered for his wager argument. In his Pensées (thoughts), however, Pascal offered several lines of apologetic reasoning, including what has been termed his anthropological argument. This argument makes the case for Christianity by pointing out that any viable worldview must successfully explain the seemingly paradoxical nature of the human condition. The seeming paradox is that human beings exhibit qualities of both greatness and wretchedness. Pascal argues that Christianity offers the best explanation for this condition based on its teachings that human beings are created in the image of God, yet original sin has tainted their nature.

Pascal realized that it is sometimes necessary to shock a complacent skeptic into paying attention to the seriousness of his or her condition. Depending on the type of skeptic encountered, Pascal would use the anthropological argument to apply “existential shock” to either humble them or exalt them. This same approach is applicable today to belief systems such as humanism and New Age spirituality that exalt human beings or to worldviews such as nihilism that ultimately lead to hopelessness and despair.

Despite some weaknesses, Pascal’s anthropological argument has contemporary apologetic value because it appeals to individuals on a psychological level. It is certainly not a definitive argument for Christianity, but it is a useful one that can be integrated into a line of reasoning that supports the validity of the Christian faith.

Are human beings glorious, exalted creatures with tremendous potential or wretched beings desperately in need of spiritual liberation? Are such seemingly contradictory views of the human condition mutually exclusive or could both perspectives be true? If the latter, does any viable worldview explain this perplexing condition? The seventeenth-century scientist, mathematician, and philosopher Blaise Pascal (1623–62) offers a timeless argument for the truth of Christianity based on what at first glance appears to be a paradox in human nature. Pascal is revered for his scientific accomplishments and he even has a computer programming language named after him. His philosophical pursuits, however, often do not receive the attention they deserve. Pascal’s wager¹ is perhaps his most well-known argument for Christianity, but Pascal has much more to offer the contemporary Christian apologist.

Pascal’s ill health and untimely death prevented him from completing a monumental work on the subject of Christian apologetics. His notes, however, have since been compiled into a collection known as Pensées (thoughts). “Pascal’s views hardly constitute an organized system,” writes Richard Popkin. “Most of his works are fragmentary, and he apparently made no effort to put the fragments together.”² In these fragmented yet brilliant writings, Pascal offers cogent insights on such issues as the human condition, morality, and theology. Pascal’s anthropological argument, though not nearly as well known as the wager, offers a unique approach to Christian apologetics and warrants attention.

PASCAL’S ANTHROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT

Pascal’s anthropological argument begins with a simple observation: human beings exhibit qualities of both greatness and wretchedness. Such an argument is appealing in a contemporary setting because it begins with an observation of human nature rather than a direct argument for the existence of God, the reliability of the Bible, the validity of belief in the resurrection of Christ, or a variety of other traditional apologetic approaches. The anthropological argument merely seeks to initiate discussion on the nature of the human condition. When certain principles subsequently have been established, it offers an argument pointing to Christianity as the best explanation of the observed condition. D.G.Preston comments on Pascal’s overall apologetic approach:

Pascal the empiricist starts with the data, notably the inexplicable phenomenon of mankind: unquestionably corrupt, subject to inconstancy, boredom, anxiety and selfishness, doing anything in the waking hours to divert the mind from human wretchedness, yet showing the vestiges of inherent greatness in the mind’s realization of this condition. Mankind is also finite, suspended between twin infinities revealed by telescope and microscope, and aware of an inner emptiness which the finite world fails to satisfy. No philosophy makes sense of this. No moral system makes us better or happier. One hypothesis alone, creation in the divine image followed by the fall, explains our predicament and, through a redeemer and mediator with God, offers to restore our rightful state.³

Pascal’s anthropological argument uses a unique approach to Christian apologetics: rather than offering arguments from natural theology,⁴ it is designed to relate to unbelievers at a prudential level of interest. This argument, in fact, offers a sensible observation and appeal to practical judgment based on the available evidence.

Is Pascal’s approach relevant today? After all, his argument seemingly rests on doctrines such as humans created in the image of God (imago Dei) and original sin (the Fall) — views many perceive as outmoded, mythical, or just plain false. Before we address the question of relevance, let’s first examine the argument in more detail.

THE PARADOX OF THE HUMAN CONDITION

“Greatness, wretchedness,” writes Pascal. “The more enlightened we are the more greatness and vileness we discover in man.”⁵ Human beings, he argues, exhibit two distinct qualities that appear to be contradictory: we are capable of exalted greatness, but we are also extremely corrupt in our nature. In Pascal’s words, “Man’s greatness and wretchedness are so evident that the true religion must necessarily teach us that there is in man some great principle of greatness and some great principle of wretchedness.”⁶ Pascal subsequently paints a less-than-flattering picture of human beings: “What sort of freak then is man! How novel, how monstrous, how chaotic, how paradoxical, how prodigious! Judge of all things, feeble earthworm, repository of truth, sink of doubt and error, the glory and refuse of the universe!”⁷

Commenting on Pascal’s anthropological argument, Peter Kreeft writes, “Man is a living oxymoron: wretched greatness, great wretchedness, rational animal, mortal spirit, thinking reed.”⁸ “We are a puzzle to ourselves,” Thomas Morris notes. “One of the greatest mysteries is in us.…How can one species produce both unspeakable wickedness and nearly inexplicable goodness? How can we be responsible both for the most disgusting squalor and for the most breathtaking beauty? How can grand aspirations and self-destructive impulses, kindness and cruelty, be interwoven in one life? The human enigma cries out for explanation.”⁹

PASCAL’S “EXISTENTIAL SHOCK” TREATMENT

One of Pascal’s apologetic techniques involves what Bernard Ramm refers to as “existential shock.” Pascal uses this apologetic technique to awaken skeptics from complacency. Ramm elaborates:

Pascal’s use of existential shock was perhaps the biggest weapon in his arsenal. It was an attempt to deal a solid blow to the skepticism and indifferentism of the Frenchmen.…

By existential shock we mean Pascal’s method of shocking Frenchmen out of their complacency by vivid contrasts, by sharp jabs at frightful inconsistencies, by penetrating analyses of the foolish modes of existence, by pictures of despair placed along side of pictures of grace and redemption. A smug, sophisticated French skeptic must see himself hanging between time and eternity, as a delicate smudge of protoplasm which a piffle of poison could exterminate, as a disposed [sic. deposed] king miserably remembering his former greatness, and as a discontented wretch who suspects that there really is blessed contentment somewhere. But where?¹⁰

The anthropological argument provides an existential shock by calling on skeptics to confront and explain the seeming paradox of human nature that is existentially undeniable. A viable worldview, says Pascal, must account for this dilemma in a manner that is intellectually cogent.

TWO ERRORS IN UNDERSTANDING THE HUMAN CONDITION

In “Discussion with Monsieur De Sacy,”¹¹ Pascal analyzes two errors regarding the human condition. Douglas Groothuis explains, “Pascal claims that merely human philosophies are unable to tell us who we are because they fall into two equal and opposite errors concerning humanity. They either exalt greatness at the expense of wretchedness or they exalt wretchedness at the expense of greatness.”¹²

This is evident in the realm of public education in the United States, where children and adults are often taught that human beings are products of chance evolution (naturalism), while various strains of psychology tout the human potential/self-esteem message — that we are creatures of great or even unlimited potential. Kreeft refers to the opposing views as “animalism and angelism” and provides examples of both: “Some examples of ‘angelism,’ which ignore the concrete, earthy, embodied nature of man, are Platonism, Gnosticism, Pantheism and New Age humanism. Some examples of ‘animalism,’ which ignore the spiritual nature of man, are Marxism, Behaviorism, Freudianism, Darwinism, and Deweyan Pragmatism.…Modern philosophy has lost its sane anthropology because it has lost its cosmology. Man does not know himself because he does not know his place in the cosmos; he confuses himself with angel or with animal.”¹³

EXAMPLES OF HUMAN GREATNESS AND WRETCHEDNESS

Examples of human greatness and wretchedness abound. Human wretchedness built and maintained the concentration camps of Nazi Germany, where some six-million Jews were brutally murdered, but it was human greatness that ended the holocaust. More recently, we can point to the infamous attack of 9/11 when Islamic terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners and turned them into deadly weapons. Terrorists bent on the destruction of thousands of human lives indeed exhibited qualities of human wretchedness while those who bravely participated in the rescue efforts in the aftermath of the events exhibited qualities of human greatness.

One might argue, of course, that such examples of human greatness and wretchedness do not necessarily apply to individuals but merely illustrate the presence of greatness and wretchedness in the broader context of humanity. This is not the case, however, for examples of greatness and wretchedness within individuals can be offered as well.

Take, for instance, some philosophical, literary, and musical figures. It is a formidable task to seamlessly interweave complex philosophies into a work of fiction in such a way as to engage the reader meaningfully. Philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche and Albert Camus accomplished literary brilliance and yet remained in despair. Groothuis cites the example of eighteenth-century French philosopher Jean Jaques Rousseau and his penchant for using his “rhetorical prowess…deceitfully for self-justifying endeavors.” It seems Rousseau “would sponge off various wealthy patrons until they found him intolerable and sent the pouting philosopher packing.”¹⁴ After such incidents Rousseau would often write remarkable letters to his former patrons filled with well-crafted falsehoods. “Rousseau showed intellectual greatness,” observes Groothuis, “even in his concupiscence (in this case, excessive self-love).”¹⁵

Literary great Ernest Hemingway served as an ambulance driver in World War I, wrote many successful and critically acclaimed works, but exhibited the ultimate form of wretchedness by committing suicide. Edgar Allan Poe’s alcoholism and alleged drug use led to his premature death, but many of his writings are ingeniously crafted. Carlo Gesualdo, a sixteenth-century composer of Renaissance music and an Italian prince, brutally murdered his wife and her lover. As a composer, Gesualdo demonstrated human greatness, but as a murderer he obviously exhibited human wretchedness. The list of examples is as long as human history.

EVALUATING THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT

At first glance, Pascal’s anthropological argument appears to muddle the veracity of the Christian faith. This is because the root of the argument appears to be based on a Christian view of Creation and the Fall. Some may even interpret Pascal’s argument as circular and claim that it is simply appealing to the Bible as evidence that the biblical explanation of human nature is true. Such accusations, however, fail to examine the anthropological argument in a proper context. Pascal’s anthropological argument appeals to the best explanation regarding the human condition. Such an argument is abductive rather than deductive or inductive. Groothuis explains:

Although one cannot directly test by empirical means the deliverances of revelation on many matters (such as the origin of the universe, the creation of humanity and the Fall into sin), Pascal thought that key theological claims offer the best explanation for the perplexing phenomena of human nature….By adducing evidence from a wide diversity of situations, Pascal argues that the Christian view of humans as “deposed kings” — made in God’s image but now east of Eden — is the best way to account for the human condition. In so arguing, he employs an abductive method (that is, inference to the best explanation) similar to that used in much scientific endeavor.¹⁶

In other words, within the confines of his anthropological argument, Pascal is not directly making the case that humans are created in the image of God and are tarnished by their fall into sin. Pascal, instead, is arguing that these Christian doctrines provide the best explanation for the seemingly paradoxical condition of human greatness and wretchedness that we observe.

The case for the validity of the anthropological argument, nevertheless, must address several philosophical issues if it is to succeed. Groothuis offers three claims that Pascal’s argument must defend: “(1) that the construal of humanity as having a dual nature is intellectually cogent, (2) that the human condition even needs to be explained, and (3) that the answer provided by the doctrines of humans being made in God’s image and of original sin are convincing.”¹⁷ We could add to this list (4) that it is necessary to demonstrate that alternative worldviews do not adequately explain the condition of greatness and wretchedness. Space does not allow a thorough analysis and response to these concerns, but each one can indeed be successfully addressed.

CONTEMPORARY RELEVANCE OF THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL ARGUMENT

The anthropological argument is compelling to contemporary culture for at least three reasons. First, it is compelling on a human level: since it addresses the human condition, it has an immediate and universal application and relevance. Second, American culture in particular is steeped in the exaltation of human goodness via psychology and ideas of human potential. The anthropological argument agrees with such views to an extent, but it acknowledges the paradoxical element of human wretchedness more honestly and offers a viable explanation. Third, many are under the impression that human beings are merely evolved beasts. Pascal recognizes “Man is neither angel nor beast”¹⁸ and puts forth a technique of dealing with those who think too highly of themselves, as well as those who think too lowly of themselves:

If he exalts himself, I humble him.

If he humbles himself, I exalt him.

And I go on contradicting him

Until he understands

That he is a monster that passes all understanding.¹⁹

It should be noted again that the anthropological argument is not the only argument Pascal uses to defend the Christian faith; as such, it is not intended to be the ultimate argument for the veracity of Christianity. Pensées, though it is fragmented and incomplete, covers a variety of issues and includes many lines of argumentation. The anthropological argument, nevertheless, provides an existential punch and forces critics and doubters to find a better explanation of the human condition. It provides a unique, psychological approach in convincing a skeptic of the truth of the Christian faith. Writing about Pascal in The Catholic Encyclopedia, J. Lataste observes:

It is certain that his method of apologetics must have been at once rigorous and original; no doubt, he had made use of the traditional proofs — notably, the historical argument from prophecies and miracles. But as against adversaries who did not admit historical certainty, it was stroke of genius to produce a wholly psychological argument and, by starting from the study of the human soul, to arrive at God. Man is an “incomprehensible monster,” says he, “at once sovereign greatness and sovereign misery.” Neither dogmatism nor pyrrhonism [complete skepticism] will solve the enigma: the one explains the greatness of man, the other his misery; but neither explains both. We must listen to God. Christianity alone, through the doctrine of the Fall and that of the Incarnation, gives the key to the mystery. Christianity, therefore, is truth.²⁰

The application of the anthropological argument in contemporary culture has strong appeal. For example, the New Age movement — more recently referred to as the “new spirituality” or simply “spirituality” — offers an extremely exalted view of humanity. The anthropological argument could easily be applied to those who accept this view. A Christian apologist could agree that humans are great and exalted, but then, as Pascal suggests, the New Ager must be humbled into recognizing the real wretchedness of the human condition. It is one thing for a New Age adherent to declare that sin is an illusion or that moral absolutes do not exist but quite another to provide an adequate explanation for examples of human wretchedness such as the Holocaust.

The anthropological argument likewise may be applied to humanism, which also posits a favorable picture of humanity. The Humanist Manifesto 1, for example, declares that humanity has the power and potential to achieve greatness: “Man is at last becoming aware that he alone is responsible for the realization of the world of his dreams, that he has within himself the power for its achievement. He must set intelligence and will to the task.”²¹ The Humanist Manifesto 2 asserts that it is only a matter of time before this happens: “Humanism…is a moral force that has time on its side. We believe that humankind has the potential, intelligence, goodwill, and cooperative skill to implement this commitment in the decades ahead.”²²

Humanism, however, lacks a cogent explanation of the seemingly paradoxical human condition of greatness and wretchedness. Here is where the anthropological argument may enter in and provide a more reasonable explanation.

DOES HUMANISM ADEQUATELY EXPLAIN THIS CONDITION?

A staunch humanist, of course, will not readily give in to Pascal’s argument. Several objections may be raised, such as (1) human beings exhibit qualities of greatness as a result of highly developed brains and (2) wretched behavior is merely the result of humans having evolved from beasts and still possessing beastly tendencies. Over the course of millions of years of evolution, the humanist would argue, time and chance produced the human intellect, which is capable of greatness. Wretchedness, on the other hand, is an unfortunate side effect of our bestial origins.

Such an argument, however, presupposes that human intellect, allegedly a product of time and chance, is actually capable of accurate reasoning. In Mere Christianity, C.S.Lewis astutely observes, “When you are arguing against Him [God] you are arguing against the very power that makes you able to argue at all: it is like cutting off the branch you are sitting on.”²³ If human reason is a product of chance, how do we know it is reliable? Humanists, who deny that God is the source of human reason, are left sitting precariously on a branch of chance and time with no guarantees that their reasoning is sound.²⁴ In Miracles, Lewis remarks, “If all that exists is Nature, the great mindless interlocking event, if our own deepest convictions are merely the by-products of an irrational process, then clearly there is not the slightest ground for supposing that our sense of fitness and our consequent faith in uniformity tell us anything about a reality external to ourselves.”²⁵ Christianity’s explanation that humans are created in the image of a rational God and thus are rational beings makes more sense than the chance and time explanation of the humanist. In short, the existence of human reason is more adequately explained by intelligent design than by random chance.

On the other hand, if humanists agree that human beings do, in fact, exhibit qualities both of wretchedness and greatness, then they are making a moral claim. From where does their standard of morality come? The existence of such a standard of morality in humans is more adequately explained by creation in the image of a moral God than by the evolution of mere matter.

The anthropological argument also provides hope for those who hold to worldviews that recognize the wretchedness of human nature but shun the inherent greatness that is also a part of that nature. Nihilism, for instance, followed to its logical conclusions, leads to despair — a meaningless existence in a pointless universe, where humans are merely an accidental product of chance and time. Human wretchedness in nihilistic thought is expressed perhaps more so in a philosophical sense (despair), but wretchedness is certainly present in a worldview that offers no real hope. It is at this juncture that Pascal’s anthropological argument can enter in and offer hope to the nihilist — hope that is based on the fact that Christianity offers a superior explanation for the human condition.

THE GENIUS OF PASCAL’S ARGUMENT

Pascal’s anthropological argument is a valuable tool that contemporary Christian apologetics can apply in a variety of ways. As we’ve seen, it is certainly not a definitive argument for the Christian faith (Pascal never intended it as such), but it does provide a certain degree of “existential shock” and an approach that is appealing to individuals on a psychological and personal level.

“Starting an apologetic argument from the point of the human condition is appealing in a psychologized and individualistic culture,” observes Groothuis in reference to Pascal’s argument. “While there is much theological illiteracy and philosophical naiveté today, there is also great interest in the soul, human potential, and spirituality. People may doubt the existence of God, the reliability of the Bible, or the deity of Christ, but they know that they exist, and they desire to understand themselves, their pain, and their possibilities.”²⁶ Pascal’s anthropological argument is well equipped to address such matters.

The genius of the argument is in many respects found in its simplicity. It asks the skeptic of Christianity to provide a more adequate solution to the observable human condition than the Christian doctrines of humanity’s creation in the image of God and the Fall, however unlikely these doctrines may initially seem. The argument, moreover, is not based on the latest scientific theories (though such theories are certainly apologetically useful at times) or on archaeological evidence for the Christian faith — theories and evidence that may change with time. Its appeal, rather, is on an existential, psychological level. It is at this point in Pascal’s apologetic scheme that an argument such as the wager may be offered along with more traditional Christian evidences (what Pascal called “Scripture and the rest”).²⁷

notes

1. In short, Pascal’s wager argues that the benefits of wagering on belief in theism far outweigh the consequences of agnosticism or unbelief if theism is true. It is wiser, then, to wager on belief. For an excellent introduction to Pascal’s wager see Douglas Groothuis, On Pascal (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2003), chap. 9.

2. Richard H. Popkin, The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, vol. 6, ed. Paul Edwards (New York: Macmillan Company and Free Press, 1967), s.v. “Pascal, Blaise.”

3. D.G.Preston, New Dictionary of Theology, ed. Sinclair B. Ferguson, David F. Wright, and J.I.Packer (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), s.v. “Pascal, Blaise.”

4. Natural theology refers to obtaining knowledge of God from nature. Pascal believed arguments for God based on natural revelation lack the force and scope required to lead a skeptic to belief in Christ. It is true that such arguments for God do not immediately lead one to Christ, but they are certainly valuable as part of a broader apologetic approach.

5. Blaise Pascal, Pensées, trans. A.J.Krailsheimer (New York: Penguin, 1995), frag.613,206.

6. Ibid., frag. 149, 46.

7. Ibid., frag. 131, 34.

8. Peter Kreeft, Christianity for Modern Pagans: Pascal’s Pensées Edited, Outlined and Explained (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1993), 55.

9. Thomas V. Morris, Making Sense of It All: Pascal and the Meaning of Life (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1992), 129.

10. Bernard Ramm, Varieties of Christian Apologetics (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1962), 33.

11. See Blaise Pascal, Pensées and Other Writings, trans. Honor Levi (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), 182–92.

12. Douglas Groothuis, “Deposed Royalty: Pascal’s Anthropological Argument,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 41,2 (June 1998): 301.

13. Kreeft, 53.

14. Douglas Groothuis, On Pascal (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2003), 64.

15. Ibid.

16. Douglas Groothuis, The History of Science and Religion in the Western Tradition: An Encyclopedia, ed. GaryB.Ferngren (New York: Garland, 2000), s.v. “Blaise Pascal,” 93.

17. Groothuis, “Deposed Royalty,” 305.

18. Kreeft, 52.

19. Pascal, frag. 130,32.

20. J. Lataste, transcribed by Richard Giroux, The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 11 (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911), s.v. “Pascal, Blaise” (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11511a.htm).

21. “Humanist Manifesto 1,” American Humanist Association, http:// www.americanhumanist.org/about/manifesto1.html.

22. “Humanist Manifesto 2,” American Humanist Association, http:// www.americanhumanist.org/about/manifesto2.html.

23. C.S.Lewis, Mere Christianity (Nashville: Broadman and Holman, 1996), 53.

24. For a detailed defense of Lewis’s argument see Victor Reppert, C.S.Lewis’s Dangerous Idea: In Defense of the Argument from Reason (Downer’s Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003).

25. C.S.Lewis, Miracles (New York: Collier Books, 1960), 105.

26. Pascal, frag.418,124.