John Edwards, Jesus, and Selfishness

Today democratic candidate John Edwards said, "I think that Jesus would be disappointed in our ignoring the plight of those around us who are suffering and our focus on our own selfish short-term needs. I think he would be appalled, actually."

I think, on this, Edwards is spot-on. Just read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John for Jesus' views of money and personal kingdom-building.

This being true, how can Edwards justify living in a 28,200 square foot home that's the largest in the county he lives in, and valued at $6,000,000? "The recreation building contains a basketball court, a squash court, two stages, a bedroom, kitchen, bathrooms, swimming pool, a four-story tower, and a room designated “John’s Lounge.”"

I understand and agree that I am not to judge other people. I also don't view myself as the example of Christlike handling of possessions. Yet Edwards, as a public figure, should be careful about quoting Jesus on "our own selfish short-term needs" while living in a home 80% the size of a football field.

In this regard Thomas Merton was correct when he asked the question as to why we need to live in mansions when the Son of Man didn't even have a roof over his own head.

God Delusion #24: Dawkins vs. David Sloan Wilson

My original intent was to read through Dawkins' God Delusion and make continual posts about the book. So, I've read the thing and wonder why am I not making post after post? The answer is, I think, that I find his book mostly non-compelling and, frankly, poorly written and poorly thought-out, especially in his attempts to write philosophy and theology and, of course, in his innate despising of all who cannot see as he does.

See posts 1-23 below for some of the reasons I have for thinking this.

I think I'll stop posting on GD, except when it seems interesting to me.

Which occurred today in reading the nytimes "Darwin's God." Evolutionary biologist David Sloan Wilson argues that, adaptively, "religion enhances group fitness." Wilson is an atheist. His idea enrages Dawkins the atheist, who calls Wilson's work “sheer, wanton, head-in-bag perversity.”

On Religious Beliefs as Either Adaptations or Non-Adaptive Byproducts

Yesterday's New York Times Magazine has an interesting article on how evolutionary theorists are trying to explain the origin of religious beliefs, to include belief in God. To inquire as to the evolutionary origins of God-belief is not to engage in Dawkins-type theorizing against the existence of God. The discussion happens on a micro-evolutionary level. It goes like this.

Religious beliefs are either "adaptations" or "byproducts." If the belief on God is an adaptation, this means it once had survival value. If it’s a byproduct of an adaptation that had survival value, then belief in God is a “nonadaptive consequence.” Whatever approach evolutionists might take, “God” seems to be hard-wired into persons. Belief in God is our “default setting.”

I think it is important to note that all beliefs/opinions/theories/behaviors can be analyzed this way. There are no human ideas/behaviors/beliefs that cannot be so analyzed because they fall outside the explanatory grasp of evolutionary theory. Thus, evolutionary theory can itself be analyzed this way. Is the belief in evolutionary theory an adaptation or a non-adaptive consequence? (For more on this see Alvin Plantinga's "An Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism.")

In itself any evolutionary explanation cannot answer the question “Does God exist?” Should one claim that to show that the evolution of a belief affects the cognitive value of that belief then one would commit, logically, the genetic fallacy. The nytimes essay understands this clearly. Which means that one could accept such evolutionary reasoning and be a Christian theist at the same time.

In this regard Justin Barrett, Senior Director University of Oxford’s Centre for Anthropology and Mind, is cited. Barrett “is an observant Christian who believes in “an all-knowing, all-powerful, perfectly good God who brought the universe into being.”” Barrett says, “Christian theology teaches that people were crafted by God to be in a loving relationship with him and other people.” He then asks, “Why wouldn’t God, then, design us in such a way as to find belief in divinity quite natural?”

I agree with Barrett when he reasons that having a scientific explanation for mental phenomena does not mean we should stop believing in them. Barrett writes, “Suppose science produces a convincing account for why I think my wife loves me — should I then stop believing that she does?”

If “God” is the human default setting, what shall we make of atheists? Scott Atran is an anthropologist, and atheist, at the University of Michigan. “Atran says he faces an emotional and intellectual struggle to live without God in a nonatheist world, and he suspects that is where his little superstitions come from, his passing thought about crossing his fingers during turbulence or knocking on wood just in case. It is like an atavistic theism erupting when his guard is down. The comforts and consolations of belief are alluring even to him, he says, and probably will become more so as he gets closer to the end of his life. He fights it because he is a scientist and holds the values of rationalism [R] higher than the values of spiritualism [S]. “

But why does Atran hold the values of R higher than the values of S? Evolutionary theory must have an answer to this. But that answer cannot be “because the values of R are true.” “Why” R is “higher” than “S” is an entirely different question that cannot be answered by showing that, e.g., Atran does hold R higher than S.

Barrett’s suggestion that God exists and has hard-wired belief in Him into persons makes as much logical sense as does any other alternative. For the Christian theist it makes sense of the belief that, as persons, God created us “in his image.”

I think that Plantinga’s work on warranted belief, and Victor Reppert’s argument that human reason is only explicable on theism, can be helpful in a discussion like this. Belief in God, as our "default setting," is a Plantingian "properly basic belief." And the valuing of R, following Reppert, is a reason to believe that the proposition "God exists" is true because philosophical naturalism is self-refuting because it is inconsistent with the valuing of R.

Cameron's "Jesus Tomb" (again...)

Here are some more good links re. this coming Sunday's Discovery Channel special on the Tilpiat tomb.

For mark Goodacre of Duke University, go here. Especially funny, I think, is Goodacre's analysis of Cameron's Beatles analogy. Goodacre writes:

"At the risk of labouring the point, let me attempt to explain my concerns by using the analogy of which the film-makers are so fond, the Beatles analogy. This analogy works by saying that if in 2,000 years a tomb was discovered in Liverpool that featured the names John, Paul and George, we would not immediately conclude that we had found the tomb of the Beatles. But if we also found so distinctive a name as Ringo, then we would be interested. Jacobovici claims that the "Ringo" in this tomb is Mariamene, whom he interprets as Mary Magdalene and as Jesus's wife, which is problematic (see Mariamne and the "Jesus Family Tomb" and below). What we actually have is the equivalent of a tomb with the names John, Paul, George, Martin, Alan and Ziggy. We might well say, "Perhaps the 'Martin' is George Martin, and so this is a match!" or "Perhaps John Lennon had a son called Ziggy we have not previously heard about" but this would be special pleading and we would rightly reject such claims. A cluster of names is only impressive when it is a cluster that is uncontaminated by non-matches and contradictory evidence.In short, including Mariamne and leaving out Matia and Judas son of Jesus is problematic for any claim to be made about the remaining cluster. All data must be included. You cannot cherry pick or manipulate your data before doing your statistical analysis."

For Christianity Today's opinion go here.

Cameron's Titanic Gaffe

Time magazine cites problems with James Cameron's outlandish claims here.

New Testament scholar Darrell Bock weighs in here.

See what N.T. Wright said way back in 1996 here.

Biblical scholar Paul Meier checks in here. Meier writes:

Alas, this whole affair is just the latest in the long-running media attack on the historical Jesus, which – we thought – had culminated in that book of lies, The Da Vinci Code. But no: the caricatures of Christ continue.
Please, lose no sleep over the Talpiot “discoveries” for the following reasons, and here are the facts:.
1) Nothing is new here: scholars have known about the ossuaries ever since March of 1980. The general public learned when the BBC filmed a documentary on them in 1996. James Tabor’s book, The Jesus Dynasty, also made a big fuss over the Talpiot tombs more recently, and now James Cameron (The Titanic) and Simcha Jacobovici have climbed aboard the sensationalist bandwagon as well. He
2) All the names – Yeshua, Joseph, Maria, Mariamene, Matia, Judah, and Jose -- are extremely frequent Jewish names for that time and place, and thus most schol-ars consider this merely coincidental, as they did from the start. One-quarter of Jewish women at that time, for example, were named Maria.
3) There is no reason whatever to equate “Mary Magdalene” with “Mariamene,”as Jacobovici claims.
4) So what if her DNA is different from that of “Yeshua” ? That particular :Mariamme” (as it is usually spelled today) could indeed have been the wife of that particular “Yeshua.”
5) What in the world is the “Jesus Family” doing, having a burial plot in Jerusalem, of all places, the very city that crucified Jesus? Galilee was their home. In Galilee they could have had such a family plot, not Judea. Besides all of which, church tradition – and Eusebius – are unanimous in reporting that Mary died in Ephesus, where the apostle John, faithful to his commission from Jesus on the cross, had accompanied Mary.
6) If this were Jesus’ family burial, what is Matthew doing there – if indeed “Ma-tia” is thus to be translated?
7) How come there is no tradition whatever – Christian, Jewish, or secular -- that any part of the Holy Family was buried at Jerusalem?
8) Please note the extreme bias of the director and narrator, Simcha Jacobovici. The man is an Indiana-Jones-wannabe, who oversensationalizes anything he touches. You may have caught him on his TV special regarding The Exodus, in which the man “explained” just everything that still needed proving or explaining in the Exodus account in the Old Testament! It finally became ludicrous, and now he’s doing it again. – As for James Cameron, how do you follow The Titanic? Well, with an even more “titanic” story. He should have known better.
There are more arguments, to be sure, but I want to get this off pronto.

Jewish archaeologist Amos Kloner oversaw the original did at Tilpial. Kloner is here quoted in The Jerusalem Post. Kloner says, "There is no likelihood that Jesus and his relatives had a family tomb... They were a Galilee family with no ties in Jerusalem. The Talpiot tomb belonged to a middle-class family from the 1st century CE."

Cameron's "Bones of Jesus Theory" Is Another Sinking Ship

James Cameron , director of the movie "Titanic," believes the family tomb of Jesus has been found, to include an ossuary containing the bones of Jesus. The Discovery Channel will air a program on this story March 4.

For the truth about this old story now being sensationalized, see Ben Witherington's excellent response here. After providing actual scholarship re. this stuff, Witherington concludes: "James Cameron, the producer of the movie Titantic, has now jumped on board another sinking ship full of holes, presumably in order to make a lot of money before the theory sinks into an early watery grave. Man the lifeboats and get out now."

Craig Evans and the "All or Nothing" Approach to Scripture

I am looking forward to reading the new book by Craig Evans, Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospel.

Craig Blomberg has a review here.

Especially interesting to me will be Evans's critique of the "all or nothing" hermeneutical approach that is often espoused by ex-fundamentalist Christians who "leave the faith" because of their inability to defend the Bible on the basis of the all or nothing approach. Which is sad.

Blomberg writes: "Evans highlights one recurrent problem—the all-or-nothing approach that leads some people to think that, if they cannot accept strict biblical inerrancy or harmonize every last detail in the Gospels, they must reject most or all of them (a mistake, I might add, sadly perpetuated by many very conservative evangelicals, too, who thus unwittingly send more hesitant skeptics over the edge)."

The all-or-nothing, modern fundamentalist approach engenders anti-Christianity in those who can no longer do the logical gymnastics needed to operate in this narrow, anachronistic approach to Scripture. These "ex-Christians" have only changed nominally. Paradigmatically they are the same persons, now becoming all-or-nothing skeptics and atheists who attack the all-or-nothing fundamentalists and evangelicals.

Jesus Warns the Two Ex-Blind Men to Keep Secrecy

FOR OUR CELL GROUP LEADERS
In Matthew 9:27-31 Jesus heals two blind men. After healing them, Jesus says… “See that no one knows about this.”

What’s going on? Why would Jesus say this.
First, note that the two blind men know more than others do. Jesus own disciples, to this point in the story, are asking "Who is this man Jesus?" The two blind men recognize the Real Jesus, as Messiah, as the “son of David.”
In regard to the command to secrecy Craig Keener says:
Jesus conceals his messianic identity, insofar as possible, from the public.
This secrecy may be due to several factors.
First, the “Christ,” or “Messiah,” was the Davidic king and officially took this title only at his enthronement.
The final “coronation” of Jesus is on the cross.
Second, Jesus’ mission was completely different from any of the political views about messiahs circulating at the time. People would hear of this "messianic miracle" and conclude inadequate, even false, things about Jesus.
“Messiahship” was an inadequate way to categorize Jesus. Jesus redfined “messiah” by the character of his mission. Yes, Jesus claims to be Messiah. And, his messiahship is to be understood differently from the varying expectations of the people.
Finally, Jesus' mission could only be understood retrospectively; that is, after the fact of and in light of his death and resurrection. It is only then that a more complete understanding of the messiahship of Jesus can be seen.

Blomberg on Bauckman

Craig Blomberg reviews Richard Bauckman's Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony here. I'm looking forward to getting to Bauckman's book soon.

Blomberg writes: "This is a volume to be commended most warmly to anyone interested in the topic and especially to any tempted to be led astray by alternate, more skeptical models of the formation of the Gospels and the truthfulness of their contents."

"You Are My Refuge"

My song "You Are My Refuge" has just come out on Life Worship's new cd. You can listen to how they did it here.