Farrell Till has *again* misunderstood Geisler's purpose. Once again, I will refer readers to the following outline of Geisler's first affirmative speech in the Geisler-Till Debate on the Resurrection:
THE GEISLER-TILL DEBATE: DR. GEISLER'S FIRST SPEECH
[Interested readers are invited to verify my outline of Geisler's speech by reading his speech for themselves on the WWW at http://freethought.tamu.edu/debates/geisler-till/geisler1.html]
I. THE NT DOCUMENTS ARE HISTORICALLY RELIABLE ACCOUNTS.
A. The extant NT MSS are accurate copies of the originals.
1. The NT has more MSS.
2. The NT has earlier MSS.
3. The NT is more accurately copied.
B. The writers were eyewitnesses or contemporaries of
eyewitnesses.
1. Luke, John, Acts, 1 Corinthians purport to be written by
eyewitnesses and/or contemporaries.
2. The accounts are fresh, vivid, and accurate (giving specific
geographical, topological, and cultural details)
3. Archaeology has confirmed the Gospel records.
4. The MS evidence points to a 1st-cent. date for the Gospel
material.
5. The writers of the NT were known to be honest men. 6. Second century writers "link" with the NT.
7. The Church Fathers cite the NT as authentic.
8. NT scholarship supports an early dating of the gospels.
9. The time lapse between the writing of the NT and the events
it described is too short for mythological development.
10. Paul wrote 1 Corinthians circa 56 CE.
II. THESE DOCUMENTS SUPPORT THE RESURRECTION [outline of second contention ommitted as it is not germane to this discussion]
Geisler is not trying to prove "that what the NT says about the resurrection of Jesus is historically accurate," as Farrell Till contends. Rather, Geisler is merely trying to prove that the writers were eyewitnesses or contemporaries of eyewitnesses, in order to support his larger conclusion that the NT is historically reliable.
> GEISLER CONTINUED:
> <<there is also equally good evidence that what these texts affirm about the
> death and resurrection of Christ is historically reliable. It should be noted
> that it is not necessary
> to this argument that they are inspired or inerrant, but only that like
> other good works of antiquity they are accurate. Again, the evidence for this
> is greater than that of any work from that period.>>
Geisler raises an excellent point. Historical reliability and inerrancy are two different issues. Since Geisler is defending the the historicity of Jesus' resurrection, he does not need to defend inerrancy. There is no logical contradiction in asserting that "Jesus rose bodily from the dead" and "The New Testament is not inerrant." Therefore, Till has to do more than just argue against inerrancy, he must give historical grounds on which a rational person may reject the Resurrection.
> TILL'S REPLY:
> As I examine the arguments that Geisler presented as "proof" of this
> assertion, we will see that almost all of them are predicated on the
> assumption that the NT documents are accurate in everything they say. Thus,
> if the NT says that Jesus was crucified, then it is a historical fact that he
> was crucified. If the NT says that Jesus was buried in the tomb of Joseph of
> Arimathea, then this is a historical fact, and so on. However, as I said in
> my debate with Geisler, if this is the only line of argument that he intends
> to use, then there is no point in debating the issue, because I readily admit
> that the NT *says* that Jesus was crucified and that the NT *says* that he
> was buried and that the NT *says* that he was resurrected. None of this is
> the issue. The issue is whether the NT is historically correct in reporting
> that all of these events happen as recorded.
This is both overly-simplistic and misleading. I have seen absolutelyt nothing from Geisler to indicate that he believes "If the Bible says it, it must be true." I despise people who think that way, but that doesn't mean that I believe, "If the Bible says it, it must be false." With respect to alleged historical events, the correct approach is to presume that a historical text is correct unless we have good reasons to believe otherwise. Historians follow this approach when considering any other historical text, and it would be inconsistent if we treated the NT any differently.
For example, the NT claims that Pontius Pilate sent a Roman guard to protect Jesus' tomb. I don't think that a correct response to this would be, "Well, Dr. Geisler, you're saying that we should believe it just because it is in the Bible." Rather I reject this report on the following grounds:
1. Our knowledge of this event relies solely upon a literal reading of Matthew. This may be an apologetic legend.
2. It is unlikely the Roman soldiers would have gone to the Jewish authorities (as Matthew 28:11-15 reports) instead of the Roman governor, Pilate, to whom they were responsible. The Gospel of Peter (11:43-49) has the guard reporting to Pilate.
3. Matthew's story about the guard is also unlikely because it states that the guard accepted a bribe from the Jews. However, given what we know about Roman soldiers, this is extremely unlikely.
4. The phrase "to this very day" which appears in Matthew 28:15 suggests that the author was writing many years after the events he was describing. Thus there was sufficient time for the origin and growth of the legend of the guard. (Do you understand now why the dating of the gospels is so important?)
5. (This is perhaps the most serious objection.) If the disciples did not grasp the importance of the resurrection predictions, then the Jews, who had much less contact with Jesus, would not have grasped them either.
Can you see the difference in the two approaches to historiography?
To be continued....
Jeff Lowder -=+ Internet Infidel +=- jlowder@atheist.tamu.edu Lowder Institute for Secular Studies http://freethought.tamu.edu/~jlowder/ Jeff Lowder <jlowder@southwind.com>