A Response to Carrell

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I am glad to know that Mr. Till is sending our correspondence to his errancy
list.  I am wondering though -- is everybody but yourself on that list a
"lurker"?  I have heard from none of them.  

I have kept most of the exchanges we had when I was on his list, for just the
reason they are now needed, because Mr. Till implies that I manufactured the
"previous post" for the present occasion.  >> I think it strange that I cannot
find Carrell's "previous post" in any of my files or in the Errancy archive,
even though I have done a search-and-find using different strings of words
that I copied directly from his "previous post."  <<   However, he is
magnanimously willing to grant me the benefit of the doubt.  Forgive me,
Farrell, if I am not as humbly grateful as I should be.  (^v^) 

It would seem, however, that his archives are incomplete for I found that
"previous post" in a file dated 5/4/96.  So I did send it, and he did receive
it and did respond to it.  Otherwise, how did he know in the first place that
he had a "Mary Magdalene" problem with me?

According to my dictionary, "Circumstantial evidence" is "Evidence that
furnishes reasonable ground for inferring the existence of a fact."  The
inadequacy of Mr. Till's archives, and the incredible fallibility of his
memory are reasonable inferences based on circumstantial evidence.  The
evidence contained in the four gospels concerning the events of the
Resurrection morning is sufficient to infer that the explanation I gave is
adequate, and that Mr. Till's "glaring inconsistencies" exist only in his own
mind.

He writes, however,

>> The Mary Magdalene Problem has been debated on the Errancy list with

several would-be apologists, and everyone who has followed these discussions
know that my PRIMARY argument always centers on Matthew's
account of what happened that morning. I don't recall ever having argued
with anyone that the fact that the synoptic narratives do not say that Mary
M was NOT with the other women when they met Jesus would be proof that she
WAS with them.  I, in fact, have always argued that linguistic rules require
the readers of Matthew's account to understand that Mary M was present
throughout the narrative and therefore had to be one of the women who
encountered Jesus as they were running from the tomb. <<

Matthew's account implies that Mary did continue with the women up to the tomb
where she witnessed with them the angel who told them that Christ had arisen.
But John implies that she left the other women at that point, apparently not
believing or understanding the angel, and that she hurried to tell Peter and
John that the body had been removed.  John's report as well as Mark's implies
that she returned to the tomb and was alone when Christ appeared to her.  In
her euphoria after that, with renewed energy, she well could have run after
the other women and joined them in time to see Christ for the second time --
(second for her, first for the others).   

However I do not believe it is incumbent on us to make such assumptions.  Luke
says that Peter "got up and ran to the tomb.  Bending over, he saw the strips
of linen lying by themselves, and he went away wondering to himself what had
happened."  (Luke 24:12)  According to John this happened when Mary M ran back
the first time and informed them that the body was missing.  Luke does not
mention that John was also with Peter when they ran to the tomb.  

Mr. Till considers himself an expert on how the Bible should have been
written, but unfortunately the writers did not have him to refer to when they
wrote.  In Matthew's account of the instituting of the Lord's Supper (Matt.
26:26) he says that Jesus first gave his disciples the bread, then the cup.
Mark 14:22ff agrees with this order.  Luke 22:17ff says he took the cup first,
then the bread, and then again the cup.  I Cor. 11:23ff has the bread first,
then the cup.

I do not think there has ever been any serious question of the order of the
elements the Lord instituted, even though Luke mentions the cup twice.  Luke
seemingly placed less emphasis on the precise order of things, preferring to
state that several things took place at approximately the same time.  Only
someone looking for trouble can see inconsistency in this.

Sincerely,
Bill Carrell

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