The Christology Symposium: Multiple Christian and Muslim Views on Jesus

On Thursday, March 15, 2012, the University of Toronto and St. Michael's College hosted "The Christology Symposium" -- an academic forum featuring presentations on Jesus from multiple Christian and Muslim perspectives followed by a panel discussion. The presentations consisted of the following:

1. "Roman Catholic Christology" (at 5:50) -- Greg Rupik (PhD Candidate, University of Toronto)

2. "Sunni Muslim Christology" (at 22:00) -- Shabir Ally (PhD Candidate, University of Toronto)

3. "Evangelical Christology" (at 39:15) -- Dr. Tony Costa (PhD)

4. "Shi'a Isma'ili Muslim Christology" (at 57:30) -- Khalil Andani (Master of Theological Studies Candidate, Harvard University)

5. Panel Discussion with all Presenters (at 1:16:44)

Toronto Baptist Seminary Essays

For those who've been wondering why I've barely posted at all in the past eight months, it's because I've been busy finishing my one year bible diploma program at Toronto Baptist Seminary. I have done a lot of theological and apologetical writing for that program, so to compensate for my relative inactivity in the blogosphere, I decided that I would post four of my best articles here on Epagonizesthai. These have some pretty good apologetic value and I do believe these constitute some of my best work so far, so they're worth looking at.

For Christian Foundations:

• The Christian Doctrine of God Explained and Defended for Muslims

For Comparative World Religions:

• Contrasting Christian and Muslim Views on the Female Gender

For the Gospel of John:

• The Divine Logos: The Christology of the Gospel of John

For Systematic Theology:

• He Will Save His People: A Case for Particular Redemption

Briefly Explaining the Trinity

During the early phase of writing and preparing my article on the deity of Christ, I had a dialogue with a Muslim regarding some of the passages I discussed in chapter one. When we came to John 1:1, he asked me a question that went somewhere along these lines: “If the word is with God and the word is God, then doesn’t that mean God is with God?” Unfortunately, this kind of misunderstanding leads to all sorts of strawman arguments against Trinitarian beliefs. They will quote, for example, the Shema in Deuteronomy 6:4 which goes, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.”

Many Christians will respond by saying that God is one, but He is three-in-one. Unfortunately, this just leads to even more confusion on the part of those who do not understand Trinitarian theology (and unfortunately, the Christian making this response probably does not understand it himself/herself either), especially since it is usually not explained in what sense God is three-in-one. Thus, it is necessary to give a brief explanation of what we actually believe regarding the Trinity.

Perhaps the most concise and accurate definition of the Trinity that I can think of is the one provided by Dr. James White in The Forgotten Trinity. It goes something like this: Within the one Being that is God, there exists eternally three coequal and coeternal persons, namely, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

There, we see what it means when Christians say that God is three-in-one. Actually, there are two Greek words that all Christians (and non-Christians who wish to understand what biblical Christianity teaches) need to know. The first word is ousia, and this is the word which we translate as being, essence or substance. This is the word that is used in the Nicene Creed when we say that Jesus Christ is “of one being [homoousion] with the Father.” The second Greek word is the word hypostasis, which is generally translated as person. Thus, when we say that the Word was with God and is God, what we mean to say is that within the one ousia of God, there are three hypostases that have eternally been together. So when we say that the Word was with God and was God. There are various places in the Old Testament wherein God is presented as being multi-personal, such as Genesis 19:24 and Zechariah 2:8-11. In these passages, Yahweh interacts with Yahweh (a strange thing to behold if He was Unitarian in nature). In addition, this doctrine is encapsulated in the Trinitarian formula that appears in these passages:

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit

(Matthew 28:19, ESV)

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

(2 Corinthians 13:14, ESV)

...according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood...

(1 Peter 1:2, ESV)

Please note that merely quoting these verses in and of itself does not prove the Trinity. Now, I believe that these passages do support Trinitarian theology, but that careful exegesis of these verses must be done first, which I do not have the space to do here. In any case, I already wrote a solid defense for an orthodox Trinitarian view of God in my previous posts. In summary, remember that there are three foundations of Trinitarian theology that must always be kept in mind, and that denial of any one of these three foundations results in a heretical viewpoint that is no longer biblical Christianity. These three foundations are:

1. Monotheism, that there is only one God (denial of this foundation leads to Polytheism).

2. There are three Divine persons (denial of this foundation leads to Modalism or Sabellianism).

3. The three Divine persons are coequal and coeternal (denial of this foundation leads to Subordinationism or Arianism).

Four Objections Against the Deity of Christ

(This is part of a much longer article that I wrote on the deity of Christ. For reference purposes, I have edited this section and am posting it on my blog.)

I know that even having given a solid scriptural and historical case for the deity of Christ in my past articles on Christology, there will still remain many objections laid out against orthodox Christian belief. Thus, I would like to address just four common objections that are often raised by Muslims, Jehovah's Witnesses, and other detractors of biblical Christianity. There will undoubtedly be more such objections that will be raised, but I will resist the urge to be exhaustive at this point.

Objection One: "Jesus never explicitly states that He is God."

It would be foolhardy to limit Jesus in this way by forcing Him to say in concise terms what He claims about Himself, especially in light of all the scriptural evidence (Isaiah 9:6-7, 10:21, Mark 14:62-65, John 1:1-18, 5:2-18, 8:58, 20:28, etc.). There are many things He did not explicitly say (such as being the Messiah), yet there is no doubt that He thought of Himself in these terms. Also, the fact that He accepts others who call Him God and worship Him (rather than rebuking them, which would be what He should have done if He is just a prophet or an angel) show that He definitely thought of Himself this way.

Objection Two: "How can a person be man and God at the same time?"

Muslims are particularly fond of raising this question. They claim that if Jesus sleeps, goes to the bathroom, gets hungry, etc., then He cannot be God. This misses a key aspect of Christian doctrine, and that is the hypostatic union: God the eternal Word became flesh. He is not a mere phantom as the early Docetists wrongly believed. He had a true human body, and He would speak and act in that body as a true human being would. But in doing so, He does not sacrifice His Divinity in the least bit. He has all the essential attributes of humanity, but at the same time He has all the essential attributes of divinity.

If God is infinite and omnipotent, it should be no problem at all for Him to enter into His own creation in the form of a human being. Also, in the incarnation, Jesus retains His full Divinity by retaining His omniscience (John 16:3), omnipresence (Matthew 28:20) omnipotence (Matthew 28:18), eternality (John 1:1) and immutability (Hebrews 13:8), among other attributes. It is true that He temporarily sheds His being unbound by time and space, but this is not an essential attribute of deity anyway. God can temporarily set this aside and still be God.

Objection Three: "When Jesus died on the cross, did God die? And if He did, who was running the world while He was dead?"

This one is another Islamic favourite. Unfortunately for those who raise it, this argument forgets two key things:

First of all, as I said before, Jesus is both fully human and fully divine. When He died on the cross, this means that His Divine spirit was temporarily separated from His human body until the Resurrection. This does not mean He ceased to exist, however. This exposes an inconsistency on the part of those who raise this argument, since not even they would believe that death means nonexistence.

Second, this question assumes a form of Modalism, which makes Jesus the entirety of the Godhead. Remember that it was not the Father or the Holy Spirit that became incarnate, only the son. The Father had always been up in Heaven, keeping things in order. In any case, I shouldn't even have to bring this one up in light of the first problem that I pointed out.

Objection four: "There are verses in the bible that contradict the deity of Christ."

Of course, it is to be expected that those who reject the deity of Christ will put forward a number of bible passages in their attempt to undermine this biblical truth. The Jehovah's Witnesses are especially adept at this, and have fooled many an unprepared Christian with their clever arguments. However, their mishandling of scripture becomes all too apparent once one has taken the time to actually examine the texts being quoted in greater detail:

God is not man, that he should lie,or a son of man, that he should change his mind.Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?

(Numbers 23:19, ESV)

Of course, the verse in context refers to the fact that Yahweh is immutable in His decrees, and is not fickle as mortal men are. Also, those quoting this passage miss the rather obvious fact that this verse was written long before the incarnation took place. In other words, Jesus did not have a human nature yet at this point in time!

And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.

(Mark 10:17-18, ESV)

Jesus is not, at this point, denying the man's description of Him as good. What He is doing, rather, is that He is trying to get the man to realize what he is just saying. In effect, He is telling the man, "Do you understand what you are calling Me? Or are you just calling me good to get closer to Me?" Jesus, of course affirms His goodness elsewhere. For example, when He is accused by the Jews, He asks them rhetorically in John 8:46, "Which one of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me?" The fact that those who deny the deity of Christ appeal to this passage is somewhat humorous, given that many of them would contend that Jesus is indeed good!

So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise.

(John 5:19)

First of all, I would like to remind the reader that this passage comes right at the heels of John 5:20-24, which is a clear reference to Jesus having divine prerogatives:

For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel. For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will. The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.

(John 5:20-24)

Notice two things here: First of all, Jesus claims to be able to give life and pronounce judgment upon people (prerogatives that only God has). Second, Jesus says that all may honour the Son just as they honour the Father. We are not talking about a lesser kind of honour here. Instead, the kind of honour that Jesus expects to receive is exactly the kind of honour one would give to God the Father. This is another clear statement of their coequality. The fact that those who cite John 5:19 ignore the context of the entire passage (because doing so demolishes their whole argument) should already raise up red flags for more attentive readers.

Now, what about the verse itself? It should be pointed out at the outset that Jesus is not denying the fact that He is all-powerful. That is reading too much into the verse. What Jesus is denying here, however, is that He has any kind of separate agenda apart from the Father. To paraphrase Dr. White, He is not some rogue deity out doing His own thing. There is complete unity of purpose in the Godhead, so that the Godhead is of one will in accomplishing God's sovereign decrees.

You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.

(John 14:28)

One must look at the verse in context. Jesus is pointing out how He will soon be ascending back to Heaven, and is rebuking His disciples for not rejoicing at this fact. The Father is positionally greater because He is up in Heaven, but this does not mean that He is ontologically greater, since the Father and the Son are one in essence and being. To give an analogy: In the army, a General is positionally greater than a Private, since a General is of higher rank than a Private. This does not mean, however, that the General is a greater person than the Private, as all men are equally created in the image of God (cf. Genesis 1:26).

What this demonstrates is an important rule in interpreting texts pertaining to the person of Jesus Christ: Difference in function does not indicate inferiority of nature. This is a common mistake made by those who assume Unitarianism. As Alan Kurschner (a contributor to Alpha and Omega Ministries) explains,

There is a built-in assumption for many that if Jesus has a lesser role than the Father, he must therefore have a lesser nature. This is an illogical inference. Those who oppose the deity of Christ point to Jesus' submissive remarks about doing the will of his Father. For example, Jesus says, "the Father is greater than I am." They infer from this that Jesus does not share the same nature with the Father (this ignores that the context is talking about their relational roles, not their nature, John 14). Jesus also calls the Father, "My God." Yet those who oppose the deity of Christ ignore that this is a humble acknowledgment of the Incarnate Jesus, modeling for us humility and submissiveness (John 20:17). This exalting affirmation is exactly what we would expect from the Son of God.

Similarly, since Jesus is the agent of the Father in many respects such as the Creation, therefore Jesus cannot be fully God. And regarding the Spirit, they will make the similar false assumption: Since the Spirit is sent by the Father, the Spirit cannot have the same divine nature as the Father. Again, they will look at these statements and make the fallacious leap that difference in function indicates inferiority of nature.

By doing so, they also deny the freedom of the Divine persons to choose their roles. Or to put it another way: they assume that to be truly God, the Son and the Spirit must have the exact same roles as the Father. Do not allow them to accept this assumption. Probe them to ensure they see this point.

(Kurschner, Alan. Two Quick Apologetic Tips on the Trinity.)

I will deal with just one more proof text:

And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

(John 17:3)

Well of course Jesus would say there is only one true God! We're monotheists! Unfortunately, those who quote this passage once again miss the entire point of the high priestly prayer (In the first place, what does it even mean for eternal life to know two persons? Can you imagine anybody saying that eternal life is to know Abraham, or Moses, or David?). It helps to read the next two verses that come afterward:

I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.

(John 17:4-5)

Did you hear that? Before God could share His glory with anybody else (cf. John 17:22), Jesus already shared glory with the Father and was by His side (once again echoing John 1:1). Now how could this be, when the Old Testament states that God gives His glory to no other (cf. Isaiah 42:8, 48:11)? The only way this passage can be interpreted consistently is if we conclude that the Father and the Son are one in Being.

In any case, there are many similar proof texts being offered up by Muslims, Jehovah's Witnesses and others who deny the deity of Christ. Needless to say, the same rules apply to those texts as the ones that apply to the ones I just cited. Always make sure to pay close attention to the context of the passages being cited, as you will often find that the context demolishes their entire argument.

Further Reading

• Bowman, Robert and Ed Komoszewski - Putting Jesus in His Place: The Case for the Deity of Christ
• Warfield, Benjamin - The Lord of Glory: A Classic Defense of the Deity of Jesus Christ
• White, James - The Forgotten Trinity: Recovering the Heart of Christian Belief

The Lord of Glory (Sermon)

Sermon Title:

The Lord of Glory

Sermon Text:

Jesus answered, "If I glorify Myself, My glory is nothing; it is My Father who glorifies Me, of whom you say, 'He is our God'; and you have not come to know Him, but I know Him; and if I say that I do not know Him, I will be a liar like you, but I do know Him and keep His word. Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad." So the Jews said to Him, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?" Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am." Therefore they picked up stones to throw at Him, but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple.

(John 8:54-49, NASB)

Sermon Proposition:

The identity of the person of Jesus Christ is at the very heart of our entire Christian faith, and those who compromise or reject the biblical truth on this issue do so at great risk to the state of their eternal souls.

Bible translations used:

AMP – Amplified Bible

ESV – English Standard Version

NASB – New American Standard Bible

NWT – New World Translation

First of all, I would like to ask you all two questions. My first question is this: How many of you here have had encounters with Jehovah’s Witnesses, Latter-Day Saints or other cultic groups? Raise your hands if you have.

(Wait for people to raise hands)

All right, that’s cool. I’ve had some encounters with some of them myself. In fact, over the summer last year I’ve had extended conversations with a Jehovah’s Witness who lives in my apartment building, and I’ve been able to procure several copies of their Watchtower magazine. Now, you don’t have to answer my second question out loud, but try to sort the question out in your own minds. The question is: Why is it that we reject fellowship with Latter-Day Saints, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Unitarians and other such groups even though they profess to be Christians?

(Wait three seconds)

Now, you could point to various errors that they teach, but I would contend that the primary heresy these groups have that becomes the source of most their other errors is in their fundamentally flawed idea of who Jesus Christ is. The Church of the Latter-Day Saints believes that Jesus is a deified man, just one among many celestial gods. The Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that He is the archangel Michael; the greatest of God’s creations, but nonetheless only a creation. Still, the Unitarians believe that He is a great moral teacher, but is not substantially equal to the Father. And I understand that this is a very pluralistic society, so it is tempting to downplay these things and pretend that it doesn’t really matter. I mean, we can all agree to disagree, right? Well, if we are to proclaim the gospel of God, we simply cannot take that kind of attitude.

What I propose to you, brothers and sisters, is that the identity of the person of Jesus Christ is at the very heart of our entire Christian faith, and those who compromise or reject the biblical truth on this issue do so at great risk to the state of their eternal souls. The Lord Jesus Himself suggests this all throughout the scriptures, and especially in the Gospel of John. In fact, this affirmation of who Christ is appears right in the beginning of that Gospel: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.” (John 1:1-3, ESV) Just prior to the passage that was recited for us, Jesus said to the unbelieving Jews, “I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins." (John 8:24, ESV).

Now, here is a helpful little piece of trivia: There is really no “He” in that passage. Jesus is actually saying, “For unless you believe that I AM you will die in your sins.” This parallels verse 58 where He says, “Before Abraham was, I AM.” For those who are not familiar with this reference, it is an allusion to Exodus 3:14, wherein God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM"; and He said, "Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, 'I AM has sent me to you.' (NASB). Now, those who deny that Jesus is God in the flesh would try to mistranslate John 8:58 to obscure the obvious. For example, if you’ve ever gotten your hands on the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ New World Translation, you will find that they will make Jesus say “Before Abraham came into existence, I have been” (NWT). They also mistranslate Exodus 3:14 by making God say, “I SHALL PROVE TO BE WHAT I SHALL PROVE TO BE.” (NWT). Makes no sense now, does it? If, however, you were able to check John 8:58 in the original Greek and compared it with the Greek Septuagint translation of Exodus 3:14, you’ll find out that they use the exact same phrase: εγω ειμι, I AM. Besides, look at how the Jews respond to Him: “Therefore they picked up stones to throw at Him, but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple” (John 8:59, NASB). If there was no connection between what Jesus says in verse 58 and the “I am” statement in Exodus 3:14, then the response of the Jews would no longer make any sense in its context. This shows the futility of any attempt to escape the implications of Jesus’ clear statements concerning who He is and where He has come from.

And by the way, there are a few I am statements that appear in the synoptic gospels as well. For example, Jesus in the trial before the Sanhedrin, when asked if He is the son of God, says "I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven" (Mark 14:62, ESV). In the gospel of Luke, the statement is shortened to “It is just as you say; I AM.” (Luke 22:70, AMP). In both cases, the phrase for “I am” is the exact same phrase, εγω ειμι. This is significant, because no other character in the entire Bible utilizes the phrase “I am” in this exact same way. Anytime any other character in the bible says “I am…”, it is either phrased differently (such as in 1 Corinthians 15:10) or it is stated in such a way that it is obvious that the person in question is making no claims to deity (such as in 1 Timothy 1:15). This is significant, for how does the Sanhedrin respond to Jesus’ statements? They responded: “‘What further need do we have of witnesses? You have heard the blasphemy; how does it seem to you?’ And they all condemned Him to be deserving of death. Some began to spit at Him, and to blindfold Him, and to beat Him with their fists, and to say to Him, ‘Prophesy!’ And the officers received Him with slaps in the face” (Mark 14:63-65, NASB).

Thus we see that these cults who deny that Jesus is truly God fall into the same fatal error that the Jewish people fell into back in Jesus’ own day. For unless we confess, as the apostle Thomas did, that Jesus Christ is “our Lord and our God” (John 20:28, paraphrased), how can His propitiatory sacrifice on the cross be infinitely sufficient to cover over all of our sins? See, our Soteriology hangs totally on our Christology (I’m assuming that you all still remember what those two terms mean): For Jesus to save us, He must be truly God, as well as truly man; otherwise His death cannot be sufficient to save us. This is not a minor issue. This is not theological nitpicking. This is at the very heart of the gospel, for the One who was nailed upon the tree, we proclaim to be “our great God and Savior” (Titus 2:13). Without this critical proclamation of the divinity of Jesus Christ, we shall be left without any gospel of grace at all.

And it is for this reason that we confess, in the words of the great Nicene Creed, that: "We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father; through him all things were made.” So, here I stand, I can do no other. Jesus Christ is the Lord of Glory, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. I stake my eternal destiny on Him, and I would dare not compromise on this great biblical truth. To those who deny this, or would think of even deserting this great confession of ours, it should suffice to point out the warning that Paul gave to the Galatians against those who would dare to pervert the Gospel: “But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to and different from that which we preached to you, let him be accursed (anathema, devoted to destruction, doomed to eternal punishment)! As we said before, so I now say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel different from or contrary to that which you received [from us], let him be accursed…” (Galatians 1:8-9, AMP).

Maranatha, our Lord Jesus come. Amen!

Jesus, the Gospels, Gnosticism and Historical Revisionism (Part 3)

(Continued from Part Two)

One common misconception about the Gnostic gospels is that they portray a purely human Jesus, whereas the four Canonical Gospels make Him more "godlike." This piece of historical revisionism is somewhat ironic given the actual facts regarding Gnosticism and the content of the Gnostic gospels

What must be remembered about the Gnostics is that they held to a dualistic view of the world; for them, physical matter is evil and spirit is good. Thus, when they wrote about Jesus, they actually tended to downplay His humanity or deny it altogether. Docetism, a heretical viewpoint that denies Jesus' humanity, claiming that He only appeared to have a physical body (hence the term Docetic, from the Greek δοκέω, meaning "to seem.") and thus incapable of feeling pain and other feelings. By contrast, the Canonical Gospels fully acknowledged Christ's human nature, while simultaneously affirming that He also has a divine nature.

Below are a couple of quotes from the Gospel of Thomas. It is to be noted that unlike the rest of the writings quoted, the Gospel of Thomas came much earlier than most of them and is not fully Gnostic. In fact, some of the sayings in Thomas are variations of what Jesus really said in the Canonical Gospels, and thus may be considered orthodox. Now, some people have erroneously claimed that Thomas presents an unadorned portrait of Jesus as being merely human. This, however, is not the case. There are statements in Thomas that portray Christ as being much more than an ordinary human being. For example, there is the exchange between Jesus and Thomas in saying 13:

Jesus said to his disciples, "Compare me to something and tell me what I am like." Simon Peter said to him, "You are like a just messenger." Matthew said to him, "You are like a wise philosopher." Thomas said to him, "Teacher, my mouth is utterly unable to say what you are like." Jesus said, "I am not your teacher. Because you have drunk, you have become intoxicated from the bubbling spring that I have tended." And he took him, and withdrew, and spoke three sayings to him. When Thomas came back to his friends they asked him, "What did Jesus say to you?" Thomas said to them, "If I tell you one of the sayings he spoke to me, you will pick up rocks and stone me, and fire will come from the rocks and devour you."

(The Gospel of Thomas. Saying 13.)

And then there is this statement in saying 77:

Jesus said, "I am the light that is over all things. I am all: from me all came forth, and to me all attained. Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there."

(The Gospel of Thomas. Saying 77.)

The Gnostic texts that come later than Thomas go even further than this. For example, in the Apocalypse of Peter, distinction is made between the human being who is nailed to the cross and the heavenly Christ. The former is nailed to the cross, while the latter raises Himself above the human being, laughing:

When he had said those things, I saw him seemingly being seized by them. And I said "What do I see, O Lord? That it is you yourself whom they take, and that you are grasping me? Or who is this one, glad and laughing on the tree? And is it another one whose feet and hands they are striking?"

The Savior said to me, "He whom you saw on the tree, glad and laughing, this is the living Jesus. But this one into whose hands and feet they drive the nails is his fleshly part, which is the substitute being put to shame, the one who came into being in his likeness. But look at him and me."

(The Apocalypse of Peter.)

And then there is the Gospel of Philip. In this gospel, Jesus is portrayed as a shape-shifter who is able to change His appearance at will. This accords well with the Docetic view that Jesus didn't really have an actual physical body:

Jesus took them all by stealth, for he did not appear as he was, but in the manner in which they would be able to see him. He appeared to them all. He appeared to the great as great. He appeared to the small as small. He appeared to the angels as an angel, and to men as a man. Because of this, his word hid itself from everyone. Some indeed saw him, thinking that they were seeing themselves, but when he appeared to his disciples in glory on the mount, he was not small. He became great, but he made the disciples great, that they might be able to see him in his greatness.

(The Gospel of Philip.)

And there is the Gospel of Truth, which affirms the eternality of the Jesus as the Son, and bestows exalted titles upon Jesus, such as "the name:"

And the name of the Father is the Son. It is he who, in the beginning, gave a name to him who came forth from him - he is the same one - and he begat him for a son. He gave him his name which belonged to him - he, the Father, who possesses everything which exists around him. He possess the name; he has the son. It is possible for them to see him. The name, however, is invisible, for it alone is the mystery of the invisible about to come to ears completely filled with it through the Father`s agency. Moreover, as for the Father, his name is not pronounced, but it is revealed through a son. Thus, then, the name is great.

(The Gospel of Truth.)

There are many more such texts that present similar views, but it will suffice to present these as sufficient evidence that the Gnostic Gospels are too slender a reed to support the weight that is being accorded to them by modern conspiracy theorists and historical revisionists.

Conclusion

In summary, it has been shown that 1) the deity of Christ is not a late invention, but is an apostolic tradition dating to the earliest days of Christianity, 2) the fourfold Gospel is also an apostolic tradition, and cannot reasonably be said to have originated in Nicaea in any way, and 3) the so-called "Gospels" that were written by the Gnostics do not portray Christ in a the manner that popular conspiracies would have you think. It would do the reader well to do more careful research on this matter and see what the truth behind the Christian faith really is. For more information, books such as The Missing Gospels and Reinventing Jesus are very helpful in presenting clear and accurate information on these topics.

In Christ,

Fisher.

Monica Dennington Slips Further Into Heresy

But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.
(2 Peter 2:1-3)

Jesus, the Gospels, Gnosticism and Historical Revisionism (Part 1)

Because Constantine upgraded Jesus' status almost four centuries after Jesus' death, thousands of documents already existed chronicling His life as a mortal man. To rewrite the history books, Constantine knew he would need a bold stroke. From this sprang the most profound moment in Christian history... Constantine commissioned and financed a new Bible, which omitted those gospels that spoke of Christ's human traits and embellished those gospels that made Him godlike. The earlier gospels were outlawed, gathered up, and burned.
(Brown, Dan. The Da Vinci Code. Doubleday, 2003. p. 234)

The above quote, taken from the popular (and controversial) Da Vinci Code, echoes a popular sentiment that has been oft-stated by conspiracy theorists, skeptics, certain liberal theologians and even Muslims (the Islamic propaganda video The Divine Book quotes the above passage nearly verbatim, as though Dan Brown was somehow a scholarly source). Yet pretty much every single statement that has been packed within that single paragraph is fraught with historical errors, and almost none of it is factually accurate.

First off, Constantine lived three centuries after Jesus walked this earth. He did not "upgrade Jesus' status." In fact, Constantine didn't even care what the results of the council of Nicaea would be to begin with. He just wanted the clergy to agree. As Philip Schaff notes,

In the year 325, as patron of the church, he summoned the council of Nice, and himself attended it; banished the Arians, though he afterwards recalled them; and, in his monarchical spirit of uniformity, showed great zeal for the settlement of all theological disputes, while he was blind to their deep significance.

(Schaff, Philip. History of the Christian Church, Volume III: Nicene and Post-Nicene Christianity. A.D. 311-600.)

Also, the deity of Christ did not originate with Constantine, or with Nicaea. It has always been affirmed by the early church. For example, within the epistles of the apostle Paul, one may find multiple affirmations of Christ's deity:

For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily.
(Colossians 2:9, ESV)

...waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ...
(Titus 2:13, ESV)

Though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
(Philippians 2:6-8, ESV)

And lest anybody object to the citing of Paul, it must be remembered that Paul was actually in contact with the other apostles. The apostle Peter, for one, approved of Paul's writings (2peter 3:15-16), and even made his own affirmation of the deity of Christ:

To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
(2 Peter 1:1, ESV)

Also keep in mind that Paul wasn't really adding any innovations, but was rather repeating what had already been handed down to him by the Jewish Christians he met in Antioch and Jerusalem. In fact, it has been recognized that Philippians 2:5-11, also known as the Carmen Christi, is actually from a tradition that predates Paul's conversion. It is most likely an early Christian hymn. If so, this is strong evidence that Jesus was acknowledged as God in human flesh from the very beginning. (For more information on this one, I strongly recommend getting a copy of The Forgotten Trinity by Dr. James White.)

Aside from the New Testament epistles, the writings of the early church fathers also provide strong evidence for the antiquity of the belief in deity of Christ. For example, there is the testimony of Ignatius of Antioch (ca. 35-108 or 117 AD). In his epistles, he writes:

There is one Physician who is possessed both of flesh and spirit; both made and not made; God existing in flesh; true life in death; both of Mary and of God; first passible and then impassible,— even Jesus Christ our Lord.
(Ignatius of Antioch. Epistle to the Ephesians. ch. 7.)

Hence every kind of magic was destroyed, and every bond of wickedness disappeared; ignorance was removed, and the old kingdom abolished, God Himself being manifested in human form for the renewal of eternal life.
(Ignatius of Antioch. Epistle to the Ephesians. ch. 19.)

If any one says there is one God, and also confesses Christ Jesus, but thinks the Lord to be a mere man, and not the only-begotten God, and Wisdom, and the Word of God, and deems Him to consist merely of a soul and body, such an one is a serpent, that preaches deceit and error for the destruction of men.
(Ignatius of Antioch. Epistle to the Philadelphians. ch. 6.)

For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. For our God, Jesus Christ, now that He is with the Father, is all the more revealed [in His glory].
(Ignatius of Antioch. Epistle to the Romans. ch. 3.)

(Important note: There are quite a few forged epistles floating around that are alleged to have been written by Ignatius of Antioch. For this reason, I have taken care to quote only from those epistles which are considered to be his real writings.)

And then there is ante-Nicene epistle known as 2 Clement. Admittedly, this is not regarded as a genuine epistle of Clement, as Clement died around the end of the first century, whereas 2 Clement was written until around 140-160 AD. Nevertheless, this epistle is still early enough to be considered a valid witness to the faith of the Apostolic church. In it, the author writes,

Brethren, we ought so to think of our Lord Jesus Christ as of God, as of the judge of quick and dead, and we ought not to think meanly concerning our salvation.
(2nd Clement. 1:2.)

And then there is the witness of Justin Martyr (Ca. 100-165 AD), who is considered to be one of the first of the great Christian apologists. In his First Apology, he writes,

Our teacher of these things is Jesus Christ, who also was born for this purpose, and was crucified under Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judæa, in the times of Tiberius Cæsar; and that we reasonably worship Him, having learned that He is the Son of the true God Himself, and holding Him in the second place, and the prophetic Spirit in the third, we will prove.
(Justin Martyr. First Apology. ch. 13.)

It is interesting to note that the quotation above is an early expression of the Holy Trinity. Although the structure of the doctrine did not fully develop until the fourth century, we can see that primitive strands of Trinitarian thought already existed in the earliest days of the church.

And finally, we have Melito of Sardis (? -180 AD). Much of his work has been lost, though we have been able to locate one of his sermons, which is now known as the Peri Pascha. This sermon is quite significant, as it displays an elevated Christology:

The one who hung the earth in space, is himself hanged; the one who fixed the heavens in place, is himself impaled; the one who firmly fixed all things, is himself firmly fixed to the tree. The Lord is insulted, God has been murdered, the King of Israel has been destroyed by the right hand of Israel.
(Melito of Sardis. Peri Pascha. v. 96.)

He continues,

This is the one who made the heavens and the earth, and who in the beginning created man, who was proclaimed through the law and prophets, who became human via the virgin, who was hanged upon a tree, who was buried in the earth, who was resurrected from the dead, and who ascended to the heights of heaven, who sits at the right hand of the Father, who has authority to judge and to save everything, through whom the Father created everything from the beginning of the world to the end of the age.

This is the alpha and the omega. This is the beginning and the end–an indescribable beginning and an incomprehensible end. This is the Christ. This is the king. This is Jesus. This is the general. This is the Lord. This is the one who rose up from the dead. This is the one who sits at the right hand of the Father. He bears the Father and is borne by the Father, to whom be the glory and the power forever. Amen.
(Melito of Sardis. Peri Pascha. vv. 104-105.)

Thus, we can see that the proof is irrefutable that Christ has always been acknowledged as God. This was not an invention of the 3rd or 4th centuries, but is the apostolic witness, and is thus part and parcel of the faith which has been delivered to the saints.

So much for the "thousands of documents already exist[ing] chronicling His life as a mortal man."

(Continue to Part Two)

Is the Trinity Biblical? (Video)

My brief reply to Monica Dennington.

Description

In light of recent denials of the doctrine of the Trinity, generally under the pretense that the doctrine is not clearly stated in the Bible, I present this short video demonstrating a few of the basic points that comprise the doctrine of the Trinity, and the scriptural basis for them. This is to give the viewer a basic where and how the Trinity is derived from the Holy Scriptures.

This is not a comprehensive video. Most (though not all) of the key texts are presented, and are allowed to speak for themselves. If anybody has any comments, suggestions, or objections regarding the Trinitarian exegesis of these passages, by all means, say so in the comment box.

By the way, some of the slides may move faster than others, and I apologize for that. Simply pause the video at those places where you think it may be moving too fast.

All scripture quotations are taken from the ESV.
Music is of the hymn "Holy Holy Holy."

Monica Dennington Now Denies the Trinity

This is the end result of having NO spiritual discernment or proper biblical training whatsoever...

For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. (2 Timothy 4:3-4)

Examining The Pagan Christ: Part Six

This is a dissection of certain sections of chapter eight of the book. At this point, Mr. Harpur begins to exhaust his information, as a lot of the chapter basically repeats the same claims he has already made numerous times in earlier chapters of his book. Thus, I will concentrate mainly on the claims that are more specific to this chapter. First:

As scholars of the controversial California-based Jesus Seminar have pointed out, some twenty gospels of various kinds have come down to us either in whole or in pieces from the first three centuries of the common era, but only four ended up included in the New Testament. The seminar, founded in 1985 by Robert Funk, now consists of a group of over seventy-five internationally recognized biblical scholars who are experts in a wide variety of fields, from ancient history to archaeology. Sifting through the Gospels and the Book of Acts, grading the various sayings and deeds of Jesus according to their probability of authenticity, they have produced a very different “man” from the figure that is the icon of orthodox Christianity. In their findings, Jesus had a human father whose name may not have been Joseph; he was born not in Bethlehem but in Nazareth; he was an itinerant sage who liked the company of social outcasts; he healed many psychosomatic illnesses; he did not walk on water, feed the crowd with miraculous meals, change water into wine, or raise the dead. In their view, there was no empty tomb; belief in the Resurrection is based on the visionary experiences of Peter, Mary and later, Paul. Jesus did not, in their view, preach that he would come again. [1]

The Jesus Seminar is pretty far out there when it comes to biblical scholarship (though to be fair, they're nowhere near as bad as some of the really, really fringe writers I've encountered). If you're not familiar with their "scholarship" methods, they basically vote on the authenticity of the Gospel texts using different coloured beads, with the different colours representing different views as to each verse's authenticity. The texts that they identify as "authentic" are based on preconceived ideas that Jesus could not have done such-and-such an act or have said such-and-such a saying, and thus you arrived at a very skewed position that doesn't even reflect the views of the consensus of scholars. [2]

Of course, this does not bother Mr. Harpur at all, as he is willing to grasp at anything he can in order to try and vindicate his ideas regarding Jesus and the Gospels. Funny enough, he praises the Jesus Seminar when their findings support his conclusions, but he reproaches them when they disagree with him on the historicity of Christ:

The chief flaw in the entire Jesus Seminar approach, however, is that like the fundamentalists, the scholars of the Jesus Seminar seem stuck with the mistaken view that they are ultimately dealing with history. If they could only strip away all accretions and get back to the kernel or core1 But myth treated as history invariably falls apart. Instead of a powerful spiritual message, they have ended up with scraps of “stones for bread.”

The truth is that the earliest documents available to the seminar scholars are some tiny fragments of a papyrus copy of John’s Gospel, dating to about 130 C.E. The first substantial physical evidence for the four Gospels comes from near the end of the second century C.E., about 170 years after Jesus’ demise. But even then, as the seminar’s leaders point out, “hard information” is lacking as to how, when, and by whom they were actually composed or edited. [3]

Mr. Harpur, does it not bother you that the majority of scholars--even these supposedly far-left liberal ones who scoff at the idea of a supernatural Jesus--admit that Jesus Christ really is a historical figure? This is the reason why I find the Jesus Mythicist position to be so untenable: There is simply no foundation for it, historical or otherwise. Only by stretching the facts beyond any reasonable interpretation can somebody even come close to the kind of position that Mr. Harpur is espousing, and rebuttals to his work such as these bear witness to that fact.

Also, Mr. Harpur tries to make much of the fact that the earliest complete codices we have of the Gospels appear nearly two centuries after Christ. If you compare this with other ancient works that have an even greater age disparity (not to mention fewer manuscripts to back them up), the reliability of the Gospel texts is actually very impressive. As biblical scholar K.A. Kitchen writes:

Among works of classical (Greek and Latin) literature, the writings of the New Testament--4 gospels, 21 letters, the history of Acts and visions of Revelation--have a manuscript attestation second to none, and superior to most. No one blinks an eyelid at depending for the Latin text of Julius Caesar's Gallic Ware (Composed within 58-56 BC) upon manuscripts all of which are 900 years later than Caesar's time, only nine or ten of the manuscripts being good textual copies. No-one doubts that we still read the real text of the works of Herodotus or Tucydides (450 BC), even though the oldest available full manuscripts (only eight or so) date from 1,300 years later! For the New Testament, how different and how vastly superior is the manuscript evidence. Some 5,000 Greek MSS (whole or fragmentary) are known, not a mere eight or ten. The most notable MSS are the Codexes Vaticanus and Sinaiticus of c. 350 AD--only 250 years after the end of the New Testament period (100 AD), not 900 or 1,300 years! Older still are the Chester Beatty and Bodmer biblical papyri, including six new Testament MSS of the second and third centuries AD, only 150 years after the New Testament period. Further back still, there is a Rylands fragment from a manuscript of John's Gospel (18:31-33, 37f.) datable by its script to about 130 AD--little more than a generation after the New Testament period itself. As this fragment came from Egypt, it is evident that John's gospel had been composed, recopied and begun to circulate well beyond Palestine before 130 AD. Hence, on this evidence alone, it must have been composed (at latest) by 90/100 AD, and more probably earlier. [4]

If you are going to cast doubt on the Gospel texts, you might as well be completely consistent and cast doubt on pretty much everything else that had also been written during that time period. Next:

Notice that the Gospel of Thomas, discovered with other Gnostic writings at Nag Hammadi in Egypt in 1945, was purely made up of sayings attributed to Jesus. It had no Passion or Resurrection story. The same is true of the hypothetical “Q,” a “sayings” source believed to have been used by both Matthew and Luke. [5]

As Mr. Harpur has himself just admitted, "Q" is just a hypothesis. We have no manuscript evidence of such a writing actually existing, so one can hardly make a good case out of it. Also, most of the so-called "Gnostic Gospels" are written way after the canonical gospels. The Gospel of Thomas is dated to around the middle of the 2nd century. The other Gnostic gospels are much later than that. It should be obvious from reading these "gospels" that they contain a lot of late (not to mention heretical) ideas, speculations and blatant mythologizing that is conspicuously absent from the canonical gospels. Finally, Tom Harpur takes issue with the Gospels being biographies:

The point is that while on the surface the Gospels appear to be a form of biography combined with proclamation, closer examination reveals that they are not biographies at all. They are extraordinarily imprecise or vague just at the places where we would most expect explicit details. We know nothing about Jesus’ appearance from these texts—the colour of his skin or his eyes, his approximate height or size, whether he was bearded or clean-shaven, whether he had long hair or was balding, and so on. We’re left wholly guessing about his date of birth and the year he died, even about whether he was married or single. Because of the vast silence about the years between his birth and the beginning of the ministry (apart from Luke’s legend-like story about Jesus’ visiting the temple at the age of twelve for his bar mitzvah), volumes have been filled with speculations that grow wilder with passing time. There are legends about supposed visits to England; mystical sojourns in Egypt, Tibet, India; and much more. Credulous souls who have great difficulty discerning evidence from fanciful conjecture flock to buy each latest embroidery on this theme.[6]

That's how they wrote biographies back then. The writers didn't feel the need to represent every detail of every part of a person's life, or even place the events of their lives in chronological order. They only concentrated on those important details that they wanted to highlight and make known to readers. The plain fact of the matter is that the Gospel writers only wrote as much as was necessary for them to convey. [7]

Also, The last sentence of this paragraph I can actually agree with. A lot of people nowadays are very gullible, and will buy into the latest fad theories that they encounter (case in point: The movie "Zeitgeist"). That aside, I'm still not seeing a solid case being presented by Mr. Harpur. If there is any compelling reason why anybody should accept his thesis, I have yet to see it.

End Notes
1. Harpur, Tom. The Pagan Christ. 2004. p. 138.
2. Strobel, Lee. The Case for Christ. Zondervan, 1998. p. 114-118.
3. Harpur, Tom. The Pagan Christ. 2004. p. 138-139.
4. Kitchen, Kenneth Anderson. The Bible and Its World. InterVarsity Press, 1977. p. 131.
5. Harpur, Tom. The Pagan Christ. 2004. p. 140.
6. Ibid, p. 144.
7. Strobel, Lee. The Case for Christ. Zondervan, 1998. p. 25-26.

Further Reading

• Sophia De Morgan - Gnostic Nonsense: A Critical Review of Elaine Pagels’ The Gnostic Gospels
  
• Sophia De Morgan - Beyond Credibility: A Critical Review of Elaine Pagels’ Beyond Belief

(Since Mr. Harpur cites Elaine Pagels as a source in this chapter of his book, I thought I'd post a couple of critiques on her work as well.)

Examining The Pagan Christ: Part Five

I have just recently gone through the seventh chapter of Tom Harpur's The Pagan Christ. At this point, he gets into the historicity of the bible in general, and ends up dismissing most -if not all- of the stories in the old and new testaments as pious myths. Here are the statements made by Tom Harpur in that chapter:

The lead article in the March 2002 issue of the prestigious Harper's magazine, titled "False Testament," bluntly stated that archaeology now refutes the Bible's claim to history. Over the past several years, dispute over biblical historicity has marked scholarly conferences and been the focus of articles in The New York Times and U.S. News and World Report, a cover story in the December 2002 issue of Maclean's magazine, and a hard-hitting piece by the archaeologist Ze'ev Herzog in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz. But the Harper's expose, by the journalist Daniel Lazare, was the most trenchant, current account I have seen yet.

Citing the most recent evidence (or rather, for the most part, the lack of it), Lazare pulled the foundation out from under almost every major historical beam in the edifice of accepted wisdom about everything from the existence of Abraham and the other biblical patriarchs to the Exodus from Egypt, the supposed gories of Kings David and Solomon, and even the reputed conquest of the Promised Land (Canaan).[1]

The way it is written sounds very sensationalistic, especially when you get to the part where he talks about Lazare "pulling the foundation out from under every major historical beam in the edifice of accepted wisdom". The fact that these things are being published in popular (oftentimes Liberal) magazines and newspapers rather than scholarly scientific journals should already be enough to raise some red flags. Further on, he writes:

Lazare stated baldly that on the basis of his research and a survey of current scholarship, he'd concluded that all of this is "bosh." In the past quarter century, he said, archaeologists have seen "one settled assumption over who the ancient Israelites were and where they came proved false." Instead of a band of invaders who conquered Canaan, "the Israelites are now thought to have been an indigenous culture that developed west of the Jordan River around 1200 B.C.E."

The epic stories of Abraham, Isaac, and the other patriarchs "appear to have been spliced... out of various pieces of local lore." The whole account of David's empire is now viewed as "an invention of Jerusalem-based priests in the seventh and eighth centuries B.C.E. who were keen to burnish their national history," he wrote. (By the way, a study of comparative religions shows that all ancient peoples did the same.)

According to Lazare's findings, Jewish monotheism--that is, the exclusive worship of a Semitic deity called YHWA--didn't fully "coalesce" until sometime between an Assyrian conquest of the northern kingdom of Israel in 722 B.C.E. and the Babylonian conquest of the southern kingdom of Judah in 586. The Bible indicates this happened much earlier. As we shall discover, the true origins appeared in Egyptian religious thought.

The situation gets even more problematic for the traditionalists in every camp. Abraham, as Kuhn had long insisted, was utterly mythological. "Not only is there no evidence that any such figure as Abraham ever lived but archaeologists believe that there is no way such a figure could have lived given what we now know about Israelite origins," Lazare wrote. In other words, as Kuhn said much earlier, he was a leading figure in the larger myth.[2]

Just so you know folks, it's YHWH, not YHWA. There is no Hebrew equivalent for the letter A, or any of the vowels, for that matter. Also, if the Exodus never occurred, that just makes you wonder how "Egyption religious thought" could have influenced the religious thought of the Israelites.

Now, he claims that there is no archaeological evidence that Abraham was a real historical figure, a position that is held only by a small minority of historians and archaeologists, not to mention certain sensationalistic journalists. In reality, we do have extra-biblical corroboration for the existence of Abraham. In particular, there is a record that comes from the reign of Pharaoh Sheshonq I, whom many scholars equate with the biblical Shishak (1 Kings 11:40, 14:25-26). In an inscription found in the Temple of Amun in Karnak, there is a mention of "The fort [or fortified town] of Abraham," which is located in the Negev desert, and has been equated by some scholars with Beersheba, a city founded by Abraham (Genesis 21:32-33). This is due to the fact that both are found in the Negev, it is unexplainable that a city as prominent as Beersheba could have been omitted from the Pharaoh's records, unless it is the very same city that is called Fort Abram by the Egyptians. [3]

Moving on, we have Harpur quoting Lazare to further disprove the Exodus, as well as the existence of David and Solomon. Here he says:

And Lazare didn't stop there. The Exodus never occurred, he asserted, a conclusion he based upon a growing body of evidence about ancient Egyptian border defences, desert sites where the fleeing Israelites allegedly camped, and so on. The Old Testament description of Canaan thus "turns out to be fictional as well."

King David, said by the Bible to have been a mighty potentate and empire builder, "was rather a freebooter who carved out what was at most a small duchy in the southern highlands around Jerusalem and Hebron." In fact, there are some archaeologists today who maintain, because of the absence of concrete evidence, that he too never existed. The name of David appears on one lone inscription on a stone block, or stele, from the ninth century B.C.E., and that's all there is. As Lazare points out, "If David and Solomon had been important regional power brokers, one might reasonably expect their names to crop up on monuments and in the diplomatic correspondence of the day. Yet, once again, the record is silent.

Fundamentalists once took delight in evidence from the 1930s that the walls of Jericho had on one occasion fallen down, much as the Book of Joshua describes. However, Lazare reminds readers that the British archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon, in more recent times, has demonstrated from pottery shards in the ruins that the destruction occurred no later 1300 B.C.E., almost a hundred years before the conquest (if there was one) could have happened. Joshua may well not have "fit the battle of Jericho" after all.[4]

The argument from silence is not a very good one. Besides, one inscription alone should be enough to prove that there was a historical David. Remember that archaeological records from the bronze/iron age aren't always well preserved. For example, the writings of certain figures as Aristotle (384-322 B.C.E.), Thucydides (460-395 B.C.E.) and Julius Caesar (100-44 B.C.E.) are only preserved in a few manuscripts (no more than 5-10 in number each), and these manuscripts are from anywhere between nine to fourteen centuries after these characters lived, yet we do not question that they existed as historical figures. [5]

Thus, it would be too biased if anybody was to apply a different standard on the Bible and the figures mentioned therein. If we were to apply such a standard consistently, then we don't know what anybody from back then said or did, and we wouldn't know if any of the major historical figures of that period even existed!

Also, if the archaeological findings on Jericho disprove anything, it is only that Jericho fell later than 1300 B.C.E. We do not have a definite date for the conquest, so it could well have occurred before the aforementioned date. In fact, archaeology does support the idea of an Israelite conquest. According to Dr. David Livingston, "Cultural changes favor an early (1400 BC) Conquest." He quotes Frederic Brandfon, one of the staff at the Beer-Sheba excavation, who makes this statement:

. . . most of the [Iron Age] villages were established prior to the destruction of the urban centers on the nearby tells. . . . Villages so characteristic of the Israelite settlement period began at a time when the Late Bronze Age cities had not yet been destroyed. The resulting archaeological picture is one of cultural overlapping, with urban and rural settlements existing side by side. . . . Sites typical of the Late Bronze Age -- the Canaanite cities -- and sites characteristic of the Iron Age -- the Early Iron Age villages are now known to have been contemporary. In relative terms, the Iron Age appears to have begun earlier than previously suspected. The excavations of the village sites has raised the date for the beginning of the Iron Age, while the Lachish and Tel Sera inscriptions have lowered the date for the end of the Late Bronze Age. The result is a broad range of overlap between what is commonly known as the "Late Bronze Age" and the "Early Iron Age" lasting almost 100 years, from about 1230 to 1150 B.C.E. [6]

"This," according to Dr. Livingston, "admirably addresses the situation of Israel living in the countryside in tents while the towns and cities remained Canaanite, but were gradually taken over by Israelites." (link)

Moving on, we have a rather ridiculous assertion coming from Kuhn, who is quoted extensively by Mr. Harpur:

In The lost Light, Kuhn makes some startling comments on Abraham, who he says categorically was never a historical figure. Kuhn even unlocks the meaning of the patriarch's name, A-Brahm, arguing it is a combination of the alpha privative (as in the words "armoral" and "anoxia" and Brahm (as in Vedic or Hindu), and means, therefore, "not Brahm." He writes that "Abraham the patriarch, or oldest of the emanations, was not Brahm, the Hindu supreme deity, Brahma, the absolute, but the first emenation from Brahm. He was the first life that was not Absolute, but from the Absolute, a kind of demi-god, or sun God." [7]

This theory of emanations sounds like something out of Gnosticism. That aside, the problem with the assertion made by Kuhn (and Harpur by quoting him) is that Abraham is a Hebrew name, while the alpha privative is a feature of the Greek language, and Brahm comes from the Hindus, who lived way too far away to have possibly exerted any influence on Jewish religious thought. It is way too much of a stretch to assert that these two somehow influenced the Hebrew tongue to produce the name "A-brahm".

The same method is used again by Harpur on the names of Lazarus and of the town of Bethany (John 11:1 ff). Notice the amount of grammatical stretching and amalgamating of different (sometimes unrelated) languages that he resorts to in his "scholarly analysis:"

Consider this a form of detective work for a few moments and see how scholarly analysis reveals the true meaning of what is going on. In the Egyptian Book of the Dead, Anu, called Heliopolis in Greek (meaning "city of the sun"), was the theological name of an actual Egyptian city where the rites of the death, burial, and resurrection of Osirirs of Horus were enacted each year. The name is a combination of nu, the name for "mother heaven", or primal, empty space, "the abyss of of nothingness," and the alpha privative--hence, A-Nu, or "not nothingness," a world of concrete actuality, the world of substantial manifestation. In other words, Anu was precisely a place where units of divine consciousness (or souls) go to their symbolic "death" in every human (incarnation) and later rise again to glory. Anu was called, among other things, the place of "multiplying bread." (Significantly, Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus, means "the house of bread." We will not stop here, tempted though we may be, to show the intimate connections between this concept and the Gospel Christ who multiplies loaves and fishes for the crowds.) The Hebrews added their prefix for "house," beth, to Anu and produced Beth-Anu, or the House of Anu. But because the u and the y were interchangeable in antiquity, we ended up with the New Testament counterpart Bethany. The point here is that when we read the Egyptian text, we find that the Egyptian Christ, Horus, performed a great miracle at Anu, or Bethany. He raised his father, Osiris, from the dead, calling unto him in the cave to "rise and come forth."

These clues help us solve the question of who Lazarus was originally. According to the great Egyptologist Sir Wallis Budge, as well as my major sources and other eminent authorities on the texts, one ancient name for Osiris was Asar. The Egyptians reglurarly expressed their reference by place the definite article "the" before the names of their gods. Just as Christians say, or should say, "the Christ," the Egyptians say "the Osirirs." But that was the equivalent of saying "Lord Osiris". When the Hebrews took up the name of the Osiris, or Lord Osiris, they used the Hebrew word for "lord," el--hence El-Asar. Later on, the Romans, speaking Latin, of course took El-Asar and added the us ending used for most male names. The result was El-Asar-us. In time, the initial e "wore off," as linguists describe it, and the s in Asar changed to z, its constant companion in language. Thus, we have Lazarus, the Osiris of the Beth-Anu story. So it is that, beginning with massey, these scholars convincingly conclude that Jesus' raising of Lazarus at Bethany is "but a rescript of the old Egyptian dramatic mystery in which Horus, the Christ, raised his 'dead' father Osiris from the grave." It is written in the hieroglyphics that Horus followed the divine Meri to the place where Asar (Orisirs) lay buried in his tomb, just as Jesus followed mary, who had come forth to meet him on the way to Bethany. The most important point is that this Egyptian recital was in the papyri perhaps as long ago as five thousand years B.C.E. [8]

To even the semi-unbiased person, the verbal gymnastics and constant reading into the text should be plainly obvious. I would like to see where Harpur found the alleged text where Horus resurrects Osiris (I already covered Horus and Osiris in part three of this series, and no mention is ever made of such an event).

Also, I guess it is irrelevant to Mr. Harpur that there is an actual historical city named "Bethany", and that the actual meaning of its name is "house of dates". Besides, how do you get "Beth-anu" out of the original Greek word "βηθανιας" (Bethanias)?

Also, the Hebrew word for Lord is actually "Adonai". "El" (short for Elohim) actually means God, so that exposes another one of the grammatical errors of Mr. Harpur. That aside, the rest of Mr. Harpur's eisegesis involves way too much stretching to be considered credible (especially the part where he alleges that a Hebrew prefix and a Latin suffix are both arbitrarily added to an Egyptian word. Besides, the New Testament was written in Greek, not Latin, so the name actually reads as "λαζαρος" (Lazaros).

All of this is used by Harpur to justify his "esoteric" interpretation of the scriptures, where we who have "the Christ within" must symbolically "die and rise again" in this life.

Finally, I must deal with one last objection from chapter seven of the book. This is a rehashing of an old argument raised time and time again by skeptics against the historicity of the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke. Here, Harpur writes:

Luke tells how a decree went out from Augustus that "all the world should be registered." The trouble is that there is absolutely no trace--in a well-documented period--of such a decree. It's simply a means of getting Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem for theological reasons. The messiah had to be of Davidic descent, and thus from Bethlehem. Luke says the birth occurred while Quirinius was governor of Syria. That means it could not have happened before 6 C.E., the year we know he took office. At the same time, Matthew says Jesus was conceived while Herod the Great was in power in Judea. But Herod died in 4 B.C.E.! The author of The Jesus Mysteries points out that Mary's real miracle, if both references are taken as genuinely historical, was "a 10-year pregnancy." For Matthew, Jesus' hometown was Bethlehem. For Luke, it was Nazareth.

As we have already seen, the stories of the angels and the shepherds, in Luke, and of the wise men, in Matthew, are rewrites of Egyptian mythical themes from at least two thousand years earlier. They are portrayed in the art at Luxor. There is no historical record of Herod's alleged edict regarding the "slaughter of the innocents" either. Common sense tells us that such an order was an impossibility in any case. Did Herod intend to kill the children of his friends, his soldiers, his civil servants, tourists passing through, and so on? You know for certain the whole matter is symbolic once you realize that an attempt to slaughter a holy child appears in all the ancient hero myths, from Moses to Horus to Sargon to Hercules. As noted earlier, the threat to the newly born Horus, the Egyptian Christ, came from Herut, the serpent. [9]

Actually, such decrees were quite common during the time of the Roman empire, and there is plenty of papyrus evidence to back that up. For example, one decree dated to around 104 C.E. reads:

Gaius Vibius Maximus, Prefect of Egypt [says]: Seeing that the time has come for the house to house census, it is necessary to compel all those who for any cause whatsoever are residing out of their provinces to return to their own homes, and they may both carry out the regular order of the census and may also attend diligently to the cultivation of their allotments. [10]

Notice the mention of "the regular order of the census". This shows such orders were quite commonplace at the time, so it is well within reason that such an event would have taken place. Mr. Harpur also claims that Matthew makes Bethlehem Jesus' hometown, but this is just another argument from silence. Just because Matthew does not explicitly state what Luke states doesn't mean that Matthew was proposing a different origin for Joseph and Mary.

Also, Mr. Harpur claims that common sense tells us that it was impossible for Herod to have ordered the slaughter of the innocents (Matthew 2:16). I guess Mr. Harpur's "common sense" does not take into account the fact that Herod was a very murderous man who had no qualms about condemning even his own relatives to death. The account of his ordering the execution of his own sons is well documented by the Jewish historian Josephus:

As for Herod, if he had before any doubt about the slaughter of his sons, there was now no longer any room left in his soul for it; but he had banished away whatsoever might afford him the least suggestion of reasoning better about this matter, so he already made haste to bring his purpose to a conclusion. He also brought out three hundred of the officers that were under an accusation, as also Tero and his son, and the barber that accused them before an assembly, and brought an accusation against them all; whom the multitude stoned with whatsoever came to hand, and thereby slew them. Alexander also and Aristobulus were brought to Sebaste, by their father's command, and there strangled; but their dead bodies were in the night time carried to Alexandraum, where their uncle by the mother's side, and the greatest part of their ancestors, had been deposited.

And now perhaps it may not seem unreasonable to some, that such an inveterate hatred might increase so much as to proceed further, and overcome nature; but it may justly deserve consideration, whether it be to be laid to the charge of the young men, that they gave such an occasion to their father's anger, and led him to do what he did, and by going on long in the same way put things past remedy, and brought him to use them so unmercifully; or whether it be to be laid to the father's charge, that he was so hard-hearted, and so very tender in the desire of government, and of other things that would tend to his glory, that e would take no one into a partnership with him, that so whatsoever he would have done himself might continue immovable... And this temper he showed in what he did afterward, when he did not spare those that seemed to be the best beloved of his friends that were left, wherein, though the justice of the punishment caused those that perished to be the less pitied, yet was the barbarity of the man here equal, in that he did not abstain from their slaughter also. But of those persons we shall have occasion to discourse more hereafter. [12]

Given this murderous nature of King Herod, it would have been well within his reason to kill all the infants in the little town of Bethlehem in order to preserve his own kingship, and such an action would have been so characteristic of him that it would have seemed redundant for anyone to record such a commonplace event. It might seem strange to the modern mindset, but it fits well with the bloody landscape of 1st century Palestine.

End Notes
1. Harpur, Tom. The Pagan Christ. 2004. p. 116.
2. Ibid, p. 117.
3. Dailey, Timothy J. Ph.D. and David M. Howard, Jr. Mysteries of the Bible. Publications Internatonal, Ltd., 1998. p. 35-36.
4. Harpur, Tom. The Pagan Christ. 2004. p. 117-118.
5. Kitchen, Kenneth Anderson. The Bible and Its World. InterVarsity Press, 1977. p. 131.
6. Herzog, Ze'ev. Beer-Sheba II: The Early Iron Age Settlements. Tel Aviv University: Institute of Archaeology, 1984.
7. Harpur, Tom. The Pagan Christ. 2004. p. 121.
8. Ibid, p. 133-134.
9. Ibid, p. 125-126.
10.McRay, John. Archaeology and the New Testament. Baker, 1991. p. 155.
12. Josephus. Antiquities of the Jews. Book 16, Chapter 11.

UPDATE (July 13, 2009)

Those who have read an earlier revision of this article might be wondering why a citation has been dropped from it. The reason behind this is that I realized that the information presented therein is not as accurate as I had hoped it to be. For a clarification on this, check out this blog post.

Further Reading

• Archaeology and the Bible
• Bible History Online
• Dr. David Livingston - Israel's Origins