The Trades: Judging the Case For Christ

My wife Megan runs a Facebook group in which atheists and Christians come together to read the Bible from the beginning of Genesis all the way to the end of Revelations. One of the religious members of that group suggested that everyone should watch the movie version of Lee Strobel’s apologetic work “The Case for Christ.”  I’d personally already read the book version during my Christian school days (along with other apologetics like Josh McDowell and C.S. Lewis), but we agreed to watch the movie anyway in the interest of helping to foster a dialog and get Christians and atheists discussing their beliefs or lack of beliefs.  (As a side note, Megan also posted a blog about Lee Strobel last year that can be found here.)

For anyone who would like to see the video before reading my blog, it’s currently available for instant streaming through Netflix, or you can probably pick up a copy of the book or video version at your local library.  You can also check out Strobel’s website here for additional information on his beliefs and claims.

Strobel’s claim to fame in the apologetic community is that he was a journalist for many years, and he frequently states he used his journalism skills to perform an impartial and open minded study of the Bible to determine if Jesus was a real historical figure, and if he really was a divine entity.  According to Strobel, he was either an atheist or an agnostic, and decided to study Christianity after his wife converted to see if its claims could be verified.

After conducting this lengthy study, Lee Strobel claims he got out a legal pad and drew a line down the middle. On one side he wrote “Evidence For” and on the other side he wrote “Evidence Against.” He stated that he simply had to believe in Jesus, as the “Evidence For” column far outweighed the “Evidence Against” column. 

What he fails to mention in this story is that he only interviewed people on one side of the debate, and only looked at pro-Christian information.

Consider for a moment if I drew a line down a legal pad and on one side wrote “Reasons why Taco Bell is the best.” Then on the other side I write “Reasons why Taco Bell is not the best.”  Now let’s say to compile the evidence for this list I only interviewed Taco Bell executives. I never interview anyone from Arby’s or Sonic or Burger King or any other restaurant that may disagree with the phrase “Taco Bell is the best.” 

Do you see why this doesn’t work?

For all his claims of being on an “investigative journey,” Strobel never once interviews anyone from the opposing side.  That’s not only dishonest, it also makes the whole “investigation” completely pointless. For those who have seen this video and have used it to try to convince people that Christianity is true, I recommend that they go back and watch it again.  If you have the book version of “Case for Christ,” please pull it out now and flip through it.  Look for the interview Strobel conducted with a scholar who does not believe that Jesus was a real historical figure who performed miracles.  Look for the interview with the prominent atheist who has a book published or some other credential that would make the person relevant to the debate.  You can stop looking now, because these interviews don’t exist.  Strobel never once interviewed a single person on the opposing side of the issue.

He makes a point of asking everyone to be open minded and critically examine the evidence, no matter where it leads, but he himself was completely unwilling to do so in this video.  The only time nonbelievers appear is for 15 to 30 second clips of random people on the street talking about what they think of Jesus.

As the movie progresses, it becomes unfortunately clear that Strobel doesn’t actually know what the word “witness” or phrase “eyewitness testimony” actually mean.  He repeatedly claims that there were many eyewitness testimonies (that is, first hand accounts) of the life and resurrection of Jesus.  This just simply isn’t the case.  The gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were all written literally decades after the events they describe. 

Consider whatever you did last night. Now consider if someone decided to write about that night forty to seventy years later and claim to know exactly what you did or said in detail.  See the problem here?  The bizarre part is that Strobel seems to be aware of this fact, but it doesn’t bother him.  He even says that “only being one generation removed is still good eyewitness testimony.”  I’m sorry Lee, but that’s just simply not the case.  Being an entire generation removed no longer qualifies as “eyewitness,” and it certainly isn’t “good testimony.”

Luke wasn’t even actually there to witness the events described in his gospel, so his accounts must be considered second hand even if you believe the Bible is entirely literally true. The problem is further compounded when one considers that it’s commonly accepted among scholars that Matthew, Mark, and John weren’t actually written by the apostles bearing those names.  The subject of the composition of the gospels is a rather complex one, with many different sources to be considered, but I would urge anyone wanting further information to simply perform a google search for a phrase like “gospel of Matthew” or even “Authors of the gospels” and dive in headfirst.

Strobel is also aware of the contradictions present between the four gospels, as many of them explain events quite differently or leave out important pieces of information present in the other ones. To explain this, Strobel says that we should expect differences in eyewitness testimonies (again, the gospels cannot in any way be considered “eyewitness testimonies”) and that courts of law suspect that witnesses are colluding together if their stories *don’t* differ in some way.

The problem with this is that we aren’t dealing with minor discrepancies of normal, everyday things that might show up at a trial.  The issue isn’t something minor like whether Jesus’ robe was white or brown.  The issue is with major differences.  For example, the gospel of John doesn’t even mention the virgin birth or Jesus being baptized.  Think about that for a moment.  The person who wrote the gospel of John either didn’t think it was worth mentioning that Jesus was born of a virgin, or he wasn’t even aware that people held this belief. That’s pretty much a deal breaker right there, and not some minor discrepancy that one would expect between different witness testimonies.  When dealing with outlandish supernatural claims, a higher standard for evidence is simply required.  Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

From there, Strobel and his interviewees go on to make a common mistake from theists – trying to use the Bible to prove the Bible.  The people he interviews talk about how 1st Corinthians 15:3-8 claims that 500 people personally saw the resurrected Jesus.

To address this “evidence,” I’ll ask that the Christians consider how they would feel if someone used this exact same tactic to try to “prove” another religion or the claims of another book.  Say, for the sake of argument, that I believed Middle-Earth was real, and the Lord of the Rings books are descriptions of real events.  Pretend that I tell you I believe in Gandalf, and that he really did arrive with an army to save the defenders of Helm’s Deep in “The Two Towers.”  As a rational, reasonable person, I would hope you’d say “I don’t believe you, prove it. Show me eyewitness.”

In response, I’d say, “Look right here in my book The Two Towers, it says that Gandalf told them he would arrive if they looked to the east at the light of the fifth day – and behold, he appeared!  Hundreds of people at Helm’s Deep saw him! I know it’s true because my book says its true! Those people are eyewitnesses!”

Do you see the problem here?  I can’t use The Two Towers to prove the events in The Two Towers actually happened.  Likewise, saying that the Bible says 500 people saw a resurrected Jesus is not proof that 500 people actually saw a resurrected Jesus, and it certainly can’t be considered “eyewitness testimony.” You can’t use the Bible to prove the Bible any more than I can use The Two Towers to prove The Two Towers.

Later, Strobel has to admit that much of the Bible was originally passed down as oral tradition for generations before being written (and that’s not even taking into account the fact that we are dealing with copies of copies of copies of copies of copies in modern day Bibles).  He tries to defend the Bible’s authenticity by saying that oral tradition can easily be passed down for generations without changing.

To answer this claim, I’ll simply ask the reader to play a round of the game of “Gossip.”  For anyone who isn’t familiar with the game, all you do is get 15 or 20 people in a circle.  Have one person whisper a phrase into the next person’s ear.  Have that person whisper the phrase into the next person’s ear, and so on, until it gets back to the original person.  Guess what?  The phrase won’t be even remotely similar to what it was originally.  Sorry to burst anyone’s bubble here.

As his coup-de-grace, Strobel asks the question, “But why would they lie?  Why would the people who wrote the Bible be willing to die for their beliefs in they weren’t true?”

First off, he’s shot himself in the foot just by asking the question.  If martyrdom proves a religion is true, then Islam and Judaism and a horde of other religions are also true.  Christianity is most certainly not unique in that it has members who have died for their beliefs.  There are martyrs of many religions.  Should I ask why those people would die for something they knew was a lie?  Religion makes it clear that human beings are willing to die in order to maintain a delusion, and that believing something is true does not actually make it true. 

Religion is dangerous in that regard, as it teaches people to ignore the one life they really have in favor of a fictional afterlife that they can’t even prove actually exists.  It’s this willingness to die for religious beliefs that leads to suicide bombers and Christians who shoot abortion doctors and religious parents who let their children die because they believe prayer works better than medicine.

Strobel also uses the tactic known as the “argument form prophecy,” which claims that the Bible must be true because Jesus in the New Testament fulfills the prophecies in the Old Testament.  All one has to do to counter this argument is point out that not only was the New Testament written long after the Old Testament, but that the people who wrote the New Testament were intimately familiar with the Old Testament.  It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what happened there.  How hard is it to make prophecy fit if I am intimately familiar with the prophecies and am writing the next book?

I’ll also again ask Christians to consider if they would accept similar claims from other religions.  Should we take fulfilled prophecies from the Koran as proof that Islam is true?  Should we take the foreshadowing in The Hobbit that is later fulfilled in the Lord of the Rings as proof that Middle-Earth is real?

To finish off my look at the Case for Christ, I’d like to mention an off-hand comment Strobel made about how he realized he needed “more faith to maintain atheism” than he needed to become a Christian. It always baffles me when Christians uses this phrase, because it’s clear they haven’t thought through the implications of what they are saying.  Is this phrase meant to be an insult, or a compliment?

By saying this, does the Christian mean that having more faith than a Christian is a negative thing?  Are they saying that having faith in something without evidence is bad?  If so, it is the Christian’s duty to immediately stop having faith in zombie Jesus or his talking snake nemesis.  On the opposite side, is the Christian trying to say that having more faith than a Christian is a good thing?  If so, then what was the point in making the statement at all?  It’s a self-defeating argument, and one that makes the arguer look rather foolish in the process.

For anyone who would like to see what others had to say about the Case For Christ, you can find other reviews here and here.