Jesus Before Constantine. Doug E. Taylor
everyone would agree with the use of an evidential method. John Frame, in responding to Habermas’s preference of an evidential apologetic method, makes a point of indicating that there is difficulty in using the evidential method in trying to reason with unbelievers and points to Romans 1 for support that unbelievers suppress the truth and exchange the truth for a lie.19 What cannot be missed is that Frame’s very argument supports the offered definition for evidence. More specifically, if evidence rightly interpreted corresponds to reality, then to know and be able to suppress truth indicates that one has epistemic access to evidence.
A second challenge to the use of an evidential method may rest in the concept of rationalism where the intent is to express that reason is the epitome of authority when discussing religious matters. “More broadly, rationalism is any philosophical position affirming the ability of thinking, apart from sensory experience, to discover fundamental truths about the world or reality.”20 The challenge here is that one is not capable of thinking in a vacuum. Even if one were truly able to reach a position whereby they could think without any external sensory experience, thinking that is done in the present is influenced by both experiences and knowledge gained in the past. One can think rationally but one cannot think where that thinking is not in some way influenced by external stimuli.21
A possible objection that might be brought against giving primacy to an evidential method, à la Evans, is associated with a lack of objectivity.22 The difficulty here is that this challenge cuts in more than one direction. First, it is not possible to come to the table as an unbiased or disinterested party, regardless of the methodology one uses in assessing historical events. Second, biases are driven to a large degree by an individual’s worldview, meaning a person’s conclusions will likely be influenced by how they see the world. The bias challenge, however, fails to carry convincing weight. Berkhof notes, “Dr. Kuyper speaks as follows of the attempt to do this [prove the existence of God through evidence]: ‘The attempt to prove God’s existence is either useless or unsuccessful. It is useless if the searcher believes that God is a rewarder of those who seek Him. And it is unsuccessful if it is an attempt to force a person who does not have this pistis by means of argumentation to an acknowledgment in a logical sense.’”23
When speaking of evidence I am speaking to those points of data that are open to investigation and known widely. Such a move is not done to avoid difficulties and questions that remain regarding what will happen in the future, rather it is a deliberate move to look at what may be known and what pieces of information are open to investigation by any interested party now, regardless of whether or not they believe in the God of Christianity. The Holy Spirit may speak to a person internally and bear witness, but this is not necessarily open to investigation by others and therefore is not considered as evidence in this work. Moving beyond this, a crucial aspect to properly understanding an evidential method is in the right interpretation of the data. When examined in context the interpretation should yield the best plausible conclusion consistent with the data.
Defining Key Terms
To facilitate clear communication between the researcher and readers, it will be necessary to define certain strategic words used throughout the research.
1.Evidence will be defined as a condition or event objective in nature, knowable by those present, open to investigation by all others, whereby when rightly interpreted, corresponds to reality.
2.Miracle will be defined as a highly improbable event with no known naturalistic causes, which is charged with religious significance in relationship with Yahweh, the execution of which is for the benefit of his people.
3.Positive apologetic will be defined as the commending of Christianity as understood through the established SPAC, affirming the deity, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
4.Defensive apologetic will be defined as a methodology or argument demonstrating why views not related to the established SPAC (the deity, death, and resurrection of Jesus) are lacking, and thus are not to be included in this research. Examples of such defensive apologetics would include responses to charges that Christians were cannibals and atheists.
5.Root cause will be defined as a plausible “why” behind a condition or event obtaining rather than the anticipated or expected results identified in the SPAC.
6.SPAC will be defined as standards, policies, or administrative controls.24 A SPAC provides the boundaries within which a system is intended to function.
7.Contributing factor will be defined as a condition or event that is of interest, and could have some level of impact or influence within the system, but if that condition or event were removed, it does not mitigate or prevent the condition or event being investigated from obtaining or obtaining in the manner currently observed.
8.Causal factor will be defined as a condition or event that, if removed, mitigates or prevents the condition or event being investigated from obtaining or at least from obtaining in the manner currently observed.25
9.Worldview will be defined as the filter, beliefs, or methodological system through which one interprets data and arrives at meaning.
10.Minimal facts are those pieces of historical data that are accepted by most critical scholars qualified to speak on the subject (90–95%) whether they are Christian or not, as well as there being multiple attestation of those historical data.
Relevant Texts for Establishing the Research Basis
History
The argument put forth by Ehrman and those who would agree with his thinking would suggest, if taken at face value, that orthodoxy was a later development of the church, pointing to the beginning of the major councils in the fourth century. Historical study, however, would not appear to agree with such a claim. In his work Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity, Walter Bauer said, “Where there is heresy, orthodoxy must have preceded.”26 While Bauer made the statement that orthodoxy must have preceded, his thesis in the end suggested the exact opposite. What must be asked is if it is true that orthodoxy must have preceded heresy. It is safe to say, at a minimum, that it is not possible to have a Christianity that predates the Christ.
This is in part why this work will build from the minimal facts argument. When we begin to look at source documents from groups that ultimately were not included in Scripture, debate centers on authenticity of the writings, the timing of the writings, and in many cases who the author actually was. Over the past century even most critical scholars have come to accept seven texts of the Christian New Testament as having authentically come from Paul. As such, the starting point for this book is different in that Bauer held the position that, “as we turn to our task, the New Testament seems to be both too unproductive and too much disputed to be able to serve as a point of departure. The majority of its anti-heretical writings cannot be arranged with confidence either chronologically or geographically; nor can the more precise circumstances of their origin be determined with sufficient precision.”27 Bauer desired to speak to the earliest Christianity, yet he appears to have not believed the source documents for Christianity to have been credible as a starting point.
James Dunn, in his two-volume work Christianity in the Making, suggested we cannot rightly use the term Christianity as something of a defining characteristic of beliefs until some eighty years following Luke penning Acts, suggesting that to use the term for the earlier church would run the risk of superimposing a modern mindset onto the data rather than letting the data reveal what constituted, and when, one was to be identified as a Christian.28 While caution is warranted, what has been missed is that a lack of total knowledge does not equate to an absence of any knowledge. According to Dunn’s thinking, he would have us believe Christianity as a clearly defined system of belief was not established until the latter half of the second century (ca. 160). However, if we consider the statement by Paul in Gal 1:6–9 we find there were others presenting different gospels from what Paul had already established. Dunn notes that in the immediate time following the reported resurrection event, multiple terms were used to describe followers of Jesus, and that the issue of identifying what it meant to be a Christian, if the term could rightly be used, gave indication of a multifaceted structure lacking in a single, overarching