http://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=11&article=3869
Is Christianity Logical? [Part I]
[EDITOR’S NOTE: This article is the first installment in a two-part
series exploring the claim of atheism that Christianity is an irrational
belief system that evades reason and abandons rationality and evidence
in exchange for intellectual dishonesty and ignorance of the truth. What
does the evidence actually show?]
The
so-called “new atheists” (Wolf, 2006) are exceedingly rabid in their
bitter denunciations of Christianity. Indeed, the severity and ferocity
with which they press their case cause the objective person to ponder,
with Queen Gertrude, “The lady doth protest too much, methinks”
(Shakespeare, III.2). As is usually the case, many of their castigations
are only properly directed toward poor practitioners of
Christianity—those who
profess to be Christians, but
whose beliefs and/or practices do not fairly and accurately represent
New Testament Christianity. The fact is that no atheist can validate his
unbelief by pitting it against the
true doctrines of
Christianity. The truths of pure, New Testament Christianity are
logically consistent. Indeed, they came from the thoroughly rational
mind of the eternal God.
Atheists are big on insisting that truth may be known, arrived at
logically, and sustained by evidence. They constantly allege that
Christianity and the Bible are at odds with a logical approach to
reality. They insist that Christianity is
unreasonable and conflicts with the laws of logic. One of these contemporary critics of religion, Sam Harris, states in his book
The End of Faith,
“Religious faith represents so uncompromising a misuse of the power of
our minds that it forms a kind of perverse, cultural singularity—a
vanishing point beyond which
rational discourse proves impossible”
(2004, p. 25, emp. added). Harris has also insisted: “The problem with
faith, is that it really is a conversation stopper. Faith is a
declaration of immunity to the powers of conversation. It is a
reason,
why you do not have to give reasons,
for what you believe” (as quoted in “Godless Quotes,” 2009, italics in
orig., emp. added). He freely ridicules Bible teaching as unreasonable
and illogical:
We either have good reasons or bad reasons for what we believe; we can
be open to evidence and argument, or we can be closed; we can tolerate
(and even seek) criticism of our most cherished views, or we can hide
behind authority, sanctity, and dogma. The main reason why children are
still raised to think that the universe is 6,000 years old is not
because religion as a “social institution” hasn’t been appropriately
coddled and cajoled, but because polite people (and scientists terrified
of losing their funding) haven’t laughed this belief off the face of the earth (in Harris and Ball, 2009, emp. added).
Harris is certainly not alone. Richard Dawkins agrees: “[R]eligious faith is an especially potent
silencer of rational calculation,
which usually seems to trump all others” (2006, p. 346, emp. added).
Christopher Hitchens summarizes the atheistic mentality of our day: “All
attempts to reconcile faith with science and reason are consigned to
failure and ridicule” (2007, p. 64).
Such invectives are not new. Skeptics, atheists, and unbelievers have
railed against Christianity and the Bible for millennia, insisting that
belief in the Christian religion and the divine origin of the Bible is
irrational, illogical, and fraught with error and contradiction. As
noted above, however, their indictments aptly apply only to those within
Christendom who have embraced false depictions of Christianity (e.g.,
Catholicism, Protestantism, Mormonism, Calvinism, et al.). What the
skeptic must realize is that fairness demands that the authenticity of
Christianity be assessed—not on the basis of the thicket of confusion,
diversity, and doctrinal disagreement that characterizes Christendom—but
upon
what the New Testament actually teaches.
MUCH OF CHRISTENDOM IS IRRATIONAL
Even as pluralism has seized Western civilization by the throat,
branding the pursuit of truth an irrelevant and impossible enterprise
(cf. Bloom, 1987), so many well-meaning, but incompetent, practitioners
of Christianity have thrown their hands up in exasperation, concluding
that arriving at certainty is a hopeless endeavor. They have relegated
the pursuit of doctrinal correctness to the dust bin of antiquity. In
its place, they have substituted entertainment (e.g., praise bands, hand
waving, and “tongue-speaking”)—mindless, emotional stimulation (which
they call “Christian worship”). Many churches have assumed the posture
that truth is elusive, and no one should be “judgmental” of anyone else;
no one should be so arrogant or dogmatic as to insist that a certain
viewpoint is the only right one. Atheists sit back and,
rightly, laugh at this unfortunate distortion of Christianity—this sellout to secular culture.
Without even examining the Bible and the claims of New Testament
Christianity, a person ought to be able to see that pluralism in
religion is self-contradictory and discredited. Those who espouse it
inconsistently insist that
they are
correct. They are
dogmatic
in their insistence that no one should be dogmatic. They hold as
absolute truth the absurd notion that there are no absolute truths. They
have to deny their viewpoint in order to hold their viewpoint. In the
meantime, the atheist claims to transcend this malady by dismissing
all religion as false, feeling confident that he has firmly legitimized his infidelity via logic and rationality.
Many well-meaning, religious people take the foolish position that
truth is elusive and unattainable, and that doctrinal correctness is
unimportant and unnecessary. Only in the task of interpreting the Bible
do such people take the position that truth is relative, always
changing, and something of which they can never be sure. Ironically,
many religionists “reason” in religion in a way that differs from the
way they reason in other facets of their lives—like driving their car or
picking up their mail.
For example, when they go to the doctor because they are not feeling
well, they communicate to the doctor their symptoms, fully expecting to
be understood. They expect the doctor to gather all the relevant
evidence (the verbal information the patient gives, as well as the
symptoms displayed by the body and test results). That evidence must
then be properly interpreted to draw the right conclusions concerning
the ailment and its proper treatment. The doctor then writes out a
prescription that the patient takes to the pharmacist and, once again,
the religious person expects the pharmacist to interpret properly the
doctor’s instructions. The religious person then takes the prescription
home and reads the label, fully expecting to understand the directions.
The fact that doctors and pharmacists can make mistakes by drawing
unwarranted conclusions about one’s physical condition does not change
the fact that if they gather sufficient evidence and reason properly
about the information, they can
know the truth about a person’s physical condition. When it comes to their religion, however, many religious people abandon rationality.
Every single day that we live, we interpret thousands of messages
accurately. We read the newspaper or watch television news, fully
expecting to understand what we read, hear, and see. We read bills,
books, and text messages with the same expectation. We go to the
mailbox, get our mail, and browse through it, fully expecting to
interpret properly the messages being conveyed. The fact that
misunderstanding sometimes occurs does not negate the fact that more
information can be examined in order to draw the right conclusions and
arrive at correct interpretations.
We go through this process constantly—every waking hour of the day, day
in and day out, year after year. You are reading this article with a
reasonable expectation of being able to understand it. We give ourselves
credit for having the ability to operate sensibly and communicate with
one another intelligibly. Yet, a host of religious people turn right
around and imply that the God of heaven, the One Who created our minds
and our thinking capacity, the One Who is infinitely wiser and more
capable than humans, is incapable of making His will known to humanity
in a clear and understandable fashion. When some people who profess to
be Christians come to the Bible, they suddenly do an about-face and
insist that we cannot be sure what God’s will is, we cannot be dogmatic
on doctrine, and we must allow differing opinions on what is spiritually
right or wrong.
Many people who claim to embrace Christianity ridicule and denounce
logic, debate, argumentation, and emphasis upon being rational and
reasonable. The practical effect of such propaganda is the upsurge of
subjectivity, emotions, and personal taste (often attributed to the
Spirit) as authoritative standards in religious practice. The Bible as
the comprehensive, comprehendible, unchanging source of religious
authority is thereby supplanted, and the satanic severance of human
culture from the God of heaven is complete.
Such behavior fuels unbelief.
Atheists can see the hypocrisy and inconsistency. They are rightly
repulsed by such religion. Nevertheless, they are obligated to
distinguish between the manifold manifestations of false religion and
the one true religion of the New Testament.
THE BIBLE AND CHRISTIANITY ARE EMINENTLY RATIONAL
The term “logic” refers to nothing more than correct reasoning. A
person is logical when he or she reasons correctly. Being “illogical”
amounts to engaging in incorrect reasoning. Does the Bible reflect
affinity with the laws of thought and logic? Did Jesus, Paul, and other
inspired speakers and writers
argue their cases,
prove their propositions, and engage in
rational, reasonable
discourse? The truth is that those who were selected by God (prophets,
apostles, and Bible writers) to communicate His will to the world
always presented their divinely inspired communication with logical precision. They never once committed a logical error. They
always
argued the case for Christianity accurately and rationally—precisely
what one would expect if they were guided by the perfect rational Mind.
Jesus Christ: The Master Logician
While on Earth, Jesus demonstrated incredible proclivity for
rationality in His sharp, potent, penetrating use of logic and sound
argumentation. His first recorded responsible activity consisted of a
logical dialogue between Himself (at the age of twelve) and the Jewish
theologians. “All who heard Him were astonished at His understanding and
answers” (Luke 2:47, emp. added). The next recorded
instance of Jesus’ public cognitive activity was on the occasion of His
baptism. He reasoned with John in order to convince John to immerse Him
(Matthew 3:13-15), advancing a logical reason to justify the action.
Debate with Satan (Matthew 4:1-11)
Immediately after this incident, Jesus faced Satan in the desert. Satan
posed three arguments, urging Christ to act on the basis of his
erroneous reasoning. Notice carefully the sequence of the disputation
between the two, with special attention to Christ’s superior (i.e.,
accurate) use of logic to defeat His opponent:
Argument #1:
Satan: “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”
Jesus: “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’”
Christ offered authoritative Scripture (Deuteronomy 8:3) as evidence to
contradict Satan’s conclusion. In other words, satisfying the
legitimate need of hunger must never take precedence over the need to
obey God and tend to spiritual needs first. Further, miracles did not
have as their divine purpose to satisfy physical needs (Mark 16:20;
Hebrews 2:3-4). Jesus’ logical reply was sufficiently decisive that
Satan attempted no rebuttal, but moved to a second argument in an effort
to convince Jesus to succumb to his faulty reasoning from atop the
temple.
Argument #2:
Satan: “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is
written: ‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’ and, ‘In their
hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone.’”
Jesus: “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’”
Observe that this time, Satan offered Scripture (Psalm 91:11-12) as
supporting evidence to justify his proposal. Yet, this clever ploy,
intended to create the illusion of legitimacy, was in fact a mishandling
of the evidence—a twisting of Scripture (2 Peter 3:16). Jesus countered
with additional Scripture (Deuteronomy 6:16) that demonstrated Satan’s
misapplication of Psalm 91 to the situation at hand. In other words,
Psalm 91, though intended to convey the care and protection that God
extends to the faithful, was not intended to provide sanction for what
Satan proposed: deliberately placing oneself in peril in order to force
God to come to one’s rescue. God’s offer of assistance does not extend
to purposely walking in front of an oncoming car just to see if He will
miraculously prevent an individual from being struck. The context of
Deuteronomy 6:16, the verse that Jesus quoted, refers to the kind of
testing and tempting displayed by the Israelites when they murmured,
grumbled, and challenged Moses to produce water—as if God was unable or
unwilling to aid them. For Jesus to have complied with Satan’s challenge
would have placed Him in the same posture as the spiritually weak,
unbelieving Israelites who “tempted” God (“tempted” is from
nah-sah—to prove/test Him due to doubting His aid/power [Gesenius, 1847, p. 552]; cf. Exodus 17:2,
re-ev—to chide, strive, contend). The only
logical
response to such a challenge was the very one that Jesus, in fact,
mustered: “Do not tempt God! Do not put Him to the test since such
indicates your own lack of faith!” This rebuttal, too, was sufficiently
potent to discourage Satan from pressing his ploy any further. Instead,
he shifted his verbal barrage to a third challenge, by dangling before
Jesus the glory of the kingdoms of the Earth.
Argument #3
Satan: “All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.”
Jesus: “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord Your God, and Him only You shall serve.’”
Jesus, for the third time, marshaled scriptural proof to show the error
of Satan’s position, while reaffirming the truth. Based on Deuteronomy
6:13, it would be sinful to worship Satan or anyone but Deity. God alone
is worthy of worship. With this third display of devastating logic,
Satan ceased his verbal assaults and fled the scene.
This marvelous demonstration of Christ’s mastery of debate and logical
disputation is not an isolated instance. Jesus wielded logic and reason
throughout His earthly sojourn. He consistently responded to His
contemporaries with piercing, devastating logic. He continually was
besieged with questions and verbal tests (Luke 11:53-54)—to which He
consistently displayed rational, reasoned response. Consider these
additional examples:
Exchange with the Pharisees Over Eating Grain (Matthew 12:1-9)
In responding to the Pharisees’ erroneous charge leveled against His
disciples for eating grain from a standing grain field on the Sabbath,
Jesus commenced to counter their accusation with penetrating logic,
advancing successive rebuttals. Before He presented specific scriptural
refutation of their false charge, He first employed a rational device
designated by logicians as
argumentum ad hominem (literally
“argument to the man”). He used the “circumstantial” form of this
argument, which enabled Him to “point out a contrast between the
opponent’s lifestyle and his expressed opinions, thereby suggesting that
the opponent and his statements can be dismissed as
hypocritical” (Baum, 1975, p. 470, emp. added). This variety of argumentation spotlights the opponent’s
inconsistency,
and “charges the adversary with being so prejudiced that his alleged
reasons are mere rationalizations of conclusions dictated by
self-interest” (Copi, 1972, p. 76).
Observe carefully the technical sophistication inherent in Jesus’
strategy. He called attention to the case of David (vss. 3-4). When
David was in exile, literally running for his life to escape the
jealous, irrational rage of Saul, he and his companions arrived in Nob,
tired and hungry (1 Samuel 21:1ff.). He lied to the priest and conned
him into giving them the showbread, or “bread of the Presence” (i.e., 12
flat cakes arranged in two rows on the table within the Tabernacle
[Exodus 25:23-30; Leviticus 24:5-6]), to his traveling companions—bread
that legally was reserved
only for the priests
(Leviticus 24:8-9; cf. Exodus 29:31-34; Leviticus 8:31; 22:10ff.). In
doing so, David clearly violated the law. Did the Pharisees condemn
him?
Absolutely not! They revered David. They held him in high regard. In
fact, nearly a thousand years after his passing, his tomb was still
being tended (Acts 2:29; cf. 1 Kings 2:10; Nehemiah 3:16; Josephus,
1974a, 13.8.4; 16.7.1; Josephus, 1974b, 1.2.5). On the one hand, they
condemned the disciples of Jesus, who were
innocent, but on the other hand, they upheld and revered David, who was
guilty.
Their inconsistency betrayed both their insincerity as well as their
ineligibility to bring a legal charge against the disciples.
After exposing their hypocrisy and inconsistency, Jesus next turned to
answer the charge pertaining to violating the Sabbath. He called their
attention to the priests who worked in the temple on the Sabbath (12:5;
e.g., Numbers 28:9-10). The priests were “blameless”—
not guilty—of
violating the Sabbath law because their work was authorized to be
performed on that day. After all, the Sabbath law did not imply total
inactivity—as if everyone was to sit down for 24 hours and
do nothing.
The Law gave the right, even the obligation, to engage in several
activities that did not constitute violation of the Sabbath regulation.
Examples of such authorization included eating (cf. Exodus 12:16)—even
from a neighbor’s grainfield (Deuteronomy 23:25)—temple service,
circumcision (John 7:22), tending to the care of animals (Exodus 23:4-5;
Deuteronomy 22:1-4; Matthew 12:11; Luke 13:15), and extending kindness
or assistance to the needy (Matthew 12:12; Luke 13:16; 14:1-6; John
5:5-9; 7:23). The divinely authorized Sabbath activity of the priests
proved
that the accusation the Pharisees brought against Jesus’ disciples was
false. [The term “profane” (vs. 5) is an example of the figure of speech
known as metonymy of the adjunct in which “things are spoken of
according to appearance,
opinions formed respecting them, or the claims made for them” (Dungan,
1888, p. 295, emp. added). By this figure, Leah was said to be the
“mother” of Joseph (Genesis 37:10), angels were said to be “men” (e.g.,
Genesis 18:16; 19:10), Joseph was said to be the “father” of Jesus (Luke
2:48; John 6:42), and God’s preached message was said to be
“foolishness” (1 Corinthians 1:21). Priestly activity on the Sabbath
gave the
appearance of violation when, in fact, it was
not. Coincidentally, Bullinger classified the allusion to “profane” in
this verse as an instance of
catachresis, or incongruity, stating that “it expresses what was true according to the
mistaken notion of the Pharisees as to manual works performed on the Sabbath” (1898, p. 676, emp. added)].
After pointing out the obvious legality of priestly effort expended on
the Sabbath, Jesus stated: “But I say to you that in this place there is
One greater than the temple” (12:6). The underlying Greek text actually
has “something” instead of “One.” If priests could carry on
tabernacle/temple
service on the Sabbath, surely Jesus’ own disciples were authorized to engage in
service in
the presence of the Son of God. After all, service directed to the
person of Jesus certainly is greater than the pre-Christian temple
service conducted by Old Testament priests—“who serve the copy and
shadow of the heavenly things” (Hebrews 8:5).
For all practical purposes, the discussion was over. Jesus had
disproved the claim of the Pharisees. But He did not stop there. He took
His methodical confrontation to yet another level. He penetrated
beneath the surface argument that the Pharisees had posited and focused
on their
hearts: “But if you had known what this means,
‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the
guiltless” (12:7). In this verse, Jesus quoted from an Old Testament
context (Hosea 6:6) in which the prophet of old struck a blow against
the mere external, superficial, ritualistic observance of some laws, to
the neglect of heartfelt, sincere, humble attention to other laws while
treating people properly. The comparison is evident. The Pharisees who
confronted Jesus’ disciples were not truly interested in obeying God’s
law. They were masquerading under that
pretense (cf.
Matthew 15:1-9; 23:3). But their problem did not lie in an attitude of
honestly desiring careful compliance with God’s law—which would have
been commendable. Rather, their zest for law keeping was
hypocritical
and unaccompanied by their own obedience and concern for others. They
possessed critical hearts and were more concerned with scrutinizing,
accusing, and condemning people than with honest, genuine application of
God’s directives for the good of their fellow human beings.
In their hypocrisy, the Pharisees had neutralized the true intent of
divine regulations, making void the Word of God (Matthew 15:6). They had
ignored and skipped over the significant laws that enjoined justice,
mercy, and faith (Matthew 23:23). Consequently, though their attention
to legal detail was laudable, their
misapplication of it, as well as their
neglect and rejection
of some aspects of it, made them inappropriate and unqualified
promulgators of God’s laws. Indeed, they simply did not fathom the
teaching of Hosea 6:6 (cf. Micah 6:6-8). “I desire mercy, and not
sacrifice” is a Hebraism (cf. Matthew 9:13) [McGarvey, 1875, pp. 82-83].
God was not saying that He did not want sacrifices offered under the
Old Testament economy (notice the use of “more” in Hosea 6:6). After
all, He was the author of such sacrifices (e.g., Deuteronomy 12:6,11).
Rather, He was saying that He did not want sacrifice
alone. He wanted mercy
with sacrifice. Internal motive and attitude are
just as important to God as the external compliance with specifics (cf. John 4:24; Joshua 24:14).
Samuel addressed this same attitude shown by Saul: “Has the Lord as
great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice
of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than
the fat of rams” (1 Samuel 15:22). Samuel was not minimizing the
essentiality of sacrifice as required by God. Rather, he was convicting
Saul of the pretense of using one aspect of God’s requirements, i.e.,
alleged “sacrifice” of the best animals (1 Samuel 15:15), as a smoke
screen for violating God’s instructions, i.e., failing to
destroy
all the animals (1 Samuel 15:3). If the Pharisees had understood these
things, they would not have accused the disciples of breaking the law
when the disciples, in fact, had not done so. They “would not have
condemned the
guiltless” (Matthew 12:7, emp. added).
While the disciples were guilty of violating an injunction that the
Pharisees had concocted (alleging the injunction to be a genuine
implication of the Sabbath regulation), the disciples were not guilty of
a violation of Sabbath law. The Pharisees’ propensity for enjoining
their uninspired and erroneous interpretations of Sabbath law upon
others was the direct result of cold, unmerciful hearts that found a
kind of sadistic glee in binding burdens upon people for burdens’ sake,
rather than in encouraging people to obey God genuinely. Their haughty
spirits sought ego boosts from presumptuously binding restrictions above
and beyond God’s explicitly stated injunctions in an attempt to appear
more religiously sincere.
Jesus placed closure on His exchange with the Pharisees on this
occasion by asserting the accuracy of His handling of this entire
affair: “For the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath” (vs. 8). In
other words, Jesus affirmed His deity and, therefore, His credentials
and authoritative credibility for making accurate application of the Law
of Moses to the issue at hand. This entire exchange demonstrates the
meticulous regard for logic and reason that Jesus possessed.
Dialogue with the Chief Priests and Elders Over Authority (Matthew 21:23-27)
Another typical incident in the life of Christ further spotlights His
propensity for rationality. On one occasion when He was teaching in the
temple, the chief priests and elders confronted Him by asking two
questions: “By what authority are You doing these things? And who gave
You this authority?” (vs. 23). Commenting on the use of the term
“authority” in this passage, Betz noted that the Pharisees used the term
exousia to refer to “the power to act which given as of right
to anyone by virtue of the position he holds” (1976, 2:601). They were
asking, in essence, “Who was it that conferred upon you this authority
which you presume to exercise? Was it some earthly ruler, or was it God
himself?” (Spence and Exell, 1961, 15:321). As Williams noted: “No one
could presume to teach without a proper commission: where was his
authorization?” (as quoted in Spence and Exell, 15:320).
With remarkable logical prowess, Jesus proceeded to “impale” His
accusers on the horns of what logicians call a “constructive dilemma”
(Baum, p. 210; Copi, p. 274; Warren, 1982, pp. 82ff.). He countered
their question by proposing to provide the answer if they would first
answer His question to them. His question: “The baptism of John, where
was it from? From heaven or from men?” Logically, Jesus was merely
putting their question back on them. They wanted to know what source
authorized His teaching. So, Jesus merely pressed them to identify John
the Baptizer’s source of authority. After all, both derived their
authority from the same source. Yet these hard-hearted religious leaders
rejected John and, by implication, his source of authority. So neither
would they accept Jesus Who received His authority from the same source
(i.e., Heaven). Hence, to spotlight their unjustified resistance to the
truth, He pricked them with their own unbelief by placing them in a
logical bind that would both silence them and expose their insincerity.
Placed into precise, valid argument form (see Warren, p. 82), Jesus’
use of a constructive dilemma entailed the first premise composed of the
conjunction of two implicative statements, the second premise composed
of a disjunctive proposition comprised of the antecedents of the two
elements in premise one, and the third premise (the conclusion)
consisting of a disjunctive statement containing the consequents of the
two elements of premise one. [See chart below]
The Jews could easily discern the logical import of Jesus’ argument—and
the predicament into which they were thrust. They could see that their
attempt to discredit Jesus was logically and decisively defeated. They
were effectively silenced. They had no choice but to bow out of the
interchange by feigning ignorance: “We do not know” (vs. 27). The fact
is, they
did know; they were simply unwilling to answer
Jesus’ question and thereby damage their own public credibility. So
Jesus concluded: “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these
things” (vs. 27). That is, there’s no point in answering your question
if you are unwilling to admit the correct answer to My question, since
the answer to both is the same.
Dispute with the Sadducees Concerning Marriage and the Resurrection (Matthew 22:23-33)
Another impressive interchange between Jesus and His opponents, in
which He demonstrated superb logical skill, is seen in the attempt by
the Sadducees to entangle Him on the subject of the resurrection. The
distinguishing doctrine of the Sadducee sect—the very doctrine that gave
them their reason for existing as a distinct faction—was the rejection
of afterlife. The inspired historian Luke explains: “For Sadducees say
that there is no resurrection—and no angel or spirit” (Acts 23:8). After
seeing the Pharisees fail in their efforts to ensnare Jesus (cf. Luke
20:26), they submitted what they must have considered to be an
unanswerable argument by which they hoped to discredit Him. Feigning
genuine interest in Bible interpretation, they approached Jesus,
addressing Him as “teacher,” and posed a technical question pertaining
to the Law of Moses. This argument was intended to demonstrate logically
the validity of their position, while simultaneously showing the
falsity of the doctrine of the resurrection. They offered the following
highly improbable scenario (which they claimed was an actual case):
Teacher, Moses said that if a man dies, having no children, his
brother shall marry his wife and raise up offspring for his brother. Now
there were with us seven brothers. The first died after he had married,
and having no offspring, left his wife to his brother. Likewise the
second also, and the third, even to the seventh. Last of all the woman
died also. Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife of the seven will
she be? For they all had her (vss. 24-28).
Here is their argument laid out in syllogistic form:
-
If the Law of Moses enjoins the Levirate marriage law in which a man
must be dead before his brother may marry his surviving spouse
(Deuteronomy 25:5-6), and
-
If there is a resurrection in which seven brothers and their one wife will rise from the dead,
-
Then the seven men will all be married to the same woman at the same time in the afterlife.
No doubt a favorite argument of the Sadducees, the purpose was to make
the idea of resurrection appear ridiculous (cf. McGarvey, n.d., p. 601).
One can easily imagine that the purveyors of this scenario delivered
the phrase “in the resurrection” with a “tongue-in-cheek” tone of voice
(since they did not believe in such), and perhaps elbowed each other
with smirks on their faces, fully confident that they had delivered a
decisive deathblow to the notion of resurrection, thereby establishing
the validity of Sadduceeism.
But their clever argument was no match for Deity. They were dealing
with the Author of truth and the premiere controversialist whose
knowledge and skill in the use of correct thinking and accurate
argumentation was unsurpassed. Jesus meticulously commenced to dismantle
their seemingly formidable challenge. First, He delivered two decisive
rebuttals to their postulated scenario that are preceded by the stinging
reprimand that they are “mistaken” (“err/in error,” KJV/NIV/ASV;
“wrong,” RSV): (1) they do not know the Scriptures, and (2) they are
ignorant of the power of God. These two assertions are followed by a
forthright declaration of the circumstances that prevail in the
afterlife (circumstances that only Deity could know): “For in the
resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like
angels of God in heaven” (vs. 30). In other words, once humans transcend
this earthly existence and enter into the spirit realm, the fleshly
relationships that characterized the physical realm will not continue.
Specifically, marriage is a function of earthly relationships, intended
by God to serve a variety of purposes that are integrally related to
earthly existence (foremost of which is propagation of the
species—irrelevant in eternity). As a piece of concrete proof of this
transition, Jesus directed the Sadducees’ attention to the angels—a
direct “gig” at their views since they also denied the existence of
angels. Here are spirit beings, also created by God, who inhabit the
celestial realm (although they travel to the Earth to do God’s bidding
and, while here, appear in male, human form [e.g., Genesis 18:2,16,22;
19:1ff.]). It is apparent, from the treatment of the subject of angels
in the Bible, that they are beings who refrain from the fleshly
relationships that humans engage in on Earth. Angels, therefore,
constitute a suitable example of Jesus’ contention that the marriage
relationship as we know it on Earth will not carry over into the
heavenly realm.
With these points, Jesus won the “debate” by undercutting the
assumption inherent in the Sadducee’s argument that earthly marriage
will transpire in heaven as it does on Earth. However, the test case
that this Jewish faction advanced was merely a ruse intended to
authenticate their central doctrine: disbelief in the doctrine of the
resurrection of the dead. Hence, Jesus proceeded to dismantle that
preeminent contention: “But concerning the resurrection of the dead,
have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, ‘I am the God
of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? God is not the God
of the dead, but of the living” (vss. 31-32). With succinct,
breathtaking brevity, Jesus demolished the core doctrine of Sadduceeism
by showing its logical fallacy. He pointed their attention to Exodus
3:6, when Moses stood before the burning bush. On that occasion, God
identified Himself as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But at the
time God made that statement to Moses (cir. 1500 B.C.), the bodies of
those three patriarchs had been in the grave for hundreds of years
(Genesis 25:8; 35:29; 49:33). God made clear to Moses that, though those
patriarchs were deceased, He continued to be their God. As Jesus
concluded: “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.” Exodus
3:6 constitutes scriptural proof that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—though
separated from their physical bodies—were still in existence. They were
not extinct. They would one day be reunited with their bodies in the
resurrection. With this decisive demonstration, Jesus essentially
devastated Sadduceeism. To remain a Sadducee, after Jesus so effectively
disproved the core doctrine of Sadduceeism, would be to live a life of
irrationality and to conduct oneself in direct contradiction to the
evidence.
This dazzling display of rationality and skilled, logical proficiency
provides ample proof that the skeptic’s charge—that Christianity is
irrational—is incorrect. Unlike the philosophers, pretenders, and conmen
of history, who sought to gather followers around themselves to support
their imposture, Jesus was consistently logical in His living of life,
constantly insisting on the exclusivity of truth (John 8:32) and its
power to transform individuals (John 17:17). He remained committed to
truth and rationality, even when it meant the loss of followers (John
6:60-71). He, indeed, is the Master Logician—the supreme and
quintessential example of right.
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