Cold-Case Christianity

LearningToLetGo

LearningToLetGo

I bought a book titled Cold-Case Christianity by J.Warner Wallace and it arrived today.

Amazon.com

www.amazon.com

It's about a cold-case homicide detective who approaches the scripture as a set of eyewitness testimonies in a murder case (which, I suppose is exactly what it is). The premise appears quite interesting so here goes.

I'll post my thoughts in this thread as I read through it. Comments are welcome.
 
LearningToLetGo said:
I'll post my thoughts in this thread as I read through it. Comments are welcome.
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I have not read the book, however I did see a short interview with him summarizing his book and it really was quite interesting.

Also, he and Lee Strobel have small roles in the movie, “Gods Not Dead 2” playing themselves in a trial sequence.

I will be interested in what you think of the book.
 
I just finished chapter five and am about 1/3rd of the way through. It's a good read. The author has been instructing the reader on the basics of criminal investigation. He's taught how to infer meaning and the meaning and significance of circumstantial evidence. He's illustrated examples of how to test witnesses and how to perform basic forensic statement analysis. Except for occasional Bible references, I feel like I'm reading a text book.

To this point, the author has delved into the martyrdom of the apostles using extra-biblical sources from the first and second century to validate their lives and deaths. This is important because he is making the case that something happened to change these men's lives and motivate them to go from farmers and fishermen to evangelists. I suppose you could say he's establishing character. He has also used forensic language analysis to determine that the Gospel of Mark is written from the point of view of Peter.

For example:

1. Mark mentions Peter with prominence
2. Mark identified Peter with the most familiarity
3. Mark used Peter to bookend his gospel
4. Mark paid Peter the most respect
5. Mark included details that can be best attributed to Peter
6. Mark used Peter's preaching style

I thought that was fascinating and he makes a compelling case for Peter as the primary source for Mark.

So far it's a captivating read. More to come soon.
 
Updates from chapters 6-8:

Chapter 6 details how to separate artifacts from evidence. In this context, an artifact is something that just happened to be present in a crime scene and cataloged by the detectives and has nothing to do with the case. Sometimes these artifacts are confusing because they make no sense and can derail an investigation. Other times these artifacts can be and are ignored as unrelated.

In scripture there are known artifacts. These are additions that were made by scribes hundreds of years after the fact or perhaps they are text attributed to the wrong author. Many of these are known and documented in your study Bible. The key question when looking at scriptural artifacts is whether they materially affect the meaning of the chapter. If the answer is no then they can be footnoted and ignored. In the case of scripture, that is exactly the case.

Chapter 7 is about one of my favorite subjects: conspiracy theories. This chapter details the process required to craft and maintain a good conspiracy theory then proceeds to thoroughly debunk the notion that the gospel writers supposedly pulled the wool over the world's eyes and crafted the best and most convincing conspiracy theory ever.

Chapter 8 is about the chain of custody of evidence. In my opinion this is the weakest chapter yet but the author promises he will return to it later in the book. Basically it seeks to answer the question of what happened to the canonical texts before the Council of Laodicea in AD 363. Can these texts be trusted or were they fabricated after the fact? Honestly that's what I am truly interested in. Fingers crossed that he can prove that case.

I'm about half way through the book and have learned a lot. If you are interested in police procedure, criminal investigations and the Bible then you'll probably enjoy this book.
 
Alright -- finished the part one of the book.

Chapter 9 is about knowing when "enough is enough". It basically describes that point in a case when enough evidence has been accumulated to tip the scales for the jury. That point, as you might expect, is unique to each person and impossible to determine in advance. From a scriptural perspective this means that each person likewise has their own point when the go from non-believer to believer. For some this point is early on and for others much later, so really -- don't give up. You never know what might flip the switch for someone.

Chapter 10 talks about the tactics that defense attorneys use to weaken or destroy the prosecution's case. These include:

1) Challenging the very nature of truth, i.e. it's all subjective
2) Attacking the very heart of the matter. In scriptural terms this means undermining the gospels themselves
3) Focusing on minutiae to distract from the big picture, e.g. the trees instead of the forest
4) Attack the messenger!
5) Demanding perfection and anything less must be false
6) Giving alternate explanations, e.g. Jesus was a great rabbi and his reputation grew to mythological proportions after his death etc.
7) Giving a nice, eloquent and professional appearance to give credence to the messenger and thus the message

So that was part one where the author describes the process of investigation and the methods/tools used to build a case. No we're entering into part two where he actually builds his case for the gospels.

Part two will answer the following questions:

1) Were they present?
2) Were they corroborated?
3) Were they accurate?
4) Were they biased?

I plan to take this next part much slower since it's the meat of the book. Stay tuned!
 
Chapter 11 seeks to answer the question of whether the gospel writers were present at the life of Jesus.

This may seem a strange question to ask, but one of the main challenges made of the gospels is that they were written long after the fact, perhaps in the second or third century, and thus contained assertions that could not be challenged by living eye witnesses.

To counter this claim, the author builds a compelling case for the gospels to have been written prior to the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD. Indeed, he demonstrates a strong case for the gospels to have been written well before that time, most likely sometime between 50 and 62 AD. He uses the following proofs:

1) Luke fails to mention the siege or fall of Jerusalem. Neither does he mention the deaths of James, Paul or Peter in 62, 64 and 65 AD respectively.
2) The books of Luke predates Acts which ends with Paul's arrest and arrival in Rome.
3) Paul quotes from Luke in his letter to Timothy when writing "the laborer deserves his wages" (1 Timothy 5:18, Luke 10:7).
4) Luke repeatedly quoted Mark and Matthew.

We can conclude that Paul had access to Luke's gospel, or at least a draft of it, and by extension possibly Matthew's and Mark's as well. Since we know Paul and Luke met many of the apostles it's no stretch to imagine the apostles also had access to these manuscripts. Since we have ample evidence of Paul and the apostles warning against false gospels in the form of the Gnostic writings, we know they were actively working against such heresies. Their silence in regards of Luke, Matthew and Mark is a heavy endorsement of these writings. As such we can definitely know that the Gospels of Mark, Matthew and Luke were read and endorsed by the apostles of Jesus as describing what they witnessed regarding the life of Jesus.
 
Chapter 12 answers the question of whether the gospel writers' testaments were corroborated. The author addresses this question from two perspectives: internal and external.

Internal means are the gospels consistent with each other and with the time, place and style of ancient Judea circa 30 AD. He begins by comparing the gospels against each other to see if one or more gospels may fill in the gaps of the others. Unsurprisingly they do. For example, ambiguous passages in Matthew are clarified by text in Mark, etc. The author then moves on to the time and place of the gospels, asking such questions as: do the names used match common names from that time and place; is the geography correct; etc? Not surprisingly, the text passes this test.

External means are the gospels validated from non-biblical sources. The author writes at length about ancient sources such as Josephus (AD 37-100), Thallus (AD 5-60), Tacitus (AD 56-117), Mara Bar-Serapion (AD 70-?) and Phlegon (AD 80-140). He also spends several pages discussing the archaeological record of that time period. Naturally these sources and others do indeed corroborate the account of the gospel writers.

Surprisingly, the author cogently shows that even if the only surviving historical texts were these non-canonical sources we would still know the following about Jesus:

1) He lived in Judea
2) Was a virtuous man
3) Had wondrous powers
4) Could predict the future
5) Was a "Wise King" of the Jews
6) Was accused by Jewish leaders
7) Was crucified by Pilate
8) Lived during the reign of Tiberius
9) Darkness and earthquake followed his death
10) Reported to have risen from death
11) Believed to be the messiah
12) Was called the "Christ"
13) Followers known as "Christians"
14) Christianity "superstition" spread after his death

Chapter 13 seeks to answer the question, were they accurate? The author addresses this by following the "chain of evidence" from the apostles to the Council of Laodicea in AD 350. He follows the students of the apostles, specifically the students of John and the students of Paul.

This chapter, although good, is perhaps the weakest evidence so far. He does trace the students of John from roughly AD 70 through approximately AD 220. However, he admits the trail goes cold for more than 100 years after that. Paul's lineage spans from about AD 60 through AD 175 and similarly goes cold. What survives of these various students matches what is in the gospels so there is ample reason to believe the evidence is accurate, but it's not air-tight. For those who want to doubt, this is their out.

All in all the reading is pleasant. I have one more chapter to go. We'll write about that soon.

Jason
 
Chapter 13 and the follow-up addendum wrap the book up in a nice little bow. I really don't have much to say about either since they said nothing of note that wasn't already covered in earlier chapters.

All in all I enjoyed the book. It was worth the modest cost ($16.99 US). The prose was light and easy to read. You don't need to have an exceptional vocabulary to enjoy it and the doctrinal issues were minimal.

The author gives excellent ammunition for evangelism so give it a go and see if you like it too.

Jason
 
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