Switch89

Just published a criticism of WLC's argument for the resurrection of Jesus. It is an excerpt from the fifth chapter of my book "Atheism and Naturalism". Be sure give feedback!

thedistillers

That would indeed be Craig's criticism.

But then Craig would argue that there are convincing evidence (or convincing reasons) to believe God exists.

Johnny Skeptic

Craig is wrong. He has the cart before the horse. The "empty tomb" argument is not valid for the simple reason that in order to claim that a body is not in a specific tomb, you first have to have evidence that it was in a specific tomb in the first place. As far as I know, Craig has never produced any historical evidence that Jesus was put in Joseph of Arimathaea's tomb.

spamandham

The empty tomb argument is about the stupidest possible argument for the resurrection. The Gospels are not reliable sources. This type of argument is geared at making fellow Christians believe there is more to all this than just stories in a book - but there isn't.

Blahface

That is just what I was going to say.

Switch89

He has not, to my knowledge, provided reasons to believe that a meddling God exists (a God who intervenes in his creation). His other arguments for God is the Kalam, the argument from morality, etc. These arguments get us no further than a deist God, and even these I have defeated at other points in my book.

Toto

But when it comes down to it, Craig will claim that any failing in his argument is his personal failing, but he still knows that God exists because Jesus has touched his heart. I have never heard of a skeptic that has been converted by Craig's arguments. His real purpose is to convince Christian college students that they can be smart and still be a Christian.

Switch89

I've often heard him say that if his arguments don't do the trick then he "is a poor apologist". I have a hard time believing that or even believing that he believes that. He's world-famous and one of the most respected apologists ever. It's not that anything is wrong with Craig's intellect or arguing ability, it's that the doctrine he defends is intellectually indefensible.

Diogenes the Cynic

There is no extant mention in Christian literature of an empty tomb until at leat 40 years after the alleged crucifixion. There is no explicit claim of a physical resurrection until 50 years after the alleged crucifixion.

Craig's MO is to get the other side to accept, a priori the historicity of a burial, a missing body and that anyone ever claimed to have witnessed a physically resurrected Jesus. If he can get the other side to accept that much, he's already won. The mistake I've seen a lot of hiis debate opponents make is that they're too willing to accept this much baloney upfront. The way to really defeat Craig is to kick his ass on those initial four assertions he always tries to get people to buy at the outset.

The weakest part of his argument, the part he tries to hustle his opponents past as fast as possible, is the claim that Jesus was ever buried in a tomb at all. His support for that is pretty much nothing but a tepid attempt to argue that Mark would not invent a fictional member of the Sanhedrin since, presumably, any hypothetical, contemporaneous Palestinian Jews would know it was a fictional character. This clearly doesn't hold up in light of the fact that Mark was talking to an almost entirely Gentile audience outside Palestine, at least 40 years later. There was little, if any chance that anyone in the audience would have a mental catalogue of all Sanhedrin members from a half-century before, and even if such a critic popped up somewhere and voiced his objection in the midst of a public reading of Mark in some Christian congregation in Rome or Constantinople, are we supposed to believe that any of the congregation would have listened or cared? Are we supposed to believe that something as inconsequential as an inconvenient historical fact was going to have any effect even in that room, much less derail the entire incipient faith all across Europe, Asia and North Africa?

Add to that the fact that "Arimathea" is not a real place name but a descriptor ("Joseph of Valedictorianville." Mark might as well have said he was from Funkytown), and that Craig's argument that a Christian wouldn't invent refutable historical facts is completely undermined by a wealth of other erroneous and invented facts throughout the Gospels (didn't Luke know that no Palestinian Jew contemporaneous with Jesus would sit still for his assertion that people had to return to their ancestral homes for a census? Why didn't anyone object to John's erroneous assertion that Jesus' followers had been expelled from the synagogues while Jesus was still alive?).

Craig really can't get past his very first assertion if you really push him on it. Unfortunately, few of his debate opponents ever seem to try.

Steven Carr

Do Craig's four facts prove a resurrection?

Did people see Lazarus after he died?

Was the tomb of Lazarus empty?

Does this prove that Lazarus was resurrected? Many Christians simply deny that Lazarus was resurrected. He was resuscitated...