Faith on Trial (19 page)

Moreover, this conduct was not the result of passive compliance that underlies most psychological manipulation. The jury has seen that, in many cases of Christian martyrdom, escape from the ultimate penalty would have been available through repudiation, and yet it was strength of character that upheld principle even to death. As we have seen from evidence presented to the jury, this fact is historically evident in the writings of Pliny (the Younger), who saw the refusal of followers of Jesus to repudiate their beliefs as stubbornness and unshakeable obstinacy when freedom was offered in return. We have seen the consequences attached to a refusal to recant in the terrible death of Ignatius (among many others), who was given many opportunities to disavow his belief prior to being thrown into the arena. The emperor Trajan confirmed that a person denounced as a Christian was to be punished, but “if any one denies that he is a Christian, and actually proves it, that is by worshipping our gods, he shall be pardoned as a result of his recantation, however suspect he may have been with respect to the past.”
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This refusal to disavow belief in the teachings of the gospel shows strength of character reflecting firm belief, not passive compliance. That belief, evidenced by conduct, provides us today with an opinion of those in the communities of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John that the testimony of these four witnesses is truthful.

The “hallucination” argument is defeated for the same reasons. The Gospel testimony is that many people saw Jesus after the resurrection in different places and at different times. It is impossible to believe that they all experienced the same hallucinations because hallucinations are subjective and personal to the subject making the claim. “By their very nature, only one person can see a given hallucination at a time.”
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The credibility of the Gospels is further supported by evidence presented to the jury that our witnesses were all of the generation born during the time Jesus lived and the events occurred. Historical evidence has been presented to show that all of the Gospels were written prior to
ad
70 when Jerusalem was destroyed, and probably much earlier. In addition, by matching the earliest manuscripts to papyrus fragments from even earlier manuscripts, you have seen that the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke can be dated within approximately thirty-three to thirty-six years of the death of Jesus at the latest, and they were already circulated throughout a wide portion of the Roman Empire at those dates. The original manuscripts were, of course, written even earlier. In fact, evidence of the certainty of an earlier manuscript of the Gospel of Matthew appears in ancient references to such a Gospel written in Aramaic, prior to the earliest Greek fragments that have been preserved.

The early dating of the manuscripts of the Gospels permits us reasonably to infer that the testimony of Matthew, Mark, and John reflects firsthand observation by these witnesses. The Gospels are written from the perspective of firsthand observers, and there is no reason to disbelieve that these people were eyewitnesses of the events reported. Some portions of Luke also reflect firsthand observation, although that Gospel has been presented to the jury primarily as a carefully conducted investigation of events that were publicly known.

Although history and logic provide evidence to support personal attribution of each Gospel to a particular individual, the jury should also recognize that personal attribution is not necessary to establish either the firsthand nature of the testimony or the integrity of that testimony. We have seen that whoever these authors were, they lived within the generation span of Jesus and thus had the opportunity to observe the events. They were in that place, at that time. That they did, in fact, observe those events is established not only by the great precision and detail of their descriptions but also by external corroborating evidence that the details are correct. These details of the fundamental points of the testimony and the historical framework of the narratives have been shown to be consistent among the witnesses in material part.

Verifiable evidence of the historical fact of the life and crucifixion of Jesus has been presented to the jury. Looking back over the horizon of history, you have seen that references to his life were preserved in writings of many non-Christian historians from the period beginning immediately after his death and throughout the following centuries, including Tacitus, Suetonius, Josephus, Pliny (the Younger), Trajan, and Thallus, and in the Talmud, well-known early Jewish literature. Further proof is supplied by numerous Christian writers of the period and by extensive archaeological evidence and other evidence that corroborates the fact of his existence and the manner of his death. In fact, the evidence that has been presented to the jury corroborates almost every single detail by which the historical and social context of the testimony has been created.

But the claim of resurrection provides the greatest authentication to the special nature of Jesus. That claim is based on the actual testimony of the Gospel witnesses. We have seen that federal law holds that direct eyewitness testimony is powerful evidence not to be easily disregarded. The inference of truth of the facts to be proved by that testimony depends on the truthfulness, or credibility, of the witness.
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The witnesses—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—have testified through the Gospels that they and hundreds of others observed the crucifixion and the resurrection, that they saw and spoke with Jesus at this time, that he appeared in recognizable form after death, and that their relationships with him continued after his physical death.

Evidence of the truthfulness, or credibility, of the witnesses has been presented to the jury. In addition, evidence has shown that the testimony of the four Gospels regarding the resurrection are all harmonious, original, and prepared without concert. Discrepancies among the four Gospels do not create material inconsistencies among them. But they show imperfections of memory that are believable and to be expected in testimony from people who observed the same event from different perspectives.

The corroborative evidence presented to the jury as proof of the reliability and credibility of the testimony of the Gospel witnesses may be relied upon with the same weight that would be attributed to other sources of authority. If you are planning to take a trip, you may call a travel agent or look at a map; if you are looking for information about China, you may turn to media or Internet information. It is common in the world of science to base research on predicates established in literature published by authorities in the discipline. The same is true for knowledge based on history. The reliability of the contents of the information accepted as true may be weighed or tested against your personal knowledge or against other authorities, but the method of receiving and accepting information based on an authoritative source is acceptable scholarly protocol.

Testimony of a fact that is not explained by our current understanding of the laws of nature is difficult for us to accept because we cannot comprehend how it happened. Science has no explanation for the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth even today.
We have seen that failure to understand the cause of an event is not a reason to reject solid evidence that the event occurred, however.
That is a fundamental point upon which all scientific research is based. The fact that we cannot understand something does not mean it is contradictory to the laws of nature. Science, which has been described as the gatekeeper to reason and truth, has adopted the protocol that credible evidence must never be rejected merely because it is not understood.

If we were to be limited only to what we know and can verify from personal experience, human knowledge would stagnate. That is why the law and science permit us to reason and infer facts from circumstances. The fact that we cannot understand the resurrection of Jesus does not diminish the value of the evidence that has been presented to you, the jury. Science has no explanation for many things that exist in our physical world today; yet we continue to try to understand the consequences of events even when we cannot explain the cause.

For those who remain skeptical because we cannot understand as a matter of science how the resurrection of Jesus could have occurred, recall that science is not yet even close to explaining many acknowledged mysteries, such as the first spark of life. After many years of concentrated efforts, “origin of life” science has no answers. The improbability involved in generating even the simplest form of life is so enormous that the famous British astronomer Sir Frederick Hoyle compared it to the chance that “a tornado sweeping through a junkyard might assemble a Boeing 747 from the materials therein.”
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If we cannot even understand our own existence, how can we dismiss other events asserted as factual merely because we cannot understand their cause? Our own lives are unexplained, yet we know that we exist!

The underlying premise of the resurrection, that God exists and life after death is possible, is also not inconsistent with our current scientific understanding of the universe and living organisms. You have seen that the Big Bang model of the universe requires a first cause that is not governed by our natural laws and that is not understood from a scientific perspective. Science has also provided overwhelming evidence that the universe and living organisms within the universe were intelligently designed. This is shown by evidence on a cosmic level that such things as the formation of the galaxies and the creation of heavy elements and light elements occurred at exactly the right time and in exactly the right ratio, or balance, to permit life to occur. The rational inference is that the first cause of the universe was not just a creative force but an intelligent Creator.

The jury may be concerned about an obvious challenge: At first glance an argument for design that relies on the delicate balance of the physical aspects of the universe may appear vulnerable to our opposing counsel’s different view, that is, that the galaxies and stars and planets and even life came into existence in a random fashion. But that hypothesis has lately been destroyed by reason and modern science’s new understanding of the limitations of random development.

For example, development of the human body at a cellular level defies any explanation of randomness. Michael Behe, a biochemist, wrote an excellent book explaining these limitations at the biological microcellular level by first analogizing the sequence of events that occur in our various cellular systems to the old Rube Goldberg contraption. His explanation of those limitations still remains the most succinct—perhaps you will remember his analogy example based on old Foghorn Leghorn cartoons.
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Like our biological microsystems, the Rube Goldberg machine used in those cartoons was irreducibly complex, that is, a single system composed of many parts that
interact
to contribute to the basic function. The removal of any one of the parts in the system caused it to cease functioning.

The Rube Goldberg machine began with a dollar bill acting as bait for Foghorn Leghorn. The dollar bill was attached to a string on a stick. The stick propped up a ball. When the bait was taken and the bill was moved, the stick also moved and the ball rolled off a cliff, hitting the raised end of a seesaw, slamming it down to the ground. On the other end of the seesaw was a rock wrapped in sandpaper. The rock flew up, igniting a flame by striking a match on its upward journey. The flare lit the fuse of the nearby cannon, the cannon fired, and the cannonball then hit a lever that started a circular saw. The saw cut through a rope holding up a telephone pole, and the pole fell on Foghorn Leghorn.

Like our own cellular systems, the Rube Goldberg contraption is an irreducibly complex system. Every component of the system depends on efficient performance by every other part in order to work.

The human blood-clotting system is a good example of an irreducibly complex microsystem that defies random development. The absence of any one of a number of its components, as in the Rube Goldberg machine, will cause the system to fail. Each component of the system activates another, and the timing is crucial. Many such irreducibly complex biochemical systems exist in our bodies.

Random development of systems like these by numerous, successive, slight modifications would not work because without
all
of the elements of the system existing in place
from the beginning,
the system will not function. The elements are interdependent. In fact, in the case of the blood-clotting system, if the first few steps required for operation of the system were in place without the last few steps already being there, the human organism would bleed to death with the first superficial wound.
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Not one scientific experiment has successfully illustrated how such an irreducibly complex biochemical system could have evolved through random selection without designed manipulation. Even those who have argued hypothetically through mathematical models that the system may have evolved through genetic mutations are unable to explain the details of such an evolutionary process or, more important, the
origin of
such a hypothetical genetic map. Behe has concluded that since there is no gradual route to the production of these complex microsystems, design is evident.
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Evidence that consciousness and personal identity can transcend physical limitations, as implied by the resurrection, is also consistent with current scientific understanding, or lack of understanding. We can map the brain, but neither neurologists, neurophysicists, nor philosophers have been able to explain how “consciousness” occurs in the human thought process. An understanding of human consciousness and its source remains one of the greatest mysteries of science, but it is almost universally accepted that the full capabilities of consciousness cannot be adequately explained in physical terms today.
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Without such an explanation, we are left with a premise that our minds are something separate from the physical brain, and we are therefore more than the sum of our physical parts.