An unconvincing case

Lee Strobel's "The Case for Christ" was a bestseller a couple of years ago. The author is a former crime reporter and atheist, who converted to evangelical Christianity and became a Christian apologist and pastor. His book seems to have spawned an entire little industry, with Strobel writing several sequels, including "The Case for the Real Jesus" and the creationist book "The Case for a Creator" (where he interviews Jonathan Wells). There is also a book called "The Case for Christmas", which is actually just a shorter version of "The Case for Christ".

I don't deny that Strobel's book is well written. It contains interviews with Christian scholars, including Bruce Metzger, Craig Blomberg and Ben Witherington. And yes, he also interviews Gary Habermas, a more controversial character. The point of the interviews is to prove that the Gospels are historically reliable, that Jesus really was resurrected, and that the evangelical message is correct. These sections, written in a lively and popularized style, presumably explain the success of the book. Christian apologetics are usually more boring! Oddly, "The Case for Christ" also contains blood-curling crime stories from Strobel's time as a crime reporter at Chicago Tribune. I'm not sure why these where included. To show that the author isn't a weakling?

But how strong is Lee Strobel's case for Christ? I admit that I'm not ready to join his mega-church any time soon. My problem with Strobel is his narrow, "fundamentalist" tack on the Gospels. Every little comma in the Gospel stories about Jesus simply *must* be literally true, with no room for scribal mistakes, bad memory, urban legend, allegory, later tampering, etc. It's an all or nothing proposition: Biblical inerrancy or atheism á la Bart Ehrman (or worse). Obviously, there can be no contradictions between the four Gospels either, so Strobel simply shoves them under the rug. How about proposing more creative solutions for a change? A final problem, also connected to the author's fundamentalism, is his insistence on Jesus being absolutely unique.

Some of the more glaring contradictions between the Gospels aren't even mentioned. Was Jesus crucified on 14 Nisan or 15 Nisan? That's hardly a side issue, since the Gospels claim to be eye witness testimony, and since the crucifixion and resurrection are supposedly the most important events in world history, recorded in revealed scripture under the guidance of the Holy Ghost. (At least if you're evangelical!) The attempt to explain away the lack of any evidence for a census of the entire Roman Empire at the time of Herod the Great and the famed Quirinius, isn't convincing either. Many of the "non-Biblical sources" for Jesus are obviously dependent on the Gospels, and cannot therefore be considered independent testimony. Why on earth Ignatius and Irenaeus are mentioned at all, is beyond me. Habermas? None of these sources mention the eclipse which supposedly accompanied the crucifixion. However, two lost works by otherwise unknown authors, quoted by Christian Church Fathers, mention the supposed eclipse... That's evidence? (Habermas, again!)

Gary, please come on! ;-)

Strobel protests that we should be open minded, and don't rule out miracles in advance. True. I'm not a materialist. But evangelicals take exactly the same approach as sceptics when investigating *other* religions. How many believe that Paramahansa Yogananda's guru was physically resurrected? Sathya Sai Baba is said to have been born of a virgin. And what about all the non-evangelicals who claim to have supernatural powers to heal, raise the dead, levitate, and what not? Or, if Strobel is a cessationist, how about *evangelicals* claiming to have these powers? Have Strobel investigated these cases with an "open mind"?

The author also claims that legends don't arise after such a short period as 40 years, but that argument only works if you accept that the Gospels aren't legends - which is precisely the question under debate. Besides, modern cult leaders create legends about themselves, showing that legends might arise already during the lifetime of a religious founder. (Once again, Sai Baba comes to mind, but there are many other examples as well.) Note also that these cults publish books about their leaders as we speak, making the "manuscript distance" nil. Yet, Strobel doesn't accept *their* testimony.

Sometimes, I wonder who the target audience for this book really is. One chapter uses Old Testament prophecies to prove that Jesus really was the Messiah. I could be out on a limb here, but something tells me the local chapter of "Jews for Judaism" might just about disagree with that one... Here, it feels as if "The Case for Christ" is really intended for evangelical Christians, perhaps to bolster their faith, rather than for secular humanists.

But even if we accept the supernatural, Strobel's conclusions could be challenged. Why should we believe that the resurrection of Jesus is any different from that of Tibetan Buddhist masters, whose physical bodies are transformed into "rainbow bodies" at the time of death, leaving an empty death bed behind? In some cases, these masters have shows themselves to people after their "resurrection". And what about angels, who even according to the Bible can materialize physical bodies, look completely human and even eat physical food? Nothing in the Gospel narratives of the resurrection disproves that Jesus was or became an angel, except the theological construct that in *this* particular case, the same kind of miracle had a unique significance and actually was really physical (despite Jesus making the same feats as the angels - walking through walls, changing appearance, etc).

I don't deny that "The Case for Christ" is well-written. It probably deserves being a blockbuster. There's even a Swedish translation! However, I believe it fails to make a case for evangelicalism or fundamentalism.