Ed. note: This article is based upon the transcript from programs
produced by the John Ankerberg Show. Additional material has
been added for this print version.
7. What are
some specific examples of the evidence for Christianity?
Among many
possible lines of evidence for Christianity, we have selected two we feel
will command the attention of any open-minded person—specifically,
fulfilled prophecy and the historical resurrection of Jesus Christ. First,
the existence of specifically fulfilled prophecy in the Bible cannot be
denied. For example, the internal and external evidence both clearly
support a pre-neo-Babylonian composition for the book of Isaiah (seventh
century BC) and a neo-Babylonian composition for the book of Daniel (sixth
century BC).82
Yet Isaiah predicts and describes what King Cyrus will do (by name) over
100 years before he even lived (Isaiah 44:28-45:6). Isaiah also
describes the specific nature and death of the Jewish Messiah 700 years in
advance (Isaiah 9:6; 53:1-12), and the Babylonian captivity of Judah 100
years in advance (Isaiah 39:5-7). Indeed, the Assyrian captivity is hinted
at by Moses as early as 1400 BC in Deuteronomy 28:64-66.
Similarly, in
530 BC, hundreds of years in advance, the prophet Daniel (Matthew 24:15)
predicts the Medo-Persian, Greek, and Roman empires so clearly that
antisupernaturalists are forced, against all the evidence, to date this
book at 165 BC and thus imply it is a forgery (cf., Daniel 2, 7, 11:1-35
in light of subsequent Persian, Greek, and Roman history and the dynasties
of the Egyptians and Syrians).83
First Kings 13:1, 2 predicts King Josiah 300 years before he was born, and
Micah 5:2 predicts the very birthplace of Jesus 700 years
before He was born. In the November 2003 issue of the ATRI
Journal, we provided a great deal of additional evidence of
supernatural prophecy in the Bible, and we show why this is impossible to
explain apart from the divine inspiration of the Bible. How are we to
account for such things if the Bible is not a book inspired by God?
Nothing like this is found in other religions.
Second, nothing
like the historical resurrection of Christ is found in other religions. As
Newsweek magazine commented in its cover story for April 8, 1996
(p. 61), "By any measure, the resurrection of Jesus is the most radical of
Christian doctrines... of no other historical figure has the claim been
made persistently that God has raised him from the dead." In light of the
evidence, the resurrection cannot logically be denied and, if it is true,
given the teachings of Jesus, it proves beyond a reasonable doubt that
Christianity alone is fully true. (See our Knowing the Truth about the
Resurrection.)
How? On the
authority of accepted principles of historic and textual analysis, the New
Testament documents can be shown to be reliable and trustworthy. That is,
they give accurate primary source evidence for the life and death of Jesus
Christ. In 2,000 years the New Testament authors have never been proven
unethical, dishonest, or the object of deception. In the Gospel records,
Jesus claims to be God incarnate (John 5:18; 10:27- 33); He exercises
innumerable divine prerogatives, and fully rests His claims on His
numerous, abundantly testified, historically unparalleled miracles (John
10:37, 38), and His forthcoming physical resurrection from the dead (John
10:17, 18). No one else ever did this.
Christ’s
resurrection is minutely described in the gospels; it was subject to
repeated eyewitness verification by skeptics; and over 2,000 years it has
never been disproved despite the detailed scholarship of the world’s best
skeptics. Nor can the resurrection be rejected a priori on
antisupernaturalist grounds, for miracles are impossible only if so
defined. The probability of a miracle is determined by the cumulative
weight of the evidence, not philosophical bias.
To illustrate
the quality of the evidence for the resurrection, a two-day public debate
was held between Dr. Gary R. Habermas, a Christian scholar, and Antony
Flew, a leading philosopher and skeptic of the resurrection. Ten
independent judges, all of whom served on the faculty of American
universities, were to render a verdict. The first panel of judges was
composed of five philosophers who were instructed to evaluate the debate
content and judge the winner. The second panel of judges was told to
evaluate the argumentation technique of the debaters.
The results on
content were four votes in favor of the Christian argument, one vote for a
draw, and no vote in favor of the skeptical position. The decision
on argumentation technique was three to two in favor of the Christian
debater. The overall decision of both panels was seven to two in favor of
the Christian position, with one draw. With one of the world’s leading
philosophers defending the skeptical position, the judges were often
surprised that the outcome resulted so heavily in favor of the
resurrection. The details are given in Did Jesus Rise From the Dead?
The Resurrection Debate (Terry L. Miethe, ed., Harper & Row,
1987). But the fact is that hundreds of such professional debates on the
resurrection, the existence of God, the creation-evolution controversy,
etc., have now been held. And Christians characteristically win the
debates. If Christian truth claims withstand all counter arguments and win
in scholarly debate, isn’t this compelling evidence Christianity is
true?
