This post is long overdue but that's never stopped me before.
I had the chance a couple of weeks ago to see arch-heretic and blasphemer Bart Ehrman's appearance on the Colbert Report. For those of you who don't read much in the field of biblical studies Ehrman is a New Testament scholar who has turned away from the faith and has been publishing books about the Bible is unreliable and is full of mistakes and whatnot. Ehrman continues to go well beyond just technical criticism by attacking the fundamental teachings of Christianity and opting for a form of gnostic belief.
During his interview with Ehrman, Colbert asked him for examples about concerning his view that the gospels just don't fit together. Ehrman cited the passion narratives as a prime example of contradictory textual evidence. He claimed that Jesus' countenance is drastically different in all four narratives and thus they are incompatible and should be jettisoned from belief.
A day or two after seeing this interview I decided to drive to Greensboro to go to an Orthodox church for the vespers of Good Friday with the 12 passion gospels. As I participated 2+ hr evening service I found great delight that not only were we reading the passion narrative of one gospel or two of them but we were reading all the passion narratives interspersed among each other. In this service we slowly walked through the events leading up to the crucifixion, recounting each word, deed, and action portrayed in the readings.
As we slowly read each of the 12 segments from the gospels I couldn't help but think of the interview I saw just days prior. Ehrman looks at the passion narratives and sees contradiction, he sees a mythos about the person of Jesus and because he looks this way he falls deeply into heresy, blasphemy, and life without the living God. The church on the other hand is called to live within the scriptures. We are called to read the scriptures through the lens of faith. We were passed down a tradition from the apostles and it is within that tradition that we read the gospels. We start knowing that Jesus is divine and human and as such we read the scriptures that way. Ehrman on the other hand, starts with the assumption that Jesus is not divine (because scientifically humans can't be divine) and thus the scriptures are wrong and are full of lies and contradictions.
I realize I'm not doing justice nor adding to the conversation of "how to read scripture" but I did want to share this delightful juxtaposition that I experienced.
You can see the Ehrman interview here via Ben Witherinton's blog.
You can also see Witherington's critique of Ehrman's books via his blog if you click here.
I haven't read Witherinton's critiques, but from my experience he does a good job refuting the heretical beliefs of individuals like Ehrman.
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9 comments:
Ehrman is many things. Mostly he is a charlatan who makes sensationalistic claims to sell books.
BTW, I find Witherington's commentary equally problematic.
Yeah, I really don't have much respect for Ehrman, for a guy who studied under Metzger it's a shame he turned out the way he did.
Like I said I haven't read Witherington's comments so I'll have to abstain. He's good at doing some things but other times I find that I'm not a fan.
Bart is a decent textual critic. Unfortunately, he thinks this makes him able to theologize. He he has never written a scholarly theological work and this shows in his "pop" theology which is so thoroughly ignorant of the history of Christian thought that it is unpalatable to anyone so versed.
Witherington so unswervingly touts the evangelical agenda I wonder at his bias. Further, he seems completely unaware at his bias. He'll attempt to disassemble the perpetual virginity of Mary as being a late doctrinal invention (he says 375AD; 150AD is probably a better estimate) while fully supporting Original Sin, a doctrine even later than the perpetual virginity. He's obviously smart, but I find him hard to take seriously.
More interesting than the interview itself is the comments below it. People can hardly agree on whether Colbert is a Christian, whether he was being serious, whether Ehrman looked stupid, whether he was smart, etc. This disagreement is instructive for what Ehrman argues in the book and elsewhere, and perhaps is better argued by Dale Allison at Pittsburgh. That is, if we have a video that we can watch over and over and dissect from a interview that happened a little over three weeks ago, but yet there are wildly variant positions on what is there - how can we trust that the gospels contain much that we can rely on? You can fall back on your orthodox high horse as much as you want, but in the end it is reduced to your faith about reliable information being somehow guarded by God against Ehrman's empirical doubt. Neither wins, but both are present. Calling him an arch-heretic, and accusing him of blasphemy makes you sound like an anachronistic troglodye who is unwilling to realistically engage the points that he bring up.
Mr. Marcuse,
You may be correct in that it boils down to belief that the faith was safeguarded by God vs Ehrman's empirical doubt. Many try to argue this point by asserting that the example you come up with and the faith being handed down through an oral/written tradition are not the same. Since the faith is much more important, and the cultures are different.
Although I think there is truth to this counter argument I won't spend much time offering it here because I suspect you are well read and educated and would have another argument that would lead us in circles, and frankly I've had a busy week and am tired. I did want to give you some sort of response though.
To call Ehrman a heretic and blasphemer is nothing short of classifying him as what he is. What Erhman teaches is not Christianity and it is not the faith of the apostles. He teaches a gospel that is contrary to scripture and the faith handed down through the Church and the councils.
I only reason I have a more of a problem with Erhman's claims than I do with a buddhist's, athiests, or muslims, is because Erhman claims to be teaching "real" Christianity.
Erhman ceased to teach the truth faith a while ago and as such from a Christian point of view he is nothing more than a heretic and a blasphemer. To deny the divinity of Christ is heresy and blasphemy plain and simple. He can go right ahead teaching that but I will continue to put him in the group of "other religions" just as I would categorize Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Muslims, and the like.
Yes I didn't engage his points and I'm sure you think that I am retreating to an orthodox "high horse" but the argument against Ehrman's claims has been set forth by the early father's for many years (cf. Irenaus, Justin Martyr, Athanasius, etc). and I can certainly do no better than they did in their refutation of the earliest heretics - the true ancestors of Erhman's teachings.
LoL, did he really just say "troglodyte?" That is SO 1980s!
And speaking of something which is totally still in vogue: attacking other people for not having quite caught up to the spirit of the times. Because, Benjamin, as you well know, it is today, our day and age, which is special; our concerns, thoughts, fears, and philosophies which trump all prior issues (as well as all later issues which might come up, no doubt). So how dare you accuse someone of blasphemy! It's not as though there's a God who is actually there that can be either properly or improperly described, right? He/she/it's just a sometimes-socially-useful concept, right?
Also, since when did human inability to perceive truth ever become a barrier to the belief in truth, generally? I imagine it had something to do with that "modern" project. Now how dumb is that? They were seeking independent "truths" that would be universally affirmable. Boy, they would have been better off taking a page from simple spacial logic, wouldn't they have, you troglodyte? I mean, after all, everyone knows that if you look at a thing from different angles you see different things. (I would have said perspectives, troglodyte, but that word has become so cognitivized as to be shedding its spacial usage in contemporary parlance.)
Mr. Marcuse,
I will respond to your comment. What makes Ehrman so repugnant is not the conclusions that he comes to, which may or may not be honest. He is despised because he purposefully misrepresents material to sell books. That is why I specifically used the term charlatan.
His work "The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture" is a landmark work and is highly regarded among scholars as a well thought out journey through textual critical issues. He aptly demonstrates his command of the various languages involved.
Then he proceeds to translate a bunch of various NT and other early Christian texts in which he so botches the translations of the underlying languages that it must be purposeful (based upon his previously demonstrated ability). Further, he makes outlandish claims that he himself later repudiates (only after having made a bundle of money selling his sensationalistic claims).
So you can see, this is not about an Orthodox "high-horse" at all, but rather about the fact that his scholarship is the worst kind and his conclusions dishonestly arrived at.
Mr Marcuse,
Also, Colbert is intentionally ambiguous about his personal life. Can you say that the apostolic writings are intentionally ambiguous about Christ, his coming in the flesh, his death and resurrection?
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