Till:
What a coincidence! I have an opposite opinion of Robert Turkel. When
he can't find explanations of biblical discrepancies, he will invent
unlikely, how-it-could-have-been scenarios out of thin air and try to
pass them off to the gullible as solutions to "alleged biblical
discrepancies."
Turkel:
Here's an example of that sort of thing -- the theme of this article
is, "Come on, the apostles couldn't possibly have been so dumb as to
not know that Jesus was resurrected!"
Till:
I congratulate Turkel. For once, he has pretty accurately summarized
the thesis of an article I wrote.
Turkel:
The operative claim at work here is that the texts indicate that the
apostles "had not expected [Jesus'] resurrection," or had a "skepticism
of a resurrection" in spite of being told by Jesus that it would
happen. On the surface this seems like rather an odd complaint from a
skeptic -- by Till's usual accounting, the apostles should have been
skeptical of a resurrection; skeptics usually reserve their greatest
admiration for Thomas, the most skeptical of the set, who didn't
believe until he had tangible proof! Why should it then be a problem
that the apostles were skeptical, if indeed they were? Why is this
unbelievable?
Till:
Oh, these are easy questions to answer. We're talking about a group of
disciples who observed a man perform amazing miracles, such as feeding
multitudes with just a few scraps of food, restoring sight to the
blind, healing the lame, walking on water, quelling storms, casting out
devils <snicker, snicker>, zapping fig trees, being
"transfigured" with Moses and Elijah, and raising the dead, so if they
had witnessed such phenomenal acts from a man who had told them several
times that he would be killed and then rise from the dead the third
day, why wouldn't they--as I asked in my article that Turkel quoted
only selectively--have been at the tomb on that third day eagerly
waiting for him to come forth? But they weren't there, and when they
saw signs that he had risen, they didn't "understand" them. Then when
they were told by witnesses that he had been resurrected, they
dismissed the testimony as "idle talk."
If Turkel can't see a problem here, he needs more help than I can give him.
Turkel:
But we have long learned not to expect consistency of thought from Till
when he thinks that there are sound bites to be bitten.
Till:
That is downright ludicrous coming from Turkel, who is the one who
specializes in "sound bites." In fact, I may change his name from
Robert "No Link" Turkel to Robert "Sound Bite" Turkel. His "apologetic"
style is to (1) reply only to selected quotations from the articles
written by skeptics, and (2) keep the URL of what he is "replying to"
from his readers by not supplying links. Whenever he posts a "reply,"
then, his readers are fed only bits, i. e., sound bites, of
what his opponent said on the issue. We will see that history has
repeated itself in Turkel's article that I am now responding to,
because he snipped and skipped so much of my article that his readers
didn't see the full force of my main arguments. Those who want to read
it will find a link to it in the headers of this article.
Turkel:
Let's have a look at some of the claims. Till first supposes he finds
"skepticism" in this passage, John 20:9:
Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.
Till:
Well, just for the heck of it, why don't we look at the entire passage
I quoted in my article? I'll enclose the sentence above in brackets to
emphasize how much of the quotation Turkel snipped.
Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus' head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. [Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.]
The verses that Turkel snipped state that Peter went into the tomb, saw the linen wrappings lying in the tomb, and saw the cloth that had been on Jesus's head rolled up by itself. Now why wouldn't a light in Peter's head have flashed at that moment to tell him, "Yes, that's what he said would happen, didn't he?" But according to the next verse, that didn't happen. The disciples just "returned to their homes."
Turkel:
Till first takes the occassion [sic] to issue the usual dirge
that the OT didn't predict the resurrection at all;
Till:
My "usual dirge that the OT didn't predict the resurrection at all"?
Hmm, I suppose that Turkel doesn't know that a dirge is a funeral song
or a song of mourning. Saying that the Old Testament didn't predict the
resurrection at all is not a song of mourning. It is a simple statement
of fact that I defy Turkel to disprove. Whenever he is ready to affirm
that the Old Testament prophesied that the Messiah would be resurrected
from the dead, I will be here to oppose him.
As usual, Turkel snipped and skipped at this point in his reply to my article, so I am going to reinsert what he cut out so that readers will see what I said and not what Turkel said that I said.
[quoting from "Why Didn't They Know?"]
From one perspective, that the disciples did not yet understand the scripture that Jesus must rise from the dead, as John alleged, is not at all surprising, for the simple reason that there were no scriptures that said he would rise from the dead. Luke had Jesus telling his disciples the night of the resurrection that "it is written that the Christ should suffer, and rise again from the dead the third day" (24:46). The Apostle Paul also alleged that the scriptures said that Christ would be raised on the third day (1 Cor. 15:4). That is the claim, but the claim and the reality are two different things. One could search the Old Testament scriptures until doom's day, and he would find nothing written about a Messiah who would rise from the dead on the third day.One will find nothing in the OT scriptures about a risen Messiah, period! Bibliolaters like to point to Psalm 16, which Luke claimed that both Peter and Paul quoted as proof of Jesus's resurrection (Acts 2:25-31; 13:35-37), but the context of the whole psalm does not support the application that the apostles gave to the verses they quoted. In my booklet, Prophecies: Imaginary and Unfulfilled, I have analyzed in detail this psalm and Peter's and Paul's application of it, so I won't repeat myself here except to say that anyone who reads the apostles' quotation in context will see a dubious connection at best between it and the alleged resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. Despite the often repeated New Testament claim, there just are no prophecies of a resurrected Messiah in the Old Testament scriptures.
[quotation ends]
It is telling that Turkel snipped this section without attempting to reply to my claim that there are no Old Testament scriptures to verify Luke 24:46 and 1 Corinthians 15:4, which said that the "scriptures" had predicted that the Messiah would rise from the dead on the third day. If Turkel were one tenth the apologist that he thinks he is, he would have pounced on the opportunity to really embarrass me and show that the Old Testament did prophesy the Messiah's third-day resurrection. Instead, he chose to sweep all of this aside with a one-sentence summation of my claim, which he followed with an irrelevant link that I will discuss below.
Turkel:
for that matter we presently refer the reader here to
show just how few hermeneutical hints Farrell has.
Till:
The here was a link to "Good
Question..." which is an article on Glenn Miller's "Thinktank." I
looked through it but found nothing that Miller offered to prove that
the Old Testament did predict the resurrection of the "Messiah," so I'm
going to provide my own link. "What
Third-Day Prophecy?"
is an article that I published in The Skeptical Review when I
was dared by a biblicist to give him publishing space. The thesis of
the article was that there are no Old Testament prophecies of a
resurrected Messiah, period, and most assuredly no prophecies that the
Messiah would rise from the dead on the third-day. I wrote the
article especially for the inerrantist who dared me to give him
publishing space, but he never replied to it. Perhaps Turkel would like
to step up to the plate and pinch hit for the inerrantist who ran away.
Turkel:
But indeed, to the main issue.
Till:
Yes, by all means, on to the "main issue." Sweep under the rug my claim
that no prophecy of the Messiah's resurrection can be found in the Old
Testament and go on to the "main issue." Could an issue be any more
"main" to a biblicist than a skeptic's claim that the New Testament
flat-out lied in saying that it had been written in the scriptures that
the "Christ" would rise from the dead the third day?
Turkel:
Were the disciples indeed so dense? Probably not -- and Farrell is
missing some points here, mainly because, as usual, he lacks the
substantive training needed to get the point.
Till:
Turkel seems to think that if he says often enough that his opponent is
uneducated, untrained, unskilled, etc., etc., etc., some of his readers
will see this accusation as proof and spare him the need of actually
having to prove the assertion. If, as he asserted, I lack the
"substantive training" to get to the point, perhaps he will take the
opportunity to show us his "substantive training" and prove to us that
the Old Testament prophesied that the Messiah would rise from the dead
on the third day.
Turkel:
First let's understand exactly what is in John here.
The words are "rise again from the dead" -- "rise again" is the Greek anistemi
used twice for emphasis. In fact this we will see is the key to the
whole issue; the word is commonly used for anyone just getting up from
their place. (Matthew 9:9 And he arose, and followed him.)
Till:
This is so typical of the kind of nonsense that Turkel will often
resort to. He seems to think that if he runs to Strong's concordance
and throws in a Hebrew or Greek word here and there, his readers will
swoon, thinking, "Hey, this guy is using Greek, so he must be right."
Actually, the word in John 20:9 was anasthenai, which is a
derivation of anistemi. Yes, the word did mean "to rise up,"
but it is context that determines whether it means "to get up" or "to
stand up" or "to rise up" in the sense of rising from the dead. I
suppose that Turkel didn't notice that John 20:9 says, in Greek, "ek
nekron anasthenai," which meant "from [the] dead to rise." Hence,
its meaning is determined by its context.
Here are some other places where derivations of the root anistemi were used.
Matthew 20:18 "See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death;
19 then they will hand him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified; and on the third day he will be raised [anasthesetai]."John 11:23 Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again [anasthesetai]."
24 Martha said to him, "I know that he will rise again [anasthesetai] in the resurrection on the last day."Acts 17:2 And Paul went in, as was his custom, and on three sabbath days argued with them from the scriptures,
3 explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Messiah to suffer and to rise [anasthenai] from the dead....
This Greek word did mean "to rise," and several times in the New Testament, it was used in the ordinary sense of "rising up" or "getting up," but the context in which it was used conveyed when it carried the sense of rising up as when being resurrected, so all Turkel has done is waste our time in a pretentious effort to make his readers think that he must know what he is talking about because he uses Greek words. What he said was as pointless as if he were commenting on a French translation of an English document that had used the word ressusciter to translate the English word rise in reference to an alleged resurrection. In such a scenario, pointing out that the English word rise just meant to "get up" or "to stand up" would be an asinine waste of time if the word rise had been used in a statement about "rising from the dead."
Such diversions as Turkel's comment about the meaning of anistemi serve no purpose but to fool readers into thinking that his assertions must be right because he refers to Greek words. At John 20:9, the Greek text said, "Oudepo gar 'edeisan ten graphen oti dei auton ek nekron anastenai," which meant, "Not yet for they knew the scripture that it behoves him from the dead to rise."
The context in which anastenai was used shows very clearly that it was meant to mean a rising from the dead. Turkel has achieved nothing but to waste time in a pretentious effort to make his readers think that he is an expert in Greek.
What Turkel meant in saying that anistemi was used "twice for emphasis" in John 20:9 is anyone's guess, because the Greek text, which I transliterated above, shows that it was used only once here.
Turkel:
But more on that shortly. Now let's look at Farrell's next example of
supposed skepticism:
Luke also indicated that the disciples of Jesus had not expected his resurrection, for Luke said that after Peter looked inside at the linen cloths, "he went home, wondering at that which had come to pass" (24:12). Numerous references to the apostles' skepticism of a resurrection appear elsewhere in the New Testament (Lk. 24:11,38; Jn. 20:24-25; Matt. 28:17).
Till:
Readers should keep in mind that Turkel skipped two entire paragraphs
in my article, which I reinserted above.
Turkel:
Luke 24:12, sorry folks, doesn't mean skepticism -- the word is thaumazo,
and it means to wonder at in the sense of marvelling or admiring. It's
the same word used to describe Jesus' positive reaction to the
centurion's faith (Matthew 8:10). Peter was amazed at something, indeed
a miracle; but what was it?
Till:
Where did I indicate that I thought "wondering" in Luke 24:12 meant to
"ask oneself about" or "to be in a state of perplexity." The Greek word
did mean to marvel, but the text is still an example of inexplicable
skepticism on the part of men who should have known immediately what
the things they were seeing at the tomb meant. Here is Luke 24:12
Luke 24:12 Then arose Peter, and ran unto the sepulchre; and stooping down, he beheld the linen clothes laid by themselves, and departed, wondering in himself at that which was come to pass.
The problem is that Peter seemed not to realize immediately that he was just seeing evidence that what Jesus had promised his disciples had happened. If he had really believed what Jesus had said in those places where he promised that he would rise again on the third day, why would Peter have been at all amazed at seeing the burial cloths in an empty tomb?
Turkel:
We'll get to that shortly.
Till:
It seems that Turkel is always saying that he will address or "get to"
so and so later.
Turkel:
On the other hand, some of the other passages Farrell notes seem a bit
stronger... in English:
Luke 24:11 And their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not.Luke 24:37-8 But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts?
There's also the doubting Thomas incident, of course, and the some doubting even before the resurrected Jesus himself (Matthew 28:17). But now let's switch gears, to places where we are told Jesus clearly gave his people the straight dope about him being about to rise from the dead:
Till:
I don't blame Turkel for wanting to "switch gears" here, because the
doubts of the apostles expressed in the presence of the resurrected
Jesus aren't exactly "user friendly" to the position he is struggling
to defend.
Anyway, Turkel shifted gears and ran away again, so I have a question that I hope he won't run from. It is a simple question. If Jesus had told his disciples several times that he would arise from the dead after three days, why did they dismiss the report of the women as "idle talk"? Let's see if Turkel ever gets around to this.
Turkel [quoting Till]:
From that time began Jesus to show unto his disciples that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed, and the third day be raised up (Matt. 16:21).
Turkel:
The word used this time is egeiro, used twice -- and this means
be roused, or woken up, whether from bed, from death, or from
obscurity. This is not as clearly implying a resurrection as you might
think it is -- why? Same reason as the other word -- it, too, has a
broad meaning, though it is usually used of people who have been sick.
(Matthew 8:15 And he touched her hand, and the fever left her: and she
arose, and ministered unto them.)
Till:
Well, as I showed in discussing "the other word," if derivatives of anistemi
were used in a context that spoke of "rising [anistemi] from the
dead," there wouldn't be much doubt about the sense in which it was
being used, would there? The text in question claims that Jesus told
his disciples that he would be killed and then raised up [egeiro].
The context makes the meaning of egeiro rather clean, unless
Turkel wants to argue that the disciples thought that this meant only
that after Jesus was killed his body would be picked up and elevated.
Later on, Turkel seems to argue that the disciples thought that the
dead body of Jesus would be raised up into heaven, as Ezekiel and Enoch
were "translated," but we'll see that he got nowhere with this quibble.
Turkel's premise seems to be that Jesus spoke in ambiguous language when he told his disciples that he would be resurrected, so let's look at the contexts of passages that used egeiro in referring to resurrection.
Mark 6:14 And king Herod heard of him [Jesus]; (for his name was spread abroad:) and he said, That John the Baptist was risen ['egerthe]from the dead, and therefore mighty works do show forth themselves in him.Luke 9:7 Now Herod the tetrarch heard of all that was done by him: and he was perplexed, because that it was said of some, that John was risen [egegertai] from the dead....
John 2:22 When therefore he was risen ['egerthe] from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this unto them; and they believed the scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.
John 21:14 This is now the third time that Jesus showed himself to his disciples, after that he was risen [egerthais] from the dead.
Romans 6:4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up ['egerthe] from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
Romans 6:9 Knowing that Christ being raised [egertheis] from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him.
Romans 8:34 Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen [egertheis] again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.
1 Corinthians 15:12 Now if Christ be preached that he rose [egegertai] from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?
1 Corinthians 15:20 But now is Christ risen [egegertai] from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.
I could keep going with many more examples of when the Greek word egeiro was used in reference to resurrection from the dead. The word egeiro was used in the same sense that we use the words "rise" and "raise" in English. Their meanings aren't really clear until they appear in contexts that show what they meant. Turkel's attempt to make such passages as Matthew 16:21 ambiguous because the word egeiro meant only to arouse or awaken is a quibble unbecoming of someone who apparently considers himself a serious apologist, because context made the meaning of the word clear. I could fill a website with English words whose meanings cannot be determined until they are used in contexts that show their meanings. In Matthew 16:21, Jesus said that he would be killed but would be raised up on the third day. The context of the word made its meaning clear.
Only someone desperate to find a solution to the problem I have identified would resort to such a quibble as ambiguity in the passages where Jesus told his disciples that he would be resurrected. Besides the passages where Jesus said that he would "rise again" on the third day after he had been killed, he also spoke to his disciples in specific terms of "rising from the dead."
Matthew 17:9 As they [Jesus, Peter, John, and James] were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, "Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised [anaste] from the dead."
So the first two apostles who went to the tomb in John 20 [Peter and John] had heard Jesus on one occasion specifically say that he would be raised from the dead. The context in which anaste was used is too clear for the word to have been misunderstood, although Mark's parallel account depicted these apparently dense apostles as "questioning what this rising from the dead could mean" (9:10), but the whole point of my article was that the apostles whom Jesus selected to take his gospel into all the world obviously weren't the intelligentsia of that period.
As for Turkel's claim that egeiro was used twice in Matthew 16:21, readers will have to ask him to explain what he meant, because the Greek text shows a derivative of egeiro only once in this text.
Turkel:
Mark, though, subs anistemi on the parallel passage, while Luke
follows Matthew, using the same word only once.
Till:
It would be more correct to say that Matthew and Luke substituted egeiro
for Mark's anistemi, because scholars generally recognize that
Mark was the first of the New Testament gospel accounts and that
Matthew and Luke used Mark as a source. I might add that this is a
critical opinion widely shared by scholars whose "lifeblood" has been
biblical research. I'll quote some for Turkel if he wants me to.
Regardless, this whole section of Turkel's "reply" has been one long quibble, because contextual analysis can determine how words like anistemi and egeiro were used. Both were clearly used in the New Testament to convey the sense of resurrection from the dead, and at least once Jesus, in the presence of three of his apostles, spoke of his "rising from the dead." Later on, I will show that Jesus actually sent the twelve on a mission that included instructions to "raise the dead."
Turkel:
It is worth pointing out here that all of these writers are writing in
hindsight having already seen the resurrected Jesus and touched him,
and having preached the gospel for a while --
Till:
Which is supposed to prove what? The gospel records contain many
passages that purport to be the very words that Jesus said on different
occasions. Is Turkel arguing that because they were writing from
hindsight, the gospel authors didn't report what Jesus had really said?
Is he arguing that what the gospels say that Jesus said may not
actually be what he said?
Turkel:
when Jesus said these words (in Aramaic), they were probably rather
more ambiguous.
Till:
Oh, my, Turkel is also an expert in Aramaic! Maybe he can use his
expertise to explain to us why the words that Jesus used in Aramaic
were "probably rather more ambiguous."
Turkel:
Next up on Farrell's list:
And while they abode in Galilee, Jesus said unto them, The Son of man shall be delivered up into the hands of men; and they shall kill him, and the third day he shall be raised up. And they were exceeding(ly) sorry (Matt. 17:22-23).
Matthew uses egeiro here, twice again;
Till:
There he goes again with the "twice again" stuff. I'm far from an
expert in Greek, but I do have a Greek text that I consult at times
like this, and I cannot find egeiro twice in this text. I find egerthsetai,
a derivative of egeiro, but I can find no other form of the
word in this text. Here is Young's Literal Translation.
And while they are living in Galilee, Jesus said to them, 'The Son of Man is about to be delivered up to the hands of men, and they shall kill him, and the third day he shall rise,' and they were exceeding sorry.
Since Young was such a stickler for literalism in his translation, I would think that if egeiro appeared twice in this text, he would have indicated it with a double "rise" or some synonym to indicate the double usage. Whatever Turkel is trying to prove by his references to double usages isn't coming across very clearly.
Turkel:
but he uses anistemi in Matthew 20:18-19, which is also found
in Mark 9:31 and Luke 18 (twice).
Till:
So then the words were used interchangeably in reference to rising from
the dead. What does Turkel think he has proven?
Turkel:
Now Farrell admits that in the latter case, the texts say that the
disciples didn't get the point, but dismisses this as a discrepancy,
because "Matthew clearly indicated that they did understand him." How?
Thusly:
The first time they were told, for example, Peter took Jesus aside, rebuked him, and said, "God forbid it Lord! This must never happen to you" (Matt. 16:22). The second time Jesus told them, Matthew said that they were "exceedingly sorry," but how could they have been exceedingly sorry about something they didn't even understand?
How indeed? Farrell forgets that most of those predictions were pretty grim -- being executed, notably. That's plenty to be sorry about and to forbid! "But," Farrell replies, "They still knew he would be resurrected, so why be sorry?" Indeed, why be sorry when any person dies? None of us seems to preserve a view of eternity long enough to stop mourning at funerals, even those of us who anticipate a resurrection.
Till:
Ah, yes, but at funerals, the mourners know that their friends and
relatives are permanently dead as far as this life--which is the only
life anyone has any guarantee of--is concerned, but Jesus was telling
his disciples that he would be killed but would rise again the third
day. Now they were hearing this from the man I described earlier, whom
they had seen "feeding multitudes with just a few scraps of food,
restoring sight to the blind, healing the lame, walking on water,
quelling storms, casting out devils <snicker, snicker>, zapping
fig trees, being 'transfigured' with Moses and Elijah, and raising the
dead," so having witnessed all of these extraordinary deeds, why
shouldn't they have believed that when Jesus said he would be killed
but would rise on the third day, he would make good on that promise? I
have been very distressed when relatives and friends died, but if I had
had good reason to think that they would have remained dead for only
three days, I think I could have handled the sorrow much better.
Till [quoted by Turkel]:
Besides, considering the general acceptance of the phenomenon of resurrection in those times (Mk. 6:14-16), what was there to misunderstand when a man said he would "rise again" after he had been killed?
Turkel:
What indeed? This is exactly where Farrell is out of his league,
because there was something to misunderstand, and our initial John
passage holds the clue. As for the above, one wonders how Herod's
bewildered exclamations amount to a "general acceptance of the
phenomenon of resurrection"! One man counts as "general acceptance"??
The man on the street didn't seem to have that idea (6:15) at any rate.
Till:
Well, let's take a look at Mark 6:15 and see just what the "man on the
street" thought about Herod's belief that John the Baptist had risen
from the dead. Turkel has a way of throwing in an unquoted scripture
reference as if (6:15) in parenthesis is supposed to prove something.
Unfortunately, most readers won't bother to check what citations like
this one say.
Mark 6:13 They [the twelve] drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them.
14 King Herod heard about this, for Jesus' name had become well known. Some were saying, "John the Baptist has been raised from the dead, and that is why miraculous powers are at work in him."
15 Others said, "He is Elijah." And still others claimed, "He is a prophet, like one of the prophets of long ago."
16 But when Herod heard this, he said, "John, the man I beheaded, has been raised from the dead!"
Some of Turkel's "man on the street" were indeed saying that John the Baptist had been raised from the dead, so this wasn't just an opinion that Herod alone had. Others [men on the street] were saying that Jesus was Elijah, so these would have been people who believed that Elijah and not John the Baptist had been resurrected. Luke's parallel account sheds even more light on what people were saying.
Luke 9:7 Now Herod the ruler heard about all that had taken place, and he was perplexed, because it was said by some that John had been raised from the dead,
8 by some that Elijah had appeared, and by others that one of the ancient prophets had arisen.
The parallel accounts together tell us that three different opinions were being expressed by Turkel's "man on the street." Some were saying that John the Baptist had been raised from the dead, some were saying that Elijah had returned, and others were saying that one of the ancient prophets had been resurrected. All three opinions would have entailed a belief that someone had risen from the dead. We don't hear such nonsense as this today. When a president with remarkable leadership abilities comes along, no one says that Abraham Lincoln has risen from the dead, because we live in a more enlightened age now, but the New Testament references to beliefs that Elijah would return or that people known to have died had been resurrected indicates that belief in resurrection wasn't at all uncommon in those days. Christianity couldn't have gotten off the ground today, because the claim that a man had risen from the dead would be laughed to scorn, but in a time when belief in resurrections wasn't unusual, it was able to gain a foothold and grow. Through the centuries, indoctrination of children to believe in such an absurdity has enabled this religion to survive.
Let this be a lesson to Turkel's readers. When he throws out a
scripture citation in passing but doesn't quote the passage, his
citation should be checked to see what it says, for in this case, an
examination of what Turkel's "man on the street" thought about Herod's
belief that John the Baptist had risen from the dead shows that
although some didn't think that John had been resurrected, all
opinions were that someone of past fame had risen from the dead.
Turkel:
I'll tie this knot shortly, but:
Till:
Yeah, right! Turkel is always going to get back to something he skips
or tie knots "shortly," but as likely as not, he doesn't go back to tie
the knot, or else he "categorizes" and responds with some general
catch-all response that really doesn't answer much of anything.
Till [quoted by Turkel]
On the way to Jerusalem, [Jesus] took them aside, told them that he would be (1) delivered up to the chief priests and scribes, (2) condemned to death, (3) delivered to the Gentiles to be mocked, (4) scourged, (5) crucified, and (6) raised on the third day. After their arrival in Jerusalem, the apostles saw Jesus (1) delivered up to the chief priests and scribes, (2) condemned to death, (3) delivered to the Gentiles and mocked, (4) scourged, and (5) crucified, yet somehow, after personally witnessing these five specific fulfillments of Jesus's statement, they didn't expect him to be resurrected. Why? One would think that if Jesus had really told them to expect all of these things, after witnessing the precise fulfillment of the first five of his predictions, they would have surely expected at least a possibility of the sixth.
Till:
Turkel stopped short here and omitted a sentence that I think is
significant enough for readers to see.
So rather than the women's having to run to tell the apostles about the empty tomb they had found, one would think that the apostles would have been on the scene themselves that third-day morning at least waiting to see if Jesus would come forth.
I think that is a reasonable conclusion to draw about a group of disciples who had allegedly witnessed the fulfillment of five specific predictions that their cult leader had made, but Turkel has different ideas. Let's look at his quibble, which even he had to say was "facetious" after he had wasted our time on silly "fluff."
Turkel:
There's Farrell not being consistent again. Items 1-5 happened to a lot
of Jews in those days; there were plenty of poor folk being bothered,
and all kinds of bandits to play with.
Till:
What an asinine explanation for problem (1). A "lot of Jews" were
brought before the priests and scribes--after all, they lived under
Yahweh's picky-picky law, but I dare say that many more Jews were not
brought before the Sanhedrin than were brought before it. This
would be somewhat as if a modern day "prophet" told his disciples that
he would be killed in a car wreck but would rise again on the third
day. Although a "lot" of people are killed in car wrecks, if after
making such a prediction, the "prophet" was killed in a car accident,
you can bet your sweet bippy that his followers would be expecting to
see him resurrected in fulfillment of the rest of the prophecy.
As for Turkel's reference to "all kind of bandits to play with," readers will have to ask him what he meant by this. There were indeed bandits in those days, as there are now, but I can't see what bandits would have to do with Jesus's prophecy that he would be delivered up to the chief priests and scribes. Whatever Turkel meant, it must have some real pertinence, because Turkel just doesn't put "fluff" or "irrelevant distractions" into his articles.
Turkel:
So, then, where's Farrell's skepticism? If I tell you that I will 1) be
arrested 2) go to jail 3) go to trial 4) be found guilty 5) be put in
handcuffs 6) be broken out of jail by a flying green quetzalcoatl, does
the fulfillment of 1-5 really impress you that #6 is sure to happen?
Till:
If Turkel had a cult built around him and he predicted 1 through 6,
after which 1 through 5 were fulfilled, you can bet that his disciples
would believe that number 6 was going to happen too. For pity's sake,
is Turkel completely unaware of cults whose leaders claimed to be God
or Jesus, whose cult members waited expectantly for their resurrections
after they had died? If not, then I suggest that he use some of the
"research" money he is begging for on his website to look into this
subject.
Turkel:
Actually I'm being facetious --
Till:
Well, if Turkel would get serious for a change, he might actually begin
to see the absurdities in what he is championing on his website.
Turkel:
we need to address one more set of points before we bop Farrell on the
head with the answer.
Till:
I waited eagerly for the "bop," but it never came. It seems to be the
bop that flopped.
Turkel:
In this set, he objects that some other folks did apparently get the
point, and it seems strange that they did while the disciples didn't.
First up:
[The apostles] had to be sought out and told, and even then they considered the news the women brought to them to be only "idle talk" (Luke 24:11). The women were telling them exactly what Jesus had said would happen, and they thought their words were just idle talk!
Till:
I guess I will have to change Turkel's moniker from Robert "No Link"
Turkel to Robert "Snip-and-Skip" Turkel. I'm going to reinsert the
entire paragraph from which Turkel snipped the two-sentence partial
quotation above. To highlight how much he snipped, I'll emphasize in
bold print the part that he quoted above. The first sentence of the
paragraph connects to the sentence that I reinserted above after
Turkel's truncation of another of my paragraphs that he only partially
quoted.
But they weren't there (according to the story). They had to be sought out and told, and even then they considered the news the women brought to them to be only "idle talk" (Luke 24:11). The women were telling them exactly what Jesus had said would happen, and they thought their words were just idle talk! At the tomb, the angels said to the women, "(R)emember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, saying that the Son of man must be delivered up into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again" (Luke 24:7). The next verse says that "they remembered his words." So the women were able to remember that Jesus had said this, but the apostles whom Jesus had taken aside on the way to Jerusalem expressly for the purpose of telling them to expect his death and resurrection apparently couldn't remember that he had said it. They just looked into the tomb and went home, "for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead." Is that what we are supposed to believe?
I had made a very significant contrast in the women's reaction and the reaction of the apostles, who had also been with Jesus when he told his disciples that he would be killed but would rise again the third day. Just a little reminder from the angel enable the women to remember immediately what Jesus had said about rising again, but the apostles seemed to walk around with a "duh" expression on their faces unable to remember much of anything. Peter and John saw clear signs in the empty tomb that Jesus had risen, as he had predicted he would, but they turned away and went back to their homes, not yet "understand[ing]" the scripture that he must rise from the dead." As I said earlier, why they wouldn't have understood the scripture that Jesus must rise from the dead is perfectly understandable, because there is no such scripture. (If Turkel denies this, then I remind him that I am still waiting for an inerrantist to reply to my article "What Third-Day Prophecy?".) Then when the women told them what they had seen and what the angel(s) had said, they dismissed it as "idle talk."
That brings us to another paragraph that Turkel snipped.
If the apostles didn't yet understand that Jesus had been destined to rise from the dead, they were a pretty exclusive club, because just about everybody else knew what to expect. As we just noticed, the women remembered immediately that Jesus had said that he would rise from the dead, and they weren't the only disciples (disciples, not apostles) who understood this.
This statement led into the partial quotation that Turkel commented on below, but I consider it a significant statement because it pointed out that just about everyone who had had any associations with Jesus understood that he was supposed to rise from the dead... except the apostles. It seems that these special emissaries to whom he entrusted the task of going into all the world to preach the gospel were slow learners. They just couldn't seem to understand what everyone else seemed to grasp with apparent ease.
Turkel:
Indeed! Once again, where's Farrell's usual skepticism? Let's remember
that women were regarded as untrustworthy witnesses in this time; who
would have put it past them to be imagining things, especially those
two angels?
Till:
Ah, yes, a variation of the old untrustworthy-women argument. The New
Testament gospels were written in Greek, and if Turkel only understood
the Greek mind a little better, he would know that women were not at
all held in the low regard that they were in Hebrew culture.
Turkel:
That's why Peter did indeed make the trip in the very next verse. Luke
24:7 uses that anistemi again,
Till:
I wonder if Luke 24:7 used anistemi twice. Anyway, I have shown
above that anistemi and its variations were used much in the
same way that we use the English word rise. If someone speaks
of "rising" from bed or of a balloon "rising," we understand from its
context what the word means. Likewise, if we heard a modern-day fanatic
speaking of someone who had risen from the dead, we would
immediately know what he was claiming. Turkel's ambiguity argument is
an example of the extremes that biblical inerrantists will go to in
their search for unity and harmony in the Bible.
Turkel:
and Farrell thinks, hey, the women could recall it, but of course they
did have an angel reminding them. But it really is moot.
Till:
Yes, it's moot, because Turkel has no reasonable explanation for why
the apostles were slow to understand that Jesus had arisen from the
dead. Besides all this, there is the problem of Paul's statement in 1
Corinthians 15:5 where he listed Cephas [Peter] first among those to
whom Jesus had appeared. Luke 24:34 was an apparent effort to harmonize
the so-called resurrection appearances with what Paul had said before
the gospels were written. When the disciples from Emmaus, who are
coming up immediately below, went to Jerusalem to tell the apostles
that they had seen Jesus, they were told, "The Lord is risen indeed and
has appeared to Simon."
Turkel:
Let's move to the next set:
Till [quoted by Turkel]:
In the conversation that Jesus had with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus on resurrection day, Cleopas, after summarizing the events surrounding the trial and crucifixion of Jesus, clearly indicated that he understood a resurrection was supposed to happen the third day:But we hoped that it was he who should redeem Israel. Yea and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things came to pass (Luke 24:21).
Turkel:
Excuse me, but how does this indicate that Cleopas "understood a
resurrection was supposed to happen"? There isn't an anistemi
or an egeiro in sight. Maybe Farrell can explain what he means
here,
Till:
Sure, I'll do that. I think that even Turkel will see what I mean if we
look first at the entire context.
Luke 24:17 And he [Jesus] said to them [the disciples going to Emmaus], "What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?" They stood still, looking sad.
18 Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, "Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?"
19 He asked them, "What things?" They replied, "The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,
20 and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him.
21 But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place.
22 Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning,
23 and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive.
24 Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him."
In the context in which he used it, the reference of Cleopas to the third day makes no sense unless it is interpreted as a reference to Jesus's promise to rise on the third day. Cleopas referred to the betrayal, trial, crucifixion, and death of Jesus, all of which Jesus had predicted to his disciples during his "personal ministry." Then Cleopas expressed a lost hope by saying that they had hoped that Jesus was the one who would redeem Israel, but it was now the third day since these events had happened. He was, in effect, saying, "We had hoped that Jesus would be the Messiah who would redeem Israel, but since it is now the third day, the day that he promised to rise from the dead, it looks as if we were wrong about who he was."
I submit that this interpretation is far more sensible than Turkel's attempt to explain why Jesus said that Abiathar rather than Ahimelech was the high priest when David entered the "house of God" to ask for bread (Mark 2:26). Turkel claimed that Jesus was, in effect, saying to the Pharisees, "In the time of Abiathar, who was a real stickler for the law, and we would expect the law to be followed, David and his friends were allowed to do this; yet you say now that we can't do something similar? Are you a better judge of the law than Abiathar was?" My reply shot Turkel's interpretation down like a gobbler at a turkey shoot by pointing out that (1) absolutely nothing was ever said in the Old Testament about any interpretations of law that Abiathar had ever made, (2) Abiathar used divination in his relationship with David in order to "speak" to Yahweh, and (3) at the end of David's life, Abiathar opposed Solomon's accession to the throne, even though Solomon was Yahweh's choice to succeed David.
I point this out to show that Turkel is just another biblical inerrantist who will (1) resort to all sorts of fanciful interpretations in order to explain away obvious biblical discrepancies, as in the case of Abiathar, and (2) will deny the obvious meanings of passages, as he is doing in his quibbling about anistemi and egeiro, in order to find some way to make a biblical statement not mean what it obviously said. Luke 24:21 did not use the words anistemi or egeiro, but so what? What possible reason could Cleopas have had in saying that it was the third day since the events in Jerusalem had happened unless he had meant that Jesus was supposed to rise from the dead on the third day?
Maybe Turkel would like to answer that question for us? What exactly did Cleopas mean? Maybe Turkel would like to consult some of those scholars whose "lifeblood" has been biblical research, and get back to us with a report of what they think Cleopas meant by his reference to the third day.
Finally, if there is any doubt that Cleopas's reference to the third day pertained to what he had heard Jesus say about his resurrection, the moreover that begins verse 22 removes it.
21 But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place.
22 Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning,
23 and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive.
24 Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him."
Turkel likes to talk about Greek, so maybe he will take the time to research a word in this text and give us a report on it. The word was alla, which was an adversative particle that denoted contrast. It was variously translated as "yea, howbeit, yet, but, etc." This word was often used at the beginning of a clause to contrast that clause with what had been said in a clause before it.
Mark 14:36 He said, "Abba, Father, for you all things are possible; remove this cup from me; yet [alla], not what I want, but what you want."
Here the thought in the last clause, introduced by alla contrasts with what was said in the first clause. Jesus wanted "this cup" to be removed from him, but what he wanted was not to take precedence over what "the father" wanted. The wish of "the father" negated what Jesus wanted.
1 Corinthians 9:11 If we have sown spiritual good among you, is it too much if we reap your material benefits?
12 If others share this rightful claim on you, do not we still more? Nevertheless [alla], we have not made use of this right, but we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ.
This is a favorite text of preachers who argue that they are entitled to be paid by the flock for their services, and I'm not trying to deny that this is what it teaches. I quoted it to show that Paul asked in the first clause why he was not entitled to reap material benefits from having sown "spiritual good" among the Corinthians if others were receiving such benefits. The clause after it, however, began with alla to show a contrast in what he had the right to do and what had really happened. He had the right to receive the material rewards, but he had not used this right. The second clause, introduced by alla had the effect of negating what was said in the first clause.
Matthew 24:6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not alarmed; for this must take place, but [alla] the end is not yet.
The wars and rumors of war would instill fear that the end had come, but the second clause, introduced by alla negated that fear. The end had not yet come, even though there were wars and rumors of war.
Matthew 22:31 "And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God,
32 ' I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? He is God not of the dead, but [alla] of the living."
The thought in the last clause, introduced by alla, contrasted with or negated the idea in the clause before it.
Now let's apply this to Luke 24:21ff. (Turkel asked me to explain what I meant, and so I am gladly accommodating him.) Cleopas had said to Jesus that the disciples had hoped that Jesus was the Messiah, but it was the third day since his crucifixion in Jerusalem. Moreover [alla], some of the women disciples had gone to the tomb that morning and reported back that the tomb was empty, and a check of the tomb had revealed that it was empty and there was no sign of Jesus. The word alla at the beginning of this clause had the effect of negating the hope that had been expressed in the preceding clause because a check of the tomb had turned up no sign of Jesus. Their hope was gone, and they no longer believed that Jesus would be resurrected on the third day.
Turkel:
but we have one more passage before we pull the big surprise:
Till:
Oh, goody, I like surprises.
Turkel [quoting Till]:
Even the enemies of Jesus understood that he had predicted his resurrection. After Jesus had been put into the tomb, they came to Pilate to ask that precautions be taken to prevent a staged fulfillment of the prediction:The next day, that is, after the day of Preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered before Pilate and said, "Sir, we remember what that impostor said while he was still alive, 'After three days I will rise again.' Therefore command the tomb to be made secure until the third day; otherwise his disciples may go and steal him away, and tell the people, 'He has been raised from the dead,' and the last deception would be worse than the first" (Matt. 28:62-64, NRSV).
So the women remembered that Jesus had predicted his resurrection, the disciples at Emmaus remembered it, and the enemies of Jesus remembered it. Everyone apparently remembered it except Jesus's own handpicked apostles.
Turkel:
Farrell's in for a big surprise, folks. He wants to know: why weren't
the apostles, at least one of them, "on the scene themselves that
third-day morning at least waiting to see if Jesus would come forth"?
For good reason! They weren't expecting a resurrection, all right, but
they were expecting something else -- something that would remove the
body, but it wouldn't be a resurrection, and there'd be nothing worth
sitting and waiting for at the door of the tomb!
Till:
Say what? Turkel can't be serious. This passage clearly teaches that
the chief priests and Pharisees didn't believe that there would be a
resurrection, as Jesus had promised, but they were afraid that his
disciples might come in the night to steal the body so that they could
later claim that he had been resurrected. The priests and Pharisees
simply wanted to take precautions so that a false claim of a
resurrection could not be made. How Turkel gets from this passage that
the apostles thought that something would take the body away but that
it wouldn't be a resurrection is an example of a biblical inerrantist
who thinks that he can say just anything and that will take a
discrepancy away.
Turkel's spin on this text is patently ridiculous. If the members of a cult had really believed that the body of their dead leader would be taken away in the night by some mysterious means, they themselves would have set up a watch to prevent it from happening. The anguish that Mary Magdalene expressed in "John's" version of resurrection morning indicates how emotionally distressing it would have been for the disciples to think that the body of their "Lord" might be stolen. "Sir, if you have carried him away," she said to Jesus before she realized that he wasn't the gardener, "tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away" (John 20:15).
The guard requested by the chief priests and Pharisees (if we accept the face value of what the New Testament says) shows that they were aware that Jesus had predicted that he would rise from the dead, so the problem still remains. Why didn't the disciples who had traveled with Jesus and heard him say several times that he would be killed and rise again the third day, know that Jesus had predicted his resurrection? The enemies of Jesus knew that he had predicted this, but the disciples who had traveled with him didn't know it.
Turkel:
Time to explain!
Till:
I'll say!
Turkel:
Jewish belief of this period had an expectation of resurrection, yes --
but not until the final judgment.
Till:
Well, that's an overstatement that I'd like to see Turkel prove. The
idea of resurrection didn't find its way into Jewish literature until
the postexilic era after the Jews in captivity had encountered the idea
in Persian religious thought and brought it back with them. Prior to
this, the concept of afterlife was some kind of shadowy existence in "Sheol"
or the pit or grave, and the only really clear expression of
resurrection in the Old Testament is in Daniel 12:2ff, which is
a postexilic work.
Daniel 12:2 Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.
3 Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever.
The idea of resurrection to an afterlife had caught on in some Jewish circles, but it was still a hotly disputed issue. The Sadducean sect, for example, rejected the notion of resurrection and even spirits and angels, whereas the Pharisees accepted belief in all of them. The apostle Paul purportedly used this sectarian disagreement to his advantage when he realized that the council convened to hear charges against him were partly Pharisees and partly Sadducees. Upon recognizing this, he cried out in the council, "I am on trial for hoping in the resurrection of the dead" (Acts 23:6) This provoked a dispute among the council members so violent that Paul had to be spirited away to safety by soldiers.
Some of those who accepted the idea of resurrection, as the Pharisees did, also had their differences. They disputed over whether the resurrection would be physical or spiritual or even an angelic transformation, so Turkel shouldn't put too much stock in what the apostles of Jesus (assuming they were even real historical characters) may have thought about resurrection. The apostle Paul, for example, taught in 1 Corinthians 15 that the resurrection of Jesus had been a resurrection of a spiritual body, a position I am fully prepared to defend after we have tied up loose ends in other matters, if Turkel is interested.
Turkel:
The idea of a single person being resurrected before that (and maybe
some with him, like Matt's saints) wasn't part of the package.
Till:
Yeah, I guess not. I suppose that is why the people were saying that
Jesus was John the Baptist risen from the dead or Elijah or one of the
prophets of old returned from the dead, and, of course, the apostles,
who had seen Jesus resurrect Jairus's daughter (Matt. 9:18ff),
the widow of Nain's son (Luke 7:11ff), and Lazarus (John 11:17ff),
wouldn't have thought that the resurrection of a single person was
"part of the package." These apostles, who were presumably witnesses to
the events on the day Jesus was crucified, would surely have been among
the "many" to whom the "many" resurrected saints appeared after Jesus
had been resurrected (Matt. 27:53), so while the women were running
around trying to convince the apostles that Jesus had risen, the city
was presumably full of "many" resurrected saint, appearing to "many" in
the city, but, of course, none of this would have given the apostles,
who had heard Jesus say many times that he would be killed and
rise again the third day, any reason to suspect that the resurrection
of a single person was "part of the package."
Is Turkel still not convinced? Well, there is much more. As I noted above, Jesus once sent his twelve apostles on a mission that included a command to "raise the dead."
Matthew 10:5 These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: "Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans,
6 but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
7 As you go, proclaim the good news, 'The kingdom of heaven has come near.'
8 Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment...."
I'll bet that Turkel is glad that he wasn't one of those twelve, because they were forbidden to take payment. That restriction would have prevented him from soliciting contributors who were willing to donate 70 or 80 drachmas per year so that he could become a full time apostle to "the lost sheep of the house of Israel." The important point in this passage, however, is the clear reference to Jesus's command that the twelve were to "raise the dead."
Did they do this? If not, why did they disobey Jesus? If they did do it, why would single-person resurrections not have been "part of the package" at the time that Jesus rose from the dead?
Just look at what is in the very next chapter of Matthew.
11:2 When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples
3 and said to him, "Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?"
4 Jesus answered them, "Go and tell John what you hear and see:
5 the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them...."
Jesus told the twelve to "raise the dead," and when John the Baptist sent messengers to ask Jesus if he was the Messiah, Jesus's answer was to go tell John what the messengers "hear and see," and one of those things that Jesus said they were seeing was that "the dead are raised." Yet Turkel, faced with a serious inconsistency in the biblical text, has the audacity to quibble that the twelve, who had been with Jesus during his personal ministry, just didn't understand that single-person resurrections were "part of the package."
Folks, those of you who flock to Turkel's website to see him grind skeptics down to size, take a good look at your hero. This is the kind of nonsense he constantly dreams up to prove that there are no discrepancies in the Bible. You should be ashamed for letting him get by with such stuff as this.
Turkel:
We have noted that the two words used to describe resurrection in the
Gospels, especially anistemi, have more mundane meanings
attached to them.
Till:
And so does the word rise in English, but as I have noted,
context determines the meaning of the word, so if a person who speaks
English hears someone claiming that a person who was killed rose
from the dead, there would be no doubt about what the word was intended
to signify. I have noted that it was the same with anistemi
and egeiro in Greek. Turkel is simply hoping that if he slings
around a few Greek words to readers who know nothing about Greek, they
will be impressed enough to think that he is on to something.
Turkel:
When describing the physical resurrection, Paul almost universally uses
egeiro (1 Cor. 15)
Till:
But Paul didn't describe a physical resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15.
He described a spiritual resurrection. I'll touch this issue only
briefly, but if Turkel wants to pursue it more in detail, I'm here. All
he has to do is let me know and agree that he will post my part of the
debate on his website.
1 Corinthians 15:35 But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come?
36 Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die:
37 And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain:
38 But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body.
39 All flesh is not the same flesh: but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds.
40 There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another.
41 There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory.
42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:
43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:
44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
I have noticed that Turkel often quotes the KJV, so I have used it here. Paul argued that the body that is planted or sown is not the body that comes forth. What was sown was a "natural body," but what was "raised" was a "spiritual body." This is contrary to what Most Christians today believe. They believe that the actual body of Jesus, which died on the cross, was the body that was raised. Paul, however, didn't think so. He said that a natural body was sown or planted, but a spiritual body was raised. Paul's epistle to the Corinthians was written well before the gospel narratives, and this is a critical opinion held by many scholars whose "lifeblood" has been biblical research. Some time later, the "gospels" were written, and the life of Jesus was put into a specific historical setting, where he was crucified and physically resurrected in a body that bore the marks of the nails in his hands and feet and the wound in his side (Luke 24:39-40; John 20:27), but this was not the kind of resurrection that was taught earlier by the apostle Paul.
Turkel:
-- he does use anistemi in Rom 14:9,
Till:
Whether he used anistemi or egeiro or anastasis
doesn't matter. They were all three words that had what Turkel calls
"mundane meanings" of "rise up," "get up," "arouse," "awaken," "stand
up," etc., but when they were used, the context showed whether they
were being used to convey the idea of resurrection from the dead. This
is just another of Turkel's desperate quibbles that proves exactly
nothing.
Turkel:
but adds the word anazao, meaning "live again".
Till:
Yes, literally, he said, "For Christ also died and rose and lived
again," so he was obviously using the word to convey a resurrection
from the dead.
Now I have a question for Turkel. What is your point besides wanting to fool your readers into thinking that you are some kind of expert in Greek?
Turkel:
In Eph. 5:14 he uses anistemi, but pairs it with nekros
("rise from the dead").
Till:
Yes, again, so putting the word anistemi, which meant "to rise"
with a phrase that meant "from [the] dead" shows that he was accusing
his readers of being in a state of spiritual death that they needed to
"rise" from.
I'll ask Turkel again what his point is besides wanting his readers to think that he is an expert in Greek and so therefore must be right in what he is saying.
Turkel:
In his earliest letter, 1 Thessalonians, he uses the double anistemi
(4:14).
Till:
Here's the double anistemi again. I'll let Turkel explain what
he meant, because the text simply said, "Ei gar pistouomen oti
Iesous apethane kai aneste outo kai o theos tous koimethentas
dia tou Iesous axei sun auto." The derivative of anistemi
is emphasized in bold print, and it appears only once in the verse,
which means, "For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, so also
God will bring with him all those who have fallen asleep through
Jesus."
Those who want to know what Turkel means by his "double anestimi" references will have to ask him. Meanwhile, suffice it to note that the context of 1 Thessalonians 4:14 conveys that rising from the dead was the intended meaning of aneste.
Turkel:
But his overall word to refer to resurrection is egeiro --
which is used mainly in the Gospels for people getting up from beds and
seats.
Till:
Well, not exactly. Many times egeiro was used in the sense of
waking up or being aroused. That is the first meaning of the word given
in Arndt's and Gingrich's Greek Lexicon of the New Testament,
but it was also used in the sense of "getting up." Whenever it was used
in the sense of waking up or arousing, the contexts conveyed it, as in
Matthew 8:25, "And his disciples came to him, and awoke [egeiran]
him, saying, Lord, save us: we perish." When it was used to covey the
idea of getting up from beds or seats, the contexts so indicated, as in
Acts 3:7, "And he took him by the right hand and raised [egeire]
him up; and immediately his feet and ankles were made strong."
Likewise, when it was used to convey rising from the dead, the contexts
so indicated, as I repeatedly showed above.
Now it is time for my question again. What is Turkel's point besides wanting to delude his readers into thinking that he is an expert in Greek?
Turkel:
Both words are verbs, and they carry a broad meaning -- and they are
not term-specific to resurrection.
Till:
Well, the fact is that if there is any word in Greek that was
"term-specific to resurrection," I would like to know what it is. The
word translated "resurrection" in English versions is almost always anastasis,
which also meant to "rise" or "stand up." The contexts in which it is
used many times in the New Testament show that it meant to rise or
stand up in the sense of rising or standing up from the dead. The word egersis
was translated once by "resurrection" in the KJV (27:53), but this is
obviously a derivative of egeiro, which Turkel claims was not
"term-specific to resurrection." The word exanastasis was used
once where "resurrection" is in the KJV (Phil. 3:11), but its
connection to anastasis is apparent. This leaves Turkel with no
Greek words that were "term-specific to resurrection," so what has he
proven by this long, dead-end tangent of his about the meanings of anistemi
and egeiro? Even the English word resurrection isn't
term specific. It was derived from the Latin word resurrectio,
which meant "to rise" or "to appear." It has acquired an associated
meaning of rising from the dead only by its long usage in Christian
societies that put great importance in their superstitious belief in
the resurrection of Jesus, but it can be used in other senses, as when
one speaks of "resurrecting" an idea or custom or controversy.
Turkel spent all of this time and proved exactly nothing. I thought he was the one who had an aversion to "fluff" and "irrelevant distractions."
Turkel:
The only word that is term-specific to resurrection is the noun form of
anistemi -- and that is anastasis.
Till:
As I showed above, anastasis is not "term-specific," because it
is obviously a derivative of anistemi. Turkel's favorite Hebrew
scholar, James Strong gave "a standing up again" as its primary
meaning. It acquired the sense of "resurrection" through usage, just as
resurrection in English acquired its meaning through usage.
Turkel:
It is used in the Gospels only with reference to the final resurrection
(e.g., Matt. 22:23, "The same day came to him the Sadducees, which say
that there is no resurrection...")
Till:
But it was used many times elsewhere in the New Testament in reference
to the specific resurrection of Jesus, so what is Turkel's point?
Turkel:
The others are general-movement words.
Till:
Which is supposed to prove what, since (1) contexts always made it
clear when rising or awakening from the dead was meant by the other
"general-movement words," and (2) even anastasis itself meant
"a standing up again"?
Turkel:
And now this leads back to our first verse, which is the key to the
whole thing:
Till [quoted by Turkel]:
Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.
Turkel:
How could John have believed, yet also not understood about the
resurrection?
Till:
Oh, that's an easy one to answer, and since I see that Turkel's answer
below isn't the most likely one, I'll be glad to answer it. Living in a
time when resurrection from the dead was a common belief (as I have
shown) and having actually seen Jesus raise the dead and having raised
the dead himself [by implication noted above], upon seeing the empty
tomb and the burial garments, John believed that Jesus had risen from
the dead. After all, when people heard about the works of Jesus, they
jumped to the conclusion that he was John the Baptist or Elijah or one
of the old prophets who had come back from the dead, so why wouldn't an
apostle who had seen dead people resurrected and had heard Jesus say
that he would be killed and rise again the third day have
believed that Jesus had been resurrected, if on the third day after
Jesus's death, he had seen what John was allegedly seeing in the tomb?
Notice, however, that the verse says only that John believed, so this
would be a reference to believing that he had seen the evidence that
Jesus's promise to rise again had been fulfilled. The next verse did not
say that they [Peter and John] did not yet believe but that they did
not understand the scripture that he [Jesus] must rise
from the dead, so this verse was not talking about belief but
understanding. John believed that Jesus had risen, but he didn't yet
understand the scripture that he must rise from the dead.
Of course, I have already pointed out that Peter and John could be excused for not understanding the scripture that had said Jesus would rise from the dead, because there was no scripture that said this.
Turkel:
Because he, and the other apostles, and everyone else (including the
chief priests and co.) were not expecting a resurrection -- they were
expecting (or for the priests, expecting a claim of) a "taking up" of
the body after the manner of Elijah, Moses (in the apocryphal works) or
Enoch.
Till:
Oh, the chief priests and company believed this too? I suppose that was
why they said to Pilate...
Matthew 27:63 "Sir, we remember what that impostor said while he was still alive, 'After three days I will rise again.'
64 Therefore command the tomb to be made secure until the third day; otherwise his disciples may go and steal him away, and tell the people, 'He has been raised from the dead,' and the last deception would be worse than the first."
I don't see anything here that even suggests that the "chief priests and company" were expecting the body of Jesus to be "taken up" after the manner of Elijah or Enoch. They clearly expressed a fear that the disciples of the man Jesus, who had said to them that he would "rise again" after three days, would come at night, steal the body away, and tell people that he had been raised from the dead. I emphasized some words to make a point that shoots to pieces Turkel's quibble that the disciples didn't believe that Jesus would rise from the dead, because they didn't understand what egeiro and anestimi meant, since they were not "term-specific." The word "rise" that the chief priests used in speaking to Pilate was translated from egeiromai, which is a derivative of Turkel's nonspecific egeiro. The word must not have been too nonspecific, because the delegation to Pilate went on to say that since Jesus had told his disciples that he would "rise [egeiromai]" after three days, they thought it probable that the disciples would steal the body and claim that he had been raised from the dead. It seems that the "chief priests and company" had no problem understanding what Jesus had meant.
The disciples, however, seemed to have been a little more intellectually dense.
Turkel:
This would have been a sign that Jesus' life was brought to an orderly
conclusion and that he had been vindicated by God.
Till:
Huh? Turkel sees all of that in the request that the chief priests and
company made to have a guard posted? Well, of course, that doesn't
surprise me, because he also saw in Jesus's reference to Abiathar as
the high priest who gave David showbread an indication that Jesus was
just saying, "In the time of Abiathar, who was a real stickler for the
law, and we would expect the law to be followed, David and his friends
were allowed to do this; yet you say now that we can't do something
similar? Are you a better judge of the law than Abiathar was?"
In other words, Turkel doesn't have any problem seeing what he wants to see in a biblical text, and if it will resolve a discrepancy, he can see all sorts of imaginative things.
Turkel:
And now we see how it is that the disicples [sic] misunderstood
and were surprised, and how the enemies still wanted the tomb guarded,
Till:
And so the enemies wanted the tomb guarded because they didn't want the
body to be "taken up" after the manner of Elijah or Enoch? I'll quote
again the statement attributed to the delegation to Pilate and ask
Turkel to identify the specific language in the text that indicates
that this was the delegation's concern.
Matthew 27:63 "Sir, we remember what that impostor said while he was still alive, 'After three days I will rise again.'
64 Therefore command the tomb to be made secure until the third day; otherwise his disciples may go and steal him away, and tell the people, 'He has been raised from the dead,' and the last deception would be worse than the first."
I'm not asking Turkel to do anything that I'm not willing to do myself. If he wants me to, I will gladly identify language in the text that indicates that the priests feared that the disciples of Jesus might steal the body and then tell people that he had been raised from the dead. Hint: if Turkel looks closely, he might see the expressions "steal him away" and "raised from the dead."
Now will he show us where their statement said anything about a fear that the body would be "taken up" in the manner of Elijah and Enoch?
Turkel:
and why the apostles were still sorry to see Jesus go, and why Jesus
had to tell Mary, "I have not yet ascended to the Father",
Till:
By the way, why did Jesus have to tell Mary that, because Matthew's
account indicates that in running from the tomb, Mary Magdalene met
Jesus, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. How could she have
held his feet without touching him? I contend that this is an
irreconcilable inconsistency in the resurrection narratives, and I
challenge Turkel to debate the issue with me. My only demand would be
that he agree to post my articles on his website so that readers can
see everything that I write on the subject.
Come on, Turkel, I dare you.
Turkel:
and why the disciples thought they were seeing a spirit -- all parties
knew that Jesus predicted the body would be missing; what they didn't
get the point on was the mechanism, because there was no room in their
belief system for a specific resurrection prior to the general one.
Till:
No, I guess there wasn't any room in their belief system for a specific
resurrection prior to the general one. After all, they had seen only
the specific resurrections of Jairus's daughter, the widow of Nain's
son, and Lazarus, and had themselves been commanded to "raise the dead"
while on a special mission, so the idea of a specific resurrection
would have been completely foreign to their experience.
Turkel:
They knew he was going, but not that he was coming back so soon!
Till:
As I said in the article that Turkel has failed to give a satisfactory
reply to, if the disciples didn't understand that Jesus was supposed to
rise from the dead, they were a pretty exclusive club, because just
about everyone else knew what to expect.
Turkel:
And so, Till fades into obscurity, never to anistemi again. It
looks like our skeptical friends should have done a bit more homework
before letting their mouths egeiro!
Till:
Turkel, of course, wishes he could fade into obscurity never to rise
again, but he has too much pride to allow that. He will hack out some
kind of reply, which I will then answer. When I debate biblical
inerrantists, I always have the same purpose in mind. I have no
illusions that they will be unable to come back with some kind of
speculative "solution," because it just isn't in their nature to admit
that they have been stumped. I enter debates with the expectation that
my opponents will always postulate how-it-could-have-been scenarios, as
Turkel has done by arguing that the apostles just couldn't understand
what "rise from the dead" meant, but my strategy is to reply to my
opponent's first absurdity so that he will come back with a second
absurdity, which I will reply to, so that he can come back with a third
absurdity, and so on until the credulity of the audience collapses
under the weight of too many absurdities.
I thank Turkel for his cooperation. It took me years to get him
into some kind of debating forum where the audience would be able to
see everything I write rather than what he just selectively quotes, so
I'm in it for the duration.
