WHERE WE ARE

In Chapter 7 of the book I’m currently working on (Thinking Critically about the Resurrection of Jesus: The Resuscitation of the Swoon Theory), I argue that an objection by Gary Habermas and Michael Licona to the Swoon Theory FAILS. The Swoon Theory is, roughly, the skeptical view that Jesus survived his crucifixion and that this led to his disciples mistakenly believing that God had raised Jesus from the dead.

One objection by Habermas and Licona asserts that the religious experience that resulted in Paul’s conversion to Christianity raises a serious problem for the Swoon Theory. I refer to this as Objection #12 (Paul’s Conversion). Here is a part of their argument for this objection:

2a. Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of the risen Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

A1. IF Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of the risen Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance, THEN it is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

THEREFORE:

B1. It is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

In Chapter 7 of my book, I argue that the historical claim asserted in premise (2a) is FALSE, making this argument UNSOUND, which means that Objection #12 FAILS.

AN ATTEMPT TO REPAIR OBJECTION #12 (PAUL’S CONVERSION)

One obvious way to try to repair the argument constituting Objection #12 is to weaken the historical claim, to make the claim more plausible:

2b. Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light.

Here is the sub-argument for premise (B1) that makes use of the modified second premise:

2b. Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light.

A1. IF Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of the risen Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance, THEN it is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

THEREFORE:

B1. It is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

With this modification of the second premise, the sub-argument becomes logically INVALID. Because the historical premise now talks about Paul ENCOUNTERING Jesus on the road to Damascus, it no longer connects logically to premise (A1) which talks about Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes the face and body of Jesus during his experience on the road to Damascus.

Thus, this revised argument does not give us a good reason to believe that (B1) is true, and since (B1) is not obviously true or self-evident, we may reasonably conclude that (B1) is dubious and might well be false. But (B1) is the only reason given to support (C1), a key premise in the argument constituting Objection #12:

C1. It is very probable that Jesus had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance when Paul clearly SAW with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus.

Thus, if (B1) is dubious, then the argument does not give us a good reason to believe that (C1) is true, and since (C1) is neither obviously true nor self-evident, we may also reasonably conclude that the key premise (C1) is dubious and might well be false. That means that Objection #12 FAILS.

ANOTHER ATTEMPT TO RESCUE OBJECTION #12

When we modify the second premise, replacing the false historical claim (2a) with the weaker and more plausible historical claim (2b), that breaks the logical connection between the second premise and premise (A1), making the sub-argument for (B1) logically INVALID.

So, we cannot just modify the second premise, we also need to modify premise (A1), so that premise (2b) logically connects with the revised version of premise (A1). The most obvious way to do that is to modify the first phrase in (A1) like this:

A2. IF Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light, THEN it is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

With this change to premise (A), we now have a logically VALID inference to the desired conclusion (B1):

2b. Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light.

A2. IF Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light, THEN it is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

THEREFORE:

B1. It is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

However, in modifying premise (A) in order to repair the logic of this sub-argument, we introduced a premise that is clearly false: premise (A2). Although this modified argument is logically valid, it is UNSOUND because premise (A2) is false. Thus, once again this argument does not provide a good reason to believe that (B1) is true.

Premise (A2) is clearly false, because it is a conditional claim and the antecedent does NOT imply the consequent. If we suppose it to be the case that Paul claimed his conversion was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light, this would NOT make it very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

In fact, claiming to have had an encounter with the physically embodied Jesus whose presence “was indicated by a glorious light” makes it UNLIKELY that Paul believed he had clearly seen with his own eyes the face and body of Jesus. For if Paul believed he had clearly seen with his own eyes the face and body of the risen Jesus, then he would have probably said so, instead of making the much weaker claim to have merely seen “a glorious light” that somehow indicated the presence of Jesus.

Thus, the modified premise (A2) is false, making this sub-argument for (B1) UNSOUND, and therefore, on this interpretation, Objection #12 FAILS, yet again.

A THIRD ATTEMPT TO FIX OBJECTION #12

Just as modifying premise (2) from (2a) to (2b) broke the logical connection between premise (2) and premise (A1), so modifying premise (A) from (A1) to (A2) broke the logical connection within the conditional claim asserted in that premise. So, we can modify premise (A2) so that the logical connection between the antecedent and the consequent of that conditional claim is restored:

A3. IF Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light, THEN it is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light.

Here is the resulting sub-argument with this revision of premise (A):

2b. Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light.

A3. IF Paul claimed that his conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light, THEN it is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul ENCOUNTERING (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the physically embodied risen Jesus whose presence was indicated by a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) light.

THEREFORE:

B1. It is very probable that Paul’s conversion to Christianity was the result of Paul clearly SEEING with his own eyes (on the road to Damascus sometime after the crucifixion of Jesus) the face and body of Jesus who had a glorious (i.e. bright and radiant) appearance.

By replacing (A2) with (A3) we have potentially fixed the problem with the broken logic internal to the conditional claim made by this premise, but we have now broken the logic of the inference to the conclusion. This argument is clearly logically INVALID, because the conclusion (B1) talks about Paul clearly seeing with his own eyes the face and body of Jesus, but nothing like that is stated or implied in the premises of the argument!

So, this version of the argument is INVALID and thus does not give a good reason to believe that (B1) is true, and thus, on this interpretation, Objection #12 FAILS, again.

Furthermore, although premise (A3) seems more plausible than premise (A2), the antecedent of (A3) does not imply the consequent of (A3), which means that this conditional claim is FALSE. So, on this interpretation, the argument is both UNSOUND and INVALID. The logic is no good, and premise (A3) is false.

The antecedent of (A3) talks about Paul making a CLAIM about an experience he allegedly had, but the consequent of (A3) asserts that Pual actually had such an experience. The former does NOT imply the latter. The fact that Paul CLAIMED that X is the case does not imply that X is in fact the case. Paul may be lying or Paul may be mistaken. Premise (A3) is false because we have no reason to believe that Paul is not lying or mistaken about this claim (and no such reason has been given in this argument).

We could now modify premise (B1) to make it into a weaker claim, a claim that says nothing about Paul clearly seeing with his own eyes the face and body of Jesus, but that would not fix the problem with premise (A3) being false. The argument would remain UNSOUND, and therefore Objection #12 would FAIL, yet again.

At this point, it seems reasonable to conclude that the attempt to repair Objection #12 by weakening the historical claim that it was based upon simply will not work. We may confidently conclude that Objection #12 (Paul’s Conversion) FAILS.