4. These writings were given titles of respect. Polycarp, Justin Martyr, Dionysius, Irenaeus, and others refer to them as “scriptures,” “divine writings,” and so forth.
5. These writings were publically read and preached upon. Paley quotes Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Origen, and Cyprian to prove the point.
6. Copies, commentaries, and harmonies of the gospels were written. Thousands upon thousands of copies of the New Testament books were laboriously made by hand. Many commentaries and other works on them were written by men such as Pantaenus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, and so on. It is especially noteworthy that during the first three hundred years, no commentary was written on any book outside the New Testament, with the sole exception of Clement’s commentary on the so-called Revelation of Peter. Harmonies, or combinations of the four gospels into one, were also composed, for example, Tatian’s Diatessaron (c. A.D. 170).
7. The New Testament books were accepted by all heretical groups as well as by orthodox Christians. Examples of such heretics include Basilides, the Valentinians, the Carpocratians, and many others. Though they all denied some aspect of New Testament teaching, they nevertheless acknowledged the authenticity of the New Testament books themselves.
8. The gospels, Acts, thirteen letters of Paul, 1 John, and 1 Peter were recognized as authentic writings even by those who doubted the authenticity of certain other New Testament epistles. For example, Origen cites the book of Hebrews to support a particular point he is making. He notes that some persons might doubt the authority of Hebrews, but he says that the same point could be proved from the undisputed books of Scripture. He then quotes Matthew and Acts. According to Origen, the four gospels were received without doubt by the whole church of God under heaven. In the same way, Eusebius reports that although some doubted certain epistles, the four gospels were universally recognized as authentic.
9. The early enemies of Christianity recognized that the gospels contained the story on which the faith was founded. Celsus, for example, admits that the gospels were written by the apostles. Porphyry attacked the Christian faith as it is found in the gospels. The heretic Julian pursued the same procedure.
10. Lists of authentic Scriptures were published, which always included the gospels and Acts. Citations from Origen, Athanasius, Cyril, and others prove the point.
11. The apocryphal books were never treated in the above manner. The apocryphal books were forgeries, which were written in the second century after Christ. They purported to be writings of the apostles and carried titles like the Gospel of Peter, the Gospel of Thomas, and so forth. It is a simple historical fact that during the first three hundred years, with one exception, no apocryphal gospel was ever even quoted by any known writer. In fact, there is no evidence that any forged gospel whatever existed in the first century, during which time the four gospels and Acts were written. The apocryphal gospels were never quoted, never read or preached upon in Christian assemblies, not collected into a volume, not included in the lists of authentic Scriptures, not appealed to by heretics, not noticed by Christianity’s enemies, not the subject of commentaries or harmonies, but were nearly universally rejected by Christian writers of that age.
Therefore, Paley concludes, the gospels must be the authentic writings of the apostles. Even if it were the case that the names of the gospel authors were wrong, it still cannot be denied in light of the above arguments that the gospels do contain the story that the original apostles told and for which they labored and suffered. Therefore, the story must be true. The only alternative would be that the apostles were all liars. But that has already been shown to be impossible in light of their sufferings and changed lives. That can only mean that the gospel story must be true.
Paley then turns to his proof of statement (2) that no similar case exists in history. I shall not summarize his argument here in such detail as I did his proof for statement (1). Paley lays down rules that can be used in assessing claims to miracles. He argues that in most cases, the evidence for a genuine miracle is not clear and that the supposed miracles are usually fakes or exaggerations, or are attributable to psychosomatic factors. In those cases where miracles cannot be explained, it still remains true that there is no evidence that the witnesses to those miracles have then voluntarily submitted to labor, danger, and suffering for the truth of the story that they told. Thus, the situation with the disciples and the gospel story of Jesus is without parallel in history.
In the second volume of his masterful work, Paley discusses confirmatory evidence for the truth of the Christian faith, such as fulfilled prophecy, the historical accuracy of the gospels, the excellence of Jesus’ moral character, and so on. The chapter that discusses the evidence for the resurrection deserves our attention.
He begins by observing that the whole of the New Testament testifies to the reality of Jesus’ resurrection. That leaves us with only two alternatives: the apostles were either deceivers or deceived. The first alternative, that the apostles were deceivers, has been to a large extent abandoned, Paley remarks, because of the obvious sincerity of the disciples, as well as their high moral character and the suffering they endured for the gospel.
The second alternative, that the disciples were deceived, implies that the belief in the resurrection is due to religious hysteria and hallucinations. But this alternative fails on several grounds: (1) Not just one person saw Jesus appear after His resurrection, but many. (2) Not just lone individuals saw Him, but groups of people. (3) They did not see Him only once, but many times. (4) They did not merely see Him, but touched Him, conversed with Him, and ate with Him. (5) Jesus’ body was not to be found. That is the decisive argument against the religious hallucination hypothesis. For it is impossible that Jesus’ followers could have believed that He was raised from the dead if the corpse were there before them in the tomb. It is equally impossible to suppose that the disciples could have stolen the body and perpetrated a fraud. Moreover, Christianity was founded in Jerusalem. That would have been impossible if Jesus’ body were still in the tomb. The Jews would have produced Jesus’ corpse as the shortest and completest answer to the whole story. Instead, all they could do was invent the lame excuse that the disciples had stolen the body. Thus, since the hypothesis of religious hallucinations is unable to explain the empty tomb, it ultimately collapses back into the conspiracy theory, which has already been seen to be ridiculous. Therefore, the historical resurrection of Jesus remains the best explanation of the facts.
The arguments of Paley and his predecessors buried the conspiracy theory forever. I cannot emphasize strongly enough that no modern biblical scholar would for a moment entertain the theory that the disciples conspired together to steal the corpse and then lie about the resurrection appearances. It is utterly out of the question. The fact that this issue is still batted back and forth at the popular level is sad testimony to the terrible lack of communication between the specialist and the man on the street. The theory has been dead for nearly two hundred years.
THE APPARENT DEATH THEORY
Another explanation that cropped up after the controversy with the deists was the apparent death theory. H. E. G. Paulus in Das Leben Jesu (1828) argued that all the miracles recorded in the gospels could be explained by purely natural causes. He was the high-water mark of the natural explanation school and devised all sorts of clever explanations for Jesus’ various miracles. As for the resurrection, Paulus held that Jesus did not really die on the cross but was laid unconscious in the tomb. There He revived, managed to escape, and convinced His disciples that He had been raised from the dead. It is an unfortunate note of history that F. D. E. Schleiermacher, the father of modern theology, also adopted this theory.