The Geisler-Till Debate




The Geisler-Till Debate

Farrell Till

    On March 29th, I "debated" Dr. Norman Geisler at Columbus College 
Columbus, Georgia.  The issue was the resurrection of Jesus.  Most 
readers will recognize that Norman Geisler is one of the premier 
spokesmen for the Bible inerrancy doctrine.  In fundamentalist circles, 
his book, _When_Skeptics_Ask_, has joined the ranks of Gleason 
Archer's _Encyclopedia_of_Bible_Difficulties_ and John Haley's 
_Alleged_Discrepancies_of_the_Bible_ as a handy reference volume for 
Christians who wish to have a ready-made, how-it-could-have-been 
explanations of Bible difficulties to use in their discussions with 
skeptics.

	Because of his reputation, I was expecting Dr. Geisler to be a 
formidable opponent who would probably confront me with challenging 
arguments, but instead I found him to be incredibly shallow.  For one 
thing, he did nothing but read manuscripts of speeches he had written 
prior to the debate.  This was true even after my rebuttal of his 
opening speech.  He simply returned to the lectern and read another 
previously prepared speech in which, believe it or not, he referred to my 
failures to respond to certain points which he had made in his opening 
speech (which I had in fact addressed), as if he could have known prior 
to the debate what I would and would not respond to in my rebuttal.  Even 
his final two-minute, wrap-up speech was read from a previously written 
manuscript.

	At the beginning of my second speech I said to the audience that 
I had several debates but that this one was the strangest I had ever 
participated in, because my opponent had responded to my rebuttal speech 
by reading a manuscript that he had written prior to the debate.  
"How could he know before the debate what I would say and not 
say?" I asked.  At this point, in a rare moment of spontaneity, 
Geisler spoke up from his seat and said, "I read your book."  
To which I said, "That's strange, because I haven't written a 
book."  He said nothing in response to this.

	Geisler's opening speech consisted of an effort to establish the 
"reliability" of the New Testament manuscripts.  He referred to 
over 5,366 copies of "existing" New Testament manuscripts, 
which scholars have studied and compared and found to be 
"ninety-nine percent free of significant variances."  From 
this, Geisler somehow reached the conclusion of the 
"reliability" with which the manuscripts had been copied by 
ancient scribes proved that everything the manuscripts said had happened 
exactly as recorded.  In my first rebuttal, I asked the audience to 
assume that those 5,000 manuscripts were 100% free of variation.  Even if 
that were true, that would in no way prove that the events recorded in 
the manuscripts had actually happened;  it would only prove that the 
manuscripts agreed in what they said.

	I presented three reasons why rational people cannot believe the 
New Testament resurrection accounts: (1) resurrected savior-gods were 
common-place in the pagan religions that flourished before, during, and 
after the time Jesus of Nazareth allegedly lived, (2) the claim that a 
dead man was restored to life is an extraordinary claim that required 
extraordinary proof, and (3) the only proof that Geisler can offer in 
support of his resurrection claim is hearsay in nature.  Since Geisler 
spoke entirely from previously prepared manuscripts, he made no attempts 
to respond to these points, except when they came up during the 30-minute 
period of responses to questions from the audience.

In developing point one, I referred to the widespread pagan belief in 
resurrected savior-gods like Osiris, Dionysus, Tammuz, and Krishna, all 
of whom had had thousands of religious adherents long before the time of 
Jesus.  The only attempt that Geisler made to rebut this argument was 
made during the question-answer session when he incorrectly said that 
bodily resurrections had not been claimed for any of the pagan saviors, 
so they were not "parallel" to the resurrection of Jesus.

In his first speech, Geisler had referred to the apostle Paul's claim 
that Jesus had appeared to "500 brethren at once" after his 
resurrection ([ref001]1 Cor. 15:6), 
so in making my second point, I asked Geisler what was extraordinary 
about someone _saying_, particularly at that time when belief in 
resurrections was commonplace, that others (even 500 others) had seen a 
resurrected man.  I asked him if he would believe a modern-day 
resurrection claim even if 500 people should say that they had witnessed 
it.  He ignored the question.

In making my third point, I emphasized that the weakness of the 
testimonial evidence for the resurrection lies in the fact that all of 
the testimony was either hearsay in nature or, as in the case of the 
apostle Paul, visionary.  We pay no serious attention to people today who 
claim to have visions, so why should we believe someone who allegedly had 
a vision 2,000 years ago?  As for the testimony of the other 
"reliable" witnesses, it was all hearsay.  Scholars know that 
the apostle didn't write the Gospel of Matthew and that the apostle John 
didn't write the Gospel of John, so these writers were not the 
"eyewitnesses" that Christian apologists claim that they were.  
So all that we have is a case of unknown writers _saying_ that 
certain women _said_ that they had found an empty tomb and had then 
seen the resurrected Jesus.  "But what did Mary Magdalene ever write 
herself?" I asked Geisler.  "What did Salome ever write?"  
"Who was she anyway?" "What did Joanna write?" 
"And who was she?"  These were questions that Geisler ignored 
as well as my demand that he tell us just who those "five hundred 
brethren" were that the apostle Paul cited as witnesses of the 
resurrection.  Where did they live?  When did they see Jesus?  I 
challenged Geisler to tell us the name of just one of those five 
hundred.  He didn't do it, of course.

I usually leave a debate thinking, "This was the weakest opponent I 
have had yet," but given Geisler's background and reputation, I have 
decided that the weakness is not in my opponents.  It just had to be that 
there is no credible evidence at all to support the views of those whom I 
debate.  If there were, then surely one of them would have cited some 
convincing reason to believe in biblical inerrancy, the resurrection of 
Jesus, the credibility of prophecy fulfillment, etc.  The evidence just 
isn't there to support any of those claims, and that is why the 
opposition appears so weak.

For $1, a written [ref002]transcript of the
debate can be obtained from Apologetics Press, 230 Landmark Drive,
Montgomery, AL 36117.  Video tapes are available on two-week rentals from
_The_Skeptical_Review_ for $1 to cover the cost of mailing.







[ref001] http://www.calvin.edu/cgi-bin/bible?I+Corinthians+15:6
[ref002] http:debate.html