I decided to move some discussion from this post up to the top level here. Specifically, Watoosh wrote: "Well, if violence is defined as initiation of force (which, of course, presupposes certain property rights), then I think Rockwell is correct..." Well, if we define cats as elephants, then many people keep elephants in their house. More seriously, firstly, violence is not usually defined that way. It's defined as, you know, violence, so that, say, someone may respond violently or non-violently to someone who aggresses against them. Otherwise, it would make no sense to say, for instance, "He punched me, but I did not stoop to violence in response." And, secondly, the libertarian usage of "initiation of force" is very offbeat. If I wander onto someone's meadow, most people would not say I had "initiated force" -- I mean, sure, I used "force" against the earth to push off walking, but that's not force directed against...
So I often read the works of William Lane Craig, a well known Christian apologist, who believes archaeological evidence exists for every detail in the Gospels, down to the ressurection.
ReplyDeleteRobert J Price, who is a former Southern Baptist turned atheist, says taking the same road as Craig "eroded my faith", and that he realized his zealous search for evidence of the Gospels would make him a disbeliever because "there is simply always more evidence around the corner". Price ended up coming to the conclusion that the Gospels were written as stories, nothing more.
Price then spent many years trying to see what was the message of the Gospels, and not whether it was true.
Here is the irony - you can learn much more from Price than from Craig. From Craig, you hear nothing but dry academic arguments. From Price, you see simple down to earth explanations of what the parables about Jesus tried to convey.
Jesus' message about the "experts of law" seems to ring amazingly true for Christian apologists.