In an unexpected broadside to Christmas, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, has come out as this season’s high-profile Bible debunker.
In a radio interview, the archbishop was challenged about the rational basis of the Christmas story. Some of the answers Williams gave were obvious and accurate ones, addressing folklore that has accrued to the story over the years but which does not have any basis in the Bible. However, it didn’t take long for him to begin disputing points of the biblical narrative.
Among his points:
It probably didn’t snow in Bethlehem. The region isn’t exactly known for winter sports today, and the Bible doesn’t mention snow. So far, so good.
Jesus probably wasn’t born in December. The Bible doesn’t say when Jesus was born, except for a general time period in Quirinius’ reign.
There were no animals in the stable around Jesus. The Bible says Jesus was laid in a manger because there was no room at the inn. A manger is a feed trough for animals, and in a largely agrarian culture, it would not be unheard of for people to sleep among animals. Could Mary have ordered Joseph to usher the animals out? Possibly. The Bible does not say anything on the subject, animals are just assumed by most people to have been in the stable with the Holy Family.
The Three Kings or Wise Men are just a legend. Here, the archbishop begins to get into trouble, biblically speaking. While it is true that the Bible does not specify “kings” or even that there were three of them, it is quite specific that Magi — a plural of Magus, a sort of Persian priest/astrologer/wizard — saw an unusual star and took it as a sign that the king of the Jews was born. They came searching for him, had some entanglements with King Herod, a Roman puppet, then found the Holy Family and delivered gifts of gold, incense and myrrh. (The three gifts are the most likely reason for the tradition of three kings — one magus per gift.)
The star of the North did not stand still in the night sky. The archbishop is on shaky ground both biblically and astronomically. Stars just don’t behave like that, the archbishop complained. Well, the North star actually does appear to stand still, since it’s aligned approximately with the Earth’s axis. So he’s got that bit wrong scientifically. However, the Bible clearly isn’t talking about the North star. It mentions a “star in the East” that obviously represented some unusual phenomenon and drew the Magi’s attention. After their involvement with Herod, the Magi were then led by the star they had seen in the east, which now went ahead of them. It’s possible this was in a general northerly direction, but clearly, this is an unusual “star.” While the archbishop is right that the stars we know of don’t behave that way, what basis is that to say that the Magi did not see and follow something they classified as meeting the criteria for a “star” under their science? It’s a bit like disputing a UFO report from a top pilot. You may not want to believe it because you’ve never seen one, but the witness seems qualified enough to accurately report what he saw.
The virgin birth is optional. Finally, the archbishop gets to it and merely chucks the whole Christmas story out the window. The virginity of Mary is a prominent and essential feature of the whole Nativity, symbolically and theologically as well as historically. The archbishop said he didn’t think the virgin birth should be a hurdle to someone signing up as a Christian, but I beg to differ. If you are OK with throwing out the beginning chapters of Matthew and Luke, why should you believe anything else in the Bible? According to Sydney’s Catholic archbishop, Cardinal George Pell, “What is important is that the Christ child was and is the son of God. For this belief and fact, the virgin birth is essential. Those who doubt or deny this are departing from essential Christian teaching.”
Highly worrisome about the whole interview is how easily the Archbishop of Canterbury, leader of the Anglican Church, slips into a fashionable “pick-and-choose” type of Christianity. When someone as highly placed and, it is assumed, scholarly as Dr. Williams starts engaging in these sort of games, what are lay people to think other than that the leaders of Christianity are hypocrites who don’t practice what they preach?
Williams is afflicted with the same sort of creeping atheism that has wormed its way into churches around the world, the sort that says, “I’m Christian, but really Jesus was just a nice guy. I don’t want to believe that other stuff because it offends my 21st-century sensibilities.” The essential problem is one of pride, placing our own personal experience above the testimony of people who actually lived in the times in question. It’s modern dogma, requiring just as much faith as any religion, to believe that our 21st century knowledge is superior to that of all previous generations. It’s what I call the “Everybody before me was drunk and/or stupid” theory of history.
And it only leads to one place. If there were no magi, there was no star, there was no virgin birth, then there was no Son of God, no crowds were fed by fishes and loaves, no demons were exorcised, no cripples were healed, no one walked on water, no prophecies were fulfilled, and, finally, no one rose from the dead. Bodies don’t do that, your eminence.
Except, we have witnesses that it all did happen. If the archbishop has now decided he needs to dissect the Bible and underline the unacceptable parts, I would suggest it’s time he hang up the robes and start his own religion.
For those interested in learning about some of the evidence that supports the historicity of the New Testament, I recommend seeing Lee Strobel’s The Case for Christ
Subscribe to the RSS feed
I hope he still believes in Santa Claus.
Comment by Steve Rosenbaum — December 20, 2007 @ 1:13 pm
Creeping atheism is a poor choice of words, it is more along the lines of creeping sanity.
SD: That would be assuming that 21st century materialism/atheism are based upon being sane, an assumption I don’t believe is safe to make. –T
Comment by Samuel — December 20, 2007 @ 4:16 pm
Actually, we don’t have any witnesses. Even if you accept that the Gospels were written by the men that tradition ascribes them to, none of those men would have been witnesses to the birth of Jesus, nor do any of them identify their source for the stories.
Vinny: Actually …
Luke 1: “Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.”
It seems Luke was a journalist with access to the original sources. Matthew, on the other hand, was most likely the apostle mentioned in Luke, Mark, Acts and (natch) Matthew. He may have also been originally named Levi. Clement of Alexandria and Irenaeus, both early church writers in the mid-second century, discuss Matthew. So, even in those events Matthew and Luke were not themselves witness to, they still had access to eyewitnesses. (Chiefly Mary herself, who traveled with Jesus and the Apostles.) More importantly, they were writing at a time when eyewitnesses, family members and other key players were still alive, so they would have been chased out of the community if they’d gotten it wrong. –T
Comment by vinny — December 20, 2007 @ 4:20 pm
I don’t think you can make that conclusion. “Handed down to us” suggests some intermediate steps before the information reached the author of Luke. There is nothing to indicate whether or not he had access to Mary or whether the story came from her.
Vinny: You have to read that in context. Luke tells you who the accounts have been handed down by: eyewitnesses. You are correct that Luke did not include a list of his sources, however, we know he was a travel companion of Paul’s and therefore had access to the inner circle of Apostles. By his own words, he is putting in order accounts from those who “from the first were eyewitnesses.” He also asserts, “I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning,” and since only he and Matthew discuss the Nativity, it seems he is literally referring to the circumstances of Jesus’ birth. Even supposing he didn’t speak directly with Mary, Jesus had an extended family, any of whom could have been a source, including James, Jesus’ half-brother, a leader of the Jerusalem Christians. The Gospel of Luke and Acts do not give any indication of the fall of Jerusalem, and Luke probably would have been writing after his adventures with Paul, so you’re looking at a likely date of the mid-60s A.D. for the writing of Luke’s books, only about 30 years after Jesus’ crucifixion. Most of the key players would have been readily available. It’s probable that Luke is writing after receiving a copy of Mark’s Gospel (the earliest), so in that opening line, Luke may actually be verifying that Mark’s version conforms to what Luke has heard from the eyewitnesses. –T
Comment by vinny — December 20, 2007 @ 7:07 pm
The gospels were written anonymously and circulated that way for some time before they were attributed to the various authors. Who was available is pure speculation.
Vinny, the Gospels are only anonymous in that the authors did not put their names at the top of the page. But the authors surely were known to the Christian community, and their writings deemed by the community to be accurate, otherwise the Gospels would never have been accepted. Further, internal and external evidence supports that the authors are exactly who tradition has always held they are. And even if you wish to ignore the arguments for the traditional view of authorship and put quotes around the names, “Luke” still clearly states he has investigated and is ordering the accounts of eyewitnesses, and confirms that other written accounts at the time agree with what his investigation has found. The eyewitnesses would include people who saw, knew, spoke with and followed Jesus. Other written accounts known to have been around at the time would have included Mark’s and the letters of Paul. The strongest witness for all the writings in the New Testament and their authorship, though, is their acceptance by the early church. But if you don’t want to believe the testimony of people who were there, I can’t stop you. I would simply refer you to my “Everybody before me was drunk and/or stupid” theory of history.
Comment by vinny — December 20, 2007 @ 8:43 pm
[...] the biblical nativity. I found all the details on Tad Cronn’s blog, so head over there to read his editorial on the Archbishop’s heresy titled The Archbishop of Can’t Be: Atheism in the [...]
Pingback by No Nativity For Archbishop of Canterbury « Infinity Goods blog — December 21, 2007 @ 2:19 am
Everyone is entitled to their own interpretation of the Bible. After all, there is no Cliff’s Notes for it. No one knows the right way to read it and look at it. The Archbishop is merely injecting some logic into the story.
Comment by Cody — January 11, 2008 @ 1:26 am