From 6c4b50237a082c15b14f8942c0e600278436e1bc Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Camil Staps
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 2015 13:44:50 +0200
Subject: Discussion October 15th

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+\documentclass[10pt,a4paper]{article}
+
+\usepackage[LGR,T1]{fontenc}
+\usepackage[margin=2cm,top=1cm]{geometry}
+\usepackage[english]{babel}
+\usepackage{multicol}
+
+\usepackage{textalpha}
+\newcommand{\textgreek}[1]{\begingroup\fontencoding{LGR}\selectfont#1\endgroup}
+
+\title{Discussion paragraph\\\large{Rethinking Fundamental Theology, chap. 6}}
+\author{Camil Staps}
+\date{October 15, 2015}
+
+\begin{document}
+
+\maketitle
+
+\begin{multicols}{2}
+
+    \subsubsection*{The resurrection as analogy}
+    On p.~147-148, O'Collins rejects the idea that the writings about Jesus' resurrection we find in early Christian literature are really about personal, mental or mystic `resurrections' of the writers:
+
+    \begin{quote}
+        Whether it uses resurrection or exaltation language, it is obvious that the New Testament's primary claim concerns Jesus' own life and glorious destiny after death.
+    \end{quote}
+
+    He provides as main argument that the writings all talk about Christ, and not about the authors. I find this a very weak argument. There are numerous examples of writings that talk about one thing on the surface, but are really talking about something else on another level -- take, for example, Animal Farm by George Orwell. O'Collins seems to be arguing we should take everything literally -- but then how should we read fables?
+
+    In political cartoons, the French are sometimes illustrated as a typical Frenchman. Should we therefore conclude that these cartoons are really about typical Frenchmen rather than about the French nation? Of course not. Then why can we not interpret the common motive of Christ's resurrection in early Christian literature as an allegory for the author's resurrection?
+
+    \subsubsection*{Old Testament prophets and New Testament witnesses}
+    If we can read resurrection accounts as analogies, we can easily extend this idea to reading the whole Gospels as analogies. This needs not be incompatible with the historical existence of Jesus. Such a view would make it considerably easier to see Jesus as `the Word of God', which otherwise gives a metaphysical problem.
+
+    Then, there is not so much difference between the Old Testament prophets who heard the Word of God, and the apostles and evangelists (or actually their eyewitness sources) who experienced the Word of God in a similar way. O'Collins uses the visual encounters with Jesus as support for his view that the resurrection really happened on p.~151:
+
+    \begin{quote}
+        Unlike the Old Testament prophets, who characteristically heard the word of the Lord, the apostolic witnesses typically saw the risen Lord rather than heard his word.
+    \end{quote}
+
+    Even without reading the Gospels as analogies, equating `the word of the Lord' and `the risen Lord' (Jn.~1:1;~14) this quote reduces to (emphasis mine):
+    
+    \begin{quote}
+        Unlike the Old Testament prophets, who characteristically heard \textbf{the Lord}, the apostolic witnesses typically saw \textbf{the Lord} rather than heard \textbf{Him}.
+    \end{quote}
+
+    In other words, the only difference between Old Testament prophets and New Testament witnesses is the difference between hearing and seeing. Based on the prologue to John's Gospel, we shouldn't make such a fuzz about `Jesus coming \emph{physically} into the world', because the New Testament encounters don't appear that much stronger than the Old Testament ones.
+
+    \subsubsection*{Scientifically explaining the resurrection}
+    Finally, I'd like to talk about the case O'Collins makes against people who try to ``account `scientifically' for any occurrences, no matter how extraordinary they seem, by finding some close analogies'' (p.~151.~ff.).
+
+    First, O'Collins seems to disagree with any analogy if it differs on but one point from Jesus. On p.~153 he writes about a specific example:
+
+    \begin{quote}
+        [\,\dots] the disciples of Jesus remembered him as having made extraordinary claims to personal authority and then as having died an utterly shameful death in a place for public executions. Rees reports no examples of anything like that among his 293 widows and widowers.
+    \end{quote}
+
+    Of course, it is the whole point of an analogy to provide a \emph{similar} case which is similar in enough aspects to explain other aspects of the base case in a similar manner as the corresponding aspects of the similar cases. Following O'Collins, we should reject any analogy of Jesus with someone who didn't live in the same time or didn't have the same name, because also those are differences.
+
+    Second, the `scientific accounts' these people give should not be taken as analogies, but rather as explanations. Similarly, people have tried to explain the appearance of matzos in the desert scientifically. Therefore, to say the `analogy' doesn't add up is to say that the differences in the analogy are relevant to the aspect we're attempting to explain. O'Collins doesn't explain why `having died an utterly shameful death in a place for public executions' is a necessary condition to be resurrected, so the argument he gives is at least incomplete, if not simply incorrect.
+\end{multicols}
+
+\end{document}
+
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