Jesus and His Church: Part II: Electric Boogaloo

So, in this post, we shall start off by looking at sola scriptura as an epistemological framework for assessing matters of faith. According to this principle, Scripture is the final and ultimate authority for all matters concerning faith for the Christian. However, whilst virtually all Christians can agree that Scripture is authoritative, there nevertheless exists a plethora of different views on multiple subjects. 

As such, how can we tell which interpretation is valid? Which translation of the Bible ought we to use? Are all translations equal and valid, or are some better than others? Whilst I was still a Protestant, I endeavored to research the underlying context of Biblical passages by looking at commentaries of the Bible that explored the linguistic and socio-cultural backgrounds behind the original text. 

Of course, religious and atheist fundamentalists alike both insist that the Bible shouldn't need to be 'interpreted' since it is the 'Word of God'. You even have people who claim that the King James Version of the Bible is the only correct version of the Bible, amongst other things. Moreover, there were still (primarily philosophical) disagreements between those who relied on finding the context.

The first thing to notice about all of this is that you are indelibly indebted to things other than the Bible to determine what beliefs are true. When arguing for a given interpretation or translation of the Bible, you have to rely on things other than the text of Scripture itself to determine the meaning of Scripture. 

You're reliant on your personal intuitions, your pastor, Biblical scholars, etc. when confronted with difficult passages. How do we decide which approaches to Biblical interpretation are valid or not? You can't say just use the Bible, because that is circular reasoning. 

Second, it is worth noting that nowhere in the Bible does it say that Scripture is the ultimate and final authority either. Jesus said that all Scripture is God-breathed and useful for teaching, but then how does one determine what is and is not Scripture? The Protestants famously removed several books from the Bible, but on what basis?

Whilst I was still a Protestant, I decided that it would probably be best to try and discover what the earliest Church believed, since they were closer in time to Jesus than I am. Well, it's worth noting that the New Testament documents were not written until a few decades after Jesus' death and the canon of the New Testament would not be decided until a few centuries after. 

Moreover, most people were illiterate, and so primarily relied on oral tradition and did not read themselves. It took me awhile to find out, but the earliest Church was much closer to Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, and the Church of the East than to Protestantism, especially low church Protestantism. 

The earliest Church had bishops and priests, they had services modeled on Old Testament temple worship. They also had councils, which is even in the text of the New Testament itself. When there was disagreement among the disciples regarding whether Christians were still required to follows the laws of the Torah or not, they held a council in Jerusalem. 

The canon of Scripture was decided by the entire Church through a series of synods and local councils. In other words, we are reliant on tradition in order to even get to Scripture in the first place. Not just the oral tradition preached by the apostles, and the textual tradition of the manuscripts, but you had extra-Biblical teachings passed onto the Church Fathers, and commentaries on Scripture made by the Church Fathers as well. 

So, in order to maintain sola scriptura, you would need to maintain that tradition was authoritative in the past but suddenly ceased being authoritative. However, it seems obvious that to maintain such would be nothing more than an exercise in question begging. Your only reason for believing it would be because you already accept sola scriptura. 

However, sola scriptura is nowhere found in Scripture itself and is not taught by the Church Fathers. Nor is it affirmed in any of the Ecumenical Councils. It's not until Martin Luther, et al. came along that people started claiming that Scripture alone determined matters of faith. But if sola scriptura is true, then why is that? 

In fact, what one finds is that Protestant-exclusive beliefs as a whole do not appear anywhere in the earliest Church. Nor are they evidenced in the writings of the Church Fathers. Scripture is important, but it is important to understand that it is only part of Holy Tradition. So, it seems clear that Protestantism and its various denominations aren't serious contenders for which branch is correct. 

However, it seems far from clear that the Catholics are correct. Now, it is important to understand that when Catholics claim that the Pope has jurisdiction of authority over the whole Church, they base this on the passage where Jesus states that upon this rock He would build His church. They claim that the rock refers to Peter, but they also go a step further and claim that this was the view of the original Church, and that it has always been understood that way.

However, the evidence for such an understanding is nowhere evidenced in the writings of the Church Fathers. Rather, the understanding of the Church Fathers was that the successor of Peter held a position of being first in honour, but did not hold authority over his brother bishops. This is clearly reflected in the Book of Acts.

For during the Council of Jerusalem, when Peter initially sided with the Judaisers, Paul openly rebuked Peter to his face. Whereas there exists a multitude of interpretations of the passage cited by Catholics in defence of papal supremacy. Only a few held the rock to be peter, whereas others held it to mean the Church as whole, others took it to be faith in Christ, and so on. 

The first evidence of anyone holding to the view that the Pope held authority over the whole Church comes to us from the 5th century AD from Pope Leo I. He was the first to argue that the Roman Church held a position of authority over its sister churches based on the primacy of Peter. 

Given that the Pope therefore does not hold authority over the entire Church, the Pope has no authority to excommunicate other Patriarchs. He can break communion with other churches, though. The problem is, however, that he would need a valid reason for doing so, and the other churches not accepting papal supremacy and the Filioque clause, etc., are not valid reasons. 

Jesus and His Church: Part I: The One True Church?

So, in previous posts, we have established that God almost certainly exists, and that the resurrection hypothesis is the best explanation of the available historical data. Knowing these things, we can conclude that Christianity is therefore almost certainly true. However, as you may or may not know, there are nevertheless internal divisions within Christianity. 

Most are familiar with the divide between Catholics and Protestants, but there exists Eastern Orthodoxy as well. There also exists the Old Catholic Church, Oriental Orthodoxy, and the Church of the East. Moreover, within Protestantism, there are many different competing denominations. It might therefore come across as confusing trying to navigate this landscape of differing 'branches' of Christianity. 

One unites all disparate branches of Christianity are two things: belief in God as Trinity, and belief in the resurrection. So, really, Trinitarianism is the one single, unique defining feature of all versions of Christianity. For that reason, we can rightly dismiss Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons as not being Christians, because they do not believe in the Trinity. Same thing applies to Unitarian Universalists. 

For the first four centuries of its existence, the Church was essentially one and whole. Sure, there were minor heretical movements, but these were universally condemned by the whole Church. It was not until 431 AD when the Council of Ephesus condemned Nestorius and Nestorianism that the Church of the East, which had already claimed to be distinct from the Church in the West as early as 410, broke off communion and split off on its own.

Now, there is some quibble about whether or not the Church of the East is truly Nestorian, but they largely follow his teachings and venerate him as a saint, so, really, if it walks like a duck... Really, the onus is on those who claim that the Church of the East isn't Nestorian to show that this is, in fact, the case. Now, Nestorius denied that Mary was the Theotokos or God Bearer.

He instead came up with the term Christotokos or Christ Bearer. This was condemned as heresy since it basically means that Jesus is two persons, therefore resulting in a quadrinity, rather than a Trinity. Now, since then, there was a schism in 1552, whereby part of the Church of the East joined the Roman Catholic Church. There was then a schism in 1968, resulting in the Church of the East splitting in two: the Ancient Church of the East and the Assyrian Church of the East. 

The next schism in the history of the Church occurred just 20 years after the Church of the East split off, in 451 AD, when the churches in Armenia, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and India broke off communion with the rest of the church. This was as a result of the Council of Chalcedon, which, aside from re-affirming the condemnation of Nestorius, also condemned Monophysitism.

Monophysitism was the position that Christ has only one nature, whereas the position of the Church was that Christ has two natures: one human, and one divine. Well, the five churches mentioned maintained that Christ had a single, mixed nature: one nature that was both human and divine, rather than two separate natures. This position, known as miaphysitism to differentiate from traditional Monophysitism, was nevertheless also condemned as heresy.

The five churches mentioned then broke off communion and became to be known as the Oriental Orthodox Church. The biggest schism in Church History, however, was known as the Great Schism, that occurred in 1054. Of course, the events that lead to this were long in the making. There were a number of key doctrines that the Roman Church began teaching that put them at odds with the Eastern churches. 

The Roman Bishop, known as the Pope, asserted jurisdiction of authority over the whole Church, which ran contrary to the notion of the Patriarchs of the Church being a confederacy of brother Bishops. Second, western Churches altered the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed without approval. They added the now-infamous 'Filioque' clause. 

The original creed read that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, whereas the western Churches added the phrase 'and the Son' afterwards. Whilst the Roman Church initially condemned this addition, it was eventually adopted by it and all the western Churches. Lastly, the Roman Church had moved to using unleavened bread in the Eucharist.

In 1054, the Pope sent a representative, Cardinal Humbert, to Constantinople who promptly excommunicated the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, and the Patriarch excommunicated the Cardinal in return. The western churches sided with the Church of Rome and became what is now the Roman Catholic Church, whereas the eastern churches became known as the Eastern Orthodox Church.

Since then, the Catholic Church has undergone numerous changes in its teachings over time. The sale of indulgences in particular kicked off the Protestant Reformation in the 1500s, and then the first Vatican council resulted in various parts of the Catholic church breaking away to become the Old Catholic Church. 

Protestantism in particular consists of numerous denominations. It can be roughly divided into high church denominations, such as Anglicanism and Lutheranism, and low church denominations. The chief difference being that low churches do not have the formal priesthood and the ceremonial pomp of the Catholic Mass and Eastern Orthodox Liturgy, whereas the high church denominations still have those things. 

The problem is not too dissimilar from the problem facing the person who knows God exists but is unsure which, if any, religion is true. Quite simply, which branch or denomination do I pick? Are they all equally valid ways to Jesus? Or is only one branch the true way to Jesus? To answer these questions, then, aside from looking at the history of the Church, it is vital to have the correct epistemology. 

Protestants subscribe to sola scriptura, which is the position that Scripture is the final and ultimate authority on matters of faith. Catholics, on the other hand, maintain that one requires the Magisterium of the Catholic Church to properly interpret Scripture. Eastern and Oriental Orthodox, as well as the Church of the East, all maintain that the correct way to approach matters of faith is through Holy Tradition. 

By Holy Tradition, they mean all of Scripture (of course), but also teachings of Jesus and the Apostles not recorded in Scripture but passed on through the writings of the Church Fathers. Moreover, they also include the writings of the Church Fathers themselves, as well as the deliverances of the various councils, particularly the Ecumenical Councils. 

The chief difference between Eastern and Oriental Orthodox is that the Oriental Orthodox reject the Council of Chalcedon, whereas the chief difference between Eastern Orthodox and the Church of the East is that the Church of the East rejects the Council of Ephesus. So, assuming you agreed with the Tradition approach, which one you would pick would depend on whether you count the Councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon as binding. 

The Catholic Church agrees with the Ecumenical councils, it must be said, but also holds its own councils held since the Great Schism as being binding, including Vatican I and Vatican II. These are the two councils where, amongst other things, Papal Infallibility was properly defined. Vatican I, however, also led to the breaking away of the Old Catholic Church. 

So, in many ways, the Roman Catholic Church stands or falls on Papal Supremacy and Papal Infallibility. As such, whether you would pick the Catholic Church or the Old Catholic Church would depend on whether you accepted Vatican I and II or not. Which Protestant denomination one would pick is a trickier subject, since there are as many different interpretations of Scripture as there are individual Protestants. 

However, many Protestant denominations have their own individual professions of faith and statements, and so on. Nevertheless, there is very much the danger of treating the matter like a spiritual 'buffet', picking and choosing which beliefs one wants to entertain and then finding the exact denomination that matches your exact whims. 

In the next few posts, I will be going over arguments for and against the general epistemological approaches mentioned above and ultimately try and arrive at a conclusion regarding which branch of Christianity, if any, is the 'correct' version of if they're all essentially valid approaches to faith in Christ. 

Weighing the Resurrection Hypothesis

In the previous post, we weighed various naturalistic hypotheses to see if any were a good candidate for the best explanation and found them all extremely wanting. In this post, we shall be looking at how well the resurrection hypothesis meets the criteria for the best explanation. 

In terms of explanatory scope, the resurrection hypothesis accounts for all the data, which is more than I can say for most of the naturalistic alternatives, and it has particularly strong explanatory power because the evidence is exactly what we would expect were the resurrection hypothesis true. It is also not particularly ad hoc since we need only suppose that God exists (which is entailed by the various arguments for the existence of God). 

How about plausibility? Just how plausible is it that God resurrected Jesus from the dead? What accepted truths, if any, imply the resurrection hypothesis? Which accepted truths, if any, imply that it is false? Now, this depends on whether or not God exists. An atheist will presumably argue that God's non-existence implies that it is false, whereas a (Christian) theist would presumably argue that God's existence implies that it is true. 

Of course, without any sort of argument for either position, then such claims are clearly question begging. If we assume agnosticism, then, at worst, plausibility is simply inscrutable. At best, we can conclude that whilst it is perhaps not necessarily plausible, it is not necessarily implausible either. However, why settle for this when we have an array of logically valid, sound arguments that show beyond a reasonable doubt that God almost certainly exists? 

With all due respect to my atheist friends and so on, atheism makes about as much sense as putting an ashtray on a motorcycle. Whilst the question of whether or not God exists might seem like an open question, it only seems this way if one ignores virtually all of philosophy and theology. Atheism logically entails its own defeat and requires us to accept a number of beliefs that are quite frankly absurd.

A similar discussion can be had when it comes to whether or not the resurrection hypothesis is disconfirmed by accepted truths or not. Now, somebody might argue that dead people stay dead. That is true enough. But the hypothesis is not that Jesus rose from the dead naturally so this response will not do. 

It's worth noting that Christianity had virtually everything stacked against it. It had none of the advantages of pagan cults which took pre-existing beliefs and myths and/or relied on humanity's base instincts, like sex cults, etc. It didn't tell people what they wanted to hear. In fact, it told people what they didn't want to hear.

Its central figure was a Galilean Jew from Nazareth who was publicly crucified for sedition and who was accused of blasphemy by the Sanhedrin. It made tough ethical demands on its followers. Really, the crucifixion of Jesus should have put a stop to the fledgling religion, but it didn't. We could suppose that the disciples were inculcated fanatics, sure, but what about James and Paul?

Moreover, why did people flock to Christianity in the thousands? Out of all the pagan religions to have ever existed, only Hinduism still persists and is limited almost entirely to India and its diaspora. The chief rival to Christianity, Islam, takes Jesus and places Him as a prophet of high importance. Why is this the case? 

So, even if we insist on rating the plausibility and level of disconfirmation somewhat neutrally, the resurrection hypothesis still comes out on top above the rival hypotheses. Even if we combine naturalistic hypotheses, these can never be more probable than either hypothesis in isolation. A combination can only be as probable or less. 

As such, given the total poverty of naturalistic alternatives to the resurrection hypothesis, it is clear that there is no chance of any them soon exceeding the resurrection hypothesis in any of the criteria for the best explanation. You'd have to resort to wildly implausible, ad hoc scenarios such as 'advanced aliens' or claim that God exists but allowed demonic forces to 'trick' humanity. But if that is your route to avoid concluding that Jesus rose from the dead, you might as well just admit you don't have an argument. It will save everybody some time. 

Naturalistic Alternatives to the Resurrection Hypothesis

So, in the previous post we established the following facts: 
1. Jesus was crucified.
2. Jesus was buried.
3. Jesus' tomb was found empty.
4. Jesus' disciples and other followers had experiences they believed to be encounters with the risen Jesus. 5. Jesus' sceptical half-brother, James, converted after a similar experience.
6. The Church persecutor, Paul, converted after a similar experience.
7. Jesus claimed to be the Messiah.
8. Jesus claimed to be divine.
9. Jesus predicted His own death and resurrection. 

Aside from these facts, we also have to explain the meteoric rise and success of Christianity when its central claims and teachings ran against the prevailing socio-cultural milieu of the 1st century. Now, we shall refer to the claim that Jesus was resurrected from the dead simply as 'the resurrection hypothesis'. The question is, is the resurrection hypothesis the best explanation of these facts, or is some other naturalistic alternative the best explanation? 

When assessing various hypotheses and trying to decide which (if any) are the best explanation, we are relying on the following criteria: 
1. The hypothesis must imply further statements describing present, observable data. 
2. The hypothesis must have greater explanatory scope than its rivals. 
3. The hypothesis must have greater explanatory power than its rivals. 
4. The hypothesis must be more plausible than its rivals. 
5. The hypothesis must be less ad hoc than its rivals. 
6. The hypothesis must be disconfirmed by fewer accepted beliefs than its rivals. 
7. The hypothesis must so exceed its rivals in fulfilling the prior conditions that there is little chance of a rival hypothesis soon exceeding it. 

We are already familiar with the resurrection hypothesis, but what are the naturalistic alternatives? The naturalistic alternatives to the resurrection hypothesis are as follows: 
1. The Doppelganger Hypothesis: Jesus had a lookalike and so either Jesus was a conman or else a lookalike capitalised on Jesus' death to dupe the disciples. 
2. The Cognitive Dissonance Hypothesis: the disciples invented the resurrection appearances to reconcile cognitive dissonance following Jesus' death. 
3. The Hallucination Hypothesis: the disciples hallucinated the risen Jesus. 
4. The Revival Hypothesis: Jesus wasn't really dead when He was taken from the cross and regained consciousness in the tomb. 
5. The Wrong Tomb Hypothesis: Jesus' followers went to the wrong tomb. 
6. The Stolen Body Hypothesis: the disciples or some other group stole Jesus' body. 
7. The Fraud/Conspiracy Hypothesis: the whole thing is made up. 

Pretty much every hypothesis satisfies condition one, so we shall skip that and move straight ahead to explanatory scope. Simply put, the more data points a hypothesis explains, the more explanatory scope it has. Explanatory power refers to how well the hypothesis explains those data points. Specifically, it refers to how probable the evidence is were the hypothesis to be true. 

Plausibility is a tad more complex; it refers to the degree the hypothesis is implied by accepted truths and the degree to which its negation is implied by accepted truths. A hypothesis is more plausible if it is implied by a greater variety of accepted truths and to a stronger degree and its probable negation is implied by a lesser variety of accepted truths and to a less stronger degree. 

The quality of being ad hoc simply refers to how many new suppositions about the past are required for the hypothesis to work. The fewer new suppositions about the past not already implied to some extent by existing beliefs, the better. Whereas the degree to which a hypothesis is disconfirmed by accepted beliefs is pretty straightforward. 

When conjoined with accepted truths, the hypothesis must imply fewer statements which are believed to be false. The final criterion is pretty self-explanatory. So, let us first review the naturalistic alternatives starting with the Doppelganger Hypothesis. There are two separate versions of this hypothesis, one where Jesus is a fraud and one where His lookalike is the conman. 

Regarding explanatory scope, the only area that might trip it up is the fact that the empty tomb needs explaining. Of course, we could suitably tailor our hypothesis to account for this fact. If Jesus were a fraud, then we could suppose He got rid of His lookalike's body, whereas if the lookalike was the conman, we could suppose he got rid of Jesus' body. 

However, what of explanatory power? This is where this hypothesis quickly crumbles. Why would the disciples conclude that they had seen the resurrected Jesus? Remember that resurrection entailed a glorious transformation into an immortal new form and was believed to be reserved for the end of time. Why would they take an ordinary human being to be a resurrected being? 

Even if we assume that the disciples were somehow too ignorant to know, an ex-Pharisee like Paul would absolutely have known the difference. So, this hypothesis, whilst it could ostensibly explain all the facts, it doesn't really explain them very well because there are obvious holes. It is also not very plausible. For the simple reason that there is zero evidence of such a lookalike.

For this hypothesis to work, we need to suppose that another man looked so much like Jesus that His own disciples couldn't tell it wasn't Him. But if such a person existed, why is there no mention of him? And how is it that either Jesus or the lookalike then somehow completely disappeared from the historical record? If Jesus or someone who looked exactly like Him were running around, someone would have noticed. 

This hypothesis is also particularly ad hoc in that it requires us to accept the existence of a doppelganger in the absence of any evidence of such an individual. It is also therefore greatly disconfirmed due to the fact that there is no such evidence of such a doppelganger. So, despite a somewhat promising start, this hypothesis falls apart like a house of cards made on sand. 

Let us therefore move onto the Cognitive Dissonance hypothesis. According to this hypothesis, the disciples were so distraught following Jesus' death that, to reconcile that reality with their Messianic hopes, they invented the resurrection appearances to deal with the cognitive dissonance they were suffering. 

As far as explanatory scope goes, this fails right off the bat, because it doesn't explain the empty tomb, or the conversions of James and Paul. It also suffers in terms of poor explanatory power because, once again, why would they claim Jesus was resurrected? It would have been easier to say either that Jesus returned to ordinary life, or even that His body has been assumed or translated into heaven. 

Whilst somewhat more plausible than the doppelganger hypothesis, it's still not very plausible because there's just no reason to suppose James and Paul would suffer the same kind of cognitive dissonance, nor would they just take the disciples at their word (especially if Jesus' body still lay in the grave!) 

It is disconfirmed by the fact that cognitive dissonance is a well understood phenomenon and would only have affected believers in Jesus. About the only area it does well in is that it is not terribly ad hoc. So, with all things considered, this hypothesis is likewise a dismal failure. 

The hallucination hypothesis has been somewhat popular amongst scholars sceptical of the claims of Christianity. However, it suffers in terms of explanatory scope since it fails to explain the empty tomb. It also doesn't have very good explanatory power since hallucinations are private and internal and thus unique to individuals. 

We could reasonably suppose a few people hallucinating the risen Jesus, but all of the disciples plus however many other followers? Not to mention James and Paul as well. Moreover, hallucinations follow the expectations of the hallucinator, so why would they hallucinate a resurrected Jesus instead of say an ordinary human Jesus? 

This hypothesis is therefore not very plausible since the phenomenon of hallucinations are particularly well understood and the accounts of the risen Jesus in the New Testament do not match accounts of hallucination. Even in cases of so-called "mass hallucinations" (which are basically just illusions rather than hallucinations) accounts of what was seen vary by individual. 

Whilst not very ad hoc except in the fact we have to believe hundreds of people experience identical visions of a resurrected Jesus, it is disconfirmed by the fact that this is just not how hallucinations work at all. I could buy some of the core disciples having a vision of Jesus and then maybe they think He has been taken up into heaven, but not people hostile or indifferent to Christianity. 

The revival hypothesis maintains that Jesus was taken down from the cross before He was actually dead and regained consciousness in the tomb and then paid His disciples, et al., a visit. This is another hypothesis that does well in terms of explanatory scope but fails in explanatory power and other criteria. 

As far as explanatory power is concerned, it doesn't explain the resurrection appearances or the conversions of James and Paul very well since Jesus would have been bloodied and bruised from all the scourging and other tortures, not to mention wounds and health issues from being crucified for several hours. 

So, why would anyone think He was a resurrected being? Why would they assume He had risen from the dead at all? However, the main thing to note is that the chances of Jesus' surviving being flogged, tortured, and then crucified are slim to none. Bearing in mind, also, that the Roman soldiers officiating the execution would have been severely punished if Jesus had really gotten away. 

However, much with the doppelganger hypothesis, Jesus disappears from the historical record afterwards. So, what happened to Him? Moreover, this hypothesis severely underestimates the brutality of crucifixion and Roman torture. This hypothesis is just therefore not very plausible. 

It is disconfirmed by what we know about the reality of crucifixion and Roman torture. It is also somewhat ad hoc since we have to suppose that a number of disparate things all coincided: Jesus somehow survived without the Roman soldiers noticing, He somehow duped the disciples and others that He was a resurrected, and then just disappeared without a trace? 

The wrong tomb hypothesis is fairly simple: the women followers of Jesus and then the disciples visited the wrong tomb. The first major problem with this, of course, is that it does nothing to explain the resurrection appearances or the conversions of James and Paul. However, even in terms of explanatory power it is particularly weak.

Why would they jump to the conclusion that Jesus was resurrected? Assuming they were gullible enough, wouldn't they have more easily assumed that Jesus' body was taken up into heaven? Wouldn't they have assumed that the body was simply missing or stolen? However, more realistically, they would have realised they visited the wrong tomb.

Moreover, why did the authorities not produce Jesus' body? In terms of plausibility, this hypothesis is not very plausible at all because even if we assumed that Jesus' followers and disciples were really gullible, there's just no way the authorities would not have produced Jesus' body had it still lain in the tomb. 

We next come to the stolen body hypothesis, which involves either the disciples or some other group stealing Jesus' body. In terms of explanatory scope, it does not explain the resurrection appearances or the conversion of James and Paul. In terms of explanatory power, it doesn't make sense why the disciples claimed Jesus was resurrected rather than returned to ordinary life or taken up into heaven. 

It is at least somewhat plausible, albeit not that much since it entails the disciples making up accounts they never deviated from (which just never happens in conspiracies like this). If we suppose that body snatching thieves were the culprits, this is even less likely since there is no evidence of such groups operating in 1st century AD Judea (thus also making this hypothesis somewhat ad hoc). 

As far as the fraud/conspiracy hypothesis is concerned, whilst the most popular against online sceptics, it is perhaps the weakest of them all because it fails virtually every criterion except explanatory scope. In terms of explanatory power, it fails because there is no divergence in the accounts, no record of anybody ever recanting their beliefs.

Why would James and Paul just go along with it? Why resurrection instead of something more palatable? It's plausible in the sense that, sure, people make things up all the time, but is very implausible in the sense that conspiracies involving many people almost always fail. The more people involved in a lie, the greater the chances of being discovered.

People make mistakes, change their story, get cold feet, and so on. These are people who went to their graves rather than recant their claim that they had seen the risen Jesus. It's extremely ad hoc because the conditions for such a conspiracy to work undetected are very exact. It's disconfirmed by the fact that conspiracies get found out.

Take the Watergate scandal. Those involved didn't even last a week before it all fell apart. You're telling me that twelve 1st century peasants kept a lie going for 40 years? Nonsense. So, as we can see, none of the naturalistic alternatives to the resurrection hypothesis manage to amount to much if anything at all. Of course, this does not mean that the resurrection hypothesis wins by default. 

We will take a look at the resurrection hypothesis separately, but for now it is worth noting that, if we are to posit a naturalistic alternative to the resurrection hypothesis, then we are going to have to resort to combining hypotheses. The problem with this, of course, is that two conjoined statements are never more probable than either statement on its own. 

The probability of two events occurring together is always less than or equal to the probability of either event occurring by itself. To suggest otherwise is to commit the conjunction fallacy. This is illustrated in the famous Linda Problem. You are asked to imagine a woman named Linda and are introduced to different background facts about Linda. 

Linda is: 31 years old, single, outspoken, and very bright. She majored in philosophy and, as a student, was deeply concerned with issues of discrimination and social justice, and participated in anti-nuclear demonstrations. Now, which statement is more probable? 1) Linda is a bank teller, or; 2) Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement?

Even if we assume that the probability of her being a feminist is high and the probability of her being a bank teller is low, the conjoined probability will never be greater than either option. For instance, suppose the probability of her being a bank teller is 0.05 and the probability of her being a feminist is 0.95. The probability of both is the probability of one multiplied by the probability of the other. But 0.05 x 0.95 is 0.0475, which is lower than the probability of her being a bank teller. 

Building A Case for the Resurrection: Maximal Data, Minimal Facts, and Socio-Cultural Background

With the preliminaries out of the way, we can move on to sifting through the evidence to build a case for the resurrection. Now, even though the evidence shows that the Gospels are reliable ancient biographies that contain eyewitness testimony, we can feasibly build a case for the resurrection that doesn't rely on them at all.

Of the thirteen epistles that bears Paul's name, seven of them are universally regarded by even critical scholars as being authentically written by Paul. Of these seven, we only need rely on just two epistles: 1 Corinthians and Galatians. Two passages, one from each epistle, are important, because they contain the earliest reference to belief in the risen Christ.

So, 1 Corinthians is universally believed to have been written around 55 AD, which means it was written roughly only 20 years after Jesus' lifetime. However, 1 Corinthians 15 contains creedal material that predates the writing of the letter itself. Various clues in how it is written reveal an oral origin and Paul himself states he is relating material that he himself received. 

Clues to the time when Paul received this oral tradition can be found in Galatians, where Paul details what he did immediately following his conversion to Christianity. He states how after spending time in Arabia and then Damascus, he went to Jerusalem and met with some of the disciples of Jesus. Paul states this was 3 years after his conversion. 

However, the oral tradition already existed when Paul visited the disciples in Jerusalem. Meaning that it had already been formulated and begun to be circulated at that time, and so the creedal material is older than 3 years after the death of Jesus. As such, scholars place the origin of the creedal material anywhere from 6 months to 2 years after the death of Jesus.

This is important because it establishes that belief in the risen Christ and the appearances to the apostles were part of the earliest traditions of the Church. In other words, belief in the resurrection did not develop over time and sceptics of the past have argued. So, before the Gospels were written, the earliest Christians already believed that Jesus had been resurrected from the dead.

Aside from attesting to the earliness of belief in the risen Jesus, it also contains the earliest accounts of the appearances of Jesus to the disciples. Aside from the appearance to Peter and the other disciples, it also mentions appearances to other groups, including a group of roughly 500 people, as well as Jesus' half-brother James. 

Paul even specifies that many of those whom Jesus appeared to were still alive at the time of his writing. In other words, they would have been available to seek out and speak with in order to get their testimony. What this means, then, is that multiple individuals clearly had experiences that they interpreted to be encounters with the risen Jesus. 

So far, we have learned two important key facts: the earliest Christians all believed that Jesus rose from the dead, and many individuals had experiences that they took to be encounters with the resurrected Jesus. What other facts can we know beyond a reasonable doubt? 

Well, we can know with certainty that Jesus was executed via crucifixion. If Jesus were not dead, then He could hardly have been resurrected from the dead now, could He? This fact is corroborated by external historical sources also: multiple non-Christian sources attest to the crucifixion of Jesus. Tacitus in particular confirms that it was during the reign of Tiberius and that Jesus was executed under Pontius Pilate. 

Jesus' death by crucifixion is thereby regarded as one of the surest facts about His life by the overwhelming majority of scholars. However, what happened to Jesus' body after His death? This is where there is at least some dispute. The Christian story is that Jesus was buried in a tomb which was then discovered by a group of His female followers.

Now, whilst a good number of scholars accept both of these as facts, it is not as universal as the support for the previously mentioned facts, so some argument is needed. For some scholars maintain that Jesus' body was either left on the cross to be eaten, or else was dumped into a mass grave. Thus, we can't just appeal to the majority of scholars. 

First of all, belief in Jesus' burial is part of the earliest Christian tradition mentioned above. This becomes hard to explain if Jesus had not actually been buried. For all the authorities had to do to quash reports of Jesus' rising from the dead would be to produce a body. This therefore greatly raises the level of plausibility of the burial of Jesus.

Second, we know that, in at least some situations, the Romans did permit burial of crucifixion victims. Of course, the question here would then be: why would the Romans permit the burial of Jesus? Well, Jesus was crucified on the eve of the Passover, and it was against Jewish law to leave someone 'hanging on a tree'. 

Interestingly, the Gospels portray two secret followers of Jesus amongst the Sanhedrin, Joseph and Nicodemus, as being the buriers of Jesus. Well, this would make sense if we suppose that, anxious to avoid transgressing the law, the Sanhedrin would have wanted Jesus taken down and dealt with as soon as possible. 

This would mean that Joseph and Nicodemus could easily have petitioned Pilate to take Jesus' body down from the cross. The rest of the Sanhedrin just wanted to make sure the law was observed. But wouldn't they have found Joseph and Nicodemus burying Jesus in an actual tomb odd? To answer that question, we must look to Jewish law and burial practices and customs.

In fact, we can also look more broadly at 1st century Near Eastern and Mediterranean socio-cultural values as well. Now, in the case of a blasphemer (which is what the Sanhedrin considered Jesus), Jewish law does state that they were to be buried in an ignominious fashion, but what did that mean precisely? Well, to be purposefully buried away from family was considered shameful.

Now, Christian philosopher and theologian, William Lane Craig, finds issue with this by pointing out that the language accounts of the Gospels do not read like Jesus was buried in a shameful manner. Whilst true, this is not incompatible with the fact that being purposefully buried away from family members would have been considered dishonorable. 

We can grant that Joseph and Nicodemus, as secret followers of Jesus, did everything they could to rightfully honor Jesus' body in death, but this would have been kept secret from the Sanhedrin. As far as the general public knew, Jesus was buried shamefully after being executed in the most heinous fashion. So, this whole account is very plausible in light of ancient Jewish and Greco-Roman burial practices and socio-cultural values.

Whereas if the Gospel writers were simply making things up, why go to all that bother? Why not have the disciples steal Jesus' body and bury Him after the fact? Thus, we can be reasonably confident that Jesus was really buried in a tomb after His death via crucifixion. This in turn provides good evidence that the tomb was therefore discovered empty.

Because if Jesus' body had still lain in the grave, then, once again, the authorities could easily have produced Jesus' body. Now, the Gospels have the Sanhedrin claiming that the disciples stole Jesus' body and hid it away somewhere. However, if Jesus' body had still lain in His tomb, and the Sanhedrin and/or Romans produced Jesus' body, this would make no sense.

There is no mention of a body being produced anywhere in the entire historical record, even in works hostile to Christianity. So, we are forced to accept that the tomb really was discovered empty. Another fact that supports the authenticity of the accounts of the empty tomb is that it features women discovering the empty tomb.

However, a woman's testimony was considered virtually worthless in ancient Jewish and Graeco-Roman society. Had the Gospel authors been inventing the accounts, why on earth would they chose women? Surely, they would have had the male disciples as the discoverers of the empty tomb. So, we can therefore be confident that Jesus' tomb was therefore discovered empty. 

Aside from these facts, we also know that Paul was a former pharisee who converted to Christianity, and that Jesus' half-brother, James, who was described as being sceptical of Jesus' claims in the Gospels, also converted to Christianity after a similar experience with the risen Jesus. However, what other facts can we discern? 

Whilst scholarship is divided whether or not Jesus really claimed to be divine and/or the Messiah, we can easily construct historical arguments that show both of these things were the case. Jesus really did claim to be divine and really did claim to be the Messiah. 

We can be confident that Jesus claimed to be Israel's Messiah because, otherwise, it makes no sense why He was executed via crucifixion. Moreover, if Jesus Himself never claimed to be the Messiah, then it becomes inexplicable how such claims became attributed to Him. After all, there were figures in Jewish history who were regarded as teachers and even healers who were never considered as being contenders for the Messiah.

Moreover, there is no non-Messianic version of Christianity. You'd think that if Jesus never claimed to be the Messiah that there would be early, non-Messianic traditions circulating alongside the Messianic traditions, but there is no trace of anything even remotely resembling this. We don't start seeing alternative traditions until much later. 

It is often claimed (without evidence, it should be said) that the canonical Gospels were either arbitrarily chosen by Constantine at the Council of Nicaea and/or that competing accounts were destroyed. Now, aside from there being no shred of evidence that this ever happened, we have hard evidence explicitly contradicting this claim.

Aside from the basic facts, such as Constantine having no role within the Council of Nicaea, and the canon of the New Testament being decided prior to the Council of Nicaea, there's the fact that we have extant copies of rival accounts to the four canonical Gospels, and they are much too late to be considered 'valid alternatives' to the canonical Gospels. 

However, it is worth noting that even in heretical forms of Christianity such as Gnosticism, Jesus is still portrayed as some kind of divine or messianic figure. It's not until much later where you get heresies such as Arianism that deny the divinity of Christ. If Jesus never claimed to be divine and never claimed to be the Messiah, why is it that the earliest traditions of Christianity hold him to be both?

Surely, if Jesus never claimed to be either, then non-Messianic, non-Trinitarian Christianity would have predated Trinitarian, Messianic Christianity and not the other way round. Especially considering that Jesus was crucified. To say that a crucified deity/messiah would have been a hard sell would be a colossal understatement. 

In an honour-shame based society such as the 1st century Near East and Mediterranean, it would have been considered utterly absurd. Jews were strict monotheists who believed that those hung from a tree were cursed by God. The pagan Greeks and Romans would have considered a deity actually becoming human (as opposed to merely appearing human) and then be crucified as utterly non-sensical.

The reason for this was because crucifixion was a status degradation ritual meant to dishonour someone as much as possible, and so it would have defied how the Greeks and Romans understood honour and deity for one to be actually fully human and actually crucified. Especially considered that Jesus was Jewish, as the Greeks and Romans held negative views of Jews. 

Jesus also hailed from Galilee, and Galileans had a negative reputation amongst Jews and non-Jews alike. Jews regarded them as backwards country bumpkins, and it was also a hotspot for uprisings and so not regarded well by the Romans. Jesus specifically hailed from Nazareth, a city of absolutely no repute whatsoever.

Jesus associated with social undesirables, such as fishermen, tax collectors, and prostitutes. Jesus' teachings made specific ethical demands of His followers (i.e. giving up familial relations if they became an obstacle) that would have been unthinkable in the social world of the 1st century. 

Jesus was a rural itinerant preacher in a world controlled by wealthy urbanites, so His social standing alone would have been enough for non-Jews to find claims regarding His divinity as ridiculous. However, they also believed that the best possible fate was to escape the world of matter. So, a deity to actually take on human flesh would have likewise been considered ridiculous to non-Jews. 

It's also worth noting that resurrection was not only a belief unique to Judaism, but also a specific mode of returning from death to life. It wasn't simply a return to your ordinary human life that you had before. But, rather, also involved a transformation into an immortal body. However, the prevailing belief amongst Jews of the 1st century was that this was reserved exclusively for the righteous dead at the end of history. 

Gentiles would have regarded resurrection as less than ideal, since it still meant having a body, and Jews would have found the idea of someone executed as a criminal and blasphemer being resurrected before the end of time as particularly odd as well. So, we can be confident that Jesus really did predict His own death and resurrection.

Note how the disciples are routinely depicted as being confused when Jesus would say He would die and be resurrected. Aside from portraying the disciples negatively, it matches the socio-cultural background data. It makes sense that the disciples would have been confused since they were not expecting the Messiah to be killed and resurrected. 

So, we can be reasonably confident of the following facts: 
1. Jesus was crucified. 
2. Jesus was buried. 
3. Jesus' tomb was found empty.
4. Jesus' disciples and other followers had experiences they believed to be encounters with the risen Jesus. 
5. Jesus' sceptical half-brother, James, converted after a similar experience. 
6. The Church persecutor, Paul, converted after a similar experience. 
7. Jesus claimed to be the Messiah.
8. Jesus claimed to be divine. 
9. Jesus predicted His own death and resurrection. 

Aside from these facts, we also have to explain the meteoric rise and success of Christianity when its central claims and teachings ran against the prevailing socio-cultural milieu of the 1st century.

Approaches to Assessing the Evidence for the Resurrection

When it comes to assessing the resurrection of Jesus as a historical event, it is often claimed by atheists that the text of what is now referred to as the New Testament is practically useless is determining what actually happened since it reflects the "biases of ancient Christians" rather than actual events. Aside from this, many also labour under the delusion that the Christian seeking to demonstrate the historicity of the resurrection must first demonstrate the reliability and truth of the entire Bible.

It's sort of a catch-22; atheists claim that the Bible is untrustworthy as a source and so cannot be used but also expect Christians to verify the veracity of the Bible as a source before they will accept any argument that the resurrection happened. Unfortunately for atheists and others sceptical of the claims of Christianity, that is not how historical investigation works. 

You can't claim that the Bible is unreliable without actual evidence, and you don't need to 'prove the entire Bible' either just to show that one event reported by the Bible happened. It is not uncommon for atheists who claim to be former Christians (as if this gives some kind of added credibility) to argue that if Christianity is true, the entire Bible needs to be validated since it claims to be the "word of God".

However, this is once again very sloppy methodology. The correct approach from a purely academic point of view is to assume an air of agnosticism and treat it like any other historical text. Treating it to a kind of radical hyper-scepticism based on your personal beliefs and prejudices is just poor epistemology and historiography. 

Now, from a historical perspective, it is perfectly possible for the Bible to be generally unreliable and for the resurrection to have happened, just as it is perfectly possible for the Bible to be generally reliable and for the resurrection to not have happened. What matters, then, is that we apply the criteria of history fairly and construct valid historical arguments for why the resurrection happened. 

As such, we need not be saddled with the laborious and time-consuming task of proving the general reliability of the entire Bible. It is the task of the historian to analyse sources with the rigorous criteria of historical research and to determine what can be determined if anything from those sources. 

Nevertheless, it is no coincidence that the claims of atheists and other sceptics of the Bible are, quite frankly, utterly baloney. From a textual criticism standpoint, the New Testament has the most reliable textual transmission of any ancient document in existence. 

Prior to the advent of the printing press, ancient texts had to be copied by hand, and so small errors could creep in. The field of textual criticism is concerned with analysing ancient texts to find and correct these small errors using a number of different criteria. 

So, first, one general principle is that the more copies there are, the easier it will be to detect errors. Second, the earlier in time a copy is to the original, the better. You do get critics like Bart Ehrman who claim that the New Testament is 'hopelessly corrupt' but is this a fair assessment? The New Testament has over 5,700 Greek manuscripts and over 10,000 in Latin.

There are then more copies in other languages such as Arabic, Coptic, Syriac, and so on. The earliest fragments of the New Testament date to the 2nd century, with complete manuscripts dating to the 5th century. The next best in terms of textual transmission would be the works of Homer, which have about 2,000 copies total. 

However, most ancient works don't even amount to that many. Tacitus' Annals, for instance, only has a handful of manuscripts dating to the 10th century and later. Yet, scholars do not run around like headless chickens worrying that we cannot recover what Tacitus originally wrote. So, why the excessive amounts of hyper-scepticism towards the New Testament?

Simply arguing that it claims to be the "word of God" will not do. You need to present an actual argument devoid of special pleading and question begging. Some instead try to attack the reliability of the New Testament on the basis of its oral traditions instead.

Scholars currently estimate that the Gospels were written roughly 30 years after the crucifixion of Jesus, with the letters of Paul being written in the 50s AD. Critics opine that this is too long after the events to be reliable. Yet, 30 years is roughly the time between the Gulf War and now, yet we would be considered out of our minds for rejecting firsthand accounts written today, 

For most of history, in fact, contemporary writings were rare. It was quite common for accounts to be written decades if not centuries after the events they describe. So, the only way to justify this radical hyper-scepticism against the New Testament is by special pleading and question begging. 

Bear in mind also that the New Testament itself shows that Jesus followed standard teaching practices of the 1st century that would have aided their memorability. Jesus utilised ancient mnemonic devices such as world play, poetic forms, contrasting thesis with antithesis, and so on. It's also worth noting that all four Gospels fall into the category of ancient biography. Moreover, we can be reasonably confident also that the New Testament documents were written by who they said they were. 

Of course, simply relying on general blanket dismissals in lieu of actual investigation is lazy and sloppy methodology. Instead, what we can do is carefully analyse the sources and see what, if anything, can be gleaned from them. That is what actual historians do. Obviously, a report coming to us from a generally reliable source can raise its overall credibility but there's multiple different things that go into assessing whether something is historical or not. 

There are times where knowing a source's bias can assist us in detecting nuggets of truth. Suppose we have a source that is biased in favour of a certain group or person. If that source reports something that reflects negatively on that person or group, we can reasonably take that as evidence that it is more likely to be true. Because why would they want to make something bad up about someone they are biased in favour of?

So, whilst we could spend a serious amount of time defending the general reliability and accuracy of the Bible, it really isn't necessary when it comes to determining whether the resurrection actually happened or not. Rather, we can go through the sources and see what truths we can learn from them, and then construct an argument that appeals to the resurrection as the best explanation, i.e. an abductive argument. 

A Methodological Approach to Miracles in the Field of History

Most forms of arguments from miracles usually focus on contemporary examples, since those are, it seems, much easier to verify than those in the distant past. However, there are those who argue it is impossible even in principle to verify historical accounts of purported miracles. It should be worth noting, of course, that there are those who argue that it is impossible in principle to even verify contemporary reports of miracles.

David Hume famously argued that no amount evidence could ever demonstrate the truth of a miracle claim because, according to Hume, we have the evidence of the regularity of nature in opposition. Now, arguments in favour of the existence of God notwithstanding, this certainly seems like question begging. The reason for this is because the regularity of nature only precludes the possibility of miracles if you already believe miracles are by nature impossible.

It should be worth noting that the laws of physics, which govern the regularity of nature, are descriptive. They are not necessary truths like the laws of logic and mathematics. We can easily imagine other universes with differing laws of physics. As such, whilst our experience provides good evidence that the universe behaves in a regular manner, it is not evidence that miracles are impossible.

If God exists, then the reason the universe behaves the way it does is because either God is micromanaging every little detail or else wound up the universe and generally leaves it alone. Assuming a position of agnosticism, the real reason the universe behaves the way it does is simply a mystery. 

Any approach that just declares something impossible without proper investigation is, quite frankly, sloppy and intellectually lazy. Carl Sagan famously stated that extraordinary claims required extraordinary evidence, but this is very faulty epistemological approach because what is and what is not considered extraordinary is entirely subjective. 

If you can't bring yourself to admit that miracles are at least possible, then you may need to rethink your epistemology. However, what of miracle claims in the distant past? Even if we grant that miracles are at least possible and therefore in principle verifiable or falsifiable, what of non-contemporary miracle claims? 

As aforementioned, some argue that miracle claims cannot be historically verified. Bart Ehrman, for instance, offers the following two arguments. First, he says that the historian is committed to methodological naturalism and so cannot confirm if a miracle has occurred or not. Second, he says that historians are only capable of reconstructing what probably happened and miracle are defined as the least probable scenario.

Regarding the first argument, methodological naturalism is not a prerequisite of historical research. It is a staple of the majority of scientific inquiry since it is exclusively concerned with how the natural world operates. Historians have no such burden since they are investigating the past. To assume that all past events are explainable within the purview of naturalism is question begging. 

The second argument, however, manages to be even worse. Because the argument commits the fallacy of equivocation and also presents a loaded definition of miracle that clearly seems to be based on question begging as well. We can grant that the historian is concerned with the most probable reconstruction of past events, but we must clearly define in what sense we mean by the term 'probable'.

Do we mean purely statistical probability or epistemic probability? The first clearly seems ill-suited to the field history, which deals with non-repeatable often one-off events. We can grant therefore that a miracle is the least probable event statistically but only a proper investigation can determine what is most probable epistemically. 

However, need we even define miracle that way? There really is no widely agreed upon definition of miracle, after all. Do we simply mean supernatural events? But then what is the difference between natural and supernatural? I think we could plausibly grant that a miracle is any event that at least seemingly defies the current understanding of the laws of nature, including the laws of probability. 

This seems sufficiently robust to me and does not beg the question. So, unless we are postmodernist who believes historical knowledge is impossible, vis a vis Keith Jenkins, then we can conclude that historical knowledge of miracles is at least in principle possible. 

Arguments from Miracles

So far, we have concerned ourselves chiefly with deductive arguments. We shall now consider an inductive argument, the argument from miracles. Of course, reports of miracles are nothing new. History is replete with miraculous claims. The question is, can any be verified and, if so, what, if anything, do they prove? 

It is often claimed by atheists that, since the advent of the scientific method, miracle claims have dropped dramatically and only tend to occur in our 'modern age' in countries with less access to education. Of course, aside from being a version of chronological snobbery and cultural elitism, it blatantly commits the genetic fallacy. 

However, more importantly, it is a claim that is actually false. Scholar Craig Keener decided to look into the prevalence of miracle claims over time and found that, contrary to the aforementioned atheistic narrative, there have been hundreds of millions of eyewitness reports of 'miracles' in the 20th and 21st centuries. Moreover, many of these come from 'educated', highly developed/first world countries, also. 

Of course, with such numbers, it is hard to investigate every single one of them. Nevertheless, there are many reports of miracles that have evidence beyond eyewitness testimony and thus can be externally verified. For instance, Gary Habermas related an account of a woman whose diseased spleen, which was later surgically removed, grew back and completely healthy. 

Other examples related by Habermas include near-death out-of-body experiences. There was one account given by a woman who claimed she saw the top of the hospital building and said she saw an old shoe. A member staff checked it out on a whim and found the specific shoe exactly as described. Another woman claimed she saw her family members (who were at their home and not even in the hospital) and was able to accurately describe what they had been doing at the time. 

Now, one counter argument is that miracle claims and reports come to us from different religions and they all can't be true. This premise is certainly true enough. However, the atheist then leaps to the completely unwarranted conclusion that all such reports must therefore be false. I shouldn't have to explain how this is a complete and utter non-sequitur. 

If competing claims within a particular meant that all such claims are false, this would surely invalidate every avenue of human inquiry, every field, and every discipline known to man. It seems fairly obvious that God could exist, but every religion be false (or at the least, not completely correct). It is possible to construct a logically and internally consistent version of religious pluralism, after all. 

Obviously, not every religion can be fully correct, since they have competing claims, but we could feasibly grant that they all possess a modicum of truth or a valid way of seeking God. However, need we resort to religious pluralism to escape this charge? After all, many religions acknowledge the existence of evil beings who operate in opposition to God. 

Moreover, there are religions also that acknowledge that God performs miracles amongst all peoples, and not just amongst those who adhere to their religion. So, it is perfectly possible for there to be miracles from competing religions, but only one religion be completely true. 

Of course, for the most part, the kinds of miracles under discussion generally do not provide evidence for a particular religion. General miracles certainly show that there exists a realm beyond the physical world but is not enough to show any one religion (if any) is fully correct. 

In my studies, I have found that only one religion stands or falls on a single miracle claim, and that is Christianity. Christianity claims that God is triune; He is three persons in one being, the Unoriginate Father, the Eternally Begotten Son, and the Holy Spirit who eternally proceeds from the Father. 

They claim that Jesus was the incarnation of the Son and preached His own death and resurrection before being killed and then risen from the dead three days later in vindication of His claims. If this is so, then this would clearly establish Christianity as being the only religion that is fully correct in its teachings. 

So, whilst general miracles can definitely be taken as evidence of the supernatural, only Christ's Resurrection determines which religion is actually correct. No other religion makes specific historical claims like this that are capable of being externally verified. As such, having reviewed the various arguments in favour of the existence of God, and concluding that they show beyond a reasonable doubt that God almost certainly exists, we shall next move onto the central claims of Christianity.

The Argument from Consciousness

A lesser-known argument for the existence of God is that of the Argument from Consciousness. This argument is relatively simple and easy to understand. It starts from the phenomenon of consciousness and argues that it is an irreducible aspect of reality incongruent with naturalism. From there, it is a relatively short hop, skip, and a jump to conclude that God is a better explanation for consciousness than any naturalistic alternative. 

There are two, key sub-arguments in favour of the premise that consciousness is not reducible to physical states such as brain states: the Chinese Room argument, and the Knowledge argument. The first of these, the Chinese Room argument, was actually put forward by a naturalist, John Searle. 

Imagine a man who is locked in a room. He does not read or understand Chinese at all. Yet, he receives slips under the door written in Chinese. Now, imagine has a rulebook written in English that tells him how to respond based on which symbols he receives under the door. He can thereby use this rulebook to interact with a native Chinese speaker in such a way that they come to believe they are speaking with another Chinese speaker. 

Yet, the man in the room at no point actually understands Chinese. He is manipulating symbols he does not understand based on a set of rules that do not explain their meaning. Now, Searle used this to argue that consciousness cannot be simulated by a computer program, which is certainly a true conclusion that can be drawn from this thought experiment.

Yet, he nevertheless argued that consciousness nevertheless emerged from physical states and remained a naturalist. But does this make sense? Surely, if the world is only composed of physical matter and energy, then the emergence of genuinely sui generis phenomenon is impossible? 

If the world only consists of physical matter and energy, then this entails that phenomenon such as consciousness must be reducible to physical states. That this is evidently not the case is therefore a very strong argument against the truth of naturalism. 

The second sub-argument is the Knowledge argument, which asks us to imagine a colour-blind person locked in a black and white room. They are provided with all physical information about colour but never experience what it is like to actually see colour. Now, imagine their colour-blindness is somehow 'cured' and they are released from their black and white prison into the real world.

If physicalism were true, then they should already know everything there is to know about colour. Yet, upon seeing colour for the first time, it abundantly clear that they learn something new. This kind of knowledge is called qualia and consists of first-person knowledge that is irreducible to third-person facts. 

What both of these arguments show is that consciousness is inherently a non-physical phenomenon. In other words, naturalism is false. But if consciousness is non-natural, how does it come to be? How is it that consciousness accompanies sufficiently advanced brain states? Well, in the absence of a naturalistic explanation, the only logical option remaining is theism. 

The Axiological Argument and the Argument from Reason

This argument for the existence of God, also known as the moral argument, is based on the objectivity of moral values and duties. It is argued that if God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist. Since objective moral values and duties do exist, then it is argued we can conclude that God therefore exists. 

It's fairly simple and straightforward, especially compared to more sophisticated arguments, but is often misunderstood. For instance, one counter claim levelled against it is the argument that the premise that objective moral values and duties would not exist if God does not exist is false because there are atheists who are nevertheless moral people.

However, such an objection is misguided because the argument is not that belief in God is necessary for there to be moral people but that His existence is necessary for there to be objective moral values and duties. The argument concerns moral ontology, but the counter argument is discussing issues pertaining to moral epistemology. Thus, it is a complete red herring argument. 

According to the axiological argument, God's existence for there to be objective moral facts, i.e. moral statements that can be true or false independent of our beliefs and mental states. The claim: 'ice cream is tasty' can be true or false but is a subjective truth since it depends upon whether or not I enjoy ice cream. Whereas the claim 'the moon exists' is true or false on the basis of whether or not there is object that we call the moon. 

If God does not exist, then there would be no such thing as moral or immoral people. There would only be people behaving according to either their own personal tastes or perhaps on the basis of societal norms, but not according to an objective moral reality that exists independently of their beliefs and attitudes. 

Whereas if God exists, then there exists an objective moral standard and thus an ontological basis for moral facts, regardless of whether anyone believes them or not. The entire planet could be populated with atheists, but for them to be moral atheists, there needs to be an objective moral standard, i.e. God. 

It is a longstanding understanding that one cannot derive normative, prescriptive statements such as moral facts from facts about the natural world. This is known as the is/ought distinction or the naturalistic fallacy. It is fallacious to argue that something is moral or immoral on the basis of whether that action is 'natural' or not.

So, what options then, are there, for the atheist seeking to deny the conclusion of this argument? Now, one could argue that moral statements refer to subjective tastes, like societal attitudes and personal values, rather than overriding objective moral values and duties. However, it is important to note that, in such a scenario, there would be no moral facts. There would only be sociological and psychological truths about societal and personal tastes. 

If moral statements are subjective, then they are not objective, which would therefore be a denial of the premise that objective moral standards and duties exist. But is this a satisfactory option? For one thing, people who do argue this rarely if ever seem to actually live according to such a view. Of course, this is merely a tu quoque. 

Nevertheless, the fact that such an ethos is unlivable in practice could be taken as an argument against the view that moral statements are subjective. For instance, some modern ideologues are so committed to their view that 'all cultures are equal' that they are willing to tolerate murderers and rapists from other countries in their midst rather than be seen as being 'intolerant'. 

However, if everyone lived that way, then it would result in chaos. Of course, one suggestion, often made by adherents of Darwinian evolutionary theory, is that moral beliefs are useful fictions meant to increase the collective chances of survival of a given population by encouraging behaviours more conducive to survival. 

The reply to this argument, which is an argument in its own right, is that if our moral beliefs were selected for survival with no regards for their truth value, then we cannot trust our moral beliefs. However, the necessary corollary of that is that this would therefore apply to all of our beliefs. 

This has been dubbed the Argument from Reason, and it simply the observation that if our cognitive faculties are not aimed at producing true beliefs, then this undercuts every belief we could ever hold, including belief in naturalism itself. Thus, naturalistic atheism is logically incoherent because its own defeater. 

More specifically, in order for our beliefs to be warranted, they can't merely be only justified true beliefs, but, rather, they need to be beliefs produced by well-designed, properly functioning cognitive faculties aimed at producing true beliefs operating in the cognitive environment for which they were designed. So, aside from supporting moral objectivism, it is also an independent argument for the existence of God. 

In addition to this reply, we can also state that if our moral beliefs are subjective with no objective components whatsoever, then this leads to either moral nihilism or moral non-cognitivism. Moral nihilism is the position that all moral statements are false, whereas moral non-cognitivism is the position that they are neither true nor false. 

Now, moral nihilism simply seems obviously incoherent. For if one moral statement is false, then its negation must be true. This is simply a matter of logic. Moral non-cognitivism is a trickier customer, however. It's not obviously false like moral nihilism is. Of course, it isn't obviously true, either. 

It certainly seems like that moral statements can be true or false. Various analyses made by non-cognitivists claim that moral statements do not express propositions, but rather attitudes. However, it seems to me as if they are misguided. For instance, sure, when I say: "X is wrong" there may or may not be an associated mental attitude accompanying it, such as disapproval or some such.

However, it is far from clear that this is the whole picture. Rather, it can be argued that certain actions elicit such mental attitudes because our moral intuitions are valid and our beliefs true such that, when those beliefs are violated, we react strongly. Non-cognitivists may complain that there exists some disparity regarding moral beliefs in that different people and societies hold conflicting views.

Whilst this is, of course, the case, note that conflicting views are prevalent in other areas too, yet we do not doubt that those statements are incapable of having a truth value. People in the past and even a minority of people today still believe that the world is flat. Some people even claim that 2+2 can equal 5. Yet we do not doubt that statements about the world or mathematical statements can be true or false. 

Additionally, we can actually take what is normally construed as an argument against the existence of God and construct an argument in defence of the premise that objective moral values and duties exist. The argument from evil alleges that the existence of evil is incompatible with the existence of God, who is morally perfect and so on and so forth,

The problem with this argument, however, is that is is logically incoherent. For if moral values and duties exist, then God exists. If God does not exist, then moral values and duties do not exist. Thus, if it can be confirmed that objective moral evil exists, then the existence of God logically and inescapably follows. 

It also hasn't escaped notice that there is nothing about the existence of moral evil that is obviously logically incompatible with the existence of God either. Ironically enough, atheist Stephen Law unintentionally provided a very good rebuttal to the argument from evil for noting that we cannot argue that a good God exists on the basis of moral goodness.

Now, whilst he intended this to be an argument against the existence of God, he has obviously misconstrued the axiological argument. We do not argue that God exists (and is good) because of the existence of moral goodness. We argue that He exists on the basis of objective moral facts. But what this does is show that, by corollary, that we cannot argue that God does not exist because of moral evil. 

The contention that God exists and as actually evil is logically incoherent, since a maximally great being cannot be evil. The logical problem from evil has long been regarded as being refuted. Whereas the general theodicy that a good God can have good reasons for permitting evil is generally more than enough to show that even the so-called existential problem of evil is similarly a non-starter.

Now, one challenge to the view that God is the ontological source of moral facts is that of moral Platonism. Platonism is the view that abstract objects really exist, just in some kind of abstract realm. When applied to moral ontology, then, Platonism would entail that moral facts are ontologically grounded in abstract objects. 

However, does this contention even make any sense? Sure, if the abstract object 'Good' existed, then we could say that goodness is objective, but then wouldn't there also be an abstract object called 'Evil'? At the least, wouldn't things we normally associate with evil, such as 'Injustice', 'Cruelty', and so on exist as well? 

If so, then what reason would we have for aligning our personal values with the good rather than the evil? Whereas, if God exists, then we have a very real reason for preferring good over evil. Because evil would not exist independently of goodness but would rather be a privation of goodness, much in the same way that darkness is the absence of light and cold is the absence of heat. 

One other challenge to the argument is the Euthyphro dilemma. Is something good because God says it is good, or does God say it is good because it is good. If the first option, then this seemingly makes morality arbitrary, but if the second then this presents a standard of goodness apart from God. 

It is hard to see how this presents a serious problem, however. For this dilemma was meant as a refutation of polytheistic morality. It does nothing to challenge the ontological source of morality being grounded in a maximally great being. Since God is maximally good and morally perfect by His very nature, we can trust His commands as being good because He is good, thus presenting a third option to the dilemma not available to the polytheist. 

Thus, having run the gamut of challenges to the argument, the axiological argument comes out on top as providing yet another argument that shows that God almost certainly exists. The argument from reason provides a nice supplement to this argument and also stands as an argument in favour of the existence of God in its own right. 

The Teleological Argument

So far, we've covered two major arguments in favour of the existence of God. Today we shall be looking at the Teleological Argument, otherwise known as 'the argument from design'. This argument takes into account various features of the universe that appear to be designed and argues that the best explanation for the appearance of design is actual design. 

Now, many labour under the delusion that evolutionary theory has long since refuted the teleological argument, but is this really the case? For starters, evolutionary theory only seeks to explain how the significant amount of biodiversity we observe emerged from a single, universal common ancestor. It relies on there already being randomly varying replicators. 

However, evolutionary theory does nothing to explain how such living organisms themselves arose, nor does it seek to explain features of the universe that strongly imply design. So, at best, evolutionary theory removes the need for appealing to design only for certain biological systems. However, need we even concede this much?

It should be worth pointing out that evolutionary theory, despite being a very successful theory, is nevertheless incomplete at present. The reason for this is because there is currently no explanation for how biological systems are able to somehow anticipate or match environmental pressures in a way that leads to novel, heritable traits. 

Evolution isn't simply change over time; it is heritable changes over time. The pressures of survival entails that new traits that arise that provide an edge are 'selected' but don't explain how novel features themselves arise. It used to be believed that random mutations alone could explain the origin of novel traits, but this is no longer the case. 

Biologists have had to coin the term 'teleonomy' to refer to traits that seemingly anticipate either other traits or come about in response to environmental pressures. Aside from this, it is also worth pointing out that the belief that evolutionary processes are necessarily blind and unguided is an unjustified metaphysical belief, not derived from any evidence. 

Now, one could argue that we shouldn't assume intelligent design in the absence of any evidence because it is simpler. However, whilst true, this only entails that the default position is agnosticism regarding the existence of intelligent design, and not its explicit denial. Moreover, given that there exists features of the physical world that strongly exhibit the appearance of design, why not appeal to actual design?

Note, furthermore, that we have gone beyond the scientific evidence into the realm of metaphysics in considering this question. Now, before we move onto considering answers to that question, it is worth noting once again that evolutionary theory does not explain how living organisms first arose. There is currently no widely accepted theoretical framework that even comes close to a partial explanation for this. 

Whilst the idea that life was intentionally, intelligently designed is derided as 'pseudo-science', it is nevertheless a fact that DNA represents highly complex, highly specified information. However, the best evidence of design actually comes to us from the field of cosmology. It has long been noted that not only do we just so happen to have just the right laws of physics to permit life, but that the constants of nature, and the initial conditions of the early universe are incredibly finely tuned. 

Constants are numerical values that describe the relative strength of various physical forces, such as the gravitational constant, G, which describes the strength of gravity. However, it has been discovered that the life-permitting range of multiple constants are such that even the slightest deviation from their current value would mean life would not have arisen. 

Too weak, and the universe would have expanded too rapidly and cooled off way too early, too strong and it would have resulted in the universe collapsing in on itself in a kind of big crunch. The strong force needs to be strong enough to bind atoms without being so strong that all matter clumps together and without being so weak that atoms cannot form. 

Moreover, the initial conditions of the early universe are similarly finely tuned. Perhaps the most breath-taking example is the low entropy condition of the early universe. Roger Penrose (who is an atheist) calculated that the probability of the low entropy condition of the early universe having arisen by chance would have been 1 in 10 ^ 10 ^ 120. 

To put things into perspective, that is larger than the difference in size between a single proton and the entire observable universe. So, the evidence for design is simply overwhelming. What we have to determine is whether or not the universe is actually designed or not. Aside from actual design, the other two alternatives are necessity and chance. 

Now, with features of design in biology and chemistry, one could ostensibly argue that these features of the universe are nevertheless explainable by means of appealing to the laws of nature. Stephen Hawking once remarked that the universe could "create itself from nothing" because of gravity. 

Now, aside from the fact that he was clearly equivocating between nothing and the initial state of the universe as described in the Hartle-Hawking No Boundary model, he is also assuming that gravity has causative powers, which is far from clear at all. The laws of nature are descriptive, not prescriptive. They themselves cause nothing.

Of course, if the laws, constants, and initial conditions of the universe themselves are all finely tuned also, then we can't just fall back on this as a potential explanation for these features anyway, since that would be to argue in a circle. As such, when seeking a purely scientific explanation without appealing to a personal explanation, critics argue that our universe's fine-tuning is explicable in terms of some kind of multiverse hypothesis. 

The problems with appealing to a multiverse in order to explain just our universe cannot be overstated enough. For starters, the idea of there being a multiverse is highly speculative. Not only does it seem to be incredibly ad hoc, but you've also greatly multiplied the explanandum in violation of Occam's Razor. 

Moreover, it seems as if there could never be any kind of verifiable evidence for the existence of such a world ensemble, which means that, at best, the multiverse is scientifically inscrutable. In other words, our reasons for preferring it have to be based on reasons other than scientific reasons. Of course, with that said, the existence of a multiverse is at least implied by some pretty interesting mathematical models of the universe.

My only issue with these mathematical models is that they posit more than 3 spatial dimensions. The most popular of these, M-Theory, for instance, has 11 dimensions. This just seems to be utter nonsense. The second big issue is that, assuming we are sticking strictly to the realm of science, is that these models don't actually solve the problem of fine-tuning. They merely push things back a step.

M-Theory, for instance, entails a particular 'setup' of the multiverse that allows for not just variance of the values of each universe's laws, etc., but also for a sufficient number of them to overcome the vastly low improbabilities of our universe's having arisen by chance. In other words, the multiverse itself would also be highly finely tuned. 

Of course, if we abandon pure science and branch off to speculative metaphysics, one could argue that every logically possible world exists as part of a world ensemble. The problem here is that there is a crippling dilemma that renders appealing to such an unbounded, speculative model moot. Either it abnegates the need for explanation of our universe's fine tuning, or it does not.

If it does, then it also does the same for every scenario featuring incredibly low probabilities. There would be no need to explain any low probability event, since all you can do is appeal to the multiverse. If I drew a Royal Flush 100 times in a row, then I could just say it was because this scenario is one of many logical possibilities that exists in the multiverse. 

If it does not abnegate the need for explanation, then it is explanatorily vacuous and thus appealing to such an unrestricted multiverse solves nothing. So, the only choices left are either necessity or design. But why think our universe has the properties that it does because of necessity? It certainly seems as if the universe could have been a multitude of different ways. 

Now, some still object to this argument in three possible ways. The first is to argue that it is unsurprising that the universe is finely tuned for life, otherwise we would not be here to observe it. The second is to parody the argument by claiming that potholes must be finely tuned to contain puddles. The third is to attack the idea of probability being applied to a one-off event such as the beginning of our universe. 

Now, the first argument confuses the true claim 'it is unsurprising to observe that the universe is finely tuned, given that I am alive to observe it and would not be here to observe it were it not' with the false claim: 'it is unsurprising that the universe is finely tuned'. 

Secondly, it does nothing to resolve which of the three options explains the fine-tuning. The fine-tuning is due to either necessity, chance, or design. Simply claiming that it is an unsurprising observation does not obviate the need for explanation. So, clearly, this response will not do. 

The second argument attempts to parody the argument to create a reductio ad absurdum. However, the example given, that of a sentient puddle observing that the pothole it is in seems 'finely tuned' for it, is not like the example of the fine-tuning of the universe. The probability of rain filling an open pothole in the road is particularly high.

So, this second response will not do either. The third argument, I think, manages to be the most reasonable. It claims that it is meaningless to speak of the probability of the values of the constants of nature, etc., taking their values by chance because there is only one observable universe. We would need to observe multiple universes to observe the actual probability.

Whilst more understandable, this argument is nevertheless similarly misguided because it confuses two different types of probability. It confuses statistical probability with epistemic probability. We are not talking of statistical probability when discussing the fine-tuning of the universe, so this objection similarly falters. 

Given that two of the three options have been ruled out, and given that only these three options are available, it follows logically and inescapably that the explanation for the fine-tuning of the universe is therefore due to design. 

Now, Richard Dawkins famously complained: 'who made God?' He also argues that positing a super intelligence to explain improbable events increases the overall level of complexity and so is not a good explanation for that reason. 

For the first complaint, this is irrelevant. Whilst it is technically logically possible for the universe to have been created by something other than God, for all intents and purposes, it is simpler to posit God rather than posit some unknown entity that may or may not have begun to exist. However, if God made the universe, then this explanation melts away when one considers that God did not begin to exist. 

The second complaint makes more sense but is similarly misguided. For God, being spaceless and immaterial, is therefore not composed of any parts. As such, He is absolutely simple and thus does not add a great deal of complexity at all. Whereas the idea that there is potentially infinite world ensemble does raise the overall level of complexity, and massively so. 

Whilst there is a tendency to mistakenly believe that science either explains everything or will one day do so, the reality is that scientific explanations and personal explanations are only incompatible if naturalism is true. Thus, to argue that we need not appeal to intelligence to explain design because of successful scientific theories is to beg the question in favour of naturalism. 

Starting from a position of agnosticism, the proponent of science as the best means of knowing might argue that we should not needlessly suppose that such a super intelligence exists. However, if the evidence is such that the only remaining explanation is such an intelligence, we are clearly rationally justified in accepting the existence of such a being. 

The Cosmological Argument

Whilst there is no one single version of the Cosmological Argument, the general approach that remains consistent throughout them is that they are based on some aspect of the universe that is taken to imply the existence of a necessary, uncaused being responsible for the creation of the universe. There are three chief versions: the Leibnizian, the Thomist, and the Kalam. 

The Leibnizian argument stems from the work of 17th century philosopher and mathematician, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. This argument starts from the simple fact that the universe exists and then argues that the existence of the universe is explainable via an external cause. The reason for this, argues Leibniz, is because everything that exists has a reason or explanation for its existence. 

Since the universe exists, it must have an explanation for its existence. Of course, it does not follow immediately that this explanation must be God, or even in an external cause. Now, some atheists have challenged the principle of sufficient reason by claiming that there are things that are brute facts about the world or universe. According to them, there are contingent states of affairs that have no explanation. 

However, it seems obvious that this can't be so, otherwise the entire enterprise of the physical, hard sciences is invalidated. For science is predicated on there being explanations for physical, observable phenomenon. If things could exist without any explanation at all, then we would have no way of knowing what things explainable and what things are not. 

In addition to this, we can grant that there are things who explanation is currently unknown due to our own epistemic limitations. In fact, we can additionally grant that there are things we cannot know (again due to epistemic or some other kind of limitations). However, this is no way commits us to or even entails that things can exist with no explanation at all. 

Some have instead chosen to challenge the principle of sufficient reason by claiming that things can exist unexplained that are necessary, such as numbers, or logical truths. First, it is far from clear that things such as numbers actually exist. The debate regarding abstract objects is not settled by any means, after all. However, it should seem apparent that, granting that such things actually exist in their own right, that this does not invalidate the principle of sufficient reason.

Rather, instead what necessary things entail is that something can exist whose explanation is not rooted in an external cause. Now, whilst this might seem promising at first for the atheist who might want to argue that the universe has an explanation not rooted in an external cause, it quickly becomes apparent that this avenue is not open to them. 

The reason for this is because the universe is contingent and not metaphysically necessary. The reason things such as numbers and logical truths can potentially exist without an external cause is because their explanation is rooted in the necessity of their own nature. Therefore, it follows that, as a contingently existing thing, the universe has an explanation of its existence rooted in an external cause. 

The second version of the Cosmological Argument comes to us from 12th century scholastic philosopher and theologian, Thomas Aquinas. Now, Thomas Aquinas relied heavily on Aristotelian metaphysics and believed a number of things that are contested, but a version of his arguments can be made that are not based on such concerns. 

Now, one thing to take note of is that Aristotle believed that the universe was past eternal, and whilst Thomas Aquinas believed in the finitude of the past as a matter of faith, he believed that it could not be shown via argument and must be accepted on the basis of revelation alone. Yet both men made arguments that entailed that the universe had a first cause. 

The reason for this is because objects are incapable of change on their own; they need something external to themselves to impart change upon them. Imagine a train consisting of an actually infinite number of train cars. That train will not move if none of the infinite train cars are a train engine. An actually infinite set of concrete objects cannot move if none of its members are capable of initiating change or motion. 

The third version of the Cosmological Argument comes to us from the 12th century Persian philosopher, Al-Ghazali. This argument is rooted in the fact that, in reality, the universe really isn't past eternal at all and must have had a beginning a finite amount of time ago. It is rooted in the simple premise that everything that begins to exist has a cause. 

For the longest time, many philosophers and then scientists assumed that the universe was past eternal. However, aside from the philosophical work done by philosophers such as Al-Ghazali, et al., there now exists scientific confirmation of the premise that the universe began to exist. As such, this argument has enjoyed something of a renaissance during the 20th and 21st centuries. 

The two chief arguments that are purely metaphysical against the past being eternal are: the impossibility of an actual infinity existing, and the impossibility of reaching actual infinity via successive addition or counting. The two chief arguments based on modern scientific evidence are: the expansion of the universe, and the thermodynamic properties of the universe. 

First, it should be prudent to differentiate between something that is actually infinite and something that is only potentially infinite. A potential infinity is a growing, albeit finite collection that tends towards infinity as a limit but never gets there. Whereas an actual infinity is a collection whose number is greater than any natural number. 

It is not hard to imagine the series of events in time being potentially infinite. Starting from a point, we can keep counting and counting to infinity but never ever reach an infinitieth number. The problem comes when we are asked to imagine the past as having no beginning either. Imagine coming across a man who is just finishing a countdown.

Starting at -5, he reaches 0 and, upon noticing you, informs you he has just finished counting all of the negative numbers. However, how can this be? If it is impossible to reach an infinitieth number, then it is impossible to start from negative infinity and count your way down to zero. Moreover, since the events in time stand in causal relations, how is it that he is finishing his countdown now and not at some other time? 

Cantorian set theory is of no avail as that only concerns the existence of infinite sets as abstract, mathematical objects which do not stand in causal relations. So, even if we grant for the sake of argument that an actual infinity can exist in the abstract realm, it becomes apparent that this cannot be the case in the concrete world. 

As far as the second philosophical argument is concerned, since we cannot reach an infinitieth number, then any series formed by successive addition cannot reach actual infinity either. However, some point to Zeno's paradoxes to show that, actually, we routinely traverse the infinite all the time. For instance, before we can cross a certain distance, we must cross 1/2 of it, and, before that, 1/4, and so on ad infinitum. 

However, it should be noted that, in this example, we are presented with another case of a potential infinity. We can keep dividing a finite line as long as we like, but we will never reach an infinitieth division. Whereas the series of events in time is a concrete collection of definite and discreet parts that are equal in length. 

The only objection to such philosophical arguments that makes any sense is the claim that, if the past must be finite, then surely this means God is past finite as well, right? This is understandable, but this makes the mistake of assuming that everything that exists is temporal. Whilst we can envision an absolute beginning to time, it is possible that there existed timeless states of affairs in the absence of time. 

As such, we can envision God being timeless sans creation and entering into time at the point of creation. Could the universe or some part of it have existed timelessly? However, this does not seem to be possible. 

This is where the scientific arguments come into play. First, we know from observational data that the universe is expanding. However, any geodesic that has an average positive expansion must have a beginning. This was initially shown by Hawking and Penrose in their singularity theorems, although these were based on general relativity and so some critics argued that quantum gravity models could subvert the absolute beginning implied by such theorems. 

However, that window was firmly shut in 2003 when Alan Guth, Arvind Borde, and Alexander Vilenkin devised a theorem that applied to quantum gravity and even higher dimensional models as well. This has led a sort of retreat into highly speculative cosmological models that feature negative or zero average expansion that nevertheless possess features that require there to be a beginning of the universe in the finite past anyway. 

However, the one fact that no model has been able to controvert is the fact that the universe has not yet reached heat death. Because of entropy, the universe is slowly tending towards thermodynamic equilibrium, or 'heat death'. However, if the universe is past eternal, surely this would have already happened by now? 

Some therefore have retreated to some particularly bizarre objections to the Kalam cosmological argument. Some have argued that nothing, in fact, begins to exist. Whether because they are mereological nihilists who believe that only simple objects exist, or because they hold to a tenseless theory of time, they deny a premise that virtually nobody in their right mind would ever question.

Mereological nihilism denies that there are composite objects and instead maintains that only simple objects like particles exist. In such a view, only these exist and what we falsely believe are composite objects are simply arrangements of matter arranged in certain ways. 

Aside from begging the question in favour of naturalism, it maintains that what we refer to as our self does not exist. I'll be blunt; any view that entails one's own non-existence is not worthy of serious refutation. Moreover, it is worth pointing out that the standard Big Bang model does not describe the expansion of matter into already existing space but describes the expansion of space itself. 

Some have claimed that there are alleged counterexamples to the principle of causation, such as virtual particle-antiparticle pairs, or radioactive decays, but this is the result of equivocation. In the case of virtual particles, these are particle-antiparticle pairs that emerge from the quantum vacuum before quickly annihilating each other and turning back into energy. 

Virtual particles are therefore at every level an example of something coming from something. Whereas radioactive decays are an example of something being caused but in a manner that is currently impossible to predict. If things could just pop into being uncaused, then why does not everything and anything just appear? Why is it only particles and universes?

The better avenue of argument is to try and rely on the tenseless theory of time. On such a view, temporal becoming is not an objective feature of reality. Instead, past, present, and future all exist at the same time tenselessly in a four-dimensional spacetime block. On such a view, the universe just exists tenselessly. 

However, such a view is not particularly defensible. Now, critics allege that such a view is entailed by the special theory of relativity, but this is a half-truth at best. In reality, the four-dimensional view of spacetime is one particular metaphysical interpretation of special relativity, albeit one that enjoys a lot of support among scientists. 

Yet, the differing metaphysical interpretations of special relativity are equal from a purely evidential point of view. There are two other views to consider. Now, the first, which was Einstein's own original view, was that space is 3D but that there was no privileged reference frame. However, this led to a number of strange features that led to Einstein ultimately rejecting this view and accepting the 4D view.

The second view, however, that of Lorentz, was that there is a privileged reference frame, which resolved the problems that plagued Einstein's own view. Aside from this fact, Einstein later came to accept this Lorentzian view on the basis of his general theory of relativity. 

The main argument against a tenseless view and in support of the view that time really is tensed (and temporal becoming is thus an objective feature of reality) is that any illusion of temporal becoming requires there to be temporal becoming. Temporal becoming is simply an irreducible and indispensable feature of reality.

The logical conclusion of these three versions of the cosmological argument is that there exists an explanation of the universe that is an uncaused first cause that is timeless (at least, sans the universe), spaceless, immaterial, and enormously powerful. However, such a cause must also be personal. 

The reason for this is because the only things we know of that are immaterial and spaceless are either abstract objects or minds. However, since abstract objects do not stand in causal relations, this leaves the only possibility as that of a disembodied mind.