Richard Swinburne
[Please also see Kai-man Kwan’s response
from pp. 5-6 below.]
1)
Kinds
of evidence for a historical hypothesis:.
a)
posterior historical
evidence: the testimony of witnesses about and the
physical data caused by what happened at the time and place in question. In so far as the hypothesis is a simple one,
and the posterior historical evidence is such as you would expect to find if
the hypothesis at stake is true but not otherwise, that is evidence for the hypothesis.
b)
the crucial importance of simplicity:
always an infinite number of possible theories to explain the evidence. The theory that is most likely to be true is
the simplest one.
c)
general background evidence of how likely the hypothesis is to be true, independently of the
detailed historical evidence. Ex.:
supernova explosion.
d)
The general background evidence
may indicate that it is likely to be true only under certain conditions. Evidence showing that those conducive
conditions were or were not present: the prior historical evidence.
2)
A
historical hypothesis h is probable in so far as it is intrinsically a simple
hypothesis and (1) the posterior historical evidence e3 is such as
probably would occur if h is true, but not otherwise, (2) the general background
evidence k makes it probable that h is to be expected under certain conditions
and not otherwise, (3) the prior historical evidence (e1 and e2)
are such as probably would occur if these conditions are satisfied, but not
otherwise. The stronger are (2) and (3), the less we need by way of (1).
3)
When we are dealing with a
hypothesis H which would be not too improbable on one world-view T but would be
immensely improbable on a rival world-view, to the extent to which the general
background evidence supports most strongly the world-view T which makes H not
too improbable, we need less by way of detailed historical evidence in order
for the claim that H is true, to be probable overall.
4)
The Resurrection: if there is
no God, it is a clear violation of laws of nature and so impossible. But if
there is a God, he has the power to set them aside. Hence, if Jesus rose from the dead, God
raised him up. But he will only do so in
so far as he has reason to do so.
5)
So to determine whether Jesus
rose from the dead, we need to investigate:
a)
the posterior historical
evidence (what St. Paul
b)
whether general background
evidence supports the world-view that there is a God of a kind able and likely
to intervene in human history in this kind of way in this kind of situation.
c)
the prior historical evidence -
whether the nature and circumstances of the life of Jesus were such that if
there is a God, he would be likely to raise this person from the
dead. In so far as our general
background and prior historical evidence supports the view that there is a God
who would be likely to raise Jesus from the dead, we shall need a lot less by
way of detailed historical evidence for the Resurrection.
6)
But suppose the natural
theologian is right that there is substantial positive evidence for the
existence of such a God. In that case
clearly he could, if he so chose, raise Jesus from the dead. Hence, to the extent to which, in virtue of
his goodness, he has reason to do so, it is probable that he will.
7)
In virtue of God’s goodness, he
had reason to become incarnate and live a certain sort of life, and that if he
does, God has reason to raise him from the dead.
a)
to make atonement for human
sins. Various theories like vicarious
punishment, compensation/satisfaction theory, and the sacrifice view. God has no right to send anyone else to do
such a formidable task (whatever its exact nature) on his behalf. A good God might choose to become incarnate
in such a way that he would be killed for leading a holy life. Then the Resurrection would constitute God’s
demonstration of his acceptance of that life as proper compensation, sacrifice
or whatever, his signature on that life.
b)
God made humans subject to pain
and suffering to serve greater goods. We humans sometimes rightly subject our
own children to suffering for the sake of some greater good. Under these circumstances we judge it a good
thing to manifest solidarity with our children by putting ourselves in somewhat
the same situation. A perfectly good God
would judge it a good thing to share our suffering by becoming incarnate. In that case his Resurrection would show us
that God has identified with our suffering.
c)
we need better information
about how to lead good lives. Moreover, moral information needs to be filled
out by moral example - we need to be shown what a perfect life consists
in. It would be good for us to have
encouraging information, and extra help in leading the moral life - a community
of encouragement, for example. Again,
God raising someone killed for certain teaching and living a certain life
constitutes his signature on that teaching.
8)
So, if God did become incarnate
in a prophet, he would need to live a certain sort of life: a good life in
difficult circumstances, perhaps ending in a judicial execution; showing us
that he believes himself to be God; giving us deep moral teaching; founding a
Church to make all this available to other generations and cultures. So we have prior reason for expecting a
resurrection of a human if he had led a life of the above kind.
9)
New Testament scholarship: the
evidence is such as we would expect if Jesus led a good and holy life, gave us
good and deep moral teaching, and founded a Church, which did teach that he was
God Incarnate who atoned for our sins. New Testament scholarship is divided
about whether Jesus proclaimed that his life and death was an atonement for
sin, and whether Jesus taught his divinity.
My own view for which I have argued in my book is that the prior
historical evidence is such as is to be expected with modest probability if
Jesus taught both his atonement and his divinity.
10) The stronger is the prior historical evidence that the life and
teaching of Jesus was of a certain kind, the more reason we have for expecting
a God to raise him from the dead. Only in the light of the general background
evidence and the prior historical evidence can we approach the posterior
historical evidence.
11) One further piece of evidence: Jesus led the life he did, when there
is no other known serious claimant for satisfying either the prior or posterior
requirements for being an incarnate God, in any way as well as Jesus. By the prior requirements I mean living a
good and holy life, giving us good deep moral teaching, showing us that he
believed himself to be God Incarnate and that he was making atonement for our
sins and founding a Church which taught the latter things. By the posterior requirements I mean his life
being culminated by a super-miracle, such as Resurrection.
12) The non-existence of any other plausible candidate for satisfying either
the prior or the posterior requirements shows that the coincidence
of the prior and posterior evidence in one candidate is extremely unlikely -
unless God brought it about. But if God did not become incarnate for the stated
reasons in Jesus but became incarnate in some other prophet or plans to do so
in future, it would be deceptive of him to bring about the existence of the
kind of evidence of his incarnation in Jesus together with the kind of
posterior historical evidence of his Resurrection. If God planned the
coincidence in Jesus of the two kinds of evidence, then Jesus was God
Incarnate; and it is very improbable that there would be this coincidence
unless God planned it.
13) So if there is a modest amount of evidence of natural theology that
there is a God who might with modest probability be expected to become
incarnate for the stated reasons and to have his life culminated by a super
miracle such as the Resurrection, and there is only one plausible candidate
(Jesus) for such an incarnation, you don’t need too much posterior historical
evidence to make it probable that Jesus rose.
An analogy - if the background evidence gives a significant probability,
say _, that John would do the crime; and so _ that he wouldn’t; and the clues
are on the whole not such as you would expect if he did the crime (although
there’s significant probability that they might occur), but are such that it is
very improbable indeed that you would find them if he did not do the crime,
then they make it probable that he committed the crime.
The Argument in Bayesian Form
Let h be the hypothesis that Jesus
rose from the dead, k be the background evidence of natural theology, and e3
be the posterior historical evidence (the testimony of witnesses to what
happened after the crucifixion). Let e1 be the detailed historical
evidence about the life of Jesus, and e2 be the evidence that the
one human about whom there is either a modest amount of e1 type
evidence or a modest amount of e3 type evidence is the one human in
whom these kinds of evidence are combined.
Bayes’s
Theorem: P(h½e&k) = P(e½h & k) P (h½k)
P(e½k)
e = (e1 & e2 &
e3)
Let t = theism, c = God becomes incarnate for
reasons of the kind which I discuss. Suppose P (t½k) = 1/2, and P(c½t & k) = 1/2, then P(c½k) = 1/4
Let f1
= the evidence (as strong as it is with reference to Jesus) that the prior
requirements for being God incarnate (living a holy life etc. etc.) are
satisfied in one prophet.
f3
= the evidence (as strong as it is with respect to Jesus) that the posterior
requirements (a super-miracle culminating his life) are satisfied in the same
prophet.
f2
= the evidence that neither of these requirements is satisfied to any similar
degree in any other prophet.
f = (f1
& f2 & f3).
Suppose
P(f½ c&k) = 1/10. Then P(f½c&k) P(c½k) = 1/40.
P(~c½k) = 1 - P (c½k) = 3/4. Suppose P(f½~c & k) = 1/1000. P(f½ ~ c&k) P(~c½k)=3/4000.
By the calculus, P(f½k) = P(f½c&k) P(c½k) + P(f½ ~ c&k) P(~c½k)
=
1/40 + 3/4000 = 103/4000
Then by Bayes’s theorem, substituting
f for e and c for h
P( c½f&k) = P(f½c&k) P(c½k) = 1/40
= 100 = 0.97.
P(f/k) 103/4000 103
If we add to f, the evidence that
the prophet is Jesus, and that the evidence that the prior and posterior requirements
are satisfied concerns Jesus, that will not make any difference to the support
given by (f&k) to c. So: P(c ½ e & k) = 0.97
Since an
incarnation needs to be culminated by a super-miracle like the Resurrection and
since it would be deceptive of God to bring it about, given the prior
historical evidence, unless he was incarnate in Jesus:
Given (e
& k), h is true if and only if c is true. So: P(h½e & k) = 0.97
Articles and
Books by Richard Swinburne
1968. "The Argument from Design." Philosophy
43(1968): 199-212.
1971. The
Concept of Miracle. London
1977. The
Coherence of Theism. Oxford
1979.
The Existence of
God. Oxford
1981. Faith and Reason. Oxford
1983. "Mackie, Induction and God." Religious
Studies 19(1983): 385-391.
1989. Responsibility
and Atonement. Oxford
1991. Revelation. Oxford
1994. The
Christian God. Oxford
1996. Is
There a God? Oxford University
1998.
Providence Oxford
2003. The Resurrection of God Incarnate. Oxford
Response to Prof. Richard Swinburne on The Probability of the
Resurrection
Kwan
Kai Man, Hong Kong
Baptist University
1)
I
think Swinburne has produced an original and ingenious argument for the
Resurrection of God Incarnate which has made enormous improvement over previous
versions, especially those offered by the evangelical apologists, e.g., Josh
McDowell. Since I basically agree with his arguments, this response mainly
constitutes of my appreciation of the merits of Swinburne’s case for the
Resurrection.
2)
First,
let me delineate the approach of traditional apologetics on the matter of
Resurrection. Usually, the apologist will draw the attention of the readers to
historical data like empty tomb and resurrection appearances on the basis of
the New Testament records. Then he would argue that naturalistic accounts like
the swoon theory and hallucination theory cannot explain all the data. Then he
concludes that the only acceptable explanation is the truth of the
Resurrection. So Christianity is vindicated.
3)
Now
let me explain why I think this argument is not entirely satisfactory (while
not denigrating its value).
a)
It
usually adopts a rather pre-critical approach to the New Testament data. While
I do not agree with the approach of the radical biblical critics, I think we
need to recognize the fact that they are influential in some circles and their
queries need to be addressed, e.g., the inconsistency of the accounts of the
resurrection appearances. Some evangelical apologists sometimes give others the
impression that they are not aware of these problems.
b)
When
I was studying in the University, a fellow Christian who was doing a Master
degree in Mathematics once told me his dissatisfaction about the conventional
argument for the Resurrection. He felt that it was unfair to treat the
hypothesis of the Resurrection on the same par with the alternative
naturalistic accounts. The failure of the latter does not automatically
vindicate the former, especially because it invokes a miraculous act of God. As
I thought over the problem, I also became uneasy about the traditional
approach. I think it is not philosophically sophisticated enough because it
neglects the influence of worldview presuppositions on the assessment of
evidence. In fact the naturalist may just insist that it was some inexplicable
and unpredictable natural event (like a sudden outburst of energy or the action
of ETs) which caused Jesus’ body to evaporate into thin air.
c)
The
traditional apologists seem to equate the Resurrection with the resuscitation
of a corpse. Is it really identical to the glorious resurrection depicted in
the New Testament which is pregnant with meaning? Jesus’ corpse has been
resuscitated- so what? At least one Jewish scholar accepts this fact but still
refuses to accept the Christian faith.
4)
On
the other hand, I am also dissatisfied with the faith-alone approach to the
Resurrection which eschews discussion of the historical facts. It introduces a
dichotomy between the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith. I still feel
that the traditional argument has some force, and it is important to Christians
who want to uphold a particularist position amidst religious plurality.
5)
It
seems to me Swinburne has successfully avoided the above problems:
a)
He
adopts an in general conservative approach to the New Testament which is
post-critical rather than pre-critical. It follows from his basic principles of
credulity and testimony, and his understanding of the critical scholarship.
While he rejects radical scepticism towards the New Testament, he is ready to
engage with the queries raised by the more reasonable critics. For example, he
has faced the alleged inconsistency of the resurrection appearance accounts,
and offered a plausible reconstruction of the events which largely reconciles
the apparent discrepancies (Swinburne 2003, 157). (Wenham has done a similar
thing.)
b)
He
clearly distinguishes different kinds of evidence for a historical hypothesis,
and recognizes the importance of background evidence. However, he argues that
the posterior and prior historical evidence together with a modestly successful
natural theology can still render the Resurrection quite probable. He provides
arguments for each of his claims, and presents the structure of the reasoning
in a Bayesian form. While the critics will certainly dispute many of his
claims, I think it is a great achievement to clarify the proper model of reasoning
which takes into account various kinds of evidence in this complicated subject
matter.
c)
By
delineating the reasons for incarnation and the appropriateness of the
Resurrection as a kind of divine signature, Swinburne has connected the fact of
Resurrection with incarnation, atonement, God’s identification with our
suffering, God’s moral revelation, and so on. It shows the coherence of the
Christian worldview, and the significance of the Resurrection. The Jesus of
history and the Christ of faith cannot be divorced after all.
6)
Plantinga
has argued that Swinburne’s probabilistic natural theology faces the problem of
the dwindling of probability. If it is only probable that God exists, and also
only probable that given that God exists, He will become incarnate, and so on,
then the resulting probability that the basic Christian doctrines are all true
will become smaller and smaller. Swinburne has made a powerful reply to this
criticism by the construction of the above argument (Swinburne 2003, 215 fn.
4). He shows that further empirical evidence can also raise the probability. In
fact, he only gives a value of 1/2 to the probability of God’s existence here.
However, after introducing the totality of evidence about Jesus, the
probability of the resurrection of God Incarnate becomes 0.97. We may dispute
the estimation of various probabilities but I think Swinburne has demonstrated
the mutual support between natural theology and historical evidence in
Christian apologetics. His cumulative argument for the existence of God
provides background evidence for the Resurrection, and in turn the historical
evidence reinforces the cumulative case.
References
Anderson, Norman Leicester :
InterVarsity Press.
McDowell, Josh. 1979. Evidence that Demands a Verdict: Historical
Evidences for the Christian Faith. Revised edition. San Bernardino , CA
Morrison, Frank. 1958. Who Moved the Stone? London
Swinburne, Richard. 2003. The Resurrection of God Incarnate. Oxford
Wenham, John. 1984. Easter
Enigma. Exeter
