Telling Fact from Fiction: A Test

[Jagella]

As many of you may be aware, real-Jesus apologists base their entire case for a historical Jesus on written stories. Scholars like Bart Ehrman, who says that a historical Jesus "almost certainly existed," is "almost certain" Jesus existed because he says he and his fellow Bible scholars can "tease out" fact from fiction in these stories using rigorous historical methods. Needless to say, many of the real-Jesus apologists in this forum agree that the stories of Jesus are, as one member here has said, "overwhelming" evidence that Jesus existed. Of course, not all of us are overwhelmed by these stories as evidence for a historical Jesus, and we appear to be at an impasse neither side proving their case.

So I have an idea: to see if people really can tell fact from fiction by reading and studying stories, I've decided to post four stories here. Please read and study these stories, and then tell me which are true stories with real people and which are fictional stories with made-up people:

• 1. Rick left Edinboro, Pennsylvania to return to his hometown of Pittsburgh. He earned a degree at a college in the Pittsburgh area and found work there.
  
  2. Clyde got bored on his family's horse farm in Kentucky and moved to Nashville to play guitar in a country-western band.
  
  3. Sandy met and married Josh, and the two of them started a successful tattoo parlor in Los Angeles.
  
  4. Joe became very ill when he came down with a case of pneumonia. He spent two months in a nursing home and was hospitalized twice.

Remember that the case for a historical Jesus stands or falls on the stories of Jesus being stories of a real person.

Question for Debate: Can you read and study these stories and use logic to tell if the persons in these stories are real or fictional?

[Goat]

[Replying to post 48 by William]

The question as to whether they are true - or for that matter, not true - cannot be answered. There is no requirement though, to believe those stories on faith.

How do you know there is no requirement to believe these stories on faith? What if there is some sort of powerful being who (like the Christians assert their God did with the Bible authors) manipulated Jagella in some way to write these stories and those of us who don't believe them will have a very bad day after we die?
The only difference between this scenario and the Christian claim is that no-one has actually made it. But beyond that...? For all you know, you could die tomorrow and God will wag his finger at you, telling you you were a naughty sinner for not believing what the great Prophet Jagella told you.
If anyone replies back saying that Jagella can't be a prophet, he hasn't said...well...God works in mysterious ways!

You would have to take the acquirement that these stories have to be taken on faith by faith, and that's sort of circular. Considering how many con men made their money by having people take stories on faith without backup , that claim to me is a strong indication that the tale is false.

[William]

[Replying to post 50 by rikuoamero]

How do you know there is no requirement to believe these stories on faith?

The OP does not stipulate so, is how I know.

[historia]

You're getting the point of the OP: stories don't prove much because in most cases you can't check them out. The stories of Jesus, which make up all the evidence we have, cannot be checked for truth.

This is why historians rarely, if ever, talk about "proving" what happened in the past.

The vast majority of historical figures, especially from the ancient world, are only known to us from later historical accounts (or "stories" as you've termed them). We cannot re-produce the past, and so can never have certain knowledge about who these people were or what "actually" happened.

And nobody is claiming we can. Rather, the claim that historians are making with regard to Jesus of Nazareth is that the hypothesis that he was an actual historical figure best explains all the available evidence, while competing hypotheses are considerably weaker in explanatory scope and power, and require more ad hoc assumptions.

Until we address the issue on those terms, I'm afraid we're just discussing epistemology rather than history.

[Jagella]

... the claim that historians are making with regard to Jesus of Nazareth is that the hypothesis that he was an actual historical figure best explains all the available evidence, while competing hypotheses are considerably weaker in explanatory scope and power, and require more ad hoc assumptions.

I don't agree that his historicity best explains the stories about him. So we're even: some people think the stories about him indicate he was a real person, and I think that we simply cannot tell.

You are more than welcome to apply any methodology that you know historians use to determine historicity to the stories in the OP to see which of those stories are actual historical people and events and which are fiction. So far nobody here has been able to pass the test.

[peterk]

Well this is interesting, and maybe someone will make it into a new thread! Let me offer a reply in three parts.

Part 1: The apology

[Replying to post 27 by peterk]

Just to correct you, upon having re-read all of Jagella's posts on this thread, the closest he has said
Yet at least some of them are not true stories! (Post 18)

You are entirely correct. I misread the details of the thread, and I apologise. I guess I assumed from the four sentences that 2 plus 2 was the split.

Part 2: The answer
Let me repeat what I tried to say in my last post, but perhaps not clearly enough. I did not intend to hide from the challenge, and my answer is simple: I have no idea whether any of the OP sentences are true or false. (I'm aware that Jagella has since suggested which sentences are true or not; I'll come back to that below.)

Now for those reading this thread who are satisfied that the analogy is solid, and the OP is an accurate reflection of what we face in the Jesus story, you can stop here, and I would agree with Jagella that his case is established. But if you're interested in my opinion of the analogy, on to Part 3...

Part 3: The analogy
For simplicity I have created two examples, one from the OP and one from the Jesus story.

Please read and study these stories, and then tell me which are true stories with real people and which are fictional stories with made-up people:
Rick left Edinboro, Pennsylvania to return to his hometown of Pittsburgh. He earned a degree at a college in the Pittsburgh area and found work there.

"I decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught." [from Luke 1]
At the beginning of his public ministry, Jesus was baptised by John the Baptist.

The way I read the OP, Jagella has set up an analogy based on the stories, as marked in red. If that was all we had, we would be in trouble. But it's not all we have. we also have the testimony of the author. In Jagella's case, he has chosen to hide his knowledge of the factualness of his sentence. In Luke's case he has come out at the beginning of his narrative saying that the story is true. The decisions that we make about history are based not on the story alone, but the combined weight of story plus testimony.

Does that mean that we have to treat Luke's gospel as true, just because he says so? Of course not. We all have to weigh up his story and his testimony and reach our own conclusions. And I accept that different people will reach different conclusions on this issue.

But my point here is that we have to take into account the testimony as well as the story. For me, Jagella's OP illustrates that perfectly. If we limit ourselves to the storyline alone, and have to work out truth for ourselves based on no personal connection to the story, the result is that we end up knowing nothing about anything. For example, every day my wife and I have conversations about what we've been doing when we're apart at work or wherever. My knowledge of those activities depends 100 percent on trusting her fair telling of events that she knows about and I don't. All of history is like this. (Which by the way is why I'm uncomfortable about the 'proof' label applied to this discussion. Proof feels like a science word. History is not the same as science. We can't repeat history like an experiment. But that doesn't mean we learn nothing about history. We just need to use the right tools, including historical testimony.)

To finish, let me respond to some of rikuamero's detailed comments.

Theoretically you could be lying about the whole matter.
Just like how the NT writers could be lying about the whole matter. We can't exactly toss this away as a potentially viable explanation.

I agree totally. For any testimony, lying is one possibility. Given the significance of the Jesus story if it is true, you should definitely ask that question of the NT authors. And if you come to a different conclusion to me, we can discuss or agree to differ.

But I think there are sensible reasons for believing you [ie, jagella]. The most obvious being that it is in your interests to set up an example which has that true/false balance.
If I were him, I would have given four completely false stories, and not revealed this. But you and I don't know if he did do this.

Again true. My assessment was that it would be in his interests to have a mixture of true/false. Yours is that he might have weighted the stories by making them all false. We each have to make our judgment. That might be based on what previous posts tell us about his character, and what motivations we might expect from him given the focus of this current discussion. Or we may simply trust him until and unless something happens to make us question that trust. Usually that is the practical and reasonable approach we take.

I weigh your testimony and for better or worse I consider it to be true.
So which of his four stories are true, and how do you know?

I've covered that above. At the point I wrote this, I accepted his testimony, which was that he chose not to reveal which ones were true.

In the same way I have weighed the testimony of the New Testament material and for better or worse I consider it to be true.
Do you use the same methodology for both groups of stories?

I believe so. I base my approach on a combination of story plus testimony. If you want to explore further, you know where to contact me!

[Jagella]

I guess I assumed from the four sentences that 2 plus 2 was the split.

You assume correctly. The "split" is two true stories and two fables.

...I would agree with Jagella that his case is established.

It's important to understand that my "case" is simply that it is often impossible to tell true stories from false stories. Please be careful not to take my test beyond that. I have posted that it may be possible to tell truth from fiction if you have some source of information aside from the story that can tell you if that story is accurate. In story 1, for example, you may have known Rick and know that he did live in Edinboro and moved back to Pittsburgh to find work. In that case you know the story is true.

And that principle is exactly why the stories about Jesus may or may not be true. We don't know if those stories are true or false because we have no other source(s) of knowledge about him that we know to be accurate that we could use as fact-checks.

In Jagella's case, he has chosen to hide his knowledge of the factualness of his sentence. In Luke's case he has come out at the beginning of his narrative saying that the story is true. The decisions that we make about history are based not on the story alone, but the combined weight of story plus testimony.

No problem! I testify that the stories in the OP are true. Does this testimony of mine make those stories more likely to be true? I could easily testify to stories that are made up, and I just did. So adding testimony to the mix doesn't help at all in determining the truth of a story.

History is not the same as science. We can't repeat history like an experiment. But that doesn't mean we learn nothing about history. We just need to use the right tools, including historical testimony.)

I just demonstrated that I can personally testify to false stories.

In conclusion, I should point out that Bible scholarship and historical studies are not useless in trying to get at the truth of the gospel stories. It sure beats making no effort at all to discover what the truth is. I just think that Bible scholars should make sure they don't mislead the public by making it appear that we know Jesus lived and that the evidence for him is "virtually certain." Scholars need to let people know that scholars are making educated guesses when it comes to the existence of Jesus.

[rikuoamero]

[Replying to post 55 by peterk]

You are entirely correct. I misread the details of the thread, and I apologise. I guess I assumed from the four sentences that 2 plus 2 was the split.

No biggies. Apology accepted.

I did not intend to hide from the challenge, and my answer is simple: I have no idea whether any of the OP sentences are true or false.

Ok cool. Same here - I haven't got the foggiest idea which is which.

But it's not all we have. we also have the testimony of the author.

The testimony of the author doesn't really add much, if anything, to the credibility, the plausibility of a story. Jagella could have said to us (given his testimony) that all of his stories are true, that all of his stories are false, or a mixture, but that does not in and of itself actually convey to us the objective truth about the stories.
Jagella has said (since my initial response to you) that the stories are 2 True and 2 False, but so what about that? He could be lying about that part, and you & I would not know. All the stories could be true, or all false, or three true or three false...

The decisions that we make about history are based not on the story alone, but the combined weight of story plus testimony.

I don't believe Luke even with the testimony, and I don't believe Jagella even with his testimony. As of the time of my writing this response to you, I don't know or believe anything about Jagella's stories. I don't know if any of his stories are true, despite what he's since said.
Do you know? Do you believe Jagella when he says 2T+2F? If so, why?
I've done similar things in the past on the forum (unfortunately, I no longer have the links to those threads). I have memories of giving a few details about myself, but putting something false in. No-one was ever able to figure out which was which, just like here with Jagella's stories.

Does that mean that we have to treat Luke's gospel as true, just because he says so? Of course not.

Okay, so shouldn't the testimony be discarded then, after saying this? So what if the author of Luke said that Theophilus was to 'know the certainty of the things he was taught'?

If we limit ourselves to the storyline alone, and have to work out truth for ourselves based on no personal connection to the story, the result is that we end up knowing nothing about anything.

Okay, so which story is true? You presumably have no connection to any of the characters or locations in Jag's stories (I don't, although I do know a person named Joe who for all I know did get pneumonia at one point and had to convalesce).

My knowledge of those activities depends 100 percent on trusting her fair telling of events that she knows about and I don't. All of history is like this.

But you don't know anyone from 2,000 years ago (at least, I assume you don't!). I certainly don't. This analogy makes no sense, because on the one hand, you're talking about your wife, a living, breathing person who exists in the here and now and who presumably has a vested interest in telling you the truth and not deceptions (and she still could by the way, there is always a possibility of infidelity)...versus people dead and buried from thousands of years ago. Do you have the same level of emotional investment in them as you do your wife?
In fact...just to go back to your wife, and I apologise if this comes across as an insult or a slight...but am I to trust her? What if she has dementia or is going senile or has some other mental issues? Then she could be 100% honest when she tells you about her day, and yet still be wrong, mistaken.
What about the following hypothetical scenario? - She tells you, inside the house, how her day went, and then walks outside the house, where I am (and could not hear the earlier conversation) and she tells me how her day went? Am I supposed to believe her when she says that?
For all we know, the author of Gospel Luke hated this Theophilus person and lied to him! Maybe the author of Luke wanted to fool Theophilus? Do we know for a fact that Theo and Luke were on good terms? If you (general you) want to suggest to me that Luke is a credible trustworthy author, how do you know that? You can't use the gospel he wrote because then that would be circular reasoning.

I agree totally. For any testimony, lying is one possibility. Given the significance of the Jesus story if it is true, you should definitely ask that question of the NT authors. And if you come to a different conclusion to me, we can discuss or agree to differ.

Ok, no argument here. So let's move along...

Yours is that he might have weighted the stories by making them all false. We each have to make our judgment. That might be based on what previous posts tell us about his character, and what motivations we might expect from him given the focus of this current discussion. Or we may simply trust him until and unless something happens to make us question that trust.

OK, here's a question to you.
Can we do what you said just now, with the NT authors? Apart from the NT texts, what information do we have about the character, the trustworthiness, the credibility, of the people who would come to write the NT texts?
I have pointed out in the past that even the NT tells us that these people are not exactly of sterling quality. Peter lies for example, denying Jesus three times, when he would have had no motivation to do so (other than to show Jesus cannot be wrong when he predicts the future, which screams to me that this little incident is nothing more than a literary device) (as an aside, there is actually only one motivation I can literally think of for why Peter would have done this, which I will discuss in a separate thread, check C&A for it).
Outside of the NT, what do we know of the authors of the NT to suggest to us that these people do tell the truth, or don't exaggerate or don't make mistakes etc?
You and I may trust Jagella because you and I have interacted with him and have formed somewhat of an emotional bond, but at the end of the day - what do you and I know about Jag? He's just a forum-member who communicates using text, just like I do. I know nothing about him other than that he's most likely from the US. I can't remember if he's divulged anything about himself.

I've covered that above. At the point I wrote this, I accepted his testimony, which was that he chose not to reveal which ones were true.

Ok...? I'm a little confused, so if you can do it again please, I'd appreciate it. Which of his stories are true, or to word it slightly differently, which of his stories do you think are true or most likely to be true? What makes you think Jag saying it's 2T+2F is itself true?

I believe so. I base my approach on a combination of story plus testimony. If you want to explore further, you know where to contact me!

I have to disagree with this, although I am not going to accuse you of a willing deception.
Instead, I think you are simply mistaken and have not actually thought it all the way through.
As I indicated up above when you mentioned your wife, why did you bring her up as an analogy, if not to imply that you have some sort of emotional bond or trust with the NT authors, like you do with your wife when she tells you how her day went?
This obviously cannot be true (you having trust in the NT authors) so this was something that just didn't 'click' with you.

[StuartJ]

You're getting the point of the OP: stories don't prove much because in most cases you can't check them out. The stories of Jesus, which make up all the evidence we have, cannot be checked for truth.

This is why historians rarely, if ever, talk about "proving" what happened in the past.

The vast majority of historical figures, especially from the ancient world, are only known to us from later historical accounts (or "stories" as you've termed them). We cannot re-produce the past, and so can never have certain knowledge about who these people were or what "actually" happened.

And nobody is claiming we can. Rather, the claim that historians are making with regard to Jesus of Nazareth is that the hypothesis that he was an actual historical figure best explains all the available evidence, while competing hypotheses are considerably weaker in explanatory scope and power, and require more ad hoc assumptions.

Until we address the issue on those terms, I'm afraid we're just discussing epistemology rather than history.

People are staking their immortal souls on an hypothesis ...?!

And the hypothesis is only for a HUMAN Jesus ...

There is less than an hypothesis for a DIVINE Jesus ...!

Feet of clay on which to build a glittering religion of truth, Mr. Historia, feet of clay ....

[Jagella]

People are staking their immortal souls on an hypothesis ...?!

And the hypothesis is only for a HUMAN Jesus ...

As I'm sure you're aware, many apologists are adopting a strategy of "speaking our language." That is, they want to come across as scientists and historians who are using the methodology of science and history to demonstrate that Jesus, the god of Christianity, existed just like Abraham Lincoln existed. The downside of such a strategy is that they must strip Jesus of his deity and his magic--at least for the purposes of formulating a hypothesis. But it's still the old con-game dressed up as science and history.

[historia]

...the claim that historians are making with regard to Jesus of Nazareth is that the hypothesis that he was an actual historical figure best explains all the available evidence, while competing hypotheses are considerably weaker in explanatory scope and power, and require more ad hoc assumptions.

I don't agree that his historicity best explains the stories about him.

Yeah, I know.

So we're even: some people think the stories about him indicate he was a real person, and I think that we simply cannot tell.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. The mere fact that you hold a contravening opinion does not entail the conclusion that our positions are "even."

You are more than welcome to apply any methodology that you know historians use to determine historicity to the stories in the OP to see which of those stories are actual historical people and events and which are fiction. So far nobody here has been able to pass the test.

There's not enough information in the OP to establish any conclusions regarding these accounts one way or the other.

With additional information, however, we could make a more informed decision.

Let's assume, for example, that we know the name of the band that Clyde played in. In fact, the band still exists today, and has several early albums where Clyde is named as the principle founder of the group. Documents from rival blue-grass and hard-rock bands from around this time also mention that Clyde founded this particular band. Let's even assume that we have correspondence from a later member of the band who played with Clyde's brother, who took over the band after Clyde left the group.

With that additional information, I think we could conclude that the story about Clyde is likely true, not just because we have multiple accounts all confirming Clyde played in this band, but the idea that the band just invested a mythical Clyde is highly unlikely.