Monday, January 2, 2006

Christian Belief VI

For the final post in our series on Christian belief we'll consider the foundational event upon which all of Christendom is based, the Resurrection of Jesus from the dead. If Jesus had only performed miracles, affirmed His deity, and died a martyr's death on the cross, He would have been promptly forgotten by time within a generation or two after his death. He would have been regarded at best as a pious dreamer and at worst a fraud and charlatan.

The Resurrection, however, authenticates everything He said and did during His life. It stamps His ministry with the words, "this must be true." Paul writes that if Christ is not raised our faith is worthless and we're still in our sins (I Cor.15:16-19). In other words, Christianity rests on the fact of the physical, historical Resurrection. When Jesus was asked for a sign to confirm His teaching about Himself He enigmatically replied that if His body is destroyed in three days it will be raised back up.

Jesus' Resurrection has always been the firmest ground for Christian belief in a life after death. Because God raised Him, Paul writes, we can have a realistic hope, indeed an assurance, that He can and will do the same for us.

But, a miracle like this is awfully hard to accept in our modern world (See here for more on the topic of miracles and the modern mind). People just don't come back to life once they are dead. What's the evidence for believing that a resurrection is really what happened?

We should start by asserting that there is nothing impossible, either logically or physically, about such an event. A revivification would only be logically impossible if there were some sort of contradiction entailed by the proposition that a dead man came back to life, but there's nothing self-contradictory about this. It would only be physically impossible if naturalism is true, that is, if there is nothing to reality but matter and energy. Yet although many people believe that naturalism is true no one can know that it is. If God exists, If God is real, miracles are possible. Since it is certainly possible that God exists it is therefore physically possible that a dead man could have been brought back to life.

Yes, the skeptic replies, but it's highly unlikely, and we should parcel out our belief according to what our experience shows is most likely. Our experience shows that any natural explanation, no matter how implausible, is still more likely than that there was an irregularity in the laws of nature because those laws are uniform and unbreakable.

This of course, begs the question, as C.S. Lewis points out in his little work On Miracles. We can only know that the laws of nature are uniform if we know that there are never any irregularities, i.e. miracles, but we can only know that there are never any miracles if we already know that the laws of nature are uniform.

Again, if there is a personal God then miracles are indeed possible and we need to consider the plausibility of an alleged instance of one based upon the evidence. In the case of the Resurrection of Jesus, the evidence, as many Christian apologists have pointed out, starts with the fact that the thing that we can be most certain of is that the tomb was empty on the first Easter morning.

How can we be sure of that? Because all that the early opponents of Christianity had to do to stamp out the nascent "heresy" in their midst was produce the corpse of the man the Christians were saying had risen from the dead, but this they never did. Moreover, a significant number of the early disciples gave their lives for their belief that Jesus was alive. This is inexplicable given the fact that no sane person sacrifices his life for something he knows is a lie. Moreover, the earliest official accounts of what happened at the tomb claimed that the disciples stole the body, but why did the authorities spread that story if the corpse was not missing?

The question, then, is not whether the tomb was empty, but rather how did it get that way?

Several theories have been placed in circulation to offer an alternative to the Biblical proclamation that Jesus was radically transformed into something much different than He had been prior to His death. We'll consider just two of the most popular.

The first, as noted above, is that the followers of Christ stole the body, but this is totally implausible. These were men and women, peasants and fishermen, cowering in hiding, afraid that the authorities were going to come to arrest them. To think that they were able to sneak past the Roman soldiers guarding the tomb, roll away a heavy stone, and steal the body without drawing notice is difficult to believe. But even if this is what happened, why weren't the disciples arrested and questioned for breaking the law and stealing the body? Again, if this is what happened why were these same men willing to suffer torture, imprisonment, hardship, and even martyrdom to proclaim to people what they knew to be false, that Jesus was alive?

The second theory is that Jesus didn't really die but merely passed out and later revived in the tomb. This is even less plausible than the first hypothesis. Consider His condition. He had been without food, water, and medical care for over two days. He had been horribly scourged, nailed to a timber, his shoulder and elbow joints would have dislocated as he hung from the cross-beam, and he had been speared in the side so deeply that bodily fluids gushed from His abdominal cavity. Even so, we are asked to believe, He somehow only passed out on the cross and revived while in the tomb. Despite His weakened state, He managed to roll away the heavy stone at the entrance, sneak past the guards, and appear to His disciples in such triumphant glory that they were convinced He had actually been brought back to life by God.

If this is what happened, of course, the disciples would have soon realized that Jesus was in bad shape and had not been raised to any genuinely new life at all. Furthermore, Jesus would eventually have died and His followers would have known that. How then do we explain the willingness of these men and women to undergo torture and execution, all the while steadfastly refusing to renounce their conviction that Jesus had overcome death?

To be sure, the implausibility of these theories is not a proof that Jesus did, in fact, rise from the dead. There could have been some other explanation for the empty tomb that no one knows about. But what the difficulty in explaining the empty tomb does do is give credence to the testimony of the eye-witnesses, it shows that the person who is willing to give the scriptural narrative the benefit of the doubt is not taking an irrational position. For the person who believes that God exists, there is no compelling rational argument against the claim that the Resurrection actually occurred. Indeed, the only argument against it is the skeptic's certainty that miracles don't happen.

Something, however, did happen that morning in a remote corner of the world which forever transformed history. Whatever it was changed thousands of lives in the immediate aftermath and millions more thereafter. It must have been dramatic. The Gospels tell us that it was the astonishing sight of the risen Christ, and there is no reason, other than that we just don't want it to be true, not to believe that witness.

Samuel Alito's Confirmation

Terry Eastland explains why he thinks Samuel Alito is going to be confirmed to the Supreme Court despite the howls of protest likely to accompany his confirmation hearings.

By the way, those hearings commence on January 9th and will likely be replete with all manner of senatorial grandstanding and other buffoonery. We hope Senator Kennedy does better getting Judge Alito's name right than he did in his futile attempt a couple of months ago to get a handle on the name of Senator Obama, which at one point he had transformed into Osama Obama.

We're looking forward to the proceedings.

Tax Time

I recently received my last paycheck for the year. Often, I wonder where in the world my money is going as like most of us, it seems to go out faster than it comes in. Where, I ask myself, is my money going???!!!

Well, I think I have discovered at least part of the answer to my question. First I looked at the deductions portion on the pay stub. You know, the government grab known as Federal Withholding, FICA, MEDFICA, and State. Some folks also have County and City.

That accounted for a full 30% difference between what I earned and what I took home. 30% !!! Those dollars are gone and might as well have been thrown down a rat hole for all the benefit I will ever receive from them.

But that doesn't resolve my continual confusion about why it's so difficult to save. Then I began to consider this partial list of other taxes (including the ones mentioned above) that I must spend from my earnings that have already been taxed!!!...

  • Accountants Receivable Tax
  • Building Permit Tax
  • Capital Gains Tax ( a tax on your savings )
  • CDL License Tax
  • Cigarette Tax
  • Corporate Income Tax
  • Court Fines ( indirect taxes )
  • Dog License Tax
  • Federal Income Tax
  • Federal Unemployment Tax
  • Fishing License Tax
  • Food License Tax
  • Fuel Permit Tax
  • Gasoline Tax
  • Hunting License Tax
  • Inheritance Tax Interest expense ( tax on the money )
  • Inventory Tax IRS Interest Charges ( tax on top of tax )
  • IRS Penalties ( tax on top of tax )
  • Liquor Tax
  • Local Income Tax
  • Luxury Taxes
  • Marriage License Tax
  • Medicare Tax
  • Property Tax
  • Real Estate Tax
  • Septic Permit Tax
  • Service Charge Taxes
  • Social Security Tax
  • Road Usage Taxes ( Truckers )
  • Sales Taxes
  • Recreational Vehicle Tax
  • School Tax
  • State Income Tax
  • State Unemployment Tax
  • Telephone Federal Excise Tax
  • Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
  • Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Taxes
  • Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax
  • Telephone Recurring and Non-Recurring Charges Tax
  • Telephone State and Local Tax
  • Telephone Usage Charge Tax
  • Toll Bridge Taxes
  • Toll Tunnel Taxes
  • Traffic Fines ( indirect taxation )
  • Trailer Registration Tax
  • Vehicle License Registration Tax
  • Vehicle Sales Tax
  • Watercraft Registration Tax
  • Well Permit Tax
  • Workers Compensation Tax

None of these taxes existed 100 years go, and our nation was the most prosperous in the world, had absolutely no debt, had the largest middle class in the world and mom stayed home to raise the kids.

What happened? Simple. America has become a liberal, socialist, welfare state.

And there's another tax that is referred to as the "hidden" tax...the insidious tax of inflation.

From the link:

The inflation tax - collected in the form of a continually depreciating currency - has been especially egregious in the postwar period. What you could buy for $1 in 1946 you have to pay $8.77 for today. Another way to put it is that $1 then is worth 11 cents today. What happened to the 89 cents? It has been taxed away by the Federal Reserve's continuing expansion of the money supply. The Clinton inflation tax alone (1992 to the present) has sliced off 18 cents from the value of the dollar.

And another link:

It is an insidious system. It gives us more by actually giving us less. That means we seem to have more money, the nominal amount of the money in our pockets or in the bank is larger. The economy seems to humming along. Stock prices and earnings seem to grow by huge amounts over the long term. But it is a trick.[14] Our judgment has been distorted by the long-term effects of inflation and the destructive policies of the central bank.[15]

These devalued dollars actually can buy fewer things. And this cycle of spending and inflating will worsen unless there is a signal change among tens of millions of Americans who are disgusted, but feel compelled to vote for one of these two windjammers. They just want to go about their business, work harder and be left alone. This kind of person is the "forgotten man.[16]" He has increasingly been pushed into the background by special interests and those forever demanding more of the welfare state.

And this link:

Inflation spurs the growth of central governments. It allows these governments to grow larger than they could become in a free society. And it allows them to monopolize governmental functions to an extent that would not occur under a natural production of money. This comes at the expense of all forms of intermediate government, and of course at the expense of civil society at large. The inflation-sponsored centralization of power turns the average citizen more and more into an isolated social atom. All of his social bonds are controlled by the central state, which also provides most of the services that formerly were provided by other social entities such as family and local government. At the same time, the central direction of the state apparatus is removed from the daily life of its prot�g�s.

And again:

Fiat money is the means by which governments obtain instant purchasing power without taxation. But where does that purchasing power come from? Since fiat money has nothing of tangible value to offset it, government's fiat purchasing power can be obtained only by subtracting it from somewhere else. It is, in fact, "collected" from us all through a decline in our purchasing power. It is, therefore, exactly the same as a tax, but one that is hidden from view, silent in operation, and little understood by the taxpayer. [pg. 162]

America once enjoyed a stable dollar backed by gold deposits, a "gold standard" system. This system gradually was undermined throughout the last century, until President Nixon finally severed the last tenuous links between the dollar and gold in 1971. Since 1971, the Fed has employed a pure fiat money system, meaning government can create money whenever it decrees simply by printing more dollars. The "value" of each newly minted dollar is determined by the faith of the public, the total amount of dollars in circulation (the money supply), and the financial markets. In other words, fiat dollars have no intrinsic value.

What does all of this mean for you and your family? Since your dollars have no intrinsic value, they are subject to currency market fluctuations and ruinous government policies, especially Fed inflationary policies. Every time new dollars are printed and the money supply increases, your income and savings are worth less. Even as you save for retirement, the Fed is working against you. Inflation is nothing more than government counterfeiting by the Fed printing presses. Inflation acts as a hidden tax levied disproportionately on the poor and fixed-income retirees, who find the buying power of their limited dollars steadily diminished. The corporations, bankers, and wealthy Americans suffer far less from this inflation, because they can take advantage of the credit expansion that immediately precedes each new round of currency devaluation.

And from House Representative Ron Paul:

Yet while politicians favor central bank control of money, history and the laws of economics are on the side of gold. So even though central banks try to mask their inflationary policies and suppress the price of gold by surreptitiously selling it, the gold markets always cut through the smokescreen eventually. Rising gold prices like we see today historically signify trouble for paper currencies, and the dollar is no exception. Should the dollar continue to decline in value, America will find itself struggling to service our already massive debt load even as our foreign creditors become less interested in our dollars.

America once enjoyed a stable dollar backed by gold deposits, a "gold standard" system. This system gradually was undermined throughout the last century, until President Nixon finally severed the last tenuous links between the dollar and gold in 1971. Since 1971, the Fed has employed a pure fiat money system, meaning government can create money whenever it decrees simply by printing more dollars. The "value" of each newly minted dollar is determined by the faith of the public, the total amount of dollars in circulation (the money supply), and the financial markets. In other words, fiat dollars have no intrinsic value.

What does all of this mean for you and your family? Since your dollars have no intrinsic value, they are subject to currency market fluctuations and ruinous government policies, especially Fed inflationary policies. Every time new dollars are printed and the money supply increases, your income and savings are worth less. Even as you save for retirement, the Fed is working against you. Inflation is nothing more than government counterfeiting by the Fed printing presses. Inflation acts as a hidden tax levied disproportionately on the poor and fixed-income retirees, who find the buying power of their limited dollars steadily diminished. The corporations, bankers, and wealthy Americans suffer far less from this inflation, because they can take advantage of the credit expansion that immediately precedes each new round of currency devaluation.

Brilliant Austrian school of economics scholar Murray Rothbard asked a seemingly complex question in the title of his essay: "What has Government Done to our Money?" The answer turns out to be pretty simple: Government consistently debases our money. How and why it debases our money has everything to do with politics, and nothing to do with the laws of economics.

It's as though you have given your check book to the government, or more accurately, they simply have taken it.

WCS

New Year's Resolution

Our New Year's resolution at Viewpoint is to continue to bring our readers thoughtful and incisive commentary on the political, religious, and social issues of the day, especially where these interface with science and philosophy. If you look forward to, and enjoy, reading us even half as much as we enjoy writing for you we will consider our task here to be worthwhile.

We hope you'll continue to read us regularly throughout the year and that you'll link us frequently to your family and friends.