Postby formerly known as hf » Tue Aug 05, 2008 4:03 pm
Because it paints a one-sided view and biased analysis of the little data available. He doesn't even begin to engage with skeptics. Any good scientist is immediately skeptical about the claims made by him and others in his book, but all you read are passages by Christian Apologists who rely too much on reference to vague notions of spirituality and tradition.
The historicity of the bible - especially the New Testament - is challenged by a number of historians and theologians. Most are agreed that church organisations have variously re-written the Bible over its history, to varying degrees.
Any arguments for the kind of accuracy Strobel and others claim the New Testament has requires a position of faith. It requires that you think any re-writes had negligible effect upon some notions of a core, other-than-human-ness, 'spiritual' nature of the book, which requires that you believe God affected the re-writings, or 'His' word was so powerful to begin with that the re-writes can't have much of an affect.
Strobel's argument is a veery poor piece of journalism (and, unfortunately - the kind of journalism we've come to expect from tabloids and the right wing US press) in that it doesn't even begin to attempt an objective approach to the subject. It takes a position very early on, and then seeks out those who will agree. There is very, very limited conflict and disagreement in this book and Strobel's other work, as he limits his engagement with Christian Apologists (and, no doubt, because propoer scientists could smell the hack journo coming a mile off and kept themselves well clear).
I don't have too much of a problem with people who rabidly claim the accuracy of the Bible - well, actually, I do - but I have even more of a problem with people who make these claims, but cannot seem to understand or realise that such claims rely upon a belief, a stance of faith a prioiri. Faith doesn't emerge out of a certain understanding of the Bible, no one reaches a state of Christian belief from a rational approach to the Bible - Faith begets faith begets faith - so the arguments made for the (supernatural) accuracy of the Bible are arguments made from a stance of faith. And thus meaningless to those who are positioned outside of the incestuous cycle of faith and belief.