Why Faith Fails The Christian Delusion

by John W. Loftus

a social prophet, that does not exclude his having been an apocalyptic

  prophet. Others have been both. The reason is obvious: as eschatological

  expectation and instruction cannot cover all of life, no successful

  apocalyptic prophet can afford to be a monomaniac. So using a criterion of

  consistency to delete apocalyptic elements from Jesus' speech because they

  contradict the sapiential elements is no more plausible than arguing that

  people who pray for God to heal them cannot go to the doctor, or that those

  who teach that Jesus will come again cannot insist that even now he lives in

  their hearts.34

  In fact, since the eschatological kingdom was expected soon and since

  entrance into it demanded repentance, as John the Baptist and Jesus both

  preached, then we would expectJesus to be a social reformer who both did and

  preached social justice, just like the prophets of old (Micah 6:8). Doing so was

  required of someone who desired to be part of the new, coming, eschatological

  kingdom. Jesus is found to be saying this eschatological event could happen any

  day and will definitely happen in his generation. Since Jesus is only found to be

  saying that his generation would see this event rather than predicting the very

  day it will happen (Matthew 2436), there is still a reason to do justice on earth

  while waiting for it. Case in point is that televangelists like Pat Robertson and

  his ilk are part of the "Christian Right" which seeks sociopolitical change, and

  yet they also think Jesus will come soon, probably in our generation.

  JESUS WAS A FAILED APOCALYPTIC PROPHET

  So if Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet, then he was a failed one, just like every

  other doomsday prophet in history-before and after him. The eminent New

  Testament scholar, James D. C. Dunn, admits this in what is surely to be his

  magnum opus: `Jesus had entertained hopes which were not fulfilled. There were

  `final' elements in his expectation which were not realized. Putting it bluntly,

  Jesus was proved wrong by the course of events."3' And yet the Jesus cult

  survived even after these failed predictions. But that isn't too unusual. Many cult

  groups survive after experiencing a failed prophecy of the end of times. Whether

  or not they survive depends on how they reinterpret what took place. The

  survival of the cult group depends on how they view the failed prophecy from

  hindsight. To understand this when it comes to the Jesus cult we need some

  historical background.

  After the destruction of Jerusalem and deportation of Jewish leaders to

  Babylon in 586 BCE, the prophet Jeremiah spoke of seventy years for the

  restoration of Israel (25:11-12; 29:10) with a new covenant (chapter 31).

  Prophetic numbers like these were not meant to be taken literally, since the

  number seven symbolizes completeness while seventy is roughly the span of a

  man's life. Nonetheless, it was a serious problem for later Jews as the years

  passed and it wasn't fulfilled. The Davidic dynasty, after all, was supposed to be

  an eternal one (2 Samuel 7:11-16, Psalm 89:36-37), but it was never

  reestablished as predicted (Jeremiah 33:14-18; Isaiah. 11:1-9; Ezekiel 34:22-24,

  37:24; Micah 5:2). So in trying to make prophesy fit, the prophets Haggai (2:20-

  23) and Zechariah (4: 6:9-13) both claimed that in their day Zerubbabel was

  going to be the Messiah. Since this didn't turn out as predicted, the prophetic

  institution was thrown into a crisis. This crisis first started when the monarchy

  ceased to exist, since the monarchy both legitimized the prophetic institution and

  provoked it due to kingly transgressions. Jeremiah's failed prophecy was the

  final straw that forced the later pseudonymous author of Zechariah 13:2-536 and

  Malachi (4:4-5) to say prophecy would cease until such time as the final prophet

  would come (cf. 1 Maccabees 4:46; 9:27). When prophecy ceased, there was a

  corresponding rise of apocalyptic literature. Apocalyptic literature predicted the

  coming apocalypse, unlike prophetic literature, which stressed immediate

  judgments upon people who were unfaithful to God's covenant. Apocalyptic

  literature expressed in cryptic language the next thing on God's timetable, the

  full restoration of Israel and the Davidic dynasty in a Messiah who would reign

  over all the nations.

  Four centuries had gone by after Jeremiah's prophecy, and no fulfillment was

  in sight. The first frilly apocalyptic book was Daniel, in which we see Jeremiah's

  prophecy altered to mean something different. It was not meant to be "seventy

  years," but rather "seventy weeks of years" (Daniel 9:2 5-2 7). This meant the

  prophecy was to be fulfilled in the second century BCE, when the book of

  Daniel was composed.37 Old Testament scholar Bernard Anderson explains

  Daniel's prophecy:

  The first seven weeks (49 years) apparently extend from king Zedikiah to

  Joshua the High Priest (587-538 BCE), who was in office in the days of

  Cyrus; the sixty-two weeks (435 years) extend from the return from the

  Exile to the assassination of the High Priest Onias III (538-171 BCE); and

  the last week covers the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes. During the first half

  of this week (171-168 BCE), Antiochus showed some lenience toward the

  Jews; but during the last half (168-164 BCE), in which the author of Daniel

  was living, Antiochus attempted to abolish Jewish religion and desecrated

  the Temple by installing an altar to Zeus of Olympus ... which came to be,

  by a malicious pun, "the abomination of desolation."38

  But the prophesied restoration of Israel and the apocalyptic eschaton did not

  happen in that day either. Even an evangelical like Kenton L. Sparks admits this:

  "It is to my mind that it is quite clear that the author of Daniel, like the authors of

  countless other Jewish apocalypses, expected the kingdom of God to appear in

  his lifetime ... these expectations clearly turned out to be incorrect.... in fact we

  are still waiting for it.39

  That this was still a problem in the first two centuries CE is evidenced by

  the fact that apocalyptic hopes like these incited several Jewish

  eschatological movements. There were the Zealots and the Sicarii in the

  days of Jesus, who had a role to play in the Great.7ewish Revolt against

  Roman rule, which led to the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE, and the massacre

  at Masada in 74 CE. Then Esdras, writing in about 90 CE, was given a

  divine interpretation of a vision he had: "The eagle, whom thou sawest

  come up from the sea, is the kingdom which was seen in the vision of thy

  brother Daniel. But it was not expounded unto him, therefore now I declare

  it unto thee" (2 Esdras 12:10-12). And he does, but this won't detain us here

  only to note his prophecy failed as well. These apocalyptic hopes also

  inspired the Bar Kokhba Revolt (ca. 132-136 CE). Simon bar Kokhba, the

  commander of the revolt, was proclaimed the long-awaited Messiah who

  would restore the Jewish people to rule over the nations. Some of these

  movements were violent ones in the hopes of providing the faithful spark

  tha
t would ignite God's wrath. Others were quietist ones like the Jesus cult.

  Stemming from John the Baptist, they called people to repent and be

  baptized in order to prepare themselves for what God himself was about to

  do for them. In these apocalyptic movements we find some divergences of

  opinion, true, but as Fredriksen argues, they all shared "the belief that the

  End was fast approaching and the final restoration of Israel was at hand....

  The forces of good will utterly vanquish the hostile powers, demonic or

  human, and the Kingdom of God will finally, truly be established."40

  In the NT, about six centuries after Jeremiah's prophecy and two centuries

  after the book of Daniel, it was claimed that Jesus was the predicted prophet

  "like unto Moses" (Acts 3:20-22, see Deuteronomy 18:18). According to the

  Gospel of Luke, Jesus came to announce that these things were starting to be

  fulfilled in his own day in what is known as his "Nazareth Manifesto" sermon

  (Luke 4:14-21). It was to be an eschatological ,jubilee (cf. Leviticus 25:13;

  Isaiah 58:6, 61:1-11) where the captives would be set free and the land would be

  given back to Israel, its rightful owners. Israel would finally be restored to her

  glory in the coming new age.41

  But if we grant that this original prediction stems back to Jesus, it "was

  continually threatened by the simple passage of time," argues Fredriksen.

  "Successive disappointments gave rise to new interpretations as the tradi tion

  reworked what was too central to relinquish." "Reconceiving Jesus and the

  Kingdom, Christian tradition in various ways continually adjusted itself... as its

  central prophecy failed. And as part of its adjustment to this unexpected future,

  the tradition grew away from its own past." 42

  The apostle Paul was the first person to reinterpret the failed prophecy

  gradually in his own lifetime. He had expected to see an immediate apocalyptic

  eschaton, as already noted in his earlier letters. So how did Paul sustain such a

  belief through twenty-five years of preaching? Fredriksen makes a plausible case

  that he did so because he came to believe that through his ministry to the

  Gentiles he was helping to bring in the eschaton. When he completes his

  ministry the end will come when God will save "all Israel" by "an eschatological

  miracle."43 Thus, "The interim before the Kingdom came would last as long as

  Paul's mission itself"44 Only when the "frill number of the Gentiles" came into

  God's kingdom through Paul's ministry would the End come (Romans 11:25).

  Paul's view came about during the debates he had with the "circumcision

  party" over the fact that there were "Too many Gentiles, too fewJews, and no

  End in sight." 45 The circumcision party argued that only after the Kingdom

  came "would Gentiles as such be redeemed." So they blamed Paul for the fact

  that the Kingdom had not yet appeared because he was not reaching out to Israel.

  Paul came to see this problem differently. The reason why the End had not come

  and the reason why the Jews were not responsive to the Gospel was because this

  was all part of God's plan. God hardened the hearts of the Jews so that through

  Paul's ministry God would save the frill number of Gentiles, and then the End

  would come (Romans 9-11). But Paul died and the End didn't come.

  With Mark's "Little Apocalypse," as we saw earlier, Daniel's prophecy was

  altered to foretell the destruction of Jerusalem soon after Jesus' own time (later

  to be destroyed in 70 CE), which was a prelude for the eschaton to happen in a

  few years.46 Yet this too did not happen. So by virtue of "the criterion of

  embarrassment," we find evidence that later NT authors altered and tried to

  explain away this failed prophecy of Jesus.47 They did so in the exact same

  manner that the multitude of other failed millenarian prophetic groups have

  done. This is an essential element for surviving as a group after such a failed

  prophecy did not materialize, and this is what we see time and again with regard

  to these types of failed prophecies in the Bible. The biblical writers

  progressively changed their position regarding the eschaton and the restoration

  of Israel, just as Paul before them did 48

  After Mark's Gospel there are subtle changes made with each subsequent

  canonical Gospel, as the prophesied eschaton did not happen. The Gospel of

  Matthew, written decades after Mark, makes subtle changes to the text. In Mark's

  Gospel the disciples asked a question specifically about the destruction of the

  temple: "Tell us, when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that

  they are all about to be fulfilled?" (13:4) Nothing was asked about the coming of

  the "Son of Man" or the end of the age because it was assumed that the

  destruction of the temple and Jerusalem would be the only signs needed for

  when the "Son of Man" would come. But in Matthew's Gospel the disciples ask

  not only about the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, but now they

  additionally ask Jesus about the sign of "your coming" along with the end of the

  age (24:3). In Matthew's Gospel more than just the destruction of the temple was

  needed as a sign for the end of the age and the coming of the "Son of Man." The

  reason is because by the time Matthew's Gospel was written, the temple had

  already been destroyed and the eschaton had not yet happened.

  While Mark's Gospel merely told believers to be on guard while waiting for

  this eschatological event (13:33), Matthew's Gospel elaborates on this warning

  for almost an entire chapter in three parables (24:45-25:30). Matthew agrees

  with Mark that this series of events will happen in that generation, of course

  (24:34), it's just that the goal posts have been moved. In his day there is more of

  a need to stress patience than before, since the faithful are becoming impatient.

  And according to Matthew when the "Son of Man" comes, he will reward the

  righteous with the kingdom and cast the unrighteous into eternal fire (25:31-46).

  These are events which were to follow immediately upon his coming, since that's

  the progression of the events depicted in Matthew.

  In the even later two-part Luke-Acts we find the goal posts are moved a little

  further. Luke drops a few words from what we first read in Mark 9:1, where

  Mark's Jesus says, "I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste

  death before they see the kingdom of God come with power" [emphasis added].

  The last three words are missing in Luke's version (9:27). As far as Luke is

  concerned, the disciples were not promised that they would see the kingdom

  "come with power." Of this slight but "huge" difference, Ehrman tells us that

  with the deletion of these three words Luke's Jesus, "does not predict the

  imminent arrival of the Kingdom in power, but simply says that the disciples (in

  some sense) will see the Kingdom."49 Luke also attempts to distance Jesus from

  the erroneous expectation that the kingdom appearing in power will take place

  immediately by blaming such a false expectation on others when introducing the

  parable of the ten minas: "While they were listening to this, [Jesus] went on to

  tell them a parable, because he was near Jerusal
em and the people thought that

  the kingdom of God was going to appear at once" (19:11).

  And the disciples do indeed see the kingdom according to Luke. They already

  experienced it since they were personally with the Messiah-king, Jesus: "Once,

  having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come,

  Jesus replied, `The kingdom of God does not come with your careful

  observation, nor will people say, "Here it is," or "There it is," because the

  kingdom of God is within (i.e., `among') you"' (Luke 17:20-21). So Luke first

  introduces a distinction between the "already here" and the "not yet." The

  kingdom was "already here" Luke says, even though the kingdom coming with

  "power" had not yet happened. This same distinction is something we see

  reflected in the later non-Pauline letter of Ephesians (2:6) and in Hebrews

  (12:22-24), although these authors believed in a future eschaton as well (cf.

  Ephesians 1:10, Hebrews 10:37-38). Of this change of perspective Bart Ehrman

  stresses:

  Luke continues to think that the end of the age is going to come in his own

  lifetime. But he does not seem to think that it was supposed to come in the

  lifetime of Jesus' companions. Why not? Evidently because he was writing

  after they had died, and he knew that in fact the end had not come. To deal

  with the "delay of the end," he made the appropriate changes in Jesus'

  predictions.50

  Some scholars conclude from Luke 17:20-21 that Jesus was not an

  apocalyptic prophet, but this is a slender reed to hang that conclusion on (just

  two verses). Bart Ehrman tells us that this saying "is found only in Luke (i.e., it

  is not multiply attested), a Gospel, as we've seen, that went some way to tone

  down the apocalyptic dimensions of our earlier sources."51 For these reasons, E.

  P. Sanders does not thinkJesus even spoke these words, but even if so, "they

  cannot be used to prove that he said nothing about a future cosmic event." For as

  Sanders argues, "one cannot take Luke 17:20-21 as canceling out the large

  number of sayings about the future kingdom-including those that immediately

  follow in Luke." (i.e., 22-37).52 In my opinion, the two similar verses in the

  Gnostic Gospel of Thomas (3, 113) also alter what Jesus predicted, as did Luke,

  since it was written early in the second century-53

  We find the final word of Jesus on the topic from the author of Luke-Acts just

  before he ascended into heaven. We see the disciples asking Jesus, "Lord, are

  you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?" (see Acts 1:6-8). Here

  we see that the disciples didn't think Jeremiah or Daniel's prophecies had been

  fulfilled yet, otherwise why would they be asking about the restoration of Israel?

  The author of Acts simply has Jesus responding that the disciples should not be

  concerned with the timing of the prophecy but instead focus on their mission

  with the help of the coming Holy Spirit. Two chapters later, Peter is reported to

  say that Jesus "must remain in heaven until the time comes for God to restore

  everything, as he promised long ago through his holy prophets" (Acts 3:21). So

  according to what the author of Acts tells us, by putting these specific words on

  the lips of Peter, the eschaton was not supposed to happen in Peter's lifetime, but

  rather sometime in the future. What started out as an urgent call to action based

  upon an immediate eschaton has now been altered to cover up a failed prophecy.

  Such talk of an imminent eschaton is completely removed in John's Gospel. In

  Dale Allison's words, this Gospel: "focuses not on Jesus coming on the clouds of

  heaven in the future but on the Spirit coming to believers in the present. It

  emphasizes not that the dead will someday arise but rather that the living can