Dr. Gavin Ortlund’s defense of C.S. Lewis’s “Liar, Lunatic or Lord” trichotomy, and Why I think it won’t work on skeptics

Maybe you’ve seen me write this already:

In Acts 2:14-36 there is a most overlooked apologetics passage. Peter supports his conclusion of “therefore know for certain” with three types of evidence: OT prophecy, eyewitness testimony, and a self-evident work of the Spirit.

The book of 1 John also seems to have this threefold witness: the fulfillment of OT prophecy “it is the last hour,” eyewitness testimony “we have seen,” and the Spirit’s self-evident testimony “you have been anointed by the Holy One.”

Or how blessed (anointed?) will be those who have not seen and yet have believed.

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No. I haven’t.
So, thanks.

Nice, I think it’s a better approach… does anything you just said apply here?

Do you mean in my criticism of the use of frameworks?

Sure, or more simply, do you have any objection to my understanding of Peter and John? Am I mislead or misleading?

I vaguely remember you objecting to my understanding of Peter in the Acts passage. Thought it was in the Penner thread, but I can’t seem to find it.

Found it:

I’d have to review this. None of it is available to immediate access in my mind.

Don’t have a huge amount of time to unpack this right now. However, I think that the biggest issue with Lewis’ trichotomy is that it was built for a different era. Most sceptics I’ve spoken to start with the assumption that Jesus is a legend. And so, in my opinion, trichotomy defences leave sceptics behind before they’ve even left the gate.

EDIT: Just saw this from @heymike3. Great minds. :sweat_smile:

Teach me not to read the thread before replying!

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I would guess that you probably think other religious texts (e.g. Book of Mormon) from religions you don’t belong to are mythical or made up. It may be good practice to ask if the same argument would convince you to believe what is in those texts.

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This skeptic would be a bit more charitable and say that the Gospels can’t be verified. I would say that you first have to establish the truth of the Gospels before we can ask questions about the characteristics of the people in the Gospels.

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I think that is completely fair. I shouldn’t expect you to put your mind on ice and ‘just’ take my word for it.

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Lewis or Peter’s argument? In my limited view, I haven’t seen either argument in other religions.

If they were used in other religions, would you find the argument compelling and convert to those other religions?

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I don’t see how the arguments would work in other religions… I don’t mean to be trivial. For me, the testimony of the Spirit was the conviction of my sin. And other religions don’t adequately account for that the way Jesus did. And then there’s the OT prophecies and historical evidence to back it up.

Muhammad was either a liar, a lunatic, or a prophet.

Right. It wasn’t some poorly constructed argument for Christianity. You had a personal experience.

The claimed evidence are the stories whose veracity we are questioning.

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The trilemma doesn’t have “prophet” as one of the options, though. It is meant to be “Lord”, i.e. God. So I guess this wouldn’t apply to Muhammad who never claimed he was God…??

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Lewis’ argument works for those who assume the truthfulness of the text, which is what I suppose the cultural drift of the Church was around him.

Personal knowledge would be a better description.

There’s all kinds of evidence… kind of like when a friend or stranger tells you they saw someone rise from the dead.

So kind of like how a friend or stranger said they met an angel named Moroni who showed them where to find a hoard of golden plates.

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It’s still evidence, but not very good from where I’m standing. If it’s a good friend who I trust, then I would give it more than a passing consideration.

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That’s been my understanding too. It doesn’t take a total Jesus mythicist (one who questions whether Jesus even ever existed) to have a problem with this. [I doubt most unbelieving skeptics are so extreme as to be that sort.] No - all it takes is someone who is a skeptic about the text giving us accurate and complete recordings of what Jesus actually taught and said. Lewis’ trilemma glosses right past that difficulty, ignoring it, before one can even get to the trilemma as stated. It is a reasonable objection for those who want all evidential considerations to be weighed.

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