The Resurrection of God Incarnate [Paperback]

This book offers what you would expect from one of the foremost defenders of natural theology. Richard Swinburne, retired chair of Oxford's philosophy department, assesses the plausibility of Christianity's claim that the Incarnate Son of God was Resurrected. He proceeds by using the methods of confirmation theory, which takes objective probability measures of various claims and then measures competing hypothesis to explain the data. For this reason, Swinburne's approach is significantly different from the approach given by other Christian scholars to defend the Resurrection. Rather than merely focusing on evidence, Swinburne also considers the prior probability of various hypotheses. After taking stock of the prior probability of the Resurrection and weighing the strength of the historical data, Swinburne employs the methods of scientific confirmation to affirm the Resurrection.

I think it is fair to warn readers that much of this book assumes the success of Swinburne's previous works, especially _The Existence of God_. This is not a weakness in the book (this sort of thing is fairly normal in philosophy), but it may leave some readers put-off because some parts of Swinburne's background information is not contained in this book.

I was somewhat disappointed that Swinburne did not give more attention to the nature of eyewitness testimony because so much of the literature on this subject has revolved around important debates about eyewitness testimony for miraculous events. For example, John Earman's book, _Hume's Abject Failure_, provides a formal rendering of the epistemic effects of eyewitness testimony, and I expected Swinburne to have some formal discussion on this matter.

While this book will most likely shock most of its readers with its powerful conclusion in favor of the Resurrection, I have found this book helpful for a number of reasons. First, Swinburne presents a novel approach to the Resurrection that addresses important issues that other accounts do not. Second, this book will be of general interest to anyone interested in philosophy of religion and will undoubtedly be an influential work in this discipline. Third, mastering the material in this book gives one an opportunity to learn and apply the methods of confirmation theory -- so, even people who are not interested in philosophy of religion will find some merit in reading this book.

Swinburne is a renowned Christian philosopher who many regard as one of the best natural theologians of the century.

This book takes a novel approach at investigating the plausibility of God becoming Incarnate as Man and then the probability that he would Resurrect. He then addresses the characteristics that God Incarnate would have. These would allow us to recognize that God became Incarnate in order to redeem humanity. For instance he postulates God would live a perfect life (of course Swinburne goes over the definition of what a perfect life would be for God), he would teach us morality, teach his atonement (what ever that may be), imply (not pronounce) his divinity, and found a Church that would carry on his teachings.

As another reviewer commented Swinburne does take for granted the success of his prior works, but he does acknowledge this, and asks the skeptical reader to allow (under the evidence of natural theology) that there is at least a fifty-percent chance that a God does exist and would have the traditional characteristics we would assume he would have. He also says that the pronoun "he" does not imply God is a man, although obviously in earlier cultures he [God] would be assumed to have masculine characteristics, but most Christian theologians throughout history have maintained that God is genderless. He then carefully constructs his arguments for God becoming Incarnate, and that Jesus of Nazareth fulfills the requirements we would assume that God Incarnate would have, as compared to other Prophets (a term he uses to describe Jesus, Moses, John the Baptist, Muhammad, Zoraster, Buddha, and Krishna).

I especially enjoyed his arguments on the Chalcedon definition and its various implications and interpretations. Swinburne does not detract from orthodox traditional Christianity but does not allow this to restrict his creativity which is a characteristic of all great theologians.

The book itself is rather brief for such a serious argument, but not a word is wasted. But I do wish the book could have been longer, but maybe when I read his other works I can come back to this text again, with more depth.

I do not think this will be convincing to the committed Naturalist by any means, but if they come with an open mind they can see the rationality of Christian belief. Or at least this particular aspect of it, and if Jesus did resurrect, then the implications for such a thing would be great. For someone looking for other questions on Christian Faith they would need to look elsewhere.

One complaint is that Swinburne also took for granted certain secondary-sources he used for evidence in constructing the historical figure of Jesus. For example, I do not think the Gospel of John holds chronological priority over the Synoptics. I leave open the possibility of course, because of the fragmentary evidence we have already of the deeds and sayings of Jesus. I do not think his argument crumbles in accepting this idea but it could detract from his argument to other readers. I also wish he would have used N.T. Wright's scholarly books (Christian Origins and the Question of God series) in order to further illumine his argument. Instead he relies on E.P. Sanders (who is one of my favorites) and Geza Vermes. Raymond E. Brown is also cited once. I recognize that Swinburne is not trying to objectively discover the Historical Jesus as these other authors are, but I think such a creative theologian as Wright would have helped more in his historical case of Jesus. I also found the lack of references to John P Meier's magnum-opus A Marginal Jew surprising.

Another complaint is the discussion of Atonement. I know that Swinburne is a Christian philosopher in the tradition of Aquinas and Anselm, but as an Eastern Christian myself I found it hard to convince myself that God Incarnate would teach such a mean and pagan dogma as Substitutionary Atonement. But because Eastern Christianity does not have a doctrine of Atonement they could just not consider this part of the criteria in considering God Incarnate. Swinburne allows the reader to choose which part of the main sections of evidence is the strongest. In my opinion Jesus may have taught something similar to the Western notion of Atonement, but not the kind taught by the West since the scholastics, I believe the East and its doctrine of Theosis is much closer to the early Church and Jewish notions of Salvation (I would look at Heschel's God in Search of Man for instance).

Overall I find this a convincing philosophical argument that if there is a God he would become Incarnate and would show his seal of approval of this God-Man's life with a "super-miracle" which in this case would be the Resurrection of Jesus.

A warning though, I am sure most thinkers will know that this is not the end-all of any argument for Jesus' Divinity or his Resurrection. Anyone who dismisses Swinburne's arguments and then rejects all of Christianity without further investigating its historical and philosophical claims is just as close-minded as any other fundamentalist, religious or otherwise. Swinburne does move the discussion forward and adds to this 2000 year old debate, but I would also recommend reading other works.

I would start with N.T. Wright's three volumes: The New Testament and the People of God, Jesus and the Victory of God, and his Resurrection of the Son of God. Then continue with Alvin Plantinga's philosophical books, Raymond E Brown's books, E.P. Sanders, John P. Meier, John Dominic Crossan, Richard Swinburne's other works, and Abraham J. Heschel's books on philosophy. I would even recommend Karl Barth and Hans Kung's theological treatises.

These are all nice breaks from the overly verbose, melodramatic and ignorant atheistic (and theistic!) apologists that dominate the best-seller lists these days. It is also better than the narcissistic self-help books that are so popular in our capitalistic self-centered society and makes us looks deeper at the beliefs we may take for granted. Life is complicated, do not accept simple answers to anything and investigate everything thoroughly. We are all pilgrims in this life, and the unexamined life is not worth living.

Who knew there were still brilliant, articulate, theologins in jolly old England? I suppose all professional philosophers and theologins know the works of Richard Swinburne, but since I am an amature apologist, I was not one of them. As I read various books on the historical proofs of the life of Jesus Christ from various authors, I kept noticing that everyone used Swinburne as a reference, so I decided to buy his book on the Incarnation of God on earth to see what it was all about. Swinburne is brilliant, and this book is a testament to his clear thinking, extensive research, and ability to articulate to the novice and experienced theologin alike the extensive evidence concerning the life and resurrection of Christ. Swinburn lays out the historical evidence in a manner that would be acceptable by any prosecuting attorney trying to prove the case, and the case is proven. I am so thankful that he wrote this book, and that I happened to stuble onto it. I think I bought a used copy, but I will keep it as a key piece of my arsenal as an apologist concering the historical proof of the Incarnate God. I recommend this book to the religious, or the skeptic. Also, to the novice or the advanced student of theology.

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