The Bible Skeptic: Biblical Inerrancy

Evaluating Sources

On the Unreliability of an Apologist

Introduction

"…if you’re getting sick to your stomach right now, you don’t go to the phone book and call Tire Kingdom, do you?" –James Patrick Holding, internet Christian apologist and author

Library Science - The professional knowledge and skill with which recorded information is selected, acquired, organized, stored, maintained, retrieved, and disseminated to meet the needs of a specific clientele, usually taught at a professional library school qualified to grant the post baccalaureate degree of M.L.S. or M.L.I.S. --ODLIS — Online Dictionary for Library and Information Science (http://lu.com/odlis/odlis_L.cfm#)

When I visit my local library and need to find references for an obscure subject like canine evolution, I’m delighted if I’m fortunate enough to engage the services of an employee holding a master’s of library science degree from an accredited university. I feel an added sense of confidence that this individual, by virtue of his or her education, will be able to help me locate the material I need by making available a host of specialized services to help me search out relevant information that I may not have known of on my own otherwise. Surely such an employee is well-equipped to help me do my research and I welcome any assistance they can offer. Were I to research canine evolution I certainly would not, as Christian apologist James Patrick ("JP") Holding points out in the quote above, open a phone book and call my local "Tire Kingdom" for assistance. By the same token, once my librarian has found me books on canine evolution, I would be very suspicious of any she found published by Road & Track or endorsed only by Goodyear or Michelin.

In an interview held with Pastor Craig Johnson of Bethel Christian Fellowship church in Agoura Hills, California, the aforementioned Mr. Holding stepped away from his indefatigable battle with skeptics over matters of biblical inerrancy, and spoke on matters within his field of expertise. The discussion with Johnson was around the use of source material when doing research on an unfamiliar or complicated subject. Mr. Holding possesses a bachelor’s degree in English and a master’s in library science. He can approach this subject with some degree of experience, unlike his forays into history, archaeology, science and theology, for which he is as uneducated as any other not credentialed in these fields. His education would have taught him how to use those many and varied tools that my local librarian uses to search out obscure books on canine evolution even if my librarian herself knows absolutely nothing about the subject. But what should one do with all that information once they acquire it? To help in evaluating sources, Mr. Holding during his interview listed a number of extremely helpful guideline one can use in assessing the relevancy and degree of trustworthiness of sources one might encounter in researching subjects of any kind. These are guidelines, Mr. Holding claims, which "professional researchers will use in evaluating a source."

Craig Johnson, Ph.D., who hosted this interview with Mr. Holding, is an evangelical Protestant clergyman and the founder and pastor of Bethel Christian Fellowship in Agoura Hills, California. He is also the "Theologian in Residence" at Chalcedon Academy, an apologetics "institute," also in Agoura Hills. He is the "institute’s" founder. [1]

Dr. Johnson makes available on his website videos of various sermons he performs and interviews he has recorded. His YouTube channel currently mirrors his interviews with Mr. Holding. Recently, I was made aware of these series of interviews he did with James Patrick Holding, "president" of Tektonics Apologetics, a website Mr. Holding maintains to publish his articles on the defense of the Bible and Christian belief. It was during one of those interviews that Dr. Johnson asked Mr. Holding to talk about the "critical use of sources" when researching subjects such as the "mythical" Jesus or other hot and controversial biblical topics. Dr. Johnson asked Mr. Holding, "How do we evaluate sources and materials…?" It is a very valuable interview with a great deal of excellent advice. Dr. Johnson noted during the interview that in today’s information age, with easy access to resources like Google and Wikipedia, everyone can appear to be an instant expert merely by gathering data, often uncritically, from these tools. Richard Dawkins, British ethologist, evolutionary biologist, popular science author, outspoken atheist and former Professor for Public Understanding of Science at Oxford, stated a similar opinion during his Channel 4 two-part documentary "The Enemies of Reason," aired across the UK in August of 2007. In the film he said,

…the internet is revolutionizing how we use and consume information. But the impersonal algorithms of internet search engines do not weed out robust evidence from un-sourced, uncorroborated assertion. Wikipedia world presents both great opportunity and huge danger.

…We must value verifiable evidence over private feeling. Otherwise we leave ourselves vulnerable to those that would obscure the truth. (Episode 1)

I would add to this that the digital age has made it very easy for non-scholars and non-specialists to get into print, as well, and come off as instant published experts. Just about anyone can get their ideas printed in a book through so-called "vanity" and "self" publishers. Typically, for as little as a few hundred dollars, anyone can have a book produced and made available on such online resellers as Amazon and Barnes & Nobel. Often, these books are not printed until they are ordered, saving a great deal of money for the publisher, allowing them to gamble on a larger number of titles which may not have passed editorial review in a more traditional publishing setting. These self-publishing companies have a minimal investment in the titles they can offer, allowing them to take on a larger number of authors, regardless of quality or sales potential. Some of these books lack editorial or peer review. [2] Mr. Holding stated that "this is a very difficult problem" precisely because of what Dr. Johnson mentioned. "There is very little critical use of sources these days by many people," Mr. Holding warned. He noted that "we have so many people producing things in print and on the internet who don’t know what they’re talking about and then in turn we have people accepting it because they don’t have the expertise to judge the credibility of the source that they’re reading or that they’ve picked up off the internet. And this is a serious, serious problem today."

Mr. Holding is right. Anyone with a modicum of computer knowledge can now open a website and upload articles about anything that strikes their fancy. I’ve encountered sites as I’ve browsed the web which range from giving strange advice for preparing meals for dogs to sites which host articles about when the world will end (complete with calendars and calculations). I’ve encountered chiropractors giving advice on vaccinations and neo-gnostic Christians decrying the United State’s government use of termite explosives on 9/11 to bring down the World Trade Center as part of a Jewish plot to frame Muslim terrorists. Anyone with enough money no longer need submit manuscripts for editorial or peer review through traditional book or journal publishers but can self-publish and make available their work via internet booksellers. So, the guidelines that Mr. Holding shares during Dr. Johnson’s interview, used to help seek out and evaluate source material, are very valuable indeed. I highly encourage my readers to jot down these guidelines and use them whenever appropriate. I sincerely hope they are used when evaluating my own articles that I author on this site. I certainly am not above being critiqued. Although I strive diligently to present as well-researched and credibly-sourced material as I am able, having others research the credibility of my work only makes me a better researcher myself.

The Guidelines [3]

Based upon his education in library science, Mr. Holding’s guidelines for evaluating source material begin with:

1. Checking Credentials

Mr. Holding advises that when reading materials, especially those of high specialty content, researchers should check to see if the author received the proper education in the field to which he or she is writing. He suggests finding out what academic degree(s) the author may possess. Is the author writing about the H1N1 virus and does he or she hold a degree (or degrees) in the biomedical sciences? Discover where the author received his or her education, what school did they attend. If writing of the H1N1 virus, and possessing a biomedical science degree, might you learn that the author's education came from Georgetown University (Department of Microbiology and Immunology), or the Yale University School of Medicine? Learn if the author has previously published in the field to which they are currently writing. Mr. Holding warns that if the source is not properly credentialed, it is possible that the author may have come into the field unprepared to properly address the material and may not have the discipline to recognize what is good in the field they’re discussing. He also makes a point of not relying on a single source when doing research, but to seek out multiple sources which could bring collaboration on the subject by expert peers.

Mr. Holding does, however, make an exception to this guideline. If the authors being read do not personally possess proper credentials in the field to which they are writing, researchers using material from such writers need to look at the credentials of the authors’ sources to see if the sources’ credentials are relevant. So, for example, while Brett Palmer may not be credentialed in the fields of paleontology and evolutionary biology, but if you find him quoting from the works of scientists like Juliet Clutton-Brock, Raymond Coppinger, Adam Miklosi or Xiaoming Wang while discussing the evolution of Canis lupus familiaris (the dog), you can be fairly assured that Mr. Palmer has sufficiently studied the subject to be able to recognize which experts in the field he needs to quote from if writing an article on this subject. The figures Mr. Palmer uses as sources are well-known, well-published, and widely well-respected by peers in their respective fields of expertise. Therefore, an article properly cited with relevant-credentialed sources can be reliable and trusted, as long as Mr. Palmer has not misrepresented his sources, taken quotes out of context, or used these credentialed experts to support a controversial opinion that the experts themselves do not hold. However, there would be good reason for suspicion if Mr. Palmer only quoted from a slim minority of those who supported a particular controversial worldview. For example, if Mr. Palmer believes that dogs were extra-terrestrial spies planted on earth to gather data on human behavior and then he referenced only those "scholars" (UFOlogists; those who study "UFO" phenomenon) who advance such a theory, then there would be good reason to suspect that Mr. Palmer has not sufficiently studied the field on which he is reporting. Doubly suspicious should one be of Mr. Palmer's work should one or more of the "scholars" from which he quotes be found to work for an organization which requires employees to sign a sort of "Declaration of Advocacy" stating that UFOs are real, that aliens exist and visit the earth regularly, and that no evidence can be believed to be reliable should it contradict these statements.

But even credentialed authors alone are not always enough and Mr. Holding recognizes this as he brings us to his second guideline:

2. Check for Sources

Even credentialed authors should buttress their discussions by referencing sources which add support to their idea. To check sources, Mr. Holding suggests researchers go to the end of articles or books to find if there are sources listed. He warns, echoing his previous caution, that non-scholars (or non-specialists) writing in a field being discussed outside their expertise need to use heavy documentation based upon the work of scholars who are credentialed in those fields. If books or articles have few, incomplete, out-of-date, or no citations then readers are right to be very suspicious about the value of the article or book under review. Mr. Holding notes that few or no sources could mean the author has not done the necessary research in the field they are discussing. Incomplete citations (e.g. title of book with no page number) implies the author does not what their readers to find what is inside that book because, if the readers investigate, they are likely to find that these sources are not being used properly. This would also apply to online articles which fail to link back to any internet sources which were used. "Overwhelmingly" old sources are considered poor documentation, according to Mr. Holding. If only out-dated sources are used, the author citing them is in effect supporting the idea that certain scholarship stopped at some time in the past. Keeping sources as current as possible helps assure that any new discoveries have been examined and are being reported properly, avoiding out-dated ideas.

3. Check if there are reputable recommendations on the back of books being cited.

Mr. Holding explains that reputable print sources like books will have "blurbs," quotations from other relevant sources, on the back of the jacket cover to allow readers quick access to short reviews that recommend that particular piece. One need look for these recommendations to be from other reputable scholars in the book subject’s field ("peer reviews"). Also, professional review sources, such as Publishers Weekly, can be relied upon. So, for example, take into consideration the "praise" for Richard Dawkins’s landmark book on biological evolution, The Blind Watchmaker with recommendations from such sources as John Maynard Smith (evolutionary biologist and geneticist from the University of Sussex), Michael T. Ghiselin (biologist and philosopher/historian of biology from the California Academy of Sciences), Edward O. Wilson (biologist, researcher in sociobiology and biodiversity, and naturalist), Michael Ruse (philosopher of science and professor at Florida State University), Douglas J. Futumya (biologist and professor at State University of New York at Stony Brook) as well as recommendations from the London Times and The Economist, and compare those "praise credentials" with those found on Michael Behe’s latest book in the controversial field of "Intelligent Design," an anti-evolution proposal which argues against naturalistic causes for biological diversity. Behe’s book is titled The Edge of Evolution. Behe was able to secure two recommendations for placement on the front and back cover of his book, one from Philip Skell, a chemist (not a biologist) at Pennsylvania State University and one from The Philadelphia Inquirer, the daily morning newspaper serving the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, metropolitan area. Using Mr. Holding’s criteria, if doing research on the subject of biological evolution, one should not automatically jettison Behe’s offering, but one should certainly be suspicious of the work knowing that Behe’s book could not gain praise or recommendation from others in the field of biology, the subject to which his book is addressed.

Behe’s book actually provides opportunity to bring up Mr. Holding’s final guideline:

4. Don’t trust something merely because it’s provocative.

Mr. Holding noted that some people rely on sources just because that source has a different point of view or a provocative opinion on a subject. As Mr. Holding notes, researchers shouldn’t automatically rely on such a source, simply because it’s provocative; the source must "earn the trust that you give it." Apparently, although Mr. Holding didn’t say so, that trust can be found by following the guidelines already mentioned. While a source may be provocative, it may still prove valuable should its author have the proper authority to be speaking on that particular subject. So, for example, when discussing biological evolution, is the provocative author a biologist who has the necessary criteria to begin speaking about the field? Or is the author a chemist who, while a scientist, is not a scientist in the proper field under discussion? What do professional peers, and not just daily newspapers, have to say about the provocative material? Does the author give some new, but valuable, insight into the subject being discussed? Do credentialed peers eagerly embrace these new conclusions? Have the provocative ideas spawned a new frenzy of exciting research, furthering our understanding of biological evolution, or are many of the author’s peers (if not most) highly suspect and even somewhat scornful in their reviews? Are the "new" ideas in the book merely a "wedge" disguised in scientific jargon to further a political or religious agenda?

Again, these tools Mr. Holding provides are extremely valuable and should be used whenever assessing complicated, unfamiliar or controversial material.

Exercising the Guidelines

Having provided Mr. Holding’s expert advice on evaluating sources when researching a subject –especially a subject with which one is not particularly familiar-- I’d like to exercise these guidelines in a very practical way. Let’s take these guidelines and see how they fare in assessing a real article discussing a subject outside the author’s area of expertise.

Mr. Holding offers us just such an opportunity regarding a piece he published on his Tektonics Apologetic website. Surely if Mr. Holding’s education taught him the value of the excellent guidelines discussed above, he certainly must have used them to provide sources for his own work. Mr. Holding is not a biblical scholar, nor an archaeologist, biologist, chemist, paleographer, linguist, or scholar of ancient literature. As noted earlier, Mr. Holding holds a bachelor’s degree in English and a master’s in library science. So, while he is certainly well-qualified to instruct others on information research techniques, he is not qualified to discuss without proper citations subjects covering archaeology, biblical criticism, paleobiology or the like. And, to his credit, he has admitted in the past that there are areas of study in which he is no expert.[4]

The article I’d like to examine for proper citations and their use is Mr. Holding’s "Evidence of Jericho" piece. Indeed, I examined the argument presented in this article in my own reply, "The Walls of Jericho," but my approach in this current article is to examine how closely Mr. Holding followed his guidelines above in researching sources for his piece to support his argument.

Let’s recap in order each guideline detailed above with an eye on Mr. Holding’s Jericho article. Did Mr. Holding follow his own research advice while doing his investigation? If you’ll recall, Mr. Holding’s first guideline was: Checking Credentials. We already know that Mr. Holding himself is not credentialed to properly comment independently on the archaeological information regarding the layered ruins of Jericho. Being able to look up books and articles on the subject does not qualify one to assess the wealth of information available regarding this complicated subject. Certainly, Mr. Holding is well-qualified to turn up numerous articles and books on the subject of biblical Jericho, but he cannot comment independently, with any authority, on the archaeological data.[5] According to Mr. Holding’s first guideline, therefore, we can dismiss him personally as any sort of authority on the archaeological and historical relevance of the material remains of Jericho as they relate to the story of Joshua’s conquest of the city as told in the Old Testament.

Having rejected Mr. Holding as a reliable source for this information, we should turn now to his second guideline: Check for Sources. Are the sources Mr. Holding used to research his article properly credentialed? At the conclusion of Mr. Holding’s Jericho article, he lists the sources he consulted for the foundation of his piece. From his article, his sources were listed as follows:

1. Bart.Jer - Bartlett, John R. Jericho. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982.

2. Bienk.JerLBA - Bienkowski, Piotr. Jericho in the Late Bronze Age. Aris and Phillips, 1986.

3. Bimson, John J. - Redating the Exodus and Conquest. Sheffield: JSOT, 1978.

4. Chars.WAF - Charlesworth, James H., ed. What Has Archaeology to Do with Faith? Philadelphia: Trinity Press Int'l, 1992.

5. Hopp.WBA - Hoppe, Leslie. What Are They Saying About Biblical Archaeology? New York: Paulist Press, 1984.

6. Rohl.PAK - Rohl, David. Pharaohs and Kings: A Biblical Quest. New York: Crown, 1995.

7. WoodB.Jer - Wood, Bryant G. "Did the Israelites Conquer Jericho?" Biblical Archaeology Review, March-April 1990, pp. 44-59.

8. Wood.STrW - Wood, Michael.In Search of the Trojan War. New York: Facts on File, 1985.

Taking these authors in turn we learn that John Bartlett is Principal of the Church of Ireland Theological College, Dublin. Piotr Bienkowski is the Deputy Director of the Manchester Museum, and Professor of Archaeology and Museology at the University of Manchester. John Bimson is lecturer in Old Testament and Hebrew at Trinity College, Bristol. James H. Charlesworth is the George L. Collord Professor of New Testament Language and Literature and director of the Dead Sea Scrolls Project at Princeton Theological Seminary (although he’s merely the editor of the work Mr. Holding cites). Leslie Hoppe is professor of Old Testament Studies at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. David Rohl is an Egyptologist. Bryant Wood is the director of the Associates for Biblical Research. And Michael Wood is a writer and historian.

Scholars such as Piotr Bienkowski and James H. Charlesworth are well-known in their fields and well-respected. But, Mr. Holding didn’t quote their positions on the significance of Jericho’s archaeological remains as they relate to the support of the biblical tale. The only two sources he used in any great detail, revealing their position on Jericho and the Bible, are Bryant Wood and David Rohl. This brings up a problem when merely seeking out the credentials of an author or the credentials of an author’s source. How does one know how to evaluate sources when you, yourself, are not an expert in the field being discussed? How can you feel confident of taking the best opinions on a controversial subject? One way is through peer review. Do other experts and scholars in the field being discussed generally agree on one of the many opinions? For example, you may find a number of books on mammalian evolution, all generally agreeing and demonstrating the evidence of how modern dogs have an ancient ancestor in hicrampisaurous. You may take notice of one such book written by Xiaoming Wang. However, you may also overturn a few books or articles by authors who disagree with this conclusion. You may find, for example, an article by Kent Hovind which argues that all dogs and wolves merely ("micro-")evolved from a "dog-" or "wolf-kind" of creature which was created by a divine entity during the first six days of creation and which sailed along with Noah on his ark during the great biblical flood. How do you know, if you have questions, upon which authority to rely? Should you lean toward Xiaoming Wang or Kent Hovind? Again, a search through the relevant peer review will reveal that approval lies with Wang, not Hovind. That should be a very strong indicator of which author has made a more robust theory for their position. In addition, Xiaoming Wang’s credential as the curator of vertebrate paleontology at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles lends his opinion a considerable amount of weight. Kent Hovind, on the other hand, is currently incarcerated for tax evasion, was founder and president of a Christian ministry and whose education consisted only of a bachelor of "religious education" from a non-accredited mid-western Baptist college and a master's degree and doctorate in "Christian education" through a correspondence course offered from the non-accredited Patriot University in Colorado Springs, Colorado. It should, be fairly easy to decide which author has the most authority on the subject of canine evolution and the choice of which argument to accept as one’s own should be crystal clear.

This leads us back to those credentialed "experts" cited in Mr. Holding’s Jericho article. As mentioned a moment ago, Mr. Holding’s argument relies on two main sources: David Rohl and Bryant Wood. Mr. Rohl is a British Egyptologist and Dr. Wood is a biblical archaeologist and Research Director of the Associates for Biblical Research. Mr. Rohl obtained a degree in Ancient History and Egyptology later in life, after working in the entertainment industry as a musician and a sound engineer. Dr. Wood has a B.S. in mechanical engineering, a M.S. in mechanical engineering, an M.A. in Biblical History from the University of Michigan and a Ph.D. in Syro-Palestinian archaeology from the University of Toronto. While the credentials of both Mr. Rohl and Dr. Wood sound impressive, it is important to note that both men’s ideas are marginal in their relevant fields. Both have offered radical theories and a check of related literature reveals them to have been largely rejected by their peers (and, as noted in my article, both reject each other’s positions!).

As Mr. Holding stated in his interview, incomplete citations (e.g. title of book with no page number) implies the author does not want readers to find what is inside that book because, if the readers investigate, they are likely to find that these sources are not being used properly. But, it is not only the lack of details in the citation that is important. Serious researchers should actually acquire the cited material and see for themselves if the source is being properly used. Do not simply trust that the author citing the material has cited it faithfully. For example, Mr. Holding refers to Piotr Bienkowski’s work on Jericho. He uses Bienkowski’s work to note that Jericho had been "destroyed by fire" and that not a lot of gold was found in its remains. Mr. Holding makes this point in order to assert biblical accuracy. As Mr. Holding notes, this lack of gold found at the site is "in accordance with Joshua 6:19, where it is recorded that the Israelites took the vessels of silver, gold, brass and iron from the city". Mr. Holding then notes this information came from a study published by Bienkowski. However, Bienkowski’s conclusions regarding Jericho and how it represents any accuracy regarding the biblical account of its destruction is at odds with Mr. Holding’s conclusion, as my own article makes clear. Looking at merely the citations in Mr. Holding’s article is not nearly enough to establish the accuracy of its conclusions. Mr. Holding also has a citation for Leslie J. Hoppe, professor of Old Testament Studies at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. She sounds like a fully qualified credentialed source to reference in one’s article. Seeing her name in the list of citations might give the impression that the article in which she appears –along with the likes of Bienkowski—is certainly well-researched and authoritative. However, Mr. Holding does not use Hoppe to support his idea, but merely as a foil for the "standard Skeptical view" which contradicts the apologetic assertion that the archaeology of Jericho supports the biblical story of Canaan’s conquest. This holds true throughout Mr. Holding’s article in which citations are given for a number of credentialed sources which, ultimately when checked for the citation’s context, do not support his article’s main conclusion. As another example, when we check Mr. Holding’s citation of John Bartlett we find that Bartlett came to a conclusion opposite that of Mr. Holding’s. Bartlett concludes in Mr. Holding’s source, his book Jericho,

The nature of Israel’s recollection of the event at Jericho makes it impossible for the modern historian to relate with any confidence the biblical account and the archaeological evidence of the destruction of Jericho. (p. 107)

Now, I am not of the opinion that Mr. Holding was implying that the sources he lists at the end of his Jericho article were all necessarily supporting his ultimate conclusion. In all likelihood Mr. Holding was merely properly citing those sources he used when researching his article. We need to know, for example, when Mr. Holding tells us that a relevant level of Jericho’s archaeological remains shows no evidence of gold relics where he found that information. The point here is to demonstrate that an impressive list of citations is not enough to give an article’s thesis positive support. While Mr. Holding’s article lists eight citations, only two of those are used to support his argument and, as we discovered in my critique of that article, those two sources disagree one with the other and neither is accepted by the larger community of properly credentialed scholars.

Mr. Holding said during his interview that incomplete source notation can mean that the author does not want his reader to check the source. But, as we learned above, a more complete check of sources up to and including actually acquiring that source material –even with proper notations-- may be required to fully check for the faithful, or relevant, use of such sources. This, of course, extends to material published on the internet, as previously mentioned. Incomplete or the lack of links back to referenced web material may indicate fear on the part of the author that readers may track back to the original material and find that it is either not quoted correctly, or is misrepresented, or in the case of contrary material, may actually be more persuasive than the original! [6]

Another caution Mr. Holding mentions is the use of outdated sources. And yet, we find in Mr. Holding’s Jericho article that he only references work regarding Dr. Wood from a magazine article nearly 20 years old. Research has been done since that time, referenced in my own article, which refutes Dr. Wood’s 1990 hypothesis.

So, credentialed sources may not always ensure proper research no matter how many are used as citations, if these sources are offering ideas rejected by the majority of others in their field of expertise and shown to be faulty. This actually draws heavily on Mr. Holding’s fourth guideline: Don’t trust something merely because it’s provocative. Dr. Wood and Mr. Rohl may be properly credentialed, but their ideas are indeed provocative (especially Mr. Rohl’s) with very little, if any, peer support.

Mr. Holding’s third guideline is to check if there are reputable recommendations on the back of books being cited. Since Mr. Holding only uses two sources to actually give support to his conclusion, Wood and Rohl, these are the only two worth considering for this criterion. Dr. Wood’s material is from a magazine and thus lacks "reputable recommendations" due to its format. David Rohl, however, is cited from his book Pharaohs and Kings. In the copy I obtained, there are no recommendations on either the back or front covers of the book. But, as Mr. Holding notes, the book itself is not the only place to look for recommendations. These can also be found in professional reviews of the book from such sources as Publishers Weekly. Regarding Rohl’s book, the two reviews I checked –one from the aforementioned Publishers Weekly, the other from Library Journal-- were less endorsements than they were acknowledgements of the book’s provocative claims and appeal to a broad audience. Clearly, these reviews were bending over backwards to find something kind to say about Rohl’s work which is rejected, not by a broad audience of laymen and average readers, but by the professionals who have the necessary educational background to properly critique the work. As noted in my article, even Mr. Holding’s other source for information about Jericho dismisses Rohl’s work: Dr. Bryant Wood. Other scholars similarly reject Rohl and certainly do not recommend his so-called "New Chronology" which, among other things, supposedly lines up the tale of the biblical conquest of Jericho with the archaeological record. Philipp Brissaud, research engineer and director of the French excavation of Tanis, Kenneth Kitchen, Personal and Brunner Professor Emeritus of Egyptology and Honorary Research Fellow at the School of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool, England, W.M. van Haarlem, curator of the Egyptian Department of the University of Amsterdam’s Allard Pierson Museum and director of the museum’s excavation project in Tell Ibrahim Awad, Egypt, Karl Jansen-Winkeln, professor of Egyptology in the Department of History and Cultural Studies at Freie Universität Berlin, and others (as well as the aforementioned Dr. Bryant Wood) have all published negative reactions to Rohl’s proposals. No university is teaching Rohl’s ideas in any course on Egyptology, world history or archaeology. So, evaluating the reputable recommendations of Mr. Holding’s sources for his Jericho article, one comes up miserably short.

Turning our attention now to Mr. Holding’s fourth guideline, don’t trust something merely because it’s provocative, we’ve already briefly discussed this above. In Mr. Holding’s interview he noted that a source must "earn the trust that you give it." So it is very unclear why he relied so heavily on Rohl as a source for his own article. We’ve already found that the larger academic community does not give Rohl’s "New Chronology" idea a shred of credibility. Certainly, Rohl’s ideas have not earned the trust of his peers so he cannot be worthy of ours, either. Dr. Wood does not fare much better, associating his work with an organization which requires a "faith statement" which hamstrings any work he may produce. If his findings contradict the faith statement, he’ll head back to the field to try more diligently to uncover enough material to match the biblical story, conveniently ignore contrary data, or find some other tactic to use in order not to abuse his employment’s Statement of Faith. Recall in my original article examining Dr. Wood’s contribution to the archaeology of Jericho that I pointed out Dr. Wood works for the Associates for Biblical Research. According to their website:

Dr. Bryant Wood, director of the Associates for Biblical Research, has reexamined and reevaluated the excavated evidence from Jericho to better correlate that data with the Biblical story of Joshua's conquest as contained in the inspired Scriptures of the Old Testament (Joshua 6).

It was a remarkable revelation to learn that Dr. Wood’s work was not to simply examine the data dispassionately, but with the sole purpose to "reexamined and reevaluated the excavated evidence from Jericho to better correlate that data with the Biblical story." However, working with the data toward a prearranged conclusion is not surprising when one learns that the Associates for Biblical Research is actually a Christian "ministry" and not a scientific organization. The Associates for Biblical Research’s first "Statement of Faith" under which Dr. Wood operates reads:

We believe in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments as the verbally inspired Word of God, and inerrant in the original writings, and that they are of supreme and final authority in faith and life. (emphasis mine)

Additionally, the Association admits in their "Philosophy of Ministry" that they are an "evangelical [Christian] organization founded for the purpose of research and fieldwork in Biblical archaeology, in order to demonstrate the historical reliability and accuracy of the Scriptures and to propagate the Christian faith. Its mission is based on the conviction that the Bible is the Word of God and, therefore, infallible, inerrant and authoritative in its original writings…"

One cannot expect Dr. Wood’s conclusions regarding the Jericho data to ever contradict these strong statements and organizational philosophy, even if the majority of other scholars in the field, Bienkowski most notably, have refuted Dr. Wood’s findings. Dr. Wood operates from a now-defunct school of "biblical archaeology." This was popular about a century ago, but fell out of favor when archaeological research failed to support the Bible literally as these early adherents believed it would. Some today, from the more conservative, evangelical, fundamentalist camp of Christian apologetics still cling to the idea that archaeology can be made to fit the biblical story. As Israel Finklestein notes in his essay, "Digging For the Truth" in the book The Quest for the Historical Israel: Debating Archaeology and the History of Early Israel, this old school of thought to which Dr. Wood still belongs,

Promoted the idea that archaeology can prove the Bible correct and the critical scholars wrong…Archaeology played the role of supplying decorative evidence for a history that was a modern, almost word-for-word rewriting of the biblical story. By doing that, scholars of the conservative school promoted historical and archaeological reconstructions that had no actual support in the finds, or were trapped in circular argumentation. (p. 10)

Amihai Mazar, in the same volume in his essay, "Patriarchs, Exodus, Conquest", quoted from Roland de Vaux, one of the early scholars of this conservative school of biblical archaeology, in words likely familiar in the halls of Dr. Wood’s Associates of Biblical Research:

"if the historical faith of Israel is not founded in history, such faith is erroneous, and therefore, our faith is also." (p. 42)

So, with that in mind, Dr. Wood and his fellow associates of the barely-breathing school of conservative biblical archaeology continue to toil in the hope that their Christian faith is not in vain. How much hope can one have that those under this weight of faith are being honest with the raw data?

Concluding our examination of Mr. Holding’s guidelines for evaluating source data, we must applaud him for giving such valuable advice. He should remember to follow it himself.

NOTES

1. See Craig Johnson’s webpage at http://www.drcraigjohnson.net/faqs.html. His apologetics "institute" webpage has been disabled but used to be located at http://chalcedonacademy.org/ (last checked, 9/5/09). Prior to the site being removed, I had visited the "About Us" page and noted details posted about the "institute." The page had reported:

Chalcedon Academy is an independent institution. As such we are not regionally accredited. When you present someone with the Certificate of Theology or Diploma in Christian Apologetics from Chalcedon you can be confident that you have received your education from a quality free-standing institution. (http://chalcedonacademy.org/about_us.html)

I could not find a faculty listing for Chalcedon Academy on the now defunct website (and no new site has been developed to take its place) and I suspect that may be because the so-called "Theologian in Residence," Craig Johnson, is the sole staff member of the "Academy" and that he not only works on campus but lives and cooks there as well. On another page from the defunct website regarding contact information, it was noted that "Chalcedon Classes are currently meeting in a private home." A search on Google Maps for the address given on the webpage showed what appeared to me to be a block of apartment buildings. Gives a whole new meaning to "in Residence."   Return to text

2. Mr. Holding himself has authored a number of books. A quick check of Amazon lists five self-published titles. The Mormon Defenders shows publication by Proaster Books. His other four titles come from Xulon Press. Proaster Books does not have a listing in the Literary Market Place (2009), The Writer’s Handbook (2009), Writer’s Market (2009; 2010), Jeff Herman’s Guide to Book Publishers, Editors and Literary Agents (2008), Christian Writer’s Market Guide (2008; 2009), The International Directory of Little Magazines and Small Presses (41st annual edition) which I checked in my local library, nor the web directory for the Association of American Publishers (www.publshers.org). These list book publishers for would-be authors and when I went through that many resources and could not find Proaster mentioned in any of them, I gave up trying. The back cover of The Mormon Defenders shows Proaster Books and its graphic design division to be located at 670 Covington Road in Los Altos, California. A check of Google Maps indicates this to be a residential home. Xulon Press is a Christian self-publishing outfit without peer editorial review. In fact, Xulon Press has no editorial staff whatsoever. So unless authors who submit to Xulon have their manuscripts examined by an independent editor, Xulon merely takes their work and dresses it up for sale on Amazon and other online retailers. Indeed, Xulon proclaims that it will "refuse to publish books that degrade the gospel of Jesus Christ." In Xulon’s corporate opinion, "today more than ever, our Christian values are under attack. So Xulon Press decided early on to publish books that uphold the gospel of Jesus Christ – and none other." (emphasis mine) A check of Xulon's website (http://www.xulonpress.com/prices_programs.htm) indicated that authors can publish their books for a minimum fee of $799 (up to $2099). Interesting articles regarding vanity publishers can be found here, here and here. Food for thought.   Return to text

3. In Mr. Holding’s interview, he did began by numbering his guidelines but then, as the interview went along, he lost this numbering system and began to just speak about certain guidelines as they pertained to questions put to him by Dr. Johnson. However, for ease of reference, I have tried to pull out those guidelines as given in Mr. Holding’s interview and have given them numbers. These may, or may not, reflect the exact numbering of the guidelines as Mr. Holding originally intended.   Return to text

4. Mr. Holding once wrote, "...I respect the knowledge of those more informed than I am (as in the hard sciences) and do not presume to know their stuff better than they do." The webpage from which that quote was taken has been removed from Mr. Holding’s website and he has instructed the processes which archive webpages never to store any of his material so the page cannot be retrieved. While admitting not to have the expertise to presume knowledge of matters such as those found in the "hard sciences," in another off-line article, he oddly stated that he refers readers "to my friends at Creation Ministries International on science issues." Creation Ministries International is a non-scientific religious ministry focusing on Bible-based creationism. Another source of young earth creationism, Answers in Genesis, also hosts a number of Mr. Holding’s articles. It’s always good to know where someone sits before you find out where they stand.    Return to text

5. I am not credentialed in the fields of archaeology, ancient literature, paleography, etc., either, which is why, when writing my original article in response to Mr. Holding’s treatment of the "evidence of Jericho," I spoke personally with Piotr Bienkowski, Janet Ambers with the Department of Scientific Research at the British Museum and Dr Henrik Bruins, of Ben Gurion University of the Negev and the Groningen radiocarbon laboratory to get accurate and up-to-date information about the archaeological significance (or lack thereof) regarding the material remains of Jericho and how they relate to the biblical story of its conquest. I won’t rely merely on my own personal interpretation of data outside my field of expertise.   Return to text

6. It has long been noted by skeptics of Mr. Holding’s work that he rarely provides links back to material he is criticizing. Indeed, no links back to my own material from Mr. Holding’s website exist in articles he’s written responding to my work. Mr. Holding states that he only links to skeptical articles when "I think they deserve it by their quality. Which of course means not many get them." Mr. Holding has apparently set himself up as a credible judge of what qualifies as "quality" material and what doesn’t. For this reason, I return the "favor" by not providing links to Mr. Holding’s site. I will, however, provide article titles for material I critique from Tektonics so they can be readily found via Google searches.   Return to text

SOURCES

Finklestein, Israel and Amihai Mazar (2007) The Quest for the Historical Israel: Debating Archaeology and the History of Early Israel Society of Biblical Literature