Some excerpts from the response that so many are waxing lyrical over:
I wonder if this review was secretly authored by a Skeptic pretending to be a Mormon.
But don't forget; the FARMS review was nothing but
ad hominem, while Holding's response was simply a devastating piece of scholarship.
We are told that TMD is "in part, another response to Blomberg and Robinson's How Wide the Divide? - a book that seemingly continues to disturb those who have trouble accepting the proposition that individuals can believe differently and still be Christians." Aw, gee, THAT canard again? Skeptic tactic imitated #3: I'm psychoanalyzed and found to be disturbed!
Of course the statement implied nothing of the sort; the normal meaning of "disturb" in this case is "annoy" or "bother." The review draws no conclusions about Holding's mental health, and in fact that statement does not mention him at all; he is being unnecessarily defensive. But what does his magnum opus say?
The seriousness of our situation became urgently clear when InterVarsity Press published an inter-faith dialog... entitled How Wide the Divide?
Note that this comes, not from Holding's own text, but from the Foreword, which was written by somebody else ("Kevin James Bywater," possibly also pseudonymous.) But it was published in Holding's book. However relaxed he may or may not be about
HWTD? it clearly bothers Mr. Bywater. Indeed, on that subject he seems to protest too much, as when he says:
I think Blomberg gave a licking and kept on ticking.
And yet it is quite clear, to those who have actually read that volume, that it was not a debate or combat work; no "lickings" were there to be had. This, indeed is what made that book so disturbing to some: Blomberg had the temerity to not only talk to a Mormon (ugh!) like a human being, but he made the fatal mistake (from a polemical standpoint) of allowing the Mormon to speak for his own faith tradition.
Holding also describes the review as a "hissy fit." Had the review said anything similar about Holding's book, Scratch and his cheer squad would be all over it; but when Holding says it, they pass it by in peculiar silence.
But don't forget; the FARMS review was nothing but
ad hominem, while Holding's response was simply a devastating piece of scholarship.
when Bywater says that "Mormonism is not biblical", it's worthless, because "neither he nor Holding spells out is what they mean by 'biblical.'" Good grief! Canard #4: Pretend you don't know what the opposition is talking about! How hard is this? "Biblical" = "in agreement with the Bible." Obviously, not 100% (because not even the worst atheist disagrees with the Bible 100%) but at core points that are distinctives. There now, wasn't that easy?
Notice the editorial insertions; evidently Mr. Holding doesn't trust his readers to grasp that the review is pronouncing Bywater's dictum "worthless." Perhaps that's because it doesn't. There are no such pejorative dismissives in the review; the "hissy fit" is a Mr. Holding sees is a reflection of his own angry reaction at not meriting a page-by-page rebuttal from one or more of FARMS' heavy hitters, as documented by our own Kevin Graham.
The important thing that Mr. Holding is missing is that his arguments rely upon certain shared assumptions about the meanings of key terms. When Bywater asserts that "Mormonism is not biblical," then he is saying something that, if true, ought to be provable from the Bible; yet not only does Holding not limit himself to the Bible to make his case, he actually relies upon extrabiblical material to determine the interpretation of biblical passages that he will allow. In the end, "Mormonism is not biblical" turns out to mean "Mormons do not read the Bible the way I think they should."
What has clearly happened is that McGregor got in way over his head reviewing TMD, and has produced the same sort of frustrated drivel that I regularly get from atheists who are in over their heads when I refer to things like "honor-shame societies" and "collectivist cultures". I may as well be explaining flight aerodynamics to a naked native.
But don't forget; the FARMS review was nothing but
ad hominem, while Holding's response was simply a devastating piece of scholarship.
Actually what has clearly happened is that Holding expected a much more detailed response, and instead got a review.
And more! Now it's time for Skeptic Imitation Device #6, "Show your need for a reading lesson." I say:
Therefore, we argue that the majority interpretation of 1 Corinthians 15:29 is off the mark. A more reasonable thesis is that the practice was devoid of theological meaning and thus not requiring Paul's explicit condemnation, or else, that we are misunderstanding the passage completely.
McGregor oddly takes this to mean:
Either the passage doesn't mean anything, or we don't understand it - but whatever the case, its meaning must be sacrificed. What isn't biblical?
GOOD GRIEF! No, not "doesn't mean anything," it's "doesn't mean anything theological". See that word "theological" before "meaning"? Ye elohims! And is it like I stopped there and provided nothing to explain how we should be understanding the passage? McGregor's obscuratanism is almost too painful to be borne!
How is this "obscurantism?" The quoted passage offers two alternatives:
1)
Either "the practice was devoid of theological meaning";
2)
Or "we are misunderstanding the passage completely."
How does the qualifier "theological" materially impact the question? The end of Mr. Holding's learned exegesis of 1 Cor. 15:29 is to offer two mutually exclusive choices so as to distract from the unpalatable third alternative, which is that Paul's contemporaries practiced a vicarious baptism on behalf of the dead, and far from disapproving the practice, Paul actually cited it as evidence in favour of a core Christian doctrine.
Then we have this:
And ugh! Skeptic Tactic #7, already! It's said:
In contrast to this approach, Holding becomes a staunch and loyal enthusiast for majority opinion or scholarship as soon as it suits his purposes.
Um, no, as soon as the data demands it actually, but you won't hear McG stepping into that hornet's nest, now, will you? The subject this time is Mark 16:15-16, and to my note that "the reader may be surprised to see this verse cited by LDS apologists, knowing that it is almost universally declared to be not part of the original Gospel of Mark," McGregor offers the derisive snort, "Just exactly why the fashions of scholarship should determine which passages of scripture form part of the faith of the Latter-day Saints is not clear, but Holding does not even attempt to address the real issue regarding the authenticity and authority of that passage; the actual question has to do not with Mark's authorship but rather with whether Jesus actually made the statement. Matthew 28:19-20 would seem to suggest that he did say it or at least something very much like it." Gack, pfft -- Matt. 28:19-20 is, under the evidence given, a model for Mark 16:15-16, and that "fashion of scholarship" has to do with sound textual-critical principles that I list in full but McGregor doesn't even shake a stick at. I may as well give McG his card for the KJV Onlyist Club. Mark IS the only source for us to decide whether Jesus made that statement as he did, as his text is clearly not original between 16:9-20, and the appeal to Matthew's parallel is a counsel of despair.
Not hardly, no.
Here is the whole "great commission" controversy in a nutshell:
Q) Was the Mark passage borrowed from Matthew?
A) Maybe. Probably. Most authorities think so.
Q) Does that mean that the passage is inauthentic in Mark?
A) It would, yes.
Q) Does that mean that Jesus never said it?
A) No. It does not. Only if we accept that Matthew invented the passage out of whole cloth would that follow. However, the alternative and--in the view of many, more likely--possibility is that Matthew was citing from an independent source--either his own recollection, or some other written
urtext, such as the mysterious
Logia which some believe to have been written down prior to the Gospels, and used by them as a source.
Q) But isn't Mark the oldest of the gospels and the one that the others copy from?
A) Such is the majority view, yes. But Matthew was there in person; even if he did use Mark's gospel as his starting point, he was entitled as a living witness to add whatever his own memory told him was missing.
But don't forget; the FARMS review was nothing but
ad hominem, while Holding's response was simply a devastating piece of scholarship.
McGregor then abandons actual argument again to remark upon my "repeatedly assuming that Mormon and Christian are distinct categories." Not an exact Skeptic canard, to be sure, but a common canard from LDS apologists who know no better. As I have told my Mormon friend Kevin Graham, and which he quite clearly understood, my repeated use of such statements as, "A fundamental point of contention between Mormonism and Christianity . . ." is not meant as any kind of social statement about division. These are terms of convenience for the average reader; if I went about making qualifying statements every line or so I may as well ship each inidividual copy of TMD in a U-Haul.
Since the book is only 130 pages long, I fail to see how using "Protestant" or even "Evangelical Protestant" in place of "Christian," or even using "mainstream" as an adjective, would have sent his book into the multi-volume range. He could have chosen almost any other pair of labels which would not have inconvenienced "the average reader," much less created the impression that "Mormon" and "Christian" are non-intersecting sets.
But don't forget; the FARMS review was nothing but
ad hominem, while Holding's response was simply a devastating piece of scholarship.
So what can I say? Maybe McGregor was p.o.'d because I sent him running to the dictionary too many times, or perhaps he missed his laxatives the day he wrote the review. Either way this review was a far cry from the sort of responsible report I had been expecting from FARMS, and while I must make it clear that this doesn't tarnish the reputation of the whole of LDS apologists in my view, it does make a certain one named McGregor smell a lot like a weasel. And veteran readers know what I mean by that reference.
But don't forget; the FARMS review was nothing but
ad hominem, while Holding's response was simply a devastating piece of scholarship.
Regards,
Pahoran