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Another class of objections would just argue that the witnesses to the resurrection were crazy:

"Obviously anyone who claims that they saw someone coming back from the dead is crazy. How can we take their stories about these outlandish miracles seriously? Clearly there was something mentally wrong with these people, and we ought to dismiss their 'testimonies' as the ramblings of the insane or the schizophrenic."

By now, it ought to be obvious that I'm going to handle this objection like all the others. Did the witnesses to the resurrection act like they were crazy? Did they exhibit the typical behaviors of the insane or the schizophrenic? If they did, we should rightly lower the Bayes' factor for their testimonies from the relatively unconditioned value of 1e8. But if they did not, then by the same logic we must increase the Bayes' factor.

This investigation is straightforward enough: read the New Testament, and look for symptoms of mental illness in areas that are not directly related to supernatural claims (one must be careful about circular reasoning). So, does the New Testament read like the work of a schizophrenic? Does it seem to describe people who were afflicted by mental illness? Would you say, for instance, that Peter's sermon at Pentecost exhibits problems with attention or memory, or that Paul's letter to the Romans demonstrate disorganized thinking?

In fact, apart from the supernatural components, I have not heard of anyone citing any part of the disciple's work in the New Testament as being characteristic of mental illness. If there is such a passage, I'd love to know about it. Can anyone point to a verse and say, "here is where Paul shows clear signs of psychosis", or "this is where Peter displays the classic symptoms of schizophrenia"? It says a great deal about the "insanity" accusation that the only evidence they can find for it are the very parts that make up the question at hand, the very parts they object to. In short, the objection effectively only amounts to saying "I disagree with these people on these points, so they must be crazy!"

On the other hand, there are plenty of reasons to think that the witnesses to the resurrection were of sound mind. Remember, they were the organizers and leaders in the early Christian church - a movement that spanned their known world. Furthermore, recall that they were successful beyond any naturally possible expectations: Christianity has lasted thousands of years until the present day, multiplied wildly, and now spans the whole globe. Can anyone give any example of an organization run by insane people that was even a millionth as successful?

In particular, the ideas behind this organization - that is, the theology of the early Church - are readily available to us as the text of the New Testament. They are the most read, discussed, studied, and applied texts to have ever been written. If you're reading this blog you're also free to go and read the New Testament. Does it seem like the work of the insane? What work by any mentally ill persons has ever reached a fraction of its stature?

So the conclusion is clear enough. Once again, upon actually considering the facts surrounding the resurrection witnesses, we find that they do not correspond at all to the scenario in the objection. The disciples display no sign of insanity, instead demonstrating many characteristics of sound and acute minds. So, according to the very logic embedded in the objection itself, this must again increase the Bayes' factor of their testimonies.

We will continue with more next week.