Editing Christological argument (section)

===Argument from the claims of Jesus to divinity===
{{See also|Lewis's trilemma}}
Lewis's trilemma is an [[Apologetics|apologetic]] argument traditionally used to argue for the [[Incarnation (Christianity)|divinity of Jesus]] by arguing that the only alternatives were that he was evil or [[Delusion|deluded]].<ref name=Dock>Lewis, C. S., ''God in the Dock'' (Eerdmans, 2014), pages 100–101.</ref> One version was popularised by [[University of Oxford]] literary scholar and writer [[C. S. Lewis]] in a [[British Broadcasting Corporation|BBC]] radio talk and in his writings. It is sometimes described as the "Lunatic, Liar, or Lord", or "Mad, Bad, or God" argument. It takes the form of a [[trilemma]]—a choice among three options, each of which is in some way difficult to accept.

This argument is very popular with Christian apologists, although some theologians and biblical scholars<ref name="Davis 2006, page 151">Davis (2006), page 151</ref> do not view Jesus as having claimed to be God.<ref>Hick, John, ''The Metaphor of God Incarnate'', [https://books.google.com/books?id=f-QMmFx8hwcC&pg=PA27 page 27].</ref><ref name="lord_jesus_christ_a01">{{Cite book  | last1 = Hurtado | first1 = Larry W. | title = Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=_MH-_ZQuZrgC&pg=PA5 | year = 2005 | publisher = Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company | isbn = 0-8028-3167-2 | pages = 5  }}</ref> Some argue that he identified himself as a divine agent, with a unique relationship to [[Yahweh|Israel's God]].<ref>{{cite book|first1=Michael F.|last1=Bird|author-link=Michael F. Bird|chapter=3: Did Jesus Think He Was God?|editor1-last=Bird|editor1-first=Michael F.|title=How God Became Jesus: The Real Origins of Belief in Jesus' Divine Nature — A Response to Bart D. Ehrman|date=2014|publisher=Zondervan|location=Grand Rapids, MI|page=46|quote=Jesus identified himself as a divine agent with a unique authority and a unique relationship with Israel's God. In addition, he spoke as one who spoke for God in an immediate sense and believed himself to be embodying the very person of God in his mission to renew and restore Israel.}}</ref> Others see him as wanting to direct attention to the divine kingdom he proclaimed.<ref>{{cite book|last=Hurtado|first=Larry W.|title=How on Earth Did Jesus Become a God?: Historical Questions about Earliest Devotion to Jesus|date=2005|publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing|location=Grand Rapids, MI|page=3|quote=To judge from the many sayings attributed to Jesus in the New Testament Gospels... [i]n addition to proclaiming and teaching about God's kingdom, Jesus also seems to have engaged in other activities that had the effect of drawing further attention to him but were primarily intended to demonstrate something of the power and the purposes of the divine kingdom that he announced.}}</ref>

The argument relies on the premise that Jesus was a great moral teacher. The structure of the argument is as follows:<ref>{{Cite book |last=Lewis |first=C. S. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OF-YSMKCVwMC |title=Mere Christianity |date=2009-06-02 |publisher=Harper Collins |isbn=978-0-06-194743-8 |language=en}}</ref>
# Jesus claimed to be God
# Jesus was a wise moral teacher
# By the trilemma, Jesus was dishonest, deluded or God
# No wise moral teacher is dishonest
# No wise moral teacher is deluded
# By 2 and 4, Jesus was not dishonest
# By 2 and 5, Jesus was not deluded
# By 3, 6 and 7, Jesus was God
# By 8, God exists

Those who dispute these premises suggest that:
# Disputing premise 1: Jesus was indeed a wise moral teacher, but his reported teachings have been distorted or misrepresented. For instance, he may not have actually claimed to be divine; this claim may have been added by later writers. Many modern New Testament scholars argue that Jesus did not, in fact, claim to be God.<ref>[[John Hick]], ''The Metaphor of God Incarnate: Christology in a Pluralistic Age'', Westminster John Knox Press, page 27.</ref>
# Disputing premise 2: [[C.S. Lewis]] expressed the opinion that any mere man who claimed to be God could not, by definition, be a wise moral teacher (and that, conversely, any wise moral teacher would not claim to be God).<ref>C.S. Lewis, ''Mere Christianity''</ref> [[Christopher Hitchens]] argued that Jesus was not a wise moral teacher by arguing against several of his teachings. For example, of Jesus' teaching "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone", Hitchens wrote: "if only the non-sinners have the right to punish, then how could an imperfect society ever determine how to prosecute offenders?"<ref>[[Christopher Hitchens]], [[God Is Not Great]], Chapter 8.</ref>
# Disputing premise 4: A person can be a wise moral teacher despite lying. Jesus could have believed (as some later philosophers have held) that religion is false but beneficial to society, and that by establishing a new religion (or a reform of Judaism) he was doing a good deed nonetheless. And a wise moral teacher who is not God certainly suffers, as all men, from human weakness. Jesus could have been a wise moral teacher, and yet made an error of judgement (as the Bible itself records of Moses,  David, and Elijah who it views as wise moral teachers who were rebuked by God or his prophets), even one as extreme as declaring himself to be a God. Or, someone can begin with wisdom and moral teachings and be corrupted by experience of power to commit particular abuses, even though his teachings are wise and moral.
# Disputing premise 5: A person can be a wise moral teacher despite being delusional. Granting credence to some, or even most, of someone's claims does not require that we give credence to all of them. Someone can believe Socrates' philosophical claims about justice without also believing Socrates' theological speculations about the Greek gods, or accept Aristotle's views on poetry without also accepting his claim that heavier objects fall faster than lighter ones.

Philosopher John Beversluis described Lewis's arguments as "textually careless and theologically unreliable",<ref>{{Cite book |first=John |last=Beversluis |title=C. S. Lewis and the Search for Rational Religion |publisher=[[W. B. Eerdmans]] |location=Grand Rapids, Michigan |year=1985 |isbn=0-8028-0046-7}}</ref> and this particular argument as logically unsound and an example of [[false dilemma]].<ref>{{Cite book |first=John |last=Beversluis |title=C. S. Lewis and the Search for Rational Religion |publisher=[[Prometheus Books]] |location=Buffalo, New York |year=2007 |page=132 |orig-year=1985 |isbn=978-1-59102-531-3 |oclc=85899079}}</ref> New Testament scholar [[N. T. Wright]] criticises Lewis for failing to recognise the significance of Jesus' Jewish identity and setting—an oversight which "at best, drastically short-circuits the argument" and which lays Lewis open to criticism that his argument "doesn't work as history, and it backfires dangerously when historical critics question his reading of the gospels", although he believes this "doesn't undermine the eventual claim".<ref>{{Cite magazine |first=N. T. |last=Wright |author-link=N. T. Wright |date=March 2007 |title=Simply Lewis: Reflections on a Master Apologist After 60 Years |url=http://www.touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=20-02-028-f |magazine=[[Touchstone (magazine)|Touchstone]] |volume=20 |issue=2 |access-date=11 February 2009 }}</ref>