"We have also a more sure word of
prophecy." 2 Peter 1:19 The
word for more sure here is bebaios, meaning firm, more sure, certain,
binding, and steadfast.(1) Peter says prophecy is more sure, more certain, and
more binding that eye witness testimony. Why?
One
reason is that, disregarding the inerrancy of Scripture, typically eye witness
testimony is considered a less than reliable body of evidence.
"Since
the 1990s, when DNA testing was first introduced, Innocence Project researchers
have reported that 73 percent of the 239 convictions overturned through DNA
testing were based on eyewitness testimony. One third of these overturned cases
rested on the testimony of two or more mistaken eyewitnesses."(2)
Eye
witness accounts are highly susceptible to the passage of time, to preconceived
beliefs, to the effects of fatigue, patience, and by "filling in the
blanks" of information to speed processing/cataloging/retrieval of
information. The term we used in practice was a form of generalization,
however, currently University College London neuroscientist Karl Friston has
expanded on the theory, calling it a process of "predictive
coding."(3)
Our
brains actively predict or guess what we are seeing when there is not enough
information, or even when the image is first coming into our brains, predicting
what is going to be visualized and as a result, the brain accepts that guess as
an accurate representation - even if it is totally wrong.
Have
you ever seen the video in which a man in an ape-suit runs across the court
during a basketball game and people interviewed afterwards say they never saw
the "ape," even though it ran right across their field of vision?
Pretty funny. Here is a link to a site where you can watch an example of this
phenomenon. http://www.livescience.com/6727-invisible-gorilla-test-shows-notice.html
A
Stanford University paper lists the following about the accuracy of eye witness
testimony:
"Accuracy
of recollection decreases at a geometric rather than arithmetic rate (so
passage of time has a highly distorting effect on recollection); accuracy of
recollection is not highly correlated with the recollector's confidence; and
memory is highly suggestible – people are easily ‘reminded’ of events that never
happened, and having been ‘reminded’ may thereafter hold the false recollection
as tenaciously as they would a true one." (4)
In addition, truthfulness, like
beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. While in grad school, I performed an
experiment to determine if good looks or race had any affect on one's
perception of truthfulness. I showed a picture of an attractive, blond, white
male, white female; black male; and black female; as well as unattractive
versions of the same along with a vignette (short story) about the person. The
participants were asked to decide if they thought the person's dialogue in the
story was truthful or not.
In short, the experiment revealed
that white, attractive males were perceived as the most truthful and honest,
followed by attractive black males, then attractive white females, then attractive
black females, and then all followed by unattractive subjects. Attractiveness
counts, as does race and gender. Remember, this was all unconscious processing
happening as far as I could observe. The results were consistent with similar
studies done, so this was not relative only to my sample.
This is all interesting, but since
Scripture is inerrant, I believe in this case, Peter had another reason
for considering prophecy a more sure word: eye witness testimony requires at
least two witnesses, and is even then questionable, but prophecy is objectively
self-validating. It either comes to pass or it does not.
"When a prophet speaketh in
the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is
the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it
presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him." [Deut.18:22 KJV]
"The prophet which prophesieth
of peace, when the word of the prophet shall come to pass, then shall the
prophet be known, that the Lord hath truly sent him." [Jer. 28:9 KJV]
You can't get better evidence than
that.
1. Strong, James. The Strongest
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001
2. Arkowitz, Hal and Lilienfeld.
Scott O. Scientific American, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/do-the-eyes-have-it/.
2009
3. University of Glasgow. What
our eyes can't see, the brain fills in. Phys.Org. http://phys.org/news/2011-04-eyes-brain.html.
2011
4. Engelhardt, Laura.The Problem
with Eyewitness Testimony: a talk by Barbara Tversky, Professor of Psychology
and George Fisher, Professor of Law. http://agora.stanford.edu/sjls/Issue%20One/fisher&tversky.htm.
2015 citing from Krist v. Eli Lilly and Co., 897 F.2d 293, 297 (7th Cir. 1990),
(listing the findings of various psychological studies.)
