Skeptics of the Resurrection will often ask the philosophical question, "Why didn't Jesus appear to more people?" or even, "Why didn't Jesus appear to the entire world?" As is often the case, the apologist must not only be well versed in the science of his/her field, but also be skilled in the art of apologetics as well when dealing with question such as these. In other words, since people are not naturally born analytical thinkers, they often have questions with premises tucked away inside of them that they themselves have not, and probably can not articulate, and so, what comes out of their mouths is a question that begs to be precisely formulated into one, out of a multiplicity of possible other formulations that the questioner may be actually wanting to hear an answer to. So, with respect to the question under consideration, what kind of implicit argument might be tucked away in their question: "Why didn't Jesus appear to more people?"
1) The questioner may be asking, and therefore wanting, to hear an answer to the following argument:
a) If God wanted us to believe in Him on the basis of public evidence for the Resurrection, then he could have given us clear and convincing public evidence that Jesus was Resurrected (i.e. He could have appeared to the whole world).
b) God has not given us clear and convincing public evidence that Jesus was Resurrected.
c) Therefore, God does not want us to believe in the Resurrection on the basis of public evidence.
This argument is used by atheists and theists alike who want to convince people like me that apologetics is actually not what God intended for us to be doing in trying to bring people to Him. On the basis of this argument, these theists will say that God intended that we believe in Him only on the basis of the witness of the Holy Spirit, and that developing arguments for God's existence are actually against His will!
2) The questioner may be asking, and therefore wanting, to hear an answer to the following argument:
a) If God was perfectly loving, then there wouldn't be any people who do not believe in the Resurrection, and who are inculpable for their non-belief.
b) There are people who do not believe in the Resurrection, and are inculpable for their non-belief..
c) Therefore, a perfectly loving God does not exist.
Since so much hangs on believing in the Resurrection, God should do something 'extraordinary' in order to get people to believe that Jesus was resurrected (i.e. appear to the whole world). Indeed, there are people who have never even heard of Jesus.
RESPONSE TO ARGUMENT 1:
First of all, the phrase 'clear and convincing evidence' is ambiguous. It could mean anyone of the following:
A proves B beyond all doubt.
A is overwhelming evidence for B.
A is very strong evidence for B.
A makes B more likely than not.
A is good evidence for B.
A is fairly good evidence for B.
A makes B a real possibility.
A suggests that B.
A marginally increases the likelihood that B.
--Taken from Everitt's The Non-Existence of God
So then, the questioner would first have to pick which one of these standards of 'proof' they have in mind when they say that God could have given us 'clear and convincing evidence.' Whatever there answer, I think the phrase 'clear and convincing evidence' lands us in a Sorites Paradox. Sorites Paradoxes involve vague predicates of discrete quantities that upon analysis turn out to lead to absurdities, or arbitrary cut off points. For example, consider the phrase "heap of sand." How many discrete granules of sand would it take to constitute a heap of sand? Let's say you choose 100,000 granules as sufficient to constitute a heap of sand. Would you say that 99,999 granules is also a heap of sand? If you answer no, then you would have to give some justification for your answer that wasn't arbitrary, which can't be done. If you answer yes, then we can repeat this process until we are down to a single granule, and at no point could we non-abritarirly say, okay, after subtracting that last granule we transitioned from a heap of sand to a non-heap of sand.
There are a few ways to escape the paradox. One, is to deny that heaps of sand exist, which seems absurd. Consider a parallel paradox, but instead of sand, think of baldness. We could ask how many hairs you can lose before you are bald, and we run into the same kind of paradox. But nobody wants to say that there are no clear cases of being bald. The other way to try and escape the paradox is to name some lower and upper limit cases that are clear examples of the predicate under consideration (baldness, heap of sand, being rich, etc.) even though we could accuse such limit cases as being wholly arbitrary.
Sorites paradoxes are also relevant to Divine Hiddenness arguments because the proponents of such arguments say that if God existed He would have given us a "heap of evidence" so that everyone would believe in Him. However, we do not have a "heap of evidence." Therefore, God doesn't exist. Since, there are clear cases of sufficient evidence, we don't want to take the first way out of this paradox and say that there is no such thing as enough evidence to consititue a "heap." The second alternative seems better, but then I would want to know what non-abitrary criteria we can use to determine whether or not the evidence we have falls into the classification of a "heap." Whatever discrete and quantitative criteria an atheist comes up with for establihsing a lower and upper bound (where everything within those bounds consitutes a heap of evidence) would undoubtedly have to let in the amount of evidence we do have; or in any case, the burden of proof is on the skeptic to demonstrate that the evidence we have for the resurrection is not 'clear and convincing.' Therefore, this type of Divine Hiddenness argument is asking for something we already have, but it tries to obfuscate this evidence by relying on vague predicates.
Moreover, with respect to the first argument, all that follows deductively is that God doesn't want us to believe in Him only and primarily on the basis of public evidence. It may be that the public evidence we do have is not as clear as it could have been, but it may still be sufficient to warrant belief in God, or the public evidence could be weakly sufficient (more plausible than not), and yet still be the means by which we come to be warranted in believing that God exists either on that evidence alone, or the public evidence (ranging from weak to strong) could serve to trigger a properly basic belief in God (See below). In the latter case, although the evidence wouldn't serve to ground belief in God on its own, it may still be a necessary means that triggers the ultima facie properly basic warrant for belief in God. So then, what somebody would have to show is that there are people who would not only believe THAT the resurrection occured, but believe IN God on the basis of public evidence if that evidence were 'clearer and more convincing' than the public evidence we do have, and moreover, they would have to show that evidence we do have is not sufficient without begging the question, and/or they would have to show that weaker evidence cannot be the means by which someone is warranted in their belief in God either taking that evidence on its own or as a means or trigger for a properly basic belief in God. But how in the world could someone demonstrate such a thing! Moreover, not only the conclusion of the argument, but the further naive claim that doing positive apologetics is against the will of God is a non-sequitor.
In fact, if God is the greatest conceivable being, then that means that He is maximally rational. It is impossible for a maximally rational agent to withhold belief in some proposition x if there is sufficient evidence to believe in x even if the evidence for x could be more 'clear and convincing' compared to what it actually is (it isn't necessary for a maximally rational being to be omniscient). Thus, if there is sufficient evidence for the event of the resurrection, then it is impossible for a maximally rational agent to not believe in the resurrection. But then, if God (a maximally rational agent) cannot not believe in the resurrection on the basis of sufficient evidence, then it is impossible that such an agent wouldn't want other rational agents to believe in the resurrection on the basis of such evidence. Thus, this argument has an implicit absurdy within it, namely, a maximally rational agent would believe something on the basis of sufficient evidence but that such an agent wouldn't want any other rational agents to believe something on the basis fo sufficient evidence! But, rationality has to do with how one OUGHT to reason so that if a maximally rational agent would believe something on the basis of sufficient evidence (which such an agent would surely do) then all other rational agents OUGHT to believe as well.
Thus, if the evidence is sufficient, then the rational thing to do would be to believe in the resurrection. If a person claims that it is insufficient without giving an argument as why this is the case, then they beg the question. If a person says well God could have given us 'clearer' evidence then we in fact have, we can agree with them, but point out that God has already given us sufficient evidence to believe in the resurrection, and if they admit that then the rational thing for them to is believe. It is an impossible double standard to say that God should give us enough evidence to believe in the resurrection, and then to be given that evidence only to not follow it where it leads. Indeed, if by 'clear and convincing someone means more evidence than what we do have, then it should be pointed out that 'one more' could be added to anything quantitative (one more appearance, one more Gospel, one more eyewitness, etc.) for a potential infinity and so no matter what the evidence someone could always ask for more which surely is absurd because then (by the objectors logic) we could never believe anything on the basis of public evidence. Thus, what is important to realize is that premise one is making a comparative claim, namely, the evidence we have could have been 'clearer.' However, this is vacuous since this could be said no matter what the evidence, and moreover, what someone would have to show is the evidence we do have is not 'clear and convincing enough;' enough for what you might say? Convincing enough to believe that the resurrection happened, but then the objector is forced to head into the trenches of historical detail and away from the original claim which premise 1 claims, namely, that simply because God could have given us 'one more piece of evidence x' ad infinitum compared to what we do have, that therefore God doesn't want us to believe in Him on the basis of public evidence. If someone disagrees that the evidence is sufficient then you may respectfully disagree and try to persuade them otherwise. If someone agrees that the evidence is sufficient but wants to know why God didn't give more evidence then you could offer plausible reasons. In either case though, the person has abandoned their argument since all that is required of God is a sufficient revelation, and just because it could have been 'clearer' doesn't mean that God doesn't want us to believe in Him on the basis of the public evidence we do have. In fact, I think such a display would have very negative consequences (see near the bottom of this blog for an explanation). With that said, there is something that is right about the argument as well that I think the Christian should happily agree with, namely, that God doesn't want people to believe in Him only on the basis of public evidence. The support for thinking this is both Scriptural and philosophical in nature.
Biblical reasons:
(Rom. 8.14-16; 1 Jn. 2.27; 5.6-10) These verses seem to teach that faith in Christ can be immediately grounded by the inner witness of the Holy Spirit so that argument and evidence aren't required for the Christian to be rational in holding his/her belief that the great truths of the gospel are true.
Philosophical reasons (taken from WLC):
1) If arguments and evidence were always necessary in order to be justified in holding to the Christian faith, then all who lack the ability, time, or opportunity to understand and assess the arguments and evidence would be lost. This consequence would no doubt consign untold millions of people who are Christians to unbelief.
(2) Those who have been presented with more cogent arguments against Christian theism than for it would have a just excuse before God for their unbelief. But Scripture says that all men are without excuse for not responding to the revelation they have (Rom. 1:21).
(3) This view creates a sort of intellectual elite, a priesthood of philosophers and historians, who will dictate to the masses of humanity whether or not it is rational for them to believe in the gospel. But surely faith is available to everyone who, in response to the Spirit’s drawing, calls upon the name of the Lord.
(4) Faith is subjected to the vagaries of human reason and the shifting sands of evidence, making Christian faith rational in one generation and irrational in the next. But the witness of the Spirit makes every generation contemporaneous with Christ and thus secures a firm basis for faith.
So then, we would expect God to offer both avenues of warrant (public and private) to ground belief in him depending on the epistemic contexts of different individuals across human history, especially if doing so will bring people into a saving love relationship with Him that otherwise would not have believed in Him:
Properly basic and private warrant via the witness of the Holy Spirit is always necessary and sufficient for a non-believer to become a believer. Public evidence can be sufficient in conjunction with the Spirit, but it is not always necessary. However, it doesn't follow from that that apologetics is useless, or of no benefit. In fact, it may become necessary given the cultural milieu in which the Gospel is preached if it is to be heard as an effective message. Indeed, I came to the Lord because of apologetics, and without it, I never would have believed! Other possible benefits of apologetics are being a bolder and more effective witness of the gospel, strengthening faith in times of spiritual dryness, but most important of all; shaping culture by keeping the gospel a plausible candidate in the marketplace of worldviews for non-believers. Lastly, even if the evidence for the resurrection is not strong, it may still be plausible enough to trigger a properly basic belief in the truth of essential truths of Christianity (of which the resurrection is a part). For example, suppose upon waking up one morning after drinking too much the night before not being able to recall what you did (not necessarily black-out, but your memory is very fuzzy or you can't conjure up any images from the night after a certain point, or something to that effect). Then, your friend walks into your room to tell you that last night was wild. Now, your friend is sort of an a$$hole, but you love him anyway. He is not the most reliable source of testimony but he isn't a habitual liar either. Upon hearing his testimony of what you did the night before your memory is triggered, and the properly basic belief of what happened is reliably formed in response to the external evidence of you friends testimony which is only about .51 likely based on previous experience. Nonetheless, the testimonial evidence triggered a properly basic belief that you are fully warranted in accepting as veridical. I think this is yet another relationship the evidence for the resurrection can have to the witness of the Holy Spirit (if that religious epistemology is correct at least) as William Lane Craig defends it.
Premise 2 is false. Premise two is basically asking for evidence strong enough to overcome a high prior improbability, and there is more than one way to do that (i.e. Jesus doesn't have to appear to the whole world in order to overcome a high prior improbability) In fact, the quality and quantity of the evidence is so good, that it can overcome a prior improbability of a million to one with a posterior probability of 99.99 percent. Read the following article to see a defense of this: http://www.johndepoe.com/Resurrection.pdf
RESPONSE TO THE SECOND OBJECTION: This objection presupposes exclusivism, which is neither necessary in order to be a Christian, nor to be saved if one instead adopts inclusivism or universalism. However, if one wants to maintain exclusivism then I suggest reading an article by William Lane Craig: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5347
One more comment that I think is worthwhile here is that what is presupposed in both of these objections is that people at all times and places are just waiting to sincerely believe in God and love Him, and worship Him if only God would give them enough evidence (i.e. by appearing). However, we are enemies of God biblically speaking, and in terms of evolutionary psychology we are very self-centered creatures that would prefer to create our own rules and life principles just as much, or more, than we would prefer to be God-centered and follow his wisdom for the good life (I take it that this is what original sin amounts to, or at least approximates to). Thus, to claim that human beings are just passive divine receptacles of truth (and therefore inculpable) is to have a view of human nature that is mistaken. Since God judges people on the basis of the revelation they do have, it is actually for a persons own good that Jesus doesn't appear to them because even if such a revelation would cause that person to believe that Jesus is resurrected, there is no guarantee, and indeed, positive reason to think that many people wouldn't believe IN God, but in such a case they will be judged more harshly since they would have been given such a clear and unmistakable revelation from God. On the other hand, those who are privy to hear the historical evidence for Jesus but who reject it may form the context that helps other people evaluate that evidence more closely and who ultimately find it convincing.
Lastly, the biblical implication for the purpose of the appearances is for commissioning the disciples for world mission.
a) If God wanted us to believe in Him on the basis of public evidence for the Resurrection, then he could have given us clear and convincing public evidence that Jesus was Resurrected (i.e. He could have appeared to the whole world).
b) God has not given us clear and convincing public evidence that Jesus was Resurrected.
c) Therefore, God does not want us to believe in the Resurrection on the basis of public evidence.
This argument is used by atheists and theists alike who want to convince people like me that apologetics is actually not what God intended for us to be doing in trying to bring people to Him. On the basis of this argument, these theists will say that God intended that we believe in Him only on the basis of the witness of the Holy Spirit, and that developing arguments for God's existence are actually against His will!
2) The questioner may be asking, and therefore wanting, to hear an answer to the following argument:
a) If God was perfectly loving, then there wouldn't be any people who do not believe in the Resurrection, and who are inculpable for their non-belief.
b) There are people who do not believe in the Resurrection, and are inculpable for their non-belief..
c) Therefore, a perfectly loving God does not exist.
Since so much hangs on believing in the Resurrection, God should do something 'extraordinary' in order to get people to believe that Jesus was resurrected (i.e. appear to the whole world). Indeed, there are people who have never even heard of Jesus.
RESPONSE TO ARGUMENT 1:
First of all, the phrase 'clear and convincing evidence' is ambiguous. It could mean anyone of the following:
A proves B beyond all doubt.
A is overwhelming evidence for B.
A is very strong evidence for B.
A makes B more likely than not.
A is good evidence for B.
A is fairly good evidence for B.
A makes B a real possibility.
A suggests that B.
A marginally increases the likelihood that B.
--Taken from Everitt's The Non-Existence of God
So then, the questioner would first have to pick which one of these standards of 'proof' they have in mind when they say that God could have given us 'clear and convincing evidence.' Whatever there answer, I think the phrase 'clear and convincing evidence' lands us in a Sorites Paradox. Sorites Paradoxes involve vague predicates of discrete quantities that upon analysis turn out to lead to absurdities, or arbitrary cut off points. For example, consider the phrase "heap of sand." How many discrete granules of sand would it take to constitute a heap of sand? Let's say you choose 100,000 granules as sufficient to constitute a heap of sand. Would you say that 99,999 granules is also a heap of sand? If you answer no, then you would have to give some justification for your answer that wasn't arbitrary, which can't be done. If you answer yes, then we can repeat this process until we are down to a single granule, and at no point could we non-abritarirly say, okay, after subtracting that last granule we transitioned from a heap of sand to a non-heap of sand.
There are a few ways to escape the paradox. One, is to deny that heaps of sand exist, which seems absurd. Consider a parallel paradox, but instead of sand, think of baldness. We could ask how many hairs you can lose before you are bald, and we run into the same kind of paradox. But nobody wants to say that there are no clear cases of being bald. The other way to try and escape the paradox is to name some lower and upper limit cases that are clear examples of the predicate under consideration (baldness, heap of sand, being rich, etc.) even though we could accuse such limit cases as being wholly arbitrary.
Sorites paradoxes are also relevant to Divine Hiddenness arguments because the proponents of such arguments say that if God existed He would have given us a "heap of evidence" so that everyone would believe in Him. However, we do not have a "heap of evidence." Therefore, God doesn't exist. Since, there are clear cases of sufficient evidence, we don't want to take the first way out of this paradox and say that there is no such thing as enough evidence to consititue a "heap." The second alternative seems better, but then I would want to know what non-abitrary criteria we can use to determine whether or not the evidence we have falls into the classification of a "heap." Whatever discrete and quantitative criteria an atheist comes up with for establihsing a lower and upper bound (where everything within those bounds consitutes a heap of evidence) would undoubtedly have to let in the amount of evidence we do have; or in any case, the burden of proof is on the skeptic to demonstrate that the evidence we have for the resurrection is not 'clear and convincing.' Therefore, this type of Divine Hiddenness argument is asking for something we already have, but it tries to obfuscate this evidence by relying on vague predicates.
Moreover, with respect to the first argument, all that follows deductively is that God doesn't want us to believe in Him only and primarily on the basis of public evidence. It may be that the public evidence we do have is not as clear as it could have been, but it may still be sufficient to warrant belief in God, or the public evidence could be weakly sufficient (more plausible than not), and yet still be the means by which we come to be warranted in believing that God exists either on that evidence alone, or the public evidence (ranging from weak to strong) could serve to trigger a properly basic belief in God (See below). In the latter case, although the evidence wouldn't serve to ground belief in God on its own, it may still be a necessary means that triggers the ultima facie properly basic warrant for belief in God. So then, what somebody would have to show is that there are people who would not only believe THAT the resurrection occured, but believe IN God on the basis of public evidence if that evidence were 'clearer and more convincing' than the public evidence we do have, and moreover, they would have to show that evidence we do have is not sufficient without begging the question, and/or they would have to show that weaker evidence cannot be the means by which someone is warranted in their belief in God either taking that evidence on its own or as a means or trigger for a properly basic belief in God. But how in the world could someone demonstrate such a thing! Moreover, not only the conclusion of the argument, but the further naive claim that doing positive apologetics is against the will of God is a non-sequitor.
In fact, if God is the greatest conceivable being, then that means that He is maximally rational. It is impossible for a maximally rational agent to withhold belief in some proposition x if there is sufficient evidence to believe in x even if the evidence for x could be more 'clear and convincing' compared to what it actually is (it isn't necessary for a maximally rational being to be omniscient). Thus, if there is sufficient evidence for the event of the resurrection, then it is impossible for a maximally rational agent to not believe in the resurrection. But then, if God (a maximally rational agent) cannot not believe in the resurrection on the basis of sufficient evidence, then it is impossible that such an agent wouldn't want other rational agents to believe in the resurrection on the basis of such evidence. Thus, this argument has an implicit absurdy within it, namely, a maximally rational agent would believe something on the basis of sufficient evidence but that such an agent wouldn't want any other rational agents to believe something on the basis fo sufficient evidence! But, rationality has to do with how one OUGHT to reason so that if a maximally rational agent would believe something on the basis of sufficient evidence (which such an agent would surely do) then all other rational agents OUGHT to believe as well.
Thus, if the evidence is sufficient, then the rational thing to do would be to believe in the resurrection. If a person claims that it is insufficient without giving an argument as why this is the case, then they beg the question. If a person says well God could have given us 'clearer' evidence then we in fact have, we can agree with them, but point out that God has already given us sufficient evidence to believe in the resurrection, and if they admit that then the rational thing for them to is believe. It is an impossible double standard to say that God should give us enough evidence to believe in the resurrection, and then to be given that evidence only to not follow it where it leads. Indeed, if by 'clear and convincing someone means more evidence than what we do have, then it should be pointed out that 'one more' could be added to anything quantitative (one more appearance, one more Gospel, one more eyewitness, etc.) for a potential infinity and so no matter what the evidence someone could always ask for more which surely is absurd because then (by the objectors logic) we could never believe anything on the basis of public evidence. Thus, what is important to realize is that premise one is making a comparative claim, namely, the evidence we have could have been 'clearer.' However, this is vacuous since this could be said no matter what the evidence, and moreover, what someone would have to show is the evidence we do have is not 'clear and convincing enough;' enough for what you might say? Convincing enough to believe that the resurrection happened, but then the objector is forced to head into the trenches of historical detail and away from the original claim which premise 1 claims, namely, that simply because God could have given us 'one more piece of evidence x' ad infinitum compared to what we do have, that therefore God doesn't want us to believe in Him on the basis of public evidence. If someone disagrees that the evidence is sufficient then you may respectfully disagree and try to persuade them otherwise. If someone agrees that the evidence is sufficient but wants to know why God didn't give more evidence then you could offer plausible reasons. In either case though, the person has abandoned their argument since all that is required of God is a sufficient revelation, and just because it could have been 'clearer' doesn't mean that God doesn't want us to believe in Him on the basis of the public evidence we do have. In fact, I think such a display would have very negative consequences (see near the bottom of this blog for an explanation). With that said, there is something that is right about the argument as well that I think the Christian should happily agree with, namely, that God doesn't want people to believe in Him only on the basis of public evidence. The support for thinking this is both Scriptural and philosophical in nature.
Biblical reasons:
(Rom. 8.14-16; 1 Jn. 2.27; 5.6-10) These verses seem to teach that faith in Christ can be immediately grounded by the inner witness of the Holy Spirit so that argument and evidence aren't required for the Christian to be rational in holding his/her belief that the great truths of the gospel are true.
Philosophical reasons (taken from WLC):
1) If arguments and evidence were always necessary in order to be justified in holding to the Christian faith, then all who lack the ability, time, or opportunity to understand and assess the arguments and evidence would be lost. This consequence would no doubt consign untold millions of people who are Christians to unbelief.
(2) Those who have been presented with more cogent arguments against Christian theism than for it would have a just excuse before God for their unbelief. But Scripture says that all men are without excuse for not responding to the revelation they have (Rom. 1:21).
(3) This view creates a sort of intellectual elite, a priesthood of philosophers and historians, who will dictate to the masses of humanity whether or not it is rational for them to believe in the gospel. But surely faith is available to everyone who, in response to the Spirit’s drawing, calls upon the name of the Lord.
(4) Faith is subjected to the vagaries of human reason and the shifting sands of evidence, making Christian faith rational in one generation and irrational in the next. But the witness of the Spirit makes every generation contemporaneous with Christ and thus secures a firm basis for faith.
So then, we would expect God to offer both avenues of warrant (public and private) to ground belief in him depending on the epistemic contexts of different individuals across human history, especially if doing so will bring people into a saving love relationship with Him that otherwise would not have believed in Him:
Properly basic and private warrant via the witness of the Holy Spirit is always necessary and sufficient for a non-believer to become a believer. Public evidence can be sufficient in conjunction with the Spirit, but it is not always necessary. However, it doesn't follow from that that apologetics is useless, or of no benefit. In fact, it may become necessary given the cultural milieu in which the Gospel is preached if it is to be heard as an effective message. Indeed, I came to the Lord because of apologetics, and without it, I never would have believed! Other possible benefits of apologetics are being a bolder and more effective witness of the gospel, strengthening faith in times of spiritual dryness, but most important of all; shaping culture by keeping the gospel a plausible candidate in the marketplace of worldviews for non-believers. Lastly, even if the evidence for the resurrection is not strong, it may still be plausible enough to trigger a properly basic belief in the truth of essential truths of Christianity (of which the resurrection is a part). For example, suppose upon waking up one morning after drinking too much the night before not being able to recall what you did (not necessarily black-out, but your memory is very fuzzy or you can't conjure up any images from the night after a certain point, or something to that effect). Then, your friend walks into your room to tell you that last night was wild. Now, your friend is sort of an a$$hole, but you love him anyway. He is not the most reliable source of testimony but he isn't a habitual liar either. Upon hearing his testimony of what you did the night before your memory is triggered, and the properly basic belief of what happened is reliably formed in response to the external evidence of you friends testimony which is only about .51 likely based on previous experience. Nonetheless, the testimonial evidence triggered a properly basic belief that you are fully warranted in accepting as veridical. I think this is yet another relationship the evidence for the resurrection can have to the witness of the Holy Spirit (if that religious epistemology is correct at least) as William Lane Craig defends it.
Premise 2 is false. Premise two is basically asking for evidence strong enough to overcome a high prior improbability, and there is more than one way to do that (i.e. Jesus doesn't have to appear to the whole world in order to overcome a high prior improbability) In fact, the quality and quantity of the evidence is so good, that it can overcome a prior improbability of a million to one with a posterior probability of 99.99 percent. Read the following article to see a defense of this: http://www.johndepoe.com/Resurrection.pdf
RESPONSE TO THE SECOND OBJECTION: This objection presupposes exclusivism, which is neither necessary in order to be a Christian, nor to be saved if one instead adopts inclusivism or universalism. However, if one wants to maintain exclusivism then I suggest reading an article by William Lane Craig: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5347
One more comment that I think is worthwhile here is that what is presupposed in both of these objections is that people at all times and places are just waiting to sincerely believe in God and love Him, and worship Him if only God would give them enough evidence (i.e. by appearing). However, we are enemies of God biblically speaking, and in terms of evolutionary psychology we are very self-centered creatures that would prefer to create our own rules and life principles just as much, or more, than we would prefer to be God-centered and follow his wisdom for the good life (I take it that this is what original sin amounts to, or at least approximates to). Thus, to claim that human beings are just passive divine receptacles of truth (and therefore inculpable) is to have a view of human nature that is mistaken. Since God judges people on the basis of the revelation they do have, it is actually for a persons own good that Jesus doesn't appear to them because even if such a revelation would cause that person to believe that Jesus is resurrected, there is no guarantee, and indeed, positive reason to think that many people wouldn't believe IN God, but in such a case they will be judged more harshly since they would have been given such a clear and unmistakable revelation from God. On the other hand, those who are privy to hear the historical evidence for Jesus but who reject it may form the context that helps other people evaluate that evidence more closely and who ultimately find it convincing.
Lastly, the biblical implication for the purpose of the appearances is for commissioning the disciples for world mission.
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