7 Factors for Testing a Historical Hypothesis

The following is an excerpt from William Lane Craig‘s Reasonable Faith, 3rd Edition, p. 233:
“The process of determining which historical reconstruction is the best explanation will involve the historian’s craft, as various factors will have to be weighed. In his book Justifying Historical Descriptions, C. Behan McCullagh lists the factors which historians typically weigh in testing a historical hypothesis:

  1. The hypothesis, together with other true statements, must imply further statements describing present observable data.
  2. The hypothesis must have greater explanatory scope (that is, imply a greater variety of observable data) than rival hypotheses.
  3. The hypothesis must have greater explanatory power (that is, make the observable data more probable) than rival hypotheses.
  4. The hypothesis must be more plausible (that is, be implied by a greater variety of accepted truths, and its negation implied by fewer accepted truths) than rival hypotheses.
  5. The hypothesis must be less ad hoc (that is, include fewer new suppositions about the past not already implied by existing knowledge) than rival hypotheses.
  6. The hypothesis must be disconfirmed by fewer accepted beleifs (that is, when conjoined with accepted truths, imply fewer false statements) than rival hypotheses.
  7. The hypothesis must so exceed its rivals in fulfilling conditions (2)-(6) that there is little chance of a rival hypothesis, after further investigation, exceeding it in meeting these conditions.”

For writings from William Lane Craig on the Historical Jesus, see here. Wikipedia on the historical method. Philosophical papers by C. Behan McCullagh here.

    Written by

    Brian Auten is the founder emeritus of Apologetics315. He is also director of Reasonable Faith Belfast. Brian holds a Masters degree in Christian Apologetics and has interviewed over 150 Christian apologists. His background is in missions, media direction, graphic design, and administration. Brian started Apologetics315 in 2007 to be an apologetics hub to equip Christians to defend the faith.

    Type at least 1 character to search
    Catch the AP315 Team Online:

    The mission of Apologetics 315 is to provide educational resources for the defense of the Christian faith, with the goal of strengthening the faith of believers and engaging the questions and challenges of other worldviews.

    Defenders Media provides media solutions to an alliance of evangelistic ministries that defend the Christian worldview. We do this by elevating the quality of our members’ branding to match the excellence of the content being delivered.