Facing trap questions

A crucial lesson for any apologist, and one which I have learned the hard way, is to learn to pick your battles. Not everyone who asks you a question has the intention of receiving an answer.

In Mark 11, we have an excellent example in the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders, who questioned Jesus as to whose authority He was acting on. These are people with whom Jesus regularly got into disagreements. They would often try to catch Him out, whether by making Him look foolish, or by giving them grounds to accuse Him.

Keeping in mind their own authority, they had no excuse for not knowing exactly who Jesus was. The Scriptures they studied on a regular basis prepared them for His arrival, and He performed many miraculous signs of His identity, and yet still they tried to trip Him up.

But Jesus responded by tripping them up. When they asked Him about His authority, He asked them a question: Is John's baptism from man, or from God? This was a difficult scenario for them. If they said from God, they would have to accept Jesus too. But if they said from men, they would be the ones looking foolish in front of the crowds. So they refused to answer, and so Jesus also refused to answer them.

This, of course, was not because He did not have an answer. He constantly asserted Himself as the one and only begotten Son of God, and The Father Himself confirmed this on a few occasions. On top of this, Jesus performed a number of miraculous signs to demonstrate His authority, as well as being able to appeal to the Scriptures that explicitly predict His arrival. He could have answered the chief priests, the scribes and the elders. But they were not looking for an answer.

Just like Jesus, we are perfectly entitled to refuse to answer trap questions. If possible, though of course we often lack the wisdom to do so, we can respond with something powerful and profound to flip it on them. Either way, it's better not to cast pearls before swine.