Is the Bible TRUE? | Alex O'Connor vs. Dinesh D'Souza | Debate Teacher Reacts

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Luke says that after the birth of Jesus, the family fled to Egypt. Matthew says that they went to the

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Jerusalem temple. Are they both correct or is one of them wrong? Who the heck cares?

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That's not the right response. Who the heck cares? That's not going to win folks to your side.

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The Bible is a historical text and a scientific text when it needs to be and it's not one when you don't want it to be.

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Wow, this is going very badly for D'Souza. And very well for O 'Connor.

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Skeptic Alex O 'Connor goes toe -to -toe with Christian Dinesh D'Souza. The debate is over whether or not the

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Bible is true. Who bested the other on the debate stage? Who asked better questions and challenged their opponent more ferociously?

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We're about to find out. If you're new here, welcome to Wise Disciple. My name is Nate and I'm helping you become the effective Christian that you were meant to be.

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Before I jumped into this ministry full -time, I was a debate teacher and it is from that vantage point that I make these videos.

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Make sure to like and subscribe to the channel since we're slowly making our way to 200 ,000 subs and I'd love to get your help with that.

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Go to logos .com forward slash wise disciple for more. I'm happy to essentially take the things that I said in my opening statement and slot them in and apply them to the things that you just said right there.

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So you began by saying that the Bible is a strange book to ask these questions of because of its purpose. I assume you'd agree with me that the

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Bible is a collection of books rather than a singular text with different authors, different intentions, and most importantly, different genres.

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So the first question I suppose I'd like to ask you is, do you agree, for example, that at least some biblical texts are attempts at historical biography such as in the gospels?

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Of course, I would agree with that, but let me just qualify it this way. Sure. When we think of the

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Bible as revealed, the question now becomes, what do we mean? Did God write the book?

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Did God inspire the book and human beings wrote it?

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Did God show human beings events that they then described in their own words?

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Okay, so the reason these things are important is it seems to me, to answer the question I raised earlier about in the beginning,

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God created the heavens and the earth, the way I understand it is there's a perfect revelation shown to a gospel, to a

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Bible, to a Jewish scribe who sees it, so to speak, but writes it in his own words.

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When I look at the book of Revelation, same thing. Does it get anything wrong? Do those scribes get anything wrong?

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It's quite possible that they, when you say get anything wrong, they are writing it in human terms. I mean, you know,

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I mean the specifically mundane human things. I'm not talking about when the author of Genesis says that God created the heavens of the earth or talks about the spirit moving across the face of the water.

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This is clearly mythological. This is clearly an attempt at mythological writing. That's fine. It would be silly to ask if that's true or not, but when somebody...

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I don't think it is mythological writing at all. I think that it is simply... I mean, put it this way. If we were in the year 4 ,000

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BC, if we were John the divine, and let's just say that God showed us in a vision the actual end of the world, right?

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Apocalypse. I wouldn't have gone to Revelation to hold that up and compare it to Genesis.

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I... That strategy is fraught with issues. So I'm trying to remain silent right now and just let everything unfold.

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I think things are interesting already. Let's just see how this plays out.

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We would then write down the four horsemen of the apocalypse, death and famine and destruction.

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We're not engaging in myth -making at all. I'm actually writing what I see. So you think there'll be a seven headed demon?

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Of course not. I'm saying that to me, what I'm seeing is so... Let's just say, for example, it is a cosmo...

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It is a thermonuclear explosion of a kind that the ancient Bible writer doesn't even know what it is, right?

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And the consequence of it is death and destruction and famine. He's going to write it down the way he sees it.

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But where's he going to get the seven headed dragon and the prostitute from? This is, this is...

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Well, he's going to get it from the Old Testament and he's going to incorporate

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Gematria in the specific numbers that he utilizes as a Jew in the first century would.

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So let me start off by saying, O 'Connor is leading with some excellent questions.

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I watched both of their opening statements. I just get the sense that what O 'Connor is doing at this point is he's setting a garden path.

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So these are initial questions that are going to lead to a whopper later. And D'Souza is trying very carefully not to get pinned, okay?

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I mentioned, you know, I saw their opening statement. I don't know if I could use the phrase opening statement. It seems this exchange seems a little bit more loose, not as formal than what would be on, you know, in a tournament or something on the debate stage.

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But definitely O 'Connor, it seems like he came ready to fight. And D'Souza was just off kilter in his opening statement.

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He seemed pretty left -footed in his presentation. If I had to guess, he was not prepared to hear

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O 'Connor's opener and it probably threw him off. Is this like a human attempt to describe a nuclear reaction?

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Yes, because when words and images fail, metaphor is the actual conduit to truth.

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Now I'd understand if that were the case, if you said that perhaps after a nuclear blast, somebody describes it as, you know, the gods of fire descending upon man with their flaming sword or something like that.

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But like a prostitute and a seven headed dragon? Well, first of all, I'm not saying it is a nuclear explosion.

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You're the problem. It wasn't a prostitute. So notice the incredulity on O 'Connor's part.

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Well, unless he's referring to Revelation 13 and not 12. So that was unclear.

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Maybe he is talking about the prostitute there. But notice the incredulity, just repeating, you know, the more incredible moments in, oh, by the way, a very highly symbolic book, right?

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An apocalyptic piece of literature that was very Jewish in nature. Nobody in the Christian church believes that the woman in Revelation 13, the dragon that comes up out of the ocean.

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In Revelation 12, the one who's being chased around an outer space, like this really is taking place in outer space.

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That the pregnant woman is a real literal woman. This beast is a real multi -headed dragon.

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We look at the rules of apocalyptic interpretation and we recognize what the author, John, is doing.

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But that's not the point. Anyway, incredulity is a very useful tool on the debate stage. Christians do the same thing to atheists, by the way, when it's their turn to get cross -examined.

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So Connor is doing what he should be doing at this point. The problem is, we're given this admittedly phantasmagorical future account, right?

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And it is so wrenching and powerful that many people, for example, have tried to render it by art and it's not easy to do it, right?

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It's not easy to do it because we have to stop and realize, first of all, that we're dealing not only with the limitations of perception, but the limitations of language.

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Let me give you a simple example. I come to America from India. I have never eaten a mushroom, okay?

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I ask you, Alex, what does a mushroom taste like? Sure. I would submit that you would be completely unable to render to me, in words, however lengthy and ornate, what a mushroom actually tastes like.

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That may be true, but I was asking, for example, about Jesus' presentation at the

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Temple of Jerusalem after his birth. This is not like trying to describe a mushroom or the end of the world.

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No, no. Okay, so now let's talk about that. Hold on a second. This is a historical event that's being recorded by one

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New Testament writer at the same time as another New Testament writer says that the family had traveled to Egypt. I don't think this is an attempt at metaphor or allegory, as I would say of Genesis, whether you think that is or not.

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I would say that in the case of the Gospels, we can agree that, in at least some instances, this is a clear attempt at mundane history.

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This is not an attempt at writing some kind of metaphor to explain a truth that's otherwise unknowable to the human mind. It's a very straightforward attempt to record what actually happened, and they contradict each other.

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Okay, so there it is. So O 'Connor wants to know, by the way, he brought up in his opening statement sort of the birth narrative there, the things that happened directly after Jesus' birth in Matthew chapter two and the corresponding passage there in Luke.

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O 'Connor wants to know why these apparent contradictions are there. And I think it's

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Luke chapter two. And so, I mean, at this point, I think we're going pretty fast. So I won't open up those passages, but just keep an eye on Matthew chapter two and Luke chapter two.

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Just have your Bible open if you have it, you know, just for your own reference. They contradict each other because they're written by four different people.

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So let me ask you this. If God were writing it, I'm quite sure. Did D'Souza just say that they contradicted each other?

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It happened, and they contradict each other. They contradict each other because they're written by four different people. So let me ask you this.

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If God were writing it, I'm quite sure he would have written it once. He wouldn't need four. Sure. So some of them are wrong then?

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No. Okay. So when you say they're wrong, let's consider Luke's gospel for a minute.

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Luke is a medical doctor. Luke is not present at the events being described.

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Luke is virtually in the position of Thucydides riding the Peloponnesian War. Now Thucydides did fight in the war, but in most of the events described by Thucydides in the

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Peloponnesian War, he wasn't there. Making them very unreliable, right? No, on the contrary. It is, in fact, the most reliable account of the

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Peloponnesian War that historians have. Let's not say that it is reliable though. No, it is. What I'm trying to say is that when you're talking about historicity, and you're talking about historicity now in the ancient world, you have to recognize that these people are not, these people are not approaching it as modern historians.

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Luke is going around interviewing people. So let me ask you this very straightforwardly then. Okay. Luke says that after the birth of Jesus, the family fled to Egypt.

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Matthew says that they went to the Jerusalem temple. Are they both correct? Or is one of them wrong?

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Who the heck cares? I mean, look. I do. And so you do. But let me say. Ooh, that's not the right response.

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Who the heck cares? That's not going to win folks to your side. Particularly when the debate is, it says, is the

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Bible true? Okay. So I actually said I wouldn't do this, but now I'm going to. So Jesus is born and then he is dedicated to the

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Lord. Look at this. So this is verse 21. And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called

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Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. And when the time came for their purification, according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the

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Lord. Look at verse 39. And when they had performed everything according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee to their own town of Nazareth.

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And the child grew, became strong, filled with wisdom, and the favor of God was upon him. Okay. So there's

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Luke's timeline of events. Jesus is born. He is circumcised at the end of eight days.

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He is presented to the Lord for purification, right? They're following the rites and rituals that the

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Jews would for any baby. And then they, it says, they returned to Nazareth.

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Okay. Now here's Matthew's account. Look at this. Verse one. Now, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the

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King, behold, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem saying, where is he who has been born

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King of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him. When Herod the

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King heard this, he was troubled in all Jerusalem with him. Now look at verse eight. And he,

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Herod, sent them to Bethlehem, sent the wise men to Bethlehem saying, go and search diligently for the child.

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And when you have found him, bring me word that I too may come and worship him. After, now pay attention to verse nine.

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After listening to the King, they went on their way and behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was.

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Okay. So it says that the wise men are sent to Bethlehem, but then they see the star and it appears to take them where Jesus is.

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By the way, it doesn't say where. Oh, also, by the way, it doesn't say how old Jesus is at this point.

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All we know in verse one is that after Jesus was born. Okay. So, and then verse 12, it says that they were warned in a dream not to return to Herod.

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And so they departed for their own country. They left and returned to their own country quietly.

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And then verse 13. Now, when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph now in a dream and said, rise, take the child and his mother and flee to Egypt and remain there until I tell you for Herod is about to search for the child to destroy him.

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And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod.

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This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet out of Egypt. I called my son. Okay. After this, the next account that we have of Jesus as a child is when he's 12 years old and he's back in Jerusalem.

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Okay. So now we have the two accounts. The question is, is there a contradiction between these two accounts or not?

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Let's see how D'Souza responds. Let me say why, let me say why what you care about is not only trivial, but indicates a kind of unwillingness to try to get what the text is trying to communicate.

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I don't think it's trivial. Because I think that the reason why Luke may have invented the flight to Egypt, but he tells us,

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Luke says when he records the flight to Egypt and then they return from Egypt, he says, this is so that we can fulfill the prophecy from Hosea chapter 11, out of Egypt, I shall call my son.

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Now in Hosea, God is talking here about the nation of Israel, at least in this case, unlike the

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Matthew prophecy, the prophecy actually exists and we can interrogate it. It seems to me like what Luke is doing here is attempting to display

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Jesus as the fulfillment of the old Testament prophecy. And in fact, he tells us that that's what he's doing. Therefore, if it is the case that Jesus didn't go to Egypt and didn't come out of Egypt on his return, then this would undermine

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Luke's attempts to identify Jesus as the Jewish Messiah fulfillment of the old Testament prophecy. That's why I think it is. And that's true.

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So either D'Souza needs to make the argument that the gospel is not a historical narrative or he needs to prove that there is no contradiction.

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Those are really the only two options available to him at this point. Well, look.

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And not trivial. Right. But I think that the... Would you agree with that? I mean, do you think it's a completely trivial point?

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If it's so trivial... No, I think that the point... And why is it included in the first place? The point as you stated it before is trivial. The point you're now raising is not trivial, but the point you're now raising is one in which you have three centuries of Jewish Christian disputation about whether Jesus is the

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Messiah. Okay. And by and large, the disputation breaks down in this way. The Jews are the biblical literalists and the

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Christians are the sort of metaphorical readers.

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And I say this because... Let's take a very famous passage that bears on this very topic, where Jesus is talking about the destruction of the temple.

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And the Jews go, you know, you said the temple would be destroyed. Now, interestingly,

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Jesus did say the temple would be destroyed and the temple was in fact destroyed in 70 AD.

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In fact, 40 years after Jesus said that, the temple was in fact physically raised to the ground and the

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Jews dispersed in a huge diaspora. But my point is Jesus doesn't reply that. Jesus doesn't say, hey, listen, wait 40 years.

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Jesus says, no, you're misreading me completely. When I said the temple,

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I was actually speaking of the temple of my body. He doesn't tell them that. He, well, but this is stated...

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We're told that that's what he means. We're told that's what he means. So what I'm getting at is here you have a case where you have an event, you have a

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Jewish literalist reading and a Christian metaphorical reading. Yeah. Another example. And you know...

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So would you say... So it's a metaphor. That's D'Souza's position.

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It's a metaphor. This is not a historical account. If I were O 'Connor, I would be pressing for clarity on what

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D'Souza just said and asking whether or not Jesus' birth is also metaphorical in his view.

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In other words, the moment that you introduce metaphor, then the question becomes, where are the boundaries for this metaphor?

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Like what's literal and what's metaphorical? Say then the flight to Egypt is a metaphor. Is that what you're trying to say? In other words,

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I'm trying to understand what it is that you're doing here to actually answer the question that I'm asking you, which is about... Because here's my theory. Here's an idea.

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Okay. Luke, the author of Luke invents the flight to Egypt in order to identify

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Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, meaning that when we read Luke, we should note that where it appears that he's making historical claims, we should note his willingness to twist history in order to fulfill a theological...

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You don't know if he's doing that. And there you go. The moment that you say what appears to be a historical narrative is actually metaphor, this is where it leads.

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Okay. How much is passed off as historical narrative, but actually never happened? O 'Connor is definitely giving

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D'Souza a run for his money. You're assuming that. This is your theory. No, no, no. What I'm saying is that that's one thesis to explain the contradiction between Luke and Matthew.

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If you want to say that it's trivial, then fine, but we still have to explain how it comes about. And what I'm saying is one idea of how this comes about leads to us undermining our trustworthiness of Luke.

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What I'm asking you for is your explanation that would not lead to us having to undermine our trustworthiness of Luke.

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I don't have the ability to referee that passage. I'm not aware of this contradiction.

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I'll have to go back and look and see. That's fine. Go and look it up. But what I am doing is I'm questioning your methodology and your kind of, what would

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I call it? You've got the Jews and the Christians arguing about events and they're very complex events and they're very powerfully meaningful events.

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Let's take, for example, Abraham and Isaac are going up the mountain.

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And Isaac says to Abraham something to the effect of, where is the lamb for the sacrifice?

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And Abraham says to him, God will provide. God will provide. Now, in a

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Jewish reading, this whole thing has got to be understood in terms of here's Abraham. He's willing to sacrifice his son.

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God says, stop. It's a tale of obedience. In the Christian reading, it's not that, or it's not only that.

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The Christian reading is, Jesus is the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. So when

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Isaac says, where is the lamb? And Abraham says, God will provide. It is a foreshadowing of a significant event in the

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New Testament. Now, again, as I say, the Jews and the Christians argued this for three centuries and more.

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Oh my goodness. This is not the

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Dinesh D'Souza who went up against Christopher Hitchens 20 years ago. This is not the

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Dinesh D'Souza who went up against Bart Ehrman and others in debates. I don't know if he's just caught unprepared, but clearly he's off guard and nervous on that stage.

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And he's not addressing O 'Connor in the way that he could be. A better response would be

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O 'Connor. Before I answer these questions, you know, like where specifically do you see these contradictions?

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Right? O 'Connor started to explain this a bit in his opening statements, but then didn't really walk that through.

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Which by the way, that's a clarification question. And also, why does your reading of the text, O 'Connor, force both accounts,

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Matthew and Luke, to take place at the exact same time? That's a question designed to identify

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O 'Connor's interpretive framework because clearly his interpretive framework leads to a contradiction that many biblical scholars and theologians over the centuries do not see.

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But that's not what D'Souza is saying at all. Actually, let's just see how he finishes here. I'm not even trying to adjudicate who's right, but I'm saying you're waltzing in coming with neither of these two assumptions.

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In fact, I assume you think that the Old Testament is as mythological as the new. No, no, no. Okay, and I guess what

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I'm saying is that people who read the Bible to understand what the

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Bible is trying to say and what we can learn from it, do what the Jewish rabbis did and do what theologians like Augustine and Anselm and so many others have done.

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They don't really do what you're doing, which is saying, hey, Luke must have talked to a guy who thought it happened over here, but in fact, you know, this guy says the roof was thatched, but another guy says they let the guy in through the roof who had to be healed.

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Contradiction. And I'm like, is this your way of trying to say the Bible is not true?

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Yes, it is. The Old Testament is not fully mythological.

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I think Genesis is mythological. I think that Exodus makes more of an attempt at history, but it has mythological undertones. I think that the military conquests

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I mentioned in my opening statements are attempts at describing literal historical events. I think the Psalms are poetry.

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I think that Job is mythology. I don't think a man called Job actually existed. And so there are lots of different genres here.

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The reason I'm asking about the contradictions in the gospel, and I understand if you don't want to talk about the specific example of Egypt and Jerusalem, fine, whatever.

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Maybe you can send me an email about it later or something. That's fine. But the reason I bring it up is to say that there are lots of these.

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And in each case, if we try to look at why they might be contradicting each other, the reasons

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I think we're given tell us that the historicity of this text should be in dispute.

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For example, I mentioned the date of Jesus's death. The synoptic gospels specifically place this after the

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Passover meal. They have the Last Supper as the Passover meal. John uniquely sets it before the

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Passover because he has the theological purpose of wanting to depict Jesus as the

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Passover lamb. Now, this is a contradiction if the gospels are supposed to be historical accounts of what happened to Jesus, which

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I imagine if we were having a debate about whether Christianity were true, about whether the God of the Bible existed, you might put forward, say, an argument for the resurrection of Jesus.

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You might say, well, we have good historical evidence to think that Jesus rose from the dead. And you might point to the story of the crucifixion and the disciples seeing him after he died.

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This is a common thread. The problem is that if we're treating it as historical in an area like that, then we have to engage with it as a historical text.

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So two things here. One, this isn't a formal debate, OK, because this isn't what formal cross -examination should look like.

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Cross -examination does not allow for speeches on the part of the opponent asking questions.

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It just requires questions. And stylistically, those questions should be more yes or no questions so that the debater can then get up and explain how his opponent has revealed himself to be wrong in the rebuttal and closing statement segments of the debate.

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So that's the first thing. The second thing is O 'Connor is laying a framework for the debate.

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You know, DeSouza was doing that a bit, too. But, you know, he's talking about how the audience should be thinking through this debate and judging it for themselves.

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And guess what? Like, in terms of his framework, he's not wrong. His framework is reasonable.

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And one that a Christian can adopt now are the contradictions that he's proposing as contradictions.

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Actual contradictions? No. But the framework itself, though, and the way that the audience should be thinking through this is actually a good one.

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And that's what I mean. The Christian is probably going to reject O 'Connor's interpretations and obviously his sort of philosophical presuppositions.

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But there's nothing else really to critique about this. So anyway, O 'Connor definitely has advantage at this point.

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DeSouza should really be calling out the interpretive issues that O 'Connor has. So that he can acquit himself in front of the audience, because he's just not doing a great job up there.

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Boy, thank you so much for watching this video. Did you know that the majority of people who do watch are not subscribed to the channel?

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If this video is blessing you, would you do me a favor and like and subscribe to the channel? It just really helps me to get the word out about this ministry.

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I greatly appreciate it. In our format, we've agreed to do a flip where you've been asking me questions. Now, let me ask you something.

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If you've got something to ask. Let me turn around and ask you questions in a sort of what I think is a more fundamental mode, because it gets to what the

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Bible really is. Let's hear it. Do you think that the universe had a beginning?

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I don't know. You don't know? I would suspect yes. You would suspect yes? Yeah, sure. How did the writers of the book of Genesis know that?

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I have no idea. I mean, if I'm going to be... You think they guessed? If I'm going to be cynical about this, if they did guess, it would be a 50 -50 guess.

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And I also think that if we had scientific... Would it be a 50 -50 guess? Yeah, because... And it might even be worse than that for you, because if we had some kind of scientific popular hypothesis, because of course the

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Big Bang might not have been the beginning of everything. Who knows, right? But whatever the popular scientific hypothesis is, if it were pointing to an infinite universe, for example, as Einstein thought we lived in, then

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I'm sure that people would open Genesis. They would say that in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and say that the earth just means the earth itself, right?

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Like, I think it would be equally easily interpretable on either account. All right. So, one of my professors at Dartmouth was

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Robert Jastrow, head of the Mount Wilson Laboratory, one of the great astronomers of the 20th century.

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Sure. So Jastrow writes in his book God and the Astronomers that for 250 years, modern science has been attempting to discover whether the universe had a beginning.

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And you can think of these scientists as ascending a very tall mountain in which there are many pathways.

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And for many years, with the steady state hypothesis and so on, there were beliefs that the universe was eternal.

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It never had a beginning. In fact, that was the prevailing point of view. And then Jastrow argues, it's almost as if we reached the top of the mountain.

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So when it's your turn to ask questions of your opponent on the debate stage, you should ask some questions.

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I know, I know. This is more, this is way more informal, but the whole point of cross -examination or Socratic dialogue, if you will, is so that you can hang your opponent with his own words, essentially.

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But when you get up there and start making speeches during cross, that's a waste of an opportunity.

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Hopefully a question is coming soon. And there was a bunch of Hebrew prophets or theologians sitting there when we've been there from the beginning.

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So I'm describing now a skeptic, a true skeptic and a true scientist describing the scientific shock that attends to a discovery that, and I think it is out of the spirit of that discovery for you to go, oh yeah,

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I mean, could have been this. It's like tossing a coin. It isn't like tossing a coin. This is a question that's been argued for two centuries and only resolved in the last several decades and resolved decisively in one side and the other.

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And the fact that you're not willing to just straight out say, yeah, it is actually an astounding fact that we now know.

29:29

No, no, no. I mean, look, the scientific method has also revealed to us that the earth was formed about four and a half billion years ago.

29:39

That is much later than the sun. The gospel, the Old Testament account, the Hebrew Bible account tells us that it was the other way around.

29:45

So it got that bit wrong. Okay. All right. So, so, so, so we're, yes, the

29:53

Bible is not. So sometimes it gets things right. Sometimes it gets things wrong. You know, the Bible is not a science.

29:59

It's not listing out a sign. Well, now hold on a second. You can't now move the goalposts, especially if you're still going to, especially if you're still going to miss the, the, the, the, the issue.

30:07

Well, well, no, the issue of the, of the origin of the universe is extremely critical. You just told me that Genesis predicted or knew about or somehow knew about the scientific hypothesis of the origin of the universe.

30:17

Then when I pointed out another scientific observation that doesn't accord with Genesis, you tell me that Genesis isn't a scientific text to begin with.

30:23

Well, if you, if you read, if you read Genesis, it is making a astounding claim, which pertains to God.

30:29

Obviously, God created the heavens and the earth. Is it making a scientific claim or not? Is it telling us how the universe scientifically formed or not?

30:35

It's not telling us how the universe scientifically formed, because if it did, they would be outlining the history of the

30:41

Big Bang. Then what's the relevance of bringing this up in the first place? Because, because it is stating a conclusion, not a process. It's not telling you how the universe was formed.

30:48

It's not telling you about. Wow. This is going very badly. For D'Souza and very well for O 'Connor.

30:57

It just, it looks as if O 'Connor fully prepped. And when he did, he prepped for two things.

31:04

Obviously, he prepped for the content of his own position on that stage. Although arguably, he's not really forthcoming about his position.

31:12

He could say more, arguably. But, you know, that's, that's one of the sort of aspects that he prepped for.

31:21

Is the Bible true? That's the title of the debate, but he also prepped for D'Souza specifically.

31:28

He's familiar with D'Souza's talking points and D'Souza's debate style. I mean, that's pretty clear at this point.

31:35

He's ready and he's just outperforming D'Souza at almost every turn. It doesn't tell us how the sun was formed, but it tells us that it was formed after the earth was.

31:44

It tells us that that's the case. That's wrong. It's incorrect. Show me.

31:50

Well, I don't have a, I don't have a Bible. Well, I've read that passage maybe a dozen times. I have never spotted this contradiction that you're describing.

31:57

But I'll go back and look at it again. But, but, but again. On what day is it that God makes the sun?

32:04

Day four? Is it day three or day four? Something around there? Right. But the mainstream of the

32:09

Christian tradition does. It obviously can't be day four because the concept of day in the original

32:17

Hebrew doesn't mean day. Sure. But day four comes after day one, right? Well, it's, it's describing, it's describing obviously epochs or, or, or periods.

32:25

Yes. So actually it's much worse because now the sun is created much, much, much later than the earth was. Well, not necessarily.

32:34

Well, show me. I don't, I don't know. I mean, we can, we can read through that. We can find, yeah. I don't think, I don't know if that would be the best, best use of our time.

32:41

I mean, we can do it if you really want to. But what I'm trying to say is that like, it's not. Let's move on. Let's move on. Why not? Ouch. Yeah.

32:49

So for, for those of us in the church who read the Bible the way that Kim Han would.

32:55

Kim, Kim Ham. Kim, Kim Han. Kim Ham. You know, or, or even

33:03

Hugh Ross, right? We would read the Bible that way. We have an interesting dilemma, don't we? God says on day one, let there be light.

33:11

On day three, he makes the earth, right? Forms the earth. Then on day four, God forms the sun.

33:18

Genesis 1 verse 16. And God made the two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night and the stars.

33:26

So that's the sun and the moon created after the earth. And somehow also there was already light.

33:36

So, you know, that's, that's from in the beginning. So, so the question is, is there a contradiction here?

33:43

Or is the assumption that the creation account in Genesis 1 is historical when it is in fact a polemic against the

33:51

Egyptian creation myth, which is what a lot of Christians believe. And it's also how the

33:57

Jews read the text as well as a poetic piece with a literal referent instead of an historical narrative.

34:05

In other words, did God create the universe and everything in it? All Christians say yes and amen. But a lot of Christians will say that Moses told the story of creation in a way that presents

34:15

God as more powerful than the Egyptian gods. And that was the point, not scientific accuracy.

34:24

It just seems like D'Souza is completely unaware of this conversation in the church.

34:31

And it shows. It's not astonishing to me that the, that like if you, if you're making claims about the origin of the universe, especially in the case where if it was, if it is making a specific hype claim in the knowledge that there's a sort of infinite hypothesis and the beginning hypothesis to take a 50 -50 stab.

34:49

It's not amazing to me. It would be more amazing to me if everything lined up and it gave us an otherwise unknowable historical scientific account of the beginning of the universe.

34:57

But as you say, that's not even what Genesis is trying to do. So I don't, in other words, I don't understand how. I'm not saying that Genesis trying to unfurl a,

35:05

I'm saying that Genesis is making a statement about creation. And the statement about creation has a very startling scientific implication.

35:13

Because if there was a creation, then there obviously wasn't something. And then there was something, you know, I mean, it's not just science, which can tell us that the universe had a beginning.

35:21

I mean, like there are lots of philosophical arguments that people have made, perhaps most famously Al -Ghazali, who argues against for the impossibility of a past infinite universe.

35:31

And I think that's quite convincingly with no reference to redshifting and no reference to scientific hypotheses.

35:37

So it's perfectly possible for somebody to, to take a pretty studious and educated guess at the fact that the universe had a beginning long before the scientific method told us that that was the case.

35:47

I'm not saying that it's not possible to make philosophical arguments. And of course, as you know, there was a tradition in ancient Greece of making philosophical arguments all over the place.

35:55

So maybe that's why. Let me, let me, let me keep going. It's my time. Let me, let me, let me post questions. I'm trying to answer your question.

36:01

Maybe, maybe if you ask me, how would they know? Isn't this astounding? I would say, well, maybe they just had a, had a philosophical tradition that toward the beginning of the universe.

36:07

And that's where they got it from. Except that. It's not inconceivable. It's not inconceivable, but it's, it's, it's not likely because when we think of the tradition of Western civilization, we speak of Athens and Jerusalem.

36:19

We speak of the origins of philosophy starting in about the eighth century BCE, and then really developing first in Greece.

36:28

And then we talk about the tradition of revelation developing in, in ancient Jerusalem.

36:33

So is there, was there a hidden philosophical tradition? Possible, but probably unlikely.

36:39

Let's proceed to the, let's, let's proceed to the issue of the veracity of the, of the, some of the historical events described in the

36:48

Bible. Would you say that figures like Jeremiah, David, are these historical figures or mythological figures?

36:59

I'd say, I don't know for certain, but I would say that the Bible is certainly attempting to paint these historical figures. Fairway is attempting to do.

37:05

You've been, you've been trying to, I don't know, but you don't know. I'm happy to say yes. Okay. So, so, so on a,

37:13

I mean, I would predict yes, I would, I would say yes. You would, you would say yes. That's what I would imagine, yeah. Okay. Do you think that Sodom and Gomorrah are historical cities?

37:22

Probably, yeah. Probably yes. Would you say that Pontius Pilate was a real person?

37:29

Yes. Yes. Sure. Okay. Would you say that, all right, now these statements that you're saying now were in no way known to be true until recent decades.

37:49

And I'm not sure. All the ones I mentioned. If you're talking about like archaeology, like, yeah, I'm talking biblical archaeology.

37:55

I mean, let me, let me give you an example of what we're talking about. You can't prove the historical existence of a person very easily. Well, let me, let me go into this a little bit here.

38:05

And also, I don't, like it's, you can, I want to make sure we're using the time wisely here. You could give me a sound archaeological bit of evidence that all of these people existed that in no way tells us about the truth of the stories that are attributed to them.

38:20

No, it does. Well, let me put it this way. For many centuries, this is a whole tradition of biblical scholarship in the 19th century.

38:29

In fact, really until, until in some cases, 10, 15 or 20 years ago, there was absolutely no evidence historically for the existence, for example, of a

38:40

Hezekiah, Jeremiah, David, let alone actual locations for David's palace.

38:48

Sure. All right. Hezekiah, his tunnels, tunnels.

38:54

Now, let me tell you something I discovered. I was getting a tour recently a few months ago in Israel from the guys at Hebrew University.

39:02

And they were talking about an archaeologist named Eliot Mazar, who's what she, she calls herself a biblical archaeologist.

39:10

She's not a Christian or even a believer, but she, the way that she does archaeology is this.

39:18

She has the Bible in one hand and the sort of the pickaxe in the other. So again,

39:23

I understand this is an informal debate, but this particular time of what appears to be cross -examination,

39:31

I mean, it's just way better spent asking leading questions to identify your opponent's position and then expose their errors and assumptions.

39:40

The more D'Souza makes speeches and tells stories, gives illustrations, the less time that he has to ask those questions.

39:51

The best thing that you can do on stage as a debater is, as I said earlier, get your opponent to admit things that are counter to their own position.

40:00

O 'Connor has been doing that against D'Souza a lot, okay? But D'Souza should be taking the time to do that to O 'Connor and he's not for some reason.

40:09

My guess is he didn't prep very much for this debate. And the approach to it is pretty simple.

40:16

It is, I want to find David's palace. Now, no one has ever heard of David's.

40:23

I mean, David's palace is in the Bible, but there's no independent corroboration of it at all. There's a foundation in Jerusalem called the

40:32

City of David Foundation. They have a little office. Dr. Eliot Mazar walks in their office and says to them, you have to move your office because the palace of David is in the ground underneath your office.

40:47

And these guys are like, how would you know that? And Dr. Mazar says, because if you read the

40:53

Bible, it will tell you that David, when he built the city of David, built his palace, brought in Phoenician builders who brought materials from Phoenicia and also brought

41:06

Phoenician building expertise. The Phoenicians were apparently the builders of the day. And so Dr.

41:12

Mazar says, we have found Phoenician seals, Phoenician coins, Phoenician inscriptions here.

41:19

And so I predict that the palace is right underneath here because the

41:24

Bible tells me that that's how that palace was built. So? So David's palace exists?

41:31

David's palace is there for you to see today. And it is in the exact location of where it was said to be.

41:38

And what I'm getting at is the archaeological approach here is to use the Bible as an archaeological tool.

41:45

The location of Sodom and Gomorrah, there was a lot of speculation that said Sodom and Gomorrah were cities over here or cities over there, but actually makes no sense because A, what we know about Sodom and Gomorrah is that they were once flourishing cities.

41:58

Two, they were burned to ashes. Three, Abraham supposedly could see the smoke from a long ways away.

42:04

And so these locations of Sodom and Gomorrah were never found until... O 'Connor is just waiting for his turn to grill to Sousa again.

42:14

You know, you can tell, I mean, he's poised. He already knows what he's going to say next. It's interesting because, you know, non -verbals can often tell you a lot and O 'Connor, he just appears to be very comfortable up there.

42:27

I wonder if he was nervous before he went out on that stage, but now that he's almost an hour and a half into this and D'Souza is not faring well, he's probably a lot more comfortable.

42:39

Recently, by recently, I mean recent decades, an archeologist, again, in the Eliot Mazar tradition, takes the

42:46

Bible and says, for Sodom and Gomorrah to exist, it's not enough to just go looking and see if we find stuff and go, hey, is this

42:54

Sodom and Gomorrah? Let's actually follow the tracks of the Bible. Let's... By the way, the archeologist who discovered the city of Sodom and Gomorrah is named

43:03

Dr. Stephen Collins. I studied him in school and had the pleasure of meeting him one time when he came and spoke in Las Vegas.

43:10

This was years ago now. He's doing some fascinating work out there, like the real life Indiana Jones, as some call him.

43:17

Follow the map, provided admittedly in very sketchy terms, the Bible is not trying to give you a map, but it's giving you clues.

43:25

By the way, last I heard, they were able to confirm that a massive air burst event destroyed the city.

43:32

It was an explosion from the sky that took out the entire city. Does that sound familiar to you at all?

43:39

Based on these clues, the actual Sodom and Gomorrah is located and you dig into it and guess what?

43:45

You find the remains of an ancient city and you also find ash and debris.

43:51

In other words, there was an ancient city there. It was completely burned to the ground. So one of the great cities of the ancient world then becomes an absolute nothing and has been an absolute nothing since.

44:03

And not only does the Bible describe these events, but it says exactly that. That these great cities will cease to exist and will never be resurrected again as they have not been to this day.

44:13

If I may, because I'm beginning to suspect this isn't a question, I might just jump in here. Sure, yeah, okay.

44:19

So the authors of the Hebrew Bible... So, my conclusion... If I might answer the question.

44:27

I mean, it is your time, but I need to be able to speak as well. The Bible contains accurate data about where archaeologically we can find the ruins of ancient cities.

44:36

Okay, that's not too extraordinary to me. I have no problem saying that the people who wrote these texts knew where these places were with exact precision.

44:46

And in fact, notice what's happening. Notice what's happening. What's happening is that the

44:51

Bible is a historical text and a scientific text when it needs to be. And it's not one when you don't want it to be.

44:57

So when I said a moment ago, here's a relatively mundane historical fact about the gospel. Laying a framework for the audience again.

45:04

You see how important that is to any debater on that stage, Christian or otherwise. Arguably, D'Souza has been trying to do that very thing, but O 'Connor is a lot more adept at it.

45:15

So now he's restating how the audience should be thinking through the debate. And he's doing so in a manner that is advantageous to his position.

45:23

This is why I've said that more often than not, whoever lays a better framework in a debate wins, even if they don't necessarily have better substantive arguments.

45:33

The goal, I mean, for any debater, whether you're AF or NEG, the goal is not to just say a bunch of stuff.

45:40

It's not just to make a bunch of arguments. The goal is for the audience to adopt your position. And that trades very often on laying a framework so your audience can think through the debate how you want them to.

45:51

... you said, well, the fact that some mundane historical fact should undermine Christianity is ludicrous.

45:57

But now you're telling me that a mundane historical fact is enough to buttress Christianity. I don't think you can have your cake and eat it too in that case.

46:04

I'm not trying to have my cake and eat it too. I'm simply saying that if somebody gives a true account of events complete with small details that are incidental to the narrative, the

46:13

Bible refers to very minor figures at times. Let's take, for example, Caiaphas.

46:19

Caiaphas is one of the two high priests who is present at Jesus's trial. We don't even know his first name.

46:28

He's mentioned as Caiaphas. The historian Josephus calls him Josephus Caiaphas.

46:35

And that is the only indication from Josephus and only one source and a source writing a little later of what this guy's name even was.

46:44

And until recently, few decades ago, I'd love to know what's going on in D'Souza's mind right now.

46:53

Is this a concerted effort to filibuster? Because there is no well out of which to draw the requisite leading questions necessary to challenge

47:02

O 'Connor? Is that why he keeps bringing up analogies and illustrations and story after story at a time when questions are key?

47:14

I would love to know what he's thinking. Absolutely no corroboration that there was ever a guy even named

47:20

Caiaphas. By the way, remind me, you can't remind me, but I'll try to remember to see if I could give maybe a better response to O 'Connor, you know, from D'Souza's position.

47:32

We'll see if we can do that too. Except now, not only do we have inscriptions with his name, we actually have his bones.

47:40

But Dinesh, what does this matter? Okay, so what I'm getting at is - What does this matter at all to the question? Why does it matter? Why does this matter? Because if somebody is giving a true account of events, you know, a guy comes running into this room and he goes, guess what?

47:54

I've just witnessed a murder. He's going to give us a lot of accounts and a lot of detail, right?

48:00

Now - Look, if somebody was trying to claim that Moses parted the Red Sea and I said, well, how could you possibly know that's the case?

48:06

And you said, well, look, we didn't have any evidence that a guy called Moses existed, but we've discovered this rock where someone wrote Moses was here.

48:12

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. We know Moses existed. And maybe we know where he existed, but the actual events, the stories that are attributed to these characters are in no way supported by anything that you're saying.

48:21

And that's the important thing. I think that's what people are interested. I doubt that anybody in this room, and they can make themselves known if they're here,

48:27

I don't think anybody in this room either thinks that it's important or is troubled in their skepticism by the existence of these people and the real existence of the places that are described in the

48:37

Old Testament. Right, and neither do I think anybody, neither do I think that a single Christian believer in the world would be shaken by anything that you've said today.

48:45

So let's really try to meet in the middle on the stuff that really matters. And I think what we're really saying, when you mentioned the parting of the

48:51

Red Sea, to me, it's like, now we're talking because we're talking about - These are different, these are different.

48:56

These are categorically different types of events. I mean, what you just said, these are different because people are troubled by what

49:02

I say and they're not troubled by what you say. Because for an atheist to say that Hezekiah existed doesn't mean they can't be an atheist.

49:08

For a Christian to say that Jesus didn't historically rise from the dead means that they're not a Christian. Correct. So these are different, they're asymmetrical.

49:17

They're asymmetrical. So let's pick up, let's pick up the - So it matters when the historical elements are wrong in terms of our grand conclusion.

49:26

For the Christian, it matters when the history gets it wrong. For the atheist, it doesn't matter when the history gets it right.

49:33

What I'm saying is that if somebody - False. I like what he's trying to do here, but that's false.

49:41

And I wish DeSouza would call him out on this stuff. When O 'Connor looks at a book, he assumes

49:48

God does not exist. And then he examines this book accordingly. This causes him to not consider what the evidence would look like for a

49:57

God, the God of the Bible, to exist and relay the same historical stories in the same fashion as we have them already in the

50:03

Bible. In other words, what would be the significant difference with the

50:08

Bible as we have it if God did not exist as opposed to if he did? Are you tracking what

50:14

I'm saying? How would the stories be different? How would the archaeological evidence change significantly?

50:20

And my answer is it wouldn't. And that's why this conversation is largely from DeSouza's side in exercise and missing the point.

50:29

The reason why these issues exist for O 'Connor has more to do with his philosophical presupposition that God does not exist and the supernatural realm is not real.

50:40

That there are no spirits, there are no angels, there are no demons, there is no heaven, there is no hell. And then he comes to this book, the

50:47

Bible, and he investigates it with that framework, through that lens. That's why he can admit all day long without a problem that the

50:56

Bible is historically accurate, sure. But the moment that a Christian tries to introduce something of a metaphysical nature that the

51:04

Bible discusses, well, all of a sudden that's made up, guys. If you were wondering where the epistemological boundaries exist for someone like O 'Connor, it's right along those lines.

51:15

DeSouza just will not call that out and identify it. And that's why he's not doing well at all.

51:22

I've got a couple minutes left. Then let's wrap up. If someone gives a true account of events, it is normal for the accounts to vary, to differ, in some cases, to have minor contradictions.

51:35

The real question is, did the thing that's being described actually happen? Okay, so let's turn to that.

51:40

Do you think, for example, that the slaughter of the Amalekites that I mentioned before actually happened? Probably, of course. And if that happened,

51:47

I mean, we haven't spoken about the concept of moral truth. I'd like to get the time to do so. We can come to that, but let's stay with what

51:53

I think you were about to get to, which I think is the heart of the matter that we haven't even gotten to, and that's this. Where the

52:00

Bible is the most unbelievable is in its account of astounding and miraculous events.

52:07

Right? Here we go. Let's take the most outrageous event of all. The resurrection?

52:13

Let's just say, bringing a guy back from the dead. Yep. Presented in the Bible as a miracle. Talking about Lazarus here.

52:19

I'm talking about Lazarus, yes. Lazarus, perfect. Now, for a Christian, a

52:25

Christian would say this. A, the Bible doesn't try to prove it.

52:30

It simply asserts it. In fact, it presents it as a truth of revelation, if you will.

52:37

God revealed this. It's a miracle, which is to say that it is a, it is a, it is not something that happens within the seeming known laws of nature, which we'll talk about in a moment.

52:52

And, and the question really here is, are these kinds of miracles possible?

53:02

If you say, are they implausible, or are they rare, or is it difficult to believe?

53:07

The Christian is like, right with you. I think the question is, did they happen? Did they happen? Right? And, and, and, and, and the

53:14

Christ, here's where the Christian and the atheist are on common ground, because the Christian and the atheist would both say that based upon ordinary experience, it can't happen.

53:26

Sure. Because otherwise it wouldn't be a miracle. So what evidence might we have to suggest that these miraculous events as described in the gospels did happen?

53:35

I'm saying that because the miraculous events, I would simply, the Christian would simply say, if God exists, miracles are obviously possible.

53:43

Sure, I agree. The atheist has a, has a higher burden. And that is the atheist has to say that whether or not

53:48

God exists, which is not the topic of our debate here, miracles are impossible. Because if they're possible,

53:54

They don't have to say that. You don't have to say that? No, of course they don't have to say that. You don't have to say that. You say, you say it is possible for a man to be raised from the dead.

54:00

I can, I can say that that's possible without thereby. Without saying, but you're saying, but this particular one didn't happen, but the event is possible.

54:06

Without thereby in any way telling us anything about whether it happened as reported. Is it possible for the, for, for, is it possible for the red sea to be parted?

54:14

Sure, why not? It is. Okay. Okay. Is it possible for a... What does that do for us? Is it possible that Muhammad flew to heaven on a winged horse?

54:23

Okay. So, so here's our problem. Well, well, hold on. Yes or no? Yes, of course it's possible. Of course it's possible. So that means that, you know, the miraculous events that's described in Islam, you've got such a higher burden of proof than the

54:33

Muslim does. If you're having a debate with a Muslim. I, I, but, but, but... Because you have to think that's impossible. I am not trying to prove the veracity of this or that miracle.

54:41

I freely admit that I can't do that. And I'm not trying to prove the veracity. But you can't disprove it either. No, of course I can't disprove it.

54:46

Exactly. But that's not my task here. That's like, that's like me saying, that's like me saying, you know, I, I, I think that,

54:53

I don't know, to take your Shakespearean example, I think that, you know, spoiler alert, you know. We don't need a Shakespearean example. Romeo took the poison.

54:59

Let's take it. Let's take an action. And if you said, well, hold on. How do you know that that actually happened? And I said, well, you can't prove that it didn't. Well, let's, let's, let's, let's, let's pick an actual example that pertains to Christianity.

55:08

Let's talk about something I raised earlier. We've got about five minutes before Q &A, by the way. Do you believe, do you believe that there is life after death?

55:16

I don't know. You don't have no idea? Yeah, I'm agnostic on that. So if I say that there's life after death, am

55:21

I being unreasonable? I don't think so. Not at all. It depends on your reasons. It depends on my reasons.

55:26

But what I'm saying is if I were to tell you that there is no empirical way to prove this one way or the other, my faith, let's say, that there's life after death is just as reasonable as someone who says there isn't.

55:39

Sure. It depends on what the reasons that are given are, of course. But sure. We're talking about the reasons that are actually available.

55:45

Not, the person who's giving a reason may give the best or not. I'm happy to say yes.

55:50

I just want to, I just want to be careful what I say because people might get the wrong impression of my beliefs. But, but, but yeah, sure. I mean, sure.

55:56

We've got two people. One says life after death. One says not. They're both just as reasonable. They're both just as reasonable. Sure. Yeah. Okay, excellent.

56:01

Okay, good. I wanted to clarify that point, particularly because what it really...

56:08

What's this got to do with the truth of the Bible? Well, what I'm, what all I am saying is that the claims of miracles, you and I are not going to be in a position to go back and see whether...

56:18

The point is the very skepticism that O 'Connor has shown appears to trade along each particular biblical teaching or point that connects to the miraculous.

56:30

And it appears that O 'Connor apparently has no problem with the Bible when it comes to non -miraculous claims.

56:37

But the moment that we get to stories and characters who are connected to the miraculous in some sense, that's where things break down for him.

56:45

This admission would be nice. So coming at it again from D'Souza's side of the fence, so to speak.

56:51

If D'Souza could point this out and ask O 'Connor to verify it, that would be great. And if that's the case, then there could be an argument to make that the materialist presuppositions that O 'Connor has are framing the

57:03

Bible as an unreliable document. Particularly when you see apparent contradictions that, by the way, are not slam dunks by any stretch.

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I mean, you have to really try hard to present those as real contradictions. The question is, are you not aware of the rejoinders from scholars and theologians who have wrestled with the same issue?

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From Matthew chapter two and Luke chapter two, for example. And given an explanation for these things, O 'Connor cannot be ignorant of those rejoinders.

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The rejoinders exist because there is play in the joints of each of those accounts, right?

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Take it back to the birth narrative of Jesus. It's not only that the case that there is only one option, right?

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Which is that there is a contradiction. There's actually two options. Yes, there's a contradiction, but then there's also, there is no contradiction.

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These two events just simply took place at different times in Jesus' life. And the way that both are worded show that they do not align.

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So the question is, why is contradiction the only option for O 'Connor? And the answer is, it seems, his presuppositions.

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All of this could have been explored by D'Souza in the form of leading questions, but he chose not to do any of this in the debate.

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I don't know why. I don't know like what happened. I've seen

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D'Souza be a lot more lively on the debate stage in the past. Either way, I think

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O 'Connor clearly bested D'Souza and held advantage the entire time. Well, shoot, now it's your turn.

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Who do you think won the debate? O 'Connor or D'Souza? Let me know in the comments below. Hey, if you made it this far, you gotta join the

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Patreon community. Jump into the discussions we're having over there right now. There's all kinds of cool features for your considerations.

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We do live streams there, Zoom hangouts. You can meet up with me one -on -one and chat about whatever you want. The link for the

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Patreon is below. I hope to see you there. But hey, we'll return soon with more videos.