BYU Scholar

Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. This is the dividing line

The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us Yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence

Our host is dr. James White director of Alpha Omega ministries and an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church This is a live program and we invite your participation.

If you'd like to talk with dr. White call now It's 602 nine seven three four six zero two or toll -free across the

United States. It's one eight seven seven seven five three Three three four one and now with today's topic.

Here is James White And good morning. Welcome to the dividing line on a

Tuesday morning the 17th Day of the month of February 2009.

Thank you for Listening I was gonna say tuning in but tuning is sort of that's an irrelevancy anymore, isn't it?

I mean is entering a URL the same as tuning really isn't Because I remember tuning folks.

Let me tell you something. I remember what tuning was like we've been you are old We've been you are old

Amazing how early the language has changed it has changed much but we still use old words because we're old

But I guess you still call tuning in it doesn't really matter hey a couple things First of all, we're cheap around here.

We don't have the special music. It used to work in Merc I used to be able I don't I do not know why this doesn't work anymore

Sound 20th that way I like it when it works.

The problem is when it doesn't work I have no idea. How do computers just heal themselves?

It's Windows man. That's just that's just how it is. It's This way it is. Anyway, I Mentioned I don't know at least a month or so ago that I we were working on our next major debate and Then I didn't say anything about it and that's because it got sort of put off And the reason it got put off is interestingly enough

Due to the conflict in Gaza Yes, how can a debate be put off due to a conflict in Gaza because obviously the debate has to do with Islam But we have now

Established a date. I'm waiting for the specifics on the location, but I can tell you this much we are looking at May 2nd and 3rd two evenings and And this will be in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and It will be in the

Islamic Society of Milwaukee That is right there in the heart of the city and I will be debating

Zulfiqar Ali Shah one night on The reliability of the New Testament the second night on the reliability of the

Quran or whichever order I'm not sure that order it's gonna go but That will be there in At their assembly hall on the ground of the mosque.

And so we are really hoping to have a very good representation from the

Islamic community and I'm very excited about that Some of you have seen we haven't been able to put up the entirety of the debate with dr

Shah from Duke University Which was not technically a debate but we can call it a debate now because it's over with But it's very short and just sort of a almost just a preview of what we'll be able to do over the two nights in in Milwaukee in May and The encounter that we had was very encouraging

We hope to be able to do a number of subjects. And so this will be the first step in that and so Very much looking forward to this and we'll be putting it up on the website as soon as we can

And if you are in the Midwest I know a lot of you folks in the Midwest sort of feel like you're in the flyover zone and Most everything happens in California, Florida or New York and you don't get to be a part of it.

Well Now you've you've got an opportunity. So May 2nd and 3rd in Milwaukee at the

Islamic Society of Milwaukee and I will be debating dr Zulfikar Ali Shah on that particular on those particular subjects.

So keep that in mind also just in passing I Will be at the end of May will be up with Bill McKeever in Salt Lake City at his conference up there doing my presentation on the

New Testament, which Should be even better by then given all the study I'm doing in that area

I'm not sure how to cram all that into the amount of time I'm given anymore It's almost frustrating but we'll be doing that at the end of May.

I believe it's 29th as I recall folks down in down under gonna be down in Brisbane at the end of July as I recall down there in in Australia and Looking forward to that because it will be your cold time of the year and it'll be our hot time here so I don't mind getting out of the heat and humidity around that time of the year to be certain and then in September Those of you in the

Santa Fe area. I was over at Calvary Santa Fe in September of 2008 and I'm gonna be back in September of 2009

Bruce Where is gonna be speaking along with myself and others at the conference there? and so I'm definitely looking forward to that as well had a great time with the folks there at Calvary Santa Fe and Looking forward to getting back there.

There was a restaurant right across the streets and about a blue tortilla or something like that I have no idea what where the name came from, but I love the food.

It was good stuff. It was good stuff What was that? Son about our pie is it is it owned by Joe Arpaio?

Why you know, he serves green bologna here. Oh, okay All right pink underwear.

And yeah, okay, that's that's Joe Arpaio So anyway, so keep in mind folks if your church has been sitting there going

I wonder I wonder I wonder If you don't get in touch with me There's no way we find out whether I can be of assistance to you or not

So go ahead and ask as things are filling up fairly quickly right now for 2009 and Always enjoy the opportunity of getting in touch with folks and meeting folks and coming to speak and things like that now

We are working on the possibility of doing things a little differently in the future Not that I want to stop going and meeting people

But especially given the economic realities of the world we are really looking into using the internet and Here's just the idea that we're playing with right now be interested in your feedback on it

But we are looking at what we've thought of doing is taking a number of my standard presentations videotaping them here and Providing the

DVD to folks and then what we would do is we would use the internet You'd make the presentation because that's normally fairly lengthy and you know the internet can still be intermittent at times and then we would connect up and The new edition of Skype according to Dale may well be what we want to use

It has desktop sharing. It has 640 by 480 instead of the small window.

It's got a larger window higher resolution now and we would connect up either

I would be in a conference room that we have or just at my desk like I do my YouTube videos and I would be able to see you and you would be able to see me and We would be able to do

Q &A on the presentation that was just made Live that way but it wouldn't cost the church the the cost of The airline ticket and the hotel and the huge amounts of food that I eat

Everybody who's had me in is chuckling at that because they're always sort of amazed it Anyway, but It would be a whole lot easier and then

I get to go home afterwards which is another way of increasing the number of people we can get to and the

Q &A and the sort of the Interaction that way and I can see you I can hear you You can see me hear me and we would have that type of interaction.

So I think that would Would be pretty cool and more and more churches have the the high -speed internet access.

They have digital projectors It's just a matter of sticking a webcam. I mean you could literally just put a

Mac or something like that. My Mac has a built -in webcam. Most most of it have built -in webcams now you could simply put that on a table in front of a microphone and have people walk up and You could be projecting what's on it so they could see me

I could see them and we could have interaction It'd be a great way of doing that. So I think that would that would be great.

Yeah Thanks Barton channel just said just serve the doc Chinese that saves a ton of money

Yeah, it certainly does except the Chinese food goes to waste too. So that's That's that's that's that good.

So there's some of the things that's coming up there and I'm excited about that Have a number of things.

I guess I'll start off with this one I It starts off saying this is going to be a first for me

But I have to agree with James White in one of his latest videos. I know pigs are flying and cows have sprouted wings

That's Matthew Bellisario the Catholic champion who? Normally has nothing but disdain for me likes to mock hats or Whatever, I'm sure he's probably making up a collection right now of bow ties images of bow ties as well, but He saw my video in which

I lamented the recent Patrick Madrid Book that came out and I just pointed out something that's rather obvious.

It's a it's a given it's a fact and I think Catholic apologists know this in their more honest moments and That is they live on fluff

Their apologetic responses are fluff They don't listen to what people are saying about their fluffy responses.

And when it comes to exegesis They just don't bother

I think the Catholic apologists know in their heart of hearts That the scholarship of Rome today has

Gone Far away from where they are theologically. It is not that you can't go find

High -end scholarship quote -unquote in Roman Catholic Biblical studies,

I mean you can go and get Fitzmeyer and Brown and so on so forth but they are as liberal as the day is long and The Catholic apologist doesn't find liberalism to be over amenable to apologetics

And so they are really in stuck in a schizophrenic situation They believe firmly what was believed 150 years ago, but in their more honest moments, they've got admit

They are not in the majority any longer especially when it comes to the viewpoints of priests and bishops and Those in authority within the

Roman Catholic Magisterium and that gives them a bit of a problem and I understand that So Matthew Bellisario says there is a it says

I Must admit there is a great lack of scholarship in the modern Catholic apologetics world today in general

There is a real need for faithful Catholic scholars these days to step up and put out some scholarly works There isn't much too many of these

Catholic apologetics works that are coming out these days There are rarely notes and sources given many of these books

Although sometimes sufficient for novices are not worth much beyond that. This is not an attack on any of these

Catholic apologists person I like Patrick Madrid and the folks at Catholic answers I do have a feel that we really need to step it up when it comes to scholarship printing a book with a few scripture

Quotes with a few paragraphs to expound is just not gonna cut it anymore See, this is

Matthew's problem. He's listening to the other side He needs to adopt the attitude of Jimmy Akin and Carl Keating and Patrick Madrid And that is the other side doesn't exist.

We don't we don't yeah, we just stick our fingers in our ears. They're not there they're not worthy of our even listening to them see poor

Matthews trying to interact with what's being said and That's where he's taking a different tack than everybody else's.

I Think that the target audiences audience at novices has been exhausted. There's plenty material out now for that purpose

We need in -depth apologetics material when we look at previous works by Catholic scripture scholars They would take a whole chapter to expound on each scripture passage using the church fathers church councils and exploration

Languages to back up their work I will readily admit that I am no scholar and I do not have the tools to read

Greek and expound upon the original Text and so forth I do I recite my sources whenever I write an article and provide the sources that I use so people can do their own research

And verify what I've written etc, etc. But again Matthew's problem is that he's not taking the majority perspective and that is you don't listen to the other side you just worry about your audience and And that's

I'm afraid what you've what you've got to do and that's the perspective they're coming from Then I was listening as I was writing yesterday

To a couple things as you may have noticed on the blog this morning. I posted a

Video that I I started working on last night. I wanted to get a bunch of videos done last night I was all revved up.

I get a bunch of videos done last I got one But I was gonna make them like five to ten minutes

I was actually make short videos remember short videos Says I got that YouTube partner thing man.

It's like hey, this is great Let's put up an hour in five minutes and not everybody can take an hour in five minutes, and I understand that But if you're looking for information then it you know, it's useful along those lines and so I Last evening posted a single video 20 almost 26 minutes in length in which

I waxed long In response to Christopher Hitchens one of the things I listened to on my ride yesterday is a fairly lengthy ride of about 40 miles and I listened to the beginning anyways over half

I would say of The Frank Turk probably close to all now to think about it was it was in the audience questions and the audience questions

Were getting less than useful, which is audience questions do do you have everything else with you, but Frank Turek and Christopher Hitchens on the existence of God and so I put up an article a

YouTube video last night dealing with the Hitchens question that he always uses and Tried to more fully respond to it than I have in the past since I now had video rather than just simply

Saying what he said and then responding to it And so I had talked about once before but it's a little bit longer now

So I put that up and I want to respond I pulled five or six segments from Hitchens where he's making particular arguments, and I am going to also

Play the part where he nails Frank Turek now nails not in the sense of winning the debate

He didn't even try to respond almost anything that Frank Turek presented There's no question about that and I think just simply on a meaningful debate level

Where you're actually going? All right. Here's where the positive argument was made did the negative side

Respond what the positive side said is there a real interaction here? There wasn't all Hitchens does is whine in a very

British accent about religion and He shows absolutely no concern

Whatsoever for accuracy of understanding he brought up limbo in this debate and said that they had just gotten rid of limbo and They did no such thing

It was not a dogma in the first place. It was a clarification blah blah. It's not even fair when dealing with groups that I disagree with and I've got to be consistent pointing that out and and he just lumps us all in with the

Pope and things like that and and That's just the way the Christopher Hitchens is so he just He's just playing on the emotions he's just getting people all excited

You know his followers all excited about hating God and joining him and rebelling against God as if somehow That was going to accomplish something.

So that's That that's on that level There really wasn't much of a contest

But it was interesting to hear Hitchens Properly identify

The main problem with evidentialist apologetics and Frank Turek is Norm Geisler's chief student in fact

I detected a number of Norman Geisler's jokes in Frank Turek's presentation and Frank did

I think make the mistake and I do believe this is always a mistake It was a mistake that That Greg Stafford avoided making for example, and that is he admitted.

This was his first formal debate. I Don't think that when you stand up in front of an audience you should tell them

Hey, it's first time I've ever done this guy sort of like going into the doctor, you know You get a young doctor. It is not gonna inspire confidence when he says hey, you're my first patient say ah

Yeah, you just don't want to go there So my suggestion to everybody is when you do your first debate if you ever do a formal debate

Don't go up there and tell people this is your first debate Just focus on the subject and don't waste nearly as much time as Frank Turek did at the beginning with With preliminaries that have nothing to do with the subject of the debate, especially when you're debating someone like Christopher Hitchens so anyway

Hitchens Nailed the weakness of evidentialist apologetics. He said did you notice that?

Dr. Turek went from deist to theist To Christian without ever explaining how he managed to do that and he was right that's where the evidentialist apologetic falls apart is

You know, it says well, I can't argue for the Christian God because from the evidentialist perspective the uniqueness of the

Christian God is just an add -on to the Vague general idea of a

God you see and so from their perspective you reason from a

God to a more specific kind of God finally to the Christian God and the presuppositionalist says below me can't do it wrong

God and I remember the first time that I heard My apologetics professor at Fuller Theological Seminary.

Yes Fuller Theological Seminary. I had a Presbyterian Professor and I thought it was great that that he

He said this because it helped me out a lot once I figured out what in the world he was saying but he was the one who said

Thomas Aquinas proved the wrong God and There was a background to that but he was right and so it is interesting that in the haze of Hitchin ism

He is still able to recognize that yeah, you know You didn't really quite establish

How you managed to go from one point to the next point to the next point?

In your in your argumentation there, and I'm not sure I can wave my arms any more than this Someone's not paying attention

But I got their attention. So anyways, so that actually I wasn't gonna talk about that What I was gonna say was that was part of what

I listened to on the ride yesterday What I listened to beforehand was a presentation

I've monitored a Particular blog called

LDS voices and I've looked for Information About Mormonism, you know

Mormonism used to be really the primary thing that we were involved with, you know every six months we were in Salt Lake City and we're out in Mesa and You know our emphasis clearly has moved elsewhere and Mormonism has been changing in that time.

I've said many times there. There's a tremendous contrast between the Mormon that you encounter today and the

Mormon that you encountered when we first started doing this in the middle 1980s and Mormonism in many ways has lost its way but there are still of course those believing

Mormons out there and so I was listening to a BYU, Idaho devotional from June of 2004

By Noel B Reynolds professor of political science at Brigham Young University Noel B Reynolds and I found some of the things he said very interesting

And you'll see why I I did let's let's listen first to this this little little clip right here

But why do we assume that they were effective? The collapse of the church in the first century suggests that many of them were not

When the second century opens we are confronted with clear evidence of a growing variety of competing versions of Christianity and The original structure of priesthood leadership has disappeared

All that remain our city leaders still known as bishops But not called or supported by a central structure under the direction of prophets or apostles now

What I found interesting throughout this entire talk was the anachronistic assumption on the part of the

Mormon speaker of the original idea that the original church was was formed as the

Mormon Church that you had a prophet and you had apostles and you had the priesthood

This is just assumed never ever proven. No evidence

Presented whatsoever and I've always felt that one of the weakest areas aside from its blatant polytheism and things like that one of the weakest areas in Mormon theology is this concept of priesthood because the

New Testament's teaching on priesthood is so clear it's so compelling and The Mormon perspective is just simply not there.

It's not what the New Testament teaches in any way shape or form and We have always found, you know, we have a priesthood tract that we passed out up in Salt Lake City Especially to all the young alleged priesthood holders during the priesthood meetings on Saturdays and we've always found that going that direction and talking with Mormons on the subject of the priesthood has been extremely effective because Let's face it.

Most Christians don't talk to him about that subject. Most Christians have no idea what the New Testament doctrine the priesthood is and So they it's it's it's not an area where they have pat answers already memorized and things like that and So over and over again,

I would hear Dr. Reynolds here Assuming something that simply isn't in evidence and that is that the early church was formed as the

Modern LDS Church is formed and that therefore when you begin to see the early forms of the of the church in History and it's different from Mormonism.

Well that that just must be a perversion and what struck me was Isn't that exactly what

Muslims do? That's exactly what Muslims do I was

I was gonna in fact, I forgot to do this But I was gonna queue up the the section from Shabir Ali in our debate in Biola in 2006

Where I I said well, you know, can you tell us how can we tell what in the New Testament is still inspired?

What is not in his responses? Well, if it agrees with the Quran it is if it doesn't it's not and So the the parallel there's so many interesting parallels between Mormonism and Islam They believe completely different things

I've said in public places more than once That when you recognize that what you believe about God whether you're a monotheist or polytheist is the most fundamental defining factor of a religion the the chasm between monotheism and polytheism cannot be crossed and Given that that means that on that level

Islam is closer to biblical Christianity than Mormonism is Because Mormonism is the most polytheistic religion

I've ever encountered I'll never forget the long internet debate those actually wasn't in it as BBS debate.

This is before the Internet with Eldon Watson, remember that rich Eldon Watson, that's there's a name we haven't heard in a while and We had this huge BBS exchange and for those of you who don't know what a

BBS was that was a bulletin board system This was before the Internet became popular and people are going.

Wow. He's an old man, isn't he? But anyway

We had this lengthy conversation concerning the the reduction of the

Islamic perspective And that is if there's an increasing number of gods in the

Islamic worldview Sorry, sorry Mormon worldview, but I love Mormon worldview.

Don't get you confused here I'll didn't Watson's not a Muslim. He's a Mormon, but they both start with him. So it gets confusing if there's an increasing number of gods in the

Mormon worldview over time Then logically as you go back in time, you're going to come to the first God and what was the first God?

Before he was a god he had to have been a man. Well who created the first man? well if he's the first God then you don't don't have a creator and so on and so forth and Eldon Watson's argument was there is an

Unlimited number of deities you cannot go backwards in infinity and eventually come to Anything other than infinity there's an infinite number of gods that makes

Mormonism the most polytheistic religion you could possibly conceive of Because there is an unlimited number of deities and he he defended that idea

It's in fact, I think it's still in the Mormon section or at least part of my conversation with Watson on Matthew 16

I know that's up there. The other one might be I don't know but anyhow, so the parallels between Joseph Smith and Muhammad are very interesting very very interesting and Here you have the same result when you have a religion that comes along that in essence says

Christianity blew it Then you get some very interesting parallels between them and Both anachronistically take their scriptures and then make them the standard even though they come afterwards logically

They should be able to be tested for consistency With the previous revelation, but no no

Just as the the Muslim looks at the Bible through the lens of the Quran The Mormon looks the

Bible through the lens of the Book of Mormon, dr. Cummins program price if they've ever read the program price and those revelations become prior more important and they become the basis upon which the

Bible is to be in essence corrected and So I found that I found that fascinating the second thing that I heard

That should not have surprised me listen to this section from dr.

Reynolds and see if this doesn't sound Yeah, it's a little bit familiar Nephi saw further that the devil's church took away many parts of the gospel

Including the covenants as verse 26 tells us and later took away many precious things out of the

Bible verse 28 Now in the first century the Christian scriptures consisted principally of the

Old Testament Available in a Greek translation called the Septuagint a few years ago

I had a personal experience that confirmed Nephi's account in a very dramatic way. I was a guest of the director of the

Vatican Library in Rome and He brought out their 4th century copy of the

Bible for me to see known as Codex Vaticanus B The first page view let me just mention its

Codex Vaticanus which in the Nessie Olin designation system is B It's not Vaticanus B.

But hey, yeah, that's okay. I just think it stinks that a Mormon gets to see Had numerous erasures additions and changes written right on the page in different inks and in different hands

I Pointed to some of these and asked him what's that?

He answered oh, that's where they make corrections I could tell that Over the last two decades

Now that's as far as he goes and talk about a very surface level discussion of Codex Vaticanus and the nature of textual emendation and la la la la la la, but hey, especially for Mormons, they have a long history of Going after the scriptures and that's what you're gonna hear that listen.

No, this way says over the last two decades. This is 2004 So two decades since the 80s what's been going on since the 80s?

Hmm. Listen many New Testament scholars have argued convincingly That the final text of the

Gospels and the epistles that were eventually canonized as our New Testament Took shape during a long period in which they were modified as necessary necessary To support the emerging theological orthodoxy among the leaders of the

Christian churches Their principal evidence comes from scriptural quotations in second century documents quotations, which are different than what we have today and Would not have supported the theological orthodoxy that emerges in the church in later centuries

Now that's not actually and I remember he's a professor of political science So I guess we can sort of give him a pass on that, but that's not actually the argumentation

But can you guess where he's getting that from? Yeah, I can guess too.

That's from Bart Ehrman Bart Ehrman the cultists apostates and Muslims favorite scholar

What an amazing thing to hear that we need to take our break we'll be right back with your phone calls right after this such a rare today

So many stars strong and true Answering those who claim that only the

King James Version is the Word of God James White in his book the King James only controversy examines allegations that modern translators conspired to corrupt

Scripture and lead believers away from true Christian faith in A readable and responsible style author

James White traces the development of Bible translations old and new and Investigates the differences between new versions and the authorized version of 1611

You can order your copy of James White's book the King James only controversy by going to our website at www .a

Omin org the history of the Christian Church pivots on the doctrine of justification by faith

Once the core of the Reformation the church today often ignores or misunderstands this foundational doctrine in his book the

God who justifies theologian James White calls believers to a fresh appreciation of Understanding of and dedication to the great doctrine of justification and then provides an exegesis of the key scripture texts on this theme

Justification is the heart of the gospel in today's culture where tolerance is the new absolute

James White proclaims with passion the truth and centrality of the doctrine of justification by faith

Dr. J. Adams says I lost sleep over this book. I simply couldn't put it down James White writes the way an exegetically and theologically

Oriented pastor appreciates. This is no book for casual reading There is solid meat throughout an outstanding contribution in every sense of the words

The God who justifies by dr. James White get your copy today at a omen org

Bible works 8 is here full of innovative and essential tools users will have a hundred and ninety plus Bible translations 35 original language text and morphology databases 29 lexical grammatical references and an abundance of additional resources

Pastors you will appreciate the phrase matching tool Which will allow you to find all of the verses containing phrases similar to your search verse giving you greater depth and keener insight during sermon preparation

Seminary professors and students will be enriched by the way Bible works 8 shows the most common words in the pericope book or chapter

Plus provides a wider range of formatting options and faster access to copying preferences scholars your research

Just got easier with the army external resources manager a handy tool to collect organize and display resource files from your computer as well

As the internet dr. James White says Bible works is the best Bible software available I have used

Bible works software for years and each new release has brought many new and useful tools to the program This is the program that runs 24 7 on my office computer and it is the one that's running on my laptop when

I engage In debates it is simply the number one research tool for anyone doing serious exegesis of the text for over 15 years

Bible works has assisted all users in their study of the original languages and That enables you to do one thing focus on the text and that translates to focusing on the truth

Order your copy of Bible works at a omen org and for a limited time You'll receive free shipping and a free mp3 download of the white airmen debate and welcome back to the dividing line glad we survived

I'll fix that later. There you go. I guess that chewing gum finally finally gave in on that one

I Just love the high -end professionalism that we we

Provide for there we set the standard that other people shoot for or shoot down at or something

I was noticing a comment in channel

From the fellow we we had hoped someday. He would write the wisdom of tired, but he never got around to it now

He's married. So I'll never write anything again. So but he says corrections on a biblical manuscript self -destruct their inerrancy and yet they the

Mormons can Can explain why interchanging white and pure and adding principle to the

Book of Mormon and its introduction are minor inconsequential changes Very true the standard for the

Book of Mormon and the standard for the Bible are not the same Thanks due to the eighth article of faith, of course, so that's just simply how how we should do that You're putting that away and you bring it as you know, you're not going to go there.

Okay good. That's fine All right, let's go ahead and take our phone caller and then I've got something else that I want to address today

Let's talk with Jeff. Hi Jeff. How you doing? Hi, dr. White great to talk to you again.

Yes, sir Yeah, it's kind of I think last time I called in late 2007. I was Wondering if you're ever gonna debate.

Dr. Ahriman. So my Times has definitely changed and I'm really glad you did the debate And I wanted to kind of comment on a couple things from dr.

Ahriman's argumentation kind of get your comments on them One was and I think a lot of people discuss the and you've discussed a lot the absolute certainty sort of criterion

Dr. Ahriman, it seems to me I kept thinking about his issues with cetera interview where he basically where he said that yeah, we pretty much know what they said and his inconsistencies, but one of the things

I was You're applying it to other texts, but I was thinking like if he applied his standard just to everyday life, there's no way

I don't have absolute proof that I'm not a brain in a vat or for younger folks

You know, I'm plugged into the matrix or something like that So, I mean there you based on his standards,

I don't think you could believe in anything Well almost anything except like, you know, it's a car like you exist

Yeah, I I think you're right I I don't know that he'd go quite that far I didn't push it that far

I do think Right. Yeah, no that far but I mean if it was

I think there's something in his life Where and I I mean, obviously I don't want to psychoanalyze them

But just based off of Romans one that there's something causing him like, okay

If I have to if I have to accept the Bible or be consistent I will be consistent in a way that rejects the

Bible You know where he will reject pacifist or whatnot, you know, well, he's a good he's a good

He's more and more influenced by post -modernism. I do think that we're seeing a more rapid evolution in ermine's

Embracing his role as the chief critic of the New Testament Since dr.

Metzger has passed. I think there was a a personal relationship with their Metzger Never denied the faith, but he's gone now and I think you've seen a

I don't know that that ermine would have put out Jesus interrupted

While ermine was or while Metzger was still alive. And so I think that's part of it

But there's also he himself admitted He has changed his views in regards to even the propriety of addressing the concept of the original text

Since he wrote the orthodox corruption of Scripture so over the past decade and a half He's had a pretty major shift in his perspective at that point.

And so I think you put all that together and as you know the the the only

Certainty in a post -modern worldview is that there is no certainty and so I think he's just being consistent at that point

He but he's not consistent in that if there really isn't any certainty at all His historical writings should be considerably more

Nebulous than they are but he's not consistent at that point Now is he going to go back and re -edit everything to become more and more consistent post -modernist?

I don't know but it will be interesting because I know that he has already done editing work on the next edition of the orthodox corruption of Scripture What kind of major changes he's going to be making because he would have to make major major changes

To bring the book into line with the presuppositions that he expressed in our debate now,

I was also thinking There was an argument that really struck me from or the

Bachman's Jesus and the eyewitnesses Yes, where when he was talking about the oral history that one of the things

Is critics or you know critics of an accurate oral history presuppose?

Or they kind of miss that they kind of assume that the people who started off the oral history were kind of Abducted right into space.

Yes, and then weren't around to check it and I was you know I was thinking it kind of I don't know how the thought pops into my head

But that that's kind of what airmen is doing with the text do That the people who wrote the text as the chain of transmission started going out weren't around at all to consult right and So even if you could say like, okay, there's a word or two we're not quite sure of I think that would go with your tenacity argument where they

Airmen kind of assuming that they weren't around at all to say Hey Paul, did you write this or not and not just for general like hated to write the letter?

But even like if there was something in the letter, you know that Paul could have seen his own letter and said well

I didn't write that Well, and here's and here's what he did not understand and and I'm sorry

He can say until the cows come home that he used to believe exactly what I believe. I don't believe him

He he if that was true Then he could have provided a significantly better critique of what

I said because I don't think he understood what I was saying remember at this one point in the debate, I forget exactly where it was, but He presented his theory that Paul writes a letter and it gets copied and then the next copy is the one where all the copies come from and so you have

Interview as well, right? And so what he's doing is he's presenting a theoretical history of transmission which he would not claim that he can prove but he's saying it's a possibility and the idea is that the original any copies other than this one line disappear and Any copies of the second and then he had come out for that disappear

It's this third that all the surviving copies have come to us now all you know all he's doing is presenting, you know, it's possible that this could have happened and Given that we'd have to say well

It's possible that the enterprise came back in time and and beamed up the the the original or beamed something

I mean, you know this possibility thing even he says it's not an issue of debating possibilities.

It's probabilities He made that statement in the debate when I was saying could you show us any text that you would say?

That none of the original readings could be even possible None of the pot originaries could possibly have existed continue to exist in manuscript tradition and he dodged that one by saying

Well, it's not a matter of possibility. It's a matter of probabilities and then he gave us one example Well, there's no textual variant at all

Which I guess he would say is more probably the original than all the manuscript reading for that text

We have which has no manuscript variations at all. I don't know where he was going there That's one of the problems with with debates is you can't necessarily push those issues to find out just how consistently it's been but here's the point all he's done is he's presented a

Theoretical reconstruction of a single Pauline letter, but every time he does this he takes it out of the context of the

Christian community He does this with the synoptic issues. He does this with textual transmission He does this in regards to the the eyewitnesses and here's the other part

That's only one letter of many letters if you're going to make an argument for entire

Corruption of the New Testament you have to do it for every letter and so you have to start multiplying that small possibility that that's how that worked by 27 different books and that becomes absolutely ridiculous

That's why I was trying to present to him was the New Testament as it appears in those earliest manuscripts in those second century manuscripts

Does not give us any reason to believe that the scenario that he has presented actually took place and since he's arguing for a

Hypothetical that would be highly unusual that he would never argue for for any other book.

That's not the New Testament I would think Then the burden of proof is upon the critic if the

New Testament as it appears from multiple sources in the second century Is reflective of a consistent mechanism of transmission over time?

Then it's the critic that has to prove his point not the person who accepts this as having been transmitted accurately

But he just he is so focused upon Variation rather than similarity that it was almost like he couldn't even imagine that he couldn't even see the logic of that And I think that's one of the real benefits of the debate is here's somebody who's clearly not

Balanced any longer and you know he may be you know some great living expert fine some people can get so into their topic that they get disconnected from reality and We've seen that happen in other instances, and I think that's exactly what has happened with these individuals

Who are just dismissing the the possibility existence of the of the original text? No, yeah, so when you're writing your book.

I would definitely modify Bachmann's argument and try to use that I had a quick question and last question in terms of like an orthodox understanding of Inspiration in terms of textual variants would we say that I mean assuming that we don't have all the streams of all the textual variants we have would say if you have like an accurate representation of the

The original text to whatever degree you want to say that I've heard someone refer to it

Kind of like you're watching an NFL game on TV. You may not be seeing like a complete hundred percent

Replication of the original text, but you have an accurate representation of the original text well

I think I think it's very good day since what we have is inspired or how would we well? Jeff I think it's very important to emphasize what

I emphasized in the debate and that is What we have? well not only the tenacity of the text and I think that that is going to become a major area of where we need to draw the battle lines because Ermin Ermin didn't refute

Kurt Ahlin's presentation of tenacity. He just mocked it And that's not that's not scholarship.

I don't care where you went to school Where I went to school which people like to mock we were taught that that's not meaningful argumentation

So if at Princeton that's considered to be meaningful argumentation. Well, we need to start redefining scholarship bit as it may

The tenacity of the text and the fact that the originals continue to exist in the manuscript tradition is absolutely necessary to to emphasize at that point and And When you do have a major variant or something like that,

I think that needs to be needs to be clearly indicated and and the options given but I Do not think and I'm about to read something here.

It's your your questions leading directly into this I don't think I don't do not think that Bengal was giving us pablum as this particular writer.

I'm gonna be quoting says When he told us that the variations between the manuscripts do not impact any article of evangelical doctrine

Even Ermin has admitted that even Ermin in his debate with Dan Wallace very clearly admitted now

He likes to play with the phrase it matters Variants matter he likes to misrepresent us as if we're saying variants don't matter.

We don't say variants don't matter What we say is that the manuscript tradition is full enough

To give us the ability to know what the original text was and to affirm that the original text is still there

That's not saying they don't matter in any way shape or form. He likes to equivocate on on that particular term but I think that's that's

Absolutely vital to emphasize and in fact what I'm gonna do here Jeff. Thank you for call I'm gonna I'm gonna continue on with this.

So I hope I keep listening and thank you for thank your call Thanks for listening to the debate. Thank you. God bless. I was really

Bothered and and I'm not gonna rush much here if we have to go a couple minutes over go a couple minutes over I'm just I just want to rush this

I read this review and those of you who have the RSS feed the evangelical textual criticism blog may have read it as well this is a review by JK Elliot at University of Leeds in the

UK of J Harold Greenlees the text of New Testament from manuscript to modern edition now,

I Do not have this edition of Greenlee it's on its way. It's prior I've today But this is an update of the books

I do have and that was his original work on textual criticism, which then became updated I think in the 80s or 90s to scribes scrolls and scripture and now has a new name with Hendrickson publishers and The there are things that are said

By by Elliot in this that you know, I want to check them out make sure they're accurate

I don't have any reason to question there. For example, he goes after Greenlee for a bad scripture index

I understand how that happens, especially if you're updating an older book I can understand how how scripture index issues can arise to be perfectly honest with you but And some of the other statements he made that are made here

I would take some issue with Greenlee on but I want you to listen to the voice of modern scholarship and This bothers me and I hope it

I think it'll bother you as much and I actually hope it'll bother you as much because it Really has prompted me to do a lot of thinking about how to avoid the

Irrationality of those who are just scared of scholarship Run run run run. We can't use our brains and who are afraid of tackling truth,

I Don't want to do you know Dan Wallace has a good point. He talks about people who are more desirous of having certainty than of having the truth and I've met many people who are very certain of untruths, so I don't want to go there

But the same time I don't want to be JK Elliot Listen to what he says,

I'm just reading two paragraphs This is from his review. This is from SBL Society biblical literature.

This is the RBL of January of 2009 So this is this is brand new Here's here's one of his here's two two paragraphs one of his ways to answer readers concerns is to offer palliative platitudes

Among such pacifying remarks are quote the great majority of textual variants involve little or no difference in meaning end quote page 83 and Quote the vast majority the most theologically significant passages the

New Testament have no significant textual variations and quote page 117 a Blatantly unsustainable assertion that tests the gullibility of the readership

Also to be endured are his quoting Bengals pablum That quote the variations between the manuscripts did not shake any article of evangelical doctrine and quote page 76 and His repeating

Sir Frederick Kenyon's words quote We have in our hands and substantial integrity the veritable Word of God and quote page 120

Despite his not drawing attention to the unsettling get -out phrase quote insubstantial ie not complete integrity and quote

The fact that majority of the text is secure may well be true But what disturbs conservative readers is not the total percentage of variants that are insignificant as regards matters theological

But that minority of readings that are indeed theologically important more on these below second paragraph

Another means listen to this another means used to placate the fundamentalists is to appeal to divine protection of the text

Surprisingly in a book by a respected academic is his appeal on more than one occasion to the

Holy Spirit Although why the index has a reference to the

Holy Spirit on 46 to 47 alludes this reviewer on Page 37 we do find quote we believe that the

Holy Spirit guided the authors of the New Testament books So that their message would be protected from error and quote and quote we likewise believe that the

Holy Spirit Operated providentially in the copying and preservation of the manuscripts through the centuries end quote

Oh Exclamation point that is not the sort of presupposition

One would find in works of textual criticism of the Greek or Latin classics or of other ancient literature

Nor is it warranted here in any case such a view is a hostage -to -fortune

The vast quantity of textual variance is hardly suggestive of providential preservation

It were better had Greenlee avoided such peculiar obitur dicta Even Greenlee himself tells us in a prelude to a description of scribal habits that quote we should not think that it was only by Supernatural preservation that the

New Testament was kept from being lost or hopelessly confused during those centuries and quote for page 37

Perversely Greenlee allows page 103 that Mark's original ending has been lost

Mainly though Greenlee is concerned to show how the frail human agency of scribal copying Resulted in accidental and deliberate change and even he points to such two places such as first Thessalonians 2 7 and 1st

Corinthians 13 3 where he is not certain which reading came from the quote inspired end quote

Biblical author and of paragraph now

Listening to this was like chewing on aluminum foil for me.

I Was Here is someone who is indeed speaking the presuppositions of the modern

Academy represented by Bart Ehrman and It is not an argument to mock a position it would be better to provide a meaningful interaction

But we do need to understand that this is the language of the modern

Academy Now I've never figured out why people who don't believe in the inspiration of the

Bible would spend their time studying the Bible But there are a lot of people who do Just a couple of things

He identifies as Pacifying remarks the statement the great majority of textual variants involve little or no difference in meaning.

I Don't know how many times I've heard Bart Ehrman say that that is not even a disputable assertion

Given that the largest textual variant in the New Testament I don't mean largest as a number of verses But the most number of times this text will bring comes up has to do with the movable new

The movable new does not impact meaning So that's a fact.

How is that a pacifying thing or are we just not supposed to mention that? Does JK Eliot so live in the realm of variation?

That he can't admit these facts Then the next quote the vast majority of the most theologically significant passages in New Testament have no significant textual variations

Okay, I've got to agree with Eliot on that one. I Wouldn't say it that way He says a blatantly unsustainable assertion that tests the gullibility of the readership

Well, I think that's I think Eliot is following Ehrman in his book review methodology here to be perfectly honest with you

But I wouldn't say that I think that there any theologically significant passage is going to have

Either minor or major textual variation in it. Most of it's going to be minor. Most of it's going to not be relevant but Is is

I haven't like I said, I've ordered the book to make sure that I can put this in context There's no period put at the end of this. I'm not sure if he's missing something when it says have no significant textual variations

But the things that the bug me he identifies Bengals statement as pablum

That's if if a conservative was writing about someone else a liberal they would be dismissed for this kind of clearly biased presentation

It's It's amazing. But then here's what really hit me and this is what

I want to spend Just a few moments on I realized that They were going over time, but we'll try to keep it brief

Another means used to placate the Fundamentalists, I mean that's just bias.

That's just that's bigotry. That's that's prejudice To placate the fundamentalist is to appear and let's let's face it folks if you want to placate the fundamentalists

You'd be using the King James Version of the Bible and you wouldn't be writing the stuff that Greenlee's writing in the first place Trust me,

I know Another means used to placate the fundamentalist is to appeal to divine protection of the text

See, it's it's it's as if that's can't even be a possibility. That's not even allowed on the table now

But how do you keep it off the table? You just mock the people who might believe it. You don't argue against it

You don't demonstrate any type of consistent worldview That would give you a reason for doing that you just simply dismiss it that's how liberalism works folks

That's how it works in politics. That's how it works in religion. That's how it works in our seminaries And this is what's coming into the seminaries.

This is the attitude that is producing the kind of literature that's out there today Listen this surprisingly in a book by a

Respected academic is his appeal on more than one occasion to the

Holy Spirit This is simple secularism

This is simple unbelief. Are you going to argue?

Dr. Elliot? That the Holy Spirit has nothing to do with the transmission of the text of the

New Testament Oh, but we can't make reference to that. What do you mean? We can't make reference to that that sounds just like Bart Ehrman say well a historian can't say anything about God because Well, God has nothing to do with history, huh?

but Christians believe that God has everything to do with history and Christians believe that the scriptures are they are new stars and that new stars

Breathe is related to new ma, which is spirit So what we have here is you can not be a believing

Christian and engage in this practice I think what we need to realize is you've got a bunch of unbelievers

Who have in essence hijacked The quote -unquote leading edge of this discipline and we need to start identifying that What that also means is those who are believers who by the work of the

Spirit in their heart Have had the rebellion against God's Word removed and I believe a part of regeneration a part of the change of the heart

Is to cause a person to bow the knee before God's speech before God's Word the men of old who've changed this world have been people who gave clear evidence of obedience to the

Word of God and Those in whose lives the

Spirit has moved in that way. I Challenge you I plead with you if you're a young man, and you feel called the ministry you feel called to study

I challenge the young men of our generation Go into this field Learn what these people have to say.

Yes, but don't imitate their unbelief take the truth that they say yes, but combine it with faith and begin providing the kind of believing

Scholarship that goes beyond the circularity. I submit to you Secular humanism is no foundation for dealing with God's universe

It will always result in the stunted viewpoints that we see in a Bart Ehrman That can give us no reason for life.

No reason to to get up in the morning and do what is right. I call upon those those young people as You go into this field.

Don't just dodge this don't dodge this area dive into it In trust and faith that God's Word is true and let's begin producing a kind of believing biblical studies

We have so much given the field over to the unbelievers and saying go well

Look at all we write we run SPL and we do this and we do that There is such danger when the

Christian Academy When the Christian Academy is So in love

With the acceptance of the world that we are no longer willing to stand up and say

I Operate under the Lordship of Christ you operate under the

Lordship of your own mind. You are a rebel against Christ and That simply isn't allowed in the

Academy any longer. I hope there's some listening right now.

I Know young reformed men. They have a lot of zeal. They have a lot of desire

They desire to learn they desire to study I Call you give consideration you want to be a scholar you want to teach?

I'm not saying it's gonna be easy You're gonna have to to go against the flow anybody who believes in the Lordship of Christ Anybody who believes

God's their creator today has to go against the flow but we need good

Sound Scholarship being produced out there. I'm not saying lower the level of scholarship

I'm saying go to a higher level of scholarship because I say to you to do scholarship under the

Lordship of Christ is the highest calling To do scholarship in the Lordship of secular humanism is not a high calling we

Need to delve into this area and give an answer for the hope that's within us Well, I have wanted to say that for quite a while As you can tell it bugged me and it still bugs me and and I'm going to include it and whatever work

However work this ends up coming out and dealing with the urban material and his new book coming out in March And I don't know how

I'm gonna put all together yet because there's it's so wide I don't know if it's to be a 500 page volume or multiple volumes.

I don't know That's a lot of work pray for us continue to support us. Thanks for listening to buying line We'll see you next time.

God bless The dividing line has been brought to you by Alpha and Omega ministries

If you'd like to contact us call us at six. Oh two nine, seven three four six zero two or write us at PO box

Three seven one zero six Phoenix, Arizona eight five zero six nine. You can also find us on the world wide web at a omen org

That's a o m i n dot o RG where you'll find a complete listing of James White's books tapes debates and tracks