Ehrman/Licona Resurrection Discussion on Unbelievable

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 at 602 973 4602 or toll-free across the United States. It's 1 877 7 5 3 3 3 4 1. And now with today's topic here is James White.

Mailbag: Certified Letter and the “Commonwealth of Global Israel”

And welcome to the dividing line. The. I had a really cool sound effect there, but it didn't work. Let's try it again. Got mail. Yes, we've got mail and I got mail. I want to start off. And I normally don't see this stuff, but this fellow sent This certified.

Let me check this. Yes certified mail.

He sent one copy to our big. You miss it. You misread that. It's it's certifiable. That's.

The person who said this is certifiable certified mail to both the post office box for the ministry as well as to the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church and The the it says the Commonwealth of Global Israel with a trademark next to it.

It's a post office box in Green Bay, Wisconsin. I've just always figured Green Bay is the central Center of all biblical prophecy. It's made out to a me and to my fellow elder via image of the beast at HTTP Colon backslash backslash six six six dot a omin org.

I actually tried to bring that up and guess what even Google can't find it. Which obviously is part of the great cosmic conspiracy anyways. Regarding the days of vengeance and the time of Jacob's trouble.

Nature's God a more perfect union versus Israel's God the Abrahamic Covenant the whore of Great Babylon wicked Israel and her sister treacherous Judah. The mount of the congregation James White and the cost of true discipleship.

There's a picture of me on here and stuff even pastor Fry got on this. This is good Mr. White as well as staff all associates elders directors trustees entire congregation and membership. Well your staff here, but it and you're a member at PR BC.

So you you get this twice. We prove me should I be an error, but the blasphemous names associated with the end time false church. That is described in Scripture include campus crusade for Christ grace to you the master's seminary Alpha and Omega ministries, etc.

This repugnant merchandising of Jesus is judged profane. These are of those who would dismiss if not murder the prophets and prophets and saints of Christ the Most High God of Israel to those who claim falsely a Personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

They may fool the congregation. But mr. White who died rose and put you in charge. This office and Christian ministry requires compliance sincerely and here is the part. Mm-hmm. Here's the signature folks I'm gonna read it all for you.

Michael Tatosky. J Michael Tatosky descendant of Joseph son of Israel Prime Minister under Egypt. The Increaser who stands against the Antichrist Empire whose mark is in the sky holder of the birthright to the whole house of Israel first.

Chronicles 5 1 through 2. Chief Prince Defender of God's remnant the survivors of Jacob Daniel 12 1 through 13 chosen by God himself the uncompromising unchanging angry deity of the Holy Bible. Servant of the King Christ himself the Lord God of salvation and faithful God of my father's that is the signature of J Michael Tatosky of Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Now evidently 16 years ago 16 years ago Mr. Tatosky Accosted John MacArthur in the parking lot at Grace Grace Church. Because part of what he sends out in this thing and what did this cost? I wonder I mean there is a number of things in it doesn't show but I Just hope it's not public money is going to.

But He sends out in this in this thing which has all sorts of you know other weirdness in it. A photocopy of a letter dated March 24th 1995. John MacArthur jr. It's on his letterhead. This is a this is a trophy for this man you need to understand and if he ever finds out about this program as I said he will be burning CDs of this and Sending it out in the future, which will make the packages even heavier and more expensive.

Dear sir, this is this is John MacArthur to J. Michael Tatosky. Dear, sir. We met the other day in the parking lot the Masters College and I expressed to you that I would respond your material. I read through it and find it difficult to react since I don't have any idea what you're saying.

Obviously you're concerned about the state of America and the church, but it's quite impossible to figure out a specifically what your issues are. Maybe that's why people aren't responding to your zeal.

Throwing everybody in the same bag further complicates any clarity. Apparently you're just mad at everybody with the lack of discrimination. Which leads you to conclude that the only person who's left is you?

That kind of attitude always comes from someone who's not only deep into the sin of pride. But probably deep into a lot of other sins. You have obviously exalted yourself. And I wonder if your private life is not filled with iniquity.

I'm going to pray that God the Lord will press you to conviction and clarity in his truth. I don't intend to respond your material any further although I certainly would welcome your repentance. Should Lord produce that in your heart.

Yours to the master John MacArthur. I I couldn't have said any any better myself. But did you wish to comment the skis you weren't you weren't gonna show that to me. Were you oh? I never do we get that.

Yeah, so you're telling me that you've got mail. We do that all the time it we do. But some it's I gotta admit. It's mildly entertaining. I mean years ago. You've got mail. Yeah, I'm thinking around.

2001 2002. This might be the same fellow as it's it's now occurred to me. I don't know I've forgotten his name. This person at the time did not know what the internet was and they just kept sending me these about half-inch thick Folders and certified mail, so I had to stand in line at the post office and sign for these things and.

Isn't that fun. Yes, that was that was fun especially back then when you know Christmas time you have to stand in a for an hour. Oh sure yeah, so. What they were were the letters to you R. C. Sproul John MacArthur a number of other I think D. James Kennedy a number of different names and all charging you with.

All kinds of sins and dotted out on this individual was convening a trial.

Really done. I missed it. I missed it. Were these like like subpoenas or something. Well. It was you know.

Like I said it was clearly he his copier was getting a workout. Let's all I bet so or somebody's copier was you know how sometimes the copier the image shifts, right? You know you get a lot of that, and you know you fill in the blank with your name and stuff like that and After a few months of going through this I started going to the counter and writing refused and handing it back to the guy and It was going back.

This still continued really and so one day I decided I got one of these things and I decided to sign for it. I took it home, and I got on the internet and did some research, and I found the guy's phone number.

Oh. Made a phone call, and I was none too happy and a fellow by this individual's name Answered the phone sound rather elderly and I basically Read him the riot after this now. Yeah, I'm sick and tired of this you're gonna stop sending me this stuff.

You don't I'm gonna start filing charges against you through the mail system all right, okay? I've refused your stuff. I don't know why you don't get the message the other gentleman said um I Believe you're actually looking for in his name, jr.

Ah. And I said is the individual at home, and he said yes, could you explain to me? What's going on? So okay, this is dad elderly dad, and he's still living in oh of course okay? Oh, yeah.

I put two together there. Oh wait. We get that all the time. No. I explained to dad.

This is what's going on with your son, and what he's been doing and it's my understanding with your photocopier probably. You know RC's pro and a number others individuals are getting these.

You know things of this supposed and their representatives are standing in line and post office boxes as well.

Yes, and the gentleman very nice man said I'm sorry. I will take care of take care. It's never heard from the individual again. So this is what that kind of?

You you actually had told me that story once and so you know what you've got mail. We do get mail, and we get it often. I Just couldn't believe it yeah fry almost didn't give it to me. And then then I wasn't overly surprised that a second copy came to the post office box, but We we get mail, and you know what we also get mentioned on the internet.

George Bryson’s Critique of Calvinism and Calvary Chapel

I Mentioned this in a blog post on Sunday, and we're gonna get this very very important stuff later today. I'm not giving out the phone number right now because honestly It's gonna take all this program prior all the next to just to review this.

I'm I want to listen to and review the Bart Ehrman Mike like Ona Encounter on unbelievable this past weekend, and I think again it's extremely important to examine apologetic methodology and Very few things illustrate the differences in apologetic methodology like these encounters and so that's we're gonna be doing the rest of program and I'm also going to be Someone again someone who helps with the ministry resource list just gave me a Paul Copan's new book Is God a moral monster on Kindle?

And I will be recording that listening to that over the next week or so as I ride because I I Found the unbelievable program where he was on to be very interesting as well. And the whole issue of the Odyssey and the issue of God's justice again extremely important.

I I learned a lot from listening that unbelievable program there were a couple of Interesting items that I had not thought of that I did learn from but I was also troubled By a number of the other statements that were that were made so we'll be listening to those things.

I have a queue of books a mile long. My Kindle is working overtime right now. I finally learned by the way Techno geek note here real quick before I read this George Bryson thing techno geek note. I Don't know why I didn't think of this.

But if you recall the techno geek blog article I put up about a month ago or so One things I should have mentioned in that. And I don't know and I just started doing it myself. Kindle has the ability to read at different rates.

Obviously if you want the real if you want to record as quickly as possible you put it on fast. Now that won't work on an iPod if you've got it on faster. That's too fast. That's that gets into the chipmunk stage.

But I noticed that the fast on the iPod and the fast and the kinder or Kindle are about the same so You might have to stop once a while like I did this morning and switch from faster To normal to listen to a Kindle recording that you did it faster.

But you can you can get it to record faster. I just recorded an entire Hurtado Larry Hurtado book in Five hours basically by having the Kindle read it at a faster rate of speed and that'll actually give me a good idea of exactly How long it's gonna take to listen to the whole thing while while writing so keep that in mind and Yesterday something really exciting happened.

My life has been fulfilled. The new Version 1 .2 of the iOS for accordance in other words Accordances iPhone app iPhone and iPod apps iPad as well. Version 1 .2 came out and it will now sync with your accordance on your Mac which means Everything I have an accordance including for the first time All the Nessie Olin and Biblio breakers to cartensia textual critical data in other words all the textual variant information I Now have on my little iPod touch and on my pet.

So when I'm out at in London or wherever I am as long as I've got my little iPod touch I now have all the textual critical data from the na 27 the Biblio breakers to cut its to cartensia the gotten gin Septuagint and the CN TTS.

I've got it all available to me electronically to carry with me all the time now and Just imagine how many volumes of print books you would have to carry To have that kind of information available to you, and I can have that on iPod touch 64 gig iPod touch amazing.

That that is actually available, so that's that's really exciting. Okay, I Was directed Oh Saturday night Sunday morning. I forget which one it was To an article I don't see a date on it as to when this was posted.

But it's on the Calvary Chapel theology website Which is run by good old George Bryson now we have you know I've debated George. And that debate is available for anybody to watch and in fact one of my most watched YouTube videos is my closing statement from that that debate I don't know how many thousands of views of that well you can't forget to read my book debate either.

Well of course that's right. We have the read my book debate on from the from Bible answer man broadcast as well. So we have debated George, and we've done it in writing. We've done it on the Bible answer man broadcast.

We've done it on in live at the Anaheim Vineyard is where that took place and We also Reviewed a Talk that George gave about I don't know two and a half three years ago now somewhere around there To Calvary Chapel pastors because you see George Bryson is the Calvary Chapel expert on Calvinism.

He is the go-to man. Now the very fact they need a go-to man illustrates the truthfulness of what I've been saying for a long time now I have said over and over and over again That as long as Calvary Chapel keeps the Calvary Chapel leadership keeps telling people read and study the Bible and Then at the same time ignores what the Bible says about the doctrines of grace.

They will continue to create Calvinists and As soon as I said that and I said that I've started saying that quite some time ago but especially over the past couple of years as I have been traveling and I do a lot of traveling and Talking to people after you know during breaks and conferences and things like that.

I have a large number of people come up to me and here's three times in Minneapolis three Times in Minneapolis this happened at the psalm 119 conference. Someone come up to me. Here's the standard conversation, you know I've heard you say a number of times.

I'm dividing line the Calvary Chapel produces a lot of Calvinists. Because they tell people to read their Bibles believe all the Bible has to say but they don't deal with what the Bible says about The doctrines of grace.

Well, that's me. Now their individual stories will vary. Some are still at Calvary Chapel's most or not but I cannot tell you how many times I mean this is becoming a regular event as I go out and speak and I've had people write to me.

We've had people call this program and talk about this. It just it happens a lot and you know It seems to me that you wouldn't have to have a go-to guy like George Bryson to talk about Calvinism. If this wasn't happening in other Calvary Chapel's, too.

We know the Calvary Chapel leadership has taken a purposeful open public Anticalvinistic out anti Calvinistic stance that does not mean that everybody in Calvary Chapel's is anti Calvinistic but the leadership has certainly taken that position.

We've seen that in the remember in a little over two years ago now we had a little back-and-forth with the With Brian Broderson and people like that there their utter inability to respond to first John 5 1 and they even brought in the head Of Veritas Theological Seminary, which is sort of now the Calvary Chapel Seminary, which by the way like Southern Evangelical Seminary.

Neither one is ATS accredited. Just I'd mentioned that in passing even though I am a little bit disturbed. If you go on Southern Evangelicals website. They they say that they are fully accredited. But they're actually associate members of ATS and let me read you from the ATS website ATS edu slash about slash pages slash member schools dot ASP X Associate members are not accredited.

But have met the requirements for associate membership as set forth in the ATS bylaws and procedures. They're not accredited. I Went through the accreditation process With Golden Gate here in Phoenix I know what it takes and the amount of money that invests and how many books you have to have and all the rest that Kind of stuff.

I've lived in both sides of that world and it bothered me a little bit. They're fully accredited since 2006. But according to this I looked up the list and they are on the so there's there's about I don't know a dozen schools Including the Irshon Graduate School, which is the one that's Pentecostal school in st. Louis that are quote associate members but according to this Not accredited that bothers me if if your school is not accredited Columbia Evangelical Seminary does not claim to be accredited never has has always been up front about that says this is how we do education.

This is this is our our philosophy if you're not accredited don't claim you are. It's all there is to it. I don't think accreditation makes for scholarship. In fact these days it is something you have to overcome but the point is don't claim that you are if you're not.

And that sort of bothers me but anyhow going back to Calvary Chapel Remember they brought in the head of Veritas and tried to respond to first John 5 -1 and we pointed out they didn't really respond to first John 5 -1 and we had that going back and forth for a little while and So they're well aware of.

Well, anyways, I need to get to this article or never get the rest of stuff I Was pointed to. Here's what the article says why Chuck Smith and Calvary Chapel produced so many Calvinist parentheses. James White parentheses or.

Why James White and his Calvinist friends not win many if any non-christians to Christ. George Bryson. Well nothing like as if George has any knowledge of these things. But gives you an idea of where George is coming from.

James White produced a radio program in which he suggested the Calvary Chapel produces a Lot of Calvinists actually have produced numerous webcasts where I have not only said that we've had people have called in who were former Calvary Chapel folks who have said that.

I Seriously doubt the Calvary Chapel is much of a stepping stone to Calvinism. Certainly not to the degree that James White wishes it were a more important question is why James White in the Calvinism that he claims Is quote the power of God for salvation everyone who believes and quote when so few if any Non-christians to Christ through a proclamation of the Calvinist gospel question mark.

Now, of course, I have said that the gospel is the power of God for salvation everyone who believes and I believe that the gospel Is thoroughly reformed. But George has never been big on Accuracy, you know when we went through his presentation, we just kept documenting error after error.

He's he he's just he's just not a good thinker. He's very easily distracted and and remember he didn't really even understood what monergism and synergism meant when we had our debate in 2001 and he came up with a new meaning for that and That's because he comes out of this anti scholarship, you know, you don't have to really Worry about you know Crossing the T's and dotting the I's and learning biblical languages stuff, you know, it's sort of the Dave Hunt You know you you Greek elitists type mindset.

And so, you know It's just it's just sort of natural that he he misses things. And what he misses here is this idea that that evidently Here has his head. Here's how he puts it. Let me see the hands of all of those of you who came to Christ After and as a result of hearing the five points of Calvinism according to James that is a true gospel.

That is the true gospel is Calvinism explained in the five points of Calvinism. Is it not so I am sorry. But I cannot see those hands. Was it the third point that says that Christ may not have died for you or your mother that moved you not to respond to?

Faith in Christ. Question mark. So what you have here is It's almost like he's going backwards. He's. He's Not even nearly as close to providing a meaningful response as at least once tried to be. This sounds like desperation to me.

It sounds very defensive. Oh No, we're not losing anybody to Calvinism. No, and so so let me straw man Calvinism a lot for you this is a clear demonstration that they are losing folks and they know it and This is a further attempt to try to scare people away from even listening to what reform folks are saying.

No one has said that the proclamation of the gospel is repeating the five points of Calvinism. Nobody and every Calvinist knows that so so when you get to the point where you're you are so far away from the truth That you're not even trying to reach the people you're talking about.

You're so into a straw man Caricature that doesn't say much for your truthfulness. It doesn't say much for your honesty. It certainly says that your arguments have pretty much failed and You're now Running on on something else.

And again, despite how many times he's been corrected. I don't think he listens to the corrections. So I guess we can't really count all of them. But was it the third point that says that Christ may not have died for you or your mother that moved you not to respond?

To in faith to Christ, it's best horribly written by the way fill the typos. George, you know, I I make typos too, but it's because I'm typing too fast. You might want to go back and look at this fix it up a little bit but um so in other words unless You believe in universal atonement unless you believe a sacrifice of Christ actually does not save anybody.

But only makes men all men savable then you're putting up a barrier to someone coming to faith in Christ. Which of course if you understood the preceding points and man's total depravity you wouldn't actually Go there anyways.

And of course if you understood the system that this man thinks he's an expert on then you would understand that your actual objection is to Unconditional election not to particular redemption at that point.

But again, it's this kind of you know. This should strike us as odd since the Calvinist gospel claims to be the only true gospel. It should also strike us as a bit strange. But the only gospel that is winning the lost of faith in Christ is what James White and many of his Calvinist friends call A false gospel.

Let us make sure we under this I think it's supposed to be understand this but stand got lost. The only true gospel ie the five points of Calvinism seems wholly ineffective or useless for winning the loss of the true Savior.

While the false gospel preaching Calvary Chapel type churches are winning the lost to the true Christ in rather large numbers as if The inconsistent message that we're being that is being preached. There is allegedly a false Gospel, I think we know why James White and other Calvinists are always trying to get a foot in the door of a Calvary Chapel.

Yeah, I'm always. That that was the funny part of all this is is he's trying to make it look like I'm trying to. I'm Seeking out Calvary Chapel folks George. It's your folks that are seeking me out. It's your folks who read the Bible and they realize your answers are childish.

They don't make sense. You are skipping so much of the testimony of the Word of God George. They see that and All your bluster cannot stop them. It must be frustrating to be in that position. I understand.

It's got to be rough. But man to put something like this out on the web. It's it's embarrassing. It makes sense to me James White is much more committed to proselytizing the saved ie saved Non-Calvinist that he finds in large numbers in churches like the Calvary Chapel churches then wasting his valuable time trying to win the lost.

With what seems to be an impotent Calvinist gospel James does not appear to be very effective if at all it weighing the lost to Christ because Calvinism does not provide him with what he needs to win them with namely a gospel the lost can actually respond to while they are Still lost.

I know that all the truly great evangelists are Calvinist. Just no one. Know w it should be no George. No one it's no. No one seems to have met any of them for the last few hundred years. Something must be in the water that Calvinists are drinking today.

Now that is just so inane that it makes you wonder why why is he responding like this? I mean, I don't think I had mentioned him in quite some time. Again, I'm not sure exactly when this was posted. Maybe it's new.

I don't know. And so he he goes on On to there, but just just to let you know, we we link to that. You can read it for yourself and And if you understand what the issues are you're left going. Why on earth is a man in the leadership of Calvary Chapel?

Writing with such dishonesty such shallow Argumentation you really you really do wonder you've got mail. Yeah, we get a lot of mail and including stuff mentioned on the web like that. Interesting stuff indeed.

The Minimal Facts Approach and the Resurrection Debate

All right. There's that stuff. We need to get that out of the way now we need to get to the important stuff and that is there was a fascinating Conversation that took place and I get to use my new sound program that I bought this really nice sound program about a year and a half ago.

Just could never I've you've all heard me struggling with it. Just a little bit I found one for a third a fourth of the cost and It is so much easier to use. I'm so happy with it. It's so much easier to find stuff in it and and it's great.

Anyway, I'm gonna use that today on the unbelievable radio broadcast of 16 April 2011 Mike Lycona who is the apologetics coordinator at the North American Mission Board and research professor of New Testament at Southern Evangelical Seminary author of the the new book in regards to the resurrection of Jesus The resurrection of Jesus a new historiographical approach IVP academic 2010 big book.

Mike Lycona has engaged Bart Ehrman a number of times. You may recall. I don't remember how long ago was now. We played portions of the debate between Shabir Ali and Mike Lycona that took place shortly after the passion of the Christ movie came out if you if that helps you to remember some of the content of that particular discussion and They were on unbelievable this past Saturday Bart was in studio.

Mike was on an ISDN line out of a radio station in Atlanta sounded really good. Real strong connection there sound like he was in studio. So that Made it a whole lot better than if he'd been on the phone and stuff like that.

That was good but once again, we have a Situation where I on the resurrection of Christ historical information on the resurrection of Christ things like that, you know, Mike has really made his mark and I Think he makes a number of good points in this conversation but we once again have the apologetic Methodology issue right in the front of us as we listen to this debate.

What we will hear over and over again is the limitation that is Enforced upon us when we have a methodology that basically says to us that history is sufficient to establish the existence of the miraculous and I don't agree with a lot of things that Bart Ehrman said, but the fact the matter is he really sees through this methodology.

Really does and So, I think we really need to listen to this we need to understand what the issues are because As I said many of the things that Michael Icona says very true very important, but but but when they are joined with an apologetic methodology that in essence seeks to.

Well, it seems to be embarrassed by first Corinthians chapter 1. It seeks to it's it's embarrassed at the end of this debate Mike Lycona is sitting there saying look the history says that the best answer for the historical information around the resurrection of Christ is that he was raised from the dead as to who raised him.

I'm willing to allow the question mark to stand and I just sit back and go. What even Bart Ehrman sits back and go what. When someone can put me and Bart Ehrman on the same side of an argument that tells us something.

That's up. Once again, I was I was Climbing out from underneath one of the underpasses on the canal when I hear Bart Ehrman saying You do not and I'm yelling you do not at the exact same time. Just it must be a funny thing.

Some of those some of the joggers and stuff. They all have have Stuff in their ears. They don't hear me coming anyways, but if there were one that was running that wasn't listening to an iPod. They would probably go.

What is that guy talking about? He's weird. But it's it's an interesting thing. So we're gonna listen to this it and we're not gonna get it done today. But so we're gonna get started on it because again, this is why we do this program.

You know everybody, you know, you know Justin on the unbelievable the the the program that gets you thinking Yeah, we do the same thing, but we do it a little bit differently. We can't bring all the people in and many of the people wouldn't come in here because I'm in here anyways.

And Justin brought that up the last time. Why do people respond to you? Well, it's because I talk about these things and I'm willing to say, you know, Mike. Love you Lord bless you. You're a brother in the Lord.

But do you hear what you're saying, brother? You do not leave that as a question mark. I'm sorry. It's just yes. Oh, come on. Really? No, you don't come on and We'll explain why as we listen to this. Let's start listening.

I cut out the introduction stuff where you know Bart's talking about being raised as a Evangelical and Mike's talking about being raised as an evangelical we cut all that stuff out. Let's get to the real issues here.

And remember the primary presentation that Mike makes here is very much the same Presentation has been made famous by William Lane Craig. And so that's why this is really really important stuff.

Historical Bedrock and the Three Facts of the Resurrection

Premier Christian Radio. Get into today's topic then. Mike perhaps we'll turn first of all to the book. You've written the resurrection of Jesus a new historiographical approach. And does this kind of bring into what I've heard you talk about before as it were that the minimal facts approach to Proving if you like that the resurrection is a reasonable way of sort of if you like Making the case for the various elements that we find in history about the resurrection.

Well anyone who studies the past we we begin to realize that there are certain events that are better attested than others. That's just the way the game works. And so what we call minimal facts or historical bedrock are those facts that are so strongly evidenced.

That they are virtually beyond dispute and that indeed. Virtually a virtual universal consensus of scholars who specialize in this subject.

Regard them as historical facts now catch that if you've not heard the William Lane Craig Genre of defense of the resurrection. This is what you need to hear and it is interesting. There are these allegedly indisputable facts that there is a consensus of scholars that agree to.

Now I get really really nervous when I hear The Christian faith being grounded upon the consensus of scholarship because not only do we hear that used against us all the time in other areas. But guess what folks the consensus of scholarship changes very quickly.

Now there was no notice. He said of those who specialize in the study of this area. There's gonna be a fascinating exchange later on between Ehrman and him about how you determine who these people are but one thing I have noticed is the actual number of facts has decreased only over the past decade or so and What Ehrman's gonna do right here is You know Mike's gonna make his point and then Ehrman's gonna say well, you know.

You sound like you're presenting three facts there. It used to be four. I think I've heard presentations with five and now it's down to three. Ehrman's gonna say all you gots one and He's right. He's exactly right and he's gonna minimize that down and then say and by the way the vast majority of people are talking about a Christians and So this quote-unquote scholarly consensus remember what makes us useful in debating Bart Ehrman is Bart Ehrman uses the authoritative Consensus argument all the time and he is the consensus.

He gets to define consensus in his own mind, which is even worse but Is this where is this where we have to ground our arguments or is there something far better is the question.

So whether one's an agnostic like Bart or an atheist or a Jew a liberal Conservative Christian they would all be persuaded that these things are facts. They're called historical bedrock because any reconstruction of the past is going to have to be founded upon or built upon These virtually undisputable facts.

When we come to these then Regarding the fate of Jesus the relevant historical bedrock would be things such as Jesus death by crucifixion. The secondly shortly after his death a number of his followers had experiences that they were convinced were appearances of the risen Jesus who appeared to them personally and that these experiences occurred in both the individual and in group settings.

And number three that there was a Enemy of the church named Paul Who likewise had an experience that he was convinced was an appearance of the risen Jesus to him and this radically transformed his life?

From You know a persecutor of the church to one of its most able defenders. Again, most almost everyone who studies the subject agrees on these three facts. So that's what we would refer to as the historical bedrock.

The real question that that remains then is what do you do with these facts and.

That leads to method. Hmm. And and as you say as far as you're concerned these three facts are uncontroversial in terms of the majority of scholars accept them. And. And and so in that sense are they are they in some way free from bias or is is that the danger of bias.

When? You come to how you interpret those facts, I suppose.

Well, there's always going to be bias. I'm going to be biased in in them and in so far as I want to use them to show that Jesus rose from the dead. Others are going to be biased and want to try to explain them in another way such as the appearances as Hallucinations because they don't want the resurrection to happen.