Joshua Evans on the Deen Show: Point #6

Early Christian Belief and the Dead Sea Scrolls

A few months ago I began responding to an appearance on the Dean show of a former youth minister and I began responding to the 10 top reasons that they put together why Jesus cannot be God. We only got through 10, 9, and 8 and now we pick up with number 7.

Number 7, talk to me brother. Number 7 is this concept was not taught by Jesus or his disciples nor was it believed in by his followers and the early followers of Christianity. As we see when they found the Dead Sea Scrolls in Qumran, we see that the early Christians were still a part of Judaism.

Little bit of a problem, the Dead Sea Scrolls are from before the time of Christ and of course the Qumran community is from before the time of Christ as well and so the idea that they're somehow relevant to determining what early Christian belief was is not only anachronistic but it's a real, real far stretch.

I suppose almost any theory under the sun has been proposed about the Qumran community and things like that. Someone may have tried to associate with Christianity but there is significantly better data as to the nature of early Christian belief.

In fact, you have not only archaeological evidence but you have the documentary evidence of books like the Didache and Clement and Ignatius and it's going to be sort of sad to hear Joshua Evans, this alleged former Christian, again we've documented so many times that quote unquote former Christians who become Muslims never knew almost anything about their former faith and then their beliefs get even stranger once they become Muslims and they start trying to refute their former faith.

The Trinity, Paul, and the Council of Nicaea

And so we're going to hear really one of the most confusing and confused presentations on early church history I think I've ever heard. We're going to hear him saying that nobody came up with the Doctrine of the Trinity until the Council of Nicaea but then he says that it came from Paul.

Paul was martyred around 64 AD so how exactly does that work? So he's going to blame Paul for everything, not going to give us any evidence of course, but he's going to blame Paul for everything, very common.

And then we're going to be told that in the first two centuries that the followers of Jesus were just like the Jews and they didn't believe in the deity of Christ despite how many clear cases and documentation we've already presented through our various videos.

But certainly Ignatius at least ten times, more than ten times referring to Jesus Christ as our God. He dies in 108, 107 -108 in that time period. Just completely ignoring the reality of history itself and jumbling everything together.

Let's listen to what he has to say.

The Apostles in the Synagogue and the Renewal of Moses

For instance, if you read the book of Acts, when Jesus Christ had departed from this earth, the disciples still daily attended the synagogue. They still daily went to the temple at Jerusalem and worshipped as the Jews worshipped because this is what Jesus Christ brought.

He brought the renewal of the laws of Moses. So if the disciples were running around teaching people that Jesus was God, they would have been banished out of the temple the day they walked in or they would have started their own church.

But neither did Jesus. Jesus went to the temple himself. He did not build his own church anywhere and say, worship me. He went to the temple and worshipped God in the same way that Moses worshipped God, the same way that Abraham worshipped God, the same way that David worshipped God, the same way that Zechariah worshipped God.

You know, he did the exact same thing and his disciples followed him and if you look at the first, second century Christians, they did the same thing. The people of Qumran, the first disciple who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls, they were also a part of Judaism.

They considered themselves practicing Jews who followed Jesus as their prophet. So we see that nothing had changed. This whole concept of Trinity did not come about until the third century of the church and it was not formulated as a doctrine that must be believed in until 325 AD at the Council of Nicaea when all of the bishops and the scholars of Christianity started to form into Christianity after Paul came together and said, okay, this is a doctrine that we must believe in.

Paul, the Damascus Road, and the Origin of Christian Titles

And the first person to expound this doctrine was Paul who never saw Jesus Christ himself, never walked with him, never talked to him, never saw him, never ate with him, never learned from him. It was something that he formulated off a vision that he said he had while he was on the road to Damascus to actually persecute Christians.

So he was the first person to ever come up with this title of Christian, ever come up with this title of Trinity, ever come up with the godship of Jesus Christ or only begotten son. All of these things came with Paul the Apostle.

Is the word Trinity ever mentioned in the Bible? It does not exist.

And there's only one verse that even barely mentions it. It's 1 John 5 and 7. And there are three that bear record on earth, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And there are three that bear record in heaven, the blood, the water.

But if you go and research that verse, almost all biblical scholars have removed that verse from the Bible because it is not a verse that was ever in the Bible. If you go get a revised standard version of the Bible, a new standard version of the Bible, all of those have removed that verse because it is explicitly not a part of the Bible.

It is not found in any manuscript before 1200.

God is one, not three in one. Worship him alone. We're talking about the creator of the heavens and the earth, that he cannot be a man. The top ten reasons why Jesus, peace be upon him, cannot be God.

Refuting the Synagogue, Nicaea, and 1 John 5:7 Claims

Okay, so many errors packed into one presentation. Said that the Christians daily attended synagogue. Well, they started being cast out of the synagogue as early as before the time of Christ, before the death of Christ, according to the Gospel of John.

They would go into synagogues to preach, but they would very quickly be cast out as they were. Why? Well, he made reference to the book of Acts, Acts 9 .20. And immediately he began to proclaim Jesus in the synagogue, saying, he is the Son of God.

Not exactly commensurate with his theory, but it's right there. We are told that Jesus brought the renewal of the law of Moses. Really? Where do you get that? We weren't told. It was just sort of thrown out there.

We were told that first and second century Christians did the same thing. He again identified the Qumran community as a Christian community. It wasn't. He ignores all the evidence of the first and second centuries regarding the universal belief that Jesus is the Son of God.

Maybe he's thinking of a sect like the Nazarenes or something. I suppose that's possible, but he didn't say that. Who knows? Hard to say when you're just throwing stuff out like that. Then we were told that the Trinity did not come out until the third century of the church, and then formulated the Council of Nicaea.

But then we were told that the first person to expound this doctrine was Paul. Well, Paul's in the first century, and so he's contradicting himself rather obviously here. We were told that Paul never saw or talked with Jesus.

You know, what if I said that Muhammad never saw or talked to Gabriel? You have more evidence in regards to Paul's conversion, more historical evidence, closer to the time, more rooted in the history of the time.

You have much more of that for Paul's conversion to Christianity and his vision of Jesus, and you have anything for Muhammad. But you believe Muhammad, but you won't believe Paul. Why? Because Muhammad, being ignorant of Paul, contradicted Paul.

This is why I just don't accept Islam's arguments, because they're backwards. You have to start backwards to be able to figure this stuff out. Anyway, we were told that Paul was the first person to come up with the title of Christian.

Actually, that was an insult, and it came by people outside the Christian faith. At Antioch, you know, it wasn't Paul that came up with it. First person to come up with the Trinity, well, you know, not quite true.

But again, if you are saying that, then Paul did that in the first century and the third century. What about all the people in the first and second century after Paul? You know, that doesn't make any sense.

And he was the first person to come up with the Only Begotten Son. Actually, that's John that utilizes that terminology, not the Apostle Paul. And so, as we have now looked at reasons 10, 9, 8, and 7 by a former youth minister, we once again discover that the Islamic arguments that seemingly were good enough to convince someone to become a Muslim are not very good arguments at all.

And it really does make you wonder, again, as I have listened to Yusuf Estes, as I've listened to most people who show up on the Dean Show, their arguments just don't stand up to examination. And when people who claimed to have once been a part of your religion and have now converted cannot even coherently present an argument that accurately represents their former faith, well, it definitely makes you wonder about what their former faith was really all about to begin with.

Closing Remarks and Preview of Point Number 6

Thanks for watching. We'll continue with point number 6 as the Lord gives us time.