Acts 9:7 and 22:9 Examined in Light of Dan Barker's Claims

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.

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Dan Barker’s Challenge on Acts 9:7 and Acts 22:9

Thank you. Morning. Welcome to the dividing line on a Tuesday morning. I want to start off with a little bit of apologetic study here I Was listening to one of the many debates that Dan Barker has done be debating Dan Barker Two weeks from this Thursday at the University of Illinois 7 p .m.

The information is on the website. So I've been listening and Was directed to a debate that Dan did with Mike Lycona and Interestingly enough an issue came up. I am mentioned only one time in his book Godless and it's on this very subject the subject of acts 9 7 acts 22 9 this is a Very old accusation of contradiction one that we have dealt with many many times in Dealing with Mormons.

If you deal with almost anybody who's gonna go online and look for contradictions this is gonna be one they're gonna throw at you so I want to play the section of the debate where this came up and Then take a look at the information related to acts 9 7 and acts 22 9.

You might want to have your Bibles or you'll be taking a look at this alleged contradiction day on the dividing line. Let's start with the interaction. This was during the cross-examination period of This debate I believe is sometime in 2004 late 2003 2004 somewhere around there is I think the the date on this?

Dan Barker and Mike Lycona, but let me ask you this. Are you granting me axe? Because if you're granting me axe then we can really settle this thing with by the way.

The sound quality is about to drop out for about 10 seconds and then it'll come back. So don't panic resurrection very easily about Paul.

Well in axe we find contradictory accounts of the red. Not at all. I don't find. Yes. We do. We find that in one case in acts 9 7 the the men that were with him heard a voice. But later in acts 22 9 the men that were with Paul heard not.

Yes, I have. I've translated much of the New Testament from the Greek. Now, I'm gonna stop again. We've played now.

Remember it was over the past couple weeks. I've played a lot of Dan Barker. And when Dan was talking to his fellow atheists at I believe George Washington University Describing his education described his time at Azusa Pacific as glorified Sunday school.

And when he described his knowledge of Greek, he said he could use a lexicon and he could throw Greek words into sermons. But when he talks to Christians, he's translated most of the New Testament now translating the New Testament.

That's not having looked at sections Of that takes a very high level of knowledge of the language and He is going to admit here. He had two years of undergraduate Greek Is is what he had now if he was a if he had a great Greek teacher, and he was a very good student at the end of your second year undergraduate.

You can work through a lot of stuff. Hebrews and most of Luke will still be a mystery to you. But you can you can work through Stuff and you can use a lexicon. You can look things up. You can follow what's being said in a in a commentary or stuff like that.

But I'm sorry after two years of undergraduate Greek to claim to just you know, we you know translate major portions of the New Testament. Little bit of a stretch here, but that's not really the reason we're looking at this courses college courses.

Have you taken in Greek two years of college Greek two years of college Greek? Okay, so that's a Greek that gets you through of quaint Greek, of course, okay that gets you through beginners and intermediate Greek.

Maybe a course of exegesis. I can appreciate that. Okay, and I've had five years of Greek and I've studied Greek now for 20 years and You know, I can see these things you're saying Dan. They just don't add up with the Greek.

Well, then explain it. Okay, first of all in Acts chapter 9 verse 7 where it says he You know, they heard the voice And in Acts 22 9 when it says they didn't hear it the Greek word for here is a kuo and it can mean both Here and to understand so, you know I think the translators have it correctly and the majority if you look at almost any Translation of the New Testament it will say in one they heard the voice, but they didn't understand what it was saying.

And what was the word in X 22 9 X 22 9? Okay. It's a cool. It's the same word. Exactly, right in Acts 9 7 They Who won't taste it was the participle. They heard the voice but in X 22 9 Look equal sign they did not hear the same didn't understand.

It could mean they didn't understand the voice. Well, then in both cases, it could be understand. It's a contradiction either way.

You know not just let's stop Immediately and I want to make sure we hear what Dan is saying before we even take the time to start working with the text itself. Basically what he just said there was well if it means understand in one place and it has to mean understand Everywhere.

And I think he gets away with this because rarely in a debate you have really the time to examine each one of these things. And that's why we're going to take the time to do it. But the fact the matter is I find this particular allegation on Dan Barker's part because he can read enough of the language to know what these issues are and I don't think through second year.

He would have had a whole lot of in-depth syntax or things like that. But but again be that as it may He he knows enough To know that he's pushing a bad point here. That's that's the point and what it illustrates for me is the fundamentalist nature of his atheism.

Dan Barker's a fundamentalist atheist. He was a fundamentalist Christian and he just kept that attitude that perspective and of course fundamentalist today means a person Who doggedly holds to a perspective without critical thought or examination?

That's not what it meant historically, but let's face it. It is it is a word that has changed in meaning and It is in popular culture today. That's what it means when someone uses that term. That's what it means.

You can correct them all you want. You can try to drag them back 70 or 80 years into history. But that's what it has come to mean is a non-reflective person a person who does not Examine what he or she is saying on certain issues and In this context Dan just will not accept correction.

He knows enough to recognize that He himself in his own writings uses words in different contexts with different meanings but he won't allow that to the writers of Scripture and. So the whole argument here would be that Luke a careful writer of all the New Testament writers.

Is not Luke considered even by the critic to be one of the most careful. He is called the historian. We know that his his specific use of language is extremely specific is extremely advanced in the sense that in Comparison to the the grammar and syntax of almost anything else in New Testament Luke is the most advanced.

He's much more classical. He's much more classical less coin a than any other element of New Testament Greek Hebrews being very similar along these lines very complex grammar a lot of participles and Infinitival forms and and and so on so forth.

So you have someone who is very careful in his his historiography and what you're asserting. Based upon two different uses as we're going to see. The the verbs are in different forms the direct objects are in different cases and in the case of a kuo There is much flexibility.

Whether it's taking its direct object in a genitive or the accusative. There is a wide semantic domain to the word a kuo which means to either hear as a physical sound or to hear with understanding and.

Then there is a modification acts 22 9 of the one speaking to me and in Acts 21 we were told that was Paul is giving this defense as which is what actually tonight is part of he is speaking in Hebrew or Aramaic whichever dialect it was.

He was speaking to the people in their own language. That means that that Luke is translating that rendering that into Greek and Hence there might be some Semitic isms and things that come through that because Luke's inaccurate to translator so the point is a Contradiction what is the law of non-contradiction?

What's the classic example a? Chair cannot be both in the room and outside the room at the same time. You can't have not have something that is true and not true at the same time in the same way. Even Given the the worst reading of the text.

That's not what you have in these two instances. The language does not allow it now Barker and Mormons interesting combination here Basis upon the King James translation which makes no differentiation does not recognize any differentiation between the two.

Simply says no one heard and the other did not hear but the the reality is that those Words were not spoken in English. They were originally written in Greek and The Greek speaker would recognize this is not an X not X situation.

There's too many complicating factors he's pushing a bad argument, but why does he do so. Because he's a fundamentalist and It has to he will not extend to any biblical writer the same level of simple compassion or kindness.

That he would any other ancient writer he wouldn't he would not argue that other ancient writers. That this is somehow a mistake. He would recognize that even in his own writings. He has to ask for people to be fair in allowing for context but not when it comes to the Bible and.

That is the problem at all because see for first century people reading Greek. That's not gonna be a problem at all. Let's suppose the electricity went out in here right now and no one could see us. You know accept maybe some people here and then some P and the sound system was out, but we just kept talking we kept going and The next day someone who was at the back.

They're talking about this debate and they said yeah, the lights went out. And yep, they kept talking. I heard them. I heard them talk. But but then later on they say and I couldn't hear a word they said well, I think we could understand.

There's no contradiction there. They understand what we're saying. We get the word here was used on both occasions. So I don't see anything Contradiction here. And even Daniel Wallace who's a prominent Greek grammarian and in his book Greek Greek grammar beyond the basics he talks about this very passage and says given the field of use of a kuo and phonet and the fact that in chapter 9 It's a kuo plus the genitive and in chapter 22.

It's a kuo plus the direct plus the accusative. It's the dative. It's accusative.

Barker is wrong. It's accusative not the dative.

He said what we can look you said 22 9. Well, it doesn't matter. There are two different cases. I agree with that. No, I've got it right here. It's it's the accusative. It's phoneme Tane phoneme. So I'm given that he says given the fact that it's taken on a different Ending there.

He says that certainly harmonizes. No, that's totally wrong. I've already so you're saying you have two years Greek experience. Yes, you're right and Daniel Wallace is a very prominent and respected Greek grammarian is wrong.

He's wrong and I can show you exactly why he's wrong all through the new test. Now. I just stopped there for just a moment.

There's an amazing amount of hubris on the part of someone To to make this kind of argument and having read Dan Barker's paper on this Again he in comparison to reading Wallace's material it's it's. Well, there is no comparison, but there's a little problem here and that is Mike like Kona's wrong.

Like Kona is actually quoting Robertson who's being quoted by Wallace who Wallace is going to disagree with. So like Kona was wrong and Barker's wrong about like Complicated we're gonna read all of Wallace here in a moment, but just so you know, that's what's going on.

Interchange of case Flexibility, I will show you other cases where those exact words are used to signify opposite words. But where the case changes it would produce a different Contradiction. The case flexibility there does not change the meaning of the word in spite of what some of these people show it.

In fact, I wrote a good article on that did Paul's men hear a voice going. And I found it problematic for the reasons I've explained. Well, well then look up those verses that I explained and look at the fact that those cases differ.

So what what Barker is arguing is that you can find in New Testament and outside of New Testament usage a wide range where a kuo the verb to hear you see generally in in Greek a verb takes its direct object in the accusative, but after you learn that and struggle through that you begin to discover that there are some verbs that take their direct object in other cases and Normally that Indicates a difference in meaning at least on the part of the person who is using the language at that particular point in time Akula can have a direct object in the accusative or the genitive.

The fact the matter is you can find in the New Testament. We don't even have to go outside the New Testament, but we could if we wish to during the coin a period a cool being used with both the genitive and accusative and with both.

Sometimes meaning to hear with understanding and sometimes having no implication of that at all with both of them. So the point again is. Without assuming guilt on the part of Luke without ascribing to Luke with no foundation for doing so other than your own prejudice.

Rampant stupidity where he can't even remember what he said just few you know a couple chapters before. It's obvious that since he uses different cases. Then the whole argument of contradiction this just doesn't doesn't fall into the realm where that would be a meaningful argument to be made.

Now we haven't gotten into some other contextual issues that are important here. But just so you understand what the argument going on between them is. What Barker is saying is well I? Can show you places in Matthew.

I can show you places in John. Where the genitive is used to mean understanding and so therefore the the accusative can't mean understanding. That's where he's just simply wrong again. He may claim to have translated a lot, but I don't think anyone's ever gonna be publishing his translation.

That's where he's just he's misleading people. He's wrong. Just because you have something in John doesn't mean that that's gonna line up with Luke's syntax. That's just a basic beginners mistake. And you would think that there would be a little bit of humility on his part.

Especially when you're talking about someone like a Dan Wallace. Who's you know that has he ever seen Greek grammar beyond the basics the size of that beast probably not but. To have the kind of temerity just simply oh, yeah, he's wrong.

Is is rather interesting.

That's precisely why Wallace says that there's no problem here. But they differ they differ in places where Matthew tells a story Where they heard the voice of the king and then Luke tells the same story there heard the voice of the same story The same king and yet different cases.

Are you telling me that there's different meanings in both retelling of the same story of course? Not. They were flexible enough to change those cases from the accusative to the dative and then To the to the genitive case and without any change in meaning so that I the dative doesn't come in here.

He's just he's misremembering it. He's just wrong about that. He misidentified it. He's just wrong. That's you know. But that's sort of irrelevant to the entire point other than the fact that he's wrong on that point too.

That's a bad argument. The contradiction stands, and why not. Why shouldn't there be contradictions in the writings of fallible human beings? Are you defending a complete? infallibility of these documents.

Now notice the red herring. Oh, let's are you saying it's completely infallible. No we're talking yes, actually. But we're talking here about whether you have a meaningful foundation and by the way it just backing up the truck a little bit farther this debate supposed to be on the resurrection and To basically what Barker is arguing here is because of his allegation of Contradiction on these two accounts in regards to Paul this somehow is relevant to Resurrection and all based upon whether the men who are with Paul did or did not hear the voice I I guess that's the the whole argumentation.

Well anyways. There's there's the the discussion that takes place from this particular debate and so I want to walk through this this text with you and again, it is a text that It would this was one of the very first alleged allegations of Contradiction I ever had to deal with as a young person Dealing with the Mormons.

I believe that the Mormons hit me with this one before the atheists ever did they tend to borrow each other's Information at least they did back then. I didn't have enough conversations at the Easter pageant this We were out there Friday and Saturday night I didn't mention anything about that because we had hoped the King James only people would not be out there, but they were anyways and so anyways, we were out there and did have I did a very nice conversation with two missionaries, but It would strike me that they probably are not quite as big on the biblical contradiction stuff as they once were.

Because that's way too objective truthy stuff, and it's not subjective enough, but anyway this is a text that you're going to need to be able to deal with and be able to give a response to and I just note that most people one of the reasons this sort of Catches a lot of would be catching more modern Christians than it would even 20 years ago is because Most modern Christians aren't using the King James anymore, and so if you have the new American Standard Acts 22 9 says and those who are with me saw the light to be sure but did not Understand the voice the one who is speaking to me, so if you have the new American Standard You're not going to see that contradiction.

You're not going to see that unless they raise it to you and say I see it's the word Here and the new American standards is trying to fool you but if you have the ESV and Those who are with me saw the light But did not understand the voice the one who is speaking to me the voice did not understand the voice.

The new English translation that Dan Wallace worked on those who are with me saw the light but did not understand the voice the one who was speaking to me and The NIV my companion saw the light, but they did not understand the voice of him who was speaking to me.

So Those give you the the big those are the big four as far as what most Evangelicals today would be carrying new American Standard ESV any TN IV. They all say did not understand the voice the one who is speaking to me so at the very least.

You have four major Bible translations that Dan Barker would have to accuse of rank Tampering with the text you're just trying to avoid a contradiction. That's all you're trying to do and that based upon his two years of undergraduate Greek.

Now you already heard most of the discussion and you heard Dan Wallace's comments brought forward but let's Let's let's take a look at what Dan Wallace actually actually said. So that we know. You know correct the record here because I think Mike Lacona was a little bit off on that one, too.

Quoting from I believe this is page 133. I copied the text out of libronics, but I had looked it up in my hardcopy as well. Looking at so this is actually on x97. There seems to be a contradiction between this account of Paul's conversion and his account of it next 22 for there He says those who are with me did not hear the voice.

However in Acts 22 9 the verba quo Takes an accusative direct object on these two passages Robertson states and Robertson here is dr. A T Robertson. His massive 1400 plus page grammar still the largest grammar in print.

Quote it is perfectly proper to appeal the distinction the cases and the apparent contradiction between a cool and test men taste phonase. Acts 9 7 and 10. Day phoneme oak a Kusan. X 22 9 the accusative case case of extent accents the intellectual apprehension of the sound while the genitive specifying case Calls attention to the sound of the voice that accent accenting the sense.

The word akua itself has two senses which fall fall in well with this case. Distinction one to hear the other to understand and quote. Now that is the Robertson citation that seemingly Mr.. Lykona was citing at that particular point in time, but that's actually a citation of Robertson not Wallace.

Continuing on with Wallace the NIV seems to follow this line of reasoning. Acts 9 7 reads. They heard the sound but not see anyone x 22 9 has my companion saw the light but not that did not understand the voice the field of meaning for both akua hear and understand and phonate sound voice coupled with a change in cases genitive accusative can be appealed to.

Harmonize these two accounts, so he says it can be appealed to. But it would be improper to say that that's how Dan does it because he goes on to say on. The other hand it is doubtful that this is where the difference lay between the two cases used with akua in Hellenistic Greek the New Testament including the more literary writers is filled with examples of akua plus genitive indicating understanding for example Matthew 2 9 John 5 25 18 37 acts 3 23 11 7 revelation 3 26 3 5 8 13 11 12 14 13 16 1 5 7 and 21 3 as well as instances of akua plus the accusative where little or no Comprehension takes place explicitly so in Matthew 13 19 Mark 13 7 Matthew 24 6 Luke 21 9 acts 5 24 first Corinthians 11 18 Ephesians 3 2 Colossians 1 4 Philippian Philemon 5 James 5 11 in Revelation 14 to the exceptions in fact are seemingly more numerous than the rule.

Thus regardless of how one works through the accounts of Paul's conversion and appeal to different cases Probably ought not form any part of the solution. That's Wallace's point. But he recognizes what has been said by all sorts of folks and that is that these two Texts are not an X not X situation just on that basic level given the difference in the form of the verb from a participle to a regular verb to the use of the accusative to the use of the genitive.

All of these things render this really on any meaningful basis irrelevant to mr. Barker's purpose. But what do we say about that? Well? It is not just Robertson who makes the observation that he he did there are a number of people that have said the exact same thing creamer vine Robertson again in word pictures Moulton quoting Robertson in in his work.

So this is you know Nigel Turner the part of genitive occurs a new testament verbs of perception. Especially with a personal object for a cool the classical rule is the person whose words are heard is in the genitive.

But the thing or person about which one hears is in the accusative. We have to ask whether the class distinction between genitive accusative has significance for exegesis in New Testament. There may be something in the difference between the genitive and acts a 9 And acts 22 not acts 22 9 that's X.

We're looking at etc. Etc. So there's there's a number of scholarly citations that Talk about the fact that there is a there is a difference in how these two texts present things. But I think what is often missed.

And I put this in letters to a Mormon elder many many many years ago. I think there's a an important element in this investigation. RJ knowling and expositors Greek Testament Said the And as well as John Abberley in the New Testament commentary edited by Alamon.

And acts 22 9 Paul is speaking to a crowd in Jerusalem according to acts 2140. Paul addressed the crowd in Hebrew. The NIV says Aramaic exactly which dialect it was is not really relevant. The point is he was not speaking Greek, which means that this is being rendered into Greek By Luke or by Paul depending as he relates it to Luke.

He mentions to his Hebrew listeners that when Jesus called him he called him in their own Language in Hebrew. How do we know this in both acts 9 for and this is something that is almost never mentioned except in just a few sources in Both acts 9 for and in acts 22 7 Saul is Not spelled in its normal form the form that is used in the rest of the book of Acts.

It is spelled in its Hebrew form Saul. What does this tell us it tells us that the voice spoke in Hebrew? Therefore acts 22 9 would probably be referring to the fact that the men who accompanied Paul did not Understand what was said they could not understand Hebrew.

The text supports this rather strongly for Paul modifies his saying they did not hear understand the voice by adding a very important phrase of The one speaking to me to laloon toss Moy notice the one speaking to me not speaking to them.

The voice was not speaking to them. The voice of the one and this is only found in acts 22. This is what emphasizes the understanding element of a kuo in acts 22 9. Is that the voice is speaking specifically to him?

This is not a revelation for these others. They may have heard the sound But they do not understand What is being said either because they don't understand Hebrew or? Because it's not for them to understand.

This is a private conversation and Therefore it is not given to them to hear these things. But the point is that The one was speaking to me Not to them. It's not just a general statement that there was a voice from heaven and anybody standing around could have heard it this the second reference specifically limits the speaking to Paul.

The emphasis is on the speaking of the voice which indicate comprehension understanding and Therefore given everything else we find in these texts. We see that the NET and IV ESV NAS B are all Appropriately Translating the text and that there simply is no meaningful basis for accusing Luke who is actually Going beyond himself to be very specific.

He's here's a situation where by trying to be as specific and careful as possible you end up coming up with an allegation of contradiction by those who simply will not allow context to be context and That's what happens and in you know, the funny thing is Dan Barker has produced two books losing faith in faith and godless they are not identical to one another and Therefore using his own standards you could accuse him of doing the very same thing That he's accusing Luke of but he would go.

You gotta allow me to define my own context and and I had to update the book so I had to change some things on. If you're not willing to give the ancient writers that level of Fairness, then why would you expect us to do that for you?

It is amazing to observe the the double standards, but hopefully that is of assistance to you in understanding of the The issue there maybe if again many Christians they only have an NIV or an ESV they've never used the King James and Therefore when these folks come up and throw an alleged contradiction at you.

You've never even it could not even have suggested itself to you because of the translation that you have and so it's important I think to be Aware of that. So keep that in mind. Hopefully that'll be useful to you and when we come back We'll look at some more of these alleged Contradictions here on the dividing line.

We'll be right back.

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The Meaning of a Kuō and the Role of Lexical Semantics

You have power yes, what do you what do you do? What are you doing in there? He's playing with stuff? He's not okay. Now. He's gonna try to make me sound all weird and stuff. That's good. That's brilliant.

That's good. And that's somehow going to just draw more attention to the fact that we don't have New bumper music. Let me just add one thing by the way that I've got to mention Dan seems to have a problem with the idea of a kuo meaning to understand and I just It is important to be able to point out that the lexical sources substantiate this very clearly I mean think of think of a kuo in John Hearing you can hear but you can't hear you're hearing what Jesus says but then you can't hear what Jesus is saying and so on so forth, so Just just look at the at low Anita's Greek lexicon based upon semantic domains and under the section on Understand the very first entry is a kuo.

That is clearly one of its meanings. Yes, it can simply mean the faculty of hearing but it can also mean to hear with understanding that is clearly a part of its of its range of meaning and I just let me highly recommend to everybody once again the Excellent book I you know, I Think it old.

It was called biblical words in their meaning by Moises Silva, I then the title may have changed. But it was you know, sometimes there are these books. Sometimes you'll just read a book and it will Change your life.