Ehrman vs Wallace - Can We Trust the Text of the NT?
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- Опубликовано: 2 фев 2020
- Do we have enough evidence to reconstruct the New Testament text? Or did early scribes corrupt it beyond repair? Dr. Bart D. Ehrman and CSNTM's Executive Director, Dr. Daniel B. Wallace debate the issue of if we can trust the text of the New Testament at Southern Methodist University on October 1, 2011. At the time, this was the largest attended debate on the text of the NT ever. Dr. Mark A. Chancey, Professor of Religious Studies at SMU, serves as MC. Though Ehrman and Wallace have held public debates in the past, this one focused on providing a general audience with insider information regarding one of the most significant pieces of literature ever written. If you are interested in the New Testament and its reliability, this is sure to be a debate you will not want to miss.
The program discussed on Bart Ehrman's Foundation Blog: ehrmanblog.org/?p=17576
Bart D. Ehrman is the James A. Gray Distinguished Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He came to UNC in 1988, after four years of teaching at Rutgers University. At UNC he has served as both the Director of Graduate Studies and the Chair of the Department of Religious Studies. A graduate of Wheaton College (Illinois), Professor Ehrman received both his Masters of Divinity and Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary, where his 1985 doctoral dissertation was awarded magna cum laude.
Dr. Wallace, director of the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts and New Testament Professor at Dallas Theological Seminary, has spent his life studying and digitizing ancient copies of the New Testament. He has authored and edited numerous books; most recently he has edited and contributed to Revisiting the Corruption of the New Testament: Manuscript, Patristic, and Apocryphal Evidence. He asserts that we have good reason to believe that the New Testament text is reliable.
Copyright © Bart D. Ehrman and CSNTM Productions. All Rights Reserved. Unauthorized use, re-posting and/or duplication of this media without the express and written permission from Bart D. Ehrman and CSNTM Productions is strictly prohibited.
Debate actually starts at 8:22
Ur welcome 😎👉
People like you restore my faith in humanity.
Thank you.
43:00 - wallace starts
1:16:30 - Ehrman response
1:22:20 - wallace response
1:43:00 - Q&A
The first highlight of the debate.👍
You saved me time
Doing the lords work, thanks!
The thing I learned is that people will believe what they want to believe not matter the evidence.
Exactly
You can't convince a man against his will.
You mean... most of the ignorant idiots who inhabit this planet. Some of us actually have honesty and humility ... did you know?
BUT THATS JUST IT THEY DONT WANT TO BELIEVE IT, BRAINWASHING MASS HYPNOSIS IS NOT THEM WANTING ANYTHING, THEY ARE BRAIN DEAD BOTS. SING THE SAME HYM OVER AND OVER AND OVER ITS LITERAL BRAIN PROGRAMMING
Yep.... well said
I REALLY wish they would’ve allowed for an actual back-and-forth dialogue between these two before the questions from the audience. I think that would’ve made this debate FAR more invigorating
with box gloves maybe ;)
@Abraham Mani really did you watch the debate they haven't got a clue and who cares about what some anonymous authors say where is the gospal of Jesus that is what the revaltion from God was I don't care what some random guys said who never even met Jesus said what is the narrative the firs gospal was written about 40 years after Jesus that's a estimate it could be much later imagine 40 years after world War 2 some random guys started telling you what happened would you except how can you put your faith in something what can lead you to eternal dambnation people are so gullible
Yes and bring up on the screen the exact books and quotes they quote of other people. So the audience and we actually see the written words by the author they are quoting. Then there is no question weather that person actually wrote what Bart and Daniel said that they wrote. That's a question I would ask if I was there.
Wallace is surprisingly candid and plays no tricks, among Christians. He admitted all the facts and reached exact opposite conclusions.
The more Ive learned about the bible after becoming an atheist, the more I've come to realize how little I knew about it when I believed.
Lmao, right. I'm learning more now about the bible science and all types of things.. my kick now is watching muslims debate and tear apart their beliefs.
For me its the opposite of what you said.
It's fascinating how the pieces fit together, the possible origins of certain extra-biblical Christian beliefs and traditions, etc. by reading apocrypha and the ancient near East context!!
@@stephenburdess2914 it's out pleasure
Funny how God is working in your life. Enjoy learning and btw there is no such thing as atheist.
One point I agree on :"We should all seek the truth to the best of our ability!"
@ John Stava... that sounds good John until you realize that very few people have any ability for discerning propaganda from truth
"...very few people have any ability for discerning propaganda from truth.." If Jesus is as the NT says he is, then he must know that about people. Then, why does he not intervene? Where is he when people need him most?
Agreed. Problem is...people are simply...not honest with themselves. Not even honest with themselves over very minor issues in life, much less, major philosophical issues. Have you ever seen someone who caused a car accident? I worked as a Paramedic for years...and I can tell you, I have never met a person, after a car accident, who admitted fault. I have heard things like...(after they pulled right out in front of traffic and get hit), "But he must have been speeding...because he came out of nowhere!" If people cannot be honest with themselves about a simple obvious, fault...how can we expect them to be honest with deep philosophical ideas? People and their human nature...make it where it is almost impossible...to admit fault. They just cannot be honest with themselves.
I agree.. if you r seeking the truth Im very sure you ll find it.. and better start soon..
@@baberoot1998 How can one be honest and say they know the truth first handed ? you have to have faith to be on either side if the isle ,if one is agnostic the reality that they know almost nothing and there is no way out sets in and its depressing ,i can see the sadness on Barts face .
I think the real question is, even if we had all the original texts, would they amount to anything more than just being what someone said?
Yes, they would.
@@akamsharif The Problem with the Bible is that they’re trying to treat it like how we treat the Hadith. But we have a complex system for deciding how authentic a Hadith is, but these Christian scholars don’t have the same seemingly
Yes because the canon is the full revelation of God. Early church history and these works have given us much evidence that these books in the new testament are canon. So is what we have in the new testament the original? Is the bigger question.
@@ibnmianal-buna3176 I am keen to know how did Muslim scholars decide on that Total Stranger who manhandled an innocent man at Hira cave with out any provocation! Who was that Stranger? He never introduced himself. He never claimed he was sent by God Almighty Yahweh. He never claimed he is an angel.
In fact he jumped at an innocent man and caught hold of him and pressed him severely when he met him for the very first time!
Does this behaviour fit for the top angel of God Almighty?
Honestly why can't we just have a question and answer session for hours between these two amazing scholars? Forget all of the typical debate methodologies and just have them arguing back and forth asking questions and answering each other. That is when the debate becomes quite intriguing and when i learn the most about this topic. Everytime i listen to a bart ehrman debate, he excells at refuting his opponents position during the crossfire sections. This is all i look forward too.
What a wonderful conversation! Two highly knowledgeable experts conversing about a topic and offering two perspectives that complement one another. Inspite their differences Ehrman and Wallace managed to leave the audience with a thorough understanding of the essential questions related to the topic in question. Bravo! Excellent job!
I have to say, Wallace's opening remarks are easily done of the most charming and seemingly honest examples of debate I've ever seen from a Bible believer. Watching the rest now, but so far I actually like this Wallace guy, which is a very pleasant and welcome surprise
I love Bart, and was glad to finally find someone close to his level in debate. Even though I disagree with Wallace, I think he’s way more intellectually honest than the others that I’ve heard him debate before. Even if you disagree with either- I think they both make pretty good arguments.
It seems I was watching a different debate than these folks at the end. None of Ehrman’s questions were solidly answered and Wallace simply insists that he’s comfortable assuming as correct what he admits he does not know. Typical.
R P G We don’t have the hard evidence we do have a lot of soft evidence...
It's like when Wallace says that "probably is on his side" while Ehrman says "we can't know" (for sure). It seems to me that these two statements mean the same thing -- and yet this was a sticking point in the debate.
R P G: That is a complete misrepresentation of Dr. Wallace’s position. He argued we do not have to have 100% certainty in order to have a high degree of confidence as to what the original text of the New Testament said. Big difference.
The bigger question to me, is, _how we know how good Mark's memory is_ , 20, 30 years after Jesus' death. And was he exposed to Jesus (no, right?), or, only early stories from those who were? I guess that's so big an unknown that it's much harder to fight about, though. Like looking for your keys under a lamppost.
Anthony Tyler thank you for confirming exactly what I wrote.
Dan and Bart are top notch scholars and, seemingly, great people. I've watched several of their debates and, each time, am left with the same impression, namely, that they're simple engaging in an apples and oranges discussion. Bart seeks certainty. Nothing short of the original texts or something close to them will satisfy him. Dan is dealing in probabilities based on extant evidence. It makes for a very informative discussion but one in which absolutely nothing is resolved.
Why interview only people who are obviously christian at the end. Ehrman was intellectually honest whilst Wallace believes he is correct without evidence.
that's probably almost everyone in the audience.
It's a matter of odds and what percentage of the overall audience fits into the believing/non-believing parties.
without evidence? The entire NT is the evidence which Erhman admits is largely as it was written if you pin him down.
@Shameless Papist then why did ehrman deconvert if he's so biased and entrenched?
@@karcharias811 The New Testament isn't evidence of anything. It is a claim, and a shaky one at that.
Did the people in the end watch the same debate as me?
No. They didn't listen to Erman at all. They went into the debate with their minds already made up, so they effectively ignored everything that didn't support their already established opinions.
It was like they dropped in after a WLC gallop in a neighboring auditorium.
@@dienekes4364 Lol, so are you guys.
Dienekes While I’m an atheist and fall somewhere between a history-ist and a mythist when it comes to Jesus, I think we all come into this with our “team”. It’s just how we are. So I think we need to be careful criticizing the opposing sides.
But I will say this: Wallace’s thinking that somehow things get better and more reliable when we get into a time where sources no longer exist...and that’s why we should believe into the reliability of New Testament...is odd. That seems backward thinking to me and is why I feel Erhman won this debate.
I watched from beginning to the end.
Bart was not impressive at all. I am not satisfied at all with Bart Ehrman arguments. His argument only: "I don't know... We don't know... We may not know..." But, he KNOWS surely the conclusion he built.
If he is consistent from the beginning to the end He doesn't know, maybe his book will not be best sellers. As he said in the beginning of the debate the title of "Misquoting Jesus" was not from him, but from publisher. It's really a pitty to trade our own integrity with money.
now, rather than copies of copies we have translations and interpretations of translations and interpretations of copies of copies
Would not matter if we had an original,it would still be a book full of bullshit ignorant goat herding child rapists claims.
@@ossiedunstan4419 but different meaning from original?
Hahaha brilliantly put
@@ossiedunstan4419 sounds like you get turned on by that.
@@ossiedunstan4419 Child rapist? What Bible are you reading?
I remember being like the audience at the end. Pastors and apologists alike teach you to wave away and tune out arguments against the accuracy of the text, and it works. I remember genuinely not being phased when someone would make some of Ehrman’s arguments, and I felt like I was being intellectually honest. Just reminds me how feelings are terrible indicators of a correct position.
All religious apologists use the same strategy.
The Bible said it
I believe it
That settles it.
Not true at all, there are many reasons why we believe what we teach.
@@JamesRichardWiley Actually I have heard no apologist say that, but maybe I was lucky. the apologists I´ve listened to follow science and scholars, yes they bring forth things that supports the idea that the bible is likely more reliable than what other might try to render, but none of their arguments go as you claim "the bible said it". Does Wallace even once say here that the bible said it, therefore it´s true???? I doubt it. I think you quote an axiom.
@@danvaz72 Greed and pride ? lol....
@@PjotrII Depends on if heard an apologist from 21st century or the first apologists who clearly told you to shut the f$$k up and believe.... Oh the ever evolving art of controlling the idiots, when will you disappear? O_O
When Wallace was talking about how there are more copies of the Bible than classical writings, all I could I hear was Matt Dillahunty's voice saying, "So what?"
There are more variations, the more copies you have. But the critical text of the scriptures still give an accurate explanation of early church prospective.
To be fair, the more copies there are, the easier it is to corroborate. Compare to other ancient texts, which all have far fewer manuscripts, unfortunately often from one. If a line is corrupted or a cluster of lines look suspect, the best scholars can do is guess what was originally there. I remember that could be a problem translating Plautus.
@@SirAnthonyChirpsALot "To be fair, the more copies there are, the easier it is to corroborate."
No, the easier it is to compare the different copies. Even if all the copies say the same thing, none of them have corroborated that what they say actually happened.
@@SirAnthonyChirpsALot
Except in the case of biblical sources these text copies are vastly different from each other on many critical issues and areas.
We are not talking about language translations and more modern day variences of versions of the same copied text. We are talking about the variations of all these older texts that are supposedly this inerrant word of a holy and righteous deity god. One that so many versions can't seem to agree upon so many simple areas.
Yes there are multitudes of these scriptural texts copied and rewritten and revised and interpreted and interpolated and reinterpreted and reinterpolated in dozens to hundreds of different ways on just about every subject and area to be discussed.
For the bible..for this religious text of a god deity who is claimed to not be the author of confusion...there is an awful lot of confusion.
This is simple to narrow down. That all these texts are either just writings of men from their own brains and imaginations..and thus why they a vary so greatly..and why we have no early true versions of original texts..because all these are the original texts and the all vary from writer to writer..
Or
This idealisms of being put forth by a god..is indeed so and this is a god that gave everything to each author on a different way compared to another. And that was according to how that person perceives this god. So it was in accordance to that god view..to each their own correctly given by that persons god.
But it still does jot account for it not showing confusion. If this god had purpose and intent to make sure there is no confusion..then it did a lousy job and could not influence or make it happen.
This I will leave the arguement upon. A god who supposedly could write the ten commandments on stone with his finger ..write down exactly why he wanted said.. can not influence for the rest of the textual writings about this religion and faith and historicity and what is to be given and said can not make it clear and precise and without confusion and division upon what is said and how it is said.
Makes no sense.. what does..it is just writings of men and their imaginations..nothing more..nothing less and that's all it ever has been and can be
In other words, I'll risk my soul and follow Bart to hell rather than believe in the Lord Jesus and go to heaven. Nice reasoning.
Wow, the closing bit with the audience feedback is a real lesson in confirmation bias.
MrTwostring, absolutely. Wallace was all but blown out of the water.
what made it biased though?
@@qitzpaquitojr.reston2337 its in black and white.... go actually look at the video
@@rpg896 It was obviously the other way around. Wallace killed Ehrman.
@@BrandonCarter469 k boomer
right at the start of this, I am curious how different the text of P45 is versus the older (4th century) manuscript of Mark? That could provide a decent benchmark for estimating how different P45 might be from the original manuscript(s).
Can we all just appreciate that cut at 01:43:10 where someone went straight to the question? Whoever did that, thank you for saving me a minute or two, seriously that work is appreciated.
EDIT: the people at the end, they all said Wallace won the debate and answered the questions and overwhelming evidence? Umm...did we watch the same debate?
Even though I disagree with Dr. Ehrman's conclusion, I genuinely respect, and like this man a lot. Anti-Christian or not, his scholarship is so incredibly helpful for everyone wanting to learn about the textual transmission of the New Testament. He's quite humble too, and a great speaker with much clarity. I cannot help but always have a smile on my face whenever I hear Dr. Ehrman speak. I pray that the Lord will draw him back into fellowship some day.
listen to your reason. If this was the word of God why would God make it reasonable to reject His word via objective evidence?
He's not anti_Christian.
One of the most evident conclusions I could see, is that evidence does not matter to those that believe. Their desire to believe is more important than evidence.
This was great! Bart, you are an excellent debater. Your videos have increased my faith exponentially! You force me to question and research, so thank you. Understanding why we believe what we believe no matter what that believe is is so important. It's just to bad your questions weren't fully addressed.
Take note that the Gospel of Mark, is not an eyewitness account. Even if you were able to reconstruct the original manuscripts of Mark, it is still not accurate. That's because Mark simply tried to write down Jesus stories he heard from people, or copied anecdotes that some other unknown people wrote down on scraps of papyrus. Mark (whoever he was) was not there with Jesus during his entire ministry. So what Mark wrote down, was all hearsay (in legal terms). You know, legendary stories of people get passed around by word of mouth, especially during a period in history where there's not much entertainment. Many of these stories can get exaggerated (if not fabricated), for dramatic storytelling effect and propaganda. People simply had no way of verifying for themselves if the stories were true. You just have to believe them, and pass them around.
Then you will love the "street epistemology" videos from Anthony Magnabosco 😉
@@freddiereadie30 Tradition puts mark as the man to whom Peter referred in his first epistle, chapter 5, who served him as an aide and secretary. So this would put Mark as a mid first century gospel dictated by an eyewitness to his secretary.
Two main points are:
1. How many differences we have between two manuscripts with a gap of 100 years. Once we know, we can make a projection for 200, 300 etc. years. Of course, we have to pick such two manuscripts a few times firstly - to see if number of differences changes, depending by historical epoche (in Antiquity, Middle Ages etc.).
2. To compare two randommanuscripts of the same time and to see the umber of difference. Once we have it, we can make a projection of this number to four, six and more manuscripts.
So, we can estimate the number of original differencesm, compare manuscripts on two levels: 1. manuscripts of the same origin - in time; 2. two different originaged manuscripts of the same time.
Beautiful expose by both men, well balanced, entertaining, straight forward and to the point and much agreed upon by both professors.
We need more Bart Ehrman
Rangel Luiz dos Santos
Why? , isn't your non belief sufficient for you?.
Rangel Luiz dos Santos More Richard Carrier as well...Scholarly and not pandering.
@@bobgriffith1810 because Christians want to dominate everyone's life in too many cases. Case in point - our current president and the republican party with a lot of Christian nationalists in it.
@@bobgriffith1810 *"Why? , isn't your non belief sufficient for you?."* - I don't want to sound rude, but this is incredibly silly. Ehrman is a skilled historian, linguist, and teacher, to touch on just a few of his qualifications. Would you respond to "we need more skilled historians" with "isn't one sufficient for you?"
@@beastshawnee4987 Hahahhahahahahah good one - Carrier - Scholarly
Dr. Ehrman, you are part of the reason why I have even a footing when interacting with Theists about the legitimate reasons for belief. I'm an Atheist, intellectually Agnostic, however educated about the scriptures. They are very impactful, and terrifying in their influence on otherwise decent communities. Hello, from South Carolina!
There is no way to tell....
Dapper Global, check out the Qur'an and give your commwnts
I love these debates. Would love to see more, because your research changed my life for the better.
You can always count on a bad moderator to interrupt the debaters during a back and forth when the discussion finally gets good and this moderator didn't disappoint.
It's good to see Ehrman debating a seasoned professional.
If you watch the video again, they said they've been debating each other for the past 30 years.
Since they both agree that the text we have today is false and we can never know what originally was in the text I don't understand why the debate is two hour long?
Evidence Payment by the minute?
Cognitive dissonance
Neither of them said that the text is false.
Since they both agree that the text is over 99% accurate is more like it. Apparently for radical skeptics 99.4% accuracy over 2000 years is not sufficient when you talking about Christian texts. But Aristotle? Who knows and who cares it is Aristotle !!! We love him!!
Erhman is guilty of this. All he says when it comes to the Canon of NT is "We can't know, we can't know, blah blah" Then I find video of him talking about the Gospel of Thomas to a Gnostic hippie society in Oregon somewhere and just fawning over it. Never mind that the Gospel of Thomas was written in the mid second century possibly the third.
There are shills out here making false comments.
It's called propaganda.
Compared to 'religious' debates this was great, because they were arguing facts and concepts rather than theology and both doing it rather well. I would really like to get a statistician to run the numbers on how many copies of which age would be needed to truly confirm the accuracy of an unknown original. I do know that any copy that is known to have been taken holey from a specific source that we also already know can be discarded from the evidence. How far would that take the pile down?
1:52:29
There is at least one essential and glaringly obvious difference between classical writings such as Homer’s Odyssey, the works of Plato, Euripides, Aeschylus, and Sophocles, compared to New Testament scripture.
None of the aforementioned authors claim their writings are the inerrant word of an omniscient, omnipotent deity. Subsequently, no one is threatened with eternal punishment for not revering the written words of the Greek authors.
Do the authors of the new testament claim they're the inerrant word? or was that just something that christians added in later?
I guess that's probably complicated.
@Lu G. So you reject the bible because you don't like it saying that God will punish you forever if you don't repent and believe in Christ?
@Lu G. : That's absurd. Christians don't "threaten" any such thing. They *warn* of it. If you choose to ignore that, fine. But if they didn't warn you, they'd be negligent, assuming they really believe it to be true. When was there any time, honestly, any Christian threatened you of anything?
@@spitfiremase
The original authors of the New Testament have not yet been identified.
@@ant1k That isn't what he said at all. You made that up entirely in your head.
I enjoy these discussions. Much I am already aware but I still hear another point of view and the reasoning supporting that point of view and the hurdles and difficulties in the tasks at hand. Very good!
When I was a child, I was told the Bible was without error. At age 20 I went to Bible school where this was reinforced. At age 25 I went to Seminary where this was reinforced some more. At age 35 I began a Graduate program in Religious Studies where "objective" research was encouraged by reading at least three textbooks on each side of the particular issue. It is now clear to me that the Bible has many errors.
@J H if you want to limit it to just the new testament I can think of 3
1. The census of Augustus didn't happen
2. Harrod the great was dead when a census did happen
3. There is 0 evidence the slaughter of the innocents actually happened
That is 3 errors on like the 1st 2 pages
The best part of the debate was the free wheeling between Bart and Wallace, but the moderator cut them off too short, not allowing them to go deeper. Moderators always do this as if they make it about themselves and not the two debaters.
Excellent! Excellent debate!!! One of the best debates I've ever heard.
Yahweh must be watching and clapping also.
You can always count on a bad moderator to interrupt the debaters when some really important back-and-forth discussion organically emerges.
"Relatively certain" is a phrase I am not comfortable with. "Relatively confident" would be OK, but certainty can never be relative. #pedantry
Wallace says ehrman was “Skirting the issues I raised with you” but yet after Erhmans first round of questions Wallace started by saying straight up that he wasn’t going to answer erhmans questions yet and proceeded with his own set of questions.
Great debate, Bart. I've read many of your books, and I've learned SO MUCH from you.
Thank you, thank you!
Probably the most good-natured debate I've seen.
Pretty amazing how people see what they want to see. The fellow at the end kept talking about the vast amount of evidence Dr Wallace presented, when he didn't show much at all. On the other hand, Dr Ehrman was on point throughout, but they seem to think he was either flailing or arguing from silence. Dr Ehrman clearly was the winner-and Dr Wallace never did get around to answering his questions!
Oddsfish!
You definitely saw what you wanted to see.
U one of the man that saw what u wanted to see...
I personally think Wallace won round one and then got owned by Bart as Bart would expound upon more.
The mere fact that Wallace kept pointing at Paul was moot imo... We know Paul, we have Paul’s earliest manuscripts compared to the Synoptic Gospels which are mere fragments for centuries, not so with Paul... Wallace knew he was beat and avoided answering Bart’s questions
So much criticism is overly applied. If you probed Ehrman on the "mistakes" and its ultimate change you find it sounded worse than it is.
@@Jamie-Russell-CME Ehm entire verses are added in our existing manuscripts. Other things were likely left out. Wordings were changed to fit theological believes. You can see this in the differences between the gospels as they are today even. This may not matter much in the sense that we get the gist of what the text was about, which would be enough in case of classic literature for example. But when every sentence is scrutinized for religious significance and entire theological constructs are build on particular wordings in the new testament it gets pretty darn relevant pretty quickly. Like the Apalachean snake handlers Erhman mentioned that base their entire religion on a scribal interpolation. Or the trinity being in the NT or not.
That intro is A+. Really he nailed setting the stage. A very great debate as well
More to the point Why would a God of all the Universe Make everything so convoluted and ambiguous if he wanted to leave his message clear and simple ?? for everyone
This was maybe one of Bart's most intellectually challenging debates.
Dr. Daniel B. Wallace was a very captivating debater and certainly had some good points.
I agree. Bart Ehrman is a great debater. He asks tough questions. One should never underestimate him. I would agree that Wallace proved to be his toughest opponent that I have come across.
If the original words are recoverable, how will we know when we have them? We have no basis for comparison. How will we know the original words once we've found them?
If you have a car and over time change all the parts... is it still the same car?
To those lacking in wisdom, it's the same car.😊😊
Ah, I wish the scholars hadn’t been interrupted when they were going at it - not for the drama, but to hear more of the live fight, _at their level_ . I wanted more of those details. Plus I admit I liked the passion (so ok, drama ;) ).
Russian Bot Farm I’d like a box of Russian Bots. Do you happen to have any fresh ones in stock?
THE WHOLE THING IS AN INSULT TO BARTS INTELLIGENCE, WHY DOES HE EVEN WASTE HIS EFFORT ON THE IDIOT SHEEP, THEY DO NOT DESERVE HIS TIME
As Mark Twain stated: "It is full of interest. It has noble poetry in it; and some clever fables; and some blood-drenched history; and some good morals; and a wealth of obscenity; and upwards of a thousand lies..."
Hearing the responses at the end was pretty disheartening. The things they believe Wallace proved were the exact things that he agreed we didn’t know. The argument should be whether or not (or at what level) you can still believe in the literal teachings of the NT given its glaring historical issues. I think to completely ignore the historical backdrop and issues leans into the growing skepticism in Modern American Christianity.
GREAT PRESENTATION. GREAT HUMOR TOO. LEARNED A LOT. CLASSIFIED QUESTIONS DONE BY THE GREAT SCHOLARS. THANK YOU
I like the Burden of Proof by Ehrman, the engineers need to prove the bridge is trustworthy. Wallace claims we are all on the train. clearly we are not. If we are, show me the caboose so i can jump off this thing.
Glad to see these sort of things are becoming more widely discussed and debated. Absolutist certainty at last has now a solid substantial counter.... my concern has been that a declining mainstream Christianity has left the field open to a rigid unchanging biblical rump who will end up never being challenged.
It was great to get an insight into the scholarship and ongoing debates within biblical academic circles and disagreements without fighting to the death as in the past.
I thought the concluding audience remarks reflect the conservative nature of SMU.
An encounter of differing views helps to change ones perspective...modifying or changing views or just the realisation that others hold compelling reasons with sincere convictions.
What questions did Wallace answer? He kept asking Ehrman questions; Ehrman gave some answers. Wallace gave none?
Yeah, Ehrman did answer “I don’t know”.
When Bart says “we don’t know”, meaning, the opposition has to provide the evidences. If you fail, then you have to admit that you’re in the wrong. I rest my case.
The evidence of what?
@@javierborda8684 That we are close to the original text, how can you say that you are close to the original text if you are just basing your text on the copies of copies of copies of copies.
@@criticalsage
How can you say there isn't when we haven't even been through all of them yet? You do realize how long it takes to go through a text and then we have ALOT, I mean, ALOT. We can't just wave a wand and viola. Not to mention how many different times new ones pop up from crazy places.
@@criticalsage
Hell we haven't even fully counted them yet.
Believe in Jesus Christ and you shall have everlasting life! Get a king james bible and believe.
Read Matthew.
Read 1 John chapter 4.
Read Genesis chapter 40.
ruclips.net/video/px_BUquo3Vc/видео.html
Comparing the number of NT manuscripts to other ancient works literally means nothing historically for the NT. Yes, it is significantly better attested than Plutarch’s works, etc., but that doesn’t imply that the NT is WELL attested. Being the best in a field of terribly attested historical documents doesn’t mean something is well attested.
I can be the best basketball player on a horrendous team, but that doesn’t mean I am a genuinely good player.
Excellent debate - with both speakers conducting themselves professionally. How refreshing. And yet, there's a point where the debate starts to go into epistomolgical circles - "can we know, can we know for sure...who knows". It would be great, perhaps next time, to see how biblical textual research examines the veracity of some of the main articles of Christian faith (i.e. was Jesus the son of God or merely a son of God (John 10:36 in the earliest manuscripts does not include the definite article "the")? From Jesus' perspective, does one enter the Kingdom of Heaven through faith - or good works? (as Ehrman hints at by citing Matt. 25)? Did Jesus see himself as a sacrfice for mankind, or as a reformer against a Persian-influenced, corrupted Judaism?...etc.
I listened to the debate and I hear Bart talk about mistakes. I don’t have these copies to rightly divide with the aid of the Holy Ghost. Do anyone know how to get copies of these manuscripts translated?
Thank you for the debate, and for airing it as you have done, here. How unfortunate, though, that the video concludes with a handful of characters who uniformly endorse the notion that Professor Wallace presented the stronger of the two cases. It would seem to me that the purpose of the video is to all its viewers to decide, and even to mull over the question whether designating a "winner" is the most useful way of appropriating the material presented here. Moreover, those "interviewed" (they aren't are they?) at the end, or better put, asked to comment as to who "won", exhibit the kind of reasoning that in other frameworks would amount to an excellent series of examples of confirmation bias. Why were they included here, anyway? The integrity of the video and presentation has been compromised by including them.
Whatever Professor Ehrman was arguing for, he put a good evidence for that argument. The fact that scholarly discussion is no longer made about the autograph or the original text is a proof of Dr Ehrman’s viewpoint.
Now, it is all about Ausgangstext, exit text, output text, initial text and the archetypal text it descended from. No more original text. It’s untenable.
Who wrote these manuscripts? We don’t really know. The debate should of ended there.
This debate was about the scribal transmission of the texts and how accurate or not that process was, not who wrote the autographs.
@Ναζωραῖος
If 90% of history was claimed to have been transmitted by an all-knowing deity, and followed to the letter by fanatics, you might have a point.
@Ναζωραῖος
Plus all the anonymous posts on the internet... oh... wait.... ;-)
T A Quite a silly claim ... If "debate" should end because we don´t know who wrote a text, I do not know of any ancient text that we can verify by 100% certainty who wrote it. If an Egyptian text on a wall doesn´t have a name of the writer - we should end the debate (research) right there. MMMmmm yeah!
@Ναζωραῖος Even if they didn´t want to deceive us, we would have no sources from the ancient time to build our history upon. We can´t verify to a 100% certainty who wrote what in the ancient world.
Did that one student interviewed even listen to Ehrman about the reliability of classical scholarship? He answered the question.
Ehrman: All I ask is that you approach it with an open mind.
Audience: What did he say? My hearing has left the building.
@Denzo Dridz There are no copies, of copies of copies of copies of copies of copies of the actions of alexander the great. There are some manuscript parts 400 years after his death. but you still believe it isn't historically reliable.
Nick Tham so you are comparing Alexander the Great to Jesus Christ? Theological arguments to historical arguments? Brilliant brother Nick
@@alhassangangu4357 I fail to see how you address the question Nick posed. As Wallace said, people don't apply the same level of scepticism to other historical documents than they do the Bible. People hate Jesus and therefore the Bible. So let's say you find a cave with 1000 copies of Aristotle and tgere are 200 000 differences, will people discount Aristotle? Nope
An open mind is for happy philosophers.
@NothingButTheTruthInChrist Agreed, "Listen" does not mean agree with me.
The debate summed up in 2 sentences.
1) Ehrman believes since we can't be 100% sure then we can't be sure at all.
2) Wallace believes we can't be 100% sure but based on the evidence its probable that we can be sure.
That is a straw man of Bart's position.
...faith...
...simple...
@@jakesanders136
Sure, the vast majority of the New Testament as it existed 200 years after the originals were written can be recovered.
Not true... Bart ehrman states the probability of a copy that equalizes the original, yet, a probability isn't to be trusted.
@Revelation 3:9 Matthew 19:28 good point there.
After watching this debate, there are a few things that I want to prove constructive criticism about the discussion. I will try to be fair on both people. I do realize that I will be a bit harsher on Wallace because I find that many of his arguments are flawed.
1) The thing that I found about Wallance argument is that he wants to convince people that because we have so many manuscripts of the new testament, it means than any other ancient text it means that it is more reliable
2) If we want to say that the NT is not reliable, then we have to say that all of the ancient manuscripts are not reliable, and as such, we will go back in the age of darkness. To me, this is an argument to appeal to emotion. The simple truth is that we don't have an accurate representation of history. It is just an account of what has occurred.
3) As for the reliability of the text, Wallance tried to use his experiment that with his 70 churches that they found that the variable of errors was about 4 errors. However, he did not say the significance of those errors. Here are two variance sentence in which both of that sentence as only 1 letter difference
* I can do this Honey
* I can't do this Honey
Both of these sentences have 1 letter difference of where the meaning of the ENTIRE sentence changes.
4) I would love where they get that number that 99% of the text is preserved. This argument seems way too convenient. I realize that most of these are spelling mistakes. A spelling mistake can make a difference depending on which word you spell. Here is another example of a spelling mistake of a single word that changes the meaning of the word itself: Long vs lung
5) Wallace did bring a high point that tax collector is more accurate to record their record than those who specialize in literature record keeping. Bert failed to respond to how those people were not able to keep an actual record
6) Wallace did make a high point about the probability of knowing the most likeable outcome Which to me Bert fails to consider how the likelihood of finding the most accurate.
7) Yet it does not mean that we do have the original text because even in a probability situation, there is still some element of chance that the probability is actually wrong. After all, if you have a likelihood of a 97% chance of being accurate, you still have a chance of 3% of being inaccurate. I know that 3% might not seem significant. To understand the impact of how significant those changes are with the figure of 1% that is a considerable change. There are 150k in the NT that would mean that there are 1500 significant words. Kinda change the perspective, eh?
8) Wallace makes the argument that you can reconstruct the entire new testament with the Greek fathers. I actually want to see the evidence that you can actually do that. I bet that this is an exaggeration, and you won't be able to reconstruct it. I also do know that some of the church father is quoting things from the Bible that does not exist from our Bibles.
you are right.Here in Mizoram, North East India, Society is devided harshly along the The Trinity line.Just one line which Bar pointd out was not present in the earlier Greek.The division is very deep in a 100pervent christian state in a hindu nation. Its not trivisl ad Mr Wallace made out to be.
@@marcus-tq7js : That's because the doctrine of the Trinity is not derived from that one line, but from the whole body of OT and NT scripture.
On #1 : No, the argument is that we can have greater confidence of reconstructing the autographs from this vast multitude of textual evidence.
On #2 : In actual fact, the faith of a well educated Christian doesn't depend on having the word-for-word exact autographs, anyway. It usually depends on having an encounter with the living Christ first.
On #3 : That's an example of a meaningful conflict, and possibly one which is also important. There are few such errors extant in the NT; and we know what they are, so we know what to be skeptical about. The woman caught in adultery is one example, and the explicit line about the Trinity is another. They are known and owned.
This is such an academic point of discussion. The original text is gone so it's completely speculatory.
That's incorrect . It's not completely speculative, good science goes into reconstruction. We actually have a very good idea what the original was
Still in Wallace's opening statement, but it amazes me that I'm *_supposed_* to be amazed that there are more copies of texts that were being churned out by the church than there are copies of the works of ancient historians. If there was a Church of Tacitus cranking out manuscripts, I wonder how many of *_those_* would have survived.
Good point, and also there was the fact that the Church was involved in, um, shall we say "purging" a lot of ancient texts.
@@TheRealShrike , that is true. The church had a long standing tradition of censoring and banning "blasphemous" literature. They even banned the Talmud for a time. The Talmud actually had to be edited so as to appease the Church.
No, it's God.
I have great respect for both of your work as schalors. I must confess I am biased as a Christian I tend to agree with Dan Wallace but I admire your work very much! I have always felt that your methodology when it comes to the manuscript tradition of the new testament was confusing but your works are very insightful
They are looking at the wrong paradigm that the original text is in Greek language, how come that the Greek Texts as the original when the existing texts has enormous and staggering number of differences between each other. The Greek Texts are only translations made by many individuals from the true original New Testament that"s why they exhibit many differencies with each other. The true original text of the New Testament is the Aramaic Pehitta because the Aramaic is the lingua franca of Christ and his early followers. It is also exhibit high masoretic level of uniformity and almost zero differences among the existing texts of it! I think they must try to put aside their traditional views and try to look at the Peshitta Text paradigm as the basis in determing the original words of the New Testament.
Sorry, Boss. I didn't complete the assignment because there was typo in the email. I couldn't really rely on it or extract any meaning from it. Perhaps everything in it was wrong. How could I know? If one thing was wrong, maybe everything was wrong. And I certainly wouldn't want to base any important decisions on something that is obviously false.
This is exactly what happens in law sometimes😆. It's sometimes absolute mess trying to figure out the original intention of a law/policy and requires amendments😭💔. Sometimes different sectors will argue about the meaning of a phrase or sentence (I am studying policy analysis).
Well done to both! Great debate
How many different variants of Tanach do we have?
Bart ehrman I’m a big fan keep doing what you do
Five mistakes.
Anyone who makes me think deeper of .y faith gets my vote coz love when ppl like Dan responds
Bart is the bridge between the Creationists and the atheists.
In his conclusion, Wallace says he's "relatively certain". Which is it? He should drop the "certain" part. He's relatively confident.
It’s kind of wired how debates now don’t really include a debate.
Imagine a drinking game where you just took a sip every time Bart said copy. You'd be on the floor.
Wow, the people interviewed at the end of the video apparently paid zero attention to what Dr. Ehrman said. Their bias is painfully apparent.
Pay no attention to those contradictions, Dorothy.
A contradiction is self-cancelling.
Like your picture?
@@Jamie-Russell-CME what?
Religion promises what it cannot deliver.
That why you need faith to believe it.
Though I'm no longer a Christian, Dr. Wallace was one of my Greek professors at Dallas Theological Seminary. I'd highly recommend "How Jesus Became God" by Ehrman to any open-minded Christian interested in historical, textual criticism.
Have_At_IT I haven’t yet, but I’d like to. I’m trying to prioritize which one of his 30 books to read next lol
Bart, Id like to know who you would like to debate or discussion with about biblical issues. Secondly, I would really be interested in a book you regard highly for the period of Christ through Augustine.
Oh - that period of study is called 'Patristics' (I think). Try asking on reddit's /r/AcademicBiblical .
The elephant in the room is; both men agree that the trinity is not present in all the oldest manuscripts. And I've read that in the revised standard version of the bible even the resurrection of jesus was removed because it was not in the earliest manuscripts. But that the heads of church got so upset they insisted both be put back. Hence, new revised standard versions of the bible were printed with both added back into the text.
My question is; if those verses were not in the oldest manuscripts then what happens to Christianity?
I cannot figure out how Wallaces argument that there are lots of cooies from centuries after...has anything to do with how accurate those copies are.
And yes, we should doubt that we have the exact originals of those other ancient authors too.
Will that change the jist?
After viewing several of Dr. Ehrman's debates on youtube, it seems to me he has yet to encounter a truly worthy opponent... which is certainly not his fault at all.
I've loved watching Dr. Ehrman debate, and I share a large amount of his views. The only truly worthy opponent I have seen was the debate against Michael Bird. Not that Bird made me change any of my views, but he is by far the most articulate and most direct debater I have seen Dr. Ehrman go up against. If you actually are looking for a worthy opponent I recommend that debate.
Faith is not an argument.
Dr. Craig to him to the cleaners, hands down. It's what happens when you face a logician.
Spoken like an atheist/agnostic.
The gospels of Peter, Luke , Matthew, and John all tell the story of Mary going to the tomb of Jesus. But each story is different from the others. Eg:
Matthew: An angel comes down from heaven, rolls back the stone covering the entrance, and then tells everyone that Jesus has already risen.
Mark : The stone is already rolled away from the entrance when everybody gets there and there is a young man inside ( angel?) who says Jesus has already risen.
Luke: The stone is already rolled away from the entrance, and as if by magic two men appear (angels?) and tell them Jesus has already risen.
John: In this last version Mary shows up, finds the stone moved and the body gone. Two men (angels?) ask her why she's crying. Jesus himself appears and tells Mary that he is about to rise to heaven.
The story of the resurrection of Jesus is arguably the most important story of the Bible from the Christian point of view and yet 4 different versions of the event from the primary Biblical sources.
That's what you get from eye witness testimonies. Seems contradict each other while they are not. It's a normal thing even in todays justice system.
@@justanotherguy4382 You're right. The details have differences but the overall portrait of the story is the same.
@@cowdyimammurrahtabari973
No.
To be errorless.....
Is the stone there when they arrive or not?
The authors of the gospels weren't really concerned with our modern way of writing history. It's an ancient literary genre of biography where they felt free to include it exclude details based in the point the author wanted to make.
@susan didary And then real Jesus lived on an island with his wife Mary Magdalene, happy to finally not be the center of the attention anymore ? :3 Sounds like Mickael Jackson conspiracy theories ^_^
Great debate and I've learned alot from both debaters.
Good job again , Dr. Ehrman. My only gripe about the format of these debates is that they grow tired. It seems that the podium lectures, then counter arguments, keep the debaters from really putting forth solid discussion. The best debates are when the speakers get to “cross examine” each other. Then they are required to directly answer the other’s questions. This one got good toward the end then until the moderator stopped it and moved them into their “final arguments” (just another lecture). It’s like sitting in church listening to a sermon which will, hopefully, become a thing of the past.
Always good to hear the genius of Bart Ehrman
I've not listened to Dan before. This exchange was very enjoyable.
The Gospel acc. to Snoopy is a little flawed when you compare modern literacy rates to 2nd/3rd century literacy rates among early Christians, and the materials used for reading and writing, not to mention lighting.
What would happen if they repeated this by candle light on parchment with a quill among a group with a more representative literacy rate?
They'll probably have to surrender their spectacles too.
I havent watched the video but can someone tell me why this question is interesting for New testament in particular? Why not also old testament
Well the Old Testament manuscripts are such a mess most Bible scholars won’t even debate how poorly they are attested to in history. At least with the NT they feel like have a chance
I love how they portray the ignorance of the audience about what was discussed in the debate.
Thanks for posting Dr Erhman. Wallace was indispensable in helping me learn Greek and you were crucial in helping me let go of ancient superstitions. Tremendous respect for both of you in your search for truth.
So basically Ehrmann says even though there is not so much discussion on the main essence, we cannot know the details, while Wallace tells us that though we can't know all the details, there can't be much discussion on the main essence? I enjoyed this very much, both are very good public speakers.
You got that right my man. They pretty much agree on alot of things. It just that they disagree on how to understand it.
Another difference is that Wallace is being reasonable and consistent. He accepts that we can't know with 100% certainty but we could have relative certainty (which is quite high). This is how the world work.
On the other hand, Ehrman is being dishonest and inconsistent. He said that historian deals with probabilities. But he refuses (more like "he dodges" ) the huge probabilities that what we have is what was written.
Bart Ehrman has never lost a debate......ever!
CORRECT. But, he better stay away from Carrier. Bart don't want that smoke.
😑😑😑😑
@@Noel-Roar , Carrier has invited Ehrman to discuss the mythological nature of the Gospels, and Bart refuses. While Ehrman is the better public speaker, Carrier is a much better research scholar and debater.
Carrier was extremely rude and disrespectful to Bart. I don't blame him for not wanting to debate him. And moreover, the Jesus is a myth faction are really on the fringe and despite his research, Carrier and his gang are extremely dogmatic.
Well, he kinda did here but we are not gonna bat an eye over it, huh?
He was literally complaining about the manuscripts over and over but didn't give any more insight on the questions "Why have there been soo many copies that have been kept throughout the years?"
Why was it important that has been passed on for generations while other myths died out long ago?
Have you ever thought about that?
Around halfway through the debate Wallace admits to not answering Bart Ehrman's questions and then proceeds to never answer them. In my mind, if you can't answer the simple questions raised by Ehrman you might as well not debate because it's an admission the bible is unreliable.
Regardless of who you think won the debate, the real winner is the audience (at least the audience that listens). Very informative stuff!
2:05:30...pursue truth at ALL costs. Great debate!
Hola alguien sabe como mDe piedobcomunicar con el Dr.Wallace es sobre el griego y la gramatica
Myself and the audience watched two different debates. I am going to boil it down too, when you base your life on Faith, you take the documentation on Faith as well.
Ok here we go I love these, Bart d Ehrman is the best!!
Bart is extremely good, he has GREAT knowledge, but that said, some could also argue against spin in his remarks. In this video, if you had NO knowledge of the issue, listening to Bart - you would think that you simply can´t rely on the bible as there are 10s of thousands of "errors/different readings", and we simply don´t know what the original said. Well, we don´t have the original texts, so from ONE perspective that is true, but my question is, HOW MUCH do the oldest text we have found differ from the newer ones?
One would expect that an old text would differ more "as there are thousands and thousands of differencies later". But no, the Papyri 52, from the beginning of the 2nd century don´t have any weird readings that would differ from the versions we have today.
Bart himself, says in this video that the majority of the "hundred of thousands" of errors are very small, spelling errors. The following would count as 2 "errors" = They went t Jerusalm"... there are 2 errors, but do you or a possible person who copies the text, have difficulties in copying or understanding the text? I think not. There are some examples where words translated wrong etc have given a text a different meaning, but back to my point, P 52 is extremely similar to the text we have today.
PjotrII hey I agree Bart is very good, about theses text in which they are referring to are as many as 5300, small fragments and bigger pieces. Errors can be defined as plots that reflect a different story from which we have now, like the changing of words when Mary went to Jesus and said to him me and your father have been looking for you, well instead of your father like the older text said the latter scribe changed it to Joseph that’s significant. The Mary Magdalene story in John the older text doesn’t contain it but tradition of altering the text and adding and taking away to fit a narrative, had the scribe making their own gospels augmenting and disturbing the text. If we find hundreds of thousands different differences in the ones we have now makes us think what the originals look like.
@@PjotrII
P52 is 3.5" x 2.5" at its widest containing partial lines from John. Not even a full line. Don't understand how one can possibly use it to prove credibility. If you can, it would also mean you can use it to prove the opposite.
How do we know the original or the signature manuscript accurately record the actual event? If this we could not know, what use are we arguing the accuracy of the later manuscript?
Sorry not signature manuscript but autographic manuscript
You have to compare the texts and the years in between when they were written. Are they the same or different ? Also you have to compare other books of ancient times to see if the texts are the same or different as time go on. Lets say Julius Caesar. He wrote some things during his life. Are they the same now as he wrote them ?