Bart Ehrman vs Mike Licona Debate the Resurrection

“narrative elasticity”

lol.

The discussion went no where for 1 hour.

Mike has to presuppose the Gospels are accurate for his argument to work.

The ‘evidence’ for the bible is NOT The same as the evidence for the holocaust.

“If you believe in the worldview then you should be a christian”

False. I could accept it happen and still not want to follow it. That point makes no sense

“you’re doing an ad hominem argument here”

No he isn’t. lol. He’s saying the resurrection of Jesus isn’t a historical fact. It’s a matter of faith.

Well Prof. Licona says right off he now believes in the Resurrection of Jesus? Why, and where are these facts? Historical? Really! Absolutely do not agree with this view. Perhaps and likely, Christ had an ascension as written, have no doubt of that, but did Christ's body resurrect, no! Did it vanish from the tomb, well that could have been, but it is clear, even Christ himself speaks repeatedly on flesh. That flesh & blood cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That we are born a physical body, but are raised up a spiritual one. And many more, including more detailed ones in the Nag Hammadi texts.

Value the gospel of John over the other three, but these four are far from all. Also wonder why most including these two Professors, only seem to speak of a single compiled book that limits what text were even included by a council so long ago. For me true Christians predated this Council of Nicaea, had much greater knowledge then is spoken of by disciples that Christ himself tells us did not even know him, at least most. Also, in today's times, most do not even give Christ nor the truth much attention. Even these two here spend too much time speaking of this one book. But no flesh resurrected.

Oh yea, what does that say in the image on screen? "They debate key historical facts about the resurrection." Wow! These are by no means facts! Absolutely not fact! But there is a true Father of Christ (the Word), and there are multitudes of spirit beings that exist without flesh, outside of space and time, that never end and have everlasting life. There are also heavens, beyond the firmament, beyond the astral heavens, and they are spoken of often. If one wishes to limit their studies to one book provided by organized religion, they do themselves a great injustice. Seek and you will find.

Both here are no scholars, but have studied and obtained degrees, perhaps went to seminary schools as well. This is a joke to me, honestly. They babel over a topic that is clearly spoken of often by Christ himself. It is quite clear, the body had little to do with anything but that we also have a body, that is it. All the rest is regarding what emanated from the Father, that is within us, that is as Christ is, as Jesus was. If one is to find this truth, they need to look within, seek truth everywhere it is, and to come to know the greatest truth of all. We are of God, we are his children. Clearly NOT our flesh, mind, or ego.

side note : The debate topic was actually "is there GOOD evidence for the resurrection" , it's a very importantly distinction, they may well be SOME evidence, found in some ancient anonymously written text written by people who's job it is to show that it happened , but that it is not contemporary, not unbiased to the subject matter, non eyewitnesses ( not that eyewitness testimony is reliable anyhow) and written by people who were not from the area or fluent in the language the stories emanated from. and written 35-60 years after the pro-ported events happened........... anyhow......

48 minutes = slam dunk ( but paraphrased)
ML = The vast majority of people in the society of Biblical Literature believe my side of the story
BE = that's because the vast majority of Biblical scholars are Christian
ML - Oh just c'mon Bart........ thats simply not true
BE -er.......OK name them 
ML - names two out of thousands of possible 
BE - eh? ........these TWO people you have just specifically cited to bolster your point, both identify themselves as being Christian? Do you accept that?
ML - cough - they aren't real christians......
BE- if Jesus and the disciples had a look at the average Christian they would would be horrified.
ML - squirms and tries to deflect the conversation
JB - cough.....we have to take a break.......
judge for yourselves who has the stronger argument

Can someone recommend a good apologist to listen to in these Debates. Thus far the pinnacle has been William Lane Craig and that is sad because he is a pseudo intellect after you watch enough of his Debates. Craig is light years above a Mike Licona, Matt Slick, Braxton Hunter or Ray Comfort though.

Licona - and all these sophists - are guilty of the "begging the question" fallacy. It makes me cringe when I hear this nonsense. Shame on them for constructing arguments that are similar to those which Nigerian scam 'artists' use.

"And so we can say with virtual certainty that there were Christians with information about Jesus from within a year or two at the very latest, of the traditional date of his death and that Paul knew at least something about what these people were saying about Jesus." - Bart Ehrman (Did Jesus Exist?, Pge 125)

The differences between Mark and John are enormous. It's not just a matter of "narrative elasticity" as Licona claims. He's trying to downplay the massive differences to make it seem that Mark and John are basically saying the same thing. They aren't though.

I have only heard one other human being. as egotistical as Bart Ehrman and that's Trump. We get it Bart, everyone else is wrong and you are the high and mighty one who needs to correct everything they say. It is that childish insatiable desire that Ehrman has in common with all elitists that he imposes with his outscore everyone else by being more outspoken than them strategy. He is the epitome of a person who sucks all the positive vibes out of a room. He obviously feels this is his calling in life. What a drag.

Why are people so ready to believe that 1 Corinthians 15 is an early creed going back to a few years after Jesus supposedly died?

If it was an early creed that was known at the time that Paul was writing (circa 55 AD) why do none of the gospel authors seem to be aware of it? None of the resurrection accounts in the gospels match what is in 1 Corinthians despite them being written only 15- 40 years after Paul was writing. This 'so called 'creed' appears nowhere but 1 Corinthians.


As for Licona's suggestion that he got this from Peter / James - Paul never suggests that he got anything at all from the apostles or from any man. In fact he stresses that he didn't and that what he received was from revelation.


1 Corinthians 15:6 says "After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep." A creed that goes back to a few years after the event it describes wouldn't include a statement that most of them were still alive.


We don't have any accounts from any of the people mentioned by Paul claiming that Jesus appeared to them. Paul is talking about roughly 585 people and we have nothing from any of them. All 1 Corinthians 15 provides evidence of is Pau's claim to have seen the risen Jesus and even that is only valid if the 'creed' was originally part of the epistle rather than a later insertion.

I don’t care what this guy says there’s a literal heaven and there’s a literal hell deceivers will come in the last days. If you are ruthless dictator like Adolf Hitler and you kill millions you’re not accountable? You just go into annihilation? If that’s the case I’d rather commit every sin in the book Robb Bank$ commit adultery your name because there’s no eternal punishment I don’t believe this guy for a minute

In the real physical world where I live people doesn't die and wake up after 3 days. Nuff said

My favorite part is when Licona states he’s a skeptic and second guesses everything!! Hahaha hahaha

Does anyone have evidence to prove that the resurrection of Jesus is not a hoax that was made up decades after Jesus by hoaxer Christian writers making up fake eyewitnesses and fake testimonials? It seems to me if Jesus had Godly powers, he would still be alive today living on earth for people to visit. Resurrection & ascendance to a heaven is a hoax that conveniently occurs in the past and easily fools the gullible folks.

Licona should have cited Mark 13 to show continuity between St. Mark’s and St. John’s Gospel.

Sure, some illiterate peasant 2k years ago declared that he saw his wacky guru after his public execution. That's like iron-clad proof. And guess what? A whole bunch of illiterate peasants in the following century believed it, that's like iron-clad proof!

By the way Elvis and Michael Jackson are totally different because none of the claimants of their being alive has been tortured. And everyone knows all the apostles and witnesses of the resurrection were brutally tortured and killed. How do we know? Well some people 2k years ago, a few decades and a few thousand miles away said so. It's like iron-clad proof...

Mike make more sense to him.

Interesting discussion but I wish they had spent more time arguing for and against the evidence behind each position. Instead, Most of their disagreement came from how they used the word history. Bart uses it in its dictionary 1st form: "The study of past events". His complaints revolve around what is and isn't accepted in the formal study of history. Micheal seems to be using the second dictionary definition of the word: "the whole series of past events." But he only touched briefly on why the accounts could be considered reliable. They kept talking past each other because of this disagreement on how to use the word history and we didn't get much meat out of the discussion. It was still great to listen to though.

I'd like to see Bart debate Mike (or anyone) about whether Jesus would recognise Evangelical Christianity as his own teaching :)

How is it not circular reasoning Bart? "Miracle's are not counted as a possibility when we look at history, therefore we can't prove Jesus rose from the dead". Is that not what you are implying?
If an event X has three possibilities: 1) miracle 2)caused naturally by Y 3) caused naturally by Z, and it's best explained by 1), then why is it wrong to conclude that by an inference to the best explanation?

Thanks for posting this

Bart commented: 1. "Jesus and the Apostles would not recognize today's Evangelical Christian as a Christian. Because Evangelical Christianity is so far removed from anything Jesus ever preached."

Ehrman destroyed Licona!

How many times does Licona use the word "evidence" ?? :P

Mike's claim on the accuracy of oral traditionmegaphone. I am African and 3 of my grand parents I got to meet, told historical stories very differently, most times only the moral take away is the same. The difference between the recitation of Torah and verbatim recitation of numerous events in the new testament is that the Torah was a book they revisited over and over again as a point of reference. They studied it for a long time before being bestowed the honor of Ben Torah. But these events like sermon on the mountain, etc happened just once. What's the chance that these different individuals will remember them verbatim? Fairly slim, and What's the chance that they all had the same take away from the same sermon? Slim. I even doubt these huge number people heard his sermon effectively with no mass communication technologies like megaphones. So no Mike.

the problem is the claim that the body was physical. Jesus appears in a room, he meets two on the road to Emmaus (who don't recognise him ) and then disappears. Spiritualists say we all survive death and spirits can materialise for a time. That would be a better explanation -though the doubting Thomas stuff and the bodily resurrection is probably the Jewish theology. Paul says we are not resurrected in a flesh and blood body but a new glorious body-again that fit in with the Spiritualist approach -and not just them . Whether they are right is another matter but there are empirical studies.

Its useless to use the argument from authority and say the majority of scholars agree Jesus was raised from the dead, when the reason people get into scholarship in the first place, like Bart, is usually to affirm what they already believe, i.e. Christianity........ and then to better equipped to defend it.

Its no longer Muslim Christian debate but Christians to Christian debate concerning christianity omg this is confusing.

"Hi ladies and germs, and welcome to my 49th appearance. It's great to be here in the fabulous Herod Room at the spectacular One Seasons Judea! I'll be here all week ... well, until Friday, anyway ... maybe Thursday ...

The RESURRECTION of JESUS was WAS WRITTEN down many years later and modified for hundreds of years .However,the RESURRECTION narrations contradict each other in all aspects and the bible in this part was a writtrn down based on the hearsay evidence and both are legally not fit to convict a petty offender in a court of any law but ,unfortunately 2 billion people following this legally illogical religion.

Miracle is a cop-out concept. Devine is another one. These terms are outside recorded history of events.

What? Hold up! Licona first says that people relating the Jesus story orally had a tradition of accuracy. Then he goes on to say when they finally got around to writing the story down ,there was "elasticity" WTF!

Mike kept saying "Everyone is going to be biased." Really? How can he make such a declarative statement? This guy's a professor somewhere?

tight spot for Mike at 48 mins - he gets challenged and then tries to swerve but changing the subject. Duly noted.

Bart Erhman is so dishonest. Sells himslf as agnostic but infact does not give room for God's existence. When it serves him, he claims every scholar agrees with him; when cornered he claims all those scholars are Christians even if some of them aren't, strictly speaking, Christians. Debates and discussions are about winning arguments to him.

Don’t people understand that miracles happen?? Geez

Thank you Bart for all you do ☺️. You're awesome. In reading the comments, it's nice to see there are rational people out there who realize the whole resurrection story is all a fabrication to convert people to their faith