Did Jesus Claim to be God? Answering Bart Ehrman

Gavin Ortlund argues that Jesus did claim to be God, responding to Bart Ehrman on @CosmicSkeptic.

Gavin Ortlund (PhD, Fuller Theological Seminary) is President of Truth Unites and Theologian-in-Residence at Immanuel Nashville.

SUPPORT:

FOLLOW:

MY ACADEMIC WORK:

PODCAST:

DISCORD SERVER ON PROTESTANTISM

CHECK OUT SOME BOOKS:

00:00 - Introduction
01:42 - John vs. the Synoptic Gospels
03:27 - Book Recommendation
04:32 - Mark 2
13:16 - The Synoptic Gospels As A Whole
15:39 - Why Jesus Concealed His Identity
17:31 - Paul's Writings
18:41 - Trilemma vs. Tetralemma
21:14 - Liar?
21:45 - Lunatic?
23:29 - Lord?
25:03 - Wrapping Up

[boomwroasted]

Another example of “popular Bart” vs. “scholarly Bart”

Great work on this one- I am always moved by your Baptist preacher moments 😂

[transfigured]

You should ask the question “did Jesus ever deny being God?” It’s illuminating to reverse the frame.

[alisatoniian]

Gavin, I want to thank you specifically for your in-depth approach. As a Classics student taking early Christian literature, I really needed this video since our professor very likely holds to the view similar to Ehrman’s and I need to pass an oral exam with him😆 God is truly blessing me through your videos, they help build a firm foundation of faith. Please continue what you’re doing!

[johnnylollard]

Gotta love when Bart infers that later Christians just made stuff up that wasnt originally there, and then starts authoritatively citing phantom manuscripts like Q.

[EmilTennis]

Another overlooked feature of the Mark 2 scene is that the question "Who can forgive sins but God alone?" is not set up as real speech. It is actually the pharisees questioning in their heart (mind). But Jesus can read their hearts and thus respond to them accordingly. This is definitely going beyond what a mere human being would be able to do.

[jty]

Amen, we love your Baptist preacher mode 😂

[thejohnsonshomeschool]

Jesus did not count equality with God as a thing to be grasped but made himself a servant to all.

[anglicanaesthetics]

"If we look at Q, M, and L"--oh you mean those sources we *project* from the Gospels and don't have?

[clivejungle]

Ehrman hangs so much on a frankly simplistic understanding of oral traditions. Firstly, oral cultures can transmit stories over centuries as the First Australians prove and in the Classical Period even uneducated people would regularly be able to recite hundreds of lines from famous poems. Plus, if you witnessed something incredible. it is not a stretch to imagine it would stick in the memory more than mundane events. I still remember vividly scoring the winner in my Sunday league cup final 25 years ago.

[jussman]

Ehrman has a “trump card” for any valid and conceivable arguments you’ve made… he calls it “the criterion of dissimilarity” in his book How Jesus Became God (p. 96). This basically says that, if anything in ANY of the gospels sounds like something a Christian would say about Jesus, then it can’t be historically accurate. 😂 I kinda stopped taking him seriously after I read that!

[lawskuboi]

Babe wake up new Gavin Ortlund video dropped

[jasonengwer]

One of the problems with Ehrman's comments at the beginning of the video is that some of the evidence for Jesus' self-perception comes from his actions, not his words. And Matthew 4:12-16 makes a significant point in that context. All four gospels say or suggest that Jesus chose to live in Nazareth as an adult, then in Capernaum. That lines up with what Isaiah 9:1 says about how the figure in the opening verses of Isaiah 9 is associated with Zebulun (the region where Nazareth is) and Naphtali (the region where Capernaum is). Jesus chooses to live in those two locations and in the same order in which they're mentioned in Isaiah 9. And there's other evidence, in all four gospels, that Jesus saw himself as the king of Isaiah 9:1-7. The king is described as if he embodies the titles of verse 6 rather than merely being named after the God who does so (e.g., the king is named Prince of Peace and brings an everlasting kingdom of peace in verse 7). Furthermore, the background of Isaiah 9 is in the origins of the monarchy in 1 Samuel 8, where the kingship has wrongly been taken from God. An eschatological return of the kingship to God himself in Isaiah 9 makes the most sense of that 1 Samuel 8 background, and it explains the titles of Isaiah 9:6. The worsening of warfare and the building up of the implements of war in 1 Samuel 8 (verses 11-12, 20) is reversed in Isaiah 9 (verses 4-7). Isaiah 9 is a reversal of 1 Samuel 8.

Both Jesus' activities and his words suggest he also viewed himself as the Servant of the Lord in Isaiah's Servant Songs (e.g., Luke 22:37). That figure is portrayed as God. The "high and lifted up and greatly exalted" language (Isaiah 52:13) is used to describe God elsewhere in Isaiah (6:1, 33:10, 57:15).

If anybody is interested in more about Jesus' patterning his life after this material in Isaiah, you can search for a January 8, 2023 post at Triablogue titled "Isaiah 9 Resources" and a March 28, 2019 post there titled "Jesus' Fulfillment Of The Other Servant Songs". I've also written an article defending the historicity of the "I am" statements in John's gospel, a June 25, 2024 post titled "The Historicity Of The 'I Am' Statements Of Jesus".

Gavin mentioned Richard Bauckham's material on the historicity of the fourth gospel. Another good, more recent resource is Lydia McGrew's The Eye Of The Beholder (Tampa, Florida: DeWard Publishing, 2021).

[rej]

More videos on critical scholars, please. This was really good

[dvd]

So glad you shared the John Duncan quote! I came across it in "Just a Talker", and I was like whoa, he said it before Lewis!

Great video, Dr. Ortlund!

[billmartin]

Really excellent video. I just taught an RCIA class on this. You’ve given me some more content to include, thanks Gavin!

[Hillbillywayfarer]

Great video, thank you! I’d love it if you’d do more videos refuting Bart Ehrman. Also, thanks for the book recommendation.

[SanctuaryofSteel]

As a historian, I'm pretty much attuned to the dangers of building an argument based on selective evidence and speculative hypotheses. Ehrman's approach is problematic when he narrows his focus to the Synoptic Gospels and dismisses the Gospel of John without fully addressing the theological nuances that might appear across all the Gospels, including John.

But even focusing solely on the Synoptic Gospels, by ignoring key passages or reinterpreting established translations in speculative ways, and then using those speculations to build further theories, Ehrman's method seems to be less about a careful weighing of evidence and more about constructing a narrative that suits a preconceived conclusion. This is a common issue in some historical-critical approaches where scholars may introduce multiple layers of hypotheses, each dependent on the previous one, leading to conclusions that are more tenuous than solid.

In historical analysis, it's very important to maintain a balance between a critical approach to sources and a responsible engagement with the available evidence. Ehrman’s method oversteps into the realm of conjecture, which weakens its credibility as a rigorous historical investigation.

[merg-vhsx]

What gets me about secular scholars of Christianity is their simultaneous distrust of the gospels* and use of the same texts to construct their arguments.

Feels like an exercise in futility.

*As reliable historical records of Christ's life and teachings

[mcoburn]

This was really good and very encouraging on probably an underaddressed topic. It is an objection I have wanted to research more but haven’t had the time. Relevant too since Bart Ehrman has a lot of cultural traction. Thank you for a good dose of Gospel Assurance!

[kylie]

If, hypothetically, Jesus *didn’t* think he was God, then he would have been the worst communicator in all of history lol