The Bible: Tough Qs and Answers

How did we get the Bible? How many variants of the early manuscripts are there? Can we trust our biblical texts? Joining me today is New Testament scholar Dr. Peter Gurry and Old Testament scholar Dr. John Meade to discuss the trustworthiness of Scripture and how we can have confidence in our biblical text.

FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA:
TikTok: @sean_mcdowell

[louesorg]

An atheist here, very curious about your channel and your way to live Christianism. <= It seems rather authentic and more in line with what should be expected from people who claim to be "followers of Christ".

[davidbradshaw]

Im so thankful for your Sean and your guests. The work you do and the content you put out has help me grow in my faith in more ways than I can count. As someone with a critical mind that often times buts heads with my faith, you and the people you’ve brought in here has helped me resolved so many issue that I once thought were a roadblock in my journey of faith. Evidence that demands a verdict still sits next to my bed and something I go back to read from almost daily. Thank you for all you do.

[lavenderwilliams]

I want to see the follow-up to this. I liked these guests. John is entertaining. Peter has a great point at the end.

[kathrynknipe]

So amazing. Such a fun conversation. Delightful.

[nelidascott]

What a great discussion! I'm currently seeking the truth and has questions especially encountering the likes of Bart Ehrman and all that, but this episode strengthened my faith especially their last words towards the end. I, too need to ponder about God's Providence and how he allowed human means with all its imperfections to deliver His perfect message to us. So many things to reflect ❤

[seaglass.jen]

This episode deserved more likes. Great discussion. I think I’ll get their book.

[justinkimberlyrowley]

Id love to see a conversation about denominations, and what the word "denomination" means and what the Bible says about divisions in the body of Christ

[dannycampisi]

Fantastic I absolutely love your channel and all of the scholars you bring on. Keep up the great work. Your channel should/will be much bigger.

[darrenmiller]

Thank you once again Dr Sean McDowell. I could not look away, I was spellbound. Forgive the term, lol. You and your friends here were a pleasure, truly encouraging. I may be even still more inspired in my Bible reading tomorrow morning. God bless you all 3, you all do great work.

[ScottSteubing]

This was fascinating. I have their book in my reading list and am looking forward to reading it.

[cindilincoln]

The height of Goliath issue: have you heard there were two or more cubits depending where you were from? That could account for the different numbers without saying the scribes misread or changed something for their own liking. That is alarming and undermines the word. A quick google search show the cubit has varied from 17.5” to 20”. A height of just 6’ for Goliath clearly would not be a giant. The translation integrity of copying what God said, not what you want it to say is critical.

[daelon]

Why was the debate between Titus Kennedy and David Falk removed? I was halfway through it.

[jamesanderson]

Hey, If possible, I would be interested to learm more about why exactly that one scholar thinks that Goliath being 9 ft tall was the original and correct reading. Maybe you could shoot him a short email asking him to elaborate on that more?

[perseverant]

Very interesting! An episode on canonization would be amazing!

[busker]

JUST A THOUGHT:
I was thinking about Goliath from this perspective. How stupid do we have to be to believe that a six foot tall man had the armies of Israel cowering like a bunch of school girls? No, both historically, textually, and archeologically, it is easy to establish as a fact, that there were giants in the earth in those days. [Not to mention that we still have people growing to amazing heights today.]

[jaggedstarrPI]

I agree with NT Wright in that the so called Gospel of Thomas doesn't meet the definition of a Gospel at all, in that it does not even attempt to express the good news of the Incarnation or resurrection. It's late and depicts a very different theology, a non Jewish Jesus, which has caused so much pain and suffering across two millennia.

[kensmith]

Goliath may have been shorter, but wore elevator shoes!😂

[johntumpkin]

Great, faith strengthening discussion from Sean and colleagues. I am a Seventh-day Adventist Christian and pastor, and am always edified by Sean's presentations and interviews, finding them to be uplifting, spiritually enriching, and useful to Bible believing Christians from all denominations.

The discussion of the height of Goliath of Gath is interesting. If the Bible is understood to be God's contextual rebuilding and building of truth after the Noachian Flood (the earliest biblical books, Job and the Pentateuch, are postdiluvian products, attributed to Moses), then the authenticity of the Bible is not challenged by occasional semantic obscurities, and some apparent numerical garbling. Having said that, I have no problem accepting the Masoretic Text portrayal of Goliath of Gath as "six cubits and a span" (1 Sam 17:4), converted to 9 feet tall in this discussion. Where there is an established, general upper limit in a species, such as seven feet tall in humans, routinely and continually, a tiny minority of humans exceed this, as may be observed, for instance, in the annals of wrestling, and in the Guinness Book of World Records. It would be scientifically incongruous for not one human, not one tree, not one pumpkin, not one elephant, not one giraffe, not one shark or whale, to exceed its average species size limit. This has never happened anywhere on Earth, at any time, and may not ever be achievable, this side of heaven, at least. Also, if Goliath's height is scaled down to seven feet tall - the general upper limit of height for humans generationally - his armor in 1 Samuel 17:5-7 (and his weaponry) must also be scaled down accordingly. Together with many lines of evidence, such as those observable in the text of 1 Samuel, extraordinary, hypermuscularity of certain groups of athletes in contemporary developed countries, to a significantly less abnormal extent in developing countries, and at the expense of bone strength and durability, and cardiovascular health, very vividly indicates that, as the money and war intensifies, the sizes escalate catastrophically. God bless!

[abedetesfa]

It seems to me that, the root of a lot of these types of discussions, is not the specific details of the question at hand (e.g. - the height of Goliath), but rather whether or not the Bible, which we as Christians hold forth as the Word of God, can be trusted or not. This is an interesting, though sometimes frustrating and confounding, discussion

[lolasimmons]

Hi Dr. McDowell, I am wondering about how the KJV only club believe that their version of the Bible is correct and without error and all the other versions are corrupt. What do you think?