Hey everybody tonight, we're debating whether or not Jesus died by crucifixion and we are starting right now Mike Jones's opening statement. Thanks so much for being with us Mike. The floor is all yours Let me share my screen here and I'll get going All right, can you see that James? I'm still clear Computer just froze. All right. There we go. Now. I got it. All right. Let me make that full screen for everybody All right. Well, thank you Thank you, James. Thank you to here for reaching out to me a few months ago and asking for the debate You from your videos you seem like a respectful nice guy. So I hope we have a cordial conversation With that said, let's dive right in Did Jesus die by crucifixion? Yeah, committee position is that Jesus was crucified, but somehow survived He was taken down from the cross the Roman soldiers assumed he was dead then Nicodemus supposedly a physician Healed him using alos they placed the unconscious Jesus in a tomb and then on the third day He emerged healed and appeared to his disciples all before going off to India to preach to the lost 10 tribes of Israel Then he died and was buried in that region If I've misrepresented your position to here then please correct me But this is the understanding I got from your videos in New Testament scholarship This is a variation of the swoon theory Which is the idea Jesus was crucified, but somehow survived the ordeal and lived a long life after Now to be honest it's odd We're even having this debate because this is not a debate mainstream New Testament scholars have The idea Jesus survived the crucifixion is soundly rejected by well over 99% of scholars So I'm representing the consensus position today Scholars have noted the evidence demonstrates Jesus's death by crucifixion is an historical fact John Dominic Crossin said Jesus's death by crucifixion under Pontius Pilate is as sure as anything historical can ever be Gerd Ludemann said Jesus's death as a consequence of crucifixion is indisputable Bart Ehrman says that Jesus died by crucifixion is almost universally attested in our sources early and late We have traditions of Jesus's bloody execution and independent gospel sources throughout our various epistles and other writings and certainly in Paul everywhere in Paul The scholarly community is clear Jesus did not survive as crucifixion and the reason is because the evidence Overwhelmingly confirms he died as Ehrman said all our early sources point to this fact Tacitus says Jesus suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberias What could be more severe than death by crucifixion? Mara Barsara Pien's letter says Jesus was murdered the Talmud says that you sure was hanged and executed Josephus Lucian and Celsus also report Jesus was crucified and there's no hint that he survived Surviving crucifixion was not the norm. He was thought to have survived. We should expect them to have reported it But these are not even our best sources all early Christian sources that speak about the crucifixion Confirmed that he died Paul our earliest Christian writer says Jesus died In fact in 1st Corinthians 15 he cites a creed He received from the early church and scholars date this creed to just a few years after the crucifixion The reasons ours is because it's formed in a mnemonic structure with parallelism There's also less than 50 words and this shows it was an early creed for catechizing new Christians Calls Peter Cephas his Aramaic name would suggest the creed was early and it has independent traditions not contingent on the Gospels like the appearance to James and an independent appearance to Peter Gerald Collins says he doesn't know of any New Testament scholar who dates the creed after the 40s Michael Icona notes the consensus is that it dates to the 30s and within a few years of Pentecost So within a few years of the crucifixion the disciples reported Jesus had died in The Gospels they also confirmed Jesus died by crucifixion But also they report Jesus himself said he would die then after his resurrection Jesus explicitly says that he died Now Archimedes will try to claim Jesus said he would not die when he spoke of the sign of Jonah And I'll get to that in a bit, but let's not cherry-pick the words of Jesus We have direct quotes in the Gospels where Jesus says he died This should be the end of the debate right here early witnesses report Jesus died and Jesus himself confirmed that But before moving on let's quickly survey the first century sources that report Jesus survived the crucifixion And we're done because there aren't any the early sources all confirmed Jesus died on the cross Now proponents of the swoon theory argue that Jesus only appeared to die and they know John reported blood and water came out of his side If Jesus had actually died his heart would have stopped the blood would have congealed and water and blood should not have come out of him Additionally, they argue crucifixion with a was a long grueling process that sometimes would last for days But the Gospels report Jesus died within hours Surely Archimedes argued Jesus could not have died so fast Well, they're overlooking some important facts medical doctors Joseph Bergersen and Frederick Zuggabee note the facts laid out in the Gospels Confirmed Jesus died on the cross first his torture to not begin at the cross He was arrested the night before beaten by the soldiers of the Sanhedrin Scourge then beaten by Roman soldiers had a crown of thorns placed on his head Then he had to carry his cross to go goth up all without food and liquid Remember Jesus was so badly beaten and tortured he could not carry his cross all the way It was expected those condemned to die to carry the crosses to the execution site Jesus could not which tells us he was already in a bad state which would have contributed to a quicker death Sure, sometimes crucifixions would last for days, but if the victims suffered in other ways before getting to the cross That would lead to a quicker death Seneca the younger remarked that crucified victims would have many excuses for dying even before mounting the cross So depending on what torture occurred beforehand you could have died within hours The Jewish soldiers would have inflicted a severe beating on Jesus given his claim to be God Which would have been considered blasphemy to them then Jesus was scourged the Roman soldiers didn't go easy on and they would have scourged him all over Seneca the elder said scourging caused deep wounds and lacerated the flesh Eusebius said scourging resulted in the innermost veins arteries and inward parts of the body being exposed This would have led to a severe loss of blood Joseph Bergerson notes scourging and blunt trauma to the chest area can cause injury to the lungs with blood and fluid Collecting within the lung tissue the lung can also collapse, which is called pneumothorax Quote Jesus was in a weakened condition from the effects of multiple beatings fluid deprivation and blood loss more likely than not He was in the early stages of shock prior to being lifted on the to the cross Bergerson notes this is the most likely cause of his death Jesus suffered from traumatic hemorrhagic shock This is caused by decreased circulating blood volume as a result of injury and bleeding Extreme thirst can occur during shock which would correlate to Jesus saying that he thirsts on the cross Shock can occur when blood loss passes 10 percent at 45 percent blood volume loss reduction in blood return to the heart and decreased Resistance in the body's blood vessels will cause the blood pressure to drop to zero the effects of shock lead to cellular deterioration in multiple organs But also in 2003 researchers noted that shock and blood loss can lead to the body losing its ability to clot blood Which is known as trauma-induced coagulopathy Bergerson says patients with more extensive injuries have greater risk of developing coagulopathy Because the extent and degree of tissue injury is a major trigger injured cells cells that line blood vessels initiate clotting mechanisms With diffuse injury and widespread activation the blood the blood clotting mechanisms Necessary blood cells and chemical factors can be depleted and cause an imbalance between the blood's ability to clot and dissolve unnecessary clots To recap Jesus was severely beaten by Jewish soldiers the language of Luke's gospel Suggest a harsh ordeal from temple guards then Jesus was handed over to the Romans He was scourged and they would have scourged his whole body meat leading to massive blood loss But even after that the gospel's report He was beaten again by Roman soldiers and had a crown of thorns placed on his head which would have caused puncture wounds Given this torture we can infer Jesus was already in the early stages of shock He could not even carry his cross to go goth up which was expected of crucified victims This torture would have prevented his blood from clotting and the injuries He suffered would have resulted in fluid building up around his lung and most likely would have caused a collapse lung Thus Jesus went to shock on the cross and died So when John who was at the cross saw blood and water come out of his side This would be expected if Jesus had died from shock The blood could not clot and the spear that pierced his side would have unleashed the clear fluid from his lungs and blood as well Now early church fathers like origin consider this supernatural because he like Ahmadis today Also thought blood clutch blood clot should have prevented this from occurring But modern medical research indicates this would have been a natural result from a victim who suffered from severe beatings and shock So it's unlikely John made this up. It's probably something he witnessed Frederick Zuggieby said if I were to certify the cause of Jesus's death in my official capacity as medical examiner The death certificate was read as follows cause of death cardiac and respiratory arrest due to hypovolemic and traumatic shock due to crucifixion Furthermore, let's just say by amazing luck. Jesus was not fed at this point and only unconscious a Soldier shoved a spear into his side given it was their job to assure their victims were dead before the bodies were removed We can reasonably infer they aimed to pierce the heart I don't know about you But if I saw someone severely beaten scourge from head to toe then beaten again Then nailed to a cross and had a spear shoved into their side I bet my life savings they died and no amount of ancient healing methods would revive someone from this much blood loss I don't really care what allows ad available. Let's be reasonable even if by a miracle Jesus was not dead yet The spear in his side would have assured his death Josephus reported that after the destruction of Jerusalem He saw three of his friends on crosses and begged Titus to take them down Titus did so in order they be given the best medical treatment of the day yet only one survived Jesus was not given the best medical treatment and instead after suffering insurmountable torture had a spear shoved into his side Doesn't take a lot to realize he died a Roman soldier would forfeit his own life if he led a prisoner escape They would have shoved that spear and far enough to pierce the heart to verify Jesus was dead Moreover, these soldiers were trained to kill they knew when someone was dead and again early sources agree with his assessment He died on the cross Burgesson says to suggest that Jesus did not die when crucified is untenable Moreover to assure that Jesus was dead a Roman soldier delivered the coup de grâce of plunging a spear into Jesus's chest Collapsing his lung and rupturing his heart an article from the Journal of Mayor of American Medical Association stated Interpretations based on the assumption that Jesus did not down the cross appear to be at odds with modern medical research Now even if Jesus survived after the severe beatings to blood loss the spear going into his side aiming for his heart He was placed in a tomb for three days where he was given no medical attention No food and no water. How was he supposed to heal and push the stone away? There was no indication in the Gospels Nicodemus was a physician Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus were there to prepare his body according to Traditional Jewish customs for burial the mixture of myrrh and aloes was used to diminish the stench of a rotting corpse It was not for preserving a corpse or attempting to revive a dying man Frederick Zagabee says aloes and Mers have some minor antiseptic Effects, but what wouldn't begin to be of any value and one considers the extent of Jesus's injuries Craig Keener says when spices were used they were important not to preserve the corpse But to diminish the stench and in practice to pay final respects to the deceased Unless by a miracle we would not expect Jesus to come out of the tomb alive And if we get to positive miracle, let's go with what Jesus said that he died and resurrected There is no indication Jesus survived But if his followers saw him alive and walking around after the crucifixion Jockman he's except the only logical explanation is that he rose from the dead Not that he survived and was taking a long well-deserved nap in a tomb Now Muslims who want to argue Jesus did not die often appeal to the sign of Jonah For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish So will the son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth To hear as argued this is Jesus claiming he would not die to quote when Jesus says my sign will be the sign of Jonah It clearly means that he will actually survive like Jonah that he will be in a circumstance Whereby he would actually be put in a situation where anybody else would die he will survive because of God's love for him This is not accurate for a number of reasons first is noted Jesus said he would die and rise These additional quotes from Jesus should help us understand that the sign of Jonah refers to Jesus being dead in the earth for three days Not alive But even without these references the sign of Jonah is not that Jesus would be alive like Jonah But that he'd be gone for three days if the sign of Jonah was that he'd be alive in the earth for three days It would have been stated like this or just as Jonah was alive in the belly of the great fish So will the son of man be alive in the heart of the earth? Jesus did not say that His comparison is not that he will share all the same ontological aspects with Jonah's experience But that'll be gone for the same length of time There is no way you we can read the sign of Jonah as implying that he would survive the crucifixion Here's aware of this argument and in the same video he responds by saying Jesus was hidden on the Friday night And he came out Sunday morning. It's two nights in a day and a half But this objection is the is a case of applying our own cultural understandings of time onto the ancient Jewish culture in that culture saying three days and three nights could refer to a period that was less than 72 hours and could refer to a period of Friday to Sunday Rabbi Eleazar of Venezuela said a day and a night are an owner and Up a portion of time in the portion of an owner is as the whole In other words, you can speak of the portion of a day as the whole we see this in the Bible Esther said she would fast for three days and three nights before going to see the king But then we read that she went to the king on the third day not the fourth in Matthew 27 the Pharisees report that Jesus said he would rise up rise after three days But they only requested to be made secure until the third day RT-France says the different phrasing of the three-day period compared with third day and the after three days is due to Septuagint wording but in the Semitic inclusive time reckoning These do not to know different periods as the pedantic Western reading would suggest So the shot sign of Jonah does not entail Jesus had to remain in the tomb for 72 hours He was in the tomb for part of Friday Saturday and part of Sunday The ancient Jewish context one could call this period three days and three nights So once again the sign of Jonah refers to the time length Jesus would be gone However, despite this, I'm not convinced Jonah even did survive his ordeal It's naturally impossible for someone to survive in a whale's stomach or any sea creature for that matter The book of Jonah does not record the God miraculously kept Jonah alive In fact, the text suggests the opposite that he died and went to shield Jonah says he went down to the roots of the mountains that he called out from the realm of the dead That he went down to the land whose bars closed on him forever, then God brought him up from the pit Brad Petrie says first when Jonah says that he cried out to God from the belly of Sheol in the pit These are standard Old Testament terms for the realm of the dead Second when Jonah says that his soul feigned within him This is another way of saying that he died. In other words Jonah's prayer is the last gasp of a dying man Thus when the fish vomits Jonah out onto the land it is a vomiting up of his corpse Finally with all this in mind notice what God's first first word to Jonah is arise This is the same semantic word that Jesus uses when he raises Jairus's daughter from the dead and says to her little girl I say to you arise in other words the story of Jonah is the story of his death and resurrection Also, I don't think Jonah was swallowed by an actual whale or fish I don't have much time to go into this my friend fan at exploring reality has a great video on this topic But basically the Hebrew word for fish dog is a general word that can refer to any sea creature And there are numerous illusions in Jonah that suggest the great sea creature was not a whale But the personification of watery chaos, which the Bible calls Leviathan In other words the chaotic seas were personified as a sea creature called Leviathan Basically the book of Jonah is using Hebraic idiomatic language to say that Jonah was swallowed up by the watery chaos of the sea And God brought him back to life after three days Which is why the text specifically mentioned shield the term for the underworld shield was said to be below the cosmic waters So Jonah was in the Leviathan watery chaos and brought down the shield God brought him up from the pit after Jonah cried out and thus he returned to life So even if the sign of Jonah referred to Jesus sharing the same status as Jonah Which it doesn't necessarily one can still make an argument from the text that eat that Jonah died and came back to life Which would parallel the account of Jesus dying and rising Finally, Ahmadis claimed that Jesus could not have died because his mission wasn't over He said he came to preach to the lost sheep of Israel, but in Judea There were only two tribes Judah and Benjamin So Jesus had to leave Judea and travel to another place like India to finish his preaching to the lost 10 tribes But the lost 10 tribes is a medieval myth. The Bible never mentions missing tribes After the Assyrian takeover we see members of the northern tribes were still there in the land many would have integrated with the kingdom of Judah Luke mentions Anna from the tribe of Asher in his gospel John mentions Levites James notes. He was writing to all 12 tribes After the Persian takeover they allowed all people to return to their respected homelands This decree would have allowed all Israelites deported by the Assyrians and Babylonians to return to Israel The Samaritans today even claim to send from the tribe of Ephraim, which is backed by genetic research So Jesus didn't have to go find missing tribes. The descendants of Israel were still in the land In conclusion the evidence confirms Jesus died on the cross Which is why scholars say this is an indisputable fact in all our early sources report Jesus died if the Akhmeti position is correct as well this creates a theological problem because All of the early followers of Jesus thought that he died Then later the Muslim start-up under Muhammad and they also did not take the Swoon theory They held to something like substitution or that Jesus actually died depending on what branch of Islam And then they didn't get the actual belief until the Akhmeti movement This sort of turns got into either a horrible communicator or the best of all deceivers because everyone thought Jesus died or was substituted However, I will say I like the Akhmeti position over what I see in traditional Sunni Islam with that Substitution theory nonsense because you guys accept Jesus was crucified that he and that he appeared to his disciples after But it would take nothing short of a miracle to confirm the Akhmeti belief that Jesus survived the crucifixion And if we have to pause in a miracle Let's go with what Jesus said what happened and did said he did happen after that he died and rose from the grave If Jesus appeared alive after his crucifixion the only logical explanation is he rose from the dead. Thank you Thank you very much for that opening We are going to kick it over to to hear for his opening as well before I do want to say folks Thanks so much for being with us here at modern-day debate I'm your host James and want to let you know as well. If it's your first time here Don't forget to hit that subscribe button. We have many more debates coming up and You can see those debates by making sure you get notifications by clicking subscribe right now with that here Thanks so much for being with us. The floor is all yours Thank you very much. Can you hear me? Okay? Yes Wonderful. So first of all to commend Michael and his excellent research and really appreciate that he's gone through a lot of our ideas and brought them to the fore For me which makes my job somewhat easier in some respects So first they're just gonna kick it off by going so did Jesus die on the cross? So Jesus piece beyond him is a beloved prophet in Islam And we also have our own views on him and I'm gonna go through some of the I'm gonna go through my view first Then we got a ten minute response. I understand So first woman cover this is the outline did Jesus claim he would be resurrected fact God save Jesus from death on the cross Where did Jesus go after surviving Christianity based on a circular argument and how the Quran illuminates the true story of Jesus so going first one So as he himself has mentioned I wanted to highlight this own sign of Jonah And I want to point out something that is very important, which is I mean you've mentioned a few things Michael Which I will hopefully respond to in my actual response But I think you've misrepresented to some extent the sign of Jonah here the sign of Jonah is the opposite claim of death So the sign of Jonah it's clearly mentioned in the Bible very clearly in the book of Jonah as well but the sign of Jonah was at the time of extreme peril Jonah in actual fact survived and Made it out of that perilous situation So he was in the stormy sea and a whale swallowed him You know, which is not a conventional thing to happen and he was in the belly of the whale praying to God This is what it says in the in the book of Jonah And then he was vomited out and then he returned to the Ninevites where he was accepted So the sign of Jonah is not about a time period In fact, if you look at the three accounts of which Jesus mentions the sign of Jonah It's only the time period is only mentioned in one of them in actual fact is mentioned Luke Matthew and and there's a third location as well I can get that up if you wish for the reply section But the sign is actually of survival because a sign is something that you know by which you know that God exists It's a it's an event which demonstrates the power and majesty of God If I go away out of town for three days and three nights, that doesn't mean I've shown the sign of Jonah It just means I've been absent for three days and three nights So Jesus couldn't have shown the sign of Jonah by just being absent Okay, it's not related to the time period and as I have pointed out to you I have pointed out in the past that's evidently not how long he was away According to the Jewish custom sunset occurred sunset other than the previous day was actually the first day of the new day So at best he was away for Two nights and three days if you really want to have it as an absolute stretch But as I mentioned the sign isn't of time period the sign which proved God's existence or was a manifestation of God's attributes Was that Jonah was in a perilous situation and yet he survived And we know what the sign of Jonah is because Jonah tells us about it So and you've quoted a little bit of well as well, but I think you've somewhat misrepresented it He said from the deep in the realm of the dead You're absolutely right in the place of shale. I called for help and you listened to my cry Now what was his call for help to which God listened his call for help was oh God save me It wasn't oh God let me die Let me suffer the state of death and then bring me back It was to save him from death That was an actual fact the the prayer that he made so to say that God listened to him But let him die when he was praying to be saved is a contradiction and the book of Jonah makes absolutely clear So the roots of the mountains I sank down the earth beneath me barred me in forever But you Lord my God brought my life up from the pit This is a story of somebody who is being saved from death death and that's always been the conventional Belief and understanding and you know if you have a very idiosyncratic and unique way of looking at it And that's up to you but that's not the conventional understanding of the sign of Jonah or indeed the events of Jonah's life and Isaiah 53 so this clearly contradicts Jesus's claim would be Jesus He would die and the only way you can understand Jesus Yeah, I would die and come back to that as you mentioned is you can only understand it how how Jonah mentioned it Which is from deep in the realm of the dead To be raised to him from crucifixion To be raised from the dead doesn't mean to be raised from the state of death It means to be raised from the place of the dead Jesus was crucified He was put in the tomb and then he came he appeared to come back to life or rather he rose his mission rose his Shooting new lights by demonstration that he had survived the crucifixion So this is an actual fact in Isaiah 53 We also, you know, this is a clear prophecy about what Jesus would go through and Christians use it all the time to prove it But if you read it carefully, it's very clear that Jesus an actual fact is mentioned here that he would be bruised But that God would initially put him to grief, but he shall see his seed He shall prolong his days. Now if you say prolong his days, what does that mean?  We will all have eternal life, right? So to be have your days prolonged and to see your seed, which is what's mentioned in Isaiah 53 Is a clear statement that Jesus will actually survive that he would be granted a long life and see his distant progeny But Jesus's actions ultimately speak louder than his words death was never part of the plan You know here we have in the Garden of Gethsemane him praying abba abba Take this bitter cup of death away from me not as I will as as but as you will and when he thought that he was dying On the cross he cries out my God my Forsaken me this is not the condition of somebody who thinks it's all going according to plan if death was the plan all along and he had stated it and he meant it and indeed if he had meant it to be death and Resurrection the question you have to ask yourself is well Why is it that the disciples did not understand what was being said according to you? He had you know raised many people from the dead debt from the dead daughter of Jarius Which will come back to Lazarus etc. If they had seen so many people being raised from the dead Then why was it so difficult for them to understand? So this is quite clearly if a person prays to be saved from death And then when they think they're dying they say why have you forsaken me? You can put whatever Christian spin you want on it in terms of all the shadow of sin was upon him And he was being he was despairing of the mercy of God etc But the reality is a plain reading of this is that he didn't want to die and he didn't think it was part of the plan And the reason is why didn't she didn't Crucified and simple answer is is because to be crucified to death According to Deutronomy was to be proven that you are false in your claim that you are a false prophet They had spoken falsely in the name of God and so Jesus wasn't afraid of death It wasn't death that he was afraid of what he was afraid of an actual fact was that People would reject the message which with which he had been sent that was actually in actual fact his main fear So how God saved Jesus from death on the cross I'm going to go through a few things the length of crucifixion you've highlighted very well Thank you very much He was put on the cross at 9 in the morning and he was taken off from about at about 3 p.m From what I understand It was approximately a six-hour period and and you make mention of the fact that oh well, you know Josephus had three friends on the cross and two they were taken down and two had died and one survived and the answer is yes Well one survived This was an actual fact known to happen people did survive crucifixion at times And the important thing about this is is you make a big deal about the fact that they were flogged etc The flogging was part of the crucifixion as you're quite rightly say But the key point I want to make is that two people were actually crucified with Jesus the two robbers and Both the robbers were still alive at the time when Jesus was thought to have died So that is something that Christians have to explain away then isn't it really because you had a contemporary to contemporary individual Contemporaneous individuals who were both crucified at the same time who went presumably through the similar process It was all this part of the same process and they were still alive and The key point of this is that pilot I mean you talk about Roman guards, etc pilot put people to death on the regular Okay, and he was surprised that Jesus has died and we know We know the pilot didn't want anything to do with it because God had sent a dream To pilots wife saying do you not have anything to do with that righteous man? So my pilot marveled that he was already dead so you can say that they are well It was perfectly obvious that he had died after six hours But the guy who put people to death on the regular he was amazed that he would they were already dead So you can't just write that off and say oh well, you know, he must have therefore died The second point to make is that his bones were not broken now This is the key. This is the main focus of the event in a way when they came to Jesus So the robbers were who are with Jesus they broke their legs because they were evidently still alive to hasten on their death They gave them femoral fractures massive trauma injuries They died very soon afterwards when they came to Jesus his head was presumably slumped. He looked like he died They they struck him with the spear and I'm afraid a Christian sometimes misrepresent this strike He was not being struck to kill him The spear wasn't there to kill him The spear was a primitive way to check whether Jesus had in actual fact died by causing a painful injury To see if he would they would elicit a response There was no response and as you made mention blood and water gushed out and and blood does not rush out of a dead body This is particularly what I want to emphasize and you know, I don't know if you know But I'm an intensive care doctor so citing Christian medical people is kind of a bit a bit Not the best tactic with me if I may say so I'm sure there are Christian intensive care doctors So I'm not gonna make a meal out of that But I want to emphasize a few things one the the actual Greek says that something coming out immediately straight away Rapidly forthwith that's youth ease. Okay, and the key point I want to make here about the blood and water coming out is that Christians make out that this is the separation of the blood and Plasma now the simple answer is is that when blood separates from plasma Okay, and if the water was the plasma You wouldn't get any blood coming out because by definition it's coagulated so you can claim that there's a coagulopathy of trauma But if there was a coagulopathy of trauma that it would still be mixed with the plasma So if the water was the plasma Then there would be no blood and and that's just one point the second point is Whether you when you cut a dead body nothing gushes out nothing rushes out Rushing out indicates a beating heart and this is why the writer of John's Gospel says that he witnessed this with his own eyes He's giving you the hint that Jesus an actual fact survived So the medicinal ointment you talk about as if it was a you you parrot the the point of the Jewish burial custom It's never been the Jewish burial custom to embalm the dead And if you look at how many pounds seventy five pounds and old money of Roman is about 35 kilograms Nobody brings 35 kilograms to embalm somebody in a procedure which has never been part of the the Jewish custom Embalming was it was it was actually a an Egyptian custom. It certainly wasn't a Jewish custom It still isn't a Jewish custom to the stay and the myrrh and aloes are healing herbs Myrrh and aloes are still used to this day I love eras use as a as a healing herb for point for wounds in particular and traumatic wounds But the big thing I always like to say in a way is quite funny because um, you know The greatest proof that Jesus didn't die on the cross Is the fact that he didn't die and I'm gonna explain what I mean by that So here Jesus appears to the two 24 and they say are you a ghost now? What is a ghost a ghost is a is a person post death Okay, and he says no, I'm not a ghost Touch me and make sure that I'm not a ghost because ghosts don't have bodies as I do and he showed them his hands and his feet And then he said do you have anything to eat now? You know Christians always like to make out that this is the post resurrection glorify body The question they have to answer is why does he still have bodily needs if he isn't an eternal body To live in heaven forever with God What's he still eating broiled fish for and he ate it as they watched So this is clearly indicating a plain reading of this is a person post assassination attempt Who has the same wounds of the assassination attempt saying no, it's really me Can you believe it?  I've got seven minutes and a half if I'm correct In understanding, please let me know if that's correct Okay, um, so where did Jesus go after surviving? The answer is that he went to seek the lost tribes of Israel Jesus went where he said he would go now you make out like there's no historical You know facts or evidence that in actual fact the lost sheep of the house of israel are scattered over to bettenapole Hashmir and afghanistan But the fact of the matter is that Jesus said these words. I have other sheep that are not of this fold I must bring them also and they will listen to my voice So there will be one flock and one shepherd He didn't say there will be one flock and 10 different shepherds consisting of all of his disciples going to see them He said there'll be one flock and one shepherd So Christians have to explain this if he ascended to heaven miraculously and has been there for 2000 years Why didn't he fulfill his words and find those other sheep? So you can claim there's no historical evidence But Jesus certainly believed that there were lost sheep for the house of israel and an actual fact that's demonstrated in this book very nicely But this is really the smoking gun. This is the gun that really I mean this This is the nail in the coffin. I would say to the question of whether Jesus survived the crucifixion or not Jesus is mentioned in first century hindu texts From 78 ad onwards king charlie vana is meant this is the bhavis yamaha purana hinduism has nothing to do with christianity Has nothing to do with islam. Okay King charlie vana was the king of this region in kashmir from 78 ad to 102 ad And he comes across a man In the hills. This is in sanskrit.  It's the supreme deity He was claiming here that i am the son of god in the same way jesus used this metaphorical term and i was born from a virgin I call myself isha masihi the prophet and i've taken to prophethood He said i preached these principles. He talks about his religion He says i preached these principles in the mlekas the mlekas of the foreign people In their own faith and thus my name is isha masihi, which is very similar to the word yashua masihi means messiah So we have any explains a little bit more about how he was persecuted in that land how he led to that to the east So we have in the first century hindu scriptures 40 years after the crucifixion We have an individual whose name is a phonetic form of yeshua masi jesus the messiah He was persecuting a foreign land born of a virgin Called himself the son of god and whose religion if you just read that text more clearly Is of speaking the truth meditating and worshiping the supreme being these are Aspects of no other human being in the history of the world other than jesus christ So christians have to explain what is jesus doing? in 78 ad post hindu texts Which has nothing to do with christianity nothing to do with islam They have to explain these findings So the question is also where did mother mary go? You know mother mary suddenly upton disappeared And nobody knows where she went and the catholics believe that the doctrine of assumption that she was assumed to have gone to heaven And the simple answer is she went with her son. She disappeared with her son They were on the border of the eastern they were on the eastern border of the roman empire and to get away from the romans after surviving He migrated east and this is the tomb of jesus christ He's buried at a place called surah negar, which means the site of the skull Which is the same actually as the the meaning of golgotha and you can see you can On his tomb where on his two outside his tomb. There is an ancient Um imprint of the man's feet who is buried in a jewish tradition Not in the islamic tradition who's buried 1900 years ago which shows the marks of crucifixion on his feet And i just want to finish on this point just this is very important And i just want to kind of focus on this let's look at the facts plainly Let's call let's have a guy called jim. Let's take this away from jesus take it away from christianity We got a guy called jim who says his miracle will be near death experience. It will be survival That's the sign He prays the night before not to die. He berates people for not praying with him to not To be saved he has an assassination attempt on him He has a beating heart that at the time of supposed death an eyewitness says the blood rushed out Rushing does not happen in a in a beating in any situation other than the beating heart He's treated with medicinal herbs for in isolation for 48 hours. He appears afterwards to his friends with the wound still fresh He denies being a ghost. He proves his body exists and he has needs by eating bread and fish and asking them showing he has appetite He hides under the cover of darkness. He flees His mother disappears at the same time somehow And then he's found mentioned 40 years later in a whole different part of the world With exactly his characteristics. He has children there as per the prophecy of isai 53 He dies and this tomb is found there which shows the marks crucifixion and this is what I want to get out This is kind of the most important thing for me. I really want to emphasize this point The only reason christians even entertain the hypothesis of resurrection When it's plainly a fact that if you see somebody after an assassination attempt If I see somebody with who I saw was hanged and he has the marks of him around his neck that He was hanged and I say to him my god jim How did you survive? You know what? I do you must have come back from the dead?  You'll say my god. I can't believe it's amazing how you survive That's what you would say the only reason christians entertain the resurrection hypothesis Is because they have a preset position that jesus was god, but to prove that jesus was god They they they supported by saying he was raised from the dead So to support the resurrection they use his divinity and to support his divinity. Guess what they use his resurrection It's a complete circular argument When you look at it from the plain reading of the facts of a man post assassination attempt Giving me excitingly medical findings as to why a man rose from the dead is absurd Well, there's no medical evidence that anybody can rise from the dead So that's that's the main and fundamental thing. I want to just finish on this point I think I've got one minute left if that's right How the Quran illuminates the true story of jesus Okay, the Quran states and you mentioned a bit about Islam We can go into this a little bit the Quran and Muhammad peace beyond him the prophet of Islam Stated the Ahmadiyya viewpoint not any other viewpoint. No no substitution theory in the Quran at all It says in the Quran that the Jews say we killed the Messiah son of Mary jesus The messenger of god whereas they slew him not nor crucified him But he was made to appear to them like one The subject of this statement is always jesus it is never The subject here Means he was made he jesus was made to appear them as one crucified And it says finally in the Quran Quran made the son of Mary and his mother a sign and gave him shelter on an elevated land of green Valleys and springs of running water and the word used there is in actual fact related to Refuge given after suffering persecution. This is all found in the book jesus in india I recommend you go away and read it by the founder of the Ahmadiyya community who claimed to be the Second coming of christ within the body of Islam And that's it You got it. Thank you very much for that opening as well And folks want to let you know before we jump into the rebuttals If you haven't yet hit like on this video if you're enjoying it Not for me, but for you so that the youtube algorithm knows what to recommend more to you So with that we're going to jump into the rebuttals. Thanks very much. Mike the floor is all yours Well, thank you for that to hear Appreciate the response a lot of issues. I see with that for one thing again all the scholars today see jesus died Even scholars do not even accept the resurrection hypothesis Jesus himself said he would die.  It also doesn't say whale The scholarly community says it most likely was a Leviathan like the paper I cited there So there's something you got to take into consideration. Yes, Jonah made it through a difficult ordeal But again, it says he went down to shield. This implies death and resurrection But again, it's about the length of time and again It's in the ancient jewish context as I cited sources There was a motif three days and three nights could refer to a period from Friday to Sunday Now with regards to the sign of Jonah, there's one place it is also mentioned It's in Matthew 16. Jesus brings up the sign of Jonah again and then later in the chapter He tells his disciples I'm going to be killed Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him saying far be it from you lord This shall never happen to you but turning and said to Peter get behind me satan Satan your hindrance to me So Jesus directly said if you deny that he's going to die, that's of satan. That's not coming from me That's coming from satan Jesus also did not say he rose from the place of the dead luke 2446 says he rose from the dead necron That's what that word means. You mentioned Isaiah 53 But I would agree with the scholarly community. This is not a direct prophecy. This is a typological prophecy A direct prophecy be something like Zechariah 9 9 A typological prophecy is something where there is a pattern in the Old Testament that Jesus fulfilled in Isaiah The suffering servant is Israel read Isaiah 40 Isaiah 41 Directly calls it Israel the suffering servant theme continues to Isaiah 53 Jesus typologically fulfills this as the fulfillment of Israel's scriptures So often we get this wrong a lot of the prophecies in the New Testament are typological fulfillments Okay, so you asked why didn't Jesus disciples understand that when he said he was going to die? Well, look at the cultural context the Jews of the time were inundated with the idea that Messiah would be a conquering Messiah That he would have to defeat the Romans if he died that would that would have been completely divorced from their cultural background So they were still inundated with that and didn't understand what Jesus was talking about You mentioned Josephus and the survival of his three friends. This is not a comparison to Jesus Because again, we don't have the accounts of the thieves of the cross what torture they went through The thieves didn't have crowns of thorns shoved into their head.  You mentioned Pilate being surprised Well, but let's take some things into consideration. Let's go to Josephus antiquities book 18 chapter 3 So this is a different event Pilate wants to build an aqueduct and he's using temple funds to construct the aqueduct The jews protest for this and so Pilate puts soldiers in the roman crowd And he's going to give the signal to cause people to be beat Uh, so the crowds disperse so then Josephus says so he bid the jews himself go away But they boldly casting the reproaches upon him and he gave the soldiers a signal Which was which had been before an agreed on who laid upon them much greater blows than Pilate had commanded them and equally punished those that were uh That were riding and those that were not nor did they spare them in the least Uh, so and he mentions that some of them even died So what he basically points out is that Pilate wanted them to go easy on the people The soldiers went far harsher than what Pilate expected. This is probably the same thing that happened for Jesus He said scourge him Uh, and they probably went far harsher than what Pilate had expected We already see the steam and Josephus of Pilate giving orders and his soldiers taking things too far the same thing happened with jesus In john you mentioned the spear going in the site. He does not say blood gushed out It just says blood and water came out of him and I can quote again medical doctor Frederick zuggaby who had quoted my opening statement He says I have investigated over 25 000 deaths and I performed over 10 000 autopsies Over 34 years during my tenure as chief medical examiner of rockland county new york And I have seen that blood Commonly flows out of the wounds of dead bodies Particularly in victims of violent death blood remains uncluttered in most victims of violent death because of the increased in certain chemical factors All right, so again same thing. He points out that joseph bergerson says okay that Blood definitely can't come out of a body depending on how much trauma they suffered. You mentioned the water being plasma I didn't argue with plasma. It was probably more like again fluid in it around his lung tissue Okay, you mentioned embalming the jesus. They were you there and bomb No one argues jesus was embalmed. That's not what joseph of aramethia and nicodemus were doing They were there to cover his body with uh spices to prevent the smell of a rotting corpse as I cited craig keener on that They do not argue. He was there to be embalmed and they were definitely not there to revive Okay, as I cited Frederick zuggaby in my uh opening statement The allows would not be enough to heal jesus given the amount of blood loss Okay, uh, you mentioned you quote put on the screen luke 24 36 to 43 as an evidence that jesus survived the crucifixion and you say let's just take the plain reading But you didn't read verse 45 and 46 Says then he jesus opened their minds to understand the understand the scriptures and he said to them Thus it is written that the christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead again that word necron It doesn't say place of the dead. It says he would rise from the dead. So the plain reading is that jesus rose from the dead Okay, if they if jesus thought he had died and came back to life. Okay, then What evidence do we have if you're if you're conceding that then literally everyone for hundreds of years Including jesus himself said that he died and all of a sudden the arpanies come Centuries later and somehow get it right that doesn't make sense Again, medical doctors like joseph berger front berger sin and frederick zuggabee note the facts laid out in the gospels Clearly indicates jesus died from traumatic shock. Okay, you mentioned the last 10 tribes. Again, this is a medieval myth This came about in the middle ages after the europeans had lost the holy land to the muslims again So they invented this myth about the lost 10 tribes. There was this far-off king named prestor john He was holding them back This myth continued throughout the middle ages and when we discovered the new world Many people thought the native americans living over there were actually lost israelites We see this in the writings of the pilgrims. This is a medieval myth Do I put scriptures you can see it in chronicles you can see it in luke You can see in the book of james the 12 tribes are still there They would have integrated with judah after the assyrian exile. This is just what the standard scholarship was There's no evidence jesus went to india again. This has been highly critiqued by scholars like her besko and his book strange tales about jesus going to gran bold jesus in india Nor about klot also has a book about this Okay, and even if jesus did go to india, this still would not prove your case that jesus did not die Mormons, for example, believed jesus died before he flew off to america to teach all the white people in mexico about mormonism Okay, even if jesus did go to india. He still could have died and rose from the dead But again, none of that is actually relevant for the actual debate here because jesus still died The evidence overwhelmingly confirms that even if by some strange theory he went out in the after One could still argue that he died. You asked where was mother mary? Okay, well, let's just read the book of ax ax 114 says all these things were cord We're all these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer together with the women and marry the mother of jesus and his brothers So after jesus's ascension mary is still with the church in jerusalem She didn't go far out the gospel of john says that he took mary into her house To this day. So she was still there. She never left jerusalem So again, the bible debunks that myth as well the tomb you mentioned is not mentioned in text until the 17th century No archaeologists or scholar today has said this is the tomb of jesus. This is just an awkwardly belief If you want to argue for that, uh, I would need some evidence But again, this also would not support your idea because again, jesus could have died came back to life like Position like lazarus did and then died again later. So again still doesn't support your argument here, which is that did jesus die or not You try to argue this circular that say christians use this circular reasoning argument say jesus is god No, jesus said himself that he was gone in matthew seven for example He says that everyone who comes to me and says lord lord want to the kingdom of heaven Now that phrase lord lord is very interesting when the heber bible was translated into the greek septuagint At times you would see places like adonai plus the divine name adonai yaway when that is translated into the greek septuagint It becomes lord lord And his scholars like michael patrick barber and jason staples have noted anytime you see the phrase lord lord in greek That's a direct direct reference to the tetragrammaton in jesus In matthew and luke says he is lord lord john a 58 He says before abraham was i am which is a first person representation of what we've seen the septuagint of Psalm 92 where he's for the mountains were you are so there's that There's no medical evidence. Uh, you said there's no medical evidence anyone could rise from the dead. Well, yeah, we agree This is this this was a miracle. We don't say this was something that naturally happened This is just a humane style argument as for the chron irrelevant. It's not point. It's a text much later And there's also various different ways muslims interpret that so with that my time is up Thank you very much for that rebuttal And want to let you know folks before we jump into the next rebuttal if you haven't yet check out modern day debate on your favorite podcast app It is ad free 100% so as you can see the bottom right of your screen we're available on every podcast app Look up modern day debate on your favorite podcast app and listen to debates on the go and add free Now we're gonna kick it over to to hear. Thank you very much. The floor is all yours Thanks very much and again, Michael. Thank you for a well-reasoned Arguments and you know, well, I disagree with you, but let's let's go through the meat of it and see what we get out to So the first thing I want to to note is that you didn't really address the main You know some of the main points I mean in particular you didn't address a tall dimension of Jesus in hindu scriptures Which I appreciate just probably the first time you've seen that that quote But I would really encourage you to go away and to look up that and and read into it Um, the second thing is is you know, when you you cite many instances where Jesus says oh why he died? Well, if we want to really understand that a simple way to understand that is an actual fact What Jesus said with respect to the daughter of jairus and you've actually mentioned that before so luke 849 55 There was a young girl the daughter of jairus Who people have believed had died and when I'll quote the bible directly when he arrived at the house of jairus He did not let anyone go in there with him except peter john and james and the child's father and mother Meanwhile, all the people were wailing and mourning for her stop wailing. Jesus said she is not dead But asleep So the reality is is that you are misrep not not deliberately I don't want to make any accusations, but I feel that you're misrepresenting What it was common parlance in in those times and we know that jesus spoke in parables So if he was to say that he was was to die and be raised from the dead That's that's and he also talks about himself having the sign of jonah And we the classical sign of jonah and how his people the people he remember We have to understand the sign of jonah how jesus's Listeners would have understood the sign of jonah. It doesn't matter what you think the sign of jonah is What matters is how jesus used the sign of jonah to explain his own future situation So when he said that my sign will be the sign of jonah What did his listeners understand the listeners would have understood that the sign of jonah by which gods Attributes by which his magnificence was demonstrated was that a man at a time of peril and when he was about to be killed Then god saved him from death It's your post hoc interpretation 2000 years later may is one thing and i'm not saying you're wrong per se I disagree with you, but the standard understanding that jesus's listeners would have understood and which jesus would have understood they understood And by which he used to communicate his future condition Was the sign of being close to death and being saved. So when he says i was in sheol I was in i was in the underworld and you brought me back They call metaphorical language for a state in which you have even in english We have this phrase you have one foot in the grave, right? This doesn't mean you're actually literally dead and you literally have one foot in the grave These are metaphors of language which you must understand and appreciate as jesus spoke in parables He used the daughter of jesus everybody thought that she was dead and he said no, she is not dead She was only asleep So this is a kind of state of near death which was described as dead in those days But was not actual clinical death and that's the thing that we're actually discussing here The appeal to authority which is what you've done for most of your initial presentation if i may say so It doesn't help i mean appealing to christian or or even non christian people who say that you know jesus died Isn't it relevancy pointing to to medical scholars who say that oh, well if i was there i would have considered him to be dead You can just go on google and you can look up man certified as dead comes back to life in the morgue Okay, there are multiple instances with modern medical technology of using stethoscopes listening for heartbeats feeling for pulses You know when you have somebody lying on a bed in front of you Where doctors get it wrong and once in a while you get a person coming who wakes up in the morgue three days later Look it up on google There's this one spanish man who was certified by hit confirmed by three different doctors is dead and he was actually alive so The idea that you know in the darkness when jesus is up there You know, you can't see him the sun has been eclipsed and earthquake has happened The roman soldiers are worried about the condition of their family at home, right? That they from four or five meters away will be able to tell if somebody's dead Without feeling his pulses without listening to his chest with the stethoscope when modern day doctors get it wrong Sometimes right is absurd. Okay, that that that seems a bit absurd to me No, sorry. I don't want to be rude or anything, but that seems strange to me. Okay, so Then the question is did jesus believe he would die You know jesus's words are one thing and words can also be interpolated We know that the bible has been post hoc interpolated But the question is did jesus believe he would die now if he believed he would die Then what was he doing praying the night before saying take this bitter cup of death away from What was he doing on the cross saying elie elie la massa baccani? Oh my lord, my lord, why has thou forsaken me? These are not the words a plain reading of this again Not the post hoc christian interpretation filtered through the lens of paul Just a simple reading of a man on a cross who believes that he would survive crying My god, my god, why have you forsaken me? This is clearly the words of a man who did not think that death was part of the plan So you're arguing that he said that oh, he said this he said this one It could be interpolation two could be parables It could be metaphorical language in the same way jonah spoke that I was in the land of the dead I had one foot in the grave and yet you saved me. Oh god Then the question is is did the disciples believe that he would he had died now This is one particular thing. I want to really focus on you know in ax 21 We have the example of paul coming back to jerusalem after his three journeys After he's written romans carinthians and galatians in which all of the modern day creeds And and doctrines of modern day christianity are found and originate in actual fact And and and james says to paul what james says to paul He says there are jews from asia who have believed From amongst those jews who have believed in jesus and i'll bring you up the specific quote in actual fact He says this is in ax 21 20 21 20 21 21 sorry, but they have been informed about you You see brother how many myriad of jews there are who have believed these are jews who believed in jesus. He's talking about Jews who have believed in jesus and they are all zealous for the law But they have been informed about you that you teach all the jews who are among the gentiles to forsake moses Saying they ought not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to their customs What then the assembly must certainly meet for they will hear that you have come Take these three men be purified with them pay their expenses Shave your heads that all may know that those things of which they were informed concerning you are nothing But that you yourself also walk orderly And keep the law of moses This is an example where at the end of writing all of modern day christian doctrines paul comes back to jerusalem And james the just who knew jesus much better understood jesus's teachings much better He tells jesus he tells paul that there are jews who have believed in jesus Who are offended by your doctrines that um, you do not need to circumcise your children that you do not need to follow The law of moses that you do not need to follow the traditions of of of moses anymore And that jesus's sacrifice is enough for you on the cross because that's what's written in galatians remands and prithians And he says to them he says to paul repent He says publicly repent in the temple with these three men who are like you So that all may know that all of these accusations are nothing and you also keep the law of moses And what does paul do does he turn around go? Hey, hey, hey james I'm uh, I've got to tell you you've misunderstood jesus his message jesus died on the cross for us We no longer need to follow the law of moses actually. What does he do? He shaves his head. He publicly repents I'm I'm basing is that the author Of modern-day christian doctrines repents publicly as recorded in acts 21 of modern-day christian doctrines And then what happens those jews who had believed in jesus they find him in the temple what james warned about him about Actually happens they mob him. They nearly kill him And then the romans have to arrest paul to save his life So the idea that there was no difference of opinion about the uh among the early christians about jesus's death is clearly False because there clearly is it stated very clearly in acts 21 And according to james there was no abs there was no uh new testament which had obviated the law of moses And in fact there was even a watered-down law for the gentiles that they still had to follow which he did surprise He says they must keep themselves from things offered to idols from blood from things strangled and from sexual immorality Do you ever tell new christians who become a christian? Do you tell them or you become a christian?  Do they still have to keep the law of moses because james had just thought that they did So there's that as well. So finally the question i want to end on the point I want to end on is that we don't differ about the fact that jesus went through the crucifixion We believe we have a different interpretation Of the facts and we have a common sense interpretation of the facts if you see a man walking around after a crucifixion attempt And he's got the wounds on him. He wants brilliant. He wants food. He asks for food Even if he thinks that he came back from the dead He didn't come from back from the dead Okay, because that is an actual fact a common sense occam's razor That's common sense occam's razor when you see a man post assassination attempt with the wounds from his body It means he survived that is the basic fresh understanding and we believe that this is an actual fact proof of jesus's truth We're not trying to say that jesus was a liar We're saying that it's proof of his truth Why because the initial impulse to crucify him was to prove that he was a false messiah That he was a false prophet as per deuteronomy That's why he was praying in the garden of gethsemane take this bitter cup of death away from me That's his proof of his truth is that he survived When anyone else would have died god saved his beloved one as per isiah 53 He prolonged his days. He saw his seed This is an actual fact the great miracle of jesus, which is the sign of jonah to a tea And the final point i want to emphasize is again this medical aspect. I want to emphasize this I think that's it. I think that's me. So i'm not going to go there. Let's wrap it up there for me. Um I hope that's okay james It is With that, thank you very much gentlemen for those rebuttals I want to say folks just a couple of quick housekeeping things. So if you haven't checked already Our guests are linked in the description box that includes if you listen to this via the podcast later Check out our guest links. We really do appreciate them. They are the lifeblood of the channel So check out their stuff and even if you're like, man, I totally disagree with them though There's a lot of value to reading your you can say opponent whatever way you want to say it Reading their content or listening to it firsthand to get a true understanding of it. So Check out our guest links as we really do appreciate them and with that we're going to jump into the five minute rebuttals Mike the floor is all yours Thank you james and thank you for that to hear I will remind you that I didn't have time to address everything you mentioned last time because we had time limits You mentioned I didn't address the hindu scriptures. So but I'm fully aware of these Benjamin walker in his book the hindu world argues that actually A lot of the hindu scriptures like the piranha texts were actually influenced by christian scriptures So citing them is not really an important argument or it's a good argument because these come much later They're influenced by christianity if there is any at all and so that could very well be where these are coming from These are not reliable texts about what happened in jesus. No scholar today thinks they are So again completely irrelevant because again the question is whether jesus died in jerusalem We need to look at the texts from jerusalem You mentioned about jairus's daughter being asleep jesus uses a saying language when he raises lazarus from the dead He says he's fallen asleep in uh john 11. His disciples say well go wake him up and he says lazarus is dead Saying that someone is asleep. It was a common way to say that somebody has died. You mentioned i'm doing post-hoc interpretation That is the swoon theory. That is exactly what this is. It's it's a long after idea And it just cherry picks the lines from jesus again jesus said directly matthew 17 mark nine Luke 18 jonah john 10 11 that he is going to die He says he is going to be killed Then he says he rose from the dead in luke 24 So again, you also bring up the sign of jonah again This is not survival jesus did not say the sign of jonah is about survival. This is reading way too much in it It's about the timeline feel be gone and that fits in with the cultural context Okay, again jesus said he will be killed in matthew 16 He said i was appealing to authority Appealing to authority is not a fallacy. It's a fallacy if i appeal to somebody That's not a scholar I appeal directly to new testament scholars. That is not fallacious. That is what every single scholar does You appeal to people who know what they're talking about who have the degrees who've written on this subject I could just say you're appealing to authority if you ever quote the akmadi founder again, okay You mentioned modern doctors sometimes get it wrong, but again Were those people that they declared dead scourged beaten hold on hung on a cross had severe losses of blood No, no, they were not you got to look at the specific evidence for jesus and medical doctors agree I cited several that say he died from traumatic shock Uh, you said that the bible could have been interpolated. Well, then how do you know? Which parts were interpolated and which parts weren't if you say the part to confirm your beliefs were not Oh, then that's just arguing in a circle. Okay, you cannot use the gospel of jon Like you have or the gospels to argue your position and then just dismiss all the parts you say were interpolated You mentioned jesus crying. My god. My god. Why is that for sake of me on the cross? But he's quoting psalm 22 which is actually a sum of victory craig keener says that jesus out of this the complaint of righteousness psalm 22 verse 1 might well suggest early christians that he participated in humanity's ultimate alienation from god and experiencing the pain death Although christians are not likely to have invented such a cry They undoubtedly found great significance in the use of the psalm He goes on to point out that This does not imply that he felt that he was forsaken. It implies a feeling of forsaken. Okay, but the psalm He's actually citing is actually a psalm of triumph being brought through and winning it ultimately in it's like advice told you Okay, i'm going to go to the place. That's the best Okay, i'm not telling you i'm going to the best restaurant and that's actually a line from a song called spirit in the sky About going to heaven So you got to take the song lyric in context with the song and likewise you take jesus's quote of psalm 22 in context of the whole song You mentioned ax 21 that paul was in james or somehow in disagreement No, verse 25 shows that paul and james are on the same page Notice what he says that james says to paul he says We we've been told that you've been telling jews who are among the gentiles to forsake moses Paul never said that read first krithian seven He says if you're of the circumcised stay among the circumcised if you're of the uncircumcised stay there Then so then james gets down to verse 25 and he says as for the gentiles We've sent them a letter with our judgment that they should abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood And what has been strangled and from sexual immorality the same conclusion They came to an ax 15 when they agreed gentiles do not have to become jews to become christians And even if they did disagree that's not evidence that somehow james thought that Jesus Survived the crucifixion.  Well, I mean, that's the case We're just gonna this is just getting at hot We're dismissing all the evidence all the evidence to just sort of confirm even jesus himself Cannot say what actually happened. He's wrong and ochmandy founder centuries later is the only guy that's right This is getting incredibly at hot We're just dismissing way all the evidence if it doesn't fit the bill With that my time's up and i'll turn it over to here Uh, but thank you and i'm looking forward to the open dialogue Thanks so much mike and we'll kick it over for our last five minute rebuttal before that open dialogue If you haven't yet hit that like folks We are only 28 away from 400 right now. We appreciate that and with that thank you very much to hear the floor is all yours Uh, can you hear me? Okay? I kind of my audio was dropping. So I I tweaked a little bit. I hope it doesn't drop anymore You've got it. Okay. We're now let's start. Thanks very much So thank you again, michael for for three points So the first point I want to make just from the outset is that, you know, the amitya founder He was born 1835 died in 1908. Mirza Ghulam Ahmad Who who claimed to be the true second coming of christ and to explain the actual reality of his life and death And that jesus died in in kashmir and he identified his tomb as well in his book jesus in india But he didn't say that this is a new idea He actually said that this is the original understanding of the christians and that in actual fact this was Resurrected in the sense this concept was demonstrated best by the quran and I and I showed you the verse Which clearly states in the quran that they did not kill him You know, I'm a qataluhu masalabuhu. Well, I can show me how to them Uh in chapter four of the quran they did not kill him Through the qataluhu means to kill with a sword or to kill but a sleigh Or masalabuhu nor did they kill him by crucifixion or crucify him to death in a sense and finish him through crucifixion Um, what uh, but he was made to appear to them. Well, I can show me how to him. He appeared to them as so Now that's clearly That's that's the ahmadi position and that's the original quranic position That's the original position of the prophet muhammad peace be upon him And we believe that the quran wasn't written by muhammad, but it was dictated to god Uh, dictated by god to muhammad who then recited his companions who wrote it down the sign of jona again I want to go back and just emphasize this point It's not the length of time if I go on a holiday for three days and three nights I haven't shown the sign. What is it that makes it a sign? You know, as I mentioned to you earlier um The sign of jona is mentioned, you know wicked and adulterous nation seeker the sign But no sure sign shall be shown to them except the sign of jona, right It's mentioned in luke 11 is mentioned in matthew 12 and is mentioned matthew 16 And only in one of those particular times is the length of time mentioned the sign I want to go back to this the sign is a person who should have died And was in a situation akin to death or very close to death and who is then survives And again, you cite the daughter of jairus and this time you take jesus's very clear words. She is not dead She is asleep What this shows is is that the people he in actual fact so-called resurrected Were never actually dead He healed them through prayer, but they were in a state close to death Same say this is exactly what jesus says. She is not dead She is she is asleep You just have to accept his words clearly as they're spoken and the proof that in actual fact, you know You'll say well, why do you take this as a literal thing? But you don't take when he says I will die and be raised on the third day is a literal thing And the reason is because the disciples didn't take it literally when jesus said to the disciple I'll be dead died and raised on the third day It says clearly in in at least two places in the gospels, but they did not understand what he meant Now if he had been going around resurrecting people from the dead, you know resurrecting daughter of jairus Lazarus etc Even at one point it says in the gospels that hundreds of came out of their graves and entered into the city, right? This is clearly a fable it's fabrication, but let's say it was true If this had been happening all day every day, then when he said well, I'm going to die as well And I'm going to come back from the dead it shouldn't have been that hard to understand Right, they'd seen examples of it in front of them But the gut the disciples understood that it wasn't to be taken literally, right? And that in actual fact is a demonstration as to why we don't either because we follow their lead on this because they best understood the message of jesus um Again the appeal to authority the people you're quoting are you know, they're they're they're they're christian scholars I agree, but you know, we have to understand that You know the best evidence that jesus didn't die is that he didn't die He was shown afterwards with his actual body and the only reason you entertain the resurrection hypothesis again I'm going to come back to this is that you believe that he was god, but you support the belief that he was god Um through belief that he rose from the dead So it's a completely circular argument If you just take the plain reading of a person who lived on this earth who was seeing post assassination attempt It's quite clear that he in actual fact If you see somebody offering assassination attempt alive with the wounds of their assassination attempt It means that they they survive the the ordeal Did jesus claim to be god? I've only got a minute. So I'll go quickly jesus claim to be god The answer is no the prophet muhammad peace be upon him also said I was the seal of the prophets before While adam was between the water and the and and the mud God also says in the Quran about the prophet Muhammad It was not it was not your hand to people to the obedience to but it was the hand of god It doesn't mean muhammad was actually god That means that they are the representative of god Eliyeli lama sabbaktani is used from an old asam which indicates triumph and I would ask you to to reflect on that Jesus was citing a psalm In which it was about triumph What did he expect? He expected triumph He expected his prayer to be answered that he made in the garden of gethsemane So I would put it back to you you need to read the context of Eliyeli lama sabbaktani and reflect on it That if he's quoting a psalm which is all about triumph Which is all about success and being saved Right and why is he's quoting that at the point of his moment of when he thinks that he's dying If it wasn't a type of a prayer that oh god, I believed you would grab me triumph, but I have not been driven it So thank you very much. That's my time Thank you very much for that final rebuttal. We're gonna go into the open dialogue folks Following that we're gonna have five minute closings and then qna So there are two ways that you can submit a question for the qna. We have a good list already So first is if you put a super chat question in that will get bumped to the top of the list Otherwise, you don't have to do a super chat. You can tag me with at modern day debate But as I said, we do put the super chats first and then we do eventually run out of time We've got to let the speakers go at some point So just keeping aware that we might not get to every single question That's a standard question with that gentlemen. The floor is all yours for open dialogue But here I have a question Can you hear me? Yeah Okay, um, do you believe jesus when he got out of the tomb he walked to his disciples Um, I would have to look into it. I'm not entirely sure I I I understand he was so yeah, sorry gone. I don't I didn't leave finish No, I'm just curious when he got out of the tomb did he walk Did he walk to the disciple was on sunday a few days after? Uh, no, I know that I know that there is this question. He said he appeared through walls that he suddenly appeared No, no, no, I wanted your beliefs. Do you believe that he walked that when he got out of the tomb He got up on his two feet and walked I don't know. I don't know the the gospel is, you know, at the end of the day We we we don't know the full details of what happened It's it's likely that he was still being administered in the tomb possibly by somebody visiting him regularly Um, it's likely that they helped him up. It's likely that they he appeared as first as a gardener to marry magdalene. I understand Um, so somebody had presumably given him those clothes and he'd he'd or he'd found them Um, so I don't know the details Is the is a symbol okay Okay, there there is no reason to think that he could walk for at least a month after he had two large nails shoved into his Feet in the Philippines they do crucifixion reenactments where they actually put nails in people and they can't walk When that happens and Frederick Zagabey in his book the crucifixion of jesus says that there's no reason to think he walked Why is it that the early church thought he resurrected if he was crawling around and looking like he just Basically was crucified Uh to the point of death. Why do they think he was resurrected in a glorified body if he was still covered in scars? Couldn't even walk would have had numerous malnutrition issues Where on earth would they get this idea from? Well, I I'm not an expert on the the events of what what happens during a crucifixion I do understand that it's not always the case that people have nails put through their feet Um, sometimes crucifixion occurred with a step on which people were arrested Their feet Um, and sometimes they were just put through their hands either way, you know I think again the kind of incredulity As to a person surviving a crucifixion attempt when people did survive crucifixion attempts, right with medical therapy Uh, as opposed to my incredulity that you know, believing that somebody rose from the dead It's they're well depart. I mean, it's it's if you have incredulity that Jesus could walk Shouldn't shouldn't you have greater incredulity that he came back from the dead Given that he was seen off towards with his wounds and required Uh eating he asked for bread and fish. So my questions you would be Sorry go on The debate is not did Jesus rise the debate is just Jesus die And I would say it's far more likely that Jesus died And something you get from like one of the more modern atheistic scholars like the hallucination slash mythic type Various theories they put out is gonna be far more likely than that he survived So even if You could make that a case it's still more far more likely you died given all the medical points I get I pointed out and again with regards to the nail going through his his cross the only archaeological evidence we have Is actually of a crucified victim in that same region named yohanan who has a nail going through his heel They use nails and there's no indication. Jesus will sort of uh given a special treatment possibility is not probability So so the reality is is there's no explicit evidence in it is a very good point You've made actually and thank you for raising this because I didn't I didn't reflect on this But there is actually no evidence when I when I look back through my reading of the gospels There's no mention actually of his feet whatsoever and even when he speaks to thomas He doesn't refer to his feet. He refers to his side and he refers to his hands um, and there's actually no mention of uh Of his feet actually being heard. So the answer is probably yes. He did walk because He we know that he was standing. We know that he was seen by as a guy dressed as a guest as a So presumably he must have been walking you just demonstrate to thankfully I appreciate this from your point, which is that actually he didn't have probably nails put through his feet at all Um, that happened to somebody else is frankly irrelevant. Um, that doesn't mean do you have any evidence that That he was sort of given this exception because again the cultural context shows that no nails would have been used in this No, the cultural context doesn't you're one incident that you can cite from a completely different incident Shows that but that doesn't actually prove anything The fact the matter is that he was walking off to it demonstrates you very aptly pointed out that you know Perhaps he did he wasn't crucified. It didn't have nails put through his feet or if he did I think it's again a push to say that a person couldn't walk Um, I think that there are instances where people do suffer and you have to remember these are flesh wounds They weren't wounds that actually broke the bones. They would actually be passed. Um, well It depends on where on the feet But if they were placed for example between the metatarsals bones It is possible that they fractured one or two bones, but people do walk actually with fractured Foot bones that does happen It's painful. Well, it's very painful. He was a young 30. He was a young 33 year old man Who'd fit and healthy all of his life So I wouldn't put it past him to actually walk especially with some aid from some other some other people So this is just begging the question you're saying because the gospel's reporting walk Therefore, he didn't have a nail in his feet so that he could walk. This is just being circular Again, if he actually had nails in his feet, he wouldn't be walking around as my main point with this And again, this is again pointing to my main point Basically is that if he had somehow survived, he would not have been walking around given what we know about crucifixion If your basic point is he was walking around so there wasn't nails in his feet This is just arguing in a circle Well, I think that the key point is that god, you know, you believe that god can resurrect the dead But he can't help jesus walk after having wounds and I think that that's That actually tells everybody quite nicely the the strange kind of Perspective you have where you where you assume an extreme position Because of your preconceived bias that he was an actual fact god and I want to ask you You know this key point I want to highlight is an actual fact the fact that jesus prayed the night before You know, my god, my god take this business out cup of death away from me We know in deuteronomy that he That according to deuteronomy a false prophet is hanged Right. Do you believe jesus was a false prophet because it says very clearly that jesus was a false prophet That the person who is hung is a false prophet according to deuteronomy Paul also reiterates this that he who was hung on the wood is a cursed of god Um, and we know clearly therefore that jesus this is why jesus didn't want to be hung on the cross So from the asylum perspective and from my understanding You know for him to have died on the cross therefore makes him a curse Do you understand what the connotations of being a cursed are and what it means? Well, so I'll answer the question but first let me just point out I'm not doing a reconstruction like you. I'm going on what the text actually says It says that he rose from the dead You're trying to find pieces you can cherry pick out to form a reconstruction about what happened And this is an inconsistent with him walking around as my main point with that With regards to him praying in the garden beforehand and then I'll get to the cursed thing again Jesus was experiencing the emotional distress Oftentimes that just simply happens from knowing you're about to go through immense pain We would expect this from anybody who's about to go through that that they're going to be lamenting and venting about What's going to happen to them that does not mean that he was somehow You know should have been happy about having to go through extreme torture with regards to paul and galatians Yes, he was a curse for us. That's literally what paul says. He was a curse for us by becoming sin This is all the Galatians 3 is about I mean this is not showing that he's a false prophet because jesus took upon all the sin upon himself and christian thought And then took it to the cross and died So yes, we do believe jesus was a curse. I don't see how that's a problem. That's that's literally christian dogma So so I mean this is getting away a little bit from the crucifixion whether he died or not But it is related and if you'll permit me james I would like to touch on this because we're now in the discussion phase So I feel like we could possibly open it out out a little bit Yeah, this is one of my major problems with from a theological perspective taking this wages from a history We've talked about the historical events of the crucifixion. I want to emphasize that You know, we don't differ on the events of the crucifixion. We differ on our interpretation of it So I that's clear between us. I think but I think this is my one of my biggest theological problems with the idea of a crucifixion Well, before we get to see a lot could you just show me the tell me the verse you're citing and do it around me that would show He's a false prophet Um, sure.  Well, well, let me read it new living translation If someone is committed to crime worthy of death and is executed and hung on a tree The body body must not remain hanging from the tree of night You must bury the body same day for anyone who is hung is a cursed and incited god in this way. You're you're quite right I was actually confusing two separate No worries Quotes so another one from deuteronomy states that um that that if a person claims to receive revelation from god Um, if he is a false prophet that prophet must die must be killed Right and that will prove that he is uh in actual fact a false prophet and I can bring that out for you if you wish But you're absolutely right But this demonstrates that he was cursed in the in the sight of god and this is from a theological perspective This is what I find most difficult than actual factors because it demonstrates that there's no concept of forgiveness and christianity whatsoever And the reason is for that because if I if I wanted to forgive you if I you know We're taught in the lord's prayer by jesus. Oh lord, forgive us That you'll you'll know the words better than I will forgive me if I butcher this, you know All of I'll say it really fast, right? Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name Thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us of our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us Okay, not to temptation but deliver us from evil for that is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever Oh man, it's a beautiful prayer and it's a beautiful prayer. It's a very Islamic prayer I would say because um, but it's not christian prayer certainly not according to christian doctrines and I'll explain why so You know forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us Now, what is the nature of our forgiveness of other people? Do we have to punish another person? uh because Somebody has forgiven us if for example my brother um trespasses against me Do I have to what is the nature of my forgiveness the nature of my forgiveness is that punishment is waived That punishment is an actual fact we're waived and that's actually the sign of our love It's also a sign of my purity That uh, I can waive punishment and that is what forgiveness is If I take out that punishment on somebody else Or if he owes me a debt and I recoup that debt from someone else you cannot describe that as debt forgiveness That is seeking and obtaining the debt So with respect to jesus this is from a theological perspective now not so much historical This is my big problem with christianity Which is there has no forgiveness because everybody who rejects jesus is going to be punished eternally in hell for all of their sin So for a finite number of sins, they're going to be punished eternally, which isn't itself unjust But then all the christians who believe in jesus All of their sins have been punished have been have been put upon jesus So when you look at it in the grand total and scheme of things god has not actually forgiven a single Sin that anybody has ever committed and furthermore god actually becomes a hypocrite god forbid Because he tells us to forgive others. He says and he teaches us a prayer Oh god forgive us as you as we forgive those so we're actually more forgiving than god We can waive punishment but god can't waive punishment and that's actually a sign of him being unholy But for us it's a sign of our holiness So this in actual fact demonstrates that the entire crucifixion narrative Is is fundamentally tortured and backwards in the islamic narrative islamic understanding when you seek god's forgiveness God indeed forgives you as you forgive the trespassers of those against you He waives the punishment and he says it is waived it is it is written off. There is no debt god has ignored it God is the one of his attributes of allah is the effacer of sins He effaces them not by collecting punishment for them. So that's one point. I wanted to make and I just want to say on the question that occurs The idea that the idea that relationally And I want you to speak to this and explain this to me because I don't get it If somebody has done wrong to me right I cannot me taking out that punishment. Somebody else doesn't fix my relational problem with that person that person is still done wrong to me It doesn't become right By virtue of that by me taking out punishment on a third party And so not only is this fundamentally unjust to the arith of third party It doesn't actually solve the arid relational issue And jesus becoming a curse alayna, which is the word in arabic. It's also similar in hebrew It is the attribute of satan So in actual fact god in actual fact regarded jesus as satan for through no fault of his own But for the sins of others and it didn't actually fix god's relational problem with them and god didn't demonstrate any forgiveness It's it's a complete mess Okay, you've been gone for like four minutes. Can I respond about the same length of time as long as you wish I've got no problem. That's absolutely fine. Yeah Yeah, I want to let you I'm sure James might have a problem if it's as long as you wish, but I mean, you know within reason No, okay. There's a there's a lot of things I want to correct there For one thing we know we do not say the punishment for sin is eternal torment in in hell That's not in the bible. It says the wages of sin is death The way god punishes typically the main ways he punishes is physical death and exile.   He did on Calvary to forgive them. They don't want to be forgiven to leave them alone. That's what hell is There are only two kinds of people in the end those who say to god Thy will be done and those to whom god says thy will be done all that are in help choose it See us louis also says the doors of hell are locked from the inside again This is about exile. So that's one thing to keep in mind there And there's also that you mentioned it's eternal conscious torment. I'm actually an annihilationist. I don't think hell is eternal That seems to be more a lot of the It seems to be more in line with a lot of the early church fathers taught There's also universalists like origin for example So there's a lot more there in terms of christian eschatology and christian afterlife with regards to the atonement God is not punishing a third party because of the trinity. Jesus is gone. Jesus takes the punishment upon himself If you steal money from me, okay, and I forgive you of your debt The the debt is still there. I have just taken the debt upon myself now to pay You know, when you forgive someone it doesn't just go away of the sin If someone were to kill my family members, I take and I forgive them I have taken all that pain upon me to absorb and then to just sort of disperse it through my own Therapy, whatever you name it sin always comes with these types of shames these feelings of guilt When we forgive others that doesn't go away. We just start to absorb it God is taking the punishment upon himself. He's not putting it on a third party He is taking it for us and if anyone wants more I did a whole video on this back in august called the absurdity of christianity Where I explained that the atonement is the reflection of god taking the punishment that we have Taking the punishment of sin upon himself in a physical manifestation of that all that suffering all that hardship all that hurt of what sin does is taken upon the cross And it's a physical manifestation of what sin causes anytime Anytime somebody sins that doesn't just go away for forgiveness because the person who's doing the forgiveness is taking The the punishment upon themselves in terms of that feeling and it's best represented in terms of debt and money These kinds of things which our analogy is used in the new testament If you told took ten thousand dollars from me and I was going to use that money to buy food over the next year Okay, I now have to and I forgive you. I now have to suffer that lack of food over the next year It doesn't go away. There's still suffering involved even in terms of forgiveness What we don't realize as humans is when we forgive little things We recognize there's little suffering like when somebody just tells a white lie or maybe steals something minor But in terms of our debt to god that is a far bigger debt to be paid and there's a lot more suffering involved And so jesus shows this in terms of the whole system that he set up with the atonement Sin, you know, you have to it goes back to his how he this is typologically fulfilling jesus with how You need to do animal sacrifices in the old testament to atone for sins Jesus then eventually takes this full punishment the full weight of it upon himself who is god who did set up the system Jude one says it was jesus who led the people of israel evictus. This is whole his whole system So yes, jesus and in terms of the whole jesus claim to be god again I go back to what jesus directly says he calls himself lord lord That is in the septuagint that always refers to the tetragrammaton Jesus says that about himself and there are numerous other places jesus does this Thanks, james. Can I just respond to that before we go to questions if that's okay? Oh, we have plenty of time. Okay. Sorry. Yeah, great. Okay, it's fine. Um, so I think that this is really interesting so um, you know Forgiveness does not involve shame Okay, anybody who's genuinely forgives another It does not experience shame or guilt for forgiving In actual fact forgiveness anybody who's done it I'm sure you have michael and perhaps you can reflect upon your own experiences and the viewers can reflect upon theirs When you forgive somebody for a wrong done to you and it is sincere forgiveness Not lip service forgiveness, but sincere forgiveness. It never involves shame. It actually is a moment of joy It is a moment of joy that you have been able to Uh fully embrace the other person despite what they did to you There's not a hint of shame within it and there is not a hint of guilt within it And the best example of this I would I would refer you in actual fact to the story of the prodigal son This is jesus's understanding of forgiveness and I would ask you Where was the shame of the father when the prodigal son returned? Oh, I don't know I know exactly where it was where was it wasn't there There was the shame of the brother who he told you know That your brother has come back and we must embrace him. Okay, and we must be grateful that he has returned But the father didn't have if he had any shame It wasn't for the fact that he had to punish himself The father didn't go through internal punishment because his son came back It was a moment of joy. He laid on a feast for the man for the boy So in actual fact, this is the true aspect of forgiveness But you don't believe in forgiveness you believe that god has to punish that he either punished himself or he punished jesus And this is also a bit of a a bit of a misrepresentation not intentionally I don't want to accuse anybody of that i god forbid But I feel this a misrepresentation of jesus's position Jesus never claimed to be god you can say he claimed lord lord As I've mentioned to you in every scripture if you read any religious text The prophets of god always claim to be the messengers of god and the spokespeople of god and by virtue of their appointed position As the spokesman of god Abaying the messenger of god becomes obeying god. This is why the prophet Muhammad peace be upon him It is said in the Quran about him that um, you know, it is not you who took the oath of allegiance But it was not your hand on top of their hand, but it was the hand of god Nobody was god. Sorry. I can't hear you saying but if I can respond now I'll just finish real quick on this if I may, you know, the key point for me is that jesus never requested worship towards himself He always said to worship the father Um, he always said he nobody ever bowed down to him You know, there was a woman who bowed down to him Seeking his blessing, but nobody ever worshiped him as he and he never asked anybody to worship him He requested people Just just to also bring us more centrally to the topic But also if you're able to wrap this point up and then we'll can go over to mike Yeah, I'll absolutely wrap it up now And the last thing I'll say is that when jesus was it was put to him Does the final point I make when it was put to jesus that you claim to be god He said Why are you offended? I call myself the son of god when you are called Ye are gods in the old testament when he you know when they picked up the stones to stone him So he manifestly demonstrated his reference to himself as the son of god in the terminology of the bible in which even the children of Israel were called gods okay First of all, none of the early prophets ever called themselves lord lord and jesus definitely accepted worship if you go to luke 4 8 Jesus says you shall worship the lord your god and serve him alone Okay, that word for worship only shows up one of their places in luke's gospel and it's in luke 24 52 Where the disciples worship jesus Jesus definitely accepted the very worship. He said was only for god So you have there with regards to the prodigal son. Yes, the father did take shame upon himself If we understand the cultural context, it's very much in the story Okay, the prodigal son comes as father says i want my inheritance now At the only proper response in that culture would be to beat the son because that'd be very shameful The culture would know you were doing this he gives him the money anyway Then when the prodigal son returns home, the father runs to meet him in that culture The original heroes of that audience would have understood this as a very shameful act Men did not run women and children ran Men did not run and then he throws a feast for this son who Shamed his father in multiple ways taking his money ruining it and the father throws a feast for him The the community will look at this as a huge shameful thing This is the response from the elder brother To he leaves he goes out into his field of works because he's like, what are you doing? This looks horrible and look at what you're not you're not giving me a feast this kind of thing This very much will look very shameful to this surrounding culture This was very much in the cultural context of that time. It was a very much an honor shame culture So yeah, i'm not sure what you mean by bringing out the prodigal son story That very much has implements of honor and shame woven throughout the elder brother even shames his father by not coming to the party This is very much in that culture. This is all talked about in david disilva's book honor patron Honor patronage and kinship. I think that's the name of it James will you it was okay if i respond briefly to that I think we still got like 20 we said like 12 minutes or something. Oh, sorry. I didn't know how long we've got So what we're 10 30? What's the time we're going to finish the uh discussion? We will be going to a q&a from the people sending the questions after this Sure, that's fine. I've lost track of time my apologies. No problem We've got 12 more minutes of open dialogue and then we have five minute closings and then q&a from the audience Okay, wonderful. That's great. So I think you know the the key thing there is that the The I know as I agree we've got to get back to the topic of the crucifixion itself But you're taking other people's shame and saying it's the father's shame, okay Other people would have been felt shame on behalf of the father perhaps by saying my god He's really you know, he's not honoring himself. He's not showing his dignity, right? But that's their shame. Okay. The man is running down the street to meet his son. He's not experiencing shame He's experiencing joy You know, how is that in any way correlative to jesus suffering on the cross? I'm going to hell for three days and three nights and he was saying elie elie lama sabbaktani I don't think jesus can help my god. Okay. That's fine. So my god my god. Why has that forsaken me? and so this is an actual fact a Uh, this is a post-hock christian reading Of the prodigal son the plain reading again I will emphasize the plain readings of all of these things Which is that the prodigal son was met by a loving and joyful father. Okay other people may have had shame on his behalf But the father didn't have any shame whatsoever Um, and the point I want to get back to with the crucifixion narrative I would like to to address my kind of most central point Which is that the resurrection Is used as proof of jesus's divinity But jesus's divinity is supported by the resurrection And so the only reason you entertain the hypothesis that jesus in actual fact rose from the dead Instead of the plain reading of an event of a person post assassination attempt being seen with the wounds of his body and needing food Still right which is survival as he said in the sign of Jonah as he prayed for right The the post and as isiah 53 says he shall prolong his days. He shall see his seed The only reason you entertain that hypothesis Is in actual fact because you believe he's god in the first place, but you use the resurrection to prove that he's god So I want you to square that circle Explain to me why i'm wrong. I'm very happy. You know, I don't mind being wrong. I want you to explain to me Why is that a wrong reading of the situation? Okay, because i'm very confused with this because I've argued for one thing with the prodigal son I just want to say people can experience multiple motions. They can experience joy Of their son coming home and still the shame you were to get from absorbing that It's horrible sin. He did but with regard to answering your question here Um, I'm confused about the point because I directly argued Jesus as god because he said he was and then he demonstrated it through the resurrection I didn't argue in a circle. So I mean Jesus said he was god and then he did miracles to show that he was who he said he was That's not arguing in a circle Okay, that's fine. That's really interesting. So you you've mentioned luke 4a This is very clearly in all of the translations you could possibly hope to read It also worshiped the lord your god and serve only him if if the word worship is used in luke's gospel only Well, you haven't mentioned matthew mark No, no, no, let me let me clear from my point here. Let me clear from my point I understand your point I understand your point which is that in luke 4a the word worship is used and in the same gospel That word is only used again when it says the disciples worshiped him, right? I get that. That's fine okay, um the point I want to make is that You know, that's the word the word as you well know in Hebrew Hebrew has multiple meanings But if you look at what Jesus himself said it says it is written worship the lord your god And serve him only and there is no recorded event Where Jesus solicited worship from anyone and when he was put to him that you call yourself god They picked up stones to stone him and they said he said why which which my good deeds you stone me They said for none of your good deeds, but that you being man call yourself god So the question this is the question. This is the event we need to focus on What was Jesus's answer to them?  And what was his answer? Did he turn around and go? Yes? I am god I am god No, he said do you not read in your own scriptures that it is written that he are gods Do you then object to the one whom god has sanctified and purified If he calls himself the son of god So he says that in your books It is written that ye are even gods But you object to me calling myself the son of god So he didn't say that he is god What he explained is that I'm using the term son of god in the same way way and with the same language That it was used in the bible Previously for the children of israel that they were called the children of god So this is this is the nature So so when it was actually put to him directly instead of post hoc interpretations of jesus's words He explained his meanings very clearly Okay, jesus called himself the son of man He said that he said you will see the son of man coming on the clouds That's a direct reference as every scholar will note to daniel seven where the son of man shows up and receives worship In a kingdom forever. Yes, jesus did receive worship I gave you luke 24 at the end of the chapter his disciples worshiped him So very much. He is receiving this and then you're also quoting from the gospel of john where jesus says he's the one who resurrects people Before abraham was iam Thomas says to my lord and my god Every scholar accepts including bart ermann for example that jesus is definitely claiming to be god in this gospel So it's a very odd argument jesus is of course avoiding getting stoned But he often goes back and reiterates that he's got for example after this when he says is written You are called gods. He's quoting psalm 82 He then says do you say of him whom the father consecrated and sent into the world? You are blaspheming because I say I am the son of god If I am not doing the works of my father, then do not believe me if I am Do if I do do them even though you do not believe me believe the works that you may know and understand that the father Is in me and I am in the father again They sought to arrest him because but he escaped it from their hands. So again, jesus once again reiterates his divinity and Quality with the father there in terms of ontology. He's again saying once again But no, no, I am very unique. I have a special relationship with the father and I am in him He is in me this kind of language I I don't know where you're coming from on this because again you can find example after example of jesus doing this Where he's accepting worship claiming to be the son of man this guy who's receiving a kingdom in worship There's a lot of the examples like this So I I just want to clarify with you. Are you referring to luke 24 50 to 52? Yeah, that's where it's disciples worship him Okay, right now. This is also the event of the ascension. I presume you're referring to Yes, while he was speaking words of love and blessing He floated off the ground into the sky ascending into heaven before their very eyes and all they could do was worship him Overwhelmed and ecstatic with joy. They made their way back to Jerusalem. Is that the quote you're referring to? And they worshiped him in return to Jerusalem of great joy. Yeah verse 52 Are you not aware that this is not in the earliest editions of luke? Are you not aware that this is a are you not aware that this is a well-known Addition to the gospels what manuscript show it's an addition. Well, people can look it up themselves It's a well-known addition. There has never been a man. There's never been a manuscript found without this section the ascension of jesus is well known to have been added as a Later interpolation of the bible and it is not to be found in the earliest editions of the bible And this is this is a well-known fact So i'm quite surprised that you would use that and it's extraordinary that you have to you have Have reverted instead of showing an event during actual jesus's gospel ministry Where they worship him the question we really have to answer for us Is where in the gospel ministry did jesus ever Solicit what if he is literally the equal partner of the father we have to ask herself a simple question Why wasn't there at least 50 50 of them worshiping the father and worshiping jesus? Why weren't their instances recorded in the gospels where he's sitting on a chair and all the disciples are bowing down before him?  How shall I enter the kingdom heaven? He says Why you call me good? There's none good, but god now I know the christian interpretation of this which is that don't you realize that i'm god Therefore, I must be in actual fact the best But that's not what he says.  That's a that's defining yourself as different.  There are multiple statements. Exodus 15 says god is a man You can you can quote paul all you want in acts, but that's a relevant. I said exodus I said exodus exodus 15 says god is a man of war That's that's that's fine But you want it but I doesn't have no relevance to what i'm actually saying It's very clearly stated in the bible in multiple multiple places and people can look it up for themselves That the old testament says that god does not die And I think that that's probably the elephant in the room You say that the proof of jesus being god is that one he said I am again. I'm not sure how that Is proof of anything when it was put to him. Are you god?  He wasn't the son of man. He was born of a virgin So in actual fact the son of god was also also a metaphor and in fact if you look at every single instance Where it is reported that he said I will die and be raised on the third day. He never says the son of god He says the son of man will be raised on the third day and that indicates that he didn't want people to misunderstand him That he was an actual fact prophesying that he was god. He was saying that I'm a man. I'm a human being Okay, with regards to your claim that it's a fact that luke was added to That's just nonsense. We've never found a manuscript a complete one that has luke in it that has that section missing It's always there. This is a reconstruction that some scholars have put forward which there is no evidence for Okay, jesus did call himself the son of man, matthew 8 20 matthew 9 6 matthew 10 23 matthew 11 19 he says Directly that he is the son of man multiple times in matthew 16 He affirms that he is the christ and we know this is a reference again to that same divine figure That is also called the son of man. So over and over again Jesus confirms again that he is the son of man. I'm not sure where you're getting this from and again All of this is irrelevant to the main topic because even if all of this is wrong Jesus still died on the cross as just a human as every single scholar today basically accepts So even if all this is wrong and jesus didn't rise from the dead Jesus didn't actually claim to be god. It doesn't matter. He's still down on the cross. The evidence overwhelmingly confirms that That's why even atheist scholars today confirm that beger lutamon says it's Indisputable. So even if all of this stuff is you're right about doesn't matter because I could cite atheist scholars It would probably agree with you on the on the luke issue, but they would still say jesus died on the cross So i'm not sure how this helps support your point at all So the son of man, uh, just want to check you. Are you finished to the point? Yeah So i'm not saying at all that he didn't call himself the son of man I fully agree. He did call himself the son of man. What i'm saying is he was born on the virgin So he wasn't the son of a man, but that's not what that means That's a specific phrase. That's a specific title We find in daniel seven a figure coming who like one of a son of man who's given a kingdom in divine power And worship forever. It's a specific reference to daniel seven.  No son of god is also son of god is a Metaphorical title for messiah in most cases right? So there is no therefore evidence that he was an actual fact god because he himself gave you evidence No, you didn't you said he said i am that's not evidence of anything I gave you matthew 715. I gave you the references about worship. I gave you john a I could say mark one So the references of worship are weak as i pointed out The you have one word which you then ascribe as evidence after in a passage Which is extraordinarily dubious and which has been touted by scholars a clear example of interpolation and loop But that's beside the point. I want to get back to the main point here, which is about the crucifixion And the main point I want to emphasize is is two things. So the lord's prayer, you know, again I want to kind of mention this as well, which is that Forgive us those figure as trespasses those who forgive against us You know as though as we forgive those who trespass against us That's not the nature of what's happening in this particular incident What's happening in this particular incident is a man being tortured to death That is not what happens when you forgive somebody. You don't feel like you're being tortured to death And the prodigal son story demonstrates that very aptly actually The father's full of joy other people have shame and issue with it, but he doesn't The the second point I want to make and come back to is again this kind of Point which is that the only reason you entertain The hypothesis of resurrection is because you believe in his divinity a priori But if you take that out of the equation, can you can I put it to you? Can I ask you this question? If we're talking about a bloke called Jim Who you see on the street after and hanging who has the marks of hanging on him Would you entertain resurrection as a hypothesis for him? Right when he has or would you think oh, this guy has an actual fact survives? I put it to you if he said I'll give you a chance to respond to his question And I just want to let you know we have to once Mike does finish We got to go to the q&a is we're actually just slightly over the open dialogue time Okay. Yeah, I would remind people that we're on the whole atoman issue. Check out my video the absurdity of christianity You can also read works by scholars like NT Wright and William Lane Craig on penal substitution and how this all plays out So there's scholarly works on that which are irrelevant to the debate If some guy named Jim said he died and rose from the dead and I saw his dead body Yes, I would entertain that as a possibility because like you I believe in God and I believe miracles are possible That doesn't mean I would fully believe it. There'd be other evidences And there's other evidence we use for the resurrection like the disciples willing to be persecuted and suffer their immediate proclamation in Jerusalem The fact that they wouldn't invent things like the women discovering a tomb and other things as well So yes, I would entertain that that doesn't mean for Jim I would believe he resurrected because I have to look at the specific evidence for that case And when it comes to Jesus, it's far more likely that he rose from the dead than that he survived the crucifixion But all that's irrelevant to the main point at the end of the day the evidence still demonstrates Jesus died Regardless of what happened after regardless of what he claimed about himself if he did claim He was God or not the even atheist scholars accept that and some of them don't think he did all those other things So keep that in mind. It's irrelevant to the main point. They may not have seen this debate though. They may change that view I have to jump into the closing statement So we're going to give each of our guests five minutes for their concluding statement to draw together the threads from this debate So we'll start with as we started earlier with mike And then we'll go to to hear for the final word in his five minute closing statement as well. Mike. The floor is all yours Well, yeah, thank you for that. I appreciate the debate. I thought I went well Uh, again, I'm not convinced at all that the swimming theory is the most likely explanation Especially after this debate the medical evidence from uh, medical experts who've actually examined the gospel who worked on dead bodies We'll say yes, Jesus died new testament scholars say this the the overwhelming consensus Is that jesus died on the cross and my opponent says that maybe i'm uh, you know, uh, Assuming a priori that jesus didn't that jesus was god or that jesus resurrected I can say the same thing to him. He only assumes the swoon theory because it's what the aqua d founder There's a gullamachman taught So I how do we not know that's not him. It's just his bias. He's coming with this a priority He's got to defend it and force the evidence to fit And unfortunately we see that he'll quote half of luke 24 but ignore the very verses right after that He'll quote the verses where luke where luke says jesus was eating a fish But ignore the verses right after that where jesus says he rose from the dead He'll quote acts 21 but ignore where james says he agrees with paul about gentiles He'll verse 25 of those kind of issues. So again, what does the actual evidence show? Okay, unless we the If we cherry pick the gospels you can make it fit the swoon theory but We can't do that. We got to go on what the actual first sensory evidence actually Tells us he cited the koran numerous times. That's just a not a reliable source and even if he is right The scholar khalil andani who's a is mali scholar has argued that the koran actually teaches jesus down the cross from places like Surah three So i'm not at all convinced that that's even the proper way to interpret I think khalil andani actually gives it a very good interpretation of this And so I would probably feel more likely to think that again regarding back to um Uh, let's see here the sign of jonah issue again once again That it this does not say I will be alive like jonah and I don't even think jonah did live It says that he will be gone for the same period of time Just as jonah was in the belly of the great fish for three days So shall the son of man be in the heart of the earth for three days That is the comparison right there. It is not just as jonah survived I'll survive too the comparison is always to the demo teeth So you got to keep that in mind At the end of the day the evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates jesus died on the cross When the spear went into his side forever juga v says this is not evidence that jesus was alive Blood and water coming out would be a natural result from a dead body someone who suffered severe beatings Traumatic shock and the blood would not be able to clot So we should expect this again early church fathers agreed that this this wouldn't happen naturally But modern medical experts say that no this is basically what happened The overwhelming evidence confirms over and over again that jesus died We didn't get much into this in the open discussion, which I was a little disappointed about I wanted to talk more about the medical research We ended up talking more about theology, which is fine. But again There's no debate when it comes to the medical research here on what actually the gospels record and what jesus says about himself He says he died Achmedes want to claim that jesus said he would not die, but they will ignore quote after quote from jesus Matthew 17 They they were gathering in galley.   That's a satanic idea So when muslims claim that jesus didn't die christians immediately think of that passage So you got to keep that in mind as well and again, this doesn't make sense from an historical standpoint You're telling me that jesus said he died and rose his followers said he died and rose all their first century sources say he died and rose then centuries later Someone comes along and says no no he actually survived That that is the definition of post-hoc reasoning. I'm either being accused of post-hoc reasoning That's the very definition of it. There's no evidence of this and again the akhmini founder physical akhmini was heavily critiqued By actual scholars in in this field again to name a few here per beskov strange tales about jesus gunter brunbold jesus in india His a lot of his ideas about that tomb not supported by the data not taken serious by archaeologists jesus died in jerusalem and if his followers saw him walking around Then he rose from the dead It would take nothing short of a miracle and no one reported that he was miraculously survived So i'm going on what the text actually say But my opponent unfortunately is cherry picking lines out of the gospels that fit the conclusion he wants And then reading that back into the first century But not going what the text say one of us is following the text one of us is saying well the founder of my movement said this I got to make the data fit it. Let me find pieces in cherry pick So unfortunately, I do appreciate to hear. I think this was a great conversation. I don't mean any ill will I appreciate the back and forth. I think you're a really nice person and I appreciate that time We'll get over to here for his five minute closing as well And then folks as I mentioned we'll have the q&a immediately after if you happen to have a question You can still submit although I gotta tell you we had to hear what time is it there where you are? Oh, don't worry. I'm a late sleeper man Okay, good because we've got a good amount of questions already folks But if you want to submit you can submit more and with that we're going to kick it over to to hear for his five minute closing as well So again, Michael, I fully agree with you. No hard feelings whatsoever. I'm feel like I've really enjoyed this conversation with you And I really thank you for engaging with me um And with the truest arm uk channel, which is the channel I'm representing Um, so please go away everybody and have a look at that truest arm uk Um, so first of all there's no akhmedi bias here You will notice that I didn't actually once quote anything from the writings of the founder of the akhmedi muslin community And I did not draw any arguments from the quran in actual fact What I did was I demonstrated that the quranic narrative Fitted an existing narrative that an actual fact is found clearly in the events of the gospels So I never based any of my arguments to be absolutely clear on the quran or on hasim ariz al-ghalam ahmed The founder of the akhmedi muslin community or on any statements of the prok Muhammad psp upon him either He has statements which also support the spoon theory So I don't have bias on the contrary I would say in actual fact that it's you who unfortunately has the bias because they can't actually be evidence for resurrection Okay, there can never be evidence for resurrection because nobody is able to Perceive into the next life to see that somebody has died and then come back to death come back to life All there can be is evidence for a person um Appearing to die and then walking around afterwards and that in and of itself does not prove resurrection because as I've demonstrated And as I've gone through that in actual fact supports The idea of a person surviving much more strongly because you and I both know that if you see somebody post hanging With the necessities of his human body That's quite evidently the greatest proof that the person in actual fact survived And the only reason you would go to a resurrection hypothesis is because you have a religious bias You see you're looking at the gospels as a christian as a person who believes the divinity of christ I'm looking at the gospels as a historical text where words have been known to have been changed over time Where words have been been inserted where there was a contradiction in the early followers between paul and james When james confronted paul and said why are you teaching the jews all places? Not to follow the the law of moses and where he publicly repented and you have to ask yourself the question If he hadn't done anything wrong if there was no disagreement between james and paul Why is it that paul then publicly repented shaved his head and stayed in the temple for three days? And why were the jews from asia who had believed in jesus so upset that they mobbed him and nearly killed him Requiring the romans to in actual fact step in and save his life So this all completely goes against your idea and your your theory that this was a settled narrative early in the christian Doctrine and i want to emphasize this point that we believe that the survival of jesus from the death on the cross in Fulfillment of his prayer in the garden of gethsema