Andrew Schulz's Flagrant with Akaash Singh - Oxford Atheist: “Jesus Christ Never Claimed He Was God”

Episode Date: August 25, 2025

YERRR – Alex O’Connor is back and we’re diving deep into Jesus, the Gospels, and the wild early days of Christianity. Was Jesus actually God? Did he have siblings? What’s up with Mormonism, Gnostic gospels, and Revelations? Alex breaks it all down. All that and more on this week’s episode of FLAGRANT. INDULGE. 0:00 Intro 00:25 Utility of religion 4:35 The Gospels 7:51 John the Baptist was real 14:48 John the Baptist’s role 20:14 Mormonism + Origins 31:29 Joseph Smith Jr. martyrdom 33:48 Expecting the Messiah + Jesus was about the action 35:27 Jesus never claimed to be God 50:36 Was Jesus worshipped? 1:00:57 Revelations is wild + Islam’s interpretation 1:06:31 Oral vs written traditions 1:10:13 The historical context + Speculation 1:12:34 John and Jesus are cousins + Preaching 1:16:41 Why did Christology arise? 1:20:19 Gospel of Judas & Thomas + Gnostics 1:27:00 Jesus had siblings + Miracle worker 1:34:36 Gospel of Thomas ending is wild 1:35:45 Wesley Huff has made blunders Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As promised, here is part two of our episode of Alex O'Connor. It's a big one. We're going to talk about Jesus and whether he even claimed to be the Messiah, and maybe it was John the Baptist. We're also going to talk about Mormons. You guys think they're weird. They might be right. Alex O'Connor is going to tell us why, and last, and probably least, but the most fun,

he's going to talk shit about our boy Wes Huff. There's some Bible beef going on. Let's see what's happening. Religion is my real thing, yeah. That's why I'm specifically asking. So I'm aware that you must have had tons of. conversation with people and they've broken down like what they feel their personal benefit from it is. Have you in your studies, like, have you read any stories that warmed your heart

to be cliche and made you go, oh, I understand the societal utility for this? Yes, there are things that hurt people and ostracize people, and that is bad, but is there like a version where you're like there is a net good for the individual? I had to debate the other day with the Christian who tried to kill his dad with a hammer. He just, like, attacked his dad. He's caved in his dad's skull with a hammer. What? Wow.

And now he's a Christian and he's totally fine. So he's like a... What was his dad doing? I can't remember, but I think, I think so this guy, he's like a sociopath or a psychopath, one or the other. Like, he's like an actual sociopath or psychopath. So I don't know if, like, there was anything particular or if he just did it for, you know, good time's sake or whatever, but for some reason, he like, he, he, like, he does.

did that and then he became a Christian and he still is like he still like has that that same brain but Christianity as far as I know this is his understanding is that Christianity has given him like this framework to abide by so that even though he's a sociopath he just he doesn't engage in that kind of stuff anyway so so yeah I mean those kinds of people exist there are also people who like I just I remember distinctly when I was when I was younger when I first started thinking about religion the first time I tried to write a book, I wanted to open it with this little story just because it happened fairly recently at the time. I was like a teenager. I just moved into a new sort of area and we went

to our local Catholic church and it was like Easter Sunday or something and there weren't very many people there. I just remember sitting down and there was this old woman on her own, just sat on this pew and she just like came up to me and went like, crap. I was like, I hope that you and your family have a very, very happy Easter. And I thought, man, And so I don't want her to become an atheist. Yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? She's on her own.

She's here in church. She's probably here every single week. And I don't think she'd become unkind or something, but I just think it would be soul-crushing. And so, of course. So how do you grapple with that? By being violently agnostic. Agnostic meaning you don't know.

So atheist is like, religion is dumb. There is no God. You don't need to think the religion. You can be an atheist who doesn't believe it's true. but still think that it's beneficial. There's societal utility to religion. Got it, got it. So the agnosticism allows you to what?

Allows me to not feel a duty in being honest to tell that old lady that I think she's wrong. Because she might not be wrong. She might be totally right, you know. As I like to say, I will die on this fence. I will happily just say that, like, look, if you think that God exists because of this reason or that reason, I'll say, I think that's bullshit and I don't think that works. But I can't say that the conclusion itself is true or false, right? Like, if you think that the Gospels are 100% historically reliable, I'll say, I think you're wrong.

I think that's just not true. Right. If you say you think Christianity is true, I'd be like, okay, maybe it is, you know? But tell me why you think that, and we'll get into the weeds. And does it matter why? It does, because, I mean, it doesn't on the level of, like, society or whatever, like, if you're a Christian because your parents were Christian and... Or what about us being... emotivists well emotivism is about ethics so it's about what you think is right or wrong oh okay

we're talking here about like what's just true and false oh yeah some people i've tried to apply emotivism to that in the path but it gets a bit complicated but but they're sort of there's ethical emotivism which is got just a linguistic claim about what good and bad mean which is like expression of emotion and this is just about what you think is true and false you know and most of my interest at the moment lies in New Testament studies and digging into the New Testament and a lot of people just don't know what's in there. They've just got no clue. Can you talk to us like we've never heard a single thing about Christianity? So the Gospels.

So there are four Gospels. Gagelion in Greek just means good news. Okay. So the beginning of the Gospel of Mark says the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the beginning of the good news about Jesus Christ. So these are the stories of Jesus Christ. And it's good news. It's just people saying, like, good news. I've got some good news to share with you.

And there are four Gospels in the Bible, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The Mark is probably the earliest, written around 70 AD. So 40 years after Jesus died. Yep. And you've got Matthew and Luke, which are written 10, 15 years after that. And John's Gospel, which is written 10 to maybe like 10, 15 years after that still. All of that is disputed. You know, dating is a very, very difficult thing to do.

And they all tell stories about the things that Jesus said and did. three of those gospels rely heavily on each other they're all interconnected they're called the synoptic gospels Matthew Mark and Luke John's gospel is like on its own it seems to have its own sources its own independent faith yeah got it

time lines a little fuzzy so what you've actually got is the Bible but Bible just means like library so we get like Biblio anything you know Bibio it's just just it means like book or library or something like that and so it's a library of books it's lots of books so when somebody says oh that's just because the Bible says that

the Bible is a collection of texts So you have to refer to which text is saying that? Yeah, but also it means that if you've got four different texts, which all say the same thing, you haven't just got, oh, it's just the Bible that says that. It's like, no, you've got four independent accounts which all say the same thing. So there's a lot more like evidence of history in the Gospels and people give them credit for. So there are some stories that only appear in one of the Gospels and none of the others. They might have happened. We don't know.

But if you've got stories that are independently attested in every single one of them, especially if you've got other reasons to think that they wouldn't be made up, it's a good reason to think that they're. historically true. Now, you said real quick, the synaptic. Synoptic. So synoptic gospels rely on each other. Yep. So does that mean that like one thing could have been written in one and then kind of paraphrase and Mark's gospel is the shortest and most people think it came first? Around 95% or so of Mark's gospel is also in Matthew and Luke, like word for word. And then Matthew and Luke add extra stuff. But do you work off of Marx, for example? I prefer to work off marks when I'm looking at the historical Jesus because it's the earliest report. The earliest thing in the New Testament is actually Paul's letters. You've heard about like 1st Corinthians and Ephesians and these kinds of things. These are letters

that Paul writes to various churches. And these are actually the earliest sources. And what year is that? Again, it's disputed, but probably around like 50 AD, something like that. So 50 years after the death of Christ, 20 years after the death of Christ. Sorry, sorry. Right, right, because it's 33. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, got it. So he's like, listen, these things happens. I'm going to tell you Exactly. But Paul is not writing a biography of Jesus. Paul is writing letters to churches telling them how to organize themselves, what the theology should be, all of this kind of stuff. It's only later that you get these biographies. So you've also got different genres in the New Testament. The Gospels are biographies that tell the life and times of Jesus. Paul is writing letters to people. You've got revelation, which is this apocalyptic vision that John of Patmos has and writes all about it. But the Gospels are most interesting to me because you've got these four different accounts. And sometimes they subtly differ. from each other and you figure out what you can learn about these different things so like you know who john the baptist is i've heard the name but what is he so a lot of people have heard of him but don't know anything about him john the baptizes jesus and it's at the beginning of all four of the

gospels this is something that they wouldn't make up because if you're if you're writing a story about jesus and you're trying to present this man as the son of god maybe god himself it makes very little sense for him to be baptized by another known preacher and so the fact that they all included it means that it must be something that actually happened. Right. So we have this historical fact about John the Baptist, which is kind of interesting now. Because you're saying people at the time would refute it because this is written at a time where John the Baptist could potentially still be alive.

Yeah, so it would have been around, but also like they wouldn't have made it up. If it didn't, if it didn't happen, they wouldn't like make it up. It's called the sometimes called like the criterion of embarrassment. Yeah. If you include something that's kind of embarrassing or doesn't look good for you, right off the entire. It's like in Matthew's Gospel at the end of, when Jesus appears to his, His disciples, Matthew's Gospel says that the 12 disciples saw him and they worshipped, but some of

them doubted, which is like not something that the author would make up. That's even more believable. Exactly. That's really sophisticated storytelling. Like, if I was to lie, I would write that in. Yeah, that's the thing. But you wouldn't want people to think. If you're trying to present Jesus as the son of God, this is him, you wouldn't make up

a story that some of his closest disciples doubted that. Or entering Jerusalem on a donkey, like having this sort of, I guess, like, low status entrance for a Messiah. The Gophis do actually want to paint Jesus as like, as like this humble servant. And the entering in on the donkey is a callback to an Old Testament prophecy about, like, about riding in on a donkey. So that could be made up. It could either, you could read that as like it's either made up to try and fit Jesus within, like, the Old Testament. and it's made up sorry for that reason or you could say that Jesus did actually do it but that he did it knowing that he was he's doing a callback but the they're calling him the son

of David but there are also other reasons why people might dispute things so for example riding into town into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey and there's people lining the streets hosanna in the highest a lot of people think that if this event actually occurred Jesus would have just been arrested like in an instant a lot of people just are just like there's no way this could have happened historically just because Jesus would have been arrested. Like the Romans would have been like what on earth is going on here. This man is like being worshipped. He needs to be arrested.

So there are all kinds of ways you can try and figure out whether these stories actually happened or whether they didn't. And I find them all extremely interesting. And they can also tell us about the communities at the time. So John's Gospel. Sorry, into real quick. About coming back in on a donkey, isn't that like the least attention-seeking version of coming back in?

Like if you rolled back in on like a white horse, then maybe people go, yo, Jesus is back. But if you come back in humbly on the donkey, maybe nobody even noticed. All the celebrations, I think, is saying. Yes, the celebration as he was coming back in. As he's coming in, like, people are lining the streets. And the fact that it means something to the high priest of Jerusalem. Yeah, they'll... Got it.

Okay. He's doing it on a feast day, I'm sure. So he's making a celebration. This is like the Yankees win the World Series. This is the parade. Yes. It's around the time of the past. And your observation on that is that that would not be smart given how much hysteria would cause

and it would put him in a particular... Yeah, I mean, it's... But Jesus, was no stranger to doing things which aren't smart like he was happy to put himself in danger but it's more like it probably didn't happen because that's probably when he would have been arrested got it and he doesn't get arrested he doesn't get arrested there no therefore that might not have happened yeah that's that's one reason to think that it might not have happened but you were you were saying something i think about mark and then we got so john

john the baptist is mentioned at the beginning of all of the gospels and john's gospel in particular it opens by really emphasizing that john the baptist is not the messiah it opens saying like there was a man called John and he was not himself the light he was making way for the light and then people come up to John the Baptist and they say are you the Messiah and he says no I'm not the Messiah and he's saying and and there's this real emphasis like the author of John's Gospel is telling us John the Baptist is not the Messiah what does that mean it gives us a clue that there were people at the time of the writing of John's Gospel who thought that John the Baptist was the Messiah and John the Baptist is a really important figure in Christianity Jesus in the

Gospels, calls him the greatest man ever born of a woman, is John the Baptist. He had to leave a little... Yeah, yeah, yeah. He'll leave a little for him, that's fire. But a lot of Christians say, like, oh, well, obviously, Jesus was excluding himself there. And you would say that as a Christian, but for me, I'm reading that, I'm not really sure about that, because I think Jesus was a disciple of John the Baptist. I think that's who Jesus historically was.

John the Baptist is preaching. All the Gospels say, if you read, like, Mark's Gospel, which is the earliest, let's look at the earliest source, you know, it will say, right there in the very, and the very earlier source that John the Baptist is in the wilderness preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. What does that mean? No one really knows. But we know that he's doing some kind of water ritual for people of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. That's obviously something that Jesus picks up with the whole forgiveness of sins thing, right? But Christians will say, well, yeah, I mean, he didn't have the authority to forgive people's sins.

He was just announcing the forgiveness of sins. Like priests would often do this. They would say to people, your sins are forgiven. They're not forgiven. Was John the Baptist a rabbi at the time? He was like a preacher in the wilderness. He was probably, he was like the son of a priest. Was he religious? Yes, so he would have been Jewish. So he's, okay.

But there's some, like we don't actually know very much about him is the thing. But we know from Luke's gospel, although. When I hear priest, I think Christianity, rabbi. But this is pre-Christianity. That's what I'm saying. So he would be a rabbi or some form of religious scholar. Like a spirit, no, as in the father would have been like a spirit. John the Baptist. John the Baptist would have, yeah, just a, yeah, just a spiritual wonder.

Yeah, a guru. A rebel to the synagogue? Yes, so this is what often people think. Guys, toward dates, this weekend, I'm going to be in Cincinnati, Ohio, Liberty Township, specifically. I'm going to be there Thursday through Friday at the Funny Bone. Then, September 11th through the 13th, I'm going to be in Donia Beach, Florida. That is far from any who wants to blow up Florida. What kind of person would do such a thing? So it's a safe show to come through, be there.

September 25th and 27th, I'm rounding out my Ohio tour in Cleveland. October 5th, Dubai, hurry up and buy those tickets. They're selling out. We might have to move to a bigger venue or figure something out, but right now we're about to sell out. And then all those dates and more, Akash Singh.com. We got big things getting announced soon, guys. Big things.

Also, Mark has tour dates. You can suck his dick in Montreal, Toronto, or Detroit. Those dates respectively are August 22nd, August 23rd, and December 6th. Why is there such a big gap? I don't know. Tour bookers, get your shit together. Comedy clubs, get your shit together. This guy got free open months.

What is that? September, October, November, book the man. Mark Gagnon Live.com. So John the Baptist is described as wearing camel skin and eating locusts and honey, and he lives in the wilderness. Like, he's this ascetic outcast. And there are all kinds of reasons why that could be the case. There's a book by a scholar called John McGrath who talks about John the Baptist. and he thinks it might have something to do with some conflict with his priestly father

and ending up like running out into the wilderness. But John is preaching this philosophy. And it's just that all of Judea were coming to him. He's this extremely popular Jewish preacher. And people are coming to him and he's baptizing them for the repentance of sins. And then Jesus comes along. And John is saying there's one coming who's greater than I. And I'm not worthy to untie his sandal strap.

And then Jesus shows up and he's like, oh, here he is. This is the guy. and then he baptizes Jesus and the heavens open up and God says this is my son with whom I'm well pleased and that's the start of Jesus's ministry. So that's the Christian version that you get in the Gospels. That's going to be history mixed with myth. In my view, Jesus was a follower of John the Baptist because all the Gospels report that he was baptized by him, which they wouldn't make up. And you've constantly got these ideas of Jesus saying like, Jesus talks about how the greatest students will one day come to surpass their teachers and Jesus is. Jesus is a lot of Jesus.

talking about this? Jesus is saying this to his disciples, and he also at one point says to his disciples that they will do greater things than I. So you will do even greater things than I. Sort of implying that there's some kind of baton to be passed on. Now, Christians will dispute this. They won't like this at all, because Jesus is the guy. But I'm thinking historically, it seems like anything that Jesus does, which he seems to get from the father, he is willing to give to his disciples. So in John chapter 20, verses like 21 onwards, Jesus says to his disciples after he's written from the dead. As the Father has sent me, I'm sending you.

And he breathes on them, says, receive the Holy Spirit. If you go and forgive anyone's sins, they're forgiven. If you do not forgive them, then their sins are retained. So Jesus seems to give the disciples the ability to forgive sins. And he does it by breathing the spirit on them. At the baptism, John the Baptist, who's preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,

baptizes Jesus. And what happens? The spirit comes into Jesus at the baptism. And so it seems like there is this analog between what's happening to Jesus. and what Jesus is then giving to his disciples. Like vampires. Now, yeah, why not? If you speak to a Christian, they're going to come in and they're going to be like, Alex

doesn't know what he's talking about, like this is all not. But like, I understand that that's not the Christian interpretation, but this is how I'm reading these things. You're analyzing it from historical record. Yeah, but also like even like if you're looking at the historical Jesus, this is a particular viewpoint. It's not like a given. This is just my understanding, but it's worth pointing out that this is something that

people need to sort of realize there are lots of different views on. even within the Gospels. Yeah, yeah, because the Gospels were saying all kinds of different stuff, and they give us all kinds of different clues into interesting facts about Jesus. Can I just one question about John the Baptist real quick? You said he was popular at the time. Yeah, extremely. Is there, like, writings about him specifically?

Is there historical account? Like, how popular? Hundreds of people, thousands of people? Well, the Gospels say all of Judea was coming to him, which is obviously an exaggeration, but it means, like, lots and lots of people. Also, when Herod Antipas, King of Judea, Like first hears about Jesus. This is again in the Gospels.

He hears about this guy Jesus who's going around causing a ruckus. And he says, this is John the Baptist resurrected. Because John the Baptist gets beheaded in the Gospels, by the way. And so who must John the Baptist have been that when he hears about Jesus? He goes, oh, that's another John the Baptist. John the Baptist must have been doing something like crazy. It must have been a nuisance. Are there any texts about John the Baptist, kind of?

There is a Gnostic group called the Mandaians who still exist today in small numbers. and they believe that John the Baptist is their last and most important prophet. They think Jesus is a false prophet, and John the Baptist is like their central figure. They historically claim to be part of the original following of John the Baptist. Anthropologically, that's probably not the case. Most of them were living in Iraq until the Iraq War, and now their numbers have completely dwindled. These guys have their own literature. You can read it online.

It's the Mandayan Book of John. and they retell the story of the baptism. So Jesus comes to John the Baptist and they have a bit of an argument and John the Baptist doesn't want to baptize Jesus, not because he's unworthy but because he knows that Jesus is going to be trouble. He's like, no, and they have an argument about it

and he has a go at him. He starts saying that you've loosened the Sabbath and you've brought disgrace to these people and you've like upset the Jews or like disgrace the Jews or something like this. And they have essentially a bit of a debate. He doesn't want to baptize him. now is this a historical source like probably not but it tells us something that people believe

which is which is this view of who john the baptist was and that jesus was a false preacher and sort of one of his followers gone awry i find that really interesting right because the most interesting things for me john's a rebel and then the next dude is even more of a rebel i know that jesus is definitely a rebel right i mean why wouldn't john the baptists have uh apostles or people that would be martyred in that way because so g so firstly he did have like followers He does have disciples, I think Jesus was one of them. But also even in the Gospels, two of Jesus' disciples are sort of poached from John the Baptist. So two of Jesus' disciples were originally following John the Baptist.

Yeah, and in fact, it's at the baptism that John says, like, this is the man, like, go and follow, and then they go and follow Jesus. Isn't this, I don't want to say it's every religion, but like, isn't the same thing happened kind of with Mormonism where you got, who's the main guy? Joseph Smith. Joseph goes, hey, we got to do this, and then he even dies before they get to Salt Lake City. but the next guy takes it. By the way, Scientology is in it? Do you know who the first ever U.S. presidential candidate to be assassinated while running for office was? While running for office?

While running for office? It was Joseph Smith, founded with a Mormon religion. He was running for president at the time. While he was traveling out to Salt Lake City. That's right. So they were sort of constant. Mormons might be on to something. Mormonism is.

I don't want to get us to distract. No, it's absolutely fascinating, man, because, like, it's such a wacky story. Like, the history, and because it's relatively recent, it's like 1800s. Like, there's more records. Like, we know certain things happen. So we know that Joseph Smith claims to receive these golden plates. He's told by the angel Moronai, go and dig up these golden plates. The golden plates exist because in ancient Israel, just before the Babylonian captivity,

some Jews and Israelites were warned. And so they fled and they built boats and they sailed to America. Jersey. And they had entire civilizations. The Garden of Eden was in Jackson County, Missouri, by the way. They have an entire civilization. They were like, I'm talking like Lord of the Rings, like battles and wars and societies and all this kind of stuff. And then the very last person, the very last, the very last Nephite, I think.

I might be getting some of this wrong. I think this is actually the son of Mormon, but Mormon's the one who, like, puts it all together. So sort of writes down the record of his people on these golden plates and buries them. Got it. Because he's the last of his kind. And then Joseph Smith is in upstate New York. and God says to him, hey man, like, go and find these plates. So Joseph Smith has these plates, and they're written in something which is called Reformed hieroglyphics.

So they look a bit like Egyptian hieroglyphics. And Joseph Smith can miraculously translate them. And the way that he does it is not by looking at the plates, puts the plates aside. He takes his hat. He takes a special kind of stone called a seer stone. He puts the sea of stone in the hat. He puts his head into the hat. And the stone starts glowing and translating what's on the golden plates.

And he starts dictating. He starts saying it out loud. God it. Someone starts writing it. Fire. And he's the only one who can see it. He's the only one that can see the translation. There are...

He's the only one that's glowing. Yeah, yeah, because he's got his head in the hat, right? Yeah. And you can see that they have the same... He never showed anyone the golden plates. There are, there are something like 11, maybe 13 witnesses to the golden plates. Oh, there are. Actually, if you read the book of Mormon, it opens with the testimony of the 13 witnesses

to the golden plates. Apart from that, nobody saw them. But the funny thing is, it sounds really wacky, but what I love about what Mormons can do is they go to Christians and Christians are like this is the most ridiculous false prophet nonsense whatever and they're like oh really so how many um how many eyewitness testimony written accounts you have to the resurrection oh oh you've got none you've just got a few second-hand account oh because we've got we've got 13 eyewitness signed like affidavit like written down testimonies of people who are still alive and were questioned by like the press yeah about it

and like even one of the guys who like one of the guys who who who swore that he sort of the golden plates later falls out with joseph smith is kicked out of the mormon church but he still says he saw the place he said i love it now there's some debate about this because one of them sort of says well he saw them with his spiritual eyes which kind of means it might have been a vision but then there are he's asked about that and he says look gentlemen look at your hands as truly as you see your hands i saw those plates right so there's all of this going on right so joseph smith then like found this this religion off the of the basis of it and they don't like being called mormons because Mormon is the name of one of the, I think he's, I guess he's a prophet, but he's like the guy

that collates the book of Mormon. They are members of the church of Jesus Christ, Islamist or something. Yeah, or like calling them a Mohammedian, probably, is more similar, which is what they used to call Muslims, because they sort of misunderstands what they were all about. And, but yeah, like, they sort of flip and flop about whether it's okay to call the Mormons, because it's a bit clunky to say member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Islamists. Of course, all Latter-day Saint, right? But so Joseph Smith, they're sort of, they're setting up communities and they're trying to find

somewhere to like set up their community so they're traveling around the united states and when they get to missouri they call such a problem in missouri that there is something called i think it's called the like the missouri executive order 45 or something otherwise known as like the mormon extermination order which which is where the governor of missouri based on some like inflated reports about what the mormons were doing gets so like worried and paranoid about them that he issues an order to exterminate Mormons to drive them out of the land by force, which basically means that you could just, like, kill Mormons.

You'd just like go Mormon hunting because he wanted them gone. They were causing such a problem. Like, in the United States, there was a law passed, an executive order that said we're just going to kill Mormons and drive them out of our land. Kill white people. I know. Which is like... Yeah, that's not shocking for me.

That's light word, right? It's just like... The worst thing America did. You could tell. Like 1800, it was crazy. You wouldn't believe. It's just wild. Don't take us too far away from Jesus.

I want to... Oh, sure. Okay, but yeah, we can definitely get back to Jesus. But Joseph Smith eventually... So part of the... When he decides to run for president, part of his running campaign is that he wants to annex Texas because he wants to make Texas like the land for the Mormon people.

So that's part of his thing. And eventually... So you know Mormons are into like polygamy? Yeah, they were. Now, if you're a polygamist, you can't be a Mormon. Like, it's anathema to them. In like the 1980s or something, they finally said it's not right. But they got, one of the problems, the reasons they got in so much trouble with the U.S. government was because they had multiple wives. And that was, that was seen as totally wrong. And so Joseph Smith is now, I can't remember which state he's in when he actually, when he actually dies. I think it might be, it might be Illinois, but I'm not sure about that. I think he dies in Illinois. Missouri is like the third spot they end up, correct? Yeah, they've sort of been all over the place and I think Illinois is where he gets is where he gets killed. You just Google that.

Yeah, yeah, I mean, okay, great. They just get getting kicked out of places? Yeah, they're getting kicked out. They're like Christian Jews. Yeah, seriously, but this is the thing. So Mormons will point out that they have a history of like persecution and people sort of don't know about this, you know. It's quite amazing because I debate Christians quite a lot

and they talk about how amazing it was that Christianity grew from just a small group of people to taking over the Roman Empire. And I'm like, the sociologist Rodney Stark calculated that in the first like two or three hundred years, I think, after the birth of Christianity, the growth rate that they experience is exactly the same as the Mormon church. And then people say, yeah, but they were being persecuted by the Roman Empire. I'm like, have you heard of the Missouri extermination? All right, guys, we're going to take a break for a second.

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episode. I remember coming back, we're in Miami. I went back home. I woke my wife up and I said, babe, we got to take all of our money and we got to dump it into Bitcoin. I swear to God, of my life, I said that. My wife will confirm that if you guys want. I said we got to put it all into Bitcoin. And you know what? We should have. It would have been rough.

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And then I let Tanya look at it, and then her Twitter gets hacked. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, like, I just send it out. I go, what is this? I need a Tanya. I don't trust anything. Yeah. You know what I mean?

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Cracken invest in everything all in one app. Let's get it. Remember, this is not investment advice. Crypto trading involves risk of loss and is offered to U.S. customers excluding Washington, New York, and Maine. Through Payward Interactive Bank. Now, let's get back to the show. There is a newspaper in Illinois that criticizes Joseph.

Smith for his polygamous practices. I think at this point, Joseph Smith is the governor of some kind of province of Illinois. And so he decides to, like, shut down the newspaper because he doesn't like the criticism. So he, like, bans it. Then there's, like, a riot because he's, like, suppressed this newspaper. Then Joseph Smith institutes martial law because of the riots, and then he flees. And then I think the governor of Illinois says, okay, Joseph Smith, you've got to come back. You're going to face trial.

We'll keep you, you keep you fine, but just, you've got to come back. So Joseph Smith goes back. He gets put in prison, and then this big angry mob descend on the prison, and they break into the prison. They shoot his brother in the face. His brother says, I'm a dead man, and then he dies. And then Joseph Smith tries to escape out of a window. They shoot him. He falls out of the window onto the floor, and they shoot him dead again.

So he dies in what is essentially a prison shoot out. And for the Mormons, this is a site of religious martyrdom. So you can now go to that. that prison. It's now owned by the Latter-day Saints. And it's the site that they go to is the point of martyrdom for their profit. There it is. There's the house. So Joseph Smith was killed falling out of that window. There's a, there's a, there he is. There's a big mob shop and kill him. So Joseph Smith becomes like a martyr and that's that. And then there's your typical religious like succession crisis who's going to take over. I think there's a point where like,

I think it's Brigham Young, who's giving a speech saying, I should be the leader, and, like, multiple people report seeing him, like, transfigure into the likeness of Joseph Smith. There's all kinds of wacky stuff going on, right? And, yeah, like, it sounds kind of insane, but is that any more insane than some of the Christian stories that we hear? But it was farther ago. Yeah, exactly. So we have to feel. So it's better.

Yeah, of course. People sort of go, like, oh, but that's ridiculous. As if God would appear to someone in upstate New York. That's ridiculous. It's like, well, that's how it sounded like God being born in Nazareth. Yeah. But people are saying in the Gospels, like, is this not Joseph's son? Is this not the guy from Nazareth?

There's anything good come from Nazareth? They're saying the same thing. Their time is founded like in Staten Island. Yeah, they actually are. Yeah. Seriously, though. So that's what's going on. Why is did Nazareth have a reputation of just not producing a nowhere town?

It was like a Fennell town. Like the Jews are expecting a Messiah and the Messiah, like, there are different views on what the Messiah was going to be. But the sort of general line on this is that they were expecting people because at the time they're being. persecuted by Rome. So they are awaiting the Messiah. To liberate them from. He will come and liberate. So they're expecting like this military leader who's going to leave them into battle against Rome and they're going to win. And they got a hippie.

They got a hippie. Exactly. Was he really hippie or is that kind of the way that depends what you mean by a hippie? Like he was he was pretty like he wasn't just like a sort of yeah peace and love man. It's kind of badass a little bit. He said some pretty serious stuff and did some serious things. A few political revolutionary. Yeah he's flipping the table. He goes into the temple and

in John's gospel he makes a chord he like put some chords together and like turns it into a whip and goes around like like like with a whip driving people out of the temple because they're trading on

in his father's house he also says some pretty serious stuff he says like if anybody does not hate their mother and their father and their brother and sister they cannot be my disciple if anyone does not hate them yeah because hatred can kind of mean in this context like preference like it's used

as well you prefer them yeah so it's one of these slightly mystifying passages, but a lot of it has to do with how these words are understood and used at the time. So it means something. So to say that you hate someone can mean that, like, comparatively you prefer me. So he's saying that you have to put me above your friends and family, which is very sort of culty. But the problem with cults is that they're wrong. That's the problem with the cult, is that they're not actually true. If the cult is true, then that probably is what you should do, right? Yeah. So, yeah, Jesus is a complicated figure who does all kinds of different stuff, but his main message is one of love.

claim in the Jubilee video that he the Christ doesn't claim to ever be the be God that's what I think and that's controversial too amongst Christians if you say Jesus never even claimed to be God even in the Gospels they'll look at you like you've said a triangle has four sides in biblical scholarship this has been a very mainstream opinion for the past few hundred years why do you believe that because there's no instance in the Gospels where I think Jesus is claiming to be God Christians think that they have examples but I think that all of them don't actually apply what are your examples and what are theirs? So there are constantly examples of Jesus seeming to separate himself from the father where he says, like, the father is greater than I am and stuff like this. And people

like rattle these off. The problem is devoid of any context, it's difficult to know what they even mean. So Christians will point to verses like when Jesus says in John chapter 10, he says, the father and I are one. And when his disciple, Philip, asks him, when do we get to see the father? He says to Philip, anyone who's seen me has seen the father. And Christians point to that, and they say, see, he's claiming to be God. But you just got to keep reading. He says to Philip, anyone has seen me, has seen the father. How can you say, show us the father?

Don't you know that the father is in me and I'm in the father? Interesting. Skip to John chapter 17, where Jesus is praying for his disciples and then for all of his Christian believers. And he prays, he's praying to the father and he says, I hope that they will all one day be in us. Just as I am in you and you are in me, I hope that they will be in us and we'll all sort of be one together. I hope. Yeah, like he prays, like that, yeah, like he's sort of praying for that to happen in the future, right? So whatever relationship Jesus has with the father there and being in him and him in him, it's something that he at least wants the disciples to one they achieve.

So if that's Jesus claiming to be identical to Yahweh, the God Yahweh, then he must think that that's something that's available to the desire. To the rest of us, yeah. That doesn't make sense. So we've got to reinterpret that first. Okay. like there are there are this is in john's gospel as well like and the interesting thing is that most of these important christological claims only appear in john's gospel and john's is the latest johns is the latest which you said has potential yeah so there's already reason to think it's less

historically reliable because it's latest but also the fact that jesus is making these claims in front of all of his disciples and if in john's gospel he makes explicit claims to be god like in john chapter 8 he says to his Jewish opponents, before Abraham was, I am. And I am is supposed to be like a callback to the name of God in the Old Testament. And he's claimed to be pre-existent because he exists before Abraham. And a lot of Christians say this is claiming to be God. And the first question that you should ask is, okay, if Jesus actually said this, and that did actually mean that by it,

did the other gospel authors just not think it was an important detail? If Jesus, like, said in the full view of his opponents and his disciples, I am God. Yeah, you'd think it'd be in every single doubt. And people say to me, well, I think that the other gospel authors were sort of focusing on different things. So they just neglected to mention the point where Jesus said, I'm God. So I don't think he historically said this. But I also don't think that means what Christians think it means for some quite interesting techy reasons.

So there are two elements of the I am statement here, like in John chapter 8. Jesus is speaking to his Jewish opponents and they say, and he's talking about eternal life. And they say, well, our father Abraham, he died. Are you saying you greater than him? and he says Jesus says Abraham rejoice to see my day and the Jews say you're not even 80 years old

and then Abraham has seen you you've seen Abraham and he goes truly I tell you before Abraham was I am at which point they pick up stones to stone him to death so the Christians say they knew he was committing blasphemy they knew he was claiming to be God

that's why they tried to stone him to death there are a few interesting things that needs to be pulled out of this right the New Testament is written in Greek so what Jesus actually says there is before Abraham was ego amy which means i am that is also a phrase that can just mean like it's me it's a very normal phrase that is used in in greek so in the next chapter jesus heals a blind man

the blind man runs into town and they say isn't this the man who was born blind and the man says ego amy it's me yeah so sometimes it can mean that but in this context it's a little bit weird because he uses it in the present tense he says before abraham was i am or it's me or something like that people think that what's going on here ebonics in the old

ebonics no he's just going I'm him oh right yeah yeah yeah in um I actually kind of think

that's basically what is going on actually like like uneducated I think no no I mean like when you know that sort of like I'm him kind of I think some of the like son of man's statements

kind of approximates but whatever in the Old Testament in the book of Exodus which is written in Hebrew Moses has talking to God, and God says to him, and God, like, is speaking to him through the burning version, all this kind of stuff. And Moses says, when I go back to my people, who shall I tell

them sent me? Like, what's your name? And God says, Ayesha, Asha, Ayesha. I am that I am, or I am who I am. So go and tell them that I am has sent you. Ayesha, Asha, Ayesha, go and tell them that Ayesha has sent you. And so when Jesus says, before Abraham was, I am, he is invoking the name that God gave himself in Exodus, which is I am. So that's the line. That's why they think that's the case. I'm suspicious of this for a few reasons. Firstly, it can also just be a normal statement.

So let's figure out which one is going on here. The Old Testament is written in Hebrew mostly. And this passage, Aesha, Asha, Ayesha, means something like I am that I am. But the New Testament's written in Greek. So the people who wrote the New Testament were using a Greek translation of the Old Testament, right? Oh, got it.

They're right in Greek. They're not consuming the Hebrew. They're consuming the Greek. And it's well known, we have good evidence that the New Testament authors are using a translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Old Testament. Yeah. Right? So, we know that that is their Old Testament. So Aisha Ashasha translates to in Greek.

Ego Amy. Hoon. Ha'an is. So this is where it gets really interesting. In the Greek version, if you read the Septuagin, God doesn't say the same thing twice. So in Hebrew, he says, Easha, Asha, Easha, I am that I am. This is the same thing twice. And then he says, go and tell them that I am has sent you.

So he says it three times. In the Greek version, he says, you know, what shall I call them? And God says, in response, Ego Amy, ha on. Which means something like I am the one who is. I am, Ego Amy, the one who is, hot on. so go and tell them Ho'an has sent you It is

It doesn't say Go and tell them Ego Amy has sent you It says go and tell them Ho'an has sent you So the version that the New Testament authors were using I think if they were trying to invoke this

passage they would have had him say something like Ha'an But he just said Ego Amy So in the Greek Septuagent When God says this to Moses The function of the phrase Ego Amy is just introducing yourself You're just saying I am the one who is

It's like saying, I am Alex. Yeah. My name is Alex, and the I am bit there is just me introducing, like the phrase. So I think in the Greek version, Ego Amy Hot On, go and tell them that Hot On has sent you. And so when Jesus says before Abraham was Ego Amy, it's not obvious to me that he's making a callback to the... Because firstly, I don't think Jesus said these words. I think that it's an invention of John's Gospel. And we know that John was using the Septuagint.

And so I don't think that that adds up. But there is still a mystery there. Why does Jesus say that he existed before Abraham? and why does he speak in the present tense? Why did you say, I am? Why didn't he say before Abraham existed, I did? Why does he say I am? Oh, sorry, do you have an answer for this?

I've got some speculation. Please tell me. So I think that what might be going on here is an allusion to the fact that Jesus as the redemptive solution to mankind's problems was planned by God from the very beginning of time. So in the book of Revelation, there's a reference to the, lamb who was slain from the beginning of time. Speaking about Jesus,

Jesus was not slain at the beginning of time. So why does it say he was slain from the beginning of time? What it's clearly getting at is that from the very beginning of time, God knew. It was just in that he would be slayed. So I think that Jesus is doing something similar here in saying, before Abraham was, I am. Before Abraham was, this plant, the thing that I'm embodied is here. And there's some really interesting, like, indications that that might be what's going on,

because there's a first century text called the Apocalypse of Abraham, which is a Jewish text. It's not in any Christian canons, but it was a Jewish text that existed, and you can read it online today. And it tells the story of Abraham. And importantly, this isn't canon, but it does tell us what some people believed. It tells us what some stories that people were familiar with. This is written around the same time as the Gospels, probably around 70, 80, 70 to 180.

And it tells the story of Abraham. And Abraham hears the voice of God, and he leaves his home, and he's terrified, and he hits the floor. and then an angel appears to him and God says to the angel who's called Yahoel who has the name of God in him which again you know Yahoel yeah and L like same root as like Yahweh and Elohim

so he's got the name of God in him too and he says to Abraham like get up and Abraham gets up and he's terrified and the angel says to him rejoice and be glad because I'm like promising for you that someone who will like the generations that will spring from you will, like, bring some kind of redemption or something like this.

He basically says, be rejoice, be glad and rejoice because, like, redemption is coming, salvation is coming, and from your generations. So interesting, then, that in John chapter 8, the context of this divine claim is Abraham. Jesus is talking about Abraham, and what does he say to them? He says, Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and they get confused. So, like, you're not even 80 years old. have you seen Abraham? And he says, before Abraham was, I am. I think what he might be getting out there is saying,

Abraham rejoiced to see my day in the sense that Abraham was promised. Like, he's the patriarch of the Jewish faith. And he was promised what I am now bringing to fulfill. Before Abraham was, I am. I think that's what's going on. Now, to be clear. And Christians get a pushback on this? Of course.

Yeah, Christians will listen to this and they'll be like, that is complete and utter nonsense. Jesus is very clearly invoking the I am statement. And it's so clunky that he would word it like that. And why would they pick up stones to stone him for death if they didn't think he was committing blasphemy? That doesn't make any sense. The key point I want to point out is that the thing about the Jewish... The thing about the Jewish opponents is that they're constantly misunderstanding Jesus.

And so people put a lot of weight on the idea that they stoned him to death and they accused him at blasphemy. And it's like, yeah, but throughout the Gospels, they're constantly getting him wrong. You think in this instance they suddenly were absolutely correct in their interpretation of what Jesus was saying? I don't think so. In fact, there's one point in the Gospels. It's the only time this happens where Jesus is explicitly accused of claiming to be God. It happens. They say, you're claiming to be God.

And Jesus downplays it. It's, yeah, semi-complicated in that there's a Psalm in the Old Testament. This is Psalm 82, which opens by saying that Yahweh presides among the council of the gods. Elohim gods It's a bit weird How is Yahweh the only god Like residing over a council of gods That doesn't make any sense

And then later in the Psalm it says I have said that you are gods You shall be sons of the most high So in the Psalm What's clearly happening here is the word gods here And some translation puts in scare quotes The word God here doesn't mean God is in like Yahweh It means God is in like a divine member of this council

right and god clarifies in the psalmas clarifies in psalm 82 he says i shall call you gods you shall be called god's sons of the most high so clarifying that what i mean is that you are not the most high you are sons of the most high right okay park that and bear in mind that most jews are familiar with with jewish scripture right jesus is talking to his jewish opponents and this time he says i and the father are one because they're asking about his identity they say if you're Messiah, tell us plainly. And he says, I and the father are one. And the Jewish opponents say to him, they pick up stones again. They go to stone him to death. And he goes like, I'm just telling you the works of my father. What are you stoning me for? For which of, I've been telling you things of my father.

For which of those do you stone me? And they say, we're not stoning you for any good works. We're stoning you because you, a mere human claim to be God. So they accuse him. Here it is, the most dramatic, most important moment of the Gospels for Christology. You're claiming to be God. what does Jesus say? Does he go, yeah, you're right? No, he says to them, have you not read your scriptures? Have you not, is it not written that you shall become gods or you shall be called gods? So he quotes the Psalm that I've just mentioned, which expressly calls non-Gods, like non-Yahu beings, gods. And when asked about his identity, he chooses to quote that Psalm. And he says to them is it not written you shall be called gods if god was willing to to give those people that title

and the scripture can't be set aside then why wouldn't he give that title to me he then says so why are you then accusing me of blasphemy for claiming to be the son of god so he clarifies they say you're claiming to be god and he says have you not read your scriptures this is just a title that was given to the divine council if he'd give it to them why wouldn't he give it to me why are you accusing me a blasphemy for claiming to be the son of God, because they're the sons of the most high. And so the one point where Jesus is explicitly accused of claiming to be God, in my view, he goes, I'm not. Yeah, yeah.

I think he's saying he's not. So Christians, again, we'll interpret this and say, like, okay, he's answering in a very clever way, which sort of doesn't deny his divinity. And we all are. But, well, they don't want to say he's, that we're all divine. They want to say that he is claiming to be God here, but he's doing it. He's probably answering in this way because he's being intentional. unclear because it's not his time to die yet, whatever.

I read this as him denying, like, that he's identical to the... I see their argument, too. I think it's a really clever argument because he's basically going, you can't say that I'm blaspheming if I am upholding scripture, right? So if you're going to kill me for that, and you are going to uphold your law, point out in the book where I'm blasphemy. And the key thing to notice is that, like, in this case, they pick up stones to stone him, and he goes, like, why are you accusing me with blasphemy?

I'm not doing what you think I'm doing. And so when it comes to from chapter 8, and it comes to John chapter 8, and Christians often say, well, why would they, why would they like throw stones at him and try to kill him if he wasn't claiming to be God? It's like, well, because somewhere else in the gospel, they tried to stone him for claiming to be God. And they were wrong. So I don't think that they got it right, you know? And what about the worship of Christ, like the people at the time worshipping him? This is another big thing, like worship. Worship is something that's only given to God. In fact, when in the Gospels of Luke and Matthew, Jesus is in the desert being tempted by Satan, and Satan says, if you just bow down and worship me, I will give you all of this land. And Jesus says, worship God and serve him only. And yet, throughout the Gospels, Jesus is worshipped and he accepts worship.

So he must be God, right? A few things to note. First, how many times in, well, actually the first important thing to know is what the word worship means. It's difficult to define even in English, but in Greek there are two words that are typically translated as worship in the New Testament. One is proscaneo and one is Latruo. Proscaneo just means to sort of bow down or prostrate yourself before a higher authority. Latruo tends to refer to like cultic religious worship of the kind that you might give to God. in no instance is Lashruo worship given to Jesus in the Gospels.

There is arguably an ambiguous case in Revelation. We can get into that, but it's not a historical source anyway. And also it's not clear if Jesus is actually being worshipped there. But in the Gospels, not once does Lashrua worship occur, being given to Jesus. So we're just left with Proscaneo worship. Now, Proscaneo, like I say, just means to bow down. or prostrate yourself before somebody else. So if only God is supposed to accept worship,

then let's look again at that Greek Old Testament, the Septuagint. Remember I mentioned it earlier? Throughout the Septuagint, the word Proscaneo comes up all the time. Lot worships two angels. Jacob worships Esau. The whole assembly of Israel worship King David, Proscaneo, King David. Like this, throughout the Old Testament, there are tons of instances of proscaneo worship being given to other people.

So it's a different type of... In the New Testament, Jesus tells a parable, the unmerciful servant who comes back to his master and he proscaneos before him. He just falls at his feet. And so in some instances, it is just translated as falling down at someone's feet because that is what proscaneo literally means, right? And so proscaneo, as occurring to Jesus, doesn't mean it's a, it's a, it's a,

worship of the kind that we would say is only due to God. It's just literally bowing down in front of somebody. Another thing to notice, this is really important. How many times does Jesus accept worship in Luke's gospel? Zero. It doesn't happen once. The word only shows up three times, twice in the temptation in the desert, and then once after Jesus ascends, his disciples worship him. But that's after he's gone, so he can't say anything about it. And crucially, that is a verse, that particular verse of them worshipping him, is contested in our manuscript tradition. There is some manuscripts we have that don't have that person.

Mark's Gospel, the earliest Gospel. How many times Jesus accept worship? Twice. Happens twice. Okay, so it does happen twice. But one of those is a demon, Legion, who if you read most translations, he sees Jesus and the man runs at Jesus and throws himself down at his feet. And it doesn't say he worshipped him. Some translations will say that, but usually it's like he fell down at his feet because that's what it means. The only other instance of Proscaneo in the Gospel of Mark is Jesus being worshipped when he's being mocked by the Roman

soldiers. Oh, so they're pretending. They put a crown of thorns on his head and then they worship him. Why? Because he's the king of the Jews. Because kings are people that you worship. You bow down before them. So they're making fun of him. They're like, oh, king of the Jews, king of the Jews. They don't think he's God. They think he's claiming to be the king of the

Jews and they're making fun of him. So even in Marx's gospel, in the earliest gospel, there are only two instances of Proscaneo. One of them is a demon and one of them is sarcastic. In John's Gospel, there's only one instance of Jesus accepting worship. This is after the blind man, who I mentioned earlier, he's healed. Sorry, no, this is the deaf and mute man, I think. And Jesus finds him again, and he says, Lord, I believe, and he worships him.

First thing to note is, again, this can just mean bowing down in front of somebody, but also that particular verse, the verse where it says he worshipped him, is not in our earliest manuscripts. Codex Vaticanus, Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Washingtonianus. It's not in there. It's not in the early manuscripts, implying that it's something that was added into the Gospels after the fact. Like what Florida's doing with textbooks.

Exactly. Exactly. It's kind of interesting, right? Sorry, I have a question. This won't jive with the proscanayal stuff that you were saying, but when you said God said, you are also God, the group of people. Have he read the autobiography of a yogi?

No. It's a Hindu guy who becomes a yogi, and he says essentially, yogi is a man who achieves God-like, not status, but God is within you, and you've realized it. you've reached that place. He says Jesus is a yogi,

Muhammad is a yogi. These guys are people who have achieved that. And they would have a following and they would have. And it kind of proves that we can all do this thing. Does that jive with what I'm hearing from you? So that jives very heavily with what I think Jesus is doing. Christians will deny that interpretation because they think Jesus is the guy. He's like a very unique kind of person, God himself in the flesh.

I'm much more in line with this, that Jesus is somebody who is essentially the idyllic example of what a faithful person should be. And there are lots of reasons why I think. that. But I do think it's important on the proscanaya point. I'll wrap that up just because I know I've banged on about worship, but it's important because remember how we started, where I pointed out that in Luke and Matthew, Jesus is speaking to Satan. And Satan says, worship me. And Jesus says, worship God and serve him only. So why does Jesus say that if worship is something you can give to other people? This is where I think, this is something I think is really interesting. If your interpretation is Jesus is saying there that you should only offer

proscanaya worship to God himself, then all of those people that I've just mentioned sinned, you know, Lot sinned, Jacob's sinned, the whole assembly of Israel sinned when they bowed down towards David, so that can't be it. So what's going on there? Well, notice how that's phrased. And he's quoting Deuteronomy chapter 6, which actually doesn't say the same thing. It's kind of weird. But Jesus says, worship God and serve him only. He doesn't say only worship God. He says worship God and serve him Let's look at the Greek the word proscaneo

worship God and then serve him only so the word only is affixed to the word serve not worship can you guess what the word in Greek for serve is there that's translated into serve

Latruo which is the other which is the other one which is the cultic religious worship that's usually only given to God or some kind of divine figure at the very least So even in the language of the Gospels, there is a division in the idea of worship. So it seems in that instance, my interpretation is Jesus is saying,

worship God because he's a higher authority. And he's rejecting Satan's worship. He's saying, I'm not going to bow down to you because you're not a higher authority over me. And it's written. I like worship God. Also, that's not written. It's really weird. He's quoting Deuteronomy 65, but Deuteronomy 65 says something like fear God and serve Him only.

He doesn't say worship. Which is an interesting implication if he's if he's rendered the word fear as worship. It can't mean the kind of worship that we're talking about, right? And Jesus says, so it's a bit mystifying some people. Well, why did Jesus say that to Satan in the desert? The reason is, because he's saying you should worship God, but you serve him only. Because if you think that Jesus was saying there, you should only offer proscanea worship to God, then all of these people sin, including, by the way, people that Jesus mentions himself. Jesus himself tells the parable of the unmerciful servant who proschino worships,

proscaneo worships before his master. In the book of Revelation, Jesus promises to his faithful believers that all of the other evil nations will one day Proscaneo before them. Jesus says all of these people will worship you. That's out of the mouth of Jesus in the book of Revelation. So it cannot be that Proscaneo worship is something that's only due to God. So in the book of Matthew, there are lots of instances of Jesus being worshipped. Mark, Luke, and John are totally unconcerned with worship. Matthew, it happens a lot.

But I think you need to understand the context, which is that worshipping someone in the sense of proscenio is something that people just did to a higher authority. someone who was of a higher status than you. Like, I don't know, maybe being the Messiah. Yeah. You know, like, so it's no mystery to me, in other words, that Jesus would be worshipped in the sense of proscaneo.

Today, when we say the word worship, we mean something a bit different. Also, here's an interesting, you know, question. Riddle me this. If proscenio worship is the kind of worship that's given to God and only God, then why is it that after Jesus ascends into heaven, nobody offers proscaneo worship anymore?

Let's no instance of like, like there's the word proscaneo shows up, but Jesus is not given proscaneo worship. Like in the book of Acts, for example, the disciples are going around and they're not going around offering proscaneo to Jesus up in heaven. Why? Why not? In my view, it's because proscaneo is just a physical action. It describes a physical behavior of bowing down and prostrating before someone who's of a higher authority. If someone's not there, you can't do it. If it were to mean, like, cultic religious worship due to God, then they would keep doing it after he ascended into heaven, but they don't. And there are instances, so Christians will dispute this again because they'll say, like, in the book of Acts, somebody bows down before Peter. They proscaneo before Peter the apostle.

And Peter says, get up because I'm just a human like you. And they say, see? So Peter's saying that you don't worship other humans. You only worship God. But I don't think that's what Peter was saying. I think he was saying, get up. He says, I am also just a man, as in I'm the same status as you. Like, I'm not your authority.

Like worship God, he's our authority. The other type of worship for someone... That's true. Yeah. How many times is that mentioned in the New Testament? It's mentioned a few times. And in referring to... So, the most interesting case for me is Revelation.

So Revelation is a wacky, wacky book. And so I want to clarify by saying that even if Revelation just said, Jesus is God, I wouldn't trust it as a historical source. It does seem to resent Jesus as a very exalted being probably God himself. Like at one point, Jesus seems to claim to be the Alpha and the Omega, which is the title of God. One instance, it's not entirely clear. who's speaking, but in another instance, it's like Jesus saying, I am the alpha and the

omega. That's something only God says. It seems like he's claiming to be God in the book of Revelation, which is a vision that a guy called John has on an island called Patmos. And there is an instance, there are two instances of Latruo in Revelation where it's a bit unclear. What happens is you've got the lamb who sort of sits on or in the center of or nearby the throne. So there's the throne of God and there's this throne of the lamb. And it's not entirely clear what the organizational structure is. So there's like the throne of God and then the lamb is like either on the throne or in the middle of the throne. And then it says that Latruo worship was given to him. So the only two times it occurs is when we're talking about

almighty God, the father and Jesus. And they're sort of together in a very ambiguous sense. And then it always uses the singular pronoun of him. It never says them. It always says him. So those instances of Latruo, I think it's defensible that the person actually being worshipped there is God, the Father, is the Almighty God. But it does seem a little bit weird that Jesus, the lamb is like on the throne or near the throne. So maybe Jesus is being given Latruo there, but it seems weird that it would say that they worshipped him rather than they worshipped then. You've got God and the son and they worshipped him. But never in the four Gospels were never in the Gospels. Never in the Gospels. This idea of Jesus being, not once.

fun. Isn't that cool? It does not happen at all. The key text here, by the way, is, did the early Christians worship Jesus by James? It's fun for you. Look at Mark's face. He's having it. Is this interpretation that you have of Jesus similar to the Muslim interpretation of Jesus? It is in the sense of not thinking he claimed to be God. So yeah, this is an interesting thing. So Muslims don't believe that Jesus died on a cross. They don't believe that he was God. They don't believe he claimed to be God. They believe he was a prophet. And so they take a lot of the same lines as I do here

but of course they're motivated for different reasons I'm just interested in the historical figure of Jesus but yeah a lot of these arguments and the annoying thing is that a lot of the time this debate only seems to happen in the context of Christians versus Muslims because atheists don't care oh Jesus said oh I in the

in the father and whatever man who cares I'm going to go at lunch but I'm interested but it means that like when Christians are debating with Muslims so for example when Jesus says I am the alpha and the omega I'm the first and the last you know, a Christian could say, but in the Quran, that's a title that God gives to himself.

You know, in the Quran. So they're using scripture to just like. One of the names of God in the Quran is Al-Hak, which means the truth. I am the truth. And Jesus says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Right. And so if your God says that the truth is one of his titles, here's Jesus claiming to be God. So they have these kinds of debates.

That doesn't do anything for me. Right. So when Muslims are on the offensive on this point, they will use some of the same arguments. They will point out that, like, firstly, they'll be suspicious of John's historicity. They'll point out that when he says, I and the father are one. He seems to be saying that we can all be one altogether. All of this kind of stuff. All right, guys, stay a break for a second.

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So this is something I always find incredibly interesting when people are really hanging on every word that Jesus said. Okay, you guys are listening very carefully to what I'm saying, right? You're paying attention? Yeah. Can any of you recite? No. Excluding this one, the last sentence I just said. Just tell me the last sentence.

I'm still trying to pronounce Latrun. That depression medication you were telling us. Yeah, okay, wow. Side effects include visions of God. So, okay, wow, yes, yes, yes. So obviously there's going to be some... You can't remember the words that I said to you 20 seconds. ago, but I'm expected to believe that the New Testament authors who were writing, at best,

decades after the death of Jesus, could remember his exact words and write them down accurately in a language that he wasn't speaking? In a language that he wasn't speaking, isn't interesting? Now, what's important to note there, though, is that, like, if I said something really particular, like, if I was talking to you, if I were talking to you, and then I suddenly said, you know, I'm a, I'm a famous songwriter or something, that might stick in your memory such that in like a month or two you could remember that I said that because it was important so if Jesus said before Abraham was I am that's the kind of thing that people could

remember this is my body exactly but like the I am thing like oh well he was quoting he was quoting the Old Testament okay so we've got a Greek rendition well actually when we say it in English we're using an English translation of a Greek text quoting an Aramaic speaking man allegedly quoting a Hebrew scripture yeah there are a lot of chains of transmission that we have to investigate and see and see what's and I might have misunderstood you but 40 years later at the earliest, I don't... If I'm quoting something, you said last week, I don't know. Some people think that John's Gospel is earlier.

So John's Gospel tends to be dated to 90 to 180. Some people date it earlier because there's one verse in John's Gospel, John Chapter 5. It opens up by saying, now, there is a pool by the sheep's gate. And it says, at this pool, this is what happened. But John says there is a pool. the temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD. And so if John's writing his gospel, and this isn't like Jesus... He's writing it in a real time.

He says, he says, now there is a sheep's gate near the pool. If that sheep gate had been destroyed, then why would he have written it like that? So some people, for that reason, put John pre-70. Kind of interesting. But the important thing to know is that it's all speculative. But at the very least, yeah, we're talking. That's why I say, at best, you know, decades after. Some scholars have dated...

Why don't they wait decades after to write it? That's a good question. I mean, why were the gospels written in the third? first place, right? Like, Jesus is going around saying his stuff and he's got disciples and stuff and there are different philosophies on this. One is that some people think that Mark's gospel, which is the first one, was written in order to deal with the destruction of the temple. The temple is the most important site for Jews, even today, right? But the temple at the time, part of being a Jew involved, like, practices that you have to do at the temple. So for them,

this is like God's house, this is where it happens. And so when that temple is destroyed, what do you do? Yeah. Like, how are you going to interpret this? And in many respects, Jesus is presenting himself as the new temple, you know? And so some people think that Mark's Gospel is written as a sort of way to respond to the temple's destruction, because he talks about the temple being destroyed a fair bit. Going back, you know, what is it, 60 years, what was happening at the time,

that allowed John the Baptist to rise in popularity. Like, what was happening culturally? Is there any conversation about that? Why, like, forgiveness could have been so important. Well, forgiveness has always been important in religious traditions, but it's seen as the prerogative of God. Right. And so it's unlikely that Christians won't think that John the Baptist was actually forgiving sins.

They would think that he was, like, announcing the forgiveness of sins or helping people participate in a ritual whereby God would forgive them. But why was this so popular? then, where there other people throughout history at that time, they were also implementing this? Like, what was the societal utility that rose, that made him rise to superstardom? As you said, everybody from Judeo is going there. We don't know, because we don't have a lot of details about John the Baptist in particular. He's fascinating from what you're telling me right now.

He's my favorite character. Yeah, why is there so, I mean, obviously you're right next to the J-Man, so it's going to be tough to live in that shadow. But, like, to me, you start something that seems to be a break-off from Judaism. I don't know how many other of these religions are existing at the time, but he seems to be the one that's the most popular, and then his descendant becomes, or his disciple becomes God. So, like, what is happening with him? I'm fascinated by him, and the thing is we just don't have very much information at all, because the Gospels are so dense, and there are so much in them, you'd be amazed at some of the things that you can pull out and things that people are still noticing today that they have noticed before about the Gospels. And yet, for some of our most famous figures, like John the Baptist, or like Mary Magdalene,

These people are, like, hardly mentioned. We have, like, no information about them. We don't know where they get their names. We don't know why she's called Mary Magdalene. Was there a place called Magdalene? Maybe. There's a place called Magdalene, like, in Israel, but it's unclear whether there's a connection there. Judas Iscariot.

Why is he called Judas Ascariot? No one knows. There are theories about this. It could be because he was a member of a particular sect that used to murder Roman officials with a dagger. And the word for dagger is something like Icarii or something. And there was a group of people called the Icari E. And maybe Iscariot kind of sounds like that. This is very terrific.

No one knows. John the Baptist is someone that we just don't have that much information about. John the Baptist was residing in the woods around Nazareth? In the wilderness, yeah. But around Nazareth. Around like Jerusalem, I think. So then how does Jesus even come to meet? Sorry, no, he would be, yeah, I don't.

Where's that? I don't know whereabouts. I don't know whereabouts. He's probably not Jerusalem. They're cousins. Oh, they're related. Yeah. Yeah.

John the Baptist is six months older than Jesus. Oh, so we know each other their whole life. And he's watching this guy come up and he's like, hey, this. So they, yeah, but then again, like, so the story is in Luke's gospel. So you know the birth story of Jesus, born in a manger, all this kind of stuff? That's only in two of the Gospels. It's only in Matthew and it's in Luke. And they tell slightly different stories with emphasis on different things.

Luke's gospel opens with the birth or the pregnancy resulting in John the Baptist. Well, what do you mean resulting in John the Baptist? So like his parents. His parents. So the priests. Oh, okay, okay. Okay, okay, okay, okay. So John, before he's born, like, there's the pregnancy, and it's like a miraculous pregnancy.

For John the Baptist as well? Yeah, in the sense that, like, I think Elizabeth was not supposed to be able to, like, conceive. He should love this guy. He also wrote a special about nothing. Yeah, I mean, this is my guy. Did IVF? Okay. Yeah, yeah.

So she wasn't supposed to conceive. It was very difficult to conceive, and then she conceived, and then she conceived. And here's John the Baptist. And it's all sort of, but the thing to know is, and so, and then, and then, and then, and this is, yeah, they're cousins because then Mary is pregnant with Jesus and then Mary meets Elizabeth and John the Baptist does a backflip in his mother's womb when she approaches Mary who's pregnant with Jesus and John the Baptist does a little backflip. It's kind of wacky, man. But the thing is, these birth narratives in my view are basically completely mythological. I don't

think there's any history in them. So I'm not sure if Jesus was actually related. to John the Baptist. I'm not, I certainly don't think that there was the backflip in the womb. But we can place them in the same city at least. Like there's a reason why they connect. Yeah, I mean, they clearly historically were actually like, like I say, I think Jesus is a follower of John the Baptist because like John is in the wilderness of Israel and Jesus comes and gets baptized by John the Baptist. I mean, Jesus is sort of all over the place in his childhood. Like he's, there's like a census. And so he has to like travel and then. he has to go here and has to go there, and then he goes to Egypt because he's scared that Herod's going to kill him. Yeah, how old and before Jesus started claiming to be like that dude?

Well, it depends which gospel you read, because there is an indication that Jesus was like teaching in the temple when he was a teenager. So there's one story in the gospels of like, I think his family are like going back from Jerusalem. I can't remember all the details. It might have been the Passover or something, and they're all leaving and they're going home and then they suddenly realize that Jesus isn't with them. So they go back and they find him like in the temple, like...

Hohmala. Arguing and talking. Yeah, literally. But he's arguing and talking with the, like, Jewish teachers. And they're all like, this kid knows so much. Like, this is incredible. And he's like impressing everybody with his, with his skills and with its knowledge. Outside of that, the so-called missing years of Jesus, there's like no record of what he just shows up when he's like 30.

I thought he was just like... He was just like... He was Zeus for 33 years and then all of a sudden he becomes... where you get conspiracy theories while Jesus traveled to India. That's where he got his... We're always there. Unbelievable how right. The source.

Yeah. Well, yeah, I mean, it makes sense to think like, oh, well, he was preaching kind of... He's the first appropriator. All of this. Yeah. Like, where's he getting these ideas? He's getting them from, like, the east. We don't know what Jesus was doing.

I mean, the reason why I think we have the missing ears of Jesus is because there was no reason to write about this Jesus figure until he started his ministry. The birth narratives were made up late. and tacked on has often happened with with biographies of of uh important figures there were like mythological origin stories of course the miraculous birth of alexander the grade or whatever um so i think we just didn't have any records of this guy because he was a nobody until until he showed up it was an eat pray love dude it was the first eat pray love this long-haired white guy that's right my dndia ate good food got spiritual it's uh it's exactly what happened that's right so i think he basically they just just show up and start and start doing that and a feeling

So it's so clear that he wasn't divine. Why did Christology come after his death? That is a hell of a question. And in fact, Brant Petrae's recent, it's called Jesus and Divine Christology, which is an attempt to show that Jesus did claim to be God. And he opens up with what he calls the paradox of how most scholars think that Jesus didn't make divine claims. But most scholars believe in what's called an early high Christology. So early on, people had a high Christology. They believed that Jesus was got. So why is it that if he didn't make any claims to be God himself? why is it that so soon and afterwards people started believing that he was God?

John the Baptist was also martyred. Yeah, he was. Around the same time. He was. And why do these beliefs develop around Jesus? That's a historical question. And obviously I don't know like the answer to it. But I think it's clear to me to see how like myths can develop over time.

But this is where it gets a little bit speculative for my view. Because Brant Petra's view is that, well, the logical answer to this is that he was making. divine claims. There are so many ways that you could interpret what's happened here. Firstly, I'm not sure exactly when it is that people start believing this. So remember I said that Paul's letters are our earliest New Testament source. A lot of people read Paul's letters and they say Paul is clearly presenting Jesus as God. And if that's the case, then you're looking like 50 AD already got the belief that Jesus is God. I'm not so sure. Other people look at Paul and see him as not so obviously like high Christology in the way that people want him to be. He might be more

of like a mystic. Some people think he's more of like a visionary. There's a lot of theories about what's going on in Poole. So it depends on what you think of Poole as to how early this actually develops. And yeah, like it's probably within decades, certainly like a hundred years or so that people start talking about Jesus as God. But then the nature of Jesus is also not entirely clear. You know, some people are like, well, was he, was he God and he just appeared to be a human? Was he sort of half God, half man? Did he become God at the baptism? Was he God as soon as he was born? Did he exist beforehand? Did he come down to earth and in somebody? Or did he begin to exist in Jesus? And none of this really gets sorted out until they start getting

Christian councils together to decide on orthodoxy. And so you've got the Council of Nicaea in 325, which a lot of people think is where they developed the Christian canon. That's not the case. But they did develop the view on Jesus' relationship to the father, which was quite important. So they just define it. 325, that's when they lock it in. They have a big discussion, yeah. And they bring all the bishops together. The trinity comes from that discussion as well.

They bring all the bishops together. And specifically, I think, like, the relationship of the son to the father and the idea that. So you get what's called the Nicene Creed, which Christians will recite today, which basically lays out. You know, we believe in one God. We believe in the father. We believe that, you know, Jesus is eternally begotten of the father. All of this kind of stuff. They just lay it out the relationship of the Trinity, that kind of stuff.

But the question is, well, why is it that in the early church? people started believing that Jesus was got. Regardless of when this finally got solidified, how does this get off the rails? An important thing to know is that not everybody thought that. There were like all kinds of different Christian views. So I'm really big on the Gnostic Christian history because I find it really interesting. And so Elaine Pagels writes a book in 1975 called the, or the 1970s, I can't remember when, called the Gnostic Gospels.

And her big thing is saying there is this idea that in the early Christian church Jesus dies, all of the, like, Peter is the first pope and you develop all of these churches. and they all basically agree, and then there are a few disputes, so they iron them out, and that's Christianity. And she's like, no, there are communities of people who believe the most wacky and incredible things about Jesus fairly early on. Like, if you've ever read the Gospel of Judas, it is a complete trip. It is a complete and utter trip. And it does present Jesus as, like, in the form of a human, but not really a human, he's God.

He's sent from the realm of Barbello, and he comes down to free people from their material prisons and bring them back up into the plethora to be there with all of the proper divine beings. Totally wacky, different view of Jesus. And we know that this text existed prior to 180 AD. We know that for a fact. In that same text, doesn't he claim that Judas will supersede all of the disciples because he is doing the will of the Father? So when the Gospel of Judas was first discovered, it seemed like Judas was the hero.

Because, this is discovered in like the 1970s. We know that this sex exists, but it's been lost for thousands of years. There's a guy called Ironaeus, who in 180 writes against heresies. And he's like condemning all these different heresies. And he talks about this gospel of Judah. So we knew it existed, but we didn't have it. And in 1970s, it's discovered. People are trying to sell it.

It goes back and forth. It goes all over the place. It spends about 16 years in a safety deposit box in New York City, which almost destroys it. Finally, it gets bought by National Geographic. And they bring in some experts. Bart Ehrman is one of them. how I've had on my show, and to find out if this is really the Gospel of Judas. So they're looking at this text, and they're reading it, and it opens up by saying that

it tells a story that the disciples are praying over their food. They're performing a Eucharist. Jesus walks in and sees them praying over their food, and he laughs at them. And they say, why are you laughing at us? We're doing what's right. And Jesus says, yeah, you're worshipping your God by doing that. you're worshipping your God by doing that. And they're like, and they start getting angry.

They're like, what? And he's basically saying, you don't understand any of this. And he says to them, if anyone of you is clever enough, and stand up and face me, and guess who stands up? It's Judas. Judas comes up to him and says, I know who you are. I know that you've come from the realm of Barbello. And I'm not fit to utter the name of the one who sent you. And then Jesus sort of explains the history of the cosmos to Judas.

how the world was created, explains how there is an ineffable, invisible spirit who emanates divine beings, and one of those divine beings falls out of the plethora of divine beings and creates the material world. And the material world is the product of like an evil or incompetent, demiurgic god called, um, called Bielzabal, which is like wacky, wacky stuff. And you can imagine when they read this, when they first discovered that they're just like, holy moly, this is absolutely insane. This is going to. change everything. But the big thing is, Judas is the one who gets up. Like you say, Judas gets up and says, I know who you are. So a lot of people read this and thought, wow, this retells

the story. Judas is the hero. That's kind of disputed because later in the text, Jesus seems to say to Judas that you also are not worthy of like entering into this house. Like Judas is the best of the disciples and he's sort of understanding it, but he's still not like the hero of the story. He's still not actually going to like be one of the generation that get back to the Pothorah. So it's kind of unclear what the treatment of Judas is in that gospel. But the way it ends is the authorities show up and Judas hands Jesus over to them and that's it, that's where it ends.

It's an incredible, it's an incredible gospel. And we know that it's written in the second century at the latest. So Christians will look at this and they'll say, well, look, I mean, the difference between something being written in like 70 AD and like 150 AD is like massive. Because you're talking about eyewitness testimony versus like, you know, 100 years later. It's like the difference between writing about two. Tupac, like now versus like a hundred years from now. Yeah, without any internet.

Totally. Exactly. Like totally different, right? So what it does tell us is that there existed communities who had completely different views of what Jesus was about. That's why the council in Nassi is important, right? Yeah, but I mean, organize all these different opinions. Even within, like, Orthodox Christianity, there were disputes about the nature of Jesus. Yeah.

And that's what's ironed out. But there are just communities that just have, like, completely, completely different views. Yeah. And these Gnostics, the reason they're called Gnostic is because it comes from the Greek word Gnosis, which means knowledge. And in Orthodox Christianity, the way that people are saved is through the sacrifice of Jesus. That's how you're saved because Jesus dies for you. For Gnostics, it's not about what Jesus did.

It's about having the right knowledge. He brings the correct knowledge. And if you have the right knowledge, that's what will save you. So some of these Gnostic Gospels don't even mention the crucifixion. It's not important. It's not in the Gospel of Judas. It's not in the Gospel of Thomas. The Gospel of Thomas is a sayings gospel, though, so maybe that's not fair.

But it's just got, like, weird and wacky stuff in it. The Gospel of Thomas is discovered in Nakamadi. So the biggest treasure trove of Gnostic Gospels was discovered in 1945 in the desert in Egypt where this farmer, this teenage farmer is digging in the desert and he accidentally hits upon a jar and he's scared to open it at first because he thinks it's got a gin in it, you know, like a demon. And eventually they open it's got all this ancient papyrus

and he takes it home and his mother's using some of it to like feed the fire. And then they discovered that it's this treasure trove of ancient documents. But that story is wacky, man, because the way they tell it at first is like oh yeah we were out there digging for some materials and then we found this jar and then the teenager is like they go and they find him some research who wants to find him and he mentions that there was like a corpse and then the older brother of the farmer was like no no no there was no corpse it's like what's going on and it seems like what might have been happening is a grave robbing and they kind of didn't want it and they've obviously discovered

all this stuff and they want to sell it so they've come up with this story so it's actually kind of unclear how it was discovered so so the leading theory was the reason these are buried in the desert is because in like the fourth century athenasius defines the 27 books of the new testament and says all the other books are heretical so they get buried in the desert and that was the theory and that's what he discovered but that changed and to some people now thinking that it was normal to bury people with with important like things to them so like with the piracy of documents so somebody was probably just buried who had an extensive collection of gnostic literature and they were buried with it there was a grave robbing and they found

this thing and they're like oh shit it's worth some money so they started they started trying to sell So this text, this collection of text includes loads of important Gnostic literature, including the Gospel of Thomas, which is probably the most famous. It's a so-called sayings gospel. So it's just a list of sayings of Jesus. It says these are the secret teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, which Judas Didomus Thomas wrote down. And some of it is similar to what we find in the New Testament canon, but some of it is incredibly weird.

Don't some people claim that Thomas was Jesus' twin? Yes. So the word didimus means. twin and in the New Testament canon Jesus had a well Jesus had Jesus had brothers we know that Jesus had brothers and it's it's kind of it's actually a point of contention because like Disputed yeah you heard of the perpetual virginity of Mary

so there's a dispute whether obviously the virgin Mary has a virgin birth of Jesus but did she then remain a virgin and Catholics say yes she did and a lot of Protestants say, no, she did. And part of the reason for that is because Jesus is described as having brothers. It could be that brother was just like a name that was given to them. It wasn't like a literal brother. Or maybe there were other sons of Joseph or something like this. But the most natural interpretation to me is that he did actually just have brothers, especially because for me, remember, I think that the birth narratives are invented. So I think the people who originally write the stories, they're not concerned with the virgin births because they don't even

know it exists. I don't think the virgin birth happened for many reasons, one of which is that, like, at one point in Mark's gospel, Jesus is performing an exorcism, and his family come out, his family come out, and they say that they think he's lost his mind. They're like, what's going? What's he doing? Is he lost his mind? Because they don't understand. I'm like, if you've got this whole thing with, like, an angel coming down to you and telling you what's going to happen and you should call him Emmanuel and you have a virgin miraculous birth.

And then, like, you and then later on, you're just like, what you just forget all of that? And you're like, oh, what's he doing? Oh, he's lost his mind. You know? It doesn't seem to line up for me. So I don't think the virgin birth happened at all, of course. There's also some dispute over the translation. I mean, it says that there's an Old Testament prophecy that says a virgin shall conceive.

The Hebrew word there is Alma, which can just mean a young woman of marriageable age. But again, Greek New Testament. So the Greek Septuagint translates the word as Parthanos, which means virgin specifically. So some people think that the New Testament authors were reading a Greek version. When the prophecy only said young woman, they read virgin, so they came up with a virgin. That's disputed as well. Who knows? But yeah, so Jesus has brothers.

And Thomas isn't described as Jesus' brother, but he's called the twin. So even in the canonical literature, it's Thomas also known as didomus. And Thomas itself, the word that the name Thomas means twin. It's like a development of an Aramaic word, which means twin. I think like Tomar or something means twin. So in the Aramaic language, his name's Thomas, which means twin. But the Gospels take a lot of effort, like translating it into the Greek. Given that Thomas already is a word that means twin, that's where the name.

name comes from. The New Testament authors write down Thomas also called Didomus. So in the Greek language, didomus means twin. So when the Greek authors are writing it, they're like, he was called Thomas, which means didomus? So it's important to the Greek authors to tell the reader that his name, that he was called the twin, right? That's important to them. So why? Why is he called the twin? Nobody knows. Some people think it could be a nickname because he looked like Jesus. And so they called him the twin. Some people think he might have been the twin brother of Jesus. Orthodox Christians will dispute that because that really puts a nail in the coffin for the virgin birth. Because if Jesus is born of a virgin and Thomas is his twin, then Thomas is also born of a virgin birth.

Oh, that kind of right? However, there is an apocryphal, it's called the Acts of Thomas, which is another apocryphal gospel, which again, not canon, probably completely a historical, but this is where Thomas travels to India. Because Thomas is historically, traditionally, the person who brings Christianity to India today. And if you go to India today, he goes there to trickle. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. If you go to India today, you will find, like, really devout groups of Thomasites who really revere Thomas as an important guy because he's the guy that brings Christianity to India. And the Acts of Thomas is one book that recounts this.

But at one point, I think they were at a wedding and somebody confuses Thomas for Jesus. They get them mixed up because they look so similar. Well, so that I was. So that I. Yeah, all these Judeans look the same. Yeah. That was the word I was looking for. They either mix them up because they are actually twins,

and that's why they look similar. Or maybe they just happen to look similar, and that's where he got the nickname. But for some reason, Thomas is called the twin. And so, again, in the Gospel of Thomas, it's Judas Didomus Thomas. So Judas is obviously some other name that he's somehow got attached to him, and then Didemus Thomas.

So twin, twin, which is a little bit weird. Some people are a bit speculative, a bit suspicious of the fact that it says that it words it like that. But I think twin could be a nickname. that he's his twin, whatever. But Thomas is allegedly the one who writes down all of these sayings of Jesus. And most scholars date this to the second century. So it's, you know, probably not actually written by Thomas.

Some scholars kind of think it's earlier, but that's a bit controversial. Again, Christians are going to watch this. And they're going to be like, it's definitely late. Like, there's no way. It's ridiculous to suggest that it's early. But like, you know what you want to think. It's got some weird stuff in there. How do you explain the miracles, like water to wine and making a blind man see and all that?

So, yeah, that's a bit weird. The water to wine only happens in John's Gospel. It's the first miracle that Jesus performed. And he doesn't want to at first. Mary, his mother, comes up to him and it's like, get the party start. She's like, we've run out of wine. And he says, we're a woman.

What does this got to do with me? Which sounds a bit clunky in the English. It sounds kind of rude. But it means something like saying like, you know, like darling. Or she's like, you know, what's this got to do with me? Like, my time hasn't come yet. And she's basically like, please, Jesus, come on. We're out of wine.

It's like, fine. So he goes and turns the water into wine. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, we, we, whether or not you think he performed miracles, especially healing and exorcism, it is like beyond the shadow of a doubt that he was known for doing that. He was known as a, as a, as a, as a, as a miracle worker, yeah, he was known well for doing that. I don't know about Lazarus in particular, because Lazarus, the raising of Lazarus only happens in John's gospel. Also, by the way, one of my favorite indications that Jesus isn't God, because he prays before he raises Lazarus from the dead.

he uh just before he raises lazarus from the dead he looks up to the sky and he says father thank you for having heard me and you know what he says he says i know that you always hear me but right now i'm saying this for the benefit of everybody watching so they will know that you have sent me implying he's not god right no it doesn't it doesn't mean that he's not god but what it means is that it implies so a lot of people say that when jesus performs miracles of his own authority that shows that he's got because you know old testament prophets like elijah and elisha raised people from the dead but they prayed to god for first. They're like, God, you know, raised this person from the dead. But Jesus did it of his own

accord. But Jesus, before he raises Lazarus, praise to God and doesn't just say, like, oh, I'm praying to Jesus, but says, I know you always hear me, but right now I'm saying it for the sake of everybody else, implying that in instances where it seems like he's acting of his own accord, he is still praying to God. He's just not doing so publicly. Because he says in John's Gospel before he raises Lazarus, I know you always hear me, but I'm saying it right now, so they'll know that you've sent me. Which is kind of interesting, right? And that would job, but I mean, you have sent me, not necessarily, but the yogi... Yeah, so there's a constantly, like, the father has sent him.

Yogi's perform miracles is kind of... Yeah, and so... You were a Hindu, dude. It's not like, it's not like... You don't know it. It's not like, it's not like, it's not like, aren't aware that Jesus was constantly saying that the father has sent him. They have their interpretation at that, but I think a lot of it lines up and then converges on the idea

that Jesus didn't claim to be God in this sense. Whether he performed his miracles is like kind of out of my purview. Like, maybe miracles happen. I mean, I probably don't think they did, but he definitely has... a reputation for doing something. Something extraordinary was going on with this guy who was walking around and doing stuff. And all of these traditions develop around him. People want to write about him and then people start writing all of these Gospels and stuff. But people have different ideas about what Jesus did. The Gospel of Thomas, which again, I should clarify, is not canonical.

Most Christians think it's like got no connection to history, but it's there's some weird stuff in there. Like at the very end, the last saying in the saying's gospel of the gospel of Thomas is the most famous where one of his, I think it's Simon Peter. it says to Jesus, you know, Mary Magdalene should depart from us because she's a woman, and women can't inherit eternal life. They're not worthy of life. Now, from what you know of Jesus, what would you expect him to say? What are you talking about?

Everybody's worthy of it. What he says is, I will draw her to me to make her a man so that she will inherit eternal life. For any woman who makes herself into a man will inherit eternal life. Now, can that be a trans-o-de-hs? It could. People say this. This is like the earliest indication of trans-drens. gender you know man into women but is that like his way of communicating to a bunch of dudes

that don't think women are that they should be and he's to find a way to communicate so they can understand the translation of the word man in that sense is like courage or like bravery yeah i'm i i think a lot of that is going on especially because so much less work has been done on the on the the thing about these gnostic gospers like the gospel of tom we're going to get wesley huff in here dude we're going to wesley huff here he's going to refute all this shit he will try i i i i i i i I've seen a lot of Wes's work. I like him.

It seems like a really nice guy. I think he's made some blunders in various areas that are really important. Blund. I've made as much known. There are some that I've spoken about and some of that I haven't. She said a podcast yesterday where I spoke in detail about this massive blunder that West Huff made. I think it was like a year or so ago, which kind of brought someone I know into a bit of disrepute, unfortunately. And he just made this really, really big blunder.

But I don't like just throwing stuff like that out there Because it sounds like you're just sort of taking a jab or whatever But I have always been happy to speak to West And I think it would be I wouldn't want to debate him Because I think you'd lose a lot of the interesting bits Because you'd be too like prideful and defensive Because you're like, I'm going to defend my view I'd like to have a conversation with him though

But yeah, I think he's made some mistakes But you are admitting on air that you would not debate Wesley Huff. No, I mean, I would. I would. But you're saying that conversation might be more fruitful Yeah, it would be it would be way better I mean, that'd be cool to listen to both you. I would love to hear his perspective on it. It's so difficult to be in our position because I know zero.

So anything you say to me is gospel. So Wes Huff thinks that Mark's gospel presents Jesus as God in every single chapter. Got it. And you guys dispute that. He's got a video. Well, I don't have so much of a problem with saying that the Gospels present Jesus as God. I just don't think Jesus claimed it for himself. Got it. So Wes relies in Mark Chapter 2 on the fact that Jesus forgives sins and says that this is, is quite an important moment.

It's the story, have you heard of when the parallels. Whereas John the Baptist doesn't forgive him, he says the father forgives them. Yeah, that would probably be the interpretation, right? And, but it's like, the thing that I think is that people often just miss important corollaries of what they're saying. So, like, in short, Jesus forgives someone's sins in a Mark chapter 2. And the Jewish opponents accuse him of blasphemy. They do it in their hearts.

They say, like, this man is blaspheming. Who can forgive sins but God alone? And the man's paralyzed. And Jesus says, why are you thinking these things? Which is easier to say, your sins are forgiven or get up and walk? So that you know that the son of man has the authority to forgive sins. I say to you, get up and walk. And the man gets up and he walks off.

So Jesus is saying, like, if you don't think I can forgive sins, watch me do this much harder thing and then you'll know that I have the authority to forgive. How stubborn are Jews to see that and be like, nah, he's not the one? Yeah, that is, we don't talk enough about the Jewish faith. But that is, that is... Imagine how much faith you have to have in your religion. You see a guy who's paralyzed. The dude goes, yo, check it.

I'm God. Watch. Get up, walk. That is the message. And they still go, this guy's great. That is the message of the Gospels. As the Gospels go on, they get more anti-Jewish. And especially in John's Gospel, you have, like, Jesus is describing, at least his Jewish opponents and possibly the Jewish people.

He says, they're like, we only have one father and our father is Abraham or our father is God. And he's like, no, your father is the devil. He says that your father is the devil. You know, and so a lot of, like, Christianity. anti-Semitism has come from this idea that the idea that the Jews are responsible for the death of Christ also develops throughout the Gospels. Was there any like conversation back in the day? There's got to be some Jews writing to each other where they're like, this guy might be honest on something. Like, he turned the water and a wine. Yeah, those are cool the Gospels.

Exactly. The letters of Paul. Okay, fair enough, fair enough. It's true. We could talk about this forever, man. I would, we'd love to have you back on next time you're in town. Talk to more. Maybe we get Wes on and have another little conversation. I would love you guys to talk. Sometimes I do think things are lost in debate.

If you managed to get the two of us in a room together, that really would be miraculous. That would be cool, but it would be miraculous. Anyway, Alex O'Connor, everybody.