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Jesus in Archaeology: What the Evidence Really Shows | Titus Kennedy | The Week in Bible Prophecy · The Week in Bible Prophecy

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: The week in Bible Prophecy, a Prophecy Watchers Podcast. Welcome
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: to the program today, Mono Gonzalez here in studio, and
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  Speaker 1: the question for today is is the Bible really a
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  Speaker 1: historical record?
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  Speaker 2: Does it have people that existed in reality?
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  Speaker 1: There's a lot of skepticism to that, and we're going
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  Speaker 1: to talk with doctor Titus Kennedy about that exact question.
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  Speaker 2: So stick around. Well, welcome.
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  Speaker 1: We do have doctor Titus Kennedy and he is a
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  Speaker 1: well known archaeologist. Have been following his work for a
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  Speaker 1: long time and his work is right up my ali
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  Speaker 1: and he nails all the things that hits all the
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  Speaker 1: things which I think are so helpful for the Christian
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  Speaker 1: because again, at the end of the day, we're going
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  Speaker 1: to ask and discover that question about whether the Bible
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  Speaker 1: has historical veracity to it, especially as compared to other books.
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  Speaker 2: So welcome Titus.
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  Speaker 3: Hey, thank you. I appreciate your interest iniblical archaeology. Looking
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  Speaker 3: forward to our conversation.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, this is good stuff.
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  Speaker 1: And so for those in our audience that might not
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  Speaker 1: know you, maybe introduce yourself.
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  Speaker 3: I'm Titus Kennedy. I'm an archaeologist specializing in the Bible.
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  Speaker 3: Various Biblical periods, and this book that we're discussing on
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  Speaker 3: people that are named in the Bible and the archaeological
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  Speaker 3: attestation for them. This is my fourth book out on
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  Speaker 3: Biblical archaeology. So initially I wrote one connected more artifacts
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  Speaker 3: and objects called Unearthing the Bible, and then I wrote
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  Speaker 3: a book focusing just on the archaeology Jesus and the
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  Speaker 3: Gospels called Excavating the Evidence for Jesus. And then I
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  Speaker 3: did one more geography focused or more archaeological site focused
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  Speaker 3: through all the Bible Lands, and that one's called The
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  Speaker 3: Essential Archaeological Guide to Bible Land. So then this one
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  Speaker 3: I switched over to people, so hitting some of the
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  Speaker 3: different topics, and then the future I'll probably go more
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  Speaker 3: into specific time periods and stories within the Bible. But
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  Speaker 3: in addition to writing, I also excavate. Excavated at several
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  Speaker 3: sites in the Bible Lands, actually eighteen sites total, or
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  Speaker 3: I've done archaeological projects in six different countries, but some
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  Speaker 3: of those have been outside of the Middle East as well.
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  Speaker 3: And I also teach. I've taught at universities and seminaries,
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  Speaker 3: continue to do that as a halftime professor, and continue
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  Speaker 3: doing research in publishing articles function as the editor of
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  Speaker 3: the Near East Archaeological Society Bulletin currently as well.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, this is awesome, and you know the people know that.
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  Speaker 1: You know, I have a background in archaology too, certainly
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  Speaker 1: not like yours, but in the sense of one of
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  Speaker 1: the things that I appreciate about your work, and you
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  Speaker 1: know we've been talking for several years now is and
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  Speaker 1: you know this maybe common if you will, about you're
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  Speaker 1: actually a Christian, You're not just an archaeologist, but you
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  Speaker 1: believe the Bible is true, and talk about the our
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  Speaker 1: world in the sense of the archaeological world, and how
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  Speaker 1: it's interesting to me when I got into archaeology, you know,
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  Speaker 1: in school, and I believe the Bible, and then I
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  Speaker 1: got into this world and I was like, that sounds
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  Speaker 1: like that guy doesn't even really believe the Bible is true.
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  Speaker 2: I was shocked.
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  Speaker 1: And so talk about that contrast between Again, it's not
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  Speaker 1: a slight on any of them, it's just they come
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  Speaker 1: from a different perspective.
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  Speaker 2: But talk about how you have navigated that.
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  Speaker 3: So in the field of archaeology in general, the vast
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  Speaker 3: majority of people, their worldview would be atheist or agnostic.
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  Speaker 3: And then when we look into the subset of people
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  Speaker 3: who follow some religion, the Christians are very small percentage
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  Speaker 3: of that. Within archaeology in general, so most archaeologists would
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  Speaker 3: not share our worldview or our beliefs, And since we're
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  Speaker 3: talking about the historical reliability of the Bible, they would
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  Speaker 3: have a different perspective on that. You know, there might
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  Speaker 3: be a range of from the Bible having some useful
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  Speaker 3: historical and geographical information to others that might just paint
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  Speaker 3: it as completely mythological and fiction. But even within the
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  Speaker 3: subset of biblical archaeology where you might think that at
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  Speaker 3: least most of those people think the Bible is historically reliable,
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  Speaker 3: that is not the case anymore as well. In fact,
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  Speaker 3: really hasn't been the case for decades. So when I
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  Speaker 3: was going through school and grad school and working on
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  Speaker 3: different archaeological probus as a volunteer then as a staff member,
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  Speaker 3: you know, most of the time I would encounter people
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  Speaker 3: who rejected the idea of Christianity and rejected the idea
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  Speaker 3: that the Bible is a historically reliable source. So it's
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  Speaker 3: an interesting thing to navigate that, especially as you're trying
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  Speaker 3: to finish your degrees and get jobs. And while you
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  Speaker 3: want to stand up for your beliefs, you also don't
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  Speaker 3: necessarily want to pick fights with people or get into
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  Speaker 3: arguments all the time, because you could get into endless arguments.
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  Speaker 3: And so for quite a while, you know, I was
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  Speaker 3: focused on learning the methodology, learning the material, finishing my studies,
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  Speaker 3: and getting established. And then once I could do that,
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  Speaker 3: then I could start to publish and have some kind
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  Speaker 3: of authority and credentials behind what I was doing.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a great way to say. It's you have
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  Speaker 1: to navigate very carefully because you know, again you don't
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  Speaker 1: want to get pigeonholed or labeled or whatever. And I
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  Speaker 1: think again, there's there's wisdom in that that you learn.
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  Speaker 2: You learn the process, you learn.
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  Speaker 1: The studies, and uh, and then like you said, once
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  Speaker 1: you get on your own and you've been validated by
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  Speaker 1: your peers with a degree a PhD, then you're like, Okay,
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  Speaker 1: now now I have some credibility and can do some
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  Speaker 1: my own research, you know, in in in this particular,
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  Speaker 1: in the in the new book. Obviously that background of
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  Speaker 1: the skepticism, I guess that's a good word. How did
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  Speaker 1: that contribute to you writing this specific book? I mean,
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  Speaker 1: obviously you're seeing that, you're seeing the the questions out there,
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  Speaker 1: so no doubt when you're writing this as I'm reading it,
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  Speaker 1: you have all that background in your mind.
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  Speaker 2: I imagine.
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  Speaker 3: So this topic of people who are our name in
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  Speaker 3: an ancient text, or especially a religious text, and in
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  Speaker 3: this case, the Bible, this is something that distinguishes the
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  Speaker 3: Bible from many other ancient religious texts. But I would
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  Speaker 3: often hear things like, oh, the Bible talks about Jerusalem,
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  Speaker 3: or the Bible talks about hatsor or Bethlehem or any
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  Speaker 3: city like that. They would say, okay, and yes, archaeologists
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  Speaker 3: have found those cities. They did exist, maybe they were
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  Speaker 3: even destroyed at such and such time, or they had
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  Speaker 3: this particular building. But they would compare that to mythology
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  Speaker 3: or even comic books and say things like, you know,
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  Speaker 3: just because the city exists and had some of the
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  Speaker 3: features of that city historically, doesn't mean that the people
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  Speaker 3: existed or that the story actually happen. One that is
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  Speaker 3: quite popular today is comparing the comic book Spider Man
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  Speaker 3: or the comic story Spider Man to the Bible and saying, oh,
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  Speaker 3: look in Spider Man, it's New York City. There's the empire,
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  Speaker 3: state building, et cetera. There are these historical setting features,
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  Speaker 3: But of course Peter Parker is not a real person.
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  Speaker 3: Spider Man is not a real person. Those events didn't happen.
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  Speaker 3: But that's not a valid comparison with the Bible, because
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  Speaker 3: we have people named throughout the Bible who are verified
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  Speaker 3: historical characters, and we have events that are so going
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  Speaker 3: from a book like my previous one that focused on
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  Speaker 3: sites and now to the people, you're shifting gears and
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  Speaker 3: looking at more specifics of the story, so to speak,
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  Speaker 3: things that are not going to appear in a mythological
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  Speaker 3: text that has a historical setting. Instead, it's got to
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  Speaker 3: be a historical text because it is actual people living
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  Speaker 3: at those times in places, fulfilling those roles and participating
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  Speaker 3: in those events.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, to me, it's fascinating because the Bible doesn't claim
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  Speaker 1: to be fiction. It claims to be an historical record
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  Speaker 1: from the creation all the way through again, a certain
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  Speaker 1: people group in a certain in a time, et cetera.
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  Speaker 1: From Abraham on and two locations, etc.
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  Speaker 2: It's just amazing to me.
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  Speaker 1: One of the things that you bring up in your introduction,
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  Speaker 1: which I thought was helpful was, well, you know, the
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  Speaker 1: Bible is similar to the Iliad by Homer, and talk
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  Speaker 1: about that like a contrast and comparison there, because I
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  Speaker 1: mean that's a historical record or text.
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  Speaker 2: Talk about the similarities and differences.
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  Speaker 3: So both are ancient texts. Both are you could say,
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  Speaker 3: cultural or religious texts ancient Greeks, and if we're talking
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  Speaker 3: about the Old Testament the Ancient Hebrews. Both have characteristics
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  Speaker 3: in them where we can see there is a setting
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  Speaker 3: within history, and both have supernatural events described in them
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  Speaker 3: as well, and so there is that crossover. And of course,
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  Speaker 3: earlier before the Archaeology of Troy and Heinrich Schliemann, many
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  Speaker 3: many scholars claimed that the Iliad was totally fictional, that
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  Speaker 3: none of those events happened, that the place didn't exist, right,
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  Speaker 3: But then the place is discovered and excavated, and they
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  Speaker 3: even find that it was destroyed around the time that
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  Speaker 3: the Iliad situates, this Battle of Troy in the Mycenean period,
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  Speaker 3: and so there was a historical event that's quartered in there,
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  Speaker 3: and so that kind of thing. We do see some
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  Speaker 3: similarities with the Bible. The geography is right, the locations
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  Speaker 3: some major type events like a war, destruction of a city.
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  Speaker 3: But when you get down to the details, that's where
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  Speaker 3: you see more differences between the Iliad and the Bible.
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  Speaker 3: Because in the Iliad we have these people like Agamemnon,
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  Speaker 3: helen Achilles, Hector, and so forth, and we have no
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  Speaker 3: evidence for those people existing in the Mycenean period. There
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  Speaker 3: are no inscriptions that talk about any of them. Hundreds
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  Speaker 3: and hundreds of years later, they do appear on things
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  Speaker 3: like jars pottery where the scenes are painted from the Iliad, though,
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  Speaker 3: so these are after the Homeric poem. These are not earlier.
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  Speaker 3: It's not source material. So in all likelihood, Homer created
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  Speaker 3: these characters, maybe off archetypes, inserting them into a historical
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  Speaker 3: event that had happened probably hundreds of years before he lived.
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  Speaker 3: But that's not the case when we look at the Bible,
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  Speaker 3: because we have contemporary archaeological evidence of many of the
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  Speaker 3: people their right name, their right family relationship, their location,
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  Speaker 3: their their job, or their title, and it verifies those
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  Speaker 3: those are real people, and so the stories have much
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  Speaker 3: more historical support than something like the Iliad that has
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  Speaker 3: merely a historical context.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's excellent because it'd be different if like you said,
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  Speaker 1: for similarities, if the people I've been to Troy I
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  Speaker 1: was actually just their last fall and on the archaeological site,
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  Speaker 1: and if you go there and they're like, oh wow,
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  Speaker 1: look at this, here's an inscription of the person that
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  Speaker 1: Homer wrote about, that would be different. But that's like
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  Speaker 1: you said, that's not that's not what is happening. And
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  Speaker 1: you mentioned inscriptions, and so you know, for the for
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  Speaker 1: the lay person, talk about the different types of artifacts
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  Speaker 1: that you were looking at that make again that provide
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  Speaker 1: an opportunity to make some comparisons between again what the
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  Speaker 1: text is saying and versus what you're looking at out
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  Speaker 1: in the field.
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  Speaker 3: So there are many many types of artifacts that might
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  Speaker 3: preserve someone's name and information about them, and this could
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  Speaker 3: vary based on that person's status. If we're talking about
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  Speaker 3: a king, then they may be mentioned on a steely
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  Speaker 3: one of these monumental stones that's inscribed often has pictures
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  Speaker 3: on it as well, and it's usually talking about either
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  Speaker 3: a major historical event or some kind of dedication. So
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  Speaker 3: we have that of those these these large stone monuments,
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  Speaker 3: we also have statues in some periods and cultures as well.
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  Speaker 3: It could be a statue of the person and their
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  Speaker 3: name is inscribed on it as well. Coins in later
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  Speaker 3: periods of history, especially when we're talking about the Roman
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  Speaker 3: period and the New Testament, we have many, many people
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  Speaker 3: attested on coins, their names on the coins, sometimes their image,
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  Speaker 3: and then back in Old Testament times, tablets, especially qneiform
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  Speaker 3: clay tablets. These were very common in the time of Daniel, Nebekinezer,
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  Speaker 3: Hezekiah and so forth. So a lot of the people
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  Speaker 3: from those periods are attested on tablets, but this is
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  Speaker 3: a type of artifact where we're more likely to see
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  Speaker 3: also someone who was not a king, so someone like
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  Speaker 3: Nebo Sarsakim, who's just mentioned once by Jeremiah, who was
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  Speaker 3: an official within the Babylonian government, but he wasn't one
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  Speaker 3: of the most important people. We also have different types
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  Speaker 3: of manuscripts, papyri and parchment that may preserve discussion of
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  Speaker 3: a historical character. So a lot of these preserve mention
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  Speaker 3: of people named in the New Testament. Mosaics sometimes have
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  Speaker 3: someone's name on them. Ostra khan is a piece of
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  Speaker 3: pottery with writing on it, sometimes inscribed, sometimes painted, but
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  Speaker 3: those are more common in say the Divided Kingdom period
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  Speaker 3: of the Old Testament or the Exile and the Persian period,
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  Speaker 3: we have seals. People had these seals that they would
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  Speaker 3: use their personal seal, and so their name and their
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  Speaker 3: title is on that seal. Many many of the Old
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  Speaker 3: Testament people are preserved in seals or the imprints that
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  Speaker 3: are made from those seals in clay, which are called boulet.
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  Speaker 3: And then again New Testament times, we have another type
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  Speaker 3: of artifact called an ashwary, which is a stone burial,
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  Speaker 3: and so there are several inscriptions with people's names and
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  Speaker 3: titles or place of origins or families that we have
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  Speaker 3: a testing New Testament characters. So all sorts of different artifacts.
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  Speaker 3: The thing that ties these together is they are writing,
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  Speaker 3: you know, either inscriptions or they're impressed or they are
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  Speaker 3: on inc somehow, and they have the names of the
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  Speaker 3: people on them.
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  Speaker 1: So we talked about the different types of artifacts that
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  Speaker 1: you would look for connections, names and other things and writings.
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  Speaker 2: You love.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, when there's writing on anything, it's like, oh,
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  Speaker 1: hold everybody stop, this is awesome, right. But you also
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  Speaker 1: talk if you can before we talk about the specifics
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  Speaker 1: of the people, which I think is going to be fun.
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  Speaker 1: What criteria this is really important. It wasn't just random.
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  Speaker 1: Oh look at that. You had very specific criteria and
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  Speaker 1: talk about your grading system, because I thought this was
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  Speaker 1: super important too.
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  Speaker 3: So several scholars have done studies like this in the past,
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  Speaker 3: looking at identifying historical characters through archaeological material, even specifically
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  Speaker 3: biblical characters. And so I built on this, and there
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  Speaker 3: are essentially five different categories that we would look at
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  Speaker 3: and then sort of a sixth add on, and we
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  Speaker 3: use these in order to evaluate if it's a legitimate
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  Speaker 3: comparison or a legitimate identification. So, first of all, you've
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  Speaker 3: got the name, so it should be the same name,
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  Speaker 3: not a nickname, not an alternative name for which we
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  Speaker 3: have no historical attestation. You could plausibly identify someone without
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  Speaker 3: their name, but that takes a lot more evidence to
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  Speaker 3: establish that, and that is not what I'm addressing in
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  Speaker 3: this book. I'm addressing the name. People who have name matches,
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  Speaker 3: so same name. Now, we do have the situation where
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  Speaker 3: you move from language to language and writing system and
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  Speaker 3: writing system, and so sometimes the spelling or the pronunciation
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: is a little bit different. But of course we see
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  Speaker 3: that even today with modern names. From one language to another,
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  Speaker 3: it's going to be a little bit different. Standard name
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  Speaker 3: in English might be a little bit different than one
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  Speaker 3: in French or German, or Italian or Russian or Arabic.
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  Speaker 3: So that's not a problem, though we can see where
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  Speaker 3: it's the same name with a slightly different linguistic spelling
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  Speaker 3: or pronunciation. The second thing is that they may have
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  Speaker 3: family relationships that are mentioned in the historical text, and
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  Speaker 3: they may also be present in that archaeological inscription. So
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  Speaker 3: they're the son of someone, or the father of someone,
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  Speaker 3: or the brother, sister, mother, grandmother, things like that, husband
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  Speaker 3: or wife, and that's not always present, but it is
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  Speaker 3: in some identifications, and that helps to narrow down exactly
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  Speaker 3: who this person is and specify it. Then we have
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  Speaker 3: their title or their occupation, or perhaps their place of
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  Speaker 3: origin or some other specific identifier, some accolade that they did.
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  Speaker 3: And this could be a king, it could be a princess,
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  Speaker 3: it could be a governor things like that. So that
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  Speaker 3: helped Jesus even more, Yeah, exactly, you know, or King
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  Speaker 3: Nebukanezer of Babylon, things like that. So then we've got
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  Speaker 3: in addition to all those things connected to the name
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  Speaker 3: and their occupation, we also need to have. The geographic
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  Speaker 3: location needs to match, so where they lived, the city
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: or at least the region, the nation, but often we'll
• 20:05
  Speaker 3: find the artifact in the city where they lived, or
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  Speaker 3: it may even have that in part of the inscription.
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  Speaker 3: And then finally the time period, so the chronological context
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  Speaker 3: needs to be the same as well. So it needs
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  Speaker 3: to fit into a plausible life span of the time
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  Speaker 3: period in which that person lived according to the historical text,
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  Speaker 3: according to what we're looking at in the biblical text,
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  Speaker 3: so whether that's fifty years or ninety years, you know,
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  Speaker 3: people live different lengths of time. It's got to be
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  Speaker 3: somewhere in there. It shouldn't be from hundreds of years
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  Speaker 3: earlier or later, except in the situation where we might
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  Speaker 3: have a later text that is referring back to someone.
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  Speaker 3: But in general I restricted these to contemporary attestations. So
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  Speaker 3: there's five there. The six add on would be confirming
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  Speaker 3: that the artifact itself is authentic. And typically this isn't
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  Speaker 3: a problem because we're excavating them, so they're coming out
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  Speaker 3: of controlled archaeological excavations. But there are quite a few
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  Speaker 3: cases where we have artifacts that have appeared on the
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: antiquities market because they were looted, excavated illegally, and they
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  Speaker 3: have to go through a process of analysis and evaluation
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  Speaker 3: to see if they are indeed genuine, and if it
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  Speaker 3: shows that they are, then it's a real artifact. Apply
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  Speaker 3: those five see if they match up. We don't always
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  Speaker 3: get all five for every person. We do in some cases.
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  Speaker 3: Some you know, we have two or three, and those
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  Speaker 3: are not quite as strong identifications.
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  Speaker 1: So the I counted up in your book, you know,
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  Speaker 1: at least I could be wrong, But one hundred and
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  Speaker 1: twenty four people, and you have an ABC or D
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  Speaker 1: rating and of the one hundred and twenty four eighty
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  Speaker 1: seven or A, so explain what that means.
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I decided to go with a rating system similar
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: to other studies, especially if you look at textual criticism,
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: they'll often do this with textual variance. So I thought
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: that would be helpful rather than just talking about it
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: in the text if it was there in the heading,
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: so people had a quick reference for it. And I
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: only gave four four categories. So I've got firm, and
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: I have probable, and I have tentative, and I have speculative.
• 22:39
  Speaker 3: So I included some speculative because I thought people need
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: to know about some of these, but they also need
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: to know that this is not a for sure thing.
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: It's it's possible, but we don't have enough evidence to
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: say definitively or positively. But essentially, what I looked at
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: is when when they're an a rating or firm, they
• 23:06
  Speaker 3: probably have all five of those categories, or or even
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: if they don't have all five, then maybe they have four,
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: maybe they even have three. But it's so obvious that
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: it couldn't be anyone else, like a specific king like Nebukanezzer.
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: You know, actually nebukan Azer the second. There's there's no
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: other king nebucan Ezzer Babylon during the sixth century BC,
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: So we don't have to confirm all his sons and
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: his daughters and his father and things like that. We
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: know exactly who that is. But in other case, is
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: where it's a more obscure figure, we do need the
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: extra information order to really confirm for sure that it
• 23:46
  Speaker 3: is that person.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean you you labeled it out chronologically basically,
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: and and but let's let's start with nebugen Azer.
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: He well known in the Book of Daniel.
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: I mean, people can read about him and of course,
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: coming from a very well known near Eastern context of Babylon,
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: you know.
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: And you have an AA rating for him, very firm.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: But how firm is it?
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: That's one of those that's absolute, cannot be mistaken. We
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: have so many texts of Nebukonezer that he himself commissioned,
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: where he is even speaking in the first person, like
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: his inscription on the Ishtar Gate. We have building projects
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: of his. There's even a steely that shows him in
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: Babylon in front of the ziggurat. Sometimes it's called the
• 24:38
  Speaker 3: Tower of Babel Steely, not the ancient ancient Tower of Babbel,
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: but another tower of Babbel. So in situations like that, again,
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: we have so much evidence. It's one hundred percent that
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: this is the person that the Bible is referring to.
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: Same time period, same location, same name, same title. Do
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: have information about his family, although it's not talked about
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: in the biblical text. And then even events associated with
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: him when he's leading the charge or ordering for Jerusalem
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: to be attacked and besieged, taking kings into exile, destroying
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: the city later on, so very obvious in a case.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: Like that, Yeah, it's fun.
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: So I mean, this is where again, when you have
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: those that are skeptical and the Bible says something, and yeah,
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: again you might go back two hundred years before a
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: lot of this was excavated and yeah, the Bible, you
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: know whatever, the skeptical world, Yeah, is it even true? Again,
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: it's just no different than the Iliad. One of the
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: ones that when I was in graduate school, you know,
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: two thousand and eight or so, I remember writing a
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: paper on it, kind of a thesis on.
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: It was the person of King David.
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: Back then you had this debate of the minimalist and maximalist,
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: and it was kind of in its heyday. And but
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: yet a lot of stuff was being discovered, and you
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: have David in your book, and so in that sense,
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: based on you have a firm rating. And based on
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: that backdrop, I mean, is David a myth or is
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: he a real figure?
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: And what does the archaeology show?
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he's He's absolutely a real figure. But until the nineties,
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: most scholars were leaning towards the idea that he was
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: a fictional or mythological character because they had no defined
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: archaeological evidence for the existence of David and his role
• 26:33
  Speaker 3: as a king. But that changed when the Tel Dan
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: Steely was found, which you've got it behind you, and
• 26:40
  Speaker 3: it talks about how the Aramians had defeated these kings
• 26:45
  Speaker 3: of Israel and Judah and they had come from the
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: line of the House of David, showing that he was
• 26:51
  Speaker 3: the king that established the ruling dynasty of these Israelite monarchs,
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: and that that was from the ninth century, so it
• 27:01
  Speaker 3: comes from the generation after essentially. And then they looked
• 27:05
  Speaker 3: at the Mesha Steely again which is Moabite, also from
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: the ninth century BC, and it also referenced the House
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: of David in the same way as the founder of
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: the royal dynasty. And then even more recently, although there's
• 27:22
  Speaker 3: still debate about this, there's the probable Palace of David
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: in Jerusalem, constructed about one thousand BC. And there's evidence
• 27:33
  Speaker 3: from several sites, cities or fortress towns around the area
• 27:41
  Speaker 3: of ancient Israel and the Kingdom of David that show
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: that there was a government functioning at the time that
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: was building those sites and ruling over them. In fact,
• 27:51
  Speaker 3: there's even the Ostra Khan from Kirbet Kyafa that references
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: the king and it's in Hebrew. So I think it's
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: very powerful evidence now for David not just as existing
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: but also as the king and the king ruling over
• 28:10
  Speaker 3: a kingdom like we read about in the Bible.
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I remember I was there in two thousand and
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: eight with Joseph Garfinkle and he he hadn't really published
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: anything yet, but we were there at Kurba Kayafa. He
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: gave us an insider view because we were over excavating
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: at got and here you have this the double gated city,
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: you know, and all again, all the things that they
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: were finding there was just and now when we go
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: when I take groups, I like to take them there
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: because it's right above the Valley of the Law, so
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: you get to see all that too and be like,
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: look here we are.
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: Here's a city.
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: And I said, here's this little known city, which I think,
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: based on again coming from that world, is this city
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: is very, very influential in this debate, and it's much
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: more than what is typically typically seen, which I think
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: is kind of fun. Tako as well, we mentioned you know, Nebukinezer,
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: which is a foreign ruler again towards the northeast, and
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: the kind of the Babylonian you know, you know, Mesopotamian
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: area of course we have Israel, but then also Egypt,
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: I mean Egypt's well known in history. Talk about she
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: Shack because here's a guy that again appeers in the Bible,
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: well known and it was he a real person.
• 29:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, so she Shack is one of these situations
• 29:29
  Speaker 3: where the way that it's transliterated in English translations of
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: the Bible can cause a little bit of confusion. But
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: we do have his name rendered in Hebrew, especially like
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: in One Kings fourteen twenty five as show Shack, which
• 29:48
  Speaker 3: is essentially identical to the Egyptian rendering of his name
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: as an Egyptian king or an Egyptian pharaoh. So in
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: Egyptian history, this would be the ruler known as Showshank
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: the First and he ruled in the tenth century BC,
• 30:07
  Speaker 3: specifically about nine five to nine twenty four, So he's
• 30:11
  Speaker 3: there before the split of the kingdom while Solomon's still alive,
• 30:15
  Speaker 3: and then he's there after the split of the kingdom.
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: And then it says in the fifth year of Reha Boem,
• 30:22
  Speaker 3: that's when this pharaoh came up and he attacked some
• 30:26
  Speaker 3: of the cities in Judah Israel as well, and he
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: besieged Jerusalem. So the time period, fits, the name, fits
• 30:34
  Speaker 3: the title fits. We don't have discussions about his family
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: ties specifically you know, his father or son or something
• 30:45
  Speaker 3: like that in the Bible, so we can't really compare that.
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: But again, this is a situation where he's a king
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: at a specific time in a specific place, and so
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: it's really not a difficult identification. And then he also
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: helps us with events. You know, we can match the
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: events of this Egyptian king in Egyptian sources with the
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: events of that Egyptian king mentioned in the Bible, his
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: attack on Judah and Israel and Jerusalem, and we see
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: this in his own inscriptions, like at the Bubastite portal
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: at Karnak where he lists all these places that he
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: went to and he defeated. Meguido actually is on one
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: of those, and that's really important because at Meguido they
• 31:32
  Speaker 3: excavated a victory steally of Showshank the first and it's
• 31:36
  Speaker 3: got his cartouches on it, so more firm identification. There
• 31:43
  Speaker 3: really another one of these where it's absolutely the same person.
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: We see them doing the same thing, same time in place.
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: And again the Bible is talking about real historical people
• 31:56
  Speaker 3: doing events that actually happened Titus.
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: Let's jump in to the New Testament, and maybe, as
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: I mentioned, maybe give a little contrast or similarity. Maybe
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: I'm wrong, but is the New Testament figures Are they
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: a little bit easier than maybe some of the Old
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: Testament figures.
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, they are easier, and the primary reason for that
• 32:18
  Speaker 3: is because it's closer to our current time. Secondarily, in
• 32:24
  Speaker 3: the Roman period, there is a lot more writing and
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: inscriptions especially that have been preserved, and so there's just
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: more information with people's names on it that we're able
• 32:37
  Speaker 3: to look at, more preserved, more writing makes it simpler
• 32:41
  Speaker 3: for us.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, And so in the same way as you're
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: looking at first century people are in the Bible, you're.
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: Using the same criteria, criteria right all the way through.
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, same criteria.
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So in that who do you think you mentioned?
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about some of the I mean the easiest
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: when we'll be Jesus, so we'll get to.
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: Him in a minute.
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: But some of the foreign rulers, some of the Roman
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: you know, people that are mentioned in the New Testament.
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: Talk about a couple of those.
• 33:13
  Speaker 3: Sure, I would say one of my favorites is Erastus
• 33:17
  Speaker 3: because he is a fairly insignificant politician in the Roman world,
• 33:25
  Speaker 3: and yet he is mentioned in the New Testament multiple times.
• 33:30
  Speaker 3: He became a Christian, he was a friend of Paul,
• 33:34
  Speaker 3: and so Paul refers to him, and he even tells
• 33:39
  Speaker 3: us his title and where he's from. And of course
• 33:43
  Speaker 3: we know the time period. He's around fifty a d.
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: When Paul is doing these missionary journeys. So this is Erastus,
• 33:52
  Speaker 3: Erastus of Corinth, and he was the city treasurer. And
• 33:57
  Speaker 3: so we have at Corinth excavations that uncovered this inscribed
• 34:05
  Speaker 3: paving stone and it was a dedication to the person
• 34:09
  Speaker 3: who paid for this pavement near the theater. And this
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: person just happens to be Erastus, the city treasurer from
• 34:19
  Speaker 3: about fifty AD in Corinth. And so this is one
• 34:24
  Speaker 3: of those situations where it's almost impossible for it to
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: not be the same person. We've got the same name,
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: the same specific title or job position, the same time period,
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: I mean really within a window of several years, and
• 34:45
  Speaker 3: the same location. We don't have family information in either
• 34:50
  Speaker 3: the New Testament or in Roman sources, but we've got
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: all the other things, and so this is generally seen
• 34:58
  Speaker 3: as a firm identification by most scholars.
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: To me, it's I remember reading years ago, just several
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: books in the sense of even Luke. You know, Luke
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: was always again a few hundred years ago by skeptics.
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: He was challenged as being a careful historian. But yet.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: Talk about that, how that is just totally not the
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: case that he was not careful.
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: That he absolutely was a very careful historian.
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah. The opinion turned the corner on this a lot
• 35:32
  Speaker 3: after the work of Ramsey when excavated many different sites,
• 35:38
  Speaker 3: especially in Asia Minor. But he was actually looking at
• 35:43
  Speaker 3: this question of is Luke a reliable historian and he
• 35:48
  Speaker 3: he didn't think so initially, but through his archaeological work
• 35:53
  Speaker 3: and research, what he found was that Luke was an
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: incredible historian, a historian of the first rank, because all
• 36:02
  Speaker 3: of these details about these places and about these people
• 36:07
  Speaker 3: he saw, they were confirmed by the archaeological evidence. And
• 36:10
  Speaker 3: so instead he believed acts was a historically reliable narrative,
• 36:18
  Speaker 3: not some theological treatise that's sort of set in a
• 36:23
  Speaker 3: semi historical context.
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: To me, it's fascinating because you know, again you as
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: you know, in a lot of the ancient inscriptions or
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: Steele or whatever.
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: A lot of it is propaganda, right, we know that's
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: the case.
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: But here Luke says, hey, I'm doing this and I'm
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: very careful about what I'm writing here. There's been a
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: lot of different reports, but I'm gonna give you a
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: very sequential thing. Theophilus, Right, so you have him in
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: there as well, talk about him. He's mentioned in the
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: Book of Acts.
• 36:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so Theophilis is one of these characters where this
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: is a lot more difficult to pin down. And you know,
• 37:03
  Speaker 3: people scholars can't really even agree exactly on who Theopholus is,
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: but I thought that it should be included because we
• 37:13
  Speaker 3: do have some interesting archaeological material to look at. So
• 37:18
  Speaker 3: we have, in particular, there's an ausuary inscription that mentions Theophilus,
• 37:25
  Speaker 3: who was a high priest around the time of Luke,
• 37:30
  Speaker 3: and it's this is one of the theories for who
• 37:34
  Speaker 3: Luke was addressing there, and so this austuary inscription is
• 37:38
  Speaker 3: actually his granddaughters ausuary, but she references him because he
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: was such an important person. And so sometimes we have
• 37:49
  Speaker 3: situations like that where an ancestor a you know, a
• 37:55
  Speaker 3: recent ancestor, but a family member is referenced on an inscription,
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: especially these burial boxes. So that's one that is more tentative,
• 38:06
  Speaker 3: but again it's worth looking at. People should know about
• 38:11
  Speaker 3: it and have that in the back of their minds.
• 38:14
  Speaker 3: All right, this is the person who might be attested archaeologically.
• 38:20
  Speaker 3: We're not sure at this point, but we've got to
• 38:23
  Speaker 3: have that material there, and there may be something that's
• 38:27
  Speaker 3: found in the future that makes this more definitive. I
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: mean often that is the case.
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And that's what I appreciate about what you did
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: here is you know, out of one hundred and twenty four,
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: you have eighty seven that are a certain but you're
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: also willing to give the others and be honest and say, well,
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: like you just said everything that you know, this is tentative,
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: or this is you know, that's possible.
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: Whatever.
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: One that is pretty certain against speaking of ausuaries is
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: one of Jesus's main enemies in the Gospel, namely Caiaphas.
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: Talk about him.
• 38:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Caiaphas. I think this is I wouldn't say universally recognized,
• 39:03
  Speaker 3: but it's a consensus that we do have Caiaphas attested archaeologically.
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: And so the main piece of evidence is his own ashwary,
• 39:14
  Speaker 3: his own burial box. It was found in a tomb
• 39:18
  Speaker 3: in Jerusalem. It was a family tomb pre seventy eighty
• 39:22
  Speaker 3: before the city got destroyed, and it was actually the
• 39:24
  Speaker 3: family tomb of the Caiaphas family, so that was their
• 39:29
  Speaker 3: family name, their last name, And there were multiple oshuaries
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: in there, others that were inscribed. They were inscribed with
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: the family name Caiaphas, but one in particular was especially
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: interesting because not only was this the most intricately carved
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: of all the ausuaries, which suggests to us that the
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: person was important that they had the money to pay
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: the highest skill artisan to do this. But then in
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: Aramaic was inscribed Joseph, son of Caiaphas on this ashwary.
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: And although the Bible doesn't say Joseph son of Caiaphas,
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: the High Priest, just says Caiaphas the High Priest. We
• 40:19
  Speaker 3: know from Josephus's writings that Joseph was his given name,
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: his first name, and so we know that's the same
• 40:28
  Speaker 3: person that's the high priest. His name was Joseph's son
• 40:30
  Speaker 3: of Caiaphas. He served as the High priest, and this
• 40:35
  Speaker 3: then would be his Aushwary. So it's the it's the
• 40:39
  Speaker 3: same name, same first name, same family name, it's the
• 40:44
  Speaker 3: same location in Jerusalem, it's the same time period, first
• 40:47
  Speaker 3: century prior to seventy eighty. And although the Ashwary inscription
• 40:54
  Speaker 3: doesn't say he's the high priest, the Ashwary itself demonstrates
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: that he was an extremely important and wealthy person, which
• 41:02
  Speaker 3: fits the high priest. And in Josephus's writings we do
• 41:06
  Speaker 3: see that he is called the high priest as well.
• 41:09
  Speaker 3: So all those things fit together. We've got all five
• 41:13
  Speaker 3: criteria for him. So this is a firm rating there.
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: Absolutely, And you know, for those that might be wondering,
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: I mean, you do mention Jesus in there, talk about
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: you know, of course we have them in the Bible,
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: but what do we have archaeologically that would bring some confirmation.
• 41:31
  Speaker 3: Yes, I think a lot of people might be surprised
• 41:35
  Speaker 3: unless they've done quite a bit of studying already that
• 41:39
  Speaker 3: Jesus is actually very well attested historically, and we could
• 41:44
  Speaker 3: say archaeologically in addition to that, So as far as
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: historical writings, So let's talk about ancient manuscripts we're going
• 41:54
  Speaker 3: to use ancient manuscripts for some people instead of just
• 41:58
  Speaker 3: stone inscriptions, and this is the case for Jesus. We
• 42:01
  Speaker 3: have some writers, historians, and philosophers from the first and
• 42:07
  Speaker 3: second century AD, some of course lived in the first century,
• 42:12
  Speaker 3: and they mentioned Jesus Christ as a historical person, like
• 42:16
  Speaker 3: Josephus does, Serapion does in a letter to his son,
• 42:20
  Speaker 3: Tacitus does as well, Pliny the Younger and Suetonius. Some
• 42:26
  Speaker 3: of those people lived into the second century, but they
• 42:29
  Speaker 3: also lived in the first century, so they're right there
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: within the generation of Jesus, so they're attesting to him
• 42:39
  Speaker 3: historically in a way. But we do have ancient manuscripts
• 42:42
  Speaker 3: of them. So this enters the realm of archaeology. But
• 42:46
  Speaker 3: then specifically with archaeology. We have two maybe three artifacts
• 42:54
  Speaker 3: that I highlight. The first one doesn't actually have Jesus's
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: aim on it, but it's called the alexanmnos Carfedo, and
• 43:03
  Speaker 3: it shows Jesus being crucified. This is the earliest pictorial
• 43:08
  Speaker 3: representation of the crucifixion of Jesus and it came from
• 43:11
  Speaker 3: Rome about one hundred eighty or so, So this is,
• 43:16
  Speaker 3: you know, doesn't have his name, but it's got some
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: events and things associated with it, and we know that
• 43:21
  Speaker 3: it's it's Christ because there's a worshiper there associated with it,
• 43:25
  Speaker 3: and the Romans are actually mocking this Christian. But then
• 43:30
  Speaker 3: with his name we have on the James ostuary, we
• 43:35
  Speaker 3: have his name appearing as the brother of James. So
• 43:39
  Speaker 3: it says in Aramaic James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus.
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: And why can we identify this Jesus as Jesus Christ. Well,
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: first of all, son of Joseph, that part brother of James.
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: James was one of his brothers. In fact, Josephus writes
• 43:57
  Speaker 3: about James as the brother of Jesus, so there's that
• 44:01
  Speaker 3: tie in. But the fact that they tacked on brother
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: of Jesus to this inscription is very very strange. We
• 44:08
  Speaker 3: don't see the same formula on any other Ashuwary inscriptions,
• 44:12
  Speaker 3: and in fact, only one other ausuary inscription has the
• 44:16
  Speaker 3: brother's name, So this tells us the brother is important.
• 44:20
  Speaker 3: They want us to know who it is. It's from
• 44:23
  Speaker 3: first century Jerusalem prior to seventy a d. So very
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: very strong case that this is mentioning Jesus and then finally,
• 44:33
  Speaker 3: something that less people know about but I think is
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: incredibly interesting. There was a cup that was excavated or
• 44:42
  Speaker 3: found during an archaeological project in the harbor of Alexandria
• 44:47
  Speaker 3: and dated to about the first century and possibly fifty
• 44:54
  Speaker 3: AD is or so. There's some dispute over it because
• 44:58
  Speaker 3: it's a pottery form, you can't you say exactly when
• 45:01
  Speaker 3: it's from. But looking at the inscription, there's a Greek
• 45:05
  Speaker 3: inscription and it says on it through Christ the Magician.
• 45:11
  Speaker 3: Now this may be the earliest attestation archaeologically of Jesus's
• 45:16
  Speaker 3: title Christ. And the reason that they would talk about
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: him like that in Egypt is because Egypt was one
• 45:25
  Speaker 3: of the centers in the ancient world from magic, and
• 45:30
  Speaker 3: so they were looking at Jesus as a magician. In fact,
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: Kelsis talks about Jesus going to Egypt as a child
• 45:37
  Speaker 3: and he says he learned magic there and that's how
• 45:40
  Speaker 3: he performed his miracles. So that's the Egyptian mindset in general,
• 45:45
  Speaker 3: you know, outside of Christianity, and later we have some
• 45:48
  Speaker 3: Egyptian papyri that even talk about a formula for casting
• 45:52
  Speaker 3: out demons was to invoke the name of Jesus, God
• 45:56
  Speaker 3: of the Hebrews. So they were familiar with Jesus with
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: his miracles, casting out of demons and so forth, and
• 46:02
  Speaker 3: so this cup may have been something where they thought
• 46:05
  Speaker 3: they could harness his miraculous power and using it in
• 46:10
  Speaker 3: some kind of ritual. So we've got historical attestation, multiple historians.
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: We have a pictorial reference to him on the cross,
• 46:22
  Speaker 3: we have his name Jesus along with his brother and
• 46:26
  Speaker 3: with Joseph on the aushuary, and then we seem to
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: have his title as well on that cup.
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, how fascinating is it that?
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: Again, there's there's a lot of things that were later,
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: you know, third fourth centuries, but we're talking about getting
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: down back in there, you know, within fifty years or
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: even sooner to his existence, which is to me is phenomenal.
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: You know, as we close here, you know, what do
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: you say to you know, somebody who is you know,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: let's say, a teenager, and like, I think, I'm like myself,
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: I'm eighteen years old, and how does how do these
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: how do the stuff that you've presented here ultimately connect
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: to the reality of the gospel, the saving Gospel message.
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: I mean that all to me that's the ultimate goal,
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: is to get somebody to say, Okay, you can believe this,
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: what do you say to them?
• 47:16
  Speaker 3: So we can evaluate the Bible on different grounds, but
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: one of those grounds is history, history, archaeology. And what
• 47:27
  Speaker 3: we can say from history and archaeology is that those places,
• 47:32
  Speaker 3: those people, those events that are written about in the Bible,
• 47:36
  Speaker 3: they're demonstrated to have been real people, places, and events.
• 47:42
  Speaker 3: The text is historically reliable. It's confirmed time and time
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: again that it's true, that it can be trusted, and
• 47:51
  Speaker 3: so we should then give this proper view to the Bible,
• 47:58
  Speaker 3: that it is a valuable source of information of truth.
• 48:03
  Speaker 3: And although we don't verify theological claims in the same
• 48:07
  Speaker 3: way that we do historical claims, the fact that the
• 48:11
  Speaker 3: Bible is demonstrated to be historically reliable should clue us
• 48:16
  Speaker 3: into the fact that maybe the theological claims are true
• 48:21
  Speaker 3: as well. They are certainly worth looking at just from
• 48:26
  Speaker 3: a purely objective historical perspective. So we can be confident
• 48:31
  Speaker 3: historically reliable, look at the theology, it should be true
• 48:36
  Speaker 3: as well.
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, one hundred percent.
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: It reminds me of Jesus's phraseology to Nicodemus. If I
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: speak to you about earthly things, and you can't grasp that,
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: then how are you going to grasp heavenly things? And
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: so here we have these objective earthly correspondences between history, science,
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: archaeology again and evidence that you can hold in your hand,
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: and it shows itself. It's not just some make believe
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: myth or fiction. And so when Jesus, this historical reliable
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: person is giving these words and again and Luke, a
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: historical historian of excellence, is writing about these truths, I
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: think it's super important that God would want us to know. Yeah,
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: we do have an element of faith, as you said,
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: theologically we take things by faith, but that faith is
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: not blind, it's not built on anti evidence or complete contradictions.
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: And so Titus says always, thank you for joining me today.
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: Thank you as well for watching everybody. Thank you for
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: your prayers and support. We could not do this without you.
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: And again I encourage you to get his book, give
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: it as a gift. It just came out today. I
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: feel honored to be interviewing Titus today on it. You
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: can certainly get it at prophecywatchers dot com as well.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: So thanks for listening, and we'll catch you next time,