Friday, May 8, 2015

Debate: Did Jesus Rise from the Dead? (David Wood vs. John Loftus)

Jesus' resurrection is the heart of both Christian preaching and Christian living. In 1 Corinthians 15:17, the Apostle Paul said: "If Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless." Hence, Christianity stands or falls with the resurrection of Jesus.

In order to discredit Christianity, atheists simply need to discredit the central miracle on which it is founded. But can atheistic explanations account for the historical facts? If they can't, is atheism a worldview in crisis?

In this video, David Wood (Christian, former atheist) and John Loftus (atheist, former Christian) debate whether Jesus rose from the dead.

11 comments:

WIKI's Page said...

Thanks Dr David for publishing this.

John is a kind of person who will not believe even if the Lord appears to him in person. Once, one has shutdown himself, no amount of reasoning and evidence will help convince him of anything.

Unknown said...

You pretty] much thrashed him in this daivd..... you even gave me information about the resurrection I was previously unaware of. Thank you David.... God bless you for your work.

Sisgp said...

David, thats not very nice of you, can't you make it fair?
Next time go out with a blindfold on and one arm tied behind your back, give the guy a chance!!

SysRq said...

I wasn't aware that I typed Jim until after I posted, but regardless of that, I believe that God is working in John's life and it seems you are a good friend David.

God bless the both you!!!

Tom said...

Is that what you call a debate?
Its more like a soliloquy or a monologue.. carried out by brother David Wood!

It was a farce, completely devoid of substance from this so called atheist "scholar"!!

Paul lied, why dont he just say the whole world is a lie?

Anonymous said...

Possibly one of the most one sided debates I have ever seen on the Resurrection (and I sat through Craig vs. Carrier). Brother David Wood did a fantastic job with appealing to the irrefutable minimal facts, and Easter's earliest creed from 1 Cor. 15. You did a very good job sticking to the facts.

Loftus on the other hand...His 'presentation' presented no facts...exegesis...or even a real appeal miracles. It was a mish mash of emotion, and his opinions on theology. Then he started talking about the Vatican, as if that is relevant at ALL, the appeal to the Gnostics, as if the Canon was forced by the 'evil Orthodox Apostles', and leaving out the 'poor old Gnostics' (WHO DIDN'T BELIEVE JESUS HAD A PHYSICAL BODY, AND THAT MATTER WAS EVIL), and most of all a weak attack on the reliability of the text of the New Testament (From how he cites Ehrman, he doesn't even understand EHRMAN). The topic was the Resurrection...Good job David

Jesus is Lord said...

Congratulation brother David! You're truly one of the best debater I've seen! I follow your work for several years and you amazes me! I pray for your protection brother in Christ! Shalom from Eastern Canada! :)

EUCLID said...

The two people in the audience who affirmed, when asked by David, that indeed they did experience a vision of their loved one after they died. Of course they did not claim a physical resurrection like with Jesus. Accordingly they cannot declare this miracle to an outsider in any convincing way as you can with Jesus physical resurrection. However to the person who so the clear vision of the person who died is equally a miracle to them as the resurrection is.

Auke Feitsma said...

Here we see the problem of authority. One who sees the ressurection in the Bible, backed with a lot of scholars, as true and the other who has a well accepted point of view of the Bible. For a lot of people the Bible is a book for people who believe in primitive stories, made up as well. It began when our christian leaders left the foundation of Jezus. Jezus died for our sins, He is the second Adam, but most of the western christians don't believe in a real Adam. In fact people who believe that the first Book is not true are calling Jezus (part of the Trinity) a liar. Thru Him the world is created and He is the Word (the Old Testament) who became flesh. When we walk away from the first Adam, the death and ressurection of Jezus is pointless. The Bible has no authority anymore, because when 1 part of the Bible is unriable, then other parts are also. Look at the reactions of the atheist. In my opinion he did this debate to help David, but for the atheist this debate was pointless. Evolution is proven and so on.
Sorry for my bad english, i am Dutch.

Cwradio73 said...

I sat through this for over 2 hours, an the title should have been "Facts vs Nonsense." I was under the belief John was capable of real fact presenting debate. It was just one man giving facts for his defence an the other making wild finger point nonsense that is never used by a good debater.

FH Sanders said...

Dear Dr. Wood,

Since both Mr. Loftus as well as many Muslim apologists appeal to textual criticism in support of their views, I thought you might be interested in this: http://michaeljkruger.com/is-the-original-text-of-the-new-testament-lost-rethinking-our-access-to-the-autographs/.
According to a new article by Dr. Craig A. Evans, the gap between our earliest copies of the New Testament and the autographs might not be so large as is often thought (in the words of Dr. Bart Ehrman, "copies of copies of copies of copies etc.").

Mark