Daniel Gullotta followed up his Miami Valley Skeptics podcast discussion with another podcast interview, this time on Logicast. The Logicast page and Daniel himself speak of the discussion as a “debate” with David Fitzgerald.
This week I was invited to join the Logicast podcast to share my thoughts on New Testament scholarship, Biblical history, and talk about my recent debate with amateur historian David Fitzgerald over the topic of Mythicism.
That sounds like a wide-ranging discussion but as readers will see the theme throughout was the mythicist controversy. I found these two podcasts, especially this one on Logicast, most interesting for the understanding they shed on the attitudes of the various parties — scholars, atheists opposed to mythicism, and mythicists themselves. I’ll share what I have learned in a future post.
Again, this is not strictly a transcript. Much is my own paraphrase/precis. Sections in inverted commas are generally the verbatim bits. Corrections welcome.
Same colour code as in previous post. Interviewers remarks are in italics.
The discussion starts at 7:10
“You did a phenomenal job for your first real mythicist debate.”
DG: It was interesting in that we did not talk much about historicity of Jesus but that it was more a discussion around the origins of Christianity.
DG: I think the issue [that we did not get down into a real debate on historicity per se] is that I’m not the Christian apologist and the mythicist topic is framed in those ways.
“Oh right, so his [DF’s] regular stuff didn’t really work on you.”
DG: David realizes I am not the enemy and I know he’s not the enemy. And the fact that this topic is framed in those ways is problematic.
DF’s arguments would be framed for Christian apologists.
On the Objectivity of the Scholars
DF said secular historians are really the only ones doing any work. My mouth almost dropped – and DG almost had a heart attack, too. Continue reading “Daniel Gullotta’s Followup Podcast on the David Fitzgerald Discussion”