About this topic
Biblical texts, Gospel reliability, authorship, historical Jesus, mythicism, interpretation, and scriptural ethics.
Debates are grouped by their main question. Scores assess the reasoning presented, not the truth of a position. Read the assessment method.
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Bart Ehrman vs James White — Does the Bible Misquote Jesus? · 2009
Ehrman narrowly prevailed by proving consequential local misattributions, while White strongly defended recoverable textual and theological continuity.
Bart Ehrman: 88 · James White: 86. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Mike Winger vs Paulogia — Evidence for the Resurrection · 2018
Mike Winger and Paulogia dispute whether early resurrection reports, appearances, persecution, and the empty tomb make Jesus’s resurrection the best historical explanation.
Mike Winger: 82 · Paulogia: 84. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Trent Horn vs Paulogia — Did the Apostles Die for a Lie? · 2023
Horn argues that documented and foreseeable suffering supports apostolic sincerity; Paulogia answers that evidence for several named leaders cannot establish all eleven.
Trent Horn: 86 · Paulogia: 87. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Paul Copan vs Randal Rauser — The Canaanite Conquest and a God of Love · 2022
Copan defends a historically grounded, hyperbolic conquest under exceptional divine judgment; Rauser argues that residual civilian targeting and identity destruction remain morally indefensible.
Paul Copan: 82 · Randal Rauser: 85. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Samuel Nesan vs Matt Dillahunty — Did Jesus Fulfill Prophecy? · 2021
Dillahunty’s two-stage demand for prospective specificity and independent event evidence outweighed Nesan’s thoughtful but insufficiently constrained cumulative covenant reading.
Samuel Nesan: 78 · Matt Dillahunty: 84. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Blake Giunta vs Matt Dillahunty — Did Jesus Rise from the Dead? · 2016
Dillahunty wins by separating early proclamation from resurrection, while Giunta offers substantial historical and Bayesian replies that leave important evidential bridges unresolved.
Blake Giunta: 77 · Matt Dillahunty: 84. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Randal Rauser vs Aron Ra — Biblical Violence and Divine Revelation · 2022
Rauser won by offering a morally constrained, genre-sensitive, fallibilist account of revelation, while Aron's strongest internal critiques exposed unresolved evidential and doctrinal costs.
Randal Rauser: 85 · Aron Ra: 77. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
James White vs Robert Price — Is the Bible true? · 2010
White narrowly wins through manuscript-stream and contextual replies, while Price’s strongest challenges expose methodological limits, oral flexibility, and inerrancy’s interpretive costs.
James White: 81 · Robert Price: 78. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Cliffe Knechtle & Stuart Knechtle vs Matt Dillahunty & Joshua Bowen: Is the Bible's treatment of slavery morally defensible? · 2021
The critics prevail by grounding ownership and coercion in specific texts, while the defenders’ canonical trajectory never fully reconciles those legal permissions.
Cliffe Knechtle & Stuart Knechtle: 69 · Matt Dillahunty & Joshua Bowen: 85. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
James White vs John Dominic Crossan: Is the Bible True? · 2005
White prevailed by one point through stronger textual rebuttals on Passion harmony and miracles, while Crossan dominated source dependence and narrowly won resurrection framing.
James White: 78 · John Dominic Crossan: 77. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Did Jesus Exist? Craig Evans vs. Richard Carrier · 2016
Carrier prevailed 80–79 because Pauline ambiguity and limits on gospel corroboration narrowly outweighed Evans’s early letters, Josephus defense, and carefully qualified historical method.
Craig Evans: 79 · Richard Carrier: 80. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Does the New Testament Misquote Jesus? Bart Ehrman vs. Craig Evans · 2010
Ehrman wins 85–83, chiefly through concrete contradictions and saying-level variants; Evans nearly matches him with historically secure cores, eyewitness-linked transmission, and contextual corroboration.
Bart Ehrman: 85 · Craig Evans: 83. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
John Dominic Crossan vs Michael Licona: Who Was the Historical Jesus? · 2018
Crossan defended a kingdom-centered, metaphorical resurrection account, while Licona pressed early-source, divine-identity, and bodily-transformation evidence through disciplined historical distinctions.
John Dominic Crossan: 82 · Michael Licona: 84. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Bart Ehrman vs Michael Licona: Who Wrote the Gospels? · 2025
Licona defended traditional Gospel authority through convergent testimony and collaboration; Ehrman prevailed by separating compatibility and reliability from identity-specific authorship evidence.
Michael Licona: 81 · Bart Ehrman: 87. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Bart Ehrman vs Daniel B. Wallace: Can We Trust the Text of the New Testament? · 2011
Wallace defended probabilistic textual recovery through abundant branching witnesses; Ehrman conceded broad continuity but showed that reconstructing their ancestor does not establish autographic identity.
Daniel B. Wallace: 83 · Bart Ehrman: 88. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Bart Ehrman vs Peter J. Williams: Are the Gospels Historically Reliable? · 2018
Williams defended cumulative contextual and theological continuity, while Ehrman more successfully separated informed settings from reliable events, highlighting provenance gaps and narrative conflicts.
Peter J. Williams: 83 · Bart Ehrman: 86. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Bart Ehrman vs Robert Price: Did Jesus Exist? · 2016
Ehrman advances convergent historical evidence for Jesus; Price challenges source independence, terrestrial Pauline readings, chronology, and whether an ordinary founder explains Christianity.
Bart Ehrman: 86 · Robert Price: 81. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Dennis R. MacDonald vs Richard Carrier: Did Jesus Exist? · 2025
MacDonald defended a mortal Jewish teacher later mythologized; Carrier’s revelatory-origin model and challenges to literary and Josephian evidence narrowly prevailed.
Dennis R. MacDonald: 79 · Richard Carrier: 81. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Jonathan McLatchie vs Richard Carrier: Did Paul Believe in a Celestial Jesus? · 2018
Carrier narrowly prevailed by pressing Pauline ambiguity and source dependence, while McLatchie answered most forcefully through contextual analysis of the crucifying rulers.
Jonathan McLatchie: 80 · Richard Carrier: 83. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Stephen Boyce vs Richard Carrier: Did Jesus Exist? · 2022
Boyce defended an earthly historical Jesus through Paul, kinship, and corroboration; Carrier pressed celestial compatibility, source dependence, ambiguity, and alternative appearance explanations.
Stephen Boyce: 78 · Richard Carrier: 83. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Cliffe and Stuart Knechtle vs Alex O'Connor: Bible Slavery, Women, and Forgiveness · 2024
The Knechtles defend Christianity as a coherent gospel of grace, meaning, value, and divine justice; O'Connor presses the hardest biblical and doctrinal cases against that moral portrait.
Cliffe and Stuart Knechtle: 74 · Alex O'Connor: 86. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Jimmy Akin vs Bart Ehrman: Are the Gospels Historically Reliable? · 2022
Akin defended cumulative Gospel reliability through ancient conventions and possible harmonizations; Ehrman pressed consequential narrative conflicts, compositional reshaping, and discontinuous self-presentation.
Jimmy Akin: 81 · Bart Ehrman: 88. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
Alex O'Connor vs Dinesh D'Souza: Is the Bible True? · 2024
O'Connor pressed concrete historical and moral counterexamples, while D'Souza defended genre-sensitive revelation, cumulative testimony, moral development, and Christianity's beneficial interpretive traditions.
Dinesh D'Souza: 76 · Alex O'Connor: 91. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.
David Wood vs Alex O'Connor: Did Jesus Claim to Be God? · 2025
Wood built a cumulative divine-identity case, while O'Connor more consistently showed that agency, delegation, and later devotion underdetermine Jesus's personal self-claim.
David Wood: 83 · Alex O'Connor: 90. Scores assess the reasoning in this debate.