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Sounds to me like Dawkins got his ass whipped.

Hello Sam,

Could you tell us where you found access to the debate please? I could only find the very few sentences aired as part of the Sunday Sequence report.

greets,
Peter

Peter,

You will learn more about the debate on Richard Dawkins's website.

See

It seems to have been a biased format whereby RD had to explain a quotation from his book and then JL was allowed to rebut it. A series of quotations were presented in that way. So it was not an open debate in the normal sense. RD had to demand some right of reply to JL's comments.

It seems also that JL is more of a preacher than a debater. Often he simply ignored the point in question and delivered a short sermon instead of an answer.

If you buy the dvd, perhaps you will lend it to me?

The format of this really spoiled it... I've heard both men speak much more convincingly, but they weren't allowed to respond to each other. It was still quite interesting, but it would be fascinating to see how it would have gone if it had been a proper debate.

Sam, I disagree that Dawkins "got his ass whipped" - I'm not a fan of his, but I thought he did OK, in so far as he was allowed to speak. Lennox spoke well enough too, but the format was so shonky that there couldn't be said to be a 'winner'.

I listened to the 'debate' although it was very controlled by the moderator to focus on his quotes from Dawkins' book.

Having heard Alister McGrath debate Dawkins I would say that the new 'defender of the faith' is certainly Lennox. No McGrath waffling around ... straight to the point .... and very good points too.

I had the impression that either Dawkins was off form or is tired of debating. Lennox seemed to be quicker to the punch and punched with more power.

However, a wonderful intellectual feast was unfortunately marred by a very loud ‘belch’ during Lennox’s final remarks as he reduced his beautiful theism arguments into a literal interpretation of the resurrection. Alister McGrath, in his debate with Dawkins, embarrassed his position in a similar manner.

The resurrection story did not arise until centuries after the death of Jesus and only when the story of Jesus was spreading through the non-Jewish, gentile, pagan communities. These communities were very familiar with dying and rising God myths and Jesus became incorporated into this mythology.

Dawkins of course pounced on this in his closing remarks and redeemed what to that point was a lost position.

When will Christianity be fully able to recognize its metaphorical stories and separate these from its picture of Jesus?

As a debate - highly recommended! Also highly recommended is Lennox's book "God's Undertaker".

Regards,
Michael

I can understand why the debate might get tiresome for Dawkins after awhile. Science marches on finding new evidence to support and refine its theories about evolution and natural selection based on powerful DNA discoveries and how they express themselves in new biological structures and functions while Christian theology just spins in place trying every variant of the same old tiresome tale. You can put lipstick and a wedding gown on a pig but it always still oinks, snorts, and stinks. You can call fundamentalist Christian theology Creation Science or Intelligent Design but it also still oinks, snorts and stinks too with no coherent explanation supported by scientific facts and mountains of them which it must ignore or try to suppress because they contradict its preordained conclusions. The so called debate is losing its character of being an intellectual exchange of unequals and becoming a competitive sermon by two arguments which talk past each other trying to preach to the unconverted. Meanwhile you have to wonder if anyone hadn't made up their mind long before they ever heard of any of the people now publicly engaged and weren't persuaded to change their minds one way or the other by either of them. Personally, I think most people only would use the arguments of the side they agree with to bolster their prior point of view. The theologians will never tire, preaching their gospel is their stock and trade, their life's work. How nice it feels to be immune to them.

This is your brain; 123456789
This is your brain on religion; !@#$%^&*(

Any question?

I can understand why the debate might get tiresome for Dawkins after awhile. Science marches on finding new evidence to support and refine its theories about evolution and natural selection based on powerful DNA discoveries and how they express themselves in new biological structures and functions while Christian theology just spins in place trying every variant of the same old tiresome tale. You can put lipstick and a wedding gown on a pig but it always still oinks, snorts, and stinks. You can call fundamentalist Christian theology Creation Science or Intelligent Design but it also still oinks, snorts and stinks too with no coherent explanation supported by scientific facts and mountains of them which it must ignore or try to suppress because they contradict its preordained conclusions. The so called debate is losing its character of being an intellectual exchange of unequals and becoming a competitive sermon by two arguments which talk past each other trying to preach to the unconverted. Meanwhile you have to wonder if anyone hadn't made up their mind long before they ever heard of any of the people now publicly engaged and weren't persuaded to change their minds one way or the other by either of them. Personally, I think most people only would use the arguments of the side they agree with to bolster their prior point of view. The theologians will never tire, preaching their gospel is their stock and trade, their life's work. How nice it feels to be immune to them.

try this link

Testing comments.

Correction.

In Post 5 I wrote:

The resurrection story did not arise until centuries after the death of Jesus and only when the story of Jesus was spreading through the non-Jewish, gentile, pagan communities.

I meant to say 'decades' and not 'centuries'.

Regards,
Michael

Hi Michael! Couple of points for your consideration...

The literal fact of the resurrection is absolutely crucial to the Christian faith (see eg 1 Corinthians 15v13ff)so both Allister McGrath and John Lennox were right to focus on it.

And of course, Christ's rising from death has been preached since Pentecost (Acts 2), only a few weeks after the event itself....for which there is ample evidence: check it out!

Christians aren't in the least embarrassed by it!

Hi Philip,

You are absolutely right that the resurrection is crucial (pardon the pun) to Pauline Christianity, and removal of that plank is fatal to the entire enterprise. However Michael is right also. "Acts" was not written until long after the events it purports to describe, and the gospels are hopelessly at odds over the precise events surrounding the resurrection (despite some incredibly grandiose bluster from Christian apologists). We also have very little (i.e. no) evidence for what the "disciples" actually thought the "resurrection" meant initially. You'll recall that Jesus himself was thought to be a resurrection of one of the prophets or John the Baptist (who himself was thought to be a resurrection of Elijah). Resurrections were two-a-penny back then - even when Herod had JtB's head on a platter somewhere!

By far the most likely explanation is that the resurrection story was concocted as a rationalisation for 1. the highly unexpected death of this very promising messiah, and 2. the rather perplexing problem of where his body had gone and who had taken it from the temporary tomb the morning after the Sabbath.
When you actually look at the evidence, it is *pitifully* thin, and the most likely explanation is that his body was removed for definitive burial elsewhere by persons unconnected with the "disciples". We already know such persons existed (the owners of the Upper Room and the Palm Sunday donkey, for instance).

[Cue PB to pitch in with some crap from FF Bruce or CS Lewis]

The problem for Christians is that the evidence really *isn't* there, so some have tried to make the meagre evidence that we *do* have appear much stronger than it actually is. But all you have to do is read the gospels, and it's clear that we're dealing with at most an empty tomb and secondary rationalisations and ghostie stories.

I suggest that Christians should be *very* embarrassed by the "resurrection", and take the hint to recognise Jesus as a purely Jewish figure (even a significant one, as Geza Vermes would contend), and Saul of Tarsus as a very mixed up puppy.

Non-christians should indeed read the gospels and the rest of the bible - it's interesting stuff, and provides a lot of the context for our post-Roman culture (I would submit). But I think Christians should read it too, and actually *think* about what they read, instead of smothering it in honey and swallowing it whole.

Perhaps Alister McGrath and John Lennox were right to focus on the resurrection, but it's time post-Christians and non-Christians focused on it too.
It is the weakest link. Goodbye. ;-)

Cheers,
-A

I have not been able to find the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ radio broadcast of the interviews done before and after The God Delusion Debate, with people in the audience. Does anyone know the link and would you be kind enough to post it? I can't recall the name of the interviewer, but he talked to me twice.

I have not been able to find the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ radio broadcast of the interviews done before and after The God Delusion Debate, with people in the audience. Does anyone know the link and would you be kind enough to post it? I can't recall the name of the interviewer, but he talked to me twice.

I have not been able to find the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ radio broadcast of the interviews done before and after The God Delusion Debate, with people in the audience. Does anyone know the link and would you be kind enough to post it? I can't recall the name of the interviewer, but he talked to me twice.