I thoroughly enjoyed this episode. I work for a sweet couple who are 90 and 91 but they were Presbyterian missionaries in Africa for 40 years. I keep my mouth shut. I will pursue Mr Erhman

"Jesus saves"????? No! Jesus bloody steals (dogma)! Just another crime against humanity dressed up as love.

I listened to this episode the other day, it was actually super interesting. Bart Ehrman is a fascinating guest for this podcast. He has a lot of pretty unique ideas on his area of study, if you haven't watched it do yourself a favor and check it out. It's cool hearing someone use the arguments I am accustomed to hearing in defence of faith discussed as counter arguments to the religion.

An astrotheological literary hybrid seems like a solid explanation. Religion isn't based on scientific facts. It requires that one ignore scientific facts.

The Story Was 3,000 yrs old then.

For what it's worth, I frequently call it "Paulism", because this apostle was the one who pushed to have gentiles included. The new testament itself I see as being rife with allegory and metaphors that were used to make abstractions more easily understandable to the congregants. With that in mind the importance of the several translations over the years is becoming more obvious. There is nothing immune to misinterpretation to be found and even the most fundamental tenets are overlooked when the scriptures are used as an excuse to oppress someone.