Why the Bible makes sense of modern life • Tom Holland & Andrew Ollerton 

Justin, you are spectacular at maximizing the impact of your guests. I’m just blown away.

Whats unbelievable is that Jonathan Pageau hasnt been on your show yet.

I love seeing Tom’s excitement over the Bible. It’s catching. His eyes light up when he speaks of it - the mansion and it’s many rooms and keys.

Love Tom H's honesty. Great place to be.

Great discussion. As a believing Christan, I must state my absolute respect for Tom Holland. "Lord I believe...aid Thou my unbelief...."

How did this video escape my notice for 7 DAYS! The RU-vid algorithm is either stupid or broken.

I liked reading Jurgen Moltmann's "The Crucified God" which is a classic. He develops his theology from the Crucifixion and shows us how all of Christian life flows from that event.

The point at around 45.00 that Andrew made regarding the human condition and our emotions towards birth, and at times loss of a loved one is exactly what helped bring me closer to faith in God and in turn the Bible!

This is wonderful, thank you very much.

It's interesting that they have now completely jettisoned the notion that the Bible is reliable, moving the goalposts to relevancy and coherency. But it's the reliability that underpins everything. This is the ONLY question. If the Bible is not reliable than what's the difference between it and Star Wars, Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings all of which are more coherent and relevant?

The Angels will swell with love and adoration of God if Tom Holland and Jordan Peterson accept Christ. He comes to us through thick and thin where we are at. I pray that He comes to these two beautiful men. Many Warm Blessings of God to you Tom and Jordan. I was so close for many years but the inbreaking eventually came from Jesus, not from me. I pray He comes to you. He changes the whole of reality. It's mind bending and beautiful. It's the deepest relationship that any human being can ever experience. I am very intelligent and intellectual myself and that sometimes can get in the way because we find answers and study things from a wide perspective of mind. In a way this makes it harder for God to reach us. But when He does! Wow! The pendulum swings and the universe is reordered through all depth and intellect. Like CS Lewis. God uses the gifts He gave us to draw us to Him. He can totally change our minds from within. Our intellect remains just as powerful but now works for Him. It's absolutely beautiful. Just imagine the power that Tom and Jordan would have as Christians! Thy will be done. Not mine Lord. xXx

Thanks Andrew, Ton and Justin!

Love this discussion. From SriLanka.

This was wonderful. Thank you so much!

Andrew, thank you for your service in promoting the Lords word in our day. It is vital and challenging I imagine. I want to humbly encourage you to emphatically say NO if asked in the future if God is one of the flawed characters in the Old Testament as Tom did around 28:30. It is important to explain-as you attempted to-many of the events of the Old Testament to those who worship the creation rather than the Creator if they are genuinely curious. To those who worship humanity and the creation, most of the death and suffering is nonsensical with an all-loving creator. And it is obvious where the cognitive dissonance comes from; for physical life and pleasure are most important to them. The spiritual is just an idea. Thus, an all loving God couldn’t take from them that which is most important. Though-as it appears you did-to leave any room for misunderstanding of the Lords goodness and unwavering righteousness is to placate their Godless worldview, and-thus-not stand firmly in truth for his glory. I want to encourage you to say firstly and unapologetically: NO! Then by all mean elaborate on particulars and theories.

Thank you for what you're doing. Tim Mackie and Tom Holland will have a great discussion when they talk about this.

Great discussion. Thank you

The Bible make sense in modern life just like the wheel or numbers are ancients concepts but still useful.

There is such unity between the angels and God that Jacob could have wrestled with an angel but also wrestled with God.

30:30 Yes! Someone get Tom Holland a copy St. Irenaeus' (c. 180) *On the Apostolic Preaching* .

I've listened to the Bible cover to cover 4 times and each time it reveals more and more. It's by far the best description of reality 🙌

It was strange and weird, supernatural, but Paul as a learned Jewish person was ready to understand it.

One problem, from a Catholic point of view, is that the Bible is not meant to stand on its own: it's supposed to reside in the Church and the Mass, its home. And the Church gives it the authoritative interpretation (magisterium). But for people from a Protestant background, they have come very far, using the Bible and reason only.

Fascinating. I am a huge Tom Holland admirer. He is a first class writer.

When I found out... Answers to life's questions were hidden in the bible.... made me intellectual interessted. Then the God revealling Himself as Judge but also a Father of Mercy... opened my heart. Then real encounters with God himself happened... a voice, a vision, getting answers, meeting people on times and places that was beyond my human reasoning This God proofed Himself Real... after I quite to want to understand the world bu myself... now looking at it trough Gods point of view... and asking for His help... like young children do to their mum or dad... and expierence His care.

Typical religious dogma to tie any scientific knowledge into The Book

Not available in Canada yet, though it was released in 2020. Looking forward to read …..The Bible: A Story that Makes Sense of Life by Andrew.

super discussion !

If you want to believe in it hard enough you will justify it's existence without evidence.

"Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow." So it can't be that God changed.

Please, Tom, in some way articulate all of the questions you had about the Bible and Christianity as you did your work. I think this would invaluable. Thanks.

Replacing truth with relevance as criterion for the Bible’s impact is the sure way to diminish its force. The same goes for coherence instead of correspondence as measure of the Bible’s claim to truth and reality. This a purely pragmatic, utilitarian approach. Only Truth is always relevant.

Keen point -- "Exodus as the history of freedom" comment. Cecil B. Demille made that point at the beginning of The Ten Commandments.

please consider Jonathan Pageau as a guest. you will be fascinated by his insights, I sure am.

Surely God is working on Tom through Andrew and the Unbelievable channel! It's such a delight to see the Holy Spirit work in Tom and, separately, in Jordan Peterson. When you can see the way the Holy Spirit tugs on the heart in people, you can't help but feel joy!

You're Right. Even atheists agree in the virtue of the Law of Love .

Really good discussion.

If I am a "intellectual" I'm glad to be child like in mind! Foolish men ponder foolish questions.

55:50 "it's that uncertainty that lies at the heart of new testament's positive message, because basically it is saying that something so odd happened, that we cannot really frame it, so we have four accounts of it and they're all different."

For a Catholic, of course, the authority of the Bible rests on the Church, which assembled the Bible.

The Fathers are the best key to the Bible.

BIG question is .....where is any evidence of a God/s

If the Bible didn't make sense of modern life it would be modern life which would need to change.

The Quran offers the same hope, meaning, and purpose to billions of Muslims. Now you’re reduce to debating a god figure in the form of a man.

Dear Tommy, Saw You, passing away on a quiet sidestreet, this morning. And your sister too, sweetsister, on the beech. She's wearing wonderfull shalljewllery on her own and said to me, I am her friend. I believe her! Corina

Regarding contemporary church I think that they should go deeper with their teachings in reference to the Old Testament. Besides what we can’t understand in it, it is ultimately God trying to set His people apart and give people running from Him victory. It’s His heart and how He began civilization.😊

Aside from better understanding ancient myths, why should anyone take seriously what biblical texts promote? Egyptian myths endured for centuries until reality rendered them irrelevant within more modern times. Clock is ticking for Judaism / Christianity / Islam etc etc.

I was struck by Holland's honesty as a questioning believer here. But I had a sinking feeling as soon as Jordan Peterson was spoken of by Justin and Ollerton as if he were a good faith actor rather than a charlatan. Ollerton's euphemistic response at 28:00 to Holland's question about the character of the OT God versus the NT God reinforced that feeling. His "partial answer" is also evasive. The subject here - the actor - is not humans, it is God himself, so to say the difference is down to "how we relate to God" is equivocation. Does God actually act as a genocidaire at some times in history? Or are some accounts in the Bible simply mistaken about the nature or actions of God?

It's a mirage. The 'Tomb of Peter' found under the Vatican is beyond sketchy. Apostles? How? They even claim Paul. X

Nobody ever attacks Hinduism, Sikhism and many other religions, nobody ever questions their relevancy. Why is Christianity always the taking on attacks

Great talk. Some suggestions: Discussion with Process Theologians , Christian Mystics, Esoteric Christianity as a subject, Richard Smoley on his book inner Christianity. And perhaps hearing from some Universalist Christians on doctrine.??? Just a few suggestions. Love your show!!!!

Another explanation, or a similar one, as to why God in the Old Testament did some things which seem unjust, is that God had a plan for his creation, and he had to bring it about in a sinful world.

"The world is not made of matter, it's made of what matters." - Jordan Peterson

I am a Christian. I don't care about tribalism, and Apostolic Succession is unprovable. It's an article of Faith. Faith in who? Bishops? So we get decent Bishops like Father Barron but we've had Popes who have committed genocide. There is a decent line in Qur'an which says that all hierarchy rests on piety. Nothing else. Ali, Muhammad's nephew, said that asceticism isn't owning nothing. It's having nothing owning you. I love Francis for this reason. I don't follow with his Lady Poverty but he was a man of his time in Christendom. He had a similar experience to Buddha. When he stripped off in front of the Bishop, gave his costly clothes back to his own Dad, knowing his Dad would reject him. And knowing that he would be accepted by the Church by blackmail he knew he was lost and found. Then went out in personal poverty to help the broken. That's Christianity. The Church had no choice but to make him a Saint. Not because the Church are good. But because Francis is! And people from outside of the Church don't understand this. It's from the bottom up. Not the top down. Jesus turned the world upside down. The slave is the master. This is what Tom is starting to understand. It's not about hierarchy. The only hierarchy is with God. End of. It's the most profound message the world has ever heard. And the person who brought it was Jesus. So who is Jesus? When that understanding is coupled with written Gospels, Christianity becomes a reality that cannot be ignored. It might not be accepted. But it cannot be ignored. And Tom is in that situation. It seems. He is starting to see the absolute profundity of The Gospel. He's waking up. And as a Church we need to be there to accept him. Not evangelise. He doesn't need that. He's clever. Be there to receive him into The Body of Christ. So forget all your misgivings. We have a man who is on the verge of seeing Christ. Let's, as a Church, be there to accept him. If he comes in, which God Willing he will, he will be a bit bereft. A bit broken. Then we can love him as him, not evangelise. Because God choses the broken. Otherwise we are no Church at all. And our personal inheritance will be lost. Because one sheep is more important than the whole flock. X

"It will become the largest of plants" - Jesus

(Exodus 21:7-11) “When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she will not be freed at the end of six years as the men are. 8 If she does not satisfy her owner, he must allow her to be bought back again. But he is not allowed to sell her to foreigners, since he is the one who broke the contract with her. 9 But if the slave’s owner arranges for her to marry his son, he may no longer treat her as a slave but as a daughter. 10 “If a man who has married a slave wife takes another wife for himself, he must not neglect the rights of the first wife to food, clothing, and sexual intimacy. 11 If he fails in any of these three obligations, she may leave as a free woman without making any payment.

Marcion - these heresies are kind of like theories that had to be tried out. It was tried, and it showed that it was in the wrong direction, which was something learned.

There was a time the fall and the crusif8xiin was the most awful parts of the bible... But with God .. there was such a great revelation he gave me. They became precious !! The Fall= biggest lesson in mindfuck The crusifixiin=the place where every heart (from the powerful to the leasts of all time and universal beings )reveals what it really about.

Of course the "behavior" of God in the Old Testament is not embarrassing - if it seems so, one has to adjust one's theological thinking so one understands why it is not "embarrassing."

Always a classic.... If two men are fighting, and the wife of one steps in to rescue her husband from the one striking him, and she reaches out her hand and grabs his genitals, you are to cut off her hand. You must show her no pity. - Deuteronomy 25:11

I wish Ollerton was a better speaker ... I am sure his book must be fantastic especially if Tom Holland endorsed it ... But man I wish Ollerton took more time to give intellectual and deep responses to Tom's questions :(

I think Bret Weinstein(an atheist) put it best when he said that the Bible has evolutionary value, where it maintains relevance to a structured life. He said something like "literally false, but metaphorically true".

But it's a little unfair to ask Tom Holland whether he is going to make a faith commitment, that seems to be from a Protestant perspective, where the only critical question is whether the person has made this commitment. (From the Catholic perspective, there are other criteria that need to be considered also.)

* sorry, cabdriver wrote ,,Ervin"

The great tale is the life of Christ, the archetypical tale.

There is no lesson in the Bible that cannot be found in another text that does not endorse slavery, genocide, and the oppression of women

Ollerton’s response to Holland’s question about the OT God was incredibly lacking. In the OT we see a holy God who knows the hearts and minds of men issuing judgment on people who deserved it (as we all do), like He did with the great flood.

Tom Holland is asking also how do Christians see this?

"The Bible is historically accurate" - Catholic catechism

What's the "Biblical position" on a future where people can download their consciousness into a computer?

Tom asked: With whom did Jacob wrestle? According to Jewish exegesis Jacob wrestled with (the angel of) Esau. Like Israel struggles with Rome (Esau is Rome according to the Talmud). Rabbis ask: when will the Messiah come? Two conditions must be fulfilled. 1. Esau should bless Jacob. (I will not let you go unless you bless me). 2. However Esau's tears must be dried as well. See my comment at Albionic American.

Tom is asking the kind of questions more Christians should be asking they are penetrating and bold! As regard to the character in the Hebrew Testament and God’s accommodation of his people... it was not his purpose to have a temple built but he accommodates. It was not his desire to have Israel have a king but he accommodates and most importantly it was not his plan to use violence but the children of Israel as we all do did not trust and went beyond what was ever Gods intention. Had they listened more closely and followed more closely I believe a very different story would’ve unfolded. See Greg Boyd’s argument/book The Cruciform God which pushes the argument that the church is still not ready to hear about violence and how it is not necessary to extend Gods kingdom. Tom’s book in some ways illustrates this as well. As for the pre-incarnate appearances of Christ, again Tom has asks the penetrating questions. I think of Nebuchadnezzar‘s comment on the fiery furnace “and the third has the form of the son of God...Finally, I wish people would stop trying to make Tom into a trophy and leave the man make his own decision and trust God!

The so called post Christian world seems to be slowly destroying humanity. Christianity is relevant and will always be relevant

The question Holland asks is a very good question. Is the God of the Old Testament flawed. My answer to that is primarily NO. God doesn't change but humanity's understanding of God certainly has changed we read the OT backwards from and with Jesus. If Jesus is the exact likeness of God, then "God is like Jesus. God has always been like Jesus. We haven't always known this but now we do." ( Brian Zahnd). We have got so often got God wrong for instance blaming God gor the violence in the OT. Could it be that on many occasions the Israelite projected their distorted view of God on Yahweh? Jesus in the gospels is the correction to that. The first Adam bought into a lie about God which has tainted us all. That is that God is not always good, not always for us. Many Christians still believe in a distorted idol which they call God. Obe that is distant and angry. Blaise Pascal said God made us in His image and we repaid the compliment. I think this is very true. The God of the OT is presented in a schizophrenic way at times full of mercy and at others smiting people at the drop of a hat. I also agree with the point made about the accommodation principle. Paul was correct Jesus us the mystery hidden from the ages. I think the only reason many Christians get God wrong today us poor teaching that us not Christocentric. Again God us like Jesus, always has been.

Omg I can't wait to take a look at the comments here below!

At least they are setting us off to discuss. The Church had lacked this for centuries. Does it take humanists to make us look at ourselves? X

_Harper's_ magazine a few years ago ran an article about the dwindling number of Zoroastrians in the world, who are known in India as the Parsees ("Persians"). At one time the Zoroastrian religion had millions of adherents across Southwest Asia; while in our world the last Zoroastrian could very well die in this century. And most of us aren't even aware of the religion's absence now. Religions come and go like everything else, in other words, and eventually this will happen to Christianity.

We learned a spoken- there are no poor gipsy cause all get a nickle from the beginning, the next is not of their parents no jew will ever get an other jew in the lawcourt, cause their laws are much more harder, than a bribe-silly-court to orthodox- no priest carries the curch,,hram" at his home, cause he carries all time. Greeks had, probably, the joy to enjoy on their lifetime all these peoples and tell others the story, so in this lies the power of greek culture. Allthough, I heard immigrants were beaten in greek cities, no allowed in the centre, where greeks live. They hate those who don't respect Eastern or 25 March, me told. These don't negate their ancient culture. Love, great fan to Tommy. Corina Ijac

Get Carl Trueman and Tom Holland together.

Jesus rose from death ... Jesus raised himself from death ... Jesus was raised by the Father from death ... all are true.

@31:00 @Tom Holland ... Esteemed Jewish scholar Alan Siegel in his book "Two powers in heaven" covers this question in depth. And the answer is yes the Jewish people believed there was a multiple godhead but later deemed it heresy because of the new Christian religion expanding its implications and applications.

Andrew certainly seems to be a man who carries the courage of his convictions -so can he tell me? … did god break his word on the cross or not?

The first Comic book ever made.

Surely the O.T. is God relating to mankind in or through, Adams' decision, whatever Adams' decision was. It would seem from the N.T. that Adams' sin was to reject faith, trust, belief in his union with God through spirit and sought another way to be like God , in effect he was rejecting his union with God, the Holy Spirit, which the second Adam didn't do. God then honors Adams' decision and it ain't pretty, relating by and large, sans spirit., sans faith, it appears, but with exceptions it seems. To force the human race into righteousness through law and punishment, the knowledge of good and evil, alone, doesn't seem to work. More is needed. The Old Covenant is the ministration of death, not life. The O.T. is an object lesson in life from the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil only. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, and is always fatal.

My Dear Friends. Finally christians admit that faith has nothing to do with truth but everything to do with taste. And Andrew, inadvertently but rightly, acknowledges this at 1:00:10, when he compares faith to simply buying a garment at a cloth shop; SPOT ON. It's all just a person's subjective experience, subjective taste, nothing to do with the objective Cosmos, nothing to do with the supposed Creator's Plan for humanity. At last, the problem has been solved. I've got a corollary question. If the supposed Creator of the Cosmos never holds press conferences, how in the world can humanity ever know who this God's representative on Earth is and what this God's PLAN for humanity is? Kind regards.

Andrew seriously struggling when they are talking about the Old Testament.

It doesn't. And it is incredibly selfrighteous and arrogant to invalidate the billion of people that have no idea what a bible book is

There are 6 or 7 different covenants, the last and everlasting one is the one established by Jesus. (See Scott Hahn)

Of course if the Bible is written by God, then applies to modern life. If it isn't, it doesn't, and never has very much.

No. The Bible CANNOT make sense of the modern world, at least, not without being itself interpreted within a much larger framework, namely the natural world and Natural Law. Call it the "cosmic framework" if you wish, following Jonathan Pageau. The better question is: can the modern world make sense of the Bible, and for that, see Jordan Peterson. But really, you can go back to, say, Aquinas for a similar take, except that the Aristotelian framework was the relevant one at the time. Remember this: devout Christians have justified, from their reading of the Bible, anything from Communism (liberation theology - look at the present Pope, for example) to anarcho-capitalism (see Tom Woods' work). This ought to indicate a serious issue, I would think. Now, I believe there is a correct answer here, but it is contingent on taking as primary NOT the Bible, but the Natural Law. In a way, this harks back to the Euthyphro argument, but now made so much sharper by the advent of the modern human sciences with their understanding of the limits of human rationality, the importance of culture and its evolutionary basis, their view of the world as a complex system (NOT a clock-work mechanical system), and their recognition of emergent phenomena (out of complexity). So yeah, interesting, but still quite short of a realistic understanding of what is really going on. Tom Holland, though, seems to get some of this. Good on him.

If you’re a Christian the Bible must be the “book” for you.

Just because the Bible contains God’s word, it does not mean that everything in the Bible is God’s word. In the Bible there are some substantial contradictions that need to be resolved, and in my judgement, the book of Esther, both Chronicles, a small part of Proverbs, the second chapter of Matthew, the letter to Hebrews, the letter of Jude and the book of Revelation are not God’s word. After having been studying and analyzing biblical texts for many years, my conclusion is that a significant portion of the Bible is of Satan, and in my writing titled A RECLUSE’S CONFESSION on my Facebook page (username: Christian Truly), I in great detail explain how and why I came to that conclusion.

I think Tom Holland is ready for Pascal's wager!

OH COME ON GUYS. God exercised his judgment on the Amalakites. And you can't stomach that? They, like all of us, are not innocent.

Eternal torture for the mind-crime of not believing in a 1700-2600 year old document makes sense to you guys? Wow. OK... walking away slowly now.

The questiin of the OT God is better answered by Bishop Barron

Come home Tom.

I am always amazed that Christians have bought into the belief that morality only flows from a supernatural being. How do they explain the thousands/ hundreds of thousands of pre-Christian cultures- some as far back as 30,000 years - that clearly had some sorts of moral code-which would be essential for a human culture to survive). Archeologists have found graves with skeletons adorned with thousands of artifacts each (as in the Sungir, Russia find,1955). Though we don’t know the reasons for certain, they obviously had sociopolitical structures, and moral codes had to have been part of that. How do Christians explain the moral codes of the non-Christian societies existing today?

The Bismillah only goes against the Gospels in relation to the Person of Jesus. The Compassionate in this world The Merciful in the next. When Jesus came into the upper room the first thing he said was, "Asalamu Alaikum." Hebrew, Aramaic and Arabic are all Semitic. Sorry I couldn't find where to reply to you personally. The Qur'an has been described by Christians as an heretical document. I find that offensive. Paul said that all scripture is God breathed. I have struggled with this for years because I was a Muslim convert then Christian. Who is Muhammad? He was taught by a Christian monk in Syria. It's deep. We can converse if you like. I may learn something. X

I appreciate the idea of seeing the god of Hebrew Scripture as one of the many flawed characters in the biblical story. He certainly seems to have a short temper, is obsessed with violence and even regrets many of the decisions he makes. In fact, he may be the most flawed character of the whole story. A sort of negative object lesson for us to learn what not to be like in our lives.