#1052 - The Weirdest James White Debates I've Seen

The Counsel of Trent

Catholic Answers

Religion & Spirituality

4.8 • 2.4K Ratings

🗓️ 30 June 2025

⏱️ 19 minutes

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Summary

In this episode Trent breaks down the strangest encounters he's seen in James White's debates. When Protestants Argue Like Atheists: https://shop.catholic.com/when-protestants-argue-like-atheists-12-weird-ways-that-anti-catholics-mimic-secular-skeptics/ My talk at the 2019 Catholic Answers Conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZ95ql0BU3E When Protestants argue like Muslims: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i46qnP2afvc

Transcript

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0:00.0	James White is an apologist for Reformed Baptist theology who's well known for his many public debates.
0:05.2	He and I have had three formal debates over the years, and in my study of apologetics, I've reviewed
0:09.5	many of his debates. Most of these debates are pretty standard fair, but a few have some strange
0:14.8	moments that I need to talk about, including one recent debate that counts as probably the weirdest
0:19.4	James White debate I've ever seen.
0:21.5	First, let's start with some honorable mentions. Recently, White debated my colleague Joe Heschmeier
0:26.1	on the sacrifice of the mass, which took an interesting turn when the subject of the early second
0:30.5	century father Ignatius of Antioch came up. There has been a tremendous amount of scholarly
0:34.5	skepticism expressed as to whether Ignatius even existed
0:38.7	and which letters are actually, because there's a Latin and there's a shorter and there's a
0:43.6	I was not taught that, but I'm sort of catching up with that. So if, so that, I hope,
0:50.3	yeah, Candidhamasian, and people like that are, I hope, I hope, I hope, I hope, it's becoming the central view. I hope Ignatius wrote... Yeah, Candideon, and people like that are taking a view, but it's a French view in Scotland. I hope, oh, it's becoming the central view.
0:56.0	I hope Ignatius existed and wrote the things we have.
1:00.0	But, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, I'm sorry?
1:03.0	You're saying the central view in scholarship is Ignatius didn't exist? the expression of that, that there are people going, did these letters actually have an original
1:12.9	form? There are so many forms of it. Why? That's not relevant to our debate right now. I'm
1:16.9	simply saying he may have written in 107-108. I hope he did, but maybe not. Now, to be fair to
1:23.2	White, I don't think he was outright claiming Ignatius of Antioch never existed. He seems to be saying
1:28.3	that all of Ignatius' letters were once considered authentic. But we now know that some of the
1:33.5	letters attributed to Ignatius are forgeries, and a few scholars today think that all of the letters
1:38.5	are forgeries. All right. Well, some scholars think that Jesus never existed, but James White,
1:43.9	along with basically every expert on the planet, doesn't think that Jesus never existed, but James White, along with basically
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