Dr Paul Allen

QUESTION: Has it been proven that Moses existed? DICK HARFIELD RESPONSE H istorians took the biblical narrative for granted until the Rosetta Stone was deciphered at the beginning of the nineteenth century, enabling linguists to begin translating Egyptian hieroglyphics. There was the expectation that evidence of the Israelites in Egypt would soon be found in the copious ancient Egyptian writings, but this gradually gave way to puzzlement because there was clearly no evidence of any Israelites in Egypt, nor of the ten plagues of Moses or even the biblical Exodus. Historians had to begin thinking the unthinkable: either there was no Exodus, or it was simply a minor event that did not really change history. Either way, there was no catastrophic series of plagues, loss of an entire army in pursuit of the Israelites, or even the dramatic economic downturn that one would expect after the loss of a huge number of productive slaves. The evidence is now in: nothing happened—there was  no bi...

  JESUS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT Even though there’s a large amount of supporting evidence for the existence of Jesus in non-Christian sources, the best evidence is found in the New Testament. The New Testament is made up of twenty-seven different documents (ancient biographies, letters, apocalyptic writings), all written in the first century. You might be thinking, What about the writers’ prejudices and impartialities? Yes, the New Testament is biased because Christians composed it, but every text is biased. Bias does not necessarily equal unreliability; if this were the case, every ancient (and modern) text would be considered unreliable. So why do historians believe that the New Testament is the best evidence for the existence of Jesus? The strongest argument is that before and during the time of Jesus, Jews did not believe that the Messiah (or Christ) was going to die.  They believed that the Messiah was going to rise up and conquer the Romans, taking back Jerusalem, where the...

Why do some historians like Tallus and Phlegon mention unusual events like eclipses during Jesus' crucifixion, and what do these accounts add to the narrative? We do not have any actual writings from Thallus, although some of his work was quoted by later writers. One such writer was Sextus Julius Africanus, a Christian who lived in the early third century. He said that Thallus reported darkness at about the time of the crucifixion but dismissed it as a solar eclipse.  As Africanus points out, solar eclipses never occur at the time of the full moon. Origen reported, in Against Celsus 2.xiv, that Phlegon wrote about "the greatest eclipse of the sun" at the sixth hour.  William Lane Craig, a theologian and Christian apologist, has written a lengthy article (Thallus on the Darkness at Noon) in which he accepts that Thallus wrote the account attributed to him and demonstrates that there was, in fact, a darkness at the time Jesus was crucified. As we only have references to wha...

    1.      THE UNIQUENESS OF THE DOCTRINE If it may be said that the distinctive doctrine of the Pentecostal movement is the baptism in the Holy Spirit it may also be said that what is most distinctive about this particular doctrine is the conviction that the initial evidence of this baptism is speaking in tongues. While Pentecostalism shares with classic Methodism, the holiness movements, and with many in conservative evangelicalism, the conviction of an additional critically important spiritual experience beyond conversion, it is in the understanding of the initial evidence of this subsequent experience that Pentecostals are unique, and it is this evidence which marks its advocates as Pentecostal. Wesley and his holiness followers, as we have seen, made experience or feeling of a particular sort the evidence of what was called the Great Salvation. But feeling is ambiguous and has led Methodism, historically, to quite different emphases. The ambiguity of feeli...

  WHAT IS THE PENTECOSTAL DISTINCTIVE? ACC REMIT 2025 A. We believe in the baptism of the Holy Spirit, which is a transformative experience, distinct from and subsequent to salvation.  It is available to all believers and accompanied by the   initial evidence of speaking in tongues .  It results in empowerment for effective witness to the world. B. We believe in the baptism of the Holy Spirit, which is a transformative experience, distinct from and subsequent to salvation.  It is available to all believers and accompanied by the sign of speaking in tongues as the  Spirit gives utterance.  It results in empowerment for effective witness to the world .   WHAT IS THE CHANGE? The change: from "initial evidence of speaking in tongues' to the "sign of speaking in tongues as the Spirit gives utterance." WHERE DOES 'AS THE SPIRIT GIVES UTTERANCE' APPEAR? On the day of Pentecost, the people were overwhelmed and dominated by the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:5)...