Challenge to atheists: I find your lack of faith disturbing!

[Aractus]

First, I will say that I found Wallace's argument lame. For those who did not watch the video, it turned on the correct text for one Bible verse, Matthew 24:36.

While I'd allow you to call it boring (if that sort of thing bores you), I wouldn't call "his argument" lame, he simply talks about how the textual variant has little to no impact over the overall meaning of the verse.

Many old manuscripts omit the phrase "nor the Son" but most modern translations include it. It is a principle of textual criticism that normally the more difficult reading is to be preferred. Many Christians who believe in the divine nature of Jesus Christ would have difficulty with the idea that he does not know everything; the tendency would be to assume the phrase was a mistake of an earlier copyist and to leave it out. Basically that's what Ehrman says in his book Misquoting Jesus: in many cases "proto-orthodox" scribes left out the phrase.

Now in the parallel passage in Mark only two manuscripts leave out the same phrase, so for Wallace that shoots down any idea of a "conspiracy" [his word] of the proto-orthodox trying to push their own views. He asks, if they took it out of Matthew, why did they not take it out of Mark. This introduces a false picture in two respects. First, Ehrman never said or implied that it was a conspiracy. It would be many cases of one lone scribe copying a manuscript and feeling his predecessor must have made a mistake. Second, the same scribe would not be going through the whole New Testament. He would only have a scroll with one of the gospels and would be unlikely to move on from Matthew to Mark. As to why Mark has fewer emendations here, my guess, only a guess, is that Mark was less popular than Matthew, so there were fewer manuscripts to begin with and those manuscripts would be less likely to wear out and need replacement—at least it is the case that for early papyrus fragments Matthew far outnumbers Mark by a ratio of 23:3.

You've made the assumption that Christian scribes were using scrolls in the second century - this is incorrect, they were in fact using codices. The earliest papyrus manuscript we have (P52) is a tiny scrap of what was once the book of John and it's printed on both sides - that's a codex.

Here's a list of the papyrus manuscripts. Some of the other early manuscripts from the second century are P4, P75 which has both Luke and John (and when Luke ends, John begins on the same page), P90, P98, P104, and of course P66 with is a near complete copy of John. Out of those, only P98 is a scroll, the rest are codices.

In Luke's account Mary conceives in the reign of Herod the Great (latest date 4 BCE) but gives birth during the governorship of Quirinius (earliest date 6 CE) resulting in a 10 year pregnancy as mentioned in another thread.

There are numerous theories on this. Even if Quirinius was governor, there still would not have been an expected census in 6-4 BC. Josephus could have misdated it as well, after all he does get certain other things wrong and he is writing some 30+ years later than Luke. Nevertheless according to Josephus, Varus was governor of Syria at the time Jesus had to have been born. Some have simply suggested the correct reading is "this was the registration before Quirinius was governor of Syria". Some have suggested that it is entirely possible that Quirinius served a short stint as governor at the time Jesus was born, and then again from 6 AD.

Historically speaking, the chances are virtually zero that Augustus ordered an empire-wide census and that we have no record of this in ancient historians or in official records. It is also very unlikely that the Romans who were only interested in collecting money would develop the impractical scheme of having everyone return to the locality his ancestors originally came from.

The chances that Luke could make an error regarding these facts is virtually zero. The Census of Quirinius was a famous census, everyone knew about it and remembered it, everyone knew that you didn't have to return to your town of birth, etc. And everyone would have know that Herod was dead at that time. The chances that Luke could make that many mistakes a mere 50 years after the event is untenable.

The bigger problem would be that Luke would have known exactly when this census takes place - 6 AD, and that it would make Jesus too young to begin his ministry and then die on the cross between c. 30-33 AD. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the previous census would have been in 10 BC, correct? There's simply no way that Luke would make such a huge error - he must be talking about a census that takes place 6-4 BC, there's simply no other logical explanation.

Another explanation is that it's widely known that the census of 6 AD introduced an inheritance tax, known because Josephus tells us. For this reason, it could have been a requirement that people register at their home towns.

Dio Cassius was a Roman and a historian in the 2nd-3rd century AD. He spent 22 years writing an 80-volume history of Rome spanning back 1,400 years. When he writes about the census of 6 AD, he mentions that the inheritance tax was introduced for the second time, being introduced once before but abolished.

Now although it seems unlikely that such a census would take place separate to the regular ones, we have no other records of this "forgotten" attempt at introducing an inheritance tax, so it is yet another possibility.

So I don't agree with your assertion that there has to be rock-solid proof for a census occurring in 6-4 BC, or it didn't happen. Could it have been an earlier attempt at introducing the inheritance tax? It's plausible. Could it have been for a different political reason now long forgotten? Also plausible.

Luke has a journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem, accommodation in a stable because there was no room at the inn, heavenly choirs, shepherds coming to visit the baby but no wise men and a fairly speedy return to Nazareth.

Matthew mentions no journey from Nazareth, the impression is that Mary and Joseph are residents of Bethlehem. No choirs of angels (how could he have missed that?), no shepherds, but there are wise men. Mary and Joseph seem to remain in Bethlehem a long time as Herod finds it necessary to order the death of all male children under the age of two years. They flee to Egypt, stay there an indeterminate length of time, come back to Judea, but fear the new ruler, and decide to settle in far-off Nazareth, described as if it were a new home for them.

Now I know the stock fundamentalist harmonization is that Matthew just didn't mention the original journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem and Luke didn't mention the wise men or the side-trip to Egypt, but it all really happened as related in both accounts. If you believe that, I have a lovely vacation property for you on Ellesmere Island.

Are you also going to tell me that no other events could have taken place during the period the story covers?

Attempts to harmonize the two fall down on the different timetables for the return from Bethlehem to Nazareth. Luke has them go back right after Mary has completed the purification rites required after the birth of a male child, i.e., 41 days after the birth of Jesus. No time for a trip to Egypt. No hope of reconciling the two accounts in all their details.

Okay you're really making my head spin, slow down, lol! Your biggest gripe seems to be the fact that he leaves out the trip to Egypt, and that, possibly, Matthew doesn't know that Mary's home town is Nazareth. I'm not entirely sure what your point is?