I watched all 10 parts of agnostic, Bart Ehrman’s, Stanford lectures entitled ‘Misquoting Jesus’. I haven’t read the book but I found him quite fair and entertaining in the lectures. I don’t agree with him on a number of points – some of them rather crucial points to his whole argument – but I did find him engaging. From what I could pick up it seems that Ehrman would take issue with many of the findings of some scholars who come out of more of a classic liberalism when it comes to the dating of some of the original New Testament books. He seemed to come out a lot more conservative on that issue than I thought he’d be.
There’s nothing earth-shattering in his presentation and he says that himself – he’s not bringing new things out onto the table he’s just popularizing textual criticism for a wider audience. His work probably could cause a lot of anxiety in certain Christian circles that aren’t taught to think a little beyond the status quo. I suppose I should warn people, if you’re evangelical that is, to exercise a bit of caution if you’re planning on watching the material – don’t denounce Christianity and run out and follow him just yet. Maybe read a little further in the subject. You never know you might find that there are a fair number of quality evangelical scholars who might also have something worth saying.
Check out Ehrman’s wiki page make sure though that you read the transcript of a debate he had with William Lane Craig in 2006 or read Dan Wallace’s critique of Ehrman’s book.
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