Debate is to fisticuffs as conversational terrorism is to bar brawls. Although Jesus contended with words, he used neither.

I read through the synoptics for the first time in my life a few months ago and I'm now re-reading John, the last time being three years ago when I came to Christ. What strikes me is the conversations between the Pharisees and Jesus. Had Jesus been in debate, I could have ripped his words apart, for he dodges questions, appears to commit logical fallacies, and sometimes seems to speak illogically.

Yet, what can I say? He's Jesus. Napoleon, a genius in his own right, saw the genius of Jesus when he read the Bible. There is an excellent chance the appearance of illogic and fallacies is due to my misunderstanding.

So Jesus wasn't a debater. But he also wasn't a conversational terrorist (see link above)—had he been, Jesus would have lost that "Christ-like" nature he's so known for. (Can you imagine Jesus derailing conversations by asking machine-gun questions and flustering his opponents to the point where they can't think or speak clearly?)

So, what technique did Jesus use in conversation? He was obviously sparring (to at least some extent). I've heard it said that Jesus uses the challenge-riposte method. (Oddly, searches only bring up this idea from within a Christian apologetics context, which leads me now to wonder if this isn't a made-up method by Christians.) The idea behind challenge-riposte can be illustrated when Jesus asks the Pharisees, "have you not read?" Of course they've read the Bible! What an insult! Jesus could have said, "it is written," and forefitted the insult. But he didn't.  At any rate, the challenge-riposte method only explains a few small portions of his discussions, not the majority.

This is a sort of partial blog here as I attempt to squeeze understanding out of the dialogs of Jesus. Why did he just say that? Why did he change the subject? Why did he use that metaphor? Why didn't he just say it plainly? Reviewing the dialogs of Jesus is a bit like analyzing a chess match between two known masters of the game.

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One major discussion is John 7-8. I've read it three times now in the last week, and right now I'm outlining what he said. It's quite fascinating. He continually refers to "him who sent me" without clearly describing his sender. But in chapter 8 he drops more hints. I want to "connect the dots" and arrive at a clear statement of who Jesus is from these two chapters. His words are a jigsaw puzzle that demand solving (even if I already know the final picture).

This is particularly important now, since last night I got into my first theological conversation with my Christadelphian neighbor. If you're not familiar with Christadelphians, here's a quick shakedown: they're God-fearing, Bible-adhering Christians. That right there eliminates a large majority of liberal "Christians." What makes Christadelphians unique is threefold: they do not believe Satan is a real person (but rather is an "idea" like "sin"), they do not believe God is a threefold trinity, and they do not believe Jesus is God.

Now, there are a handful of clear passages that evidence Jesus' divinity. I could only recall one, from John 8, since I had been studying it recently. Jesus mentioned special knowledge of Abraham to the Pharisees. The Pharisees said, "you're only 30, how do you know Abraham?" Jesus replied, "before Abraham was, I AM." If that wasn't clear enough, the Pharisees' reaction is: they immediately picked up stones to kill Jesus the blasphemer, a man who claimed to be God Himself. I'll write another post on Christadelphians later.