25AR30-20

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AR 30:20 - Destroying "evidence of Jewish history" in Palestine

In this issue:

ANTISEMITISM - "the anti-Semitism version of flat-earth theory"

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE - anticipating "the arrival of AI religions"

DEITY OF CHRIST - the earliest biblical evidence

Apologia Report 30:20 (1,709)
June 5, 2025

ANTISEMITISM

"The Destruction of History for a Lie That No One Believes" by Seth Mandel (Commentary, May 6 '25) -- "In late April, the Press Service of Israel (TPS) covered the blacklisting of researchers who study ancient sites in Judea and Samaria, because the area is over the 'green line' and thus considered occupied territory by the UN. Now, one might suggest that, occupied or not, the preservation and exploration of history is pretty important.

   "And it is - which is why those who undertake it get blacklisted if their areas of study encompass Jewish historical sites.

   "This boycott is very clever," Moshe Gutman, head of Preserving the Eternal, told TPS. "After having publications rejected repeatedly, archaeologists learn to avoid Judea and Samaria entirely. The scientific community is effectively driven away from the area."

   "The culprits aren't shy about the coordination. A few days after TPS's first report, the service got on-the-record confirmation from the top editor of a leading archaeological journal based in London that covers the Levant. 'Publication in [Palestine Exploration Quarterly] is guided by the PEF's ethical policy,' the editor told TPS. 'The main aspect of this is international law, by which many academic institutions and publications, including PEQ, are bound.'

   "There is one way to publish results from Judea and Samaria in the journal, however: if the authors 'have cooperated with the relevant Palestinian authorities to do so.'

   "In other words, get permission from the Palestinian bureaucrats who are in charge of destroying evidence of Jewish history. And here's where the other side of the boycott comes in: 'There is no cooperation with the Palestinian Authority in the field of archaeology in Judea and Samaria, but not because the Israelis don't want it,' an archaeologist at Bar-Ilan University said. 'I would love to conduct a joint research with my Palestinian colleagues…. But it's impossible because they are afraid to cooperate with Israelis. They would be treated as traitors for this.'"

   Tel Aviv-based journalist Amelie Botbol notes that "the United Nations and other international forums play a key role in the denial of history because they have 'automatic anti-Israel majorities' for any votes. Those same authorities turn a blind eye when Jewish sites are violated....

   "This is the anti-Semitism version of flat-earth theory. It exists outside the very idea of knowledge. That is what is so threatening to the academic world: Their defensiveness is a tacit acknowledgement that the Palestinian-fueled anti-Zionist narrative of the land is universally regarded as a made-up story.

   "If there's a second silver lining, it's in the form of a lesson learned the hard way. Israel is the only trustworthy steward of the region's history." <www.tinyurl.com/3529u6s5>

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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

"ChatGPT & 'The De-Souling of the World'" ("Rod Dreher's Diary" Substack, May 6 '25) -- reviews the May 4 '25 Rolling Stone magazine story, "People Are Losing Loved Ones to AI-Fueled Spiritual Fantasies: Self-styled prophets are claiming they have 'awakened' chatbots and accessed the secrets of the universe through ChatGPT" by Miles Klee. <www.archive.ph/TjqSr> 

   Dreher explains "the piece talks about ChatGPT users who begin communicating with the thing, which begins to lead them to believe that they (the users) are God, or are in some way connected to a spiritually powerful being." 

Klee's opening line: "Talking to ChatGPT can lead down a rabbit hole to religious delusions of grandeur." Examples follow. 

   Early on, Dreher advises: "In a landscape saturated with AI, [there will always be a] question that's increasingly difficult to avoid. Tempting though it may be, you probably shouldn't ask a machine" about your personal stuff!

   He includes a link to "the Reddit thread that forms the basis for the story," including select detail and adds: "Even if there is nothing spiritual about this technology - meaning, that its behavior can be entirely explained by naturalistic means - it can easily have religious effects in its users. ...

   "It is clear that AI will be a machine that goes beyond the idol and becomes a portal of communication with what many people will treat as divinity. Neil McArthur, director of the University of Manitoba Centre for Professional and Applied Ethics, foresees the arrival of AI religions. <www.tinyurl.com/8yj68fat> He says that generative AI (AI that can create new information) possesses qualities associated with divine beings," listing five of them. <www.tinyurl.com/3mjv55hm>

And, since we're on the topic of AI mischief, check this out: "Meta Sued After AI Rats Out Wrong-Think" (no byline, "Interest of Justice" substack, May 24 '25) -- "Filmmaker Robby Starbuck is suing Meta after its AI platform lied about him committing a crime and insisted that authorities should take his kids away from him - all because he’s fighting against DEI policies." <www.tinyurl.com/2d6kxe8k>

   As the AI cloud of alarm covers the globe, think of how frightening this must be for those who have no hope of even trying to comprehend it all. What a great moment in history to watch and pray as Jesus brings hope to those who feel utterly lost.

 ---

DEITY OF CHRIST

"What's the Earliest New Testament Evidence for the Divinity of Jesus?" by Michael J. Kruger (Canon Fodder, May 6 '25) -- the opening includes the observation that "scholars are quick to point to Apollonius [of Tyana] as evidence that in the ancient Greco-Roman world there were many people who were regarded as divine in some sense. This didn't mean, of course, that they were the God of the universe, pre-existent and supreme. Rather it meant that they were regarded as special enough to be elevated to some sort of semi-divine status - like the many other Greco-Roman gods.

   "This scholarly framework is then applied to Jesus in some fashion. It is argued that Jesus's followers, at least at the earliest stages, did not regard him as the supreme God of the universe. But they viewed him as an ordinary man that was elevated to some sort of god-like status, not that different than Apollonius of Tyana."

   Kruger reviews how "the average Christian would rebut this claim by simply pointing to the numerous places where Jesus claims to be not only divine, by the very God of the Old Testament. ...

   "But, modern scholars have an answer to this line of reasoning. Sure, John presents Jesus as fully divine, but he was the last Gospel written, probably in the 90's of the first century. By then, Jesus's divine status had grown and expanded and evolved. If you go back to the earliest Gospel (Mark), which was written in the 70's, then you find a very human Jesus.

   "Now, we should not underestimate how persuasive this line of reasoning is to people. Last year, I gave a lecture on 'Lost Gospels' at Princeton University and this was one of the most common arguments I heard. ...

   "To understand what the earliest Christians believed about the divinity of Jesus we turn to Paul of Tarsus. Why Paul? Larry Hurtado explains it best: 'Pauline Christianity is the earliest form of the Christian movement to which we have direct access from undisputed first-hand sources' (Lord Jesus Christ, 85). As we shall see, Paul didn't simply believe Jesus was God in some marginal, semi-divine sort of way. Rather he viewed him as the one God of Israel, the pre-existent Lord of the universe."

   Richard Bauckham concludes: "A higher Christology than Paul already expresses in 1 Corinthians 8:6 is scarcely possible, and … [is] the common character of all New Testament Christology" (2008:30). ...

   "Phil 2:6-11, one of the clearest and most profound declarations that Jesus is Lord over all. Not only does Paul affirm the pre-existence and incarnation of Jesus - 'though in the form of God…made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men' - but he describes the highest possible exaltation of Jesus: "So that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

   "This latter phrase draws explicitly on Is 45:23, where, in the original context, Yahweh declares, 'To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance.' Paul takes the glory due to Yahweh alone and applies it to Jesus - showing that he considers the latter as fully part of the divine identity.

   "Thus, Hurtado has observed that when Phil 2:6-11 is viewed as a whole it describes the work of Christ in a 'narrative sequence,' starting with his pre-existence, moving to his incarnation, then to his humiliation, and finally to his exaltation (Hurtado, 2003:123).

   "What is particularly noteworthy about both of these passages is that scholars have argued that each of them reflect even earlier Christian tradition that significantly predates Paul's own letters. ...

   "Thus, not only do these passages show that the apostle Paul himself had a high Christology, but that this high Christology pre-dates Paul and appears in the very earliest layers of the Christian faith, maybe even as early as the 40's of the first century. ...

   "That means that the highest Christology offered by John's Gospel was not a later evolutionary development. Apparently, that high view of Jesus had been present from the very earliest days of the Christian movement." <www.tinyurl.com/yuhtvtza>

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