CONTEXT
Heard in
Conversation
"And so I actually started by going and looking at the literature outside the gospels. Authors like Plutarch and Suatonius for example that are often cited in this discussion."
Source Episode
Were the Christmas stories meant to be history?
For decades, scholars have claimed that ancient birth narratives were never meant to be taken as history. Then one scholar went and actually read them.
New Testament scholar Caleb Friedeman tested that claim against the ancient biographers themselves, and what he found in their own writing doesn't fit the story we've been told.
🔓 Members get the full unedited interview with Caleb, including Shelby's pushback on whether these stories are too beautiful to be real. faithlab.supercast.com (https://faithlab.supercast.com/)
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February 27, 2026