Did you know that the "Christmas story" everyone knows, with the shepherds and wise men, is actually an amalgamation of the accounts in the gospels of Luke and Matthew? Today, Dr. Bart Ehrman answers my questions about the inconsistencies in these two narratives, and whether they can be reconciled.

We have hundreds of manuscripts of the Gospel of Mark, and no two are exactly the same. From spelling errors to deliberate, theologically-driven changes, each scribe put their own mark on the gospel. Today, Dr. Bart Ehrman joins me to discuss the hows and whys of these rewrites.

We often talk about copies of the gospels, how different manuscripts differ from one another, and the implications of these differences - but we rarely talk about the original gospel manuscripts. Today on Misquoting Jesus, Dr. Bart Ehrman joins me to discuss what an original text actually is, and why they matter.

The Catholic tradition considers the apostle Peter to be the first Pope and the founder of the church in Rome, but what does the historical record say? Today, Dr. Bart Ehrman joins me to discuss where this idea came from, whether Peter was ever in Rome, and what historians know about the founding of early churches.

Gnosticism is one of the most confusing and enigmatic early Christian groups, whose beliefs were considered secret knowledge meant only for a select few. Today, Dr. Bart Ehrman answers my questions about what Gnostics thought about Jesus - where he came from, what he was doing on earth, and whether or not he was divine.

Have you ever submitted a question to the Misquoting Jesus podcast? Ever heard the answer? Today, Bart and I are going to be doing an entire episode covering listeners questions on the topic of the apostle Paul - keep listening, and we might get to yours!

There are several resurrection stories in the New Testament - including, of course, Jesus himself, but what about the mass resurrection in the gospel of Matthew? Today, Dr. Bart Ehrman joins me to discuss why the righteous were raised from the dead when Jesus came for sinners, and what happened to them after their resurrection.

Marcion, founder of the 2nd century Christian group imaginatively called the Marcionites, had some beliefs that would be cause for stoning in the Life of Brian. This week, Dr. Bart Ehrman joins me to talk about what those beliefs were, Marcion's own personal gospel, and what other christians thought about it.

The gospel of John doesn't mention Jesus' birth from a virgin, doesn't show Jesus' baptism by John, and does absolutely nothing to keep his identity secret - not even don a pair of glasses. This week, Dr. Bart Ehrman joins me to explain why the gospel of John is so drastically different to the rest of the new testament gospels!

The Dead Sea Scrolls preserve the beliefs of the Essenes, an ancient Jewish sect that were, like Jesus and John the Baptist, expecting the end of the world. Dr. Bart Ehrman joins me today to talk about whether Jesus and John were actually Essenes.