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In a viral online video—”Jordan Peterson vs 20 Atheists”—popular Canadian psychologist Dr Jordan Peterson faced off with twenty atheist influencers, debating issues from the moral foundations of science to the atheist conception of God. A prominent Christian philosopher has since weighed in on the debate.

Published late last month, the segment is part of Jubilee’s distinctive “Surrounded” series, in which an (often well-known) individual is placed in the middle of a circle of interlocutors (themselves often social media influencers or content creators), who take turns debating prompts chosen by the individual.

Interlocutors can be voted out by a majority of their fellows, which allows another person an opportunity to cross swords with the celebrity debater (in this case, Jordan Peterson).

The program in question has attracted some controversy—accumulating over 6 million views on YouTube, with shorter clips also going viral on social media platforms including TikTok, X and Instagram.

Intellectuals and influencers from around the internet have since responded to the debate, offering a range of views on who won and interacting with the four prompts Dr Peterson defended during the segment. One particularly illuminating perspective was offered by Christian apologetics heavyweights Dr Sean McDowell (son of Josh McDowell) and Dr William Lane Craig. 

Sean McDowell is an associate professor at Biola University’s Talbot School of Theology and Resident Scholar for Summit California. He holds four earned degrees—including two master’s degrees in theology and philosophy, respectively, and a PhD in Apologetics and Worldview Studies from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. 

McDowell is known for his intelligent, culturally relevant, and winsome approach to Christian apologetics. In a video posted to his YouTube channel recently, McDowell said that he could not “think of anyone more qualified or interesting to give his response” to Jubilee’s recent video than Dr William Lane Craig. 

Who is William Lane Craig? 

Dr Craig is a contender for the title of the most well-known and respected Christian philosopher and apologist alive today.

He is also a seasoned debater.

As McDowell notes in his video, Dr Craig has personally debated the leading contemporary atheists—people like Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, and Bart Ehrman—and he has also gone toe-to-toe with Dr Peterson himself.

Craig holds two earned doctorates (PhDs)—an extremely rare and difficult achievement. One of these is in philosophy, considering the Kalam cosmological argument for God’s existence, and the second is in theology, exploring the historicity of the resurrection. 

Like McDowell, Craig is on faculty at Talbot School of Theology (Biola University), which incidentally runs America’s largest master’s philosophy program. He currently holds the title of Emeritus Research Professor of Philosophy at Biola and, until 2024, was Professor of Philosophy at Houston Christian University.

Was Peterson Really Defending Christianity? 

In his review of Peterson’s Jubilee debate, Craig identifies many areas of agreement with the popular psychologist—for example, in an iconic exchange with Oxford scientist Dr Peter Atkins, Craig defended similar claims to Peterson around the limits of science, especially for understanding morality.

However, Craig also highlights that many of Peterson’s prompts in the Jubilee video were simply irrelevant to the truth of Christianity, per se. While they certainly raise interesting questions, they are primarily sociological and psychological claims, rather than core philosophical or theological ones.

For example, Peterson’s first prompt—that “Atheists reject God, but they don’t understand what they’re rejecting”—is very plausibly true. It certainly seems that atheists—and many Christians—have a cartoonish conception of God, which lacks philosophical precision, rigour, and theological richness.

However, the question is simply irrelevant to the question of the actual truth of Christianity itself.

Whether or not people generally have a faulty view of God is simply tangential to the question of God’s actual existence—or his actual nature.

Throughout the Jubilee debate, Peterson is hesitant to defend Christianity at the level of propositional truth. In part, as Craig acknowledges, this may simply be because he is staying in his lane as a trained psychologist.

However, it would also make sense if he is not himself a Christian—which leads to the main controversy around the debate.

Is Jordan Peterson a Christian? 

Significant controversy has surrounded (pardon the pun) the “Surrounded” debate’s original framing as “Christian vs 20 Atheists”.

During one viral exchange, Peterson asks an interlocutor why he is pressing a leading question about Roman Catholic doctrine. The atheist replies, “Because you’re a Christian,” to which Peterson quickly responds, “You say that. I haven’t claimed that.” 

Looking slightly exasperated, the atheist insists that he was under the impression that he was debating a Christian. This is corroborated by the fact that the Jubilee video was originally entitled, “Christian vs 20 Atheists,” only later being renamed “Peterson vs 20 Atheists”.

Commenting on Peterson’s repeated evasiveness about issues like the truth of the resurrection—which is an essential belief within historic Christianity—Sean McDowell highlights that a public confession of Christ is vital for a mature Christian faith.

While agreeing about the importance of the public confession, William Lane Craig points out that there may also be plausible reasons for Dr Peterson’s ongoing evasiveness, which are not necessarily incompatible with his affirming Christian faith—at least at a very immature level.

He is certainly evasive, and I think that that’s deliberate myself. If I were his publicity agent, I would say, ‘Be as evasive as you can. Do not answer the question.’ So long as he keeps evading it, that evokes the mystery, that promotes the controversy.

Craig cautions Christians against being too hasty to judge Peterson, saying, “We don’t know his heart.”

Did Jubilee Make a Mistake? 

While the Jubilee segment has fuelled significant debate online, many seem to have judged it to be something of a letdown.

Many viewers were confused as to why Jordan Peterson was initially pitched as a “Christian” against atheists—and that confusion flowed over into the debate itself, with some participants apparently feeling duped into a debate that was different from what they expected.

One YouTube commenter on Sean McDowell’s video reaction claimed to be one of the atheists in the debate.

He noted: 

This guy (William Lane Craig) is the sort of person I was hoping to debate. The idea of getting the perspective of a famous theologian, in a debate format, was fascinating. In the debate, I said the same thing as Dr. Craig regarding the first prompt (in essence, ‘this is irrelevant to the main debate between Christians and Atheists’). It was amusing and deeply satisfying to hear [Craig] echo the critique.

As Christian YouTuber Ruslan said in his review of the debate, “I think there are substantially more people that they could have gotten to play the position of the Christian…”

…if I were Jubilee, I would run this back with GodLogic Apologetics, Mike Jones from InspiringPhilosophy, Wes Huff—there’s so many people they could have reached out to to do this, and do it right. For whatever reason, they went with someone that they could’ve still got a banger with, and they decided to kind of muddy the waters.

Perhaps Jubilee’s next “Surrounded” edition can feature Dr William Lane Craig or Dr Sean McDowell versus 20 atheists.

You can watch the entire Jubilee video here.