Podcast Summary

Episode Overview

Podcast: New Books Network
Episode: Daniel McClellan, "The Bible Says So: What We Get Right (and Wrong) About Scripture’s Most Controversial Issues" (St. Martin's Essentials, 2025)
Host: Schneer Zalman Neufeld
Guest: Dan McClellan
Date: March 18, 2026

Theme:
This episode delves into misconceptions and debates about what the Bible truly says on controversial issues. Dan McClellan, a public biblical scholar, discusses his new book and his work demystifying scripture for a broad audience. The conversation critically examines common dogmas about biblical authority, inspiration, inerrancy, and univocality, and explores how interpretation, translation, and cultural context shape what people believe the Bible says about major moral and social topics.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

Dan McClellan’s Personal & Academic Journey (01:19-08:34)

• Background: Conversion to LDS Church at 20, missionary work in South America, early affinity for the Bible and apocryphal texts, academic path through BYU, Oxford, Trinity Western University, and PhD at University of Exeter, focusing on cognitive science of religion and conceptualization of deity.
• Professional Experience: Served as scripture translation supervisor for LDS Church for a decade.
• Pivot to Public Scholarship: Began engaging with misinformation about the Bible on social media platform TikTok, unexpectedly amassing a large following and making a career out of public scholarship.

"I realized that there were people who made their living studying the Bible. And I thought, wow, I think that would be about the coolest job in the world." (05:21, Dan McClellan)

The Motto: Data Over Dogma (09:04-11:01)

• McClellan’s guiding principle emphasizes privileging scholarly data over doctrinal assumptions or identity politics.
• Strives for objectivity, even critiquing positions prevalent in his own faith community.
• Sees himself as an umpire, “there to call balls and strikes rather than, you know, bat for any team.” (09:30, Dan McClellan)

Core Dogmas in Bible Interpretation (11:02-13:23)

• Univocality: Assumes the Bible speaks with a single, unified voice—McClellan rejects this, noting authors often held differing or even conflicting views.
• Inspiration: The belief that every word is inspired by God.
• Inerrancy: No errors exist in the Bible due to its divine origin.
• Highlights how these dogmas underpin much biblical misinformation, especially on social media.

“…if I can kind of dismantle those presuppositions and make people aware of the interpretive lenses through which they have for so long looked at the Bible, I think that can help us get to more productive discourse." (12:57, Dan McClellan)

Why Does Accurate Understanding of the Bible Matter? (13:23-14:42)

• The Bible is frequently leveraged as rhetorical authority in both private and public life—even at highest levels of government.
• Misreadings can justify harmful policies and power structures, so equipping people to read and critique it accurately is vital.

How Meaning Is Constructed: The Bible "Doesn't Say Anything At All" (14:42-18:22)

• Texts themselves have no inherent meaning—meaning is generated by readers through interpretive processes.
• Draws on cognitive linguistics: "The production of meaning is something that goes on in the mind of a person..." (15:41, Dan McClellan)
• Uses a story about biscuits in the UK/US to illustrate the role of interpretive frameworks.
• Emphasizes scholarly attempts to recover original authors’ and audiences’ perspectives, while acknowledging the inherent limits and uncertainty of that project.

Metaphors for Bible Interpretation: Jigsaw Puzzles vs. Lego (18:24-22:44)

• Jigsaw Puzzle: Many treat the Bible like a puzzle with a “picture on the box” (i.e. inherited tradition) to which all texts should be conformed.
• Lego Chest: McClellan prefers this metaphor, where the Bible is a box of parts and each person “builds” meaning according to their needs, often finding what they’re already looking for.
• Warns against leveraging this constructed approach in policy or political arguments, which often justifies harmful actions.

"...what we're building is really up to us, but to the degree that we can construct from the LEGO bricks of the many different verses in the Bible, we can say, well, this is biblical..." (20:21, Dan McClellan)

The Historical-Critical Approach (22:53-24:45)

• McClellan employs a historical-critical method—using tools from history, textual criticism, cognitive science of religion—to attempt to reconstruct what texts might have meant for original authors and audiences.
• Other interpretive approaches (feminist, liberation, trauma, disability, reception history, etc.) are valuable, but his main work sticks to this foundation.

“The Bible”: Text, Canon, Manuscripts, and Translation (26:46-32:59)

• There is no single “Bible”—different communities have different canons, rely on different source manuscripts, and most access is through translation, which introduces further variance.
• Highlights the lack of awareness about these choices and their impact.
• Anecdote: Some treat the King James Version as the “real” Bible to the extent of “correcting” Greek manuscripts with it, indicating profound misunderstandings.

Is the Bible Itself "Inspired"? (32:59-36:33)

• The Bible cannot declare itself inspired because today’s Bible did not exist when its texts were written.
• 2 Timothy 3:16 (“All scripture is God-breathed”) is often used as proof, but the text likely originally referred only to Jewish scripture and meant “life-giving,” not “inspired.”
• The modern understanding of inspiration is a later interpretive development.

"...the word theopneustos, which we generally take to mean inspired, doesn't seem to have meant inspired in the late first or early second century... it seems to mean something more like life-giving…" (34:13, Dan McClellan)

Creation Ex Nihilo: Out of Nothing? (36:33-41:16)

• The doctrine that God created the universe out of nothing (ex nihilo) did not appear until the late second century CE.
• Genesis 1:1 better translates as “when God began to create the heavens and the earth…,” not “in the beginning.”
• Biblical and Jewish sources, and early philosophies (notably Aristotle), assumed pre-existent matter rather than creation from nothing.
• Changing translations reflect updated scholarship; many traditionalists dislike this.

Slavery in the Bible (44:52-49:46)

• The Bible never prohibits slavery or questions the institution itself.
• Some passages mitigate conditions (e.g., how Israelite slaves are treated), but many permit buying, selling, and owning people, especially foreigners.
• Relevant law codes (e.g., Hammurabi) are similar; Israelite law is not systematically more just.

"There's no part of the Bible that questions, undermines, or prohibits the practice itself of, of buying, selling, and owning other human beings." (45:04, Dan McClellan)

Abortion: What Does the Bible Say? (50:17-54:51)

• The Bible never asserts that abortion is murder.
• Only clear legal passage, Exodus 21:22-25, treats harm to a fetus as a property crime, not equivalent to murder.
• Historical Jewish and Christian interpretation only reinterpreted this as murder much later (Calvin, 16th century).
• New Testament references (e.g., John Baptist leaping in the womb) reflect different philosophical views on “ensoulment,” but none directly equate abortion with murder.

Homosexuality in the Bible (54:51-61:32)

• Ancient and modern concepts of homosexuality differ; the Bible refers only to specific sex acts, not sexual orientation.
• Leviticus prohibits men taking the penetrative role with other men, due to social perceptions about status and masculinity—this does not address female same-sex acts at all.
• New Testament passages (e.g., Paul in Romans 1) build off prevailing Greco-Roman notions, not informed by contemporary understandings of sexuality or consent.
• McClellan critiques the selective, ahistorical application of ancient sexual ethics to modern issues, noting the documented harm caused by anti-gay interpretations.

"We reject Paul's sexual ethic when it comes to celibacy, but we want to wave the flag of Paul's sexual ethic when it comes to...same sex intercourse...[applying] his ahistorical, non-biological and kind of inaccurate take..." (60:08, Dan McClellan)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Biblical Meaning:
  "We read it and we generate meaning with the text...what we're building is really up to us..." (17:28, 20:21 – Dan McClellan)

• On Social Consequences:
  "People need to be aware that that's what's going on [the construction of biblical cases to justify actions] so they're not duped into imagining that...it actually ever was intended to be in the Bible." (22:44, Dan McClellan)

• On Scholarship vs. Dogma:
  "I'm basically just striving to make sure that I'm representing the scholarship to the best of my ability without allowing any of the dogmas to muddy the waters..." (10:53, Dan McClellan)

• On Harmful Interpretations:
  "I don't like bullies. And so I'm gonna do what I can to...get in the way of that kind of leveraging of the Bible because I don't think that's what we should be doing with those texts." (61:04, Dan McClellan)

Important Segment Timestamps

• Dan’s Academic/Professional Story: 01:19–08:34
• “Data Over Dogma” Motto: 09:04–11:01
• Dogmas (Univocality, Inspiration, Inerrancy): 11:02–13:23
• Why Accurate Understanding Matters: 13:23–14:42
• Texts Don’t Have Inherent Meaning (Cognitive Linguistics): 14:42–18:22
• Puzzle vs. Lego Metaphor: 18:24–22:44
• Historical-Critical Approach: 22:53–24:45
• Defining “the Bible”: 26:46–32:59
• Biblical Inspiration & 2 Timothy: 32:59–36:33
• Creation Ex Nihilo: 36:33–41:16
• Slavery in the Bible: 44:52–49:46
• Abortion & Personhood: 50:17–54:51
• Homosexuality: 54:51–61:32

Summary

This episode provides a nuanced, historically rooted examination of how the Bible is interpreted on hot-button social issues, exposing how much is dependent on later tradition, translation, and interpretive frameworks—rather than the words of the texts themselves. Dan McClellan dispels common misconceptions and asserts the importance of informed, critical scholarship when invoking the Bible in public life, all while advocating for humility and transparency in discussions about scripture. If you want to understand what the Bible actually says—and how we arrive at those conclusions—this is an essential listen.