Dan McClellan, “Data Over Dogma,” and the Battle Over the Bible

Dan McClellan has become one of the most influential Bible scholars on social media, building a massive platform around a simple motto: “Data over dogma.”But is his approach really free from dogma?In this episode of Cloud & Fire, Kelvin Anderson and Josiah Spencer examine McClellan’s approach to Scripture, his use of critical scholarship, his stated concern for less powerful groups, and his rejection of inspiration, inerrancy, and univocality as unsupported dogmas.We also step back and ask a bigger question: What happens when the methods we use to study the Bible begin by excluding some of the Bible’s own claims about itself?This isn’t an attempt to answer every argument McClellan has ever made. It’s a challenge to Christians to understand the debate, engage serious scholarship, examine the assumptions behind the conclusions, and do the work necessary to defend what we believe.