The Debate That Opened Everything

In late 2024, Christian apologist Wes Huff sat down with popular sceptic Billy Carson for a debate that went viral. It eventually reached Joe Rogan's podcast and tens of millions of views. Carson's central claim was that the Genesis creation account was copied "word for word" from the Enuma Elish, the ancient Babylonian creation epic. The Bible, he argued, was just a repackaged version of older Mesopotamian myths.

Huff asked Carson to summarise the Enuma Elish. What followed was a version of the story so loosely framed it was, as one commentator put it, borderline unrecognisable. When Huff pressed for specific parallels beyond surface-level similarities, Carson couldn't produce them.

Because the parallels aren't there. Not at the level that matters.

What most Ancient Near Eastern scholars actually recognise is that Genesis isn't a copy of the Enuma Elish. It's a polemic against it. The biblical authors knew the Babylonian story. They weren't borrowing from it. They were dismantling it, point by point, and replacing it with a radically different vision of God, humanity, and purpose.

This is a claim that sounds insignificant in an academic journal. But on a podcast watched by tens of millions, it becomes the most important distinction in the world. Because if Genesis is just a copy — if the Bible is just repackaged Babylon — then nothing in it is authoritative. Nothing in it is original. Nothing in it carries the weight of a God who actually spoke. It's all just humans recycling myths.

But if Genesis is a polemic — if it deliberately takes the Babylonian story, exposes its architecture, and replaces it with something radically different — then the two stories are not relatives. They are enemies. They are opposite answers to the same question. And the question is the one that every human being must eventually face: What are you? What are you for? And who do you serve?

Yes, both stories mention the separation of waters. Yes, both describe the earth as formless. Yes, both involve the creation of humanity from earthly material. The surface similarities are real — and they exist precisely because the biblical authors were engaging with the Babylonian text. They knew their audience knew the Enuma Elish. They were writing to an Israelite people who had lived for decades inside Babylonian culture during the exile. And they were saying: you know that story you've been hearing? Here is what actually happened. Here is who God actually is. Here is what you actually are.

The Enuma Elish says the cosmos was born from violence. Genesis says the cosmos was spoken into being by a voice of love. The Enuma Elish says humanity was created from the blood of a condemned rebel to serve as slaves. Genesis says humanity was formed by the hands of a loving Creator, filled with His own breath, and made in His image. The Enuma Elish says the gods are threatened by humanity. Genesis says God delights in humanity. The Enuma Elish says the world is held together by domination. Genesis says the world is held together by covenant.

These are not minor differences. These are opposite answers to every question that matters.

And the debate between Huff and Carson — for all its internet drama and viral reach — was never really about two men arguing on a podcast. It was the same argument that has been playing out for five thousand years. The same two architectures. The same two visions of reality. One says you are a slave made from condemned blood in a cosmos held together by violence. The other says you are an image-bearer made by a God who walks with you in a garden and calls you by name.

Which story do you want to be true?

And what if the one you want to be true actually is?

The tragedy is that Carson's inability — or unwillingness — to see the vast differences between these two stories contributed to one of the most public unravellings we've seen in the online space. After the debate, he tried to suppress the footage, threatened lawsuits, and watched his credibility erode in real time. Pride led to a fall. It always does. Scripture warns us about this pattern. It's the same pattern that brought Lucifer down. The moment you elevate yourself above the truth, the ground beneath you gives way.

But let me be clear: I wish Billy grace. I pray he finds the love, peace, and joy that the gospel offers. Because here's the uncomfortable truth — we've all been Billy. Every one of us. Myself included.

We think we know the creation story. We think we know Genesis. But most of us have been living inside the Babylonian version without realising it. We've absorbed assumptions about God, about ourselves, about heaven, about purpose — and baptised them in whatever language our culture speaks. Christian language. Scientific language. Spiritual language. The costume changes. The architecture doesn't.

Have you ever stopped to ask where your picture of God came from?

Where did you get your image of heaven? Of hell? Of what happens when you die?

Did it come from the Bible? Or from a painting? A film? A sermon that quoted more Dante than Revelation?

Did you choose your worldview — or did it choose you?

What are these two stories? What do they actually say? And why does it matter which one you're living inside?

That is the question this book will answer.

But before we open the ancient texts, I want you to consider something.

What do you think happens when you die?

Ask the average Christian and they'll say: "I'm going to heaven." Up there. Away from here. Escape the earth, float to a higher realm, live in the clouds forever. But that's not what the Bible actually teaches. That's closer to the Babylonian view — where heaven was strictly the domain of the gods, off limits to humans, and the dead descended to a grey underworld of dust and shadow.

What does Revelation actually say? "I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God" (Revelation 21:2). Heaven comes down. God relocates His dwelling to be with humanity. We're not going up. He's coming down. He always has been. That's the whole story.

So before we judge Billy for getting the creation story wrong — how many of us have been getting the ending wrong?

How many of us have been living inside a Babylonian framework — gods up there, humans down here, scrambling to ascend — without ever realising that the God of the Bible has always been a God who descends?

The creation story you carry in your head — wherever it came from — is not just an origin myth. It is an operating system. It determines how you see yourself, what you believe you're worth, what you think happens when you die, and how you spend the one life you've been given. It shapes your politics, your business, your relationships, your ambitions, and your fears. It is the foundation beneath everything you build.

Have you ever examined that foundation?

Do you know where your assumptions about God came from? About heaven? About what you're for?

Most people haven't examined it. They inherited it. From school, from culture, from social media, from a Sunday school class they half remember. And they've been building on it ever since — never once checking whether it can hold the weight.

I share this not to attack anyone. I share it as a warning and an encouragement. Please don't build on a foundation you haven't examined. These two stories are not the same. They are opposites. They produce different dikaiosyne — different alignments, different architectures, different civilisations. And the difference between them determines everything about how you live, what you build, and who you ultimately serve.

This book is an invitation to check.