Bill Hwang, Major Supporter of Ravi Zacharias, Indicted for Racketeering, Market Manipulation and Fraud

For many years, Bill Hwang was a high flying donor for Ravi Zacharias’ ministry. He also was someone who Zacharias put in front of his audiences even though Zacharias knew Hwang had a checkered past. Now some more of those chickens may be coming home to roost. Watch:

As I pointed out in 2017, Hwang’s first SEC rodeo cost him 44-million and the loss of his ability to trade securities for five years. Apparently, he found a way to do it and do it massively.

Ravi Zacharias Radio Show Dropped by Bible Broadcasting Network; CMA Re-Investigates Allegations

Bible Broadcasting Network have dropped Ravi Zacharias’ syndicated radio show “Let My People Think” from their broadcasting lineup.

We are saddened and deeply troubled to hear once again of disturbing allegations against Ravi Zacharias.  In the past, after hearing of similar allegations, BBN concluded we would give Ravi the benefit of the doubt based on our longstanding relationship. At the time, however, we expressed to the leadership of RZIM that future questions of this nature would require us to discontinue our broadcast of Let My People Think. We have notified RZIM of this decision, effective immediately. We will continue to pray for the ministry of RZIM.
___________________________________
 For God’s Glory,
Jason Padgett
Business & Operations Manager

 

Also today, Christianity Today published a disclosure that the Christian & Missionary Alliance denomination will again investigate the allegations against Zacharias. In 2018, the denomination decided not to pursue discipline against Zacharias. Based on my knowledge of the charges and investigation at the time, I believe that the denomination overlooked evidence and did not do a thorough investigation.  The CT article implies that as well.

 

Ravi Zacharias, 1946-2020

This morning Ravi Zacharias International Ministries released a statement announcing the death of their founder. Ravi Zacharias had been ill with an aggressive form of cancer. He was 74.

Until late in his ministry, Zacharias was universally beloved among evangelicals as a minister and defender of Christianity. He was affiliated with the Christian Missionary Alliance church. Recently, scandals marred his work, but for the most part his fans continued to stand with him. His organization will continue his apologetics work with his daughter Sarah Davis as CEO.

Davis had this to say about funeral arrangements:

Soon our family will gather for a graveside service. In the days ahead we will provide details for a public memorial service to be held in Atlanta and streamed around the world.

Ravi Zacharias, R.I.P.

 

The Washington Post obituary by Sarah Bailey for Ravi Zacharias contains a link to this blog’s exclusive 2018 apology concerning Zacharias’ claim that he studied at Cambridge and was a professor at Oxford.

 

Exclusive: Ravi Zacharias Apologizes for False Claims about His Credentials at Oxford and Cambridge

In response to my request for a comment about his false claim to be a professor at Oxford (see this post for video) in a speech to the C.S. Lewis Institute, Ravi Zacharias sent the following statement to me:

“I am thankful for the opportunities I have had throughout my life to pursue an education from a broad range of outstanding institutions. I earned my bachelor’s degree in theology from Ontario Bible College (now known as Tyndale University College and Seminary in Toronto) and then completed a Master’s in Divinity from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois. I was then privileged to serve as Chair and Associate Professor of Evangelism and Associate Professor of Evangelism and Contemporary Thought at Alliance Theological Seminary in Nyack, New York. In subsequent years, I had the opportunity to participate in guided studies at Ridley Hall, an independent theological college affiliated with the University of Cambridge, which consisted of studies in a few subjects including philosophy and world religions. I was also a Senior Research Fellow, an honorary title which Wycliffe Hall, a permanent private hall of the University of Oxford, bestowed for a number of years. This role provided a wonderful opportunity for me to lecture there.

While I have been privileged to receive several honorary doctorates from other institutions, to be clear, I have never earned a doctoral degree and was never enrolled at the University of Oxford or the University of Cambridge. And while I have lectured at Wycliffe Hall, I am not and have never been a professor at the University of Oxford. I recognize that academic terms and designations are important, and I apologize for any occasion on which I have wrongly titled my association with either of these institutions. For these reasons, I previously updated my curriculum vitae on the RZIM website to best reflect my educational and professional experience.”

The second paragraph contains some new admissions (in bold print). He acknowledges never being enrolled in Oxford or Cambridge and apologizes for using titles in the past suggesting he was a professor at Oxford. This took place over two decades.

In December 2017, Zacharias acknowledged that he did not have an earned doctorate and said he would discontinue using the title “Dr” (he has honorary doctorates). However, at that time, he did not address his past misleading academic claims involving Oxford and Cambridge. Today, this statement partially addresses that situation.

As I did yesterday, I asked for reaction from Canadian apologist John Stackhouse. Via email, Stackhouse said:

It is good to have Ravi Zacharias apologize for misleading claims about his academic credentials—as he has now done again. But now what?

Not only Mr Zacharias himself, but Mr Zacharias’s publishers, the RZIM board, RZIM staff members, RZIM institutional partners, RZIM donors, and the Christian & Missionary Alliance all have vital decisions to make now. What can and should be salvaged of a ministry whose leader has admitted that he lied, repeatedly, about the basic facts of his competence to perform that ministry?

Christians should pray for integrity, honesty, courage, gentleness, and wisdom for everyone involved in this mess—for it is, despite the mild language of this admission by Mr Zacharias, a terrible mess indeed.

 

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Blast from the Past: Ravi Zacharias Made Himself a Professor at Oxford

In a 2012 speech before the C.S. Lewis Institute, Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias referred to himself as a “professor at Oxford” after saying he had studied at Cambridge.  Watch (the complete speech is here. The clip is at 52:41):

In fact, Zacharias was never on the faculty in any capacity at Oxford University. He spent some time in the city of Oxford with an honorary position at Wycliffe Hall, a ministry preparation school which has an affiliation with Oxford but his statement here is simply false.

For those who followed the scandal surrounding Zacharias’ credentials back in December 2017, this will seem like old news. However, what was true then is still true – in the public statements from his ministry, Zacharias never addressed his false claims about credentials from Oxford and Cambridge. He has not acknowledged them, even though some of them still persist in his publications and speeches such as this video.

Zacharias’ false claims about his credentials came under scrutiny through the persistent work of attorney Steve Baughman. Christianity Today briefly took up of credential inflation via an interview with John Stackhouse, an apologist and professor at Crandall University in New Brunswick, Canada.

I asked Dr. Stackhouse if I could include his reactions to the false claim by Zacharias to the C.S. Lewis Institute and he agreed as long as I made it clear that he is also a human being who understands the temptations to cover insecurity with credential inflation. Stackhouse said the comment might seem to some observers like “no big deal.” However, he said, “It is a big deal. No one who knows anything about the respective cultures of Oxford and Cambridge universities would claim to be ‘a professor at Oxford’ who wasn’t in fact a full Professor at Oxford.”

Stackhouse explained that in North America, colleges and universities “refer to assistant and associate professors as ‘Professor,’ but at Oxford you have to have attained that final rank for that term to apply to you.” Those who have rank at less than full professor are given other titles.

He added, “And to say you are a ‘professor at Oxford’ while referring to Cambridge University (“my studies at Cambridge”) clearly implies that you are on the staff of the university—not on the staff of the apologetics institute you yourself founded in the city of Oxford, or a lecturer at an affiliated theological college, or anything else.”

In Stackhouse’s opinion, the claim isn’t a “slip of the tongue.” He said:

It isn’t a “dynamic equivalent” translation of a foreign educational situation for a lay American audience.  It is a falsehood that serves only to exaggerate his intellectual authority. One just can’t make a remark like this as a mere error. It’s like saying “I’m an astronaut” or “I’m a senator.” If you understand the terms at all, you can’t use them unless you literally are an astronaut or senator.

Compounding the problem is that Zacharias hasn’t personally addressed these issues. I asked Ravi Zacharias International Ministries for a comment on this video last night and did not hear from them today.

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Image: Kristamaranatha at the English Wikipedia [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons