Tributes to the late expository preacher John MacArthur continue to flow in—including at least one from someone who does not share MacArthur’s Christian faith.
In a tribute to MacArthur on Tuesday (July 15), conservative political commentator Ben Shapiro expressed admiration for MacArthur’s passion for the Bible, recounting how MacArthur urged him to convert to Christianity during an interview.
Shapiro interviewed MacArthur at length twice—once in 2018 and again in 2024. While Shapiro is an Orthodox Jew, he said on Tuesday that he was never insulted by MacArthur’s attempt to convert him and that he even saw it as a sign of friendship.
Shapiro opened his show on Tuesday by offering his “condolences to the family and all of the followers of John MacArthur, the Southern California preacher, and someone who I venture to say was a friend of mine.”
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Shapiro went on to describe MacArthur as “an amazing human being.”
“MacArthur, of all the people that I know in this sphere—I know quite a few—was absolutely staunch in his defense of the Bible,” said Shapiro. “He is somebody who certainly never shied away from the messages of the New Testament and somebody who made himself controversial because of that, which I think is quite a good thing.”
“In the first interview that I did with him, a lengthy interview, he spent fully 30 minutes of the interview talking to me about why I ought to convert to Christianity,” Shapiro added about MacArthur. “And as a Jew, I will say that not only do I not find that insulting, I find that absolutely useful. Why? Because he is saying the thing that he believes. And I think that that is a good thing.”
Shapiro said that he considered MacArthur a friend “because he’s somebody who cared about my eternal soul.”
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“We could have disagreements on what would happen, you know, with regard to heaven or hell or whether the New Testament was truth or not truth depending on whether you’re a Christian or a Jew,” Shapiro continued. “But I was never upset by the fact that he believed that I ought to convert to Christianity. Because, of course, many Christians believe that I ought to convert to Christianity. It’s not an insult.”
