A failed debate spawned a systematic handbook for future disputations

Evidence

It is clear that the Dominicans were not pleased with the outcome of the Barcelona disputation and that they felt that the problem was neither with the premises nor the method of debate, but with its execution. This is why Martí composed (probably with a team of helpers) his Pugio fidei (Dagger of the faith), a handbook for future debates between Dominican missionaries and Jews. He organizes his work along the general lines taken by Pablo Cristiá, specifically trying to parry the objections made by Nachmanides and giving a much more thorough exposition of the Talmud passages in question. He cites Jewish texts in Hebrew and Aramaic, providing a Latin translation. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1189

Categorization

• XREF: Failure-as-feedback: rather than abandoning the debate method, the Dominicans treated execution (not premise) as the flaw and doubled down — a striking parallel to modern policy/litigation failures treated as implementation problems.