لطفا منتظر باشید ...
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the
Beneficent
Bible Contradictions
PAUL SAID, "God is not the author
of confusion," (I Corinthians 14:33),
yet never has a book
produced more confusion than the bible! There
are
hundreds of denominations and sects, all using the "inspired
Scriptures"
to prove their conflicting
doctrines.
Why do trained theologians differ?
Why do educated translators disagree
over Greek and Hebrew
meanings? Why all the confusion? Shouldn't
a
document that was "divinely inspired" by an omniscient and
omnipotent
deity be as clear as
possible?
"If the trumpet give an
uncertain sound," Paul wrote in I
Corinthians
14:8, "who shall prepare himself
to the battle? So likewise ye, except
ye utter by the tongue
words easy to be understood, how shall it
be
known what is spoken? for ye shall speak into the air."
Exactly! Paul
should have practiced what he
preached. For almost two millennia, the
bible has been producing
a most "uncertain sound."
The problem is not with
human limitations, as some claim. The problem
is
the bible itself. People who are free of theological bias
notice that
the bible contains hundreds of
discrepancies. Should it surprise us when
such a literary and
moral mish-mash, taken seriously, causes so
much
discord? Here is a brief sampling of biblical
contradictions.
Should we
kill?
•Exodus 20:13 "Thou
shalt not kill." •Leviticus 24:17 "And he
that
killeth any man
shall surely be put to death."
vs.
•Exodus 32:27 "Thus
sayeth the Lord God of Israel, Put every man
his
sword by his side, .
. . and slay every man his brother, . .
.
companion, . . .
neighbor." •I Samuel 6:19 " . . . and the
people
lamented because the
Lord had smitten many of the people with a
great
slaughter." •I
Samuel 15:2,3,7,8 "Thus saith the Lord . . . Now go
and
smite Amalek, and
utterly destroy all that they have, and spare
them
not; but slay both
man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and
sheep,
camel and ass. . . .
And Saul smote the Amalekites . . . and
utterly
destroyed all the
people with the edge of the sword." •Numbers
15:36
"And all the
congregation brought him without the camp, and stoned
him
with stones, and he
died; as the Lord commanded Moses." •Hosea
13:16
"they shall fall by
the sword: their infants shall be dashed in
pieces,
and their women with
children shall be ripped up."
Should we tell
lies?
•Exodus 20:16 "Thou
shalt not bear false witness." •Proverbs
12:22
"Lying lips are an
abomination to the Lord."
vs.
•I Kings 22:23 "The
Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of
all
these thy prophets,
and the Lord hath spoken evil concerning thee."
•II
Thessalonians 2:11
"And for this cause God shall send them
strong
delusion, that they
should believe a lie."
Also, compare Joshua 2:4-6 with
James 2:25.
Should we
steal?
•Exodus 20:15 "Thou
shalt not steal." •Leviticus 19:13 "Thou shalt
not
defraud thy
neighbor, neither rob him."
vs.
•Exodus 3:22 "And ye
shall spoil the Egyptians." •Exodus 12:35-36
"And
they spoiled
[plundered, NRSV] the Egyptians." •Luke 19:29-34
"[Jesus]
sent two of his
disciples, Saying, Go ye into the village . . . ye
shall
find a colt tied,
whereon yet never man sat: loose him, and bring
him
hither. And if any
man ask you, Why do ye loose him? thus shall ye
say
unto him, Because
the Lord hath need of him. . . . And as they
were
loosing the colt,
the owners thereof said unto them, Why loose ye
the
colt? And they said,
The Lord hath need of him."
I was taught as a child that when
you take something without asking for
it, that is
stealing.
Shall we keep the
sabbath?
•Exodus 20:8
"Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy." •Exodus
31:15
"Whosoever doeth any
work in the sabbath day, he shall surely be put
to
death." •Numbers
15:32,36 "And while the children of Israel were in
the
wilderness, they
found a man that gathered sticks upon the sabbath
day.
. . . And all the
congregation brought him without the camp, and
stoned
him with stones, and
he died; as the Lord commanded Moses."
vs.
•Isaiah 1:13 "The
new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies,
I
cannot away with; it
is iniquity." •John 5:16 "And therefore did
the
Jews persecute Jesus
and sought to slay him, because he had done
these
things on the
sabbath day." •Colossians 2:16 "Let no man therefore
judge
you in meat, or in
drink, or in respect of an holy-day, or of the
new
moon, or of the
sabbath days."
Shall we make
graven images?
•Exodus 20:4 "Thou
shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or
any
likeness of anything
that is in heaven . . . earth . . . water."
•
Leviticus 26:1 "Ye
shall make ye no idols nor graven image, neither
rear
you up a standing
image, neither shall ye set up any image of stone."
•
Deuteronomy 27:15
"Cursed be the man that maketh any graven or
molten
image."
vs.
•Exodus 25:18 "And
thou shalt make two cherubims of gold, of beaten
work
shalt thou make
them." •I Kings 7:15,16,23,25 "For he [Solomon] cast
two
pillars of brass . .
. and two chapiters of molten brass . . . And
he
made a molten sea .
. . it stood upon twelve oxen . . . [and so
on]"
Are we saved
through works?
•Ephesians 2:8,9
"For by grace are ye saved through faith . . . not
of
works." •Romans
3:20,28 "Therefore by the deeds of the law there
shall
no flesh be
justified in his sight." •Galatians 2:16 "Knowing that a
man
is not justified by
the works of the law, but by the faith of
Jesus
Christ."
vs.
•James 2:24 "Ye see
then how that by works a man is justified, and
not
by faith only."
•Matthew 19:16-21 "And, behold, one came and said
unto
him, Good Master,
what good thing shall I do, that I may have
eternal
life? And he [Jesus]
said unto him . . . keep the commandments. . .
.
The young man saith
unto him, All these things have I kept from my
youth
up: what lack I yet?
Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect,
go
and sell that thou
hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt
have
treasure in
heaven."
The common defense here is that "we are saved by faith and
works." But
Paul- [laanati allahi]real founder
of christianity) said "not of works."
Should good works
be seen?
•Matthew 5:16 "Let
your light so shine before men that they may see
your
good works." •I
Peter 2:12 "Having your conversation honest among
the
Gentiles: that . . .
they may by your good works, which they
shall
behold, glorify God
in the day of visitation."
vs.
•Matthew 6:1-4 "Take
heed that ye do not your alms before men, to
be
seen of them . . .
that thine alms may be in secret." •Matthew
23:3,5
"Do not ye after
their [Pharisees'] works. . . . all their works they
do
for to be seen of
men."
Should we own
slaves?
•Leviticus 25:45-46
"Moreover of the children of the strangers that
do
sojourn among you,
of them shall ye buy, . . . and they shall be
your
possession . . .
they shall be your bondmen forever." •Genesis 9:25
"And
he [Noah] said,
Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be
unto
his brethren."
•Exodus 21:2,7 "If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six
years
he shall serve: and
in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. .
.
. And if a man sell
his daughter to be a maidservant, she shall not
go
out as the
manservants do." •Joel 3:8 "And I will sell your sons
and
your daughters into
the hand of the children of Judah, and they
shall
sell them to the
Sabeans, to a people far off: for the Lord hath
spoken
it." •Luke 12:47,48
[Jesus speaking] "And that servant, which knew
his
lord's will, and
prepared not himself, neither did according to
his
will, shall be
beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not, and
did
commit things worthy
of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes."
•
Colossians 3:22
"Servants, obey in all things your
masters."
vs.
•Isaiah 58:6 "Undo
the heavy burdens . . . let the oppressed go free,
.
. . break every
yoke." •Matthew 23:10 "Neither be ye called Masters:
for
one is your Master,
even Christ."
Pro-slavery bible verses were
cited by many churches in the South during
the Civil War, and were
used by some theologians in the Dutch
Reformed
Church to justify apartheid in
South Africa. There are more pro-slavery
verses than cited
here.
Does God change his
mind?
•Malachi 3:6 "For I
am the Lord; I change not." •Numbers 23:19 "God
is
not a man, that he
should lie; neither the son of man, that he
should
repent." •Ezekiel
24:14 "I the Lord have spoken it: it shall come
to
pass, and I will do
it; I will not go back, neither will I
spare,
neither will I
repent." •James 1:17 " . . . the Father of lights,
with
whom is no
variableness, neither shadow of
turning."
vs.
•Exodus 32:14 "And
the Lord repented of the evil which he thought to
do
unto his people."
•Genesis 6:6,7 "And it repented the Lord that he
had
made man on the
earth . . . And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom
I
have created from
the face of the earth . . . for it repenteth me that
I
have made him."
•Jonah 3:10 ". . . and God repented of the evil, that
he
had said that he
would do unto them; and he did it
not."
See also II Kings 20:1-7, Numbers 16:20-35, Numbers
16:44-50.
See Genesis 18:23-33, where
Abraham gets God to change his mind about
the minimum number of
righteous people in Sodom required to
avoid
destruction, bargaining down from fifty to ten. (An
omniscient God must
have known that he was playing
with Abraham's hopes for mercy--he
destroyed the city
anyway.)
Are we punished for
our parents' sins?
•Exodus 20:5 "For I
the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting
the
iniquity of the
fathers upon the children unto the third and
fourth
generation."
(Repeated in Deuteronomy 5:9) •Exodus 34:6-7 " . . .
The
Lord God, merciful
and gracious, . . . that will by no means clear
the
guilty; visiting the
iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and
upon
the children's
children, unto the third and to the fourth generation."
•
I Corinthians 15:22
"For as in Adam all die, . . ."
vs.
•Ezekiel 18:20 "The
son shall not bear the iniquity of the father."
•
Deuteronomy 24:16
"The fathers shall not be put to death for
the
children, neither
shall the children be put to death for the
fathers:
every man shall be
put to death for his own sin."
Is God good or
evil?
•Psalm 145:9 "The
Lord is good to all." •Deuteronomy 32:4 "a God
of
truth and without
iniquity, just and right is he."
vs.
•Isaiah 45:7 "I make
peace and create evil. I the Lord do all
these
things." See "Out of
Context" for more on Isaiah 45:7.
•Lamentations
3:38 "Out of the
mouth of the most High proceedeth not evil and good?"
•
Jeremiah 18:11 "Thus
saith the Lord; Behold, I frame evil against
you,
and devise a device
against you." •Ezekiel 20:25,26 "I gave them
also
statutes that were
not good, and judgments whereby they should not
live.
And I polluted them
in their own gifts, in that they caused to
pass
through the fire all
that openeth the womb, that I might make
them
desolate, to the end
that they might know that I am the
Lord."
Does God tempt
people?
•James 1:13 "Let no
man say . . . I am tempted of God: for God cannot
be
tempted with evil,
neither tempteth he any man."
vs.
•Genesis 22:1 "And
it came to pass after these things, that God
did
tempt
Abraham."
Is God
peaceable?
•Romans 15:33 "The
God of peace." •Isaiah 2:4 ". . . and they shall
beat
their swords into
plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks:
nation
shall not lift up
sword against nation, neither shall they learn war
any
more."
vs.
•Exodus 15:3 "The
Lord is a man of war." •Joel 3:9-10 "Prepare war,
wake
up the mighty men,
let all the men of war draw near; let them come
up:
Beat your plowshares
into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears:
let
the weak say, I am
strong."
Was Jesus
peaceable?
•John 14:27 "Peace I
leave with you, my peace I give unto you."
•Acts
10:36 "The word
which God sent unto the children of Israel,
preaching
peace by Jesus
Christ." •Luke 2:14 " . . . on earth peace, good
will
toward
men."
vs.
•Matthew 10:34
"Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I
came
not to send peace,
but a sword. For I am come to set a man at
variance
against his father,
and the daughter against her mother, and
the
daughter in law
against her mother in law. And a man's foes shall
be
they of his own
household." •Luke 22:36 "Then said he unto them, . .
.
he that hath no
sword, let him sell his garment, and buy
one."
Jesus also
said "I came to set the earth on fire, and how i wish
that
it were already
kindled." "Do you suppose that I came to bring
peace
to the world? NO,
not peace but division" Luke 12:49 &
51
Was Jesus
trustworthy?
•John 8:14 "Though I
bear record of myself, yet my record is
true."
vs.
•John 5:31 "If I
bear witness of myself, my witness is not
true."
"Record" and "witness" in the above verses are the same
Greek word
(martyria).
Shall we call
people names?
•Matthew 5:22
"Whosoever shall say Thou fool, shall be in danger
of
hellfire." [Jesus
speaking]
vs.
•Matthew 23:17 "Ye
fools and blind." [Jesus speaking] •Psalm 14:1
"The
fool hath said in
his heart, There is no God."
Has anyone seen
God?
•John 1:18 "No man
hath seen God at any time." •Exodus 33:20 "Thou
canst
not see my face: for
there shall no man see me, and live." •John
6:46
"Not that any man
hath seen the Father, save he which is of God
[Jesus],
he hath seen the
Father." •I John 4:12 "No man hath seen God at
any
time."
vs.
•Genesis 32:30 "For
I have seen God face to face." •Exodus 33:11
"And
the Lord spake unto
Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto
his
friend." •Isaiah 6:1
"In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also
the
Lord sitting upon a
throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled
the
temple." •Job 42:5
"I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear:
but
now mine eye seeth
thee."
How many Gods are
there?
•Deuteronomy 6:4
"The Lord our God is one Lord."
vs.
•Genesis 1:26 "And
God said, Let us make man in our image."
•Genesis
3:22 "And the Lord
God said, Behold, the man has become as one of us,
to
know good and evil."
•I John 5:7 "And there are three that bear
witness
in heaven, the
Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three
are
one."
It does no good to claim that "Let
us" is the magisterial "we." Such
usage implies
inclusivity of all authorities under a king's
leadership.
Invoking the Trinity solves
nothing because such an idea is more
contradictory than the
problem it attempts to solve.
Are we all
sinners?
•Romans 3:23 "For
all have sinned, and come short of the glory of
God."
•Romans 3:10 "As it
is written, There is none righteous, no, not one."
•
Psalm 14:3 "There is
none that doeth good, no, not one."
vs.
•Job 1:1 "There was
a man . . . who name was Job; and that man
was
perfect and
upright." •Genesis 7:1 "And the Lord said unto Noah,
Come
thou and all thy
house into the ark; for thee have I seen
righteous
before me in this
generation." •Luke 1:6 "And they were both
righteous
before God, walking
in all the commandments and ordinances of the
Lord
blameless."
How old was
Ahaziah?
•II Kings 8:26 "Two
and twenty years old was Ahaziah when he began
to
reign."
vs.
•II Chronicles 22:2
"Forty and two years old was Ahaziah when he
began
to
reign."
Should we swear an
oath?
•Numbers 30:2 "If a
man vow a vow unto the Lord, or swear an oath . .
.
he shall do
according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth."
•Genesis
21:22-24,31 " . . .
swear unto me here by God that thou wilt not
deal
falsely with me . .
. And Abraham said, I will swear. . . . Wherefore
he
called that place
Beersheba ["well of the oath"]; because there
they
sware both of them."
•Hebrews 6:13-17 "For when God made promise
to
Abraham, because he
could swear by no greater, he sware by himself . .
.
for men verily swear
by the greater: and an oath for confirmation is
to
them an end of all
strife. Wherein God, willing more abundantly to
shew
unto the heirs of
promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed
it
by an
oath."
See also Genesis
22:15-19, Genesis 31:53, and Judges
11:30-39.
vs.
*Matthew 5:34-37
"But I say unto you, swear not at all; neither
by
heaven . . . nor by
the earth . . . . Neither shalt thou swear by
thy
head . . . . But let
your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay:
for
whatsoever is more
than these cometh of evil." •James 5:12 ". . .
swear
not, neither by
heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other
oath:
but let your yea be
yea; and your nay, nay; lest ye fall
into
condemnation."
When was Jesus
crucified?
•Mark 15:25 "And it
was the third hour, and they crucified
him."
vs.
•John 19:14-15 "And
about the sixth hour: and he saith unto the
Jews,
Behold your King!
But they cried out . . . crucify him."
It is an ad hoc
defense to claim that there are two methods of
reckoning
time here. It has
never been shown that this is the
case.
Shall we obey the
law?
•I Peter 2:13
"Submit yourself to every ordinance of man . . . to
the
king, as supreme; Or
unto governors." •Matthew 22:21 "Render
therefore
unto Caesar the
things which are Caesar's." See also Romans 13:1,7
and
Titus
3:1.
vs.
•Acts 5:29 "We ought
to obey God rather then men."
How many animals
on the ark?
•Genesis 6:19 "And
of every living thing of all flesh, two of every
sort
shalt thou bring
into the ark." •Genesis 7:8-9 "Of clean beasts, and
of
beasts that are not
clean, and of fowls, and of every thing
that
creepeth upon the
earth, There went in two and two unto Noah into
the
ark, the male and
the female, as God had commanded Noah." •Genesis
7:15
"And they went in
unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all
flesh,
wherein is the
breath of life."
vs.
•Genesis 7:2 "Of
every clean beast thou shalt take to thee by
sevens,
the male and his
female: and of beasts that are not clean by two,
the
male and his
female."
Were women and men created
equal?
•Genesis 1:27 "So
God created man in his own image, in the image of
God
created he him; male
and female created them."
vs.
•Genesis 2:18,23
"And the Lord God said, It is not good that the
man
should be alone; I
will make him an help meet for him. . . . And
Adam
said, This is now
bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall
be
called Woman,
because she was taken out of Man."
Were trees created
before humans?
•Genesis 1:12-31
"And the earth brought forth grass, and herb
yielding
seed after his kind,
and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was
in
itself, after his
kind: . . . And the evening and the morning were
the
third day. . . . And
God said, Let us make man in our image . . .
And
the evening and the
morning were the sixth day."
vs.
•Genesis 2:5-9 "And
every plant of the field before it was in the
earth,
and every herb of
the field before it grew: for the Lord God had
not
caused it to rain
upon the earth, and there was not a man to till
the
ground. And the Lord
God formed man of the dust of the ground . .
.
And the Lord God
planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put
the
man whom he had
formed. And out of the ground made the Lord God to
grow
every tree that is
pleasant to the sight, and good for
food."
Did Michal have
children?
•II Samuel 6:23
"Therefore Michal the daughter of Saul had no child
unto
the day of her
death."
vs.
•II Samuel 21:8 "But
the king took the two sons of Rizpah . . . and
the
five sons of Michal
the daughter of Saul."
How many stalls did
Solomon have?
•I Kings 4:26 "And
Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses for
his
chariots, and twelve
thousand horsemen."
vs.
•II Chronicles 9:25
"And Solomon had four thousand stalls for horses
and
chariots, and twelve
thousand horsemen."
Did Paul's men hear
a voice?
•Acts 9:7 "And the
men which journeyed with him stood
speechless,
hearing a voice, but
seeing no man."
vs.
•Acts 22:9 "And they
that were with me saw indeed the light, and
were
afraid; but they
heard not the voice of him that spake to
me."
(For more detail on
this contradiction, with a linguistic analysis
of
the Greek words, see
"Did Paul's Men Hear A Voice?" by Dan
Barker,
published in the The
Skeptical Review, 1994 #1)
Is God
omnipotent?
•Jeremiah 32:27
"Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh: is
there
anything too hard
for me?
•Matthew 19:26 "But
Jesus beheld them, and
said unto them, With
men this is impossible; but with God all things
are
possible."
vs.
•Judges 1:19 "And
the Lord was with Judah; and he drave out
the
inhabitants of the
mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants
of
the valley, because
they had chariots of iron."
Does God live in
light?
•I Timothy 6:15-16 "
. . . the King of kings, and Lord of lords;
Who
only hath
immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach
.
.
."
•James 1:17 " . . .
the Father of lights, with whom is no
variableness,
neither shadow of turning."
•John 12:35 "Then
Jesus saith
unto them, . . . he
that walketh in darkness knoweth not wither
he
goeth."
•Job 18:18 "He [the
wicked] shall be driven from light into
darkness, and chased
out of the world."
•Daniel 2:22 "He
[God] knoweth
what is in the
darkness, and the light dwelleth with him." See
also
Psalm 143:3, II
Corinthians 6:14, and Hebrews 12:18-22.
vs.
•I Kings 8:12 "Then
spake Solomon, The Lord said that he would dwell
in
the thick darkness."
(Repeated in II Chronicles 6:1)
•II Samuel
22:12
"And he made
darkness pavilions round about him, dark waters, and
thick
clouds of the
skies."
•Psalm 18:11 "He
made darkness his secret place;
his pavilion round
about him were dark waters and thick clouds of
the
skies."
•Psalm 97:1-2 "The
Lord reigneth; let the earth rejoice . .
.
clouds and darkness
are round about him."
Does God accept
human sacrifice?
•Deuteronomy 12:31
"Thou shalt not do so unto the Lord thy God:
for
every abomination to
the Lord, which he hateth, have they done
unto
their gods; for even
their sons and their daughters they have burnt
in
the fire to their
gods."
vs.
•Genesis 22:2 "And
he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac,
whom
thou lovest, and get
thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him
there
for a burnt offering
upon one of the mountains which I will tell
thee
of."
•Exodus 22:29 "For
thou shalt not delay to offer the first of
thy
ripe fruits, and of
thy liquors; the firstborn of thy sons shalt
thou
give unto
me."
•Judges 11:30-39
"And Jephthah vowed a vow unto the
Lord,
and said, If thou
shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon
into
mine hand, Then it
shall be, that whatsoever cometh forth of the
doors
of my house to meet
me, when I return in peace from the children
of
Ammon, shall surely
be the Lord's, and I will offer it up for a
burnt
offering. So
Jephthah passed over unto the children of Ammon . . .
and
the Lord delivered
them into his hands. . . . And Jephthah came
to
Mizpeh unto his
house, and, behold, his daughter came out to meet
him
with timbrels and
with dances: . . . And it came to pass at the end
of
two months, that she
returned unto her father, who did with
her
according to his vow
which he had vowed."
•II Samuel 21:8-14
"But the
king [David] took
the two sons of Rizpah . . . and the five sons
of
Michal . . . and he
delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites,
and
they hanged them in
the hill before the Lord: and they fell all
seven
together, and were
put to death in the days of harvest . . . And
after
that God was
intreated for the land."
•Hebrews 10:10-12 "
. . . we are
sanctified through
the offering of the body of Jesus Christ . . .
But
this man, after he
had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat
down
on the right hand of
God."
•I Corinthians 5:7 "
. . . For even Christ
our passover is
sacrificed for us."
Who was Joseph's
father?
•Matthew 1:16 "And
Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom
was
born
Jesus."
vs.
•Luke 3:23 "And
Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of
age,
being (as was
supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of
Heli."
I have received numerous
replies from Christians who think that
these
contradictions are either trivial or easily explained. Yet
not a single
"explanation" has been convincing.
Most of them do little homework,
inventing off-the-cuff defenses of
what the bible "could have meant," or
devising creative
explanations that actually make the problem worse.
For
example, one Christian, agreeing with Eusebius, explained
that "Thou
shalt not bear false witness" does
not prohibit lies, and that God
actually wants us to tell
falsehoods if it will further the kingdom
of
heaven.
Many of the defensive
attempts are arguments from silence. Some
apologists assert that
since the writer of John does not say that
there
were not more women who visited the tomb with Mary, then it
is wrong to
accuse him of contradicting the
other evangelists who say it was a group
of women. But this is a
non-argument. With this kind of thinking,
I
could claim that the people who accompanied Mary to the tomb
included
Mother Teresa, Elvis Presley, and
Paul Bunyan. Since the writer of John
does not specifically
exclude these people, then there is no way
to
prove that this is not true--if such fragile logic is
valid.
All of the above
contradictions have been carefully studied, and
when
necessary the original languages have been consulted.
Although it is
always scholarly to consider the
original languages, why should that be
necessary with the "word
of God?" An omnipotent, omniscient deity
should
have made his all-important message unmistakably clear to
everyone,
everywhere, at all times. No one
should have to learn an extinct
language to get God's message,
especially an ancient language about
which there is much
scholarly disagreement. If the English
translation
is flawed or imprecise, then God
failed to get his point across to
English speakers. A true
fundamentalist should consider the English
version of the bible to
be just as inerrant as the original because
if
we admit that human error was possible in the translation,
then it was
equally possible in the original
writing. (Some fundamentalists do
assert that the King
James Version is perfect. One preacher
reportedly
said, "If the King James Version
was good enough for the Apostle Paul,
then it's good enough
for me.") If a contradiction exists in
English,
then the bible is
contradictory.
The above list of
thirty-three contradictions is a very small portion
of
the thousands of biblical discrepancies that have been
catalogued by
scholars. See "Leave No Stone
Unturned" for seventeen additional
contradictions specific
to the resurrection of Jesus.
Even if a defender of the bible
were to eliminate all of the
above (and no one has come close),
we are still only scratching the
surface. The bible is a flawed
book. DO THEY
NOT CONSIDER THE QURAN (WITH CARE) HAD IT BEEN
ANY
OTHER THAN
ALLAH
THEY
WOULD HAVE
FOUND
THEREIN MANY
A
DISCREPANCY
HOLY QURAN 4:8
