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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Contradictions
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Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
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Posted
One of the 'old chestnuts' levelled at the church is the 'many contradictions' in the Bible that somehow justify a total rejection of its integrity or claim to contain any truth.
What particular 'contradictions' do Shipmates consider might be seen as so damaging that they do, indeed, call into question the Bible's authenticity?
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"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
I would not say that it "contradictions". Disagreements in the text are inevitable when you have many authors over thousands of years.
What's the killer-diller for people who want to believe is the places where the Bible is actively impossible to obey. The 'thou shalt not suffer a witch to live' would be an example. Do we really want to instigate the death penalty for witches? How do we define that class of persons?
Or the injunction about wearing fabric of mixed fibers. Really? I sit here in my polyester-and-cotton tee shirt and have to believe that this is a basic tenet of the faith?
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
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fletcher christian
Mutinous Seadog
# 13919
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Posted
I think the biggest contradiction that muddies the waters is that so many Christians claim the Bible points at God but they point at the Bible like it is God.
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'God is love insaturable, love impossible to describe'
Staretz Silouan
Posts: 5235 | From: a prefecture | Registered: Jul 2008
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
I wouldn't dismiss them as "chestnuts", Muddy.
They are all too real, and I for one stick with my faith despite the fact that I don't have satisfactory explanations for them, rather than because I do.
There are countless trivial, and even pseudo-, contradictions, but the biggies, ISTM, are as follows:-
- A God of love who has created most people with the intention of tormenting them for eternity.
- A God of love who has built so many forms of suffering into creation - such as diseases/deformities/disabilities, famine (droughts, floods, crop failures), earthquakes/tsunamis - which cannot be explained away as misuse of the blessing of human freedom, such as war can be.
- A soteriology of justification by faith derivable from Pauline and Johannine sources, versus its absence, and replacement by a "works" soteriology, in the Synoptics.
- A premium on Christian unity, alongside a lack of clarity in many major areas such as eschatology, pneumatology and ecclesiology which guarantees division and denominationalism.
- OT admonitions to genocide and ethnic cleansing versus a total ban on violence for Christians individually or communally in the NT.
They, and others, cannot be dismissed by simply rolling our eyes and muttering, "Oh no, not THAT one again!"
Posts: 3355 | Registered: Jan 2011
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
but the biggies, ISTM, are as follows:-
- A God of love who has created most people with the intention of tormenting them for eternity.
- A God of love who has built so many forms of suffering into creation - such as diseases/deformities/disabilities, famine (droughts, floods, crop failures), earthquakes/tsunamis - which cannot be explained away as misuse of the blessing of human freedom, such as war can be...
Well, but these ones aren't in the Bible. They are derived from the assumptions some of us bring to the Bible.
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
- A premium on Christian unity, alongside a lack of clarity in many major areas such as eschatology, pneumatology and ecclesiology which guarantees division and denominationalism.
I think this one derives from a total misunderstanding of the meaning of "unity".
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
I wouldn't dismiss them as "chestnuts", Muddy.
They are all too real, and I for one stick with my faith despite the fact that I don't have satisfactory explanations for them, rather than because I do...
- OT admonitions to genocide and ethnic cleansing versus a total ban on violence for Christians individually or communally in the NT.
They, and others, cannot be dismissed by simply rolling our eyes and muttering, "Oh no, not THAT one again!"
Totally agree with you here, including the frustration and the fact that you can't just dismiss this.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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fausto
Shipmate
# 13737
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
I wouldn't dismiss them as "chestnuts", Muddy.
They are all too real, and I for one stick with my faith despite the fact that I don't have satisfactory explanations for them, rather than because I do.
There are countless trivial, and even pseudo-, contradictions, but the biggies, ISTM, are as follows:-
- A God of love who has created most people with the intention of tormenting them for eternity.
- A God of love who has built so many forms of suffering into creation - such as diseases/deformities/disabilities, famine (droughts, floods, crop failures), earthquakes/tsunamis - which cannot be explained away as misuse of the blessing of human freedom, such as war can be.
- A soteriology of justification by faith derivable from Pauline and Johannine sources, versus its absence, and replacement by a "works" soteriology, in the Synoptics.
- A premium on Christian unity, alongside a lack of clarity in many major areas such as eschatology, pneumatology and ecclesiology which guarantees division and denominationalism.
- OT admonitions to genocide and ethnic cleansing versus a total ban on violence for Christians individually or communally in the NT.
They, and others, cannot be dismissed by simply rolling our eyes and muttering, "Oh no, not THAT one again!"
To the extent that these contradictions do actually appear in the text of the Bible (but see cliffdweller's comment above, as they don't necessarily), they do not refute the authenticity or validity of the Bible. What they do refute is some readers' suppositions about the perfect veracity and internal consistency that they naively imagine it ought to contain.
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"Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way." Gospel of Philip, Logion 72
Posts: 407 | From: Boston, Mass. | Registered: May 2008
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Well, but these ones aren't in the Bible. They are derived from the assumptions some of us bring to the Bible.
It is every bit as much an assumption to assert that they aren't in the Bible as it is to assert that they are.
Certainly there is both a prima facie hermeneutical/exegetical and historical/doctrinal case for them.
quote:
I think this one derives from a total misunderstanding of the meaning of "unity".
Which is simply to say that there are different theories of what unity does or should consist of - another cause of division!
Historically, Christians have not only separated from one another over such issues, but killed one another as well.
You can argue that they should not have done so, based on your personal view of how unity should work, but the facts are that they did, that they did so sincerely based on what they genuinely believed was the right interpretation of Scripture, and that God must have foreseen that they would.
[corrected UBBCode trainwreck]
[ 06. June 2016, 05:58: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posts: 3355 | Registered: Jan 2011
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Macrina
Shipmate
# 8807
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Posted
I came across this one the other day when I had a close encounter with a street evangelist. After initially being quite irritable with her and going back to say sorry and finish the dialogue more respectfully she stated explicitly that there were no contradictions in the Biblical text.
As others have said above there definitely are multiple contradictions and variations on various tales within the text. I think it would be intellectually dishonest to claim that there were not. The next step is how you handle these contradictions and variations.
Most Christians will probably make an argument that invokes allegory over literal meaning or bring up points about translations and copying bringing multiple meanings to the text. This to me is okay since it acknowledges a fact 'there are contradictions' but provides a framework within which you can accept them.
The OP asks how the existence of contractions would cause one to question the authenticity and validity of the Bible. From where I am standing my first question is authentic in what sense and valid in what sense?
Posts: 535 | From: Christchurch, New Zealand | Registered: Nov 2004
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
I don't think there is an obvious knock-out blow which shows that Jesus Christ never existed (or the various other conspiracy theories). I still think the narrative is engaging and that the best explanation is that the Incarnation was a Real Thing.
That said, there are some troubling things which mean that a reasonable person could question whether it is all a load of rubbish.
For me, the textural contradictions are the least important part of this. For me it is much more troubling to read all the books that didn't make it into the canon and to contemplate whether what exists is the best attempt to find texts that marry up.
We're then into the business of whether we trust influential people in the early church to have assembled a faithful narrative hundreds of years after the events that are described.
On the one hand, I think this leads to a basic inconsistency at the heart of Protestantism, in that the NT was assembled in the context of the church (the kind of church?) they/we don't believe in. But on the other hand, I think there is also a problem for the RCC and Orthodox in that some who were very involved seemed to be, well, weirdly unorthodox.
There have been a whole bunch of things that are much more recent but even with a whole lot of modern forms of information are still inexplicable. So it isn't a great surprise that there is weirdness about texts that are this old.
My base position is that there were a whole lot of "Christianities" available from the earliest times and that the NT was subsequently quote unquote redacted by the "winning" proto-orthodox camp. But I don't think that this makes the theology that we have inherited wrong.
Ultimately it is about faith. Either we believe in the continuity and tradition that is passed down to us, or we think that somehow, somewhere the message was corrupted before it got to us.
I don't see that it is possible to be absolutely certain in either direction.
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arse
Posts: 10697 | Registered: Sep 2002
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Schroedinger's cat
Ship's cool cat
# 64
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Posted
You see I would argue that there are no contradictions in the Bible, because contradictions assume that the texts are a rigid and scientific account of events. They are not. The differences (for example) in the gospels are because they are accounts told by individuals as their understanding of the stories - because that was how people told stories then.
And the writing overall is not a textbook for how to be a Christian - it is stories of people trying to relate to God over centuries. It is not contradictions as much as personal stories.
In a sense, these alternative approaches are what makes the Bible authoritative for me, because it records failures as well as successes. I would consider the genocide in Exodus as an example of people failing to understand God, in spectacular fashion. It makes my pathetic failures seem somehow more forgiveable.
But I understand that this is simply my approach to reconciling them.
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Blog
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Posts: 18859 | From: At the bottom of a deep dark well. | Registered: May 2001
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Back in my more full-on evangelical charismatic days there used to be a preacher who would regularly say, 'The Bible is full of contradictions ... and I believe them all!'
I think the issue Mudfrog raises only becomes a big issue if we insist on some form of scriptural inerrancy or infallibility in a conservative evangelical kind of way ... and yes, I know there are plenty of shades, grades and nuances across the spectrum between out-and-out ardent verbal plenary inspiration literalist and more 'developed' forms of belief in inerrancy ...
But that could take us into Dead Horse territory.
FWIW, I think there are equal and opposite errors to avoid at both extremes in arguments of this kind. On the one hand, like the street evangelist cited here, we can shrug our shoulders and engage in a kind of hermeneutical limbo dance in attempt to demonstrate that contradictions don't exist ... and thereby kid ourselves - or else we can run to the opposite extreme and magnify both contradictions and apparent contradictions in such a way as to say, 'Well, it's all unrealiable, so there's no point in believing any of it ...'
In the messiness and murkiness of life, I don't believe the choice is anywhere near as clear-cut as that.
Neither the Church Fathers nor the Reformers insisted on an absolute literal understanding of every biblical text nor where they that concerned about contradictions - despite the selective proof-texting of various inerrantists who insist otherwise ...
Both Luther and Calvin were happy not to accept some of the numbers involved in OT accounts of battles and massacres ... some of the Fathers were more than happy to allegorise things in a way we'd find baffling today ...
There are ways to 'reconcile' or come to terms with anomalies - but I don't think the traditional evangelical methods - at least as held at the more conservative end of the spectrum - hold water.
Some of the hermeneutical gymnastics some of these guys deploy go well beyond reason and common sense.
That's my two-happ'orth for what it's worth ...
And welcome back Kaplan Corday, I hope you enjoyed your European trip!
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Sipech
Shipmate
# 16870
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Posted
I think the "chestnuts" term is fair when the issues are those that people keep returning to, like the proverbial dog coming back to its own vomit, refusing to move on until all contradictions have been "answered".
The most obvious one I can think of is the account of Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus. It's recounted three times in the book of Acts. Did the people with him hear a voice or not?
The accounts contradict one another, so at least one must be partially inaccurate.
But Mudfrog correctly identifies the underlying purpose behind most of the claims of contradictions: to throw the baby out with bathwater. i.e. If X is in the bible and X turns out to be inaccurate then the whole bible is inaccurate.
That's the metanarrative behind attacks on the bible. I wouldn't call it logic, because it's not logical. It's a great exercise in not being able to see the wood for the trees.
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I try to be self-deprecating; I'm just not very good at it.
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TheAlethiophile
Posts: 3791 | From: On the corporate ladder | Registered: Jan 2012
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Yes, but the same apparently inexorable logic seems to apply to those who insist on scriptural inerrancy.
It's not just those who, like W C Fields, tend to read the Bible 'looking for loopholes', ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif) but those who insist on scriptural inerrancy (framed in late 19th/early 20th century conservative Protestant terms) who engage in that sort of behaviour.
This article, from an evangelical perspective, is a good corrective to that particular way of thinking:
http://www.quodlibet.net/articles/perry-inerrancy.shtml
The author cites several examples of highly conservative evangelicals who bend over backwards to reconcile the irreconcilable in order to defend their particularly rigid take on the authority of scripture.
Of course, those who set out to pick it all to bits do the same, only in reverse. 'If I can show a contradiction here or there then the whole thing will collapse ...'
I don't think the great Truths of Almighty God balance on a knife-edge in this way.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
One really glaring one to me has always been David's census, inspired directly by God according to the Samuel account, but by Satan in the Chronicles account.
It matters because it shows a very different idea of the source of evil; in the Samuel theology God sends both good and evil whereas in Chronicles the Satan character is proposed as a source of evil. As such, it goes right into questions of the nature of God.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Yes, there is that, but again, there are ways of reconciling the apparent contradictions ... there are scriptural instances where God appears to 'use' Satan as an agent to achieve some greater aim ...
But the problem of Theodicy remains.
Ultimately, I can 'live' with the contradictions there as I don't see these accounts so much as a journalistic narrative as people's attempts to wrestle with events and come to terms with them theologically.
'Heck, there's a whopping big plague ... we must have done something wrong ...'
'God must be punishing us for something. Whatever could it be? Perhaps it was that census?'
'I say it's not God but Satan ...'
'No, I say it's God who is doing the punishing ...'
'Could it not be both?'
And so on and so forth ...
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sipech:
I think the "chestnuts" term is fair when the issues are those that people keep returning to, like the proverbial dog coming back to its own vomit, refusing to move on until all contradictions have been "answered".
Though equally applicable to various conservative apologists, who are willing to constantly spew out falsehoods and half truths in the pursuit (presumably) of some 'Greater Truth'.
Posts: 4035 | From: Berkshire | Registered: May 2007
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fausto
Shipmate
# 13737
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Macrina:
I came across this one the other day when I had a close encounter with a street evangelist. After initially being quite irritable with her and going back to say sorry and finish the dialogue more respectfully she stated explicitly that there were no contradictions in the Biblical text.
As others have said above there definitely are multiple contradictions and variations on various tales within the text. I think it would be intellectually dishonest to claim that there were not. The next step is how you handle these contradictions and variations.
Most Christians will probably make an argument that invokes allegory over literal meaning or bring up points about translations and copying bringing multiple meanings to the text. This to me is okay since it acknowledges a fact 'there are contradictions' but provides a framework within which you can accept them.
The OP asks how the existence of contractions would cause one to question the authenticity and validity of the Bible. From where I am standing my first question is authentic in what sense and valid in what sense?
Well, if you start with the hermeneutical suppositions of plenary verbal inspiration -- that every word in the Bible was in effect directly dictated by God to passive human stenographers who contributed no gloss or perspective of their own -- and divine perfection, then it would be impossible for the Bible to contain any untruths or contradictions or even clouded human apprehensions. If, further, you suppose that the only thing that lends the Bible any authority or value is its divine provenance, then any contradiction or other imperfection refutes its authority. So it becomes necessary to either (1)deny that any such contradictions exist, (2) deny the validity of the Bible entirely, or (3) deny the hermeneutical approach and find another that allows room for both imperfections in the text and its usefulness in supporting a valid faith. However, many readers are unwilling to consider a different hermeneutic (or are unaware that other hermeneutical approaches even exist), so they choose either (1) or (2).
[ 06. June 2016, 12:59: Message edited by: fausto ]
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"Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way." Gospel of Philip, Logion 72
Posts: 407 | From: Boston, Mass. | Registered: May 2008
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Yes, there is that, but again, there are ways of reconciling the apparent contradictions ... there are scriptural instances where God appears to 'use' Satan as an agent to achieve some greater aim ...
But the problem of Theodicy remains.
Ultimately, I can 'live' with the contradictions there as I don't see these accounts so much as a journalistic narrative as people's attempts to wrestle with events and come to terms with them theologically.
'Heck, there's a whopping big plague ... we must have done something wrong ...'
'God must be punishing us for something. Whatever could it be? Perhaps it was that census?'
'I say it's not God but Satan ...'
'No, I say it's God who is doing the punishing ...'
'Could it not be both?'
And so on and so forth ...
Very nice. We've ALWAYS made this stuff up.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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fausto
Shipmate
# 13737
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by fausto:
plenary verbal inspiration -- that every word in the Bible was in effect directly dictated by God to passive human stenographers who contributed no gloss or perspective of their own
I admit that this is a bit of an exaggeration on my part, but not by much. Strictly speaking, plenary verbal inspiration holds that the authors expressed themselves in their own words, but it nevertheless also holds that every one of the author's words was so directly inspired by God that they have the same authority as if God himself spoke them. This contrasts rather subtly with direct dictation, in which the authors merely recorded the divine words that they heard coming to them externally and supernaturally (which is, for example, how Mohammed claimed to have received the Qur'an). In practice, to me, it seems a distinction without a difference. Many "Bible-believing Christians" will profess plenary verbal inspiration because that is the lingo they have been taught, but when you ask them to describe it, what they describe is dictation.
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"Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way." Gospel of Philip, Logion 72
Posts: 407 | From: Boston, Mass. | Registered: May 2008
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Macrina
Shipmate
# 8807
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by fausto:
quote:
Originally posted by Macrina:
I came across this one the other day when I had a close encounter with a street evangelist. After initially being quite irritable with her and going back to say sorry and finish the dialogue more respectfully she stated explicitly that there were no contradictions in the Biblical text.
As others have said above there definitely are multiple contradictions and variations on various tales within the text. I think it would be intellectually dishonest to claim that there were not. The next step is how you handle these contradictions and variations.
Most Christians will probably make an argument that invokes allegory over literal meaning or bring up points about translations and copying bringing multiple meanings to the text. This to me is okay since it acknowledges a fact 'there are contradictions' but provides a framework within which you can accept them.
The OP asks how the existence of contractions would cause one to question the authenticity and validity of the Bible. From where I am standing my first question is authentic in what sense and valid in what sense?
Well, if you start with the hermeneutical suppositions of plenary verbal inspiration -- that every word in the Bible was in effect directly dictated by God to passive human stenographers who contributed no gloss or perspective of their own -- and divine perfection, then it would be impossible for the Bible to contain any untruths or contradictions or even clouded human apprehensions. If, further, you suppose that the only thing that lends the Bible any authority or value is its divine provenance, then any contradiction or other imperfection refutes its authority. So it becomes necessary to either (1)deny that any such contradictions exist, (2) deny the validity of the Bible entirely, or (3) deny the hermeneutical approach and find another that allows room for both imperfections in the text and its usefulness in supporting a valid faith. However, many readers are unwilling to consider a different hermeneutic (or are unaware that other hermeneutical approaches even exist), so they choose either (1) or (2).
I think you've pretty much just said what I also said, unless I'm missing a point?
Posts: 535 | From: Christchurch, New Zealand | Registered: Nov 2004
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
I was about to contradict you, fausto when I realised that actually, I agree with you.
My brother-in-law is an ardent and entrenched inerrantist and whilst he insists that verbal plenary inspiration is different to dictation, when you ask him to highlight or cite the differences he can't do so ...
Try as he might, he can't get away from a completely monergist approach that doesn't see inspiration operating in some kind of synergistic way but which has to involve the over-riding of the human faculties to such an extent that they all but disappear.
I really don't see how they get around this one and it's one of the reasons why I couldn't be comfy in the sort of circles that espouse that kind of approach.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Well, but these ones aren't in the Bible. They are derived from the assumptions some of us bring to the Bible.
It is every bit as much an assumption to assert that they aren't in the Bible as it is to assert that they are.
Certainly there is both a prima facie hermeneutical/exegetical and historical/doctrinal case for them.
I disagree, obviously. Unpacking that might be another thread, though...
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
I think this one derives from a total misunderstanding of the meaning of "unity".
Which is simply to say that there are different theories of what unity does or should consist of - another cause of division!
Historically, Christians have not only separated from one another over such issues, but killed one another as well.
You can argue that they should not have done so, based on your personal view of how unity should work, but the facts are that they did, that they did so sincerely based on what they genuinely believed was the right interpretation of Scripture, and that God must have foreseen that they would.
Certainly your history is correct. Whether God "should have foreseen that" is debatable, though. Perhaps the implied alternative (spelling everything out in minute, authoritarian detail) would be equally problematic. Perhaps there's something we've yet to learn about the true meaning of unity-- and perhaps that's really important. Dictating a rubber-stamp theology probably won't get us there.
All of which is not, again, to dispute the reality of contradictions, or the fact that some of them are quite troubling. The final one listed-- the conflict between the conquest narratives and the sermon on the mount-- I find particularly troubling, and not easily set aside.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Sorry, my brother-in-law's brother ... not my brother-in-law. He's moved from that position and is very articulate in expressing his reasons for doing so.
To be fair, I think it is possible to hold to a high view of scriptural authority and inspiration without descending into an overly woodenly literal approach - but there is fine line as you approach the more conservative end of the spectrum.
I suspect there's an equally vertiginous precipice at the opposite end too - whether in excessively 'out-there' liberal terms of in a form of 'Church Fundamentalism' that can be equally as rigid and inflexible as 'Biblical Fundamentalism'.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Ultimately, I can 'live' with the contradictions there as I don't see these accounts so much as a journalistic narrative as people's attempts to wrestle with events and come to terms with them theologically.
'Heck, there's a whopping big plague ... we must have done something wrong ...'
'God must be punishing us for something. Whatever could it be? Perhaps it was that census?'
'I say it's not God but Satan ...'
'No, I say it's God who is doing the punishing ...'
'Could it not be both?'
And so on and so forth ...
Something we still see today... There was a hurricane where 100s died-- it was the Gays! No it was the war! No it was abortion!...
As much as I think theodicy is an important question-- perhaps THE important question-- that we can't duck away from, there is something worse than ducking an important question.
To engage in just the sort of eisegetical gymnastics we're rightly decrying here, perhaps the contradictions exist to warn us against the dangers we encounter when we "try to make everything fit."
(now I'm thinking of an "eisegetical gymnastics" game in Circus... someone names the Bible contradiction, and you come up with a wildly imaginative explanation... We'll call it: hermeneutical Cirque du soleil...)
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
It is every bit as much an assumption to assert that they aren't in the Bible as it is to assert that they are.
Like it's just as much an assumption to assert God exists as it is to assert that God doesn't exist?
It's usually thought that positive statements require evidence rather than negative statements.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Brenda Clough
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# 18061
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Posted
Oh, now that would be a fun game.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Gamaliel
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# 812
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Posted
I think a hermeneutical Cirque de Soleil would be fun ...
In the light of mdijon's latest comment in response to Kaplan, could I also suggest an Cataphatic/Apophatic Cirque de Soleil (or Cirque de Twilight?) where Shippies take turns to post Cataphatic assertions (or equivocations) followed by Apophatic ones?
Now THAT might be fun ...
![[Biased]](wink.gif)
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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fausto
Shipmate
# 13737
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Macrina:
quote:
Originally posted by fausto:
quote:
Originally posted by Macrina:
I came across this one the other day when I had a close encounter with a street evangelist. After initially being quite irritable with her and going back to say sorry and finish the dialogue more respectfully she stated explicitly that there were no contradictions in the Biblical text.
As others have said above there definitely are multiple contradictions and variations on various tales within the text. I think it would be intellectually dishonest to claim that there were not. The next step is how you handle these contradictions and variations.
Most Christians will probably make an argument that invokes allegory over literal meaning or bring up points about translations and copying bringing multiple meanings to the text. This to me is okay since it acknowledges a fact 'there are contradictions' but provides a framework within which you can accept them.
The OP asks how the existence of contractions would cause one to question the authenticity and validity of the Bible. From where I am standing my first question is authentic in what sense and valid in what sense?
Well, if you start with the hermeneutical suppositions of plenary verbal inspiration -- that every word in the Bible was in effect directly dictated by God to passive human stenographers who contributed no gloss or perspective of their own -- and divine perfection, then it would be impossible for the Bible to contain any untruths or contradictions or even clouded human apprehensions. If, further, you suppose that the only thing that lends the Bible any authority or value is its divine provenance, then any contradiction or other imperfection refutes its authority. So it becomes necessary to either (1)deny that any such contradictions exist, (2) deny the validity of the Bible entirely, or (3) deny the hermeneutical approach and find another that allows room for both imperfections in the text and its usefulness in supporting a valid faith. However, many readers are unwilling to consider a different hermeneutic (or are unaware that other hermeneutical approaches even exist), so they choose either (1) or (2).
I think you've pretty much just said what I also said, unless I'm missing a point?
I was trying to point out that contradictions in the text only invalidate the Bible as a source of authority if it is read from one particular, rigid hermeneutical perspective. From that perspective, it can only be either entirely true or entirely false, and it is true or false depending on whether or not you perceive imperfections in the text. But bringing a different set of hermeneutical presuppositions to your reading of the text allows you to find value and authority in it even while recognizing that it may also contain contradiction and paradox.
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"Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way." Gospel of Philip, Logion 72
Posts: 407 | From: Boston, Mass. | Registered: May 2008
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fausto
Shipmate
# 13737
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by fausto:
I was trying to point out that contradictions in the text only invalidate the Bible as a source of authority if it is read from one particular, rigid hermeneutical perspective. From that perspective, it can only be either entirely true or entirely false, and it is true or false depending on whether or not you perceive imperfections in the text. But bringing a different set of hermeneutical presuppositions to your reading of the text allows you to find value and authority in it even while recognizing that it may also contain contradiction and paradox.
What might not have come through as clearly as I intended is that those who use contradictions in the text to deny the validity of the Bible are relying on exactly the same hermeneutical suppositions as those who deny the existence of any contradictions. In both cases, it seems to me, it is their suppositions that are flawed, not the text. The text is what it is and speaks for itself.
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"Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way." Gospel of Philip, Logion 72
Posts: 407 | From: Boston, Mass. | Registered: May 2008
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I think a hermeneutical Cirque de Soleil would be fun ...
Done. Visit me there.
fair warning: I predict the evangelical team will win this one in a landslide. We've got far more practice playing the game...
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Mudfrog
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# 8116
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Posted
Thanks for engaging in all this guys ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Apart from the census instance and the Paul's conversion example, no one has actually addressed (unless I missed it)the 'common man's' proptest that the Bible is full of contradictions i.e. it says one thing in this book and another in a different book.
In my experience the rather academic stuff about progressive revelation - a 'fighty' God in the OT and a 'nice' God in the NT, etc, is a little too philosophical for the non theologically minded bloke on the Clapham Omnibus who wants to know whether he can trust the history written in the Bible.
The issue that has been raised about inerrancy is both a red herring and a straw man!
It basically because not even an inerrantist - and I include myself ere - would ever tell you that every Bible verse must be taken literally! Who on earth would even think that? The's not what inerrant and infallible means!
No one believes the hills skip like lambs or the trees of the field clap their hands!. It's inerrant and infallible in matters of history and in matters of doctrine and faith.
So, in those matters of history and doctrine - where are the contradictions. the glaring 180 degree opposite truths that negate what it says somewhere else?
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"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
So, in those matters of history and doctrine - where are the contradictions. the glaring 180 degree opposite truths that negate what it says somewhere else?
I think one has to do some pretty supple gymnastics to make Mark 2:25-26 agree with 1 Samuel 21:1.
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arse
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Gamaliel
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# 812
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Posted
With respect, Mudfrog, I think you're missing the point ...
I don't think anyone here believes that scriptural inerrantists take metaphorical material literally - hills skipping like lambs and so on ...
No-one I know who doesn't sign up for a Chicago Statement style position on Biblical Inerrancy would claim that.
As for the Man on The Clapham Omnibus, I had no idea you were addressing the question to him. I thought you were asking us what we thought.
And by 'we' I mean Shipmates, all of whom are Men or Women on The Clapham (Los Angeles) or Wherever Else Omnibus but who, for whatever reason, find themselves with an interest in these things to the extent that they spend time here discussing it.
Meanwhile, I'm with Fausto. The same hermeneutical approach is employed on either side - whether it's 'The Bible is full of contradictions therefore it's untrustworthy' or 'There are no contradictions in the Bible, if there were we couldn't trust it as God's word written ...'
Dress it up however we may, neither approach is a particularly 'sophisticated' one ... and I don't mean that in an elitist way - what I mean is that both positions are pretty crude.
With the greatest respect to the original Princeton 'fundamentalists', the later Protestant evangelical inerrantists painted themselves into a corner on this one.
Other Christian traditions have painted themselves into corners on other things.
This is your paint oneself into the corner thing.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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fausto
Shipmate
# 13737
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
So, in those matters of history and doctrine - where are the contradictions. the glaring 180 degree opposite truths that negate what it says somewhere else?
Are you looking for a list of specific instances where one verse contradicts another? Google "Bible contradictions." Those lists are all over the internet. Here's one:
http://infidels.org/library/modern/donald_morgan/contradictions.html
It's awfully easy to take any specific pair of conflicting verses and simply dismiss the contradiction as not being essential to doctrine, but if the inerrancy of scripture is itself an essential doctrine, then any contradiction, no matter how arcane, is relevant to the doctrine. If on the other hand scriptural inerrancy is not an essential doctrine, we're off into an entirely different discussion.
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"Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way." Gospel of Philip, Logion 72
Posts: 407 | From: Boston, Mass. | Registered: May 2008
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Anselmina
Ship's barmaid
# 3032
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by fausto:
Well, if you start with the hermeneutical suppositions of plenary verbal inspiration --
Of course, this is how all good conversations should begin . I LOVE SHip of Fools!
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Irish dogs needing homes! http://www.dogactionwelfaregroup.ie/ Greyhounds and Lurchers are shipped over to England for rehoming too!
Posts: 10002 | From: Scotland the Brave | Registered: Jul 2002
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Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
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Posted
Here's another one,
John the Baptist sent disciples to ask 'Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?'
and in another Gospel, the same John tell his own aforementioned disciples who informed him that jesus was baptising 'and all are going to him!.He said: 'No one can receive anything except what has been given from heaven. You yourselves are my witnesses that I said: 'I am not the Messiah'... he who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom who stands with him and hears him rejoices greatly at his voice... the one who comes from above is above all, the one who belongs to the earth is of the earth and speaks about earthly things...etc etc, finishing with: 'Whoever believes in this Son has eternal life.'
Did he know or did he not?
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
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Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
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Posted
And how many donkeys did our Lord ride on, I'm dying to know.
Or what were centurions doing building synagogues in Galilee, which was not occupied?
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Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
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Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
With respect, Mudfrog, I think you're missing the point ...
I don't think anyone here believes that scriptural inerrantists take metaphorical material literally - hills skipping like lambs and so on ...
No-one I know who doesn't sign up for a Chicago Statement style position on Biblical Inerrancy would claim that.
As for the Man on The Clapham Omnibus, I had no idea you were addressing the question to him. I thought you were asking us what we thought.
Missing the point of my own question??
When I asked 'What particular 'contradictions' do Shipmates consider might be seen as so damaging that they do, indeed, call into question the Bible's authenticity?' I meant 'might be seen by others. i.e. those who raise those 'old chestnuts' - people on the Clapham Omnibus, if you will.
And as for those 'contradictions' on that website, I can answer all of the first 20 that I read before I gave up.
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"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
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Stetson
Shipmate
# 9597
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Posted
quote:
What particular 'contradictions' do Shipmates consider might be seen as so damaging that they do, indeed, call into question the Bible's authenticity?
I'm not sure if it calls into question the authenticity of the Bible itself, so much as the thought-processes of one, admittedly pretty central guy, but the various points where Christ speaks of his relationship with the Father in what we would consider to be proto-Arian terms, versus the times where he speaks of it what we would consider to be Trinitarian terms.
I suspect everyone here can think of examples. One of the more interesting explanatory theories I've heard is that Jesus didn't know he was God during his earthly life, which also has the advantage of making the Crucifixion all the more horrific a sacrifice(since he wouldn't know what he had planned for himself in the aftermath).
Though this would involve God basically giving himself amnesia in order to more precisely live with the limitations of a corporeal man, which is kind of a weird idea.
[ 06. June 2016, 18:29: Message edited by: Stetson ]
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I have the power...Lucifer is lord!
Posts: 6574 | From: back and forth between bible belts | Registered: Jun 2005
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fausto
Shipmate
# 13737
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
And as for those 'contradictions' on that website, I can answer all of the first 20 that I read before I gave up.
Can you really? Without denying either that God is perfect, or that every word of the text is divinely inspired?
Those are the hermeneutical premises on which it is alternatively claimed either (1) that the Bible contains no inconsistencies or (2) that its inconsistencies render it unreliable. Your original question asked (I'm paraphrasing) what contradictions in the text rise to the level that they would support an argument that the text as a whole is unreliable. The answer that would be given by readers who would make such an argument (I'm not one of them) is that any contradiction, no matter how minor, is an imperfection, and any imperfection disproves its divine provenance, and therefore its divine authority. However, that answer rests on and requires those hermeneutical premises. If instead you adopt a different hermeneutical approach that allows for the presence of even minor inconsistencies and imperfections in the text (and it sounds as though you have), then any particular inconsistency can be overlooked or explained without undermining the overall validity of all scripture.
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"Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way." Gospel of Philip, Logion 72
Posts: 407 | From: Boston, Mass. | Registered: May 2008
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Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
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Posted
OK, let's look at one:
GE 6:4 There were Nephilim (giants) before the Flood.
GE 7:21 All creatures other than Noah and his clan were annihilated by the Flood.
NU 13:33 There were Nephilim after the Flood.
On the surface - taken literally (!) there is an inconsistency here. Giants in Canaan after the Exodus, who were descended from the original Nephilim? Indeed; how can they exist if only Noah's family survived the Flood?
Well, look at who said they saw giants in the land: The comment that they saw giants was patently untrue; it was an exaggeration on their part when they returned to the camp. Of course they didn't see giants, they were just taller people! And the Bible doesn't say that there were giants or that they were indeed the descendants of the pre-Flood ones. It was just the spies over egging the pudding because they were frightened and wanted to persuade the Israelites to turn back.
[ 06. June 2016, 18:56: Message edited by: Mudfrog ]
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"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
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fausto
Shipmate
# 13737
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
OK, let's look at one:
GE 6:4 There were Nephilim (giants) before the Flood.
GE 7:21 All creatures other than Noah and his clan were annihilated by the Flood.
NU 13:33 There were Nephilim after the Flood.
On the surface - taken literally (!) there is an inconsistency here. Giants in Canaan after the Exodus, who were descended from the original Nephilim? Indeed; how can they exist if only Noah's family survived the Flood?
Well, look at who said they saw giants in the land: The comment that they saw giants was patently untrue; it was an exaggeration on their part when they returned to the camp. Of course they didn't see giants, they were just taller people! And the Bible doesn't say that there were giants or that they were indeed the descendants of the pre-Flood ones. It was just the spies over egging the pudding because they were frightened and wanted to persuade the Israelites to turn back.
The Bible doesn't say they were lying or exaggerating; it only says this was the report of the scouting party. It does say that the scouting party reported seeing "descendants of Anak" (verse 28), that they reported seeing Nephilim (verse 33), and that the descendants of Anak "come from the Nephilim" (verse 33).
What you are saying is that this account cannot be comprised of true words inspired by God, but rather, must be an entirely human record of an entirely human conversation that was either mistakenly or intentionally incorrect. In other words, your hermeneutic allows for the presence of human error and inaccuracy in the text. It is therefore not an inerrantist hermeneutic.
[ 06. June 2016, 19:44: Message edited by: fausto ]
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"Truth did not come into the world naked, but it came in types and images. The world will not receive truth in any other way." Gospel of Philip, Logion 72
Posts: 407 | From: Boston, Mass. | Registered: May 2008
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
How about the circumstances of Judas' death, Mudfrog?
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
So, in those matters of history and doctrine - where are the contradictions. the glaring 180 degree opposite truths that negate what it says somewhere else?
What's wrong with the Census example? God or Satan? How much more 180 degree opposite do you want?
[ 06. June 2016, 21:37: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
You are missing the point of people's objections to your - to my mind - overly literal hermeneutic.
In one breath you maintain that you are not a literalist because you understand figurative speech - hills skipping like lambs - then you try to reconcile apparent anomalies between OT narratives in a highly literal way.
That's only an issue if we apply modernist standards of historiography.
I'm still pretty conservative theologically but can't honestly see the point in trying to square these sort of circles. It's the moral and theological points that are the important thing not whether references to the Sons of Anak and The Nephillim tie up.
That's what I mean by missing the point. It's a form of missing the wood for the trees. I'm not sure how the apparent ability to reconcile narrative anomalies in OT stories is of any help to The Man on The Clapham Omnibus.
It's not as if anyone's salvation is in jeopardy by the way we understand or apply ourselves to some of the more obscure or arcane episodes in scripture.
I don't see how it makes any difference in that particular instance. Rather than becoming something which will engage The Man on The Clapham Omnibus it becomes a parlour game for Bible geeks that may play well on The Circus but which is of limited value in real life.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
Years ago when I taught a high school Sunday School class, we examined the accounts of Easter morning which are in the four gospels.
I have heard people say that since the accounts differ in some respects, you can't believe any of it.
What we did was list all those points in which the gospels were in agreement. Then we looked at points that were mentioned in one gospel, but not every gospel.
It's been many years, and the only detail I remember offhand is that all four agree that Mary Magdalene went to the tomb to care for the body, and found the tomb empty. Matthew, Mark, and Luke say that several women, including Mary Magdalene, went. John does not mention any other women. However, he did not say she went alone. Apparently this was a detail that did not interest him.
The gospels contradicted each other in some details, but these were trivial.
The fact that the tomb was empty was the main point.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Well yes, of course.
Which is why I find the whole conservative evangelical predeliction for trying to make varying accounts dovetail with one amother a complete itrelevance for the most part.
The Fathers didn't insist on all the narrstive details having to 'fit' and agree, neither did the Reformers.
It's become a particular obsession with a particular brand of conservative evangelical Protestant. It's only of any consequence if you insist on that particular hermeneutic and see scriptural inerrancy as some kind of defining shibboleth - as Perry observed in the article I referenced - it almost becomes 'sola infallibis' rather than 'sola scriptura'.
Not only is this issue irrelevant to The Man on the Clapham Omnibus, it's also irrelevant to Christians who don't operate with the particular hermeneutic that Mudfrog does.
This is an 'internal' issue for conservative evangelicals. It has less relevance for other forms of Protestant still less RCs and Orthodox who don't quite share the same 'need' to have everything fit a nice, neat hrrmeneutical schema.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
And how many donkeys did our Lord ride on, I'm dying to know.
This belongs down in the Cirque du Soleil thread, but I have heard some (with straight faces) suggest he rode a donkey AND a colt, with one leg slung over each... which sounds darn uncomfortable and a tad dangerous, but then, if you're riding to your inevitable death I guess that point's moot...
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
When I asked 'What particular 'contradictions' do Shipmates consider might be seen as so damaging that they do, indeed, call into question the Bible's authenticity?' I meant 'might be seen by others. i.e. those who raise those 'old chestnuts' - people on the Clapham Omnibus, if you will.
It depends upon quite how high you set the bar for the Bible's authenticity.
If you claim that the Bible is only authentic if inerrant in matters of history, faith, and doctrine, then an inconsistency in something as trivial as what Pontius Pilate wrote on the cross above Jesus' head is sufficient.
If you have a different standard for authenticity then the number of contradictions that might damage that standard is lower.
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
Posts: 10567 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Feb 2004
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