Audie
Veteran Member
" is said to have"
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Bible contradictions
- Thread starter an anarchist
- Start date
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
That claim has failed countless times. The "fulfilled prophecies" claim fails once on puts the same sort of restrictions on Christians that they would put upon other religions.
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
Christians should study Nostradamus. He was an "expert" on prophecy. He was not a prophet at all. He likely studied the Bible and saw what it took to make a "fulfilled prophecy". He made his prophecies specific enough so that later people could say "Oh!! He was talking about Hitler!" Or Napoleon, or whatever famous person one wanted. Both the subject and the prophecy were an odd mixture of specific and vagueness so that some of them could be applied to more than one person and be fulfilled multiple times.
In reality when a prophecy seems to come true more than once it tells us that it is a failed prophecy. It was written to "come true".
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
I know. And it is such a burden at times
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
Probably not.
Soandso
ᛋᛏᚨᚾᛞ ᛋᚢᚱᛖ
And yet many prophecies have not been fulfilled by Jesus, which is why so many Jews don't buy that Jesus was the Messiah. Many of those fulfilled prophecies were completed long after his death as well, and only by those who actively worked to make them happen after the fact. Not very convincing
The Bible tells me so
Argumentum ad populum
I will say, though, being a popular religion makes it a lot easier to fulfill your own prophecies when you have the money and power to do whatever you want
Soandso
ᛋᛏᚨᚾᛞ ᛋᚢᚱᛖ
Did someone bring up the Judas contradiction? That one's my favorite
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
He did both, either at the same time or one right after the other. He was a very talented individual
Esteban X
Member
Over two thousand years I would say that would be unlikely. However the fact that same contradictions are raised repeatedly suggests that they have not been addressed convincingly
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Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
For most of those two thousand years people were not looking for any. And it is amazing how quickly and naturally people make up excuses for such happenings. Did you see what Jimmy Kimmel did recently with Trump supporters?
Ajax
Active Member
There is another view too.
He didn't fulfill any prophecies. Dishonest authors especially in "Matthew's" gospel took prophecies concerning Israel and used them for Jesus.
He was not the Messiah because he didn't fulfill any of the Messiah requirements written by prophets, apart from being Jewish.
Many others performed miracles.
Many others were supposedly resurrected. Nobody recognized Jesus after the resurrection.
The largest religion is the illogical fallacy agrumentum ad populum.
Ajax
Active Member
My favorite is this...
The doctrine of the Trinity is the central doctrine concerning the nature of God, which defines one God existing in three coequal, coeternal, consubstantial divine persons sharing one essence, substance and nature (homoousion). This expresses at once their indissoluble unity.
However, the gospels clearly state that Jesus did not want to go to the cross; it was not his will, in contrast to Father's, despite being God himself and having made this plan for salvation, knowing he would save the world and would be resurrected in three days (Matthew 26:39, Luke 22:42). Also needed angel from heaven to strengthen him (Luke 22:43). There is absolutely no logic in this and is a huge contradiction with the doctrine of Trinity.
Augustus
…
Given the people who compiled the Bible obviously knew there were contradictions in it and clearly didn’t see it as irredeemably problematic, I guess it’s fair to say folk are unlikely to discover any contradictions that haven’t been discussed at least once or twice in the last 2000+ years.
Some folk seem to think they are uncovering this devastating secret that no one had noticed until internet atheists Sherlock Holmes’d the mystery with their critical thinking superpowers.
wellwisher
Well-Known Member
One way to explain all the contradictions in the Bible, is that the text of the Bible was written after the events. The accounts of the events had been pass forward, in time, by word of mouth. The New Testament version of the Bible was written about 200 years after the events. Rather than be deceptive and ignore how some word of mouth accounts diverged/differed, the compilers wished to be honest and publish even diverging stories, since it was hard to confirm exactly which of the two or more were correct after 200 years. This honesty would leave it to future historians to research and iron it out. For now the story needed to get out, imperfections and all.When I was a teenager, Christian apologetics was my thing. I would like to create a thread about contradictions in the Bible. Believers of it often claim it is without contradiction, something I used to tout.
Let’s compile the contradictions, and let’s try to explain them if possible.
I’ll start.
The account of how King Saul died. 1 Samuel 31 says that Saul killed himself, yet immediately after, in 2 Samuel 1 , an amalekite says that he killed Saul.
So context is important, right? On first glance, there are contradictions in the accounts. I read a scholarly commentary book on the books of Samuel, so I’ll relay what i learned from it. The scholar said that amalekites were thematically supposed to represent deceit. The original audience of the text would have understood that the amalekite was lying for personal gain, he did not really kill Saul.
Also, 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel is from the same author. Would it be likely that an author would contradict himself right away?
So that is one contradiction shoddily explained away.
If you were a con artist, who was lying and running a scam, you would practice your well rehearsed story to make sure your story has no holes and no contradictions, since even one flaw might stand out to a cynical audience. The tiny flaw, under cross examination could be used to undermine your entire thesis and scam. But if you are honest and you include all the data, even data that is off the curve, this builds trust and allows the audience to ask questions and even dig to help the cause gain additional insight. A honest account does not hide behind makeup or leave out bad data. This is how science works. Fiction is better if perfect.
As a modern example of the contrast, just before the election of 2020, the con artists from one side conspired with 51 ex intelligence officials to sign a petition that stated the Hunter Biden Laptop was Russian Disinformation. At that time, if you had been around and left the country this is the story you would know and might pass it forward as family lure; when I was young.....
More recently, after digging in the archives, it turned out that petition was actually part of an election interference scam, since the FBI had already confirmed the authenticity of the laptop, months before the petition, which today is now common knowledge. The FBI report had been buried by the con artist conspiracy, for almost a year, to avoid the truth of the laptop being made public during the 2020 election season. The other side, who gave the laptop to the FBI, a year earlier, waited patiently for the FBI report to be made available; freedom of information act. But the FBI was in on the scam and foot dragged the release. This resulted in the victim side releases an unofficial account to a Newspaper, that was then censored and blackballed by social media; more FBI conspiracy leading to violations of freedom of the press and speech.
If it had not been due to the power of an impeachment inquiry, into some alleged RICO crimes, by the current President, the first story could have been successfully covered up, and left as the final truth. But a twist of fate in 2022, allowed the other side to win control of Congress, which had the power to force access to the covered up FBI materials, that were still being illegally foot dragged. Then, if you were watching news, you would have more data and another POV for the scam and the scope of corruption in the US Government.
Say you were writing a book; 2020, 2022, 2024, etc. and you only publish one or the other account, you would not tell the whole continuing story. The whole story would include how the original intrigue and coverup was very convincing and quite successful. It did indeed help steal an election and the cover was able to last long enough to gain the Presidency. Once the Presidency was gained, the coverup now had insider leverage at the very top; A President, who was in charge of the Injustice and intel agencies. In the end, the intrigue still won the day, since even with proof of a stolen election and cover up, nobody was ever punished and the stolen election stood. Crime does pay within the US Government. Honesty is too easy to overcome and block with lies, foot dragging, and disinformation.
The dishonest side, who ran the scam, would still prefer all future history books, only have the intrigue story, of how they were able to overcome a Russian spy plot to save the Presidency and America. Fake news still sticks with that story. However, since that current story, leaves a sour taste in terms of justice, this story may still have a third act, where justice, although slow, finally catches up with the crooks. There is potentially three acts; even larger play, with a twisting plot, with each act capturing the audience; ups and downs, unit the finale, where the audience cheers.
Does this example help and show how honesty is not afraid to show imperfections, from sincere witnesses, if it helps with the whole truth and the ups and downs of the plot. Sometime the future is when the story comes home and the entire plot comes to light.
The skeptic has no difficulty explaining the contradictions. It's the believer who has the impossible task of explaining why they aren't contradictions. Christianity teaches that its god knew how the world would unfold before it created it, and it also teaches that man has free will. Only believers contend that that is not a contradiction, the rest arguing that if the future is preordained, free will doesn't exist, just the illusion of free will. And why is that contradiction there? Because people make mistakes. There are multiple contributors to the process, and they don't always compare notes or see the ramifications of their choices when defining their gods.
But for the skeptic, there is no counterargument. He can only just keep insisting that there is no contradiction there, which doesn't convince the critical thinker. What else can he do?
Also, if one is willing to admit that the Bible contains some false stories and misinformation, and one has no means available to decide which if either of two or more contradictory accounts is accurate, the book isn't a reliable source of information and the question becomes not whether men wrote some of it but rather whether a deity wrote any of it.
The same is true regarding failed prophecy. The skeptic has no difficulty explaining that, but the believer does.
Ajax
Active Member
No, your theory does not stand. Firstly, contradictions within the same book, where there is one author, are minimal, if not non existent.
In my opinion, the dishonesty arises for example, to gospel writers and especially the author of Matthew, who invented stories and deliberately misinterpret and wrongly named "prophecies" to fit his text.
More importantly your honest opinion that the gospels were written based on word of mouth, creates a huge problem regarding validity. You must be aware of the game "broken telephone" or "Chinese whispers", where in a group of ten people, the first one says a sentence to the second and each one has to pass it to the next. The final outcome, after 5 minutes with ten people, is usually nothing like the original sentence. Imagine what must have happened if this game was played with hundreds, if not thousands of people for 40-50 years, when the first gospel was written. As the years passed, the original word of mouth was misquoted more and more. That is why the simple gospel of Mark became the theological gospel of John. And finally in 325 AD we had the doctrine of Trinity.
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No, it suggests that some people are unconvinceable.
A couple of quick questions:
- How would you rate your familiarity with midrash?
- What, in your opinion, is the author's most egregious invention and deliberate misinterpretation?
Ajax
Active Member
1) Almost zero. I know what it is, but I believe that biblical texts were written in a language to be understood by the people at the time they were written.
2) The Immaculate Conception.