Biblical Contradictions

[mycorrhiza]

If we were to both write about what President Obamah did yesterday. Do you think the accounts would use the EXACT same wording, or say the exact same things?

Ok, imagine this:

There is no internet, not history books, nor TV, nor radio.
We hear stories about Obama, who lived 100 years ago, and four people, in different places write down the version of the story they heard. The stories are slightly different due to being mistold.

That is kinda what happened with the gospels.
Not a single gospel-writer actually met Jesus as far as we know.

 

[sojourner]

I mean the other sources of light is good enough for me.

But not good enough for actual biblical scholarship.

 

[sojourner]

If we were to both write about what President Obamah did yesterday. Do you think the accounts would use the EXACT same wording, or say the exact same things?

And those differences would constitute a contradiction.

 

[Vadergirl123]

What makes more sense:

1. The story meant actual day and nights as was understood by the people of the time it was written.

2. The story meant a different kind of day and night that included an unknown, perhaps not visible, light-source, rendering the usage of day and night useless as it is impossible to understand the magical day and night of God.

Okay, of course it could also have been a 24 hr day with a lightsource other than the sun. if you already had your own idea there was no reason to ask me haha

 

[Vadergirl123]

And those differences would constitute a contradiction.

So I f I write President Obamah had cheese pizza for lunch, and you write President Obamah had ice cream for lunch then that's a contradiction???

 

[sojourner]

What makes more sense:

1. The story meant actual day and nights as was understood by the people of the time it was written.

2. The story meant a different kind of day and night that included an unknown, perhaps not visible, light-source, rendering the usage of day and night useless as it is impossible to understand the magical day and night of God.

I vote for the "invisible, magical kind," because that one creates a non-contradictory situation (and, as we all know, resolving all contradiction is the most important thing).

 

[mycorrhiza]

Okay, of course it could also have been a 24 hr day with a lightsource other than the sun. if you already had your own idea there was no reason to ask me haha

Then we must ask:

Is God so illogical that instead of creating the sun first he created a simulated day and night using a temporary magical light source?

To me, it's more logical that this was written by humans who didn't know much about the world, since it's filled to the brim with scientific inaccuracies, which simply wouldn't be there if it was an actual account of how a perfect God created the Universe.

 

[mycorrhiza]

So I f I write President Obamah had cheese pizza for lunch, and you write President Obamah had ice cream for lunch then that's a contradiction???

Yes, that's a contradiction.

 

[Vadergirl123]

Ok, imagine this:

There is no internet, not history books, nor TV, nor radio.
We hear stories about Obama, who lived 100 years ago, and four people, in different places write down the version of the story they heard. The stories are slightly different due to being mistold.

Yep they most likely are...and that's why the bible's so amazing. Some of the writers were form other cultures etc and they all(through God's inspiration) managed to write a book that's internally consistent and fits together. (and I know you won't agree, but just message me your response please...)

 

[Vadergirl123]

Yes, that's a contradiction.

Not when you find out that President Obamah had cheese pizza AND ice cream for lunch We both didn't contradict each other. I mentioned one part of his lunch and the other writer mentioned another part.

 

[sojourner]

So I f I write President Obamah had cheese pizza for lunch, and you write President Obamah had ice cream for lunch then that's a contradiction???

Yup. One account says "pizza." The other says "ice cream." Neither says, "both." Unless there's a third perspective that can show beyond a reasonable doubt that he had both, the accounts are contradictory. No matter what he actually ate.

Since there is no third perspective for the bible, the contradictions remain contradictions. Regardless of what "actually happened," or how badly we want to resolve them. The bible isn't an "answer book." It's a library of Tradition. The redactors included many stories that contradict each other, simply to preserve all the Tradition -- not just "what fits."

 

[Vadergirl123]

Then we must ask:

Is God so illogical that instead of creating the sun first he created a simulated day and night using a temporary magical light source?

I never said he used a "magical" light source, and there's nothing "illogical" about doing that. Also there's no reason for you to ask me why he did what he did.

To me, it's more logical that this was written by humans who didn't know much about the world, since it's filled to the brim with scientific inaccuracies, which simply wouldn't be there if it was an actual account of how a perfect God created the Universe.

You are free to believe whatever you want about God and the bible(and I'll save the supposed scientific innaccuracies for another thread )

 

[mycorrhiza]

Not when you find out that President Obamah had cheese pizza AND ice cream for lunch We both didn't contradict each other. I mentioned one part of his lunch and the other writer mentioned another part.

But there is no source that says that he ate both. And if it's important enough to include, why didn't both include the same thing?

Like the story of the thieves on the crosses. One of the thieves converting is quite an important story, so why didn't the others include that, and instead say that both the thieves mocked Jesus?

If two people witness a bank robbery, both will probably say that the bank was robbed, but they will remember differently. One might say that the robber had blond hair, while the other might say that he had brown, because that's the way memory works.

 

[mycorrhiza]

I never said he used a "magical" light source, and there's nothing "illogical" about doing that. Also there's no reason for you to ask me why he did what he did.

If it was a physical light source, then he wouldn't need to remove it to replace it with another exactly like it, thus we must conclude that it was a "magical" light source.

It's quite illogical indeed. If I make shoes, I don't make one perfect pair just to discard them and make another pair exactly like them.

 

[Vadergirl123]

Yup. One account says "pizza." The other says "ice cream." Neither says, "both."

Well when we both turn in our reports we see that two other writers have written about President Obamah's lunch. And then the editor decides he'll put our four individual reports into one Main report. Would his MAIN report be contradictory if it read as follows.....
1. President Obamah ate cheese Pizza for lunch.
2. President Obamah ate ice cream for lunch.
3. President Obamah ate ice cream and cheese pizza for lunch.
4. President Obamah ate lunch at noon.
Do these accounts contradict each other???

 

[mycorrhiza]

Well when we both turn in our reports we see that two other writers have written about President Obamah's lunch. And then the editor decides he'll put our four individual reports into one Main report. Would his MAIN report be contradictory if it read as follows.....
1. President Obamah ate cheese Pizza for lunch.
2. President Obamah ate ice cream for lunch.
3. President Obamah ate ice cream and cheese pizza for lunch.
4. President Obamah ate lunch at noon.
Do these accounts contradict each other???

Nope, but these do:

1. Obama ate four slices of pizza for lunch.
2. Obama ate one slice of pizza for lunch.
3. Obama ate only ice cream for lunch.
4. Obama skipped lunch.

And it's contradictions like these we find everywhere in the Bible.

 

[Vadergirl123]

But there is no source that says that he ate both. And if it's important enough to include, why didn't both include the same thing?

Well for the sake of the analogy we'll say there is no source(obviously we'd have sources that show what the president ate) And it doesn't matter if they both don't include the same thing. Maybe I just don't see what the president ate for dessert as that improtant to my overall report. And there's a possibility that the other writer doesn't see the president eating cheese pizza as that improtant to his overall report.

 

[InChrist]

they aren't eyewitness accounts. No one knows who wrote the gospels. The names were added way later. Mark (the earliest) was written post 70 c.e. That's at least forty years after the fact, by someone who was not an eyewitness. John was probably written after the year 100 c.e. At least 70 years later. How could the writer be an eyewitness? These are stories, because that's what the ancients did: They told stories.

[FONT=&quot]I contend that they are eyewitness accounts and the historical reliability of the scriptures and the scriptures themselves support this.[/FONT]


[FONT=&quot]“The internal evidence supports these early dates for several reasons. The first three Gospels prophesied the fall of the Jerusalem Temple which occurred in A.D. 70. However, the fulfillment is not mentioned. It is strange that these three Gospels predict this major event but do not record it happening. Why do they not mention such an important prophetic milestone? The most plausible explanation is that it had not yet occurred at the time Matthew, Mark, and Luke were written.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]In the book of Acts, the Temple plays a central role in the nation of Israel. Luke writes as if the Temple is an important part of Jewish life. He also ends Acts on a strange note: Paul living under house arrest. It is strange that Luke does not record the death of his two chief characters, Peter and Paul. The most plausible reason for this is that Luke finished writing Acts before Peter and Paul's martyrdom in A.D. 64. A significant point to highlight is that the Gospel of Luke precedes Acts, further supporting the traditional dating [/FONT] [FONT=&quot]dating of A.D. 60. Furthermore, most scholars agree Mark precedes Luke, making Mark's Gospel even earlier.”

[/FONT] The Historical Reliability of the Gospels

The Historical Reliability of the Gospels | Bible.org - Worlds Largest Bible Study Site


“Before dismissing the Biblical accounts as "ghost stories" or third and forth hand knowledge, I would propose that you could research how we account for our current view of all ancient events. Contrary to what may be assumed, the New Testament documents were all composed within sixty years of the events which they record. This is hardly enough time to develop them into incredible fairy tales. Previously I had said that it would be tantamount to someone constructing the idea in the 1990's that Kennedy never really died after the Dallas shooting, but the whole thing had been faked by Hollywood. This story won't go anywhere, because there are too many eyewitnesses still alive today who could contradict it.
Josh McDowell supports this in his book Evidence That Demands a Verdict. He quotes F.F. Bruce, a noted authority on the reliability of the New Testament, who writes: "The earliest preachers of the gospels knew the value of... first-hand testimony, and appealed to it time and time again. 'We are witnesses of these things,' was their constant and confident assertion. And it can have been by no means be so easy as some writers think to invent words and deeds of Jesus in those early years, when so many of Jesus' disciples were about, who could remember what had and had not happened.”

Read more: http://www.comereason.org/cmp_rlgn/cmp050.asp#ixzz1vGdMtKmO


[FONT=&quot]Inasmuch as many have taken in hand to set in order a narrative of those things which have been fulfilled among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write to you an orderly account, most excellent Theophilus, that you may know the certainty of those things in which you were instructed. Luke 1-4[/FONT]

 

[Vadergirl123]

Nope, but these do:
1. Obama ate four slices of pizza for lunch.
2. Obama ate one slice of pizza for lunch.
3. Obama ate only ice cream for lunch.
4. Obama skipped lunch.

They do indeed contradict haha that long analogy was mainly to show how the verse
the bird crows twice.
The bird crows. don't contradict each other like Sojurner believed.(and I'm sure it could be used in other examples )

 

[sojourner]

[FONT=&quot]I contend that they are eyewitness accounts and the historical reliability of the scriptures and the scriptures themselves support this.[/FONT]

Not really.

[FONT=&quot]“The internal evidence supports these early dates for several reasons. The first three Gospels prophesied the fall of the Jerusalem Temple which occurred in A.D. 70. However, the fulfillment is not mentioned. It is strange that these three Gospels predict this major event but do not record it happening. Why do they not mention such an important prophetic milestone? The most plausible explanation is that it had not yet occurred at the time Matthew, Mark, and Luke were written.[/FONT]

Mark does allude to the destruction of the temple, though, which leads scholars to believe that it was written post-70. Since both Matthew and Luke use Mark as a source, they had to have been written later.

Bible.org - Worlds Largest Bible Study Site

"Site": Your first huge clue that the scholarship is questionable. and unreliable.

[FONT=&quot]It is strange that these three Gospels predict this major event but do not record it happening.[/FONT]

Why would they? In the timeline of the story, it hadn't happened yet.

“Before dismissing the Biblical accounts as "ghost stories" or third and forth hand knowledge, I would propose that you could research how we account for our current view of all ancient events. Contrary to what may be assumed, the New Testament documents were all composed within sixty years of the events which they record.

Nope.
There is ample evidence that Q, which provides much of the material for Matthew and Luke, was extant before 40 c.e., less than 10 years after the fact. Q consists of Jesus quotations. Q most likely would have been generated by "eyewitnesses." Q was most likely oral. The earliest stories of Matthew were also most likely oral. But it was written later.

[FONT=&quot]Inasmuch as many have taken in hand to set in order a narrative of those things which have been fulfilled among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write to you an orderly account, most excellent Theophilus, that you may know the certainty of those things in which you were instructed. Luke 1-4[/FONT]

You understand that Luke makes it clear in this statement that he was not an eyewitness?