Thinking of explanations

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nobspeople
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Thinking of explanations

Post #1

Post by nobspeople »

We all know there are biblical contradictions. This has been discussed here many times in various threads so this thread is NOT about what the contradictions are, or what they mean (or don't mean). This thread is about the reason WHY christians have to negotiate around these contradictions.

Reading an article recently, the author said "Give me a long list of apparent contradictions, and I can usually think of explanations."
It made me wonder WHY said author has to do this.
It seems to me if god is perfect and caring enough to provide a biography of sorts (or road map of life, as I've heard it called before), god would take the time to make sure the bible is accurate and contradiction free (see [for some apparently masochistic reason] a popular thread on this site about the bible being trustworthy). Yet, we see contradictions in the bible in various places. So god allowed the contradictions. Is god testing the faith of believers? Is god inept? Worthless (or at the very least, not worthy of worship)? Moronic?

Whatever the reason, believers have to 'come to terms' with these contradictions.

But the question is WHY?

For 'discussion':
If god exists, it allowed these contradictions to permeate its book, so the believers have to work around them. Why? What's the point for such a 'loving and all knowing' being to sow discourse and cast doubt on its own story? Help make sense of this senseless act.
Or is there no god at all, and the bible is a hodgepodge of slapped together fairy tales but clueless people who wish to cominate and control the masses?
Have a great, potentially godless, day!

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Difflugia
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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #2

Post by Difflugia »

nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pmReading an article recently, the author said "Give me a long list of apparent contradictions, and I can usually think of explanations."

It made me wonder WHY said author has to do this.
Because his or her theological view of the Bible is flawed.
nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pmIf god exists, it allowed these contradictions to permeate its book, so the believers have to work around them.
The Bible can be neither literal history nor inerrant because it contradicts both known history and itself. That doesn't mean that the Bible is wrong (though it could mean that), but it does mean that theological conservatives are wrong about the Bible. There are a number of possibilities that are still consistent with the existence of a god and that god having a connection to the Bible.

The Bible could be a record of the human experience of connection with God, but without direct divine inspiration.

The Bible could also be inspired of God, but intended as a sort of multidimensional picture through which one may come to know God, His expectations for humanity, and what Humanity's expectations should be of God. The New Testament as we have it, for example, aligns much more closely and reliably with what we know of gnosticism, for example, than it does with orthodoxy. Unfortunately, much of what the gnostics wrote is now lost and most of what we have are the writings with which proto-orthodox apologists chose to engage.
nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pmWhy? What's the point for such a 'loving and all knowing' being to sow discourse and cast doubt on its own story? Help make sense of this senseless act.
If God were real, this would be the only sticking point for me. If God were real and connected with the Bible in some way, so many people being so wrong would somehow have to be a part of His plan. To reconcile with a good god, it would have to be something like universal salvation, but with clues that would lead to a recognition of the real god during one's life on Earth. Gnosticism is more typically a good god vs. a bad god kind of thing, though.
nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pmOr is there no god at all, and the bible is a hodgepodge of slapped together fairy tales but clueless people who wish to dominate and control the masses?
Though it does include that, I generally think that it's a record of people trying to deal with experiences that they interpret as divine. The divine isn't real, though, so it's something else that they're misinterpreting.

The stories of the patriarchs and the book of Judges, for example, appear to contain older, disconnected stories that were collected and represent mostly morality tales about how the gods dealt with people "in the good old days," even from the perspective of those originally telling them and then writing them down. Later redactors incorporated them into larger collections for both theological and political purposes.
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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #3

Post by Miles »

nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pm We all know there are biblical contradictions. This has been discussed here many times in various threads so this thread is NOT about what the contradictions are, or what they mean (or don't mean). This thread is about the reason WHY christians have to negotiate around these contradictions.

Reading an article recently, the author said "Give me a long list of apparent contradictions, and I can usually think of explanations."
It made me wonder WHY said author has to do this.
It seems to me if god is perfect and caring enough to provide a biography of sorts (or road map of life, as I've heard it called before), god would take the time to make sure the bible is accurate and contradiction free (see [for some apparently masochistic reason] a popular thread on this site about the bible being trustworthy). Yet, we see contradictions in the bible in various places. So god allowed the contradictions. Is god testing the faith of believers? Is god inept? Worthless (or at the very least, not worthy of worship)? Moronic?

Whatever the reason, believers have to 'come to terms' with these contradictions.

But the question is WHY?

For 'discussion':
If god exists, it allowed these contradictions to permeate its book, so the believers have to work around them. Why? What's the point for such a 'loving and all knowing' being to sow discourse and cast doubt on its own story? Help make sense of this senseless act.
Or is there no god at all, and the bible is a hodgepodge of slapped together fairy tales but clueless people who wish to cominate and control the masses?
If god exists I believe the best explanation would be entertainment. After the beginning, and as time wore on, god became increasingly bored, so he said "Lets make man in our image and watch him navigate the various trials and tribulations I set before him. Among these I will create a book of instructions that is replete with crazy stuff like faerie tails, miracles, absurdities, and contradictions. And let's see how he deals with that. Tee Hee!" (God was also a bit fey.)

.
Last edited by Miles on Tue Apr 26, 2022 2:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Difflugia
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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #4

Post by Difflugia »

Miles wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 2:08 pm(God was also a bit fey.)
That's another possibility that I usually don't consider, but is quite distinct: the god responsible for the Bible is different than the god in the Bible.

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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #5

Post by 1213 »

nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pm ...
If god exists, it allowed these contradictions to permeate its book, so the believers have to work around them. Why? What's the point for such a 'loving and all knowing' being to sow discourse and cast doubt on its own story? Help make sense of this senseless act.
Or is there no god at all, and the bible is a hodgepodge of slapped together fairy tales but clueless people who wish to cominate and control the masses?
I think this whole question is based on false premise that makes the whole thing irrelevant.

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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #6

Post by Miles »

1213 wrote: Wed Apr 27, 2022 8:59 am
nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pm ...
If god exists, it allowed these contradictions to permeate its book, so the believers have to work around them. Why? What's the point for such a 'loving and all knowing' being to sow discourse and cast doubt on its own story? Help make sense of this senseless act.
Or is there no god at all, and the bible is a hodgepodge of slapped together fairy tales but clueless people who wish to cominate and control the masses?
I think this whole question is based on false premise that makes the whole thing irrelevant.
Are you saying that if god exists the Bible can't contain any contradictions? If so, I direct you to HERE. And if there are contradictions isn't it reasonable to ask, why? Of course it is. So what false premise are you referring to?

And, if god doesn't exist why couldn't the Bible be regarded as a "hodgepodge of slapped together fairy tales but ["by"?] clueless people who wish to . . . control the masses?" Personally, I believe control is an objective of all religions.



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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #7

Post by 1213 »

Miles wrote: Wed Apr 27, 2022 2:37 pm
1213 wrote: Wed Apr 27, 2022 8:59 am
nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pm ...
If god exists, it allowed these contradictions to permeate its book, so the believers have to work around them. Why? What's the point for such a 'loving and all knowing' being to sow discourse and cast doubt on its own story? Help make sense of this senseless act.
Or is there no god at all, and the bible is a hodgepodge of slapped together fairy tales but clueless people who wish to cominate and control the masses?
I think this whole question is based on false premise that makes the whole thing irrelevant.
Are you saying that if god exists the Bible can't contain any contradictions?
No. I say that i don't think you can really prove there is any real contradiction in the Bible. You can show contradictory interpretations, but that does not mean the contradiction is in the Bible, when it is in your interpretation.

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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #8

Post by POI »

1213 wrote: Thu Apr 28, 2022 8:39 am No. I say that i don't think you can really prove there is any real contradiction in the Bible. You can show contradictory interpretations, but that does not mean the contradiction is in the Bible, when it is in your interpretation.
1) Okay, we might want to start with the assumption that the interested person reading the Bible has, at least, an average reading comprehension level.

2) The next task might be, is each and every given Biblical (statement/claim/other) a (literal one, figurative one, or other)?

I would continue, but I highly doubt any actual (standard) has been established for both 1) and 2), thus far?
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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #9

Post by Difflugia »

POI wrote: Thu Apr 28, 2022 11:32 am
1213 wrote: Thu Apr 28, 2022 8:39 am No. I say that i don't think you can really prove there is any real contradiction in the Bible. You can show contradictory interpretations, but that does not mean the contradiction is in the Bible, when it is in your interpretation.
1) Okay, we might want to start with the assumption that the interested person reading the Bible has, at least, an average reading comprehension level.

2) The next task might be, is each and every given Biblical (statement/claim/other) a (literal one, figurative one, or other)?

I would continue, but I highly doubt any actual (standard) has been established for both 1) and 2), thus far?
This gets to the heart of the OP's question:
nobspeople wrote: Tue Apr 26, 2022 1:03 pmIf god exists, it allowed these contradictions to permeate its book, so the believers have to work around them.
In the main, the disconnect in the claim of no "real contradiction" isn't a lack of reading comprehension, but the insistence that the extreme effort to "work around" such contradictions, even if perhaps only "apparent," is no such thing. It's the claim, often implied, that the necessity of such creativity to maintain the doctrine of inerrancy to the point of ignoring authorial intention has no bearing on the validity of the doctrine in the first place.

Whether the contradictions are "real" or not and whether they can be overcome by creative word definitions or the assumption of implausible details, the question is why a god would require such efforts to understand its communication in the first place. Even if all things that inerrancy apologists assert could somehow be simultaneously true, the question is still a valid one that isn't addressed by the assertion that the contradictions are "interpretation."

If Jesus was literally descended from David and born in Bethlehem as Matthew's and Luke's genealogies claim, why was John 7:40-43 written in a way that strongly implies that he wasn't? The question isn't whether a counterintuitive application of Greek grammar is possible (typically the last and far too often the first refuge of the inerrantist), but why would the communication of a god require such a tortured reading in the first place? Leaving aside how one explains it, why would a god require one to?
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Re: Thinking of explanations

Post #10

Post by nobspeople »

[Replying to Miles in post #6]

Indoctrination is a powerful thing for certain personality types. You can see it here:
"I say that i don't think you can really prove there is any real contradiction in the Bible. You can show contradictory interpretations, but that does not mean the contradiction is in the Bible, when it is in your interpretation."
Believers are trained to think this way: whenever there is doubt, wiggle around it so that it makes sense to you, in your current state of mind.

When someone presents XYZ to another, and the other person says 'No, it's not XYZ, it's really 'apple forte'!', that's not logic that's taught indoctrination bordering on intellectual dishonesty. Sometimes they don't believe it, other times they've been so fooled they actually believe XYZ is 'apple forte'. After a certain point, they can't be blamed for it.

When someone is presented with a blatant contradiction, yet refuses to see it, much less admit to it, there's little you can do but continue to point them out. Ultimately, it's the individual that's responsible for seeing it (or not).

As the saying goes, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink.
Have a great, potentially godless, day!

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