The Bible, contradictions, and modes of thinking

[liamconnor]

Here is a quote from another thread, which exemplifies much thinking among thinkers uneducated in the disciplines relevant to ancient studies--including biblical studies.

Many claim the bible is the infailable word of an omnipotent, omniscient god; that the bible is innerant(no error, no contradiction) but this is far from being the case.

One such example is that fact the bible both says that nobody saw God or God's face and that some saw God or God's face.



On one hand we have some verses say no human has ever seen God or God's face:

"But He said, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.�"(Exodus 33:20)

"No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him."(John 1:18)

"No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us."(1 John 4:12)



On the other hand we have other verses that say several humans have seen God or God's face:

Abraham saw God:
“Now when Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am God Almighty; Walk before Me, and be blameless; “(Gen. 17:1)
"Now the LORD appeared to him by the oaks of Mamre, while he was sitting at the tent door in the heat of the day.� (Gen. 18:1)

Moses saw God:
"The LORD would speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend."(Exodus 33:11)


Jacob saw God:
" And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: “For I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.“ " ( Genesis 32:30)

Many people saw Jesus or Jesus's face. And he is God. Therefore many saw god or god's face.

Q: How can anyone say with a straight face this is not a contradiction? Eh?

I think a far more interesting question arises from these examples:

The writings listed in the OP were written by men; men who knew the same texts no less than you.

How could such people write what they wrote if it is so obvious to YOU that they contain contradictions? Two possibilities for consideration:

1) They were all dumb as rocks and didn't recognize a contradiction when it slapped them in the face.

2) We are separated from them by centuries, during which enormous shifts in various paradigms have occurred: shifts in language and categories of thought. We attempt to translate what they wrote into our own modern language, and then interpret our own translation according to our own modern categories of thought. And so we find contradictions. But would they be contradictions for them? Example: it is not hard to imagine a future civilization stumbling upon a random corpus of writing from our own period, and finding two statements from the journal of the same author, which don't match: 1) I discovered that rain is made up of hydrogen and oxygen. 2) It was raining cats and dogs that day.

Q4D: Which is a better explanation for the apparent contradictions listed in the OP? Or, is there another explanation that hasn't been represented?

[Tcg]

Q4D: Which is a better explanation for the apparent contradictions listed in the OP?

The most obvious explanation is that it isn't an "apparent contradiction". It is a real contradiction which can't be explained away no matter how much one wishes to ignore it.

[rikuoamero]

Hi Liam, let's take your example of a text from today that has (among others) two statements: rain is made up of hydrogen and oxygen, and that day, it was raining cats and dogs.

To try and have this match with the Bible, let's say that this Hypothetical Text is used (or was) by a group of people as a holy book, much like many people today do with the Bible. The author of this text is believed by adherents to have spoken for God, with God, in his name, etc. That there are many things that do not jell with scientifically observed reality, such as the line about it raining cats and dogs.
Now, a future civilisation studying this text and studying those people who held to this text may say amongst themselves
"Hmm...maybe it isn't literally true that it rained cats and dogs."
"Hmm...did they believe it literally? How can we tell? In other parts of the text, they say other apparently fantastical things happened, like a man resurrecting from death".

The point of my response Liam is that you right now would NEVER take "raining cats and dogs" literally (as in, animals falling from the sky like rain droplets). However...if it were in your holy book? How would you be able to tell that it is not meant to be taken literally, or did happen once upon a time? After all...you believe a man died after being nailed to a piece of wood, and then came back to life a few days later. Why wouldn't a person like you in this hypothetical position believe that cats and dogs really did fall from the sky?

[benchwarmer]

[Replying to post 1 by liamconnor]

The choices given, which exemplify much thinking among thinkers uneducated in non black and white thinking, are typical when trying to save 'holy scripture' from serious examination.

The first choice, which is an obvious throw away, is crafted such that no one would ever choose it. The second choice gives a ridiculous analogy while it tries to be the answer everyone should choose. Does this text in the second analogy claim to be the 'word of God' or some other such claim that renders all words to be taken literally? I didn't think so.

More likely options:

- The authors may not have been as familiar with the other texts as claimed.

- The authors may have been familiar with the texts, but weren't trying to present the 'infallible word of God' and weren't worried about contradictions.

- The authors didn't realize their work would be slapped together with the other works (which they may or may not have been familiar with) and did not consider trying to line up all the stories to avoid contradiction.

It's clear the Bible is a collection of writings that have been pulled together from different authors and different times. It's also clear that many of these writings appear to be slight variations on other stories and religious texts from earlier cultures and religions. The proper people to 'place blame on' for all the contradictions are , IMHO:

- The people who pulled together the works i.e. the 'editors' of the Bible

- The people who claim the Bible is indeed the infallible word of a god.

Most of the rest of us realize the Bible is just a collection of writings that provides an interesting view into the cultures of the times of the writings and clearly realize that the entire tome is not an infallible collection of any god.

[marco]

1) They were all dumb as rocks and didn't recognize a contradiction when it slapped them in the face.

2) We are separated from them by centuries, during which enormous shifts in various paradigms have occurred: shifts in language and categories of thought. We attempt to translate what they wrote into our own modern language, and then interpret our own translation according to our own modern categories of thought.

Both 1 and 2 would indicate error. Some may well have been fairly stupid. However, people of the past were as clever as we are, without modern aids. A friend regularly passes on pieces of ancient Egyptian she's translating and some texts are beautiful.
Your accusation of thickness would apply more to those who found themselves incapable of making allowances for changes in time and custom.

It is necesary to examine other possibilities, I think.

[alexxcJRO]

among thinkers uneducated in the disciplines relevant to ancient studies--including biblical studies.

It seems it is really impossible for you to make a thread without the use of ad hominem.

I think a far more interesting question arises from these examples:

The writings listed in the OP were written by men; men who knew the same texts no less than you.

How could such people write what they wrote if it is so obvious to YOU that they contain contradictions? Two possibilities for consideration:

1) They were all dumb as rocks and didn't recognize a contradiction when it slapped them in the face.

2) We are separated from them by centuries, during which enormous shifts in various paradigms have occurred: shifts in language and categories of thought. We attempt to translate what they wrote into our own modern language, and then interpret our own translation according to our own modern categories of thought. And so we find contradictions. But would they be contradictions for them? Example: it is not hard to imagine a future civilization stumbling upon a random corpus of writing from our own period, and finding two statements from the journal of the same author, which don't match: 1) I discovered that rain is made up of hydrogen and oxygen. 2) It was raining cats and dogs that day.

Q4D: Which is a better explanation for the apparent contradictions listed in the OP? Or, is there another explanation that hasn't been represented?

It’s so funny how you made only two options and exaggerated the first in making it sound very improbable so the only remaining one to look acceptable.
Q: Why are you trying to manipulate the outcome? Are not sick playing these boring games?

Also you made the second option sound like we should not trust our interpretation of the bible because of our modern thinking; that modern humans cannot comprehend what the ancient people really wrote in their ancient documents because of great shifts in language and categories of thought.

Q: Are you not a modern human? Why do you trust your modern thinking and the way you interpret the translations according to your own modern categories of thought?

Q: Did Jesus really said what we modern humans think he said?

Huh, probably not. We cannot trust the way we interpret our own translation according to our own modern categories of thought.


In your desperate and pathetic attempt to smear atheists and make them look bad you have shot yourself in the foot.

Man i was laughing so hard my abdomen hurt after. )

[Willum]

[Replying to post 1 by liamconnor]

1) They were all dumb as rocks and didn't recognize a contradiction when it slapped them in the face.

If they were fiction writers, contradiction is what you'd expect from different writers.
Besides, really, what should one expect from goat-herders? Not the works of Shakespeare, surely.

And your premise is self-contradicted by observation: If the READERS of the work swallow the contradictions, and they are far more objective than the writers, the writers did an OK job.

It is only modern perspective and insight into modern science and philosophy that has allowed us to dismiss religion as what it was:
The vainglorious attempt of a people to explain the natural world.

You'll notice, that those who support the Bible and other awkward religions, often support obsolete philosophies and sciences:
Believing that monkeys can wake up men as the course of evolution, is one example.
Not understanding that the logical observation of the "Conservation of Mass," is that nothing requires creation, regardless of events (for example, there is no reason to believe the Big Bang is an exception).
Believing God can't be found, or that you can't prove he doesn't exist, simply by proposing other better explanations.

and so on...

So in short, let's face it, mankind is pretty dumb, the worst sin of dumbness is there are people out there who observe human nature and write lies to suit it. Then use those lies to endorse wars and genocides, invoking a higher, non-existent god to justify those sins of "being dumb."

[Overcomer]

The phrase "face to face" is an idiom in Hebrew. It isn't to be taken literally. It refers to intimacy as in Ex. 33:11 in which we read that "God spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to a friend." Think of the English idiom -- we don't see eye to eye -- in comparison. It isn't literally talking about not being able to stare into someone's eyes. It means two people don't agree.

When it says that no one can see God's face and live, it's referring to God the Father. He is spirit (John 4:21) and he is invisible (Col. 1:15). And we see that, when the Bible speaks of him showing himself, it is his glory that people see or he is shrouded in a cloud. See Exodus 33-34.

And there are, of course, anthropomorphisms in the Old Testament, that is, times when human characteristics are ascribed to God. Again, see Exodus 33 where God covers Moses with his "hand".

When someone does literally see God, whether in the Old Testament or the New, it's Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, who they see. In the Old Testament, these are known as christophanies. In the New Testament, people, of course, see Jesus, who is God Incarnate, prior to his death. Following his resurrection, they see Jesus in his glorified body.

For further reading, see here:

http://www.gordonconwell.edu/resources/ ... tament.cfm

https://bible.org/question/light-gen-38 ... d%E2%80%9D

https://www.gotquestions.org/shekinah-glory.html

https://bible.org/seriespage/4-we-will- ... ur-worship

[Divine Insight]

1) They were all dumb as rocks and didn't recognize a contradiction when it slapped them in the face.

Based on watching how humans behave today the above sounds quite reasonable to me.

Also, there are three things to note here.

1. Often times these contradictions are separated by time and even by authors. In other words, one author made claim that God spoke with humans face-to-face, while another author claims that no one has seen the face of God.

In that situation it's easy for apologists to make excuses concerning that the two authors simply meant different things.

2. Even single authors will often contradict themselves, especially when making up stories. In fact, this is how police catch criminals. They interrogate them until they start to find inconsistencies in their tales.

3. Finally, you have a very superficial example here, IMHO. The example that some people claimed that certain people saw the face of God while others claim that no one can look upon the face of God. As far as I'm concerned that's a "trivial contradiction" that I wouldn't even bother bringing up if I were going to discuss contradictions in the Bible.

In fact, I just came from a thread on that very topic. Read my post #10 in that thread if you want to see some serious contradictions:

The most significant contradiction or inconsistency?

[William]

[Replying to post 1 by liamconnor]

Why do you believe the bible is 'the word of GOD'?

I think that this is the underlying problem with Christians who continually try to defend the indefensible.
If Christians were able to face this truth, rather than ignore it, they would be stepping significantly in the right direction and be freer for it.