Creation Contradiction Proves Errancy

[JoeMama]

In the animal Creation passages, (Genesis 1:25-26), God already had made the animals, but later (Genesis 2:18-19) he said that making the animals was something he planned to do.

If these are contradictory, does that mean the Bible is not without error?

[TRANSPONDER]

[Replying to William in post #19]

New topic (viewtopic.php?t=41600)

I have viewed the new topic. It requires some adjusting, such as clear quotes from what I actually said, that the context is preserved.
In doing so, the questions for debate you have proposed, will also require adjusting.

Which is to say that the new topic presently is straw about stuff I didn't say/haven't argued.

I think I'll leave the topic where it is. Feel free to engage it, or not. This is what debate is all about.

Going back for a look at the OP, it addresses an old Bible excuse. The 'metaphorical' excuse (or poetic symbolism) does nothing to validate 'inerrancy' which is broadly whether the Bible is factually reliable or not. If it is just considered a poetic fantasy, well, that is what we atheists have been saying all along. If the apologists are trying claim that the Bible is telling reliable truth but using fanciful untruths to do it, excuse me while I laugh.

[The Tanager]

It is either intended to be factual (in which case it is wrong) or it it pertic, in which case it doesn't matter. Either way it is no cause to believe the Bible as fact

Why can’t poetry relay facts about reality? In Shakespeare’s world, Romeo was relaying a fact about how he felt about Juliet. There are other subjects than the order of creation.

This is speculative and good old'making stuff up to excuse errors'. They could have corrected it but didn't and going by what was the state of knowledge up to a lot later there is no evidence that anyone know differently from what is in genesis on the order of creation, and they were wrong.

What they believed about the actual order of creation (if they cared about that at all in their life) is irrelevant. The point is that the text gives two different orders of creation. And they were okay with leaving both in. That shows they don’t care about the actual order of creation and aren’t making a statement about it.

I have no faith in the critical thinking skills of anyone who tries to validate what is wrong in the Bible by using poetry as an excuse. Poetry or supposed fact it is wrong either way.

If it is not a scientific statement about the order of creation what fact is it wrong about? The order of creation? If so, then Shakespeare is wrong about the order of creation just as much because both are actually being silent on that issue. Not addressing an issue is not being wrong about that fact.

[Difflugia]

This isn’t shoehorning inerrancy into a contradictory text, but avoiding shoehorning a question into the text that wasn’t a concern of the author.

If we disagree, it's only because I think it's both.

If they were concerned about the order of creation being known, then they would have harmonized (or editorialized) on which order of creation was correct since charity calls for us to not treat them like idiots in the face of a clearly different order of creation.

Again, I agree with you. I don't think they're the idiots. I think that the authors wanted to be understood, which is why I don't think that harmonizations geared toward preserving the doctrine of inerrancy help anyone understand the Bible.

The people I'm arguing against here are the inerrantists, not the authors of the Bible.

As far as claiming the concept of inerrancy is meaningful, what do you think my position on that is?

I've no idea. You seem to be agreeing with us, but trying to somehow turn it into an argument against us. Is your claim that the Bible's not inerrant? That the Bible is inerrant, but the contradictions between Genesis 1 and Genesis 2-3 don't affect inerrancy? Some third thing?

So far, your argument seems to be that we can't say that inerrantists are wrong because the biblical authors didn't have inerrancy in mind. That's a non sequitur, though, so I hope I've misunderstood your argument.

[TRANSPONDER]

It is either intended to be factual (in which case it is wrong) or it it pertic, in which case it doesn't matter. Either way it is no cause to believe the Bible as fact

Why can’t poetry relay facts about reality? In Shakespeare’s world, Romeo was relaying a fact about how he felt about Juliet. There are other subjects than the order of creation.

It can of course. As I said Shakespeare is right about where the sun rises. Whether the Genesis account is intended as fact or poetry it is wrong - unless ine denies science.

This is speculative and good old'making stuff up to excuse errors'. They could have corrected it but didn't and going by what was the state of knowledge up to a lot later there is no evidence that anyone know differently from what is in genesis on the order of creation, and they were wrong.

What they believed about the actual order of creation (if they cared about that at all in their life) is irrelevant. The point is that the text gives two different orders of creation. And they were okay with leaving both in. That shows they don’t care about the actual order of creation and aren’t making a statement about it.

You assume that you know why they left it is. You don't know and I don't know. I guess that either they has two accounts and put them both in, or the saw the second account as going into detail about the creation of man. That is irrelevant, and even if you are right and they they didn't care that contradicted (not uncommon in the Bible after all) it still means it is wrong and so the Bible is still a book without factual merit.

I have no faith in the critical thinking skills of anyone who tries to validate what is wrong in the Bible by using poetry as an excuse. Poetry or supposed fact it is wrong either way.

If it is not a scientific statement about the order of creation what fact is it wrong about? The order of creation? If so, then Shakespeare is wrong about the order of creation just as much because both are actually being silent on that issue. Not addressing an issue is not being wrong about that fact.

I'm quite sure that Shakespeare was wrong in what he thought about the order of creation, just as in The merchant of Venice,

Look, how the floor of heaven
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold:
There's not the smallest orb that thou behold'st
But in his motion like an angel sings
Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins;

he was wrong about the singing spheres of the celestial bodies. That it is great writing doesn't alter the fact that it is wrong, and so is the Bible on creation, whether one takes it as poetry or fact or both.

[TRANSPONDER]

This isn’t shoehorning inerrancy into a contradictory text, but avoiding shoehorning a question into the text that wasn’t a concern of the author.

If we disagree, it's only because I think it's both.

If they were concerned about the order of creation being known, then they would have harmonized (or editorialized) on which order of creation was correct since charity calls for us to not treat them like idiots in the face of a clearly different order of creation.

Again, I agree with you. I don't think they're the idiots. I think that the authors wanted to be understood, which is why I don't think that harmonizations geared toward preserving the doctrine of inerrancy help anyone understand the Bible.

The people I'm arguing against here are the inerrantists, not the authors of the Bible.

As far as claiming the concept of inerrancy is meaningful, what do you think my position on that is?

I've no idea. You seem to be agreeing with us, but trying to somehow turn it into an argument against us. Is your claim that the Bible's not inerrant? That the Bible is inerrant, but the contradictions between Genesis 1 and Genesis 2-3 don't affect inerrancy? Some third thing?

So far, your argument seems to be that we can't say that inerrantists are wrong because the biblical authors didn't have inerrancy in mind. That's a non sequitur, though, so I hope I've misunderstood your argument.

Again we can only guess about the reason contradictions were allowed to stay in. I can make a fair guess about why the gospel contradictions were left in - the gospels were written separately by writers who had no idea they contradicted. Later when they were put together, the contradictions were simply ignored, just as the faithful ignore them today.

Interestingly, Luke WAS aware of the contradiction. Ho must have seen copies of Paul's letters and realised the disciples did not go to Galilee (and stay there as he thought would have been the intention of the story), but knew from Paul that they stayed in Jerusalem and founded the church. So he rewrote the gospel to agree with Paul, but didn't know his alteration was in contradiction to the other gospels.

Not that the Faithful who collated the gospels or the believers who read them noticed the contradictions or cared if they did. They simply wave them away on miserable excuses or just ignore the facts altogether.

I would guess something of the kind could explain the Genesis contradiction, too. The multiple authors theory is well known enough to Bible scholars, other than the fact - concealing kind.

In any case of course, whichever explanation one uses, it does not make the Bible true or valid or believable, there or anywhere else.

Atheist Axiom no 6 "Metaphorically true means 'Not true at all'". The metaphor or symbolic apologetic is merely smokescreening with (I guess) the idea of arguing that the bible is conveying truth even though so much of it is untrue. This attempt to bamboozle should never have worked and shouldn't now.

[The Tanager]

I've no idea. You seem to be agreeing with us, but trying to somehow turn it into an argument against us. Is your claim that the Bible's not inerrant? That the Bible is inerrant, but the contradictions between Genesis 1 and Genesis 2-3 don't affect inerrancy? Some third thing?

So far, your argument seems to be that we can't say that inerrantists are wrong because the biblical authors didn't have inerrancy in mind. That's a non sequitur, though, so I hope I've misunderstood your argument.

Yes, you’ve misunderstood my argument. It has only been that the different orders of creation are not an error or a contradiction because the text isn’t trying to answer the question: “what is the correct order of creation?” at all. It’s a very limited claim.

[The Tanager]

It can of course. As I said Shakespeare is right about where the sun rises. Whether the Genesis account is intended as fact or poetry it is wrong - unless ine denies science.

Is Shakespeare wrong about Juliet being the sun?

[TRANSPONDER]

It can of course. As I said Shakespeare is right about where the sun rises. Whether the Genesis account is intended as fact or poetry it is wrong - unless ine denies science.

Is Shakespeare wrong about Juliet being the sun?

Yes of course he is, in any factual sense. Poetically fair enough but in terms of taking Shakespeare as any guide to factuality, no, though it may get obvious things right, like the sun rising in the east. But it is not a reliable guide to science, cosmology or indeed history, when it had Cleopatra and mark Anthony go indoors for a game of billiards.

So the Bible is wrong on creation, wrong on the Flood, wrong, it now looks like, on the Exodus and conquest, wrong on the sun standing still, wrong (I would argue) on the way the Assyrian siege of Jerusalem went, wrong on the prophecy of Tyre and wrong on Daniel, even if the Hasmoneans did win the Maccabean war.

Wrong on so much in the NT, too. The Nativities, provably, despite Apologist denial. Pilate as a weak appeaser, the blasphemy charge, the Passover release and on all the evidence the resurrection, as anything more than imagination. And poetry, metaphor or symbolism won't save any of it. Not from anyone who care about evidence, reason and critical thinking rather than denialist Faith.

[The Tanager]

Yes of course he is, in any factual sense. Poetically fair enough but in terms of taking Shakespeare as any guide to factuality, no, though it may get obvious things right, like the sun rising in the east. But it is not a reliable guide to science, cosmology or indeed history, when it had Cleopatra and mark Anthony go indoors for a game of billiards.

No, not of course. Shakespeare isn't claiming anything about the sun being a person, so he isn't wrong about that fact there. He isn't claiming to be a reliable guide to science, cosmology, or history in that phrase. He's writing poetically, but he's not writing poetically about the sun; he is talking about a fictional love. Just like Genesis isn't claiming to be a reliable guide on the order of creation. To treat them as such is the error, not the errors mistreating them as such fabricates.

[JoeMama]

It was asked, "What does it matter [if there are errors in the Bible?"
Here is my response:


St. Augustine (354-430) was one of the founders of the Roman Catholic Church. He well understood that Christianity was like a house of cards; if the church dared to admit to even a single error in the Bible, who could say there wasn't an error on every page? The resurrection story might then be false and everyone's hopes are in vain. This is what he said:


"The most disastrous consequences must follow upon our believing that anything false is found in the sacred books....If you [even] once admit into such a high sanctuary of authority one false statement, there will not be left a single sentence of those books, which, if appearing to anyone difficult in practice or hard to believe, may not by the same fatal rule be explained away as a statement, in which intentionally, the author declared what was not true." --St. Augustine in Epistula, p. 28.