Conflicting statements in the bible

[Baalzebutt]

I found this very interesting graphic online.

The red arcs connect conflicting statements within the bible.

Too small to really get a good look at but looks interesting.

Any thoughts?

[Tex]

Most of the "contradictions" I've seen are so obviously out of context it isn't even funny. I'd like to see what constitutes a contradiction before I believe some graph.

[Mononoke]

This is the full poster, with contradictions and the verses referenced. (Warning, it's a big image; if someone wants a text equivalent, though it's not the same, the Skeptic's Annotated Bible has a list with 472 items.) I agree that some contradictions are stretching it; however, some also are I think valid contradictions. No idea how many of which or even specific examples of each, though.

[Minimalist]

He didn't REALLY want to see them, Mon. He just wants to pretend that they don't exist.

You learn their lingo after a while.

[Tonus]

This guy thinks that there may be thousands. He doesn't track them as a way of proving the Bible infallible, but as a way of figuring out the styles and motivations of the various writers. The comment section can be even more entertaining than the blog posts.

[Tex]

I went and looked at a few on the list, and the only one that even looked like it could possibly be a contradiction (john 12:40) was one where God blinded people so that they could not see truth. This one, while more understandable than most, is still shouldn't be that hard. The end of the verse given says that God would heal them if they turned (same word for "repent"). What is making them blind is not God's wrath, but truth. Light is shown to eyes that refuse it, so they are blinded. The command to Isaiah (Is. 6:10 says the same thing) is to keep making them blind.

Now, this does seem more farfetched because that is not explicit in the text. You have to read the rest of Isaiah to get it. However, Isaiah preached many things that people did not want to hear, the first and most repeated was the complete destruction of the holy land (Babylonian conquest will succeed). They ended up killing Isaiah, and about a hundred years later Babylon was at the gates.

[Minimalist]

How about the one where "John" ( or whoever ) has your boy nailed up on the day before passover but the other 3 bozos have it on passover?

Or where Matty says he was born when Herod the Great was king ( before 4 BC) but Luke claims it was during the governorship of Quirinius (after 6 AD?)

Or where Mark has your guy pulling the Gary Cooper silent routine while John has him a regular chatty kathy?

Or the varying empty tomb stories?

Or the different "last words?"

Take your pick.[/quote]

[Plotinus]

It is all narrative.

The 'Bible' is a collection of works of various ethnic stories and wisdom literature.

Basically, it's poetry.
Annoyingly I was disappointed by many of the "contradictions" because I have a small understanding of how biblical narrative works.

[Tex]

I pick all of them.

1) Format is (Passage just before Crucifixion)/(Passage of burial) - (answer1)/(answer2)

Luke 22:7/Luke 23:54 - Day of Unleavened Bread/Day of Preparation, Mark 14:12/Mark 15:42 - Day of Unleavened Bread/Day of Preparation, Matthew 26:17/Matthew 27:62 Day of Unleavened Bread/Day of Preparation, John 18:28/19:31 - Near Passover/Day of Preparation

I see nothing overly complicated that needs explaining.

2) This one is a bit more tricky. I went looking and looking for the answer, and never found it. There is no answer here. Luke is wrong. Luke 2 has Quirinias for the birth and then its 29 A.D., so Jesus is a max of 23 and he's starting his ministry (which Luke says is about 30). Luke had to have flubbed a number in his math or something and then oopsied with the ruler from there. If he simply didn't carry the one, it puts Jesus at 6 B.C. rather than 6 A.D., fitting with Luke's account much better.

3) Sometimes Jesus speaks, sometimes he didn't. John mentions the times he did. Matthew has him silent most of the time. Mark and Luke both mix it up. I don't even understand what the issue is.

4) None of these contradict either. The text of the angels isn't exact, but pretty much means the same thing. All the rest is either info omitted or included that the others don't have. That omitted info seems pretty trivial. The accounts are never really that different. The women show up, see, run back, and tell the guys.

5) All accounts have Jesus crying out at the very end. "It is finished" and "into your hands I commit my spirit" have the same meaning. At the very least, these have no relevance to Christian teaching. That last cry in any account didn't need to be anything special. All accounts are geared toward a specific audience or for a specific purpose. Mark is just relaying the story and telling facts. Matthew is specifically for the Jews, scripture references everywhere, prophesy stuff everywhere, genealogy, etc.. Luke is for the non-Jews, genealogy of Jesus to Adam, few Jewish references, etc.. John is communicating Jesus is YHWH. He wants that clear. His book isn't even in chronological order.

[Minimalist]

1. I expected the apologetic bullshit and you didn't disappoint. Others, with clearer heads, perhaps, have already conceded the point.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/unreasonabl...crucified/

So in Mark, Jesus was nailed to a cross at 9am the day after the Preparation of the Passover. In John, Pilate is about to send Jesus to his death at 12pm on the day of the Preparation for the Passover.

It's a plot device for a point "John" (or whoever) was trying to make. It is not history. But it IS a contradiction with the other 3.

2. "Luke is wrong. " Yes..or Matty is wrong... but one of them is wrong which is the whole point. They contradict each other and believe me, finer minds than yours have tried to reconcile this one and failed.

3. "I don't even understand what the issue is." Of course you don't.

Nonetheless, it is there...plain as day. In Mark "jesus" barely speaks, in John, he rattles on.

http://vridar.wordpress.com/2012/08/10/3...-nazareth/

here are also a few examples of John reacting to Synoptic precedents, making his preferred changes to them. John actually tells us why he rejected Gethsemane: “Should I say, Father save me from this hour? No, for it was for this purpose that I came to this hour!” [12:27] And: “The cup the Father has given me: shall I not drink it?” [18:11]

This is a literary response to a literary invention by Mark which John did not approve of. It’s a slap in the Synoptic face.

Similarly, John also repudiates Jesus’ meek silence before Pilate by having him engage in a disputation with the governor.

He also rejects Simon of Cyrene because Jesus is quite capable of carrying his own cross all the way, thank you very much. Jesus “carried his own cross,” John declares.

Now both may be, but one must be, wrong. "Jesus" either gabbed like a teenage girl on a cell phone or not but he could not do both at the same time. This is a contradiction.

4. "The women show up, see, run back, and tell the guys."

No. Mark 16,8 - (the original ending before some monk tried to improve it.)

8 The women fled from the tomb, trembling and bewildered, and they said nothing to anyone because they were too frightened.

5. "All accounts have Jesus crying out at the very end. "It is finished" and "into your hands I commit my spirit" have the same meaning."

But they are NOT the same words. They are different which means that there are contradictions between them.

Matthew 27:46
And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
.
Luke 23:46
And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost.

John 19:30
When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.

Mark 15,33
34 Then at three o’clock Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which means “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”

I am not making an argument that any of this bullshit is right or wrong. Understand that it is all literary invention. But it takes a particular kind of myopia not to see that they do not even agree with each other. I regard this as your problem.