Harmonizing Alleged Bible Contradictions
by Dave Brown
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This page discussed the process of harmonization, and then gives examples of how this process can be applied. As we add more and more alleged contradictions we will create children pages. But for now, this collection of articles are all on this page. Examples will be added as time goes on. Click below for articles that deal with the following:
The Process of Harmonization
by Dave Brown
Preface to this series of articles. The goal of these articles is not to influence those who have decided that they reject any notion of God, and thus have no inclination whatsoever of yielding obedience to God. While we love and have concern for the people who might cling to this notion, if criticizing the bible is their only motivation for raising questions, the responses in these articles cannot possibly help them. First off, they do not believe the bible to start with, so any evidence we present from the bible will be ignored. Secondly, even if they did give it consideration (and many of them will just to further criticize) they will not be able to understand what we are saying because information from the scriptures cannot be understood if not viewed from a spiritual perspective that respects that God is and that He rewards those who seek to understand the truth that He has revealed (Hebrews 11:6). This is made quite clear in many places, but perhaps most specifically in ...
1 Corinthians 2:14
Now the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually judged.
Is it not amazing that God's word explains why so many in our world today have hardened their hearts to understanding His truth, and thus have rejected what God offers to them -- the free gift of eternal life?
By the title above we are clearly inferring that the bible contains some statements that, when isolated and taken out of context, appear to be contradictions. We will present some of these in future articles over the next few months. But for now, let us just assert and prove that these are only apparent, they are not real. The bible contains absolutely no contradictions in what God communicated because God is omniscient and He cannot lie (Titus 1:2). God the Father and Jesus through the Holy Spirit were responsible for all scripture, as it says in 2 Peter 1:20-21: “… no prophecy of scripture is of private interpretation. For no prophecy ever came by the will of man: but men spoke from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit.” The term “private interpretation” has been misunderstood by many who have quoted this verse to mean that individuals do not have the ability to interpret God’s word. In fact, it means just the opposite – if it is not of private interpretation, then it must be of public interpretation – meaning that no individual or small group of men have a lock on it. It is absurd to think that Peter would make a statement that would infer that no individual could possibly understand the very statement that he was making. Let's get real.
We are not talking about trivial inconsistent numbers in different Old Testament books, nor of the few differences that have arisen due to translations and copying of old manuscripts. The reason that these are of no concern is that we know of absolutely no doctrinal dispute within the church that has ever been caused by such. Our salvation does not depend on such things. For God to require that all translations and quotes from the bible be 100% consistent with the original Greek or Hebrew manuscripts would require what we might call an ongoing set of simultaneous miracles. Anyone can copy a passage of scripture, or an entire book, onto the Internet and make all kinds of changes in it to suit their sinful purposes and represent it as the truth. For some people to be satisfied, God would have to correct all such things in real time.
God will continue to use sinful men to keep his promise (Matthew 24:35): "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." The fact that no doctrinal issues have arisen over these trivial differences, and the fact that Gods plan of salvation can be obtained from any scholarly translation is further proof that God is in control (Revelation 4 and 5). By scholarly translations here we mean translations that were performed by groups of objective scholars who tried their best to reveal the true meaning of the Greek/Hebrew manuscript, and who were not under the influence of any religious organization.
Our goal in this article is to provide a method for resolving apparent contradictions. Generally this is called harmonizing the various passages of scripture. The music metaphor is a good one in that both of the alleged contradictory statements are perfectly true despite their not being exactly on the same note. Quite often they are addressed to two different audiences for the purpose of making very different points. But taken together they produce the very pleasing sound of harmonious truth.
Enemies of God’s word are constantly looking for contradictions because this provides further justification for their lack of faith. The antithesis of this is a good starting point to discuss harmonization, since it begins as a matter of faith in the following:
1 Corinthians 2:14-16
14 Now the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually judged.
15 But he that is spiritual judges all things, and he himself is judged of no man.
16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.
Thus, those seeking to find contradictions will find them – make no mistake about that. But those who have faith in God revealing a consistent revelation will be able to harmonize any apparent contradiction that surfaces.
In fact, we cannot grow in God’s grace and mature in the knowledge of God’s will for us without being able to harmonize many passages of scripture with slightly different literal meanings. For although the apparent contradictions that we will discuss in future articles are relatively rare, slight differences do occur in perhaps dozens of passages, also requiring this harmonization process for accurate interpretation. We say this is part of the maturing process since if someone is going to harmonize two or more passages, they must have a good understanding of what each of these passages is really stating, not just a surface impression from either (1) reading but not studying, or (2) being told a meaning by others. This argues strongly for a comprehensive approach to resolving what the bible says on any subject.
So the first and most important step is to counter the enemies of the Word by knowing in your heart that there is an explanation that will harmonize any apparent contradiction. But then what?
It is more a matter of applying principles than it is of following a step-by-step methodology. Most of these principles are discussed elsewhere on BibleThought and the links have been provided on key phrases below. We give a brief summary of these principles in what follows:
Milk and meat. Think in terms of what your experience with God’s word has shown you to be obvious. As an example, Paul’s seemingly simple statement in 1 Corinthians 6:12: “All things are lawful for me; …” should not meet the smell test to even the most novice Christian. How can murder, rape, pedophilia, or any other sin be lawful when we know Paul has spent so much time preaching against all sin? Our understanding of the simple milk of God’s word must over-ride any interpretation that would contradict the simple milk truth. Our immediate impression upon reading a statement such as this ("all things are lawful") should be: “there must be something more to it, so let's look a bit deeper.”
Consider figurative language. When a statement does not meet the smell test it must not be actually saying what our first impression of it is telling us. So we should start looking for the use of figurative language to qualify what the literal interpretation of the passage is. In the 1 Cor. 6:12 example there are two figures of speech being used: (1) hyperbole, and (2) a type of the not … but construct. Paul’s adversaries were obviously making certain claims that they were free to practice certain things, and so Paul does them one better … as we might say today: “Yea, sure. ALL things are lawful." Remember that in order for something to be effective hyperbole it must be absurd if taken literally, which this part of the verse definitely is. But then there is also the not-but construct when considering the entire verse. 1 Cor. 6:12: “All things are lawful for me; but not all things are expedient. All things are lawful for me; but I will not be brought under the power of any.” There are two not-but statements in this verse (for emphasis). Remember that in a not-but statement the emphasis is on the “but” part of the statement as far as the literal validity of the statement is concerned. The first part of the statement is given for contrast, not as a literal statement of fact. Finally, while sarcasm is a difficult figure of speech to identify, we suspect that Paul was also being a bit sarcastic with such an over-the-top statement.
Comprehensive approach. If two passages in the bible seem to contradict, do not limit your consideration to just those two passages. Generally the New Testament contains a dozen (or dozens) of verses that deal with the subject under consideration. Make a list of all of them and consider them all simultaneously. What you are looking for in order to harmonize the two of concern is what the preponderance of scriptural evidence proclaims. The alternative is to base beliefs on exceptions and then destroy all of the simple and plain teachings of God’s word with the misinterpretation of the exception. For example, we will have an article on predestination, but we know what the preponderance of scriptural evidence teaches from Genesis 3 to the last chapter of the book of Revelation on the subject of free will. Thus, no doctrine that we believe with regard to predestination should contradict the simple teaching of the individual responsibility of people for their own actions.
Be deductive. Deduction is the process of elimination. Make a list of possible interpretations, each of which must be false if something else on the list is true. (Technically, this means that each statement is mutually exclusive of all others, and that together they are collectively exhaustive of all possible alternatives -- but these technical terms are not important.) Usually there will only be two or three things on the list, although there could be more in some cases. Now take a comprehensive approach and use the simpler and clearer (perhaps obviously literal) passages to eliminate the items on the list that are obviously false. We do not believe it will take too long to eliminate all but the one that is the truth. If debates over doctrines and church practice were considered in this way, they would quickly disappear.
False teachers have used the ignorance of their followers to seize upon doctrines that are inconsistent with honest and mature biblical interpretation. These teachers would not exist if each Christian would make it his or her business to obey the following command: “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that need not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15). In a sense false teachers will suffer a greater condemnation (James 3:1) than their followers. However, where ignorance exists Satan will provide the false teacher to assure the destruction of the masses. Don't be part of that herding instinct.
What are the conditions of salvation given by Jesus?
Return to Understanding page
- Is Jesus God (a divine being along with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit)?
- Saved by Works or Not Saved by Works
- Predestination or Free Will
- Bible Verse Comparisons - Which One is True?
- Does the Bible Promote Love or Slavery and Racism?
The Process of Harmonization
by Dave Brown
Preface to this series of articles. The goal of these articles is not to influence those who have decided that they reject any notion of God, and thus have no inclination whatsoever of yielding obedience to God. While we love and have concern for the people who might cling to this notion, if criticizing the bible is their only motivation for raising questions, the responses in these articles cannot possibly help them. First off, they do not believe the bible to start with, so any evidence we present from the bible will be ignored. Secondly, even if they did give it consideration (and many of them will just to further criticize) they will not be able to understand what we are saying because information from the scriptures cannot be understood if not viewed from a spiritual perspective that respects that God is and that He rewards those who seek to understand the truth that He has revealed (Hebrews 11:6). This is made quite clear in many places, but perhaps most specifically in ...
1 Corinthians 2:14
Now the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually judged.
Is it not amazing that God's word explains why so many in our world today have hardened their hearts to understanding His truth, and thus have rejected what God offers to them -- the free gift of eternal life?
By the title above we are clearly inferring that the bible contains some statements that, when isolated and taken out of context, appear to be contradictions. We will present some of these in future articles over the next few months. But for now, let us just assert and prove that these are only apparent, they are not real. The bible contains absolutely no contradictions in what God communicated because God is omniscient and He cannot lie (Titus 1:2). God the Father and Jesus through the Holy Spirit were responsible for all scripture, as it says in 2 Peter 1:20-21: “… no prophecy of scripture is of private interpretation. For no prophecy ever came by the will of man: but men spoke from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit.” The term “private interpretation” has been misunderstood by many who have quoted this verse to mean that individuals do not have the ability to interpret God’s word. In fact, it means just the opposite – if it is not of private interpretation, then it must be of public interpretation – meaning that no individual or small group of men have a lock on it. It is absurd to think that Peter would make a statement that would infer that no individual could possibly understand the very statement that he was making. Let's get real.
We are not talking about trivial inconsistent numbers in different Old Testament books, nor of the few differences that have arisen due to translations and copying of old manuscripts. The reason that these are of no concern is that we know of absolutely no doctrinal dispute within the church that has ever been caused by such. Our salvation does not depend on such things. For God to require that all translations and quotes from the bible be 100% consistent with the original Greek or Hebrew manuscripts would require what we might call an ongoing set of simultaneous miracles. Anyone can copy a passage of scripture, or an entire book, onto the Internet and make all kinds of changes in it to suit their sinful purposes and represent it as the truth. For some people to be satisfied, God would have to correct all such things in real time.
God will continue to use sinful men to keep his promise (Matthew 24:35): "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." The fact that no doctrinal issues have arisen over these trivial differences, and the fact that Gods plan of salvation can be obtained from any scholarly translation is further proof that God is in control (Revelation 4 and 5). By scholarly translations here we mean translations that were performed by groups of objective scholars who tried their best to reveal the true meaning of the Greek/Hebrew manuscript, and who were not under the influence of any religious organization.
Our goal in this article is to provide a method for resolving apparent contradictions. Generally this is called harmonizing the various passages of scripture. The music metaphor is a good one in that both of the alleged contradictory statements are perfectly true despite their not being exactly on the same note. Quite often they are addressed to two different audiences for the purpose of making very different points. But taken together they produce the very pleasing sound of harmonious truth.
Enemies of God’s word are constantly looking for contradictions because this provides further justification for their lack of faith. The antithesis of this is a good starting point to discuss harmonization, since it begins as a matter of faith in the following:
1 Corinthians 2:14-16
14 Now the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually judged.
15 But he that is spiritual judges all things, and he himself is judged of no man.
16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.
Thus, those seeking to find contradictions will find them – make no mistake about that. But those who have faith in God revealing a consistent revelation will be able to harmonize any apparent contradiction that surfaces.
In fact, we cannot grow in God’s grace and mature in the knowledge of God’s will for us without being able to harmonize many passages of scripture with slightly different literal meanings. For although the apparent contradictions that we will discuss in future articles are relatively rare, slight differences do occur in perhaps dozens of passages, also requiring this harmonization process for accurate interpretation. We say this is part of the maturing process since if someone is going to harmonize two or more passages, they must have a good understanding of what each of these passages is really stating, not just a surface impression from either (1) reading but not studying, or (2) being told a meaning by others. This argues strongly for a comprehensive approach to resolving what the bible says on any subject.
So the first and most important step is to counter the enemies of the Word by knowing in your heart that there is an explanation that will harmonize any apparent contradiction. But then what?
It is more a matter of applying principles than it is of following a step-by-step methodology. Most of these principles are discussed elsewhere on BibleThought and the links have been provided on key phrases below. We give a brief summary of these principles in what follows:
Milk and meat. Think in terms of what your experience with God’s word has shown you to be obvious. As an example, Paul’s seemingly simple statement in 1 Corinthians 6:12: “All things are lawful for me; …” should not meet the smell test to even the most novice Christian. How can murder, rape, pedophilia, or any other sin be lawful when we know Paul has spent so much time preaching against all sin? Our understanding of the simple milk of God’s word must over-ride any interpretation that would contradict the simple milk truth. Our immediate impression upon reading a statement such as this ("all things are lawful") should be: “there must be something more to it, so let's look a bit deeper.”
Consider figurative language. When a statement does not meet the smell test it must not be actually saying what our first impression of it is telling us. So we should start looking for the use of figurative language to qualify what the literal interpretation of the passage is. In the 1 Cor. 6:12 example there are two figures of speech being used: (1) hyperbole, and (2) a type of the not … but construct. Paul’s adversaries were obviously making certain claims that they were free to practice certain things, and so Paul does them one better … as we might say today: “Yea, sure. ALL things are lawful." Remember that in order for something to be effective hyperbole it must be absurd if taken literally, which this part of the verse definitely is. But then there is also the not-but construct when considering the entire verse. 1 Cor. 6:12: “All things are lawful for me; but not all things are expedient. All things are lawful for me; but I will not be brought under the power of any.” There are two not-but statements in this verse (for emphasis). Remember that in a not-but statement the emphasis is on the “but” part of the statement as far as the literal validity of the statement is concerned. The first part of the statement is given for contrast, not as a literal statement of fact. Finally, while sarcasm is a difficult figure of speech to identify, we suspect that Paul was also being a bit sarcastic with such an over-the-top statement.
Comprehensive approach. If two passages in the bible seem to contradict, do not limit your consideration to just those two passages. Generally the New Testament contains a dozen (or dozens) of verses that deal with the subject under consideration. Make a list of all of them and consider them all simultaneously. What you are looking for in order to harmonize the two of concern is what the preponderance of scriptural evidence proclaims. The alternative is to base beliefs on exceptions and then destroy all of the simple and plain teachings of God’s word with the misinterpretation of the exception. For example, we will have an article on predestination, but we know what the preponderance of scriptural evidence teaches from Genesis 3 to the last chapter of the book of Revelation on the subject of free will. Thus, no doctrine that we believe with regard to predestination should contradict the simple teaching of the individual responsibility of people for their own actions.
Be deductive. Deduction is the process of elimination. Make a list of possible interpretations, each of which must be false if something else on the list is true. (Technically, this means that each statement is mutually exclusive of all others, and that together they are collectively exhaustive of all possible alternatives -- but these technical terms are not important.) Usually there will only be two or three things on the list, although there could be more in some cases. Now take a comprehensive approach and use the simpler and clearer (perhaps obviously literal) passages to eliminate the items on the list that are obviously false. We do not believe it will take too long to eliminate all but the one that is the truth. If debates over doctrines and church practice were considered in this way, they would quickly disappear.
False teachers have used the ignorance of their followers to seize upon doctrines that are inconsistent with honest and mature biblical interpretation. These teachers would not exist if each Christian would make it his or her business to obey the following command: “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that need not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15). In a sense false teachers will suffer a greater condemnation (James 3:1) than their followers. However, where ignorance exists Satan will provide the false teacher to assure the destruction of the masses. Don't be part of that herding instinct.
What are the conditions of salvation given by Jesus?
Return to Understanding page