What is the biggest bible contradiction?

The four very different accounts of the discovery of the empty tomb at the end of each gospel.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

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Surely this belongs in accuracy and inerrancy forum?

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More proof the universe wasn't designed.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

Another good one is Judas' death. In Matthew 27 Judas hangs himself. In Acts 1, he falls down and his guts burst open.See if you can get your friend to claim that Judas hanged himself on his own entrails.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

Did you see my previous entry? That was the one that bothered me the most when I was a literalist.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

Matthew 28:Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to the tomb. An angel appeared with an earthquake, rolled away the rock blocking the entrance, and sat on it. The guards fainted. The women went to tell the other disciples and met Jesus on the way.- Mark 16:Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome went to the tomb. The rock was already rolled away, and a young man (an angel) was sitting within the tomb. No mention of Jesus before they found the other disciples.- Luke 24:Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, Joanna, and other unidentified women came to the tomb. It was empty when they got there. Suddenly two angels appeared beside them. No mention of Jesus before they got to the disciples.- John 20:Mary Magdalene came to the tomb alone. The rock was moved, the tomb was empty, and there was nothing to be seen. She ran to tell the others. Peter and another disciple ran to the tomb and saw that it was empty. When they left, two angels appeared to Mary, and also Jesus appears to Mary within the tomb.-How's that for an inerrant, divinely inspired book's description of the most important historical event in human history, and fairly recent history to the Gospel writers, and which had actual eye witnesses?Edited by Chiroptera, : typo in the Luke version

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

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I've never read the bible very thoroughly....

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If I wanted to promote atheism, I would advocate for mandatory Bible reading classes in all the public schools.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

Are you Finnish? Because your written English is excellent. Except for no trace of an "accent".

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

Yep. When I was a Biblical literalist, what bothered me the most from a theological perspective was when I read these alleged Old Testament prophecies of the Christ's suffering and death in context, and realized what a stretch it was to make them out to be prophecies.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

I can see why you would feel these examples are minor. Afterall, we do have some very major problems in the Biblical record. The Genesis creation account is contradicted by biology, the story of the Flood is contradicted by modern geology, the story of the Exodus contradicts modern archaeology, and so forth. These are very serious problems that pretty much show beyond a doubt that the Bible cannot be taken seriously as a literal description of history.But I can't see how a literalist can be so complacent about the contradictions that have been exposed. Take my contribution about the four different accounts of the discovery of the empty tomb. You are saying that the process of "divine inspiration", which somehow was able to give the writers an accurate account of the creation or an accurate account of pre-Flood history, or an accurate account of pre-recorded Hebrew history, was not able to give the Gospel writers an accurate account of the discovery of the tomb? It appears that "divine inspiration" isn't so different from the normal human inspiration responsible for other myths and written accounts.

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For those who have ears let him hear.

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And for those who have eyes let him see.That is what we have been trying to get the literalists to do.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

Hi, schraf. I think zaron is admitting these accounts are contradictory, but that they are just "minor" contradictions. The Bible is inerrant, except when it isn't.When the Bible describes the sun going about the earth, that is a figure of speech. When Isaiah describes the earth as a disk and the sky as a tent, then it is actually describing an expanding universe. When angels stand on the four corners of the earth, that is a metaphor. When the Gospel writers contradict one another, that is "minor".But when the first two chapters of Genesis contradict basic facts in biology and geology, then modern science is wrong. Go figure.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

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At the time of Jesus, under Roman persecution, it was natural for them to believe the Messiah would save them from this, as they were the Chosen People of God.

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Actually, it was natural for them to think this because this is what the Old Testament scriptures said.-

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Many Jews were disappointed in their expectations.

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Actually, the only Jews who were disappointed were the followers of the Jesus cult. They were so shocked by the unexpected crucifiction of their "Messiah" that they had to go back and take Old Testament scriptures out of context to manufacture their own "prophecies".

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

How's this:Luke, presumably writing under divine inspiration, is giving the actual account, but Paul, with no claims of divine inspiration being made, was relying on his memory and may have had a few details mixed up. People can mix up details in their memories even for very important events.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

I dunno, nem. If Luke made a mistake I would think he would have put the same mistake into Paul's mouth, too.On the other hand, I suppose, Luke might have meant to write the same words in both places by miswrote one of them -- people do things like that, two.But I would think that Luke, being divinely inspired to write an inerrant work, would be the one to trust: both as to what actually happened and as to what Paul said what happened. But then I don't believe the Bible is inerrant, so maybe this is too naive?Anyway, both versions seems "logical" to me; what logical problems do you see? Are you thinking illogical in terms of inerrancy?What do you think about the possibility of scribal errors? That is, perhaps copyists made minor errors in transmitting these works, which were originally inerrant?

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

Oh! Like the Jesus Seminar does!

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus

Hi, Anne.The problem with the water analogy is that it seems pretty close to the Sabellian heresy. But it might be that the point being made in the analogy is different than what I am reading into it. That is the problem with using concrete analogies to try to explain something that is by its nature ineffable.

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Kings were put to death long before 21 January 1793. But regicides of earlier times and their followers were interested in attacking the person, not the principle, of the king. They wanted another king, and that was all. It never occurred to them that the throne could remain empty forever. -- Albert Camus