Are there contradictions in the Bible?
When I was a new Christian, someone showed me the apparent contradictions between the creation accounts
in Genesis 1 and Genesis 2. According to Genesis 1:
- God made the trees on day three
- The birds from water on day five
- And the animals on day six, all before man.
Genesis 2 records the creation of trees, animals, and
birds from dirt on day six, all after man. This apparent contradiction disappears when one reads in Genesis 2
that the events in that chapter describe the events regarding the creation of the items in the Garden of Eden only.
God knew Satan could come and say he had created all things if Adam did not actually witness God?s creative power.
God made Adam on the sixth day, put him in the garden, made some trees to grow before Adam, then made 1 more of each
of the animals so that Adam could name them and select a wife. The rest of the world was already full of plants and
animals from earlier in the week.
Many scoffers have sited I Kings 4:26 "And Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots, and twelve
thousand horsemen" and II Chron. 9:25 "And Solomon had four thousand stalls for horses and chariots, and twelve thousand
horsemen" as a contradiction. There is no contradiction. He had 40,000 stalls for horses yet only 4,000 stalls for the chariots.
They had 10 men and 10 horses per chariot in case they got a "flat tire." See II Sam 10:18 "And the Syrians fled before
Israel; and David slew the men of seven hundred chariots of the Syrians," and I Chron. 119:18 "But the Syrians fled before
Israel; and David slew of the Syrians seven thousand men which fought in chariots," to show the same point.
The men of 700 chariots would be 7000 men.
Numbers 25:9 tells us, "And those that died in the plague were twenty and four thousand." Yet, I Cor 10:8 says, "Neither let us
commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day three and twenty thousand." Scoffers who cannot read well see
a contradiction here also, but it is obvious that 1000 died later of the same plague.
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Aristotle's dictum stated that when a critic criticized a document, the benefit of the doubt goes to the document
not to the critic. No one has ever proven a contradiction in God's Word though thousands have tried.
The Bible is the anvil that has worn out many hammers.
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This topic is covered in more detail with pictures and calculations in the seminar notebook.
We offer a great book (even though the author is a little sarcastic with his response to the scoffers questions)
that deals with all of the other so-called contradictions or problem passages in the Bible.
The book is called Errors in the King James Bible and costs about $14.95.
