The Tools Of Integrated-Apologetics Course 1.4.1
Analyzing Bible Difficulties
Dr. Johnson C. Philip & Dr. Saneesh Cherian
Chapter-I
The Categories Of Difficulties In The Bible
History tells us that the attempt to find difficulties and contradictions in the Bible is thousands of years old. Over these millennia several thousand alleged difficulties have shaken many Bible-believing Christians, but the actual number of difficulties is far less than it at first appears. Careful analysis shows that these difficulties fall into certain categories, the total of which is not more than about two dozen.
This means that instead of a few thousand different difficulties in the Bible, there are less than two dozen types of difficulties to answer, most of which are not really difficulties at all. The actual number looks so large because hundreds of examples of same type are found, inflating the total number. Of these two dozen categories, only about a dozen are of any serious interest and it is only these we mention in this work.
Difficulties, problems, and apparent contradictions arise because of the following reasons:
1–Difficulties Arising From The Original Text: All of us know that the Holy Scriptures are absolutely infallible and inerrant, but this applies only to the original writings (or autograph). Today we do not have the original autographs with us. What we have are copies which have come to us through centuries of hand-copying.
Any type of copying is bound to introduce errors of spelling, repetition, omission, and others; the problem is compounded when this process of hand-copying is repeated for hundreds or thousands of years without the help of modern writing aids. In fact many of the ancient non-biblical books have altered so much in this process that in some cases up to 90% of the extant text of a book is corrupted. However, those men who copied the books of the Bible knew that they were not handling an ordinary book, so they took exceptional care during hand-copying. As a result, the number of errors that have crept into the biblical manuscripts are minimal, compared to other ancient manuscripts.
The hand-copying process resulted in some errors of translation in the King James Version, that most people use in English. Some of these errors have crept into other languages also because of the same influence. However, the tens of thousands of ancient biblical manuscripts available today have helped Bible scholars to restore the original text with great certainty. Another difficulty of the original text is the language. The ancient Hebrews did not write like contemporary authors. Their written language had only capital letters. Further, their alphabet contains no vowels and, to compound the problem, the words were not separated from one another. Thus the original written form of Genesis 1:1 might have looked something like: NTHBGGNNNGGDCRTD…
and 1 John 1:9 might have looked like:
FWCNFSSRSNSHSFTHFL…
These examples are given in English, but are sufficient to explain what the biblical text might have looked like in its original Hebrew. The words were finally separated, and vowels inserted, by modern scribes. Even a single wrong division or insertion of vowel by them could drastically change the meaning of the original, though the original text is still intact. Further, instead of numerals, the ancient Hebrews used letters of the alphabet to express numbers. Thus names and words could often be numbers and vice versa, adding to the potential problems.
Interestingly most copyists’ errors are of such a nature that they do not affect the essential nature of the message of the Bible. Nor do any such errors affect any major doctrine of the Bible. This is because most of the errors are related to spelling and numbers (such as some ages mentioned in the chronologies) which do not affect the Bible’s message.
A good proportion of the alleged difficulties are based upon the King James Version of the Bible which was translated about four hundred years ago. But since this translation has been done, archaeologists have discovered thousands of ancient biblical manuscripts, some of which are more than two thousand years old. The science of recovering the original text by comparison of these manuscripts has developed to a high degree of precision, and many scholars have painstakingly worked out the original text with great certainty. All of this has helped scholars to make the newer translations like the New American Standard Bible and the New King James Version more accurate, even in trivial matters like numbers and ages mentioned in genealogies. It must be understood very clearly that there is no other ancient book of comparable age and size which is represented by so many ancient manuscripts and therefore we are fully able to reconstruct the original autographs to a high level of precision without actually having them in our possession. Secondly, even though many errors had crept into the manuscripts used for making translations like the KJV, most of the errors (over 90%) were insignificant in nature. The small number of significant errors do not affect sincere readers because, by comparison of different manuscripts, the original words are being retrieved. In essence, no copyist’s error has affected the essential message of the Bible and the remaining non-significant errors are now being corrected by scholars involved in Textual Criticism.
2–Difficulties Arising Out Of Translation Problems: Translating matter recorded in one language into another is quite difficult. The difficulty increases many fold when idiomatic expressions from an extinct language, representing the speech pattern of an ancient society, have to be translated into present-day speech. The problems faced by Bible translators are beyond imagination, and these difficulties will automatically introduce many unknown errors into the translated text.
Sometimes a Hebrew or Greek word can be translated by many different words in another language, none of which might be adequate for a satisfactory translation. Translators can choose only one word, but that choice might not be fully appropriate. Further, if they use the same word throughout the Bible to translate the original word, they are being to narrow, and their language becomes too rigid. On the other hand, if they use different words in different places (as the context demands) to translate the same word in the original, then they may raise many other possible difficulties to the reader as well as for the expositor. As a consequence, every translation has to depend upon numerous carefully weighed compromises, and this is bound to cause many problems when the translation is widely circulated.
The original autographs of the Bible were verbally inspired by God, and therefore they are inerrant and infallible, but the same is not true of translations. The paraphrases are removed further from the original text. Even the most faithful translation of the Bible contains some paraphrases, biases of the translators, wrong equivalents, and also archaisms. Archaic words are those which have lost or changed their original meaning so that they no longer mean what the translator intended them to mean.
In addition to this, the Hebrew of the Old Testament and the Greek of the New Testament uses hundreds of different figures of speech. It is not always easy for a translator to recognize them, and even after a correct recognition, it is not always easy to convey the full meaning into another language. In I Thessalonians. 4:4 there is an expression about possessing one’s "vessel", an expression not at all easy for the translator. The Greek word used here for vessel may mean not only an actual vessel, but also a ship, the human body, and also one’s wife. Even though all these meanings do not have equal weight for this Greek word, they are all important to understanding the correct meaning of the commandment. This puts the translator in a very difficult position because no other language in the world may have an exactly equivalent word, with all these meanings attached to it. Many difficulties arise out of these problems of translations.
Instances of translation-related problems abound both in the Bible as well as in common life. For example’ "hitting the bull’s eye" is in common use in English. But many non-English translators have translated this expression literally into their languages (when translating books), creating havoc with the message. When translating the Bible it is common to find non-English speakers translating "the lamb of God" into their native languages as "God’s sheep’s child".
Today many wonder about the use of the term "sister" for lover in Song Of Solomon 4:9. The problem has been created by a literal translation of an endearing word that does not make sense to a non-Hebrew. The Scriptures have many sex-related words that sounded perfectly normal to the Hebrews, but that might be offensive to others if translated literally. Thus the translators are forced to substitute euphemisms, or even symbolic words instead of making an accurate translation.
3–Difficulties Arising Out Of False Interpretation Of The Bible: The Bible speaks about numerous subjects: history, geography, politics, ethics, psychology, human relationships, etc. These statements have definite and clear cut meanings because God does not deal in ambiguities. However, this does not imply that every person will necessarily understand everything found in the Bible. No human being can understand all human truth, and therefore it naturally follows that NO human can understand the whole of the divine truth.
Once a difficulty arises in the Bible, the human mind tries to solve the problem by substituting a possible interpretation for the intended meaning. Obviously all interpretations will have a human prejudice in them and therefore the number of such interpretations might increase. Some of these interpretations might violently contradict the ideas cherished by others, and this might upset many people about the Bible. But the problem here is not with the Bible, but with the differing viewpoints of the people who are trying to bring out the possible meaning or implication of the biblical text under consideration.
Many times people’s philosophical backgrounds bias them to such an extent that they start viewing the Bible in the light of these wrong notions. For example, for thousands of years people all over the world were under the influence of the Aristotelian cosmology, according to which the earth is flat and also the center of the solar system. Since this was the most dominant idea, almost all the people who read the Bible (laymen as well as scholars), interpreted many passages in the Bible to imply that the earth is the center of the solar system. Thus when the heliocentric view (according to which the sun is the center of the solar system) was advanced, a number of theologians rose up to oppose this view. They were all labouring under the false notion that the Bible conforms to their Aristotelian philosophy, and that if anyone dared to question this philosophy, he was questioning the Bible.Nothing could be farther from the truth, but this kind of behavior can be seen even today.
Even now there are people who believe that the earth is flat and that all the pictures which show the earth to be a sphere are clever fakes. Interestingly, many of these people claim that they have come to this conclusion about the solar system from their study of the Bible. However, to an honest reader, who is willing to permit the use of figurative expressions in describing natural phenomena, it will become obvious that the Bible supports neither the concept of a flat earth, nor the geocentric/heliocentric solar systems.
When the activities of the infinite God are expressed using the finite language and limited concepts of mankind, difficulties are bound to arise. Most of the difficulties are of predictable nature, and this is why we are studying the categories of difficulties. Once people are familiar with the commonest types of errors, they will be in a good position to tackle old as well as new problems when they are thrown at them.
4–Difficulties Arising Out Of A Wrong Conception Of The Bible: Many people think that when we say that the Bible is the word of God, of divine origin and authority, then it means that every statement in the Bible has come from the mouth of God. But this is definitely a wrong notion. The Bible contains a record of what regenerate AND fallen men have spoken, what the good AND the fallen angels have spoken, and also what God has spoken. Divine inspiration only implies that all that is recorded has actually taken place exactly as stated in the word of God. It does not imply that all of it represents truth. Rather, both the truth as well as the false statements of men and spirit beings, and even of animals, are recorded so that we might be instructed and warned when we study them in the light of the entire revealed word of God.
For example, the fool’s comment that ‘there is no God’ is not recorded to imply that it is true, but to instruct us in what a human heart thinks when it is bent upon foolishness. The story of Jephthah in Judges 11, in which he vows to sacrifice that which comes to meet him, is not to approve what he did but rather to demonstrate the folly of hasty decisions. The story of the unrighteous steward is recorded in Luke chapter 16 not to commend his unrighteousness, but rather to demonstrate how wise the worldly people are in money matters. A good portion of the book of Ecclesiastes demonstrates how regenerated persons think when they are out of fellowship with God.
All kinds of statements uttered by men and spirit beings, and even by animals, are recorded in the Bible, not to approve them but to instruct us in what is right and what is wrong. All statements must be examined in the light of the entire word of God to see what God wants us to learn from them. In Daniel 2:11 we find a very interesting reference to the polytheistic ideas of the wise men who attended King Nebuchadnezzar’s court. But this does not mean that the Bible condones polytheism. Similarly, comparing Isaiah 36:10 with 37:6 brings out a false claim, but it does not imply that the Scriptures endorse it.
5–Difficulties Arising Out Of The Type Of Language In Which The Bible Was Written: The Bible is a Book for all times, ages, and for all kinds of people, therefore it is written in a language which is not ‘dated’. It uses common people’s language instead of technical jargon. Technical books are written for a limited readership, and they become outdated very soon, but the Bible was written for every person ever to be born, to serve generation after generation without ever becoming outdated. This is the reason why the Bible uses expressions like ‘the sun rises’, but this does not imply that sun revolves around the earth. Even in this twenty-first century we speak of the ‘rising’ and ’setting’ of the sun though we know that sun is not, in reality, rising. Since the Bible is a Book for all people of all ages, it also uses similar language of accommodation.
Also, prose, poetry, and prophecy have different ways of expressing truth, and they should never be mingled or confused with each other. A good example of such language is found in Leviticus 26:19 which says "And I will break the pride of your power; and I will make your heaven as iron, and your earth as brass". The prophecy only implies a condition of rainlessness, not that the skies will become iron and that the earth will actually become brass.
6–Difficulties Arising Out Of Our Incomplete Knowledge Of The Customs, History, Geography And The Society Of Bible Times: Though archaeologists have amassed a vast wealth of knowledge about Biblical times, our understanding of the past is not yet complete in any way. Because of this, many expressions and events mentioned in the Bible pose some difficulty to readers. The tremendous amount of archaeological information that has been discovered in recent times, however, have been solving many of these difficulties. One such difficulty is the drinking of wine mentioned in the Bible. Most people who are offended by reading about this are ignorant of the three different ways in which most cultures treat alcoholic drinks. Alcohol is used as medicine, as part of food, and for getting intoxicated. When wine is mentioned in the Bible, most of the time it is part of the food, where there is no hint of intoxication. It is used in this way in numerous agricultural societies. This includes many societies in India too. Also, there are many suggestions from historical records that many times the wine used as part of food was not intoxicating at all. The reason why tax-collectors were hated, how salt can lose it flavour, and what "putting fire on the enemy’s head" meant can be understood only if we understand the cultures in the context of which these things were spoken.
7–Difficulties Arising Out Of Our Ignorance Of The Conditions Under Which A Certain Book Was Written Or A Certain Commandment Was Given: The meaning and significance of certain books like Esther, Song Of Solomon, and Ecclesiastes can be understood only if one knows the conditions under which these books were written. Also, certain commandments like the one given to exterminate all of the Canaanites can be understood only if we understand the degeneration of those people, and the impossibility of reforming them. Let us consider the example of the book called Song Of Solomon. Many people are shocked when they read this book because it contains many statements related to the love between a man and his right woman. In fact such kinds of reaction to this book has given rise to a host of ways in which the meaning and message of this book are interpreted. However, the first thing that we must understand is that "reaction" is never the proper criterion by which to evaluate, judge or interpret something in the Word of God. The second thing to understand in this connection is that marriage is a divine institution, declared holy by God. The contemporary attitude to marriage and related subjects is not the result of Christian thinking. Rather, pagan philosophies and movements have so much vulgarised and profaned the subject that many people shun all discussion of these subjects. But it is not reasonable to expect the Word of God to shun the discussion of a subject merely because people have profaned the subject. This is a modern phenomenon originating in the perversions of Western society. The Eastern societies, however, have always considered marriage sacred and discussion of such subjects an essential part of training society — especially the young and people of marriageable age. It was a kind of premarital counseling in these societies, and seen in that light the book takes on a new meaning. In fact there are many such things in the Bible about which people feel uncomfortable. But it must be pointed out that in almost all such cases, people judge the Word of God in the light of pagan ideas and philosophies which they have so firmly accepted that they don’t know that they are doing !!
8–Difficulties Arising Out Of The Many-Sidedness Of The Bible: We all have certain preconceptions, prejudices, and a philosophy of looking at things, and this makes our thoughts one-sided. For example, among theologians there are both Calvinists as well as Arminianists, even though neither of them might have perceived the full truth. God’s truth is many-sided, and none of us can comprehend it all in our lifetimes. As a consequence, one aspect of truth might appear to contradict another, even though there is no REAL contradiction. For example, under the influence of humanistic philosophies many people are able to see only the ‘love’ aspect of life, but not the discipline or balance aspect. Such people speak against all forms of discipline and punishment without realising what they are actually doing — sheltering the criminal and abandoning the innocent to danger. Such people are horrified at the thought of capital punishment mentioned in the Bible because it hurts their emotions, but at the same time they exhibit an attitude of apathy towards the persons who were assaulted, murdered, or raped by the criminal who is now facing the capital punishment.
9–The Infiniteness Of God And The Finiteness Of Our Understanding: God and His wisdom are infinite. It is not possible to describe His thoughts and dealings accurately, using our limited human language. As a consequence, when God’s acts and attitudes are expressed in human language, difficulties are bound to arise. If we are sufficiently conscious of the fact that the finite mind cannot in any way fully comprehend the Infinite, much frustration will be avoided. Questions related to the sovereignty of God and our free will, the problem of pain and evil under a just God, etc. come into this category. Since there has to be some way of speaking about the infinite God in spite of linguistic limitations, two practices are common in the Bible: describing the acts and thoughts of God in terms of human activity, and using human terms to describe what God thinks or does. Both of these practices have their communication value, but if pressed to the extreme, they can give rise to non-existent problems. For example, when the Bible speaks of God "repenting" over something, it must not be confused with the repentance which humans undergo. These two activities are entirely different, but the writers use the same words to describe them because we do not have other suitable words. It is foolish to debate over such words when they are only what are called "anthropomorphisms" and "anthropopathisms".
10–Difficulties Arising Out Of Fallacies Of Logic: Logic is the foundation of all clear thinking, reasoning and communication. But when a large number of interdependent subjects are discussed, people tend to make errors of logic in their deductions and interpretations. This behaviour becomes very prominent with those people who are preoccupied with their own biases and subjectivity. They hear what was not said, deduce what was not intended, and make conclusions which are not warranted in the normal course. For an example let us look at the following statements:
(A)–All dogs have four legs
(B)–All tables have four legs
Though both the statements above are true in themselves, it is wrong to conclude that since both objects have the same number of legs, all dogs are tables. In the same way, it is wrong to put two statements from the Bible together to arrive at conclusions that are not intended by the writer/speaker.
11–Difficulties Which Arise When The Precise Nature Of A Statement Is Not Understood: Every language contains several types of statements. Some are very general in nature, while others are highly restrictive. Some are affirmative, subjunctive, speculative or figurative. Sometimes it is difficult to translate the precise sense of the original into other languages, while at other times even experienced translators overlook this peculiarity. At still other times one statement in the original language might admit or contain more than one sense while the translator is restricted to conveying one single sense. While this type of difficulty usually does not hinder seekers from discerning the possible meaning, which is sufficient for their edification, persons who read the Bible with the express intent of discrediting it will surely find a problem here. Also, most expositors point out these possibilities during the course of their expository messages and therefore people who are given to serious study usually overcome these difficulties in the course of their Bible study. To clarify the matter, let us consider the common English word "can". It is a word which most of us use commonly in our everyday conversation. Interestingly, this common and simple word can be used in a number of different ways. Depending on the construction of the sentence and the mood and tone of the speaker it can express potential, permission, or even a stern order! Hence it is the nature of the sentence which dictates the precise meaning that is to be attached to this word. If this word under consideration has been used by someone to express a possibility, but someone else interprets it as permission, then strange interpretations may come out of it which will be completely opposite in meaning to what the speaker intended. Consider the following : "You can sin". When it is used to express a possibility, it might mean "You can (fall into) sin (if you are careless)". But a careless interpretation can distort it to mean "(You have permission so that now) you can sin”! This is enough to demonstrate why one should be careful to discern the nature of a sentence before it is labelled as a problem passage.
12–Difficulties Of Numbers: Numbers have been used throughout the Bible in connection with money, measurement, age, the number of people in a group, or the number of things, etc. Sometimes the reckoning is approximate while at other times it is exact. Today also we see similar practices in connection with quoting of numerical figures. Where only the approximate value is required people round off the figure while where precision is required people quote numbers with sufficient accuracy, even up to several decimal places. It is the same in the Bible. A good example of this kind of statement is found in Numbers 14:30. On a cursory reading of this verse it might seem that only two persons, Caleb and Joshua, from the original number, entered Canaan. However, the speaker (God) fully knew that the actual number of people who entered Canaan was tens of thousands. Yet He quoted the small figure of two because He had qualified (in the previous verses) the number that He is quoting, so that this figure no longer represents the total. On the other hand, when measurements related to buildings and vessels are given, most of the figures tend to be exact specifications. The best example is the specification given for the huge tank built for the temple of Solomon. The figures given in the Bible (I Kings 7:23-26) are so exact that they can be used to calculate the value of ‘pi’ (circumference/diameter) accurately up to two decimal places (i.e.3.14). Critics have raised many problems related to numbers. Many of these look like problems because the way in which these numbers have been used had not been determined by the translators/interpreters.
13–Problems Related To The Dullness Of Our Spiritual Perception: Even spiritually mature people have not reached the final knowledge or understanding that is necessary in spiritual matters. Even in mature people, spiritual perception still remains so dull that it can be compared to seeing an image in smoked or ground glass or mirror. Also, answers to many classes of problems can be understood only by spiritually discerning people, and they will remain problematic issues for immature persons who have only a very dull spiritual perception. Concerning doctrinal issues, they cannot be understood by unregenerate people because such subjects can be understood only with the help of the Holy Spirit, and this help is available only to believers in Christ. Problems dealing with God’s justice, the presence of evil, injustice, and suffering in God’s creation, and the untold miseries suffered by the innocent are some of the difficult problems in this category. If unregenerate persons, or believers who have not grown significantly, have difficulty with these problems it is only natural. They are trying to understand matters for which they do not have any mental or spiritual preparation or background. Even spiritual maturity is not a guarantee that we will comprehend all the answers. Many times believers obtain a better view of the whole matter only after passing through a personal crisis or misery. After the crisis is over, they might reflect and find that God allowed it all only for their spiritual good.
CONCLUSION
There are many people all around us who would like to discredit the Bible somehow or other. One standard tactic of such people is to raise many ‘difficulties’ in the Bible. They argue that if the Bible is the Word of God then there should not be any difficulties. The first thing that we should note about these people is that they are being naive! In fact, in any person-to-person communication of substantial length, difficulties are bound to arise. This is more so when finite humans try to understand the infinite God. The second thing to understand is that most of the difficulties advanced by the critics fall into certain definite categories. Knowing these categories of difficulties will help us to understand the reason for the difficulty and to solve it. We face difficulties even in simple books written by human beings. Therefore it is to be understood that the Book that has been written by God, and which tries to capture that acts of the infinite God in the finite languages of humans, will cause its readers some difficulties. These difficulties do not discredit the Bible in any way, and they do not hinder the communication of the main message of the Bible. Rather, if such difficulties were absent then one would have wondered whether it is God’s word, or a carefully written and edited book produced by mere humans.
Analyzing Bible Difficulties
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