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Loading...This is the opening gambit in my debate with Rev. Matthew Firth on whether there are contradictions in the Gospels. I believe there are many. He believes there are none whatsoever. So who is right? I would strongly recommend that, if you are really interested in the matter, you actually look up the passages in question and see for yourself.
I will need to be brief on each one, since space is highly restricted. I ended up requiring 1300 words, and so obviously Rev. Firth can follow suit.
- I start with one that may seem completely unimportant, but is, to me, a clear contradiction. In Mark 5:21-24 a man named Jairus approaches Jesus in distress. His daughter is “very ill.” He wants Jesus to come heal her so she doesn’t die. Jesus agrees to go, but before he can get to Jairus’s home, he is delayed by a woman who herself desperately needs to be healed (5:25-34). While Jesus is dealing with her – it takes a while – someone comes from Jairus’s house to tell him that it is too late, the girl has now died (5:35). Jesus comforts Jairus, goes, and raises her from the dead. Matthew also tells the story (Matthew 9:18-26). But in this case …Matthew also tells the story (Matthew 9:18-26). But in this case Jairus comes to Jesus to tell him that “My daughter has just now died” (9:18). He wants him to raise her from the dead. Jesus goes and do so.
So the contradiction: when Jairus comes to Jesus: does he want him to heal his sick daughter, who unfortunately dies before Jesus can get there? Or does Jairus come only after the girl is dead, wanting Jesus to raise her from the dead?
To see more, inclucing three other contradictions that most people will find important — dealing with key passages of the Gospels — you will need to belong to the blog. Joining is quick, easy, and relatively cheap — just about 50 cents a week. You get a lot for that money. So why not join?
Click here to read “Contradictions in the Gospels – Rev Matthew Firth’s Response“
Bart: “In considering the question, note: both genealogies are *explicit* that this is the line of Joseph (not, for example, Mary … Moreover, the genealogies are patrilineal – not traced through mothers but explicitly through fathers to sons.”
I hate to bring this up about a fellow blog member, but even a nonfundamentalist professional biblical scholar such as Professor James Tabor misreads Lk 3,23 ὡς ἐνομίζετο to argue that Luke is really giving Jesus’ genealogy through Mary, thus reviving this old canard and giving aid and comfort to the fundamentalists.
Is there not some sanction that you can impose on James through the blog rules, UNC, or SBL?
Yes, that’s a serious misreading of the grammar, imho. BUT, as it turns out, I just asked James if he’d like to do some guest posts! 🙂
That would be great, I like Tabor’s books and think he’s an original, insightful thinker.
If James Tabor does a guest post, it might be interesting if he addressed the issue of Jesus birth – specifically the `Pantera“ story which I believe he thinks is a viable possibility. I think its an interesting take and something that is rarely discussed. Just a suggestion.
That would be great – and folks would probably also enjoy Dr Tabor’s thoughts on the linkages between 4Q521 ‘On Resurrection’ and the ‘signs’ that Jesus’s followers related to JB during his imprisonment (that the ‘signs’ may have their roots in Qumran). Much like the recent Joel Marcus guest post on JB, I would think it would likely spark interest. Not to staff Dr Tabor with more work…
The Matthew/Luke nativity account is the most blatantly obvious contradiction in the entire New Testament, and I believe Bart should have led off with it. It actually contains multiple contradictions, all of which have historical and logical connotations that have no basis in fact (the census, being in Egypt and Jerusalem at the same time, Herod’s slaughter of children, the traveling star, etc.). I haven’t seen Rev. Firth’s rebuttal, but it seems that the only possible rebuttal is to choose willful ignorance.
Bart, I like your examples.
I’ll share two contradictions that may not be so clear cut, but they amuse me.
In Luke 1:35, an angel explains to Mary that her coming son will be very special: “…the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.”
But Luke 2:48-50 reports that Mary doesn’t understand that Jesus is special: “When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, ‘Son, why have you treated us like this?…’ ‘Why were you searching for me?’ he asked. ‘Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?’ But they did not understand what he was saying to them.”
It seems Mary forgot about an angel explaining how Jesus is the Son of God.
Matthew has God the Father speak to a crowd at Jesus’s baptism, saying that Jesus is “my son.” Clearly Jesus has a favored status: “…a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased’” (Matthew 3: 17).
Later, Matthew 11:3 cites the question Jesus is to answer for John the Baptist: “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”
Was John the Baptist asleep at the baptism?
This is all very soundly reasoned, though I suspect it will not have much impact on Rev Firth’s camp. People who believe in an inerrant Bible start out with very different set of presuppositions. Still, conversation across this line is a good thing, IMO. I hope it goes well.
For those new to the blog Dr. Ehrman’s “Jesus Interrupted” is an excellent book about contradictions in the Gospels and I highly recommend it.
I think the most prominent contradictions are found in the birth and resurrection stories. I think it is particularly striking that there are such problems in the resurrection stories, as one can argue, as Paul did, that it is the most important doctrine of Christianity. Odd that they couldn’t keep their stories straight for such an important event.
No need to post this, but in case no one else has mentioned it. There appears to be a rogue private HTML tag at the end. I logged out and confirmed that the full text is available to non-members.
Looking forward to the back and forth this generates.
Thanks! I corrected it as soon as I saw your comment!
It’s all explained by quantum mechanics. The Christs (Joseph and Mary Christ, parents of Jesus Christ) were in a superposition of the two.
The return to galilee and stay in jerusalem views are very much irreconcilable .
Don’t forget John 20-21, where a week or more is spent in Jerusalem and then the action shifts to the Sea of Galilee! (John 21 is still my favorite of the Resurrection narratives).
Bart: “Yes, that’s a serious misreading of the grammar, imho. BUT, as it turns out, I just asked James if he’d like to do some guest posts!”
Well I think he should have to defend his misreading of ὡς ἐνομίζετο in Lk 3,23. And, in the meantime, perhaps I should let him know that his blog membership may be riding on this …
It is my experience that conservative Christians who believe in biblical inerrancy can never be convinced that any contradiction exists in the Bible. Why? Answer: Their faith is not based on evidence but upon the still, small voice that they believe talks to them in their heart (head). The fact of the matter is, any and all contradictions can be explained away if one tries hard enough to harmonize them. Mormons, Muslims, Hindus and others do the very same thing with the apparent contradictions in their holy books.
I believe that a more productive discussion with Rev. Firth would involve the following topics:
1. How do you know that the voice you hear “in your heart” is God and not simply…YOU?
2. The majority of scholars, including the majority of Roman Catholic scholars who very much believe in the supernatural and the bodily resurrection of Jesus, reject the claim that the Gospels were written by eyewitnesses or the associates of eyewitnesses. How strong is the evidence for the supernatural claims of Christianity, in particular, the Resurrection, if the four Gospels are not eyewitness sources? Just because all the apparent discrepancies in a story can be creatively harmonized does not prove that the story itself is historically true.
Such is the species nature of faith. It reminds me of Steve Martin’s method for getting $1,000,000, tax free!
1st; Get a million dollars, then
2nd:Tell the IRS the 2 simple words to not pay taxes: “I forgot”
Evidence just doesn’t matter at all. Like everyone else, I have relatives like this; it doesn’t matter what you tell them, what evidence you present, they just “choose” not to believe it.
There is also the absence of evidence for such a world-wide census at that time, plus that there is no earthly reason for everyone to return to his “own town to be registered,” and plenty of reasons not, starting with the chaos that would have resulted. Also, the point of a census was to establish a tax base, which only makes sense if you do it where people are living now.
When it came to identifying the 27 books of the NT, what is the logical explanation the church father(s) — or Athanasius, I suppose — had for including two gospels with contradictory geneologies? It’s one thing to have variances on events but genealogies? One can only assume contradictions were not edited out completely because no one was sure which one may be correct. Also, what is the earliest account of anyone pointing out such blatant issues?
They reconciled them! At least to their satisfaction. But they had to include both Gospels because by that time *everyone* agreed these were the ones, and the intellectuals couldn’t possibly get away with saying, Nope!
Prof Ehrman: If the genealogy is in fact patrilineal where’s the relationship to David for Jesus? Joseph wasn’t actually Jesus’ father after all, but doesn’t Hebrew scripture say the messiah will be descended from the house of David?
Curiouser and curiouser…..
Exactly!
Dr. Ehrman,
What do you think the situation is with “the 11/12” from 1 Cor. 15:5 (or in what direction do you lean?) Do you think that, as some say, “The 12” was basically a nickname given to the apostles whether there were always a literal 12 men at any given time or not? or Do you think Paul didn’t know the story about Judas? OR as others from the Jesus Seminar have said, perhaps the Judas story was just a later legend?
I’m inclined to think he didn’t know about Judas.
I’m not really sure where on the blog to attach this question so I’ll put it here:
In the gospel of Mark, Jesus’ disciples asked him where he wanted to eat Passover, he gave them specific instructions and they prepared it. When evening came (the beginning of the new day), Jesus ate the Passover meal with his disciples (meaning that it was now no longer the day of Preparation but Passover). Jesus was arrested later that evening, turned over to the authorities, crucified at nine in the morning of the next day and died shortly after three in the afternoon (which would still be on the day of Passover). Later that same day, as evening approached, Joseph of Arimathea collected Jesus’ body from Pilate and placed it in the tomb. Mark 15:42 indicates, however, that Joseph’s act of collecting the body occurred on Preparation Day even though earlier verses clearly have Jesus eating the Passover meal on Passover AFTER the day of Preparation.
This makes no sense. Is there a rational explanation for this apparent error in chronology? Am I reading this incorrectly?
It’s because any day before a festival, including the weekly Sabbath, was called the day of Preparation. You couldn’t cook on the festival day (including sabbath) so you prepared for the meal the day before. Jesus died, inthe Synoptics, on the Day of Preparation for Sabbath; but that year that day (Friday — always the day before the Sabbath) happened to be the day of Passover (the day *before* was the “Day of Preparation for Passover”). So there were two days of preparatino in a row. The food preparations for the two days had to be done on Thursday that year.
Ah. Two different but consecutive days of Preparation. OK. So the account in Mark puts the Passover on Friday and the Sabbath (of course) on Saturday. The account of Jesus’ crucifixion in John, however, appears to put both the Passover and the Sabbath on the same day: Jesus is presented to the Jews by Pilate on the day of Preparation for the Passover around noon (John 19:14) and Jesus dies later that same day on the day of Preparation for the Sabbath (John 19:30-31).
1) Is it possible that the Passover and the Sabbath could occur on the same day and, if so, that the preceding day could then be correctly referred to both as the day of Preparation for Passover and as the day of Preparation for the Sabbath?
2) The account in Mark has Jesus being crucified and dying ON Passover before the Sabbath while the account in John has him crucified and dying on the day BEFORE Passover (and also before the Sabbath.) Is there a rational explanation for THIS apparent conflict? Am I reading this incorrectly (given my misunderstanding in my previous question)?
1. Yup, that definitely happened some years (Just as Christmas is sometimes on Sunday); in John that’s what it’s called a “Great Sabbath” (19:31) — it’s a Sabbath with another festival on it. 2. That’s right. That’s why in John Jesus does not eat a Passover meal with his disciples. John appears to have changed the day of Jesus’ death so that he would die on the same day, at the same hour, and at the hands of the same people (the chief priests) as the Passover Lamb (day of Preparation for Passover, after noon)
Dear Mr. Ehrman,
I was reading an Apologist’s book. The author’s claim was (I am writing a summary):
“In the Hellenistic period, people did not expect perfect non-contradiction from texts. Thematic ordering was more important than chronological order. People in Hellenistic times did not think as they do today.”
However, as far as I know, biblical contradictions were taken seriously even in the Hellenistic period. Porphyrios reads the last chapter of Jesus’ life horizontally and says that the Gospels are contradictory.
Frankly, I’m a little confused. What did people in the Hellenistic period think? Was thematic ordering important to people in the Hellenistic period?
Thank you.
Like now, there were lots of different peole with lots of different views. Most historians certainly wanted to get things right, even if they arranged their accounts outside of strict chronological sequence. But preciseion in the modern sense was hard to come by: there just weren’t the research methods and data retrieveal systems to make it possible.
Firstly we do not know that Jesus was crucified on a Friday as we have no contemporaneous non biblical evidence. I know various individuals have suggested certain years and dates but the fact remains that we have nothing conclusive.
The theological implications of Jesus dying as the paschal lambs are being slaughtered cannot be ignored. As with the lamb none of his bones are broken. And Paul is the first to compare Jesus with the paschal lamb.
Secondly, all three synoptic writers have the disciples asking Jesus where he wants to celebrate Passover and each of those accounts has this question being asked on the Day of Unleavened Bread – Matthew and Mark refer to it as the First Day of Unleavened Bread. Given that the first day of unleavened bread is 15 Nissan those accounts suggest that this meal, which again Matthew and Mark refer to as being partaken in the evening [both use the Greek Ὀψίας] it follows that this meal would have taken place at the end of 15 Nissan. That would place the arrest etc. occurring in the early hours of darkness on 16 Nissan and the execution taking place later that same day.
As an addendum. Would Pilate really have been overly concerned about executing three criminals during the Jewish holidays? These interrogations were entirely Roman affairs despite the gospel accounts of Jewish mobs being present. Likewise the executions, again despite the gospels portrayals, which in John have the Jews actually carrying out the crucifixion.
Regardless of the “bad press” Pilate received from Josephus and Philo, some of which might be justified, he clearly was doing his job successfully insofar as Rome was concerned given that he held his post for some ten years.