Goliath

The bible is allegedly the word of the xian god. If it is inerrant, then it is the xian god's fault.

Sheesh, I learned that in sunday school when I was 6 or 7 years old...

Sincerely,

Goliath

Steven Carr

As pointed out already, God says less and less as the Bible goes on.

Joshua 1
1 After the death of Moses the servant of the LORD , the LORD said to Joshua son of Nun, Moses' aide: 2 "Moses my servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them-to the Israelites. 3 I will give you every place where you set your foot, as I promised Moses. 4 Your territory will extend from the desert to Lebanon, and from the great river, the Euphrates-all the Hittite country-to the Great Sea on the west. 5 No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life.

The Israelites never controlled all these territories.

Joshua 13
1 When Joshua was old and well advanced in years, the LORD said to him, "You are very old, and there are still very large areas of land to be taken over.

2 "This is the land that remains: all the regions of the Philistines and Geshurites: 3 from the Shihor River on the east of Egypt to the territory of Ekron on the north, all of it counted as Canaanite (the territory of the five Philistine rulers in Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gath and Ekron-that of the Avvites); 4 from the south, all the land of the Canaanites, from Arah of the Sidonians as far as Aphek, the region of the Amorites, 5 the area of the Gebalites ; and all Lebanon to the east, from Baal Gad below Mount Hermon to Lebo Hamath.

God admits there is still land to be taken over, although Joshua 21 says '43 So the LORD gave Israel all the land he had sworn to give their forefathers, and they took possession of it and settled there. 44 The LORD gave them rest on every side, just as he had sworn to their forefathers. Not one of their enemies withstood them; the LORD handed all their enemies over to them. 45 Not one of all the LORD's good promises to the house of Israel failed; every one was fulfilled.'

So not one of the Lord's good promises failed, although the Lord stated that he had not delivered over the land, and so his promises had failed.

Madkins007

Steven- thanks, this is EXACTLY what I am looking for! It is to the same speaker (Joshua), confirmable, and appears straightforward enough. I appreciate it!

Madkins007

The 'pi=3', 'locusts with 4 legs', and 'bats are birds' bits are terrible examples of 'errors' since they assume that the culture that recorded the information was stupid.

How on Earth could artisians have made the great works of art they did if they really thought that pi was 3? They may not have known it to too many decimal places, and they may not have had any formulas, but if they really thought that pi was 3 then they would not have been able to make good wheels for the carts or any of a hundred other applications requiring at least some precision.

The locusts bit would require even more stupidity on the recorder's part as they actually ate these things at times and how stupid would you have to be to not notice the extra legs?

Besides- (I can't resist this, sorry!) "If it is inerrant, then it is the xian god's fault"- it hardly seems fair to say it is His 'fault' if it is without error! I am also not sure it is fair or accurate to say something like 'if it is ERRONEOUS, then it is the xian god's fault' as we can already demonstrate that there HAVE been human errors in other aspects of the bible's history and I don't know anyplace god promised that the bible as we have it would be perfect (even though many churches teach this.)

Goliath

Not at all. They just show that the allegedly omnipotent, omniscient god who (allegedly) wrote these things made a mistake...somehow...

Don't know, not relevant to the discussion, and don't care.

But that's the point: it isn't without error.

Again, the bible is supposed to be the word of your god. Your god is allegedly perfect, whence the bible must contain no errors. But it does.....

Sheesh, do I have to present your arguments for you?

Sincerely,

Goliath

Sparrow

One can easily make a circle without even knowing the concept of Pi, much less any approximation of its value.

Dean Anderson

Well, limiting your criteria to places where Yahweh says something that is demonstrably wrong makes it tough for the simple reason that Yahweh doesn't actually speak directly to people that much.

Still, here are three to get you going. The first and third are often quoted on these boards, but I have yet to see the second one discussed...

1) Genesis 2:17 - Yahweh directly tells Adam that he will die the day he eats the fruit. As the serpent points out, this is a direct lie and Adam lives for another 930 years.

2) Genesis 6:3 - Yahweh decides that humans are living too long and announces that he is resetting their aging so that they will live for 120 years from now on. Unfortunately, people don't live for 120 years. Most die a long time before that, and a few rare individuals have lived longer than that (and some biblical figures such as those in Genesis 11 are quoted as living over 200 years).

3) Exodus 17:14 - Yahweh announces that he will completely blot out Amaleq from memory and no-one shall remember it's existence. Unfortunately, there is a permanent reminder of the existence of Amaleq recorded in the book of Exodus itself!

zjallen

If I recall (I don't have my bible with me, darn), arn't the first two creations stories in Genesis contradictory? I beleive if my memory serves me the first one talks about how God made everything (the heaves, planet, animals) in 5 days, then man on the 6th, and rested on the 7th. In one of the next passages, it says he made man first, then made all the animals as potentials companions, then came up with the woman idea. Aside from the two being contradictory, it makes you wonder how a omnipotent being can have a "eureka" moment and think of woman after trying to mix man with horses and dogs and fish and Him only knows what else. The story of woman being created from man's rib is often told to me by creationists as being proved true by men having one less rib, I don't know which church camp they heard this from as any doctor will tell you otherwise.

I think that's right, someone correct me if I'm wrong.

GakuseiDon

(1), yes; (2), maybe; (3) no, not an error.

So what can you tell me about the Amalekites? Do we even know what the Amalekites called themselves?

The work "Amalek" has the meaning "becoming dispirited through loss of spirit as a result of hard labour and continuous toil" - hardly a name that they gave themselves. http://www.betemunah.org/watchman/am...l#_Toc35568176. It came also to be associated with "intellectual doubt". The author in the link identifies Christianity as symbolic 'Amalekites'.

I must admit I have a little chuckle whenever I see this brought up by contradictionalists. It's ironic that the "error" symbolizing "intellectual doubt" is accepted so uncritically!

Dominus Paradoxum

Well, I do have moral errors, and these are all done or commanded by God, so they fit your criteria:

(NAB)Hosea 14:1: “Samaria shall expiate her guilt, for she has rebelled against her God. They shall fall by the sword, their little ones shall be dashed to pieces, their expectant mothers shall be ripped open.�

(NIV)Samuel 15: 2-3: “This is what the LORD Almighty says: 'I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt. 3 Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy [1] everything that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.' �

(NIV)Exodus 21: 20:21: “If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, 21 but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property.�

(NIV)Ezekiel 5: 8-10: 8 “Therefore this is what the Sovereign LORD says: I myself am against you, Jerusalem, and I will inflict punishment on you in the sight of the nations. 9 Because of all your detestable idols, I will do to you what I have never done before and will never do again. 10 Therefore in your midst fathers will eat their children, and children will eat their fathers. I will inflict punishment on you and will scatter all your survivors to the winds.�

(NIV)2 Kings 2: 23-24: 23 “From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some youths came out of the town and jeered at him. "Go on up, you baldhead!" they said. "Go on up, you baldhead!" 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the LORD . Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the youths.�

(NAB)Deutoeronomy 21: 18-21 “If a man has a stubborn and unruly son who will not listen to his father or mother, and will not obey them even though they chastise him, 19 his father and mother shall have him apprehended and brought out to the elders at the gate of his home city, 20 where they shall say to those city elders, 'This son of ours is a stubborn and unruly fellow who will not listen to us; he is a glutton and a drunkard.' 21 Then all his fellow citizens shall stone him to death. Thus shall you purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel, on hearing of it, shall fear.

(NAB)Exodus 20: 5 “For I, the LORD, your God, am a jealous God, inflicting punishment for their fathers' wickedness on the children of those who hate me, down to the third and fourth generation;�