When Were Languages Divided?

I received the following question:

In Genesis 11:1 it says the whole earth had one language, yet in chapter 10 it says how they were divided according to their languages. Is this another thing like Genesis 1 and 2 where the first chapter is overview and second chapter is detailed?

Yes, Genesis 10 declares an overview of what happened, whereas Genesis 11 goes back and explains it in more detail.

I am not sure that Genesis 2 is entirely just a more detailed repetition of chapter 1. It does offer more detail about the creation of Adam on day 6. I don’t think much else is a repeat, however.

David’s Census

I received the following question:

I was reading through 1 Chronicles last night and today.  I came upon the census of David (chapter 21).  I specifically remembered that in 2 Samual 24 that “He [the Lord] moved David against them to say, ‘go number Israel and Judah’.”  And the number was 800000 and 500000 for Israel and Judah. Chronicles documents it as 1100000 and 470000.

Also chronicles states that “Satan stood up against Israel and moved David to number Israel.“  Much of the conversations are different, but it intrigues me why the Lord would offer the same choice to David and why David would conduct two censuses.

Also I am wondering if there were in fact two censuses because of 1 Chronicles 27:24.  I was interested in your thoughts on this  … eh hem … ‘contradiction’.  I’ll keep looking at and perhaps the truth will hit me. As I said before I would be interested in your thoughts too.

I believe that the answer here lies in the exact designations given to each category.

Contradictions: Wrath in Jeremiah

I received the following question:

There was an article in “The Onion” that suggested a contradiction in the Bible. I’m not sure how genuine the article content is, as this publication is supposed to be a satirical one!

Slight Inconsistency Found In Bible
             
STILLWATER, OK–The world’s theological community is in an uproar following Monday’s discovery of a slight inconsistency in the Bible. “I was reading Jeremiah 17:4, in which God says, ‘Ye have kindled a fire in mine anger, which shall burn forever,’” said Pastor Theodore Strait of First Lutheran Church in Stillwater. “And I immediately recalled Jeremiah 3:12, which says, ‘For I am merciful, saith the Lord, and I will not keep anger forever.’ I thought, how can this possibly be? The Bible, contradicting itself?” Biblical scholars are scrambling to explain the strange paradox, believed to be the first time a passage in the Bible has been found to contain flaws in logic.

In Jeremiah there are indeed these two statements.  The author of this article, though, has failed to take into account the contexts of these statements, a failure which is usually the case in any accusation against the Bible.

Alone But Not Alone

I was asked the following question:

In I Thessalonians 3:1-2, Paul is saying that “we thought it best to be in Athens alone and sent Timothy to establish you….” The corresponding Acts chapters (17:10-14) say that Paul, Silas & Timothy went to Berea after being in Thessalonica. Paul goes on to Athens without Silas & Timothy, and they come to him when he is in Corinth . So who are the “we” in I Thessalonians 3:1, and how could Paul have sent Timothy since Timothy wasn’t with him. It seems like the “we” could mean Paul & Silas because that’s who wrote the letter (which wouldn’t make sense because Silas was not with Paul in Athens); but then again, we guess it could be the “brethren” in Acts 17:14. Any thoughts?

That is a very good question. I think a closer examination of the text can clear some of these questions up. First of all, how Paul could have sent Timothy when Timothy wasn’t with him? The decision for Paul to be left alone at Athens apparently was made, not once he was already in Athens, but before he left Berea, as is set forth in Acts 17:14. “Then immediately the brethren sent Paul away, to go to the sea; but both Silas and Timothy remained there.” So there was the decision to leave Paul alone at Athens, made in Berea, not in Athens. Therefore that was also where he determined to send Timothy to Thessalonica to check on them rather than bringing him with him.

Contradictions: The Bloodshed of Jezreel

So far in our study of contradictions, we have mostly focused on the New Testament books, and particularly the gospels, for it is easy to find many seeming discrepancies among these books since they record the same or similar events. As we have seen, these supposed contradictions are usually caused by assuming that two different but similar events are the same events, so that the records of these events ought to be the same. Yet when we realize that they are separate events, we see that they are not contradictions at all. Yet more puzzling are some of the contradictions in the Old Testament, when God seems to say something that contradicts what He does later. We have seen examples of this in our messages on “The Death of Josiah” and “The Prophecy of Jonah.” A similar example is found in the strange discrepancy regarding “The Bloodshed of Jezreel.”

Contradictions: The Repentance of Manasseh

In our studies on supposed “Contradictions in Scripture,” we have considered the differences between the four gospels, and have seen that generally the supposed “contradictions” between them are caused, not by a real mistake in one of the gospel records, but rather by a misunderstanding on the part of us, the readers. Usually, the problem is that the event that supposedly is in contradiction happened more than one time. Thus, when people assume that the events are the same, and then find that they are different, they assume a discrepancy. As it has been said, we create our own troubles, and then are troubled by the troubles we have created.

Yet the gospels are not the only part of the Bible that repeats the same event. We find a very similar situation in the Old Testament, where I and II Chronicles repeat some of the events found in II Samuel and many of the events found in I and II Kings. Are there any apparent contradictions here, in the repetitions between Chronicles and Kings? The fact is that there are, most notably the instance of the fate of King Manasseh.

Contradictions: The Preparation of the Passover

It can be argued that the difficulty of working out the time elements surrounding the events of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection is one of the hardest tasks a person who wishes to prove that there are no contradictions in Scripture has to undertake. Whether it is the details regarding the triumphal entry and the casting out of the moneychangers or the confusing records of the women’s visit to the tomb, the events of these most important of days challenge us to find exactly how to piece them together to show one, continuous whole of events that happened exactly as the Scriptures record they happened and do not contradict. And perhaps there is no aspect of this task that is more difficult to work out, at least on the surface, than the exact timing of the Passover.

In order to understand this fully, we need to remember how the Israelites divided their days. We start our days in the exact middle of the night (when we are using standard time,) at the time we call “midnight.” Halfway through the day is then when the sun is at its highest overhead in the sky, which we call “noon.” Yet the Israelites did not divide their days this way. For them, they counted their days as beginning at sundown, or the very beginning of the night, approximately 6:00 PM by our reckoning. Then, they counted twelve hours of night from that point. Then, at sunrise, or about 6:00 AM by our reckoning, began the day, and that continued for twelve hours of daylight. At the evening, then, the next day would begin. So, what for us would be evening of the night before for them would actually be the start of the following day.

On the surface, then, it would seem that the Lord most definitely was crucified on the actual day of Passover. Since He and His disciples kept the Passover the evening before, and for them that was the same day as the day following, that means that, though He was not killed at evening like the Passover lamb (or kid, see Exodus 12:5,) was to be killed, He nevertheless did die on Passover day. So we could rightfully say that He fulfilled the Passover, the Passover lamb being a symbol of Christ in His death.

Contradictions: The Titles on the Cross

When it comes to what some call “contradictions” in Scripture, the most common occurrences we find of these supposed discrepancies are differences between the accounts in the four gospels. We have seen throughout this study many cases when one gospel might disagree with the others regarding the details of a certain event. And in some cases, like those of Peter’s denials or the women at the tomb, the contradiction is magnified by the fact that not one of the gospels agrees with the others, but all of them give a different account of the event. In this message, we will discuss another such difficulty, regarding the wording of the titles placed upon Christ’s cross.

The casual student might not see this difficulty at first, for all the gospels agree that there was such an accusation written against Him. Yet the more careful student cannot help but notice that the wording of the accusation as it is written in the four gospels is different in every case. Not one of the four gospels agrees with any other one regarding what exactly this writing was. We will demonstrate this below by quoting these four passages.

Contradictions: The Triumphal Entry

When we study the events of Christ’s last days of His earthly ministry before His death on the cross, things get very confusing between the four gospels, and it is difficult to determine precisely what happened when. Exact time elements are not always stated, and a word like “and” could join together two events that happened minutes or days apart. Nevertheless, if we are careful and diligent, I believe that we can figure out a “harmony” of events that leaves all four gospels being completely accurate, and yet gives us a picture of what exact events happened, and how, and in what order.

We have already examined several topics that related to these events of the Lord’s last few days before His sacrifice. We considered the blind men of Jericho, and realized that there were actually four blind men healed in or near the city of Jericho that day in three distinct events. We also considered the casting of the money changers out of the temple, and concluded that the casting out in John was a different occasion from that recorded in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, which took place at the end of His ministry.

Yet there is still another mystery regarding His last days that remains to be cleared up. This is in regard to His triumphal entry. We can see the problem when we compare the entry as recorded in Matthew with its record in the other gospels. First of all, let us look at Matthew 21:1-11.

Contradictions: The Money Changers in the Temple

In considering various supposed “contradictions in Scripture,” it is not only important to note that various gospels record similar but different events, but also that they choose to record one event over another based on the structure and purpose of each gospel. Sometimes this is harder to see than others, but in some cases it may be obvious. The most obvious example of a different purpose causing different events to be recorded is the book of John.

Anyone reading through the gospels in order will come to the end of Luke with the distinct feeling that he has read three books that are very much the same. Certainly Matthew, Mark, and Luke are different, but at the same time they share many of the same or similar stories, and so can seem very repetitive. That is why these gospels are often called the “synoptic” gospels. It is because of their similarity to each other, and the fact that they seem to share so many accounts. Then, however, as we read on from Luke, we come upon the book of John. And John is so different that we are almost taken aback at first, since we have become so used to the repetition in the other three gospels. There are actually only nine events recorded in John that are recorded in one or more of the other books, and all the rest are different. As I said in my first message, “Contradictions Intro,” this has led some to claim that John was written at a much different time period than the other gospels. What those who claim this do not understand is that John was not written at a different time, but rather was written for a very different purpose than the other gospels.