If one had a dollar for every time he had heard someone say, “I can’t trust the Bible because it is filled with contradictions,” he could do his part to stimulate the economy! Today, we wish to examine that charge, although we will not delve deeply into scientific or linguistic matters. At the outset, we wish to emphasize that if one does not care how he uses the Bible, he can make it say anything, including making it contradict itself. For example, we can prove, if we use Scripture out of context and dishonestly, that it teaches us to commit suicide by hanging. The Bible plainly says of Judas, “Then he threw down the pieces of silver in the temple and departed, and went and hanged himself” (Matthew 27:5). In Luke 10:37, Jesus said, “Go and do likewise,”and in John 13:27, Jesus commanded, “What you do, do quickly.” So, if one cares not how he uses the Word of God, he can make it teach whatever he likes, including that we should all quickly commit suicide by hanging. Someone will object, “That is ridiculous!” Yes, it is! However, it is no more ridiculous than the way many “prove” things from the Bible in other instances. Furthermore, it is no more ridiculous than the “evidences” some assert for the Bible’s contradicting itself! The point is that we must be honest in the way we use the Bible, or any other book, or we can make it prove anything we want it to prove. Here is another oddity; when it comes to secular books written by men, this kind of dishonesty will seldom, if ever, be used. Yet, when it comes to the Bible, this kind of “interpretation” is so common it is tiresome!
We must begin the study by asking the question, “What is a contradiction?” The dictionary defines it as follows: “something illogical: something that contains parts or elements that are illogical or inconsistent with each other” (Microsoft Encarta Reference Library 2003). If someone were to say the sky is blue and someone else were to say that it is green, we have an apparent contradiction. This is the general definition of contradiction that needs to be expanded on by pointing out what a contradiction is in logic. It is something that cannot both be and not be at the same time. Copi in his Introduction to Logic, third edition, put it in these words, “the principle of contradiction asserts that no statement can be both true and false” (244). Hence, when one is presented with statements that seem to contradict one another, he must ask himself three questions: (1) Is the same thing, or the same person under consideration in both statements? (2) Is the same time period in view in both statements? (3) Is the language (words) that appear to be contradictory being used in the same sense in both statements? These are important questions and must be answered correctly in order to determine whether or not a contradiction exists. For example, if one were to come across the statements: Jay is rich. Jay is poor; he would ask, do these words contradict? The answer is — not necessarily, for the first statement may refer to Jay Rockefeller and the second to some other person having the same first name. We need to know that the writing we are accusing of being contradictory is speaking of the same thing, regarding the same time, using words in the same way. When we do that — we find none in the Bible!
